July Storybook Alphabet SOM Blog Hop

Hello again and welcome to our Australasian SOM Blog Hop featuring the beautiful "Storybook Alphabet" stamp. Hello to those of you who arrived from http://doristaylor.blogspot.com.au/2017/07/july-stamp-of-month-blog-hop.html. and to my regular readers.

Let me tell you why I LOVE alphabet stamps so much.  I have a "Hannah", a "Daniel" and a "Maddie" - do you see the problem here? No sticker letters could ever have enough "a" "e" and "d" or "n" stickers for me.  With alphabet stamps I can make my own titles exactly the colour I want, exactly the way I want every single time.  And who wouldn't want to add an alphabet stamp to their collection when it is only $7.50 with a $75 purchase?

This stamp works brilliantly for cards. Both of these were made quickly using up scraps.  I used a rock and roll technique for the top one with Lemon in the middle and then Sorbet and Sweetleaf on either end.  I deliberately placed my stamps higgeldy piggeldy on the long block - no messing about getting them straight that way!

These little bookmarks were just a bit of fun for my bookworms (again using my box of scraps!) I am thinking this would also be a fabulous school holiday idea to get the kids to make personalised bookmarks for their friends!  July school holidays are upon us and we are bound to get a few cold, rainy days where this kind of project with some junk food and scrapping by the fire will go down a treat.

Cards and bookmarks aside it also makes awesome titles (only giving you a sneak peak of this page as it will also be featured in our Jack SOM) and I am teaching it at our Consultant Meeting this month too!

I hope you can see the many uses for this stamp set too! Head over to http://colsiesscrappyfusions.blogspot.com.au/2017/07/s1707-storybook-alphabet-australian.html for more great ideas! We are glad to have Colleen joining us this month so don't forget to leave her a comment.
Until next time,
Keep smiling,
Nell

Julie and Julia January Project 1

Finally a finished for Julie and Julia (I did actually begin socks for Hannah this month but found the pattern painful and had to rip them out at the heel so many times that the project has stalled!)  Adelaide had the dubious honour of being the world's hottest city yesterday which kind of makes knitting anything wooley a bit of a joke in January.

Hannah and I hit apon this idea in "Mollie Makes Christmas" quite some time ago and decided that it was a great way to use up old Creative Memories Christmas paper.  Some of the stars are handcut and some are cut on my cricut but either way it is kind of simple and home-made and should be a welcome addition to our Christmas decorating next year!

 

I also found a cotton washcloth buried at the bottom of my knitting basket so it has been finished off today too (and promptly claimed by the littlest pink princess).

Enjoy your weekend!

Keep smiling,

Nell

Simple Gift Bags

I recently did this quick and easy gift bag tutorial for my customers and thought I would share it here:

Quick and Easy Gift Bags:

Using the 12” Trimmer cut a rectangle 8” x 5 and a half”  Make one long edge fancy using the wavy/scallop/zigzag blade.

Change to the perforated or scoring blade.

Along the long edge score/perforate the paper at 1/2  inch, then 2 ½,  then 1 and a ¼, then 2 ½.

Turn the paper and along the long straight edge score/perforate in 1 inch.

Snip into the corners of this one inch strip so that your paper looks like this:

Place tape runner or double sided tape on the bottom edges and the ½ inch strip at the end. 

Now fold it up! Punch one or two holes through the top to tie ribbon and decorate as desired.  I have found these the perfect size to fill with lollies, or 2-3 snack bar sized chocolates.

I should also add that this is not my original idea.  It was modified from a friend's diecut stencil so that I could do it using our Creative Memories tools.

Happy crafting,

Nell

xxx