Brrrr!!!!  Anyone else not "diggin" this -31 degree weather?  Don't get me wrong ... I don't mind winter ... and I don't mind cold but you can KEEP the wind!!!  It feels like little razor blades cutting your skin - no fun!  The solution? Stay inside .. and craft :)  That's what I did yesterday.  I've been wanting to make cards with my Holly Holidays DSP and Holly & Jolly rubons all week - yesterday I managed to have a good play.  What a great set of supplies!  I cracked off these 12 cards in no time and I LOVE them - I just can't get enough of the Cherry Cobbler.  And the seam binding!  Have you tried the seam binding??!!  I LOVE how easy it is to make bows with!  I really struggle with the stiff grosgrain but THIS stuff!  Well ...let's just say I can understand why it's on backorder!  Apparently I'm not the only one who loves it!!  Here are my little beauties:

I REALLY need to spend some time working onhow to get decent photos on my blog - when I resize they get so pixelated! 

Sooooo - on with other exciting news - the latest SU promotion.  Have you heard?!  Any self-respecting SU addict will already know by now all the details of their 1 week promotions but in case you missed it ... here is a link to all the products that are on sale:

http://www.stampinup.com/ca/documents/Online_Spectacular_flyer_CA.pdf

(Once again, I need to spend some time figuring out how to link these things into my blog!  Maybe over Christmas I'll find some to time to play with it!)

There are Select Big Shot Dies, fabric, digital downloads, scissors, buttons, brads, ribbon, decor elements, stamp sets - 20% - 50% off!!  I already placed my digital download order.  Just in time to make my calendars for my Mom's Christmas present!  Check it out and drop me a line if you would like to place an order through me (if you place an on-line order of $200 or more you get FREE shipping on TOP of the free hostess merchandise!  Shop at http://www.tamarabertram.stampinup.net/

OK - off to Staples to photocopy all the flyers for these great specials for an upcoming fundraiser I'm doing.  Stay warm!

Tam

Dashing All The Way ...

Happy Thursday!

OK - I'm officially in the Christmas spirit!  I have 99.5% of my shopping done (just a few stocking stuffers for Craig to hunt down) - I even have the gift for the bus driver bought!  Hee hee - and I thought I wouldn't be done by the end of November (which is what I always strive for!)  I should know me better than that!  Sometimes I really do think I need therapy - I can't STAND having things hanging over me - like Christmas and birthday presents.  I seem to have some mortal fear of HAVING to go out at the last minute to buy a present.  I guess I went through that a few times when I was younger ... you know what I mean ... wandering in and out of stores looking for something ... ANYthing to buy for someone.  Not exactly what Christmas is all about!  I like to find gifts I know people would like not something bought out of obligation ...

... but I digress!  On with stamping!  I finally broke down and bought the little Dasher stamp ... what I was waiting for I DON'T know.  It's not like the PRICE was holding me back!  Seriously!  $10.95 for this little guy and it can be used to make such quick and cute projects!  Case in point ... my little gift card holder.  This took me 5 minutes to cut and put together.  It is the 3rd project we will be making at my Technique Class tomorrow night (let me know if you can come ... I only have room for 2 more stampers).

Thanks to Trish Miles (Queen Of All Things) for pointing out that you could use a Sharpie on the rhinestones to add color to them - never occurred to me!

Have a great daya and great weekend!  Stay warm out there!

Christmas Wish Books

Happy Tuesday!  Hope you're warmer than I am today.  Brrrrr - winter is a comin'!  That nasty wind!  I was planning to run a few errands today but I'm starting to like the thought of another cup of coffee, my warm slippers and some stamping instead!
The plan for todays project is to make the girls' Christmas wish books.  Every year I make them a special book for them to write their Christmas Wish List in.  I'm thinking this year the 6 pages in the book won't be enough.  They have circled vitually EVERY toy in the Sears Catalogue!!!  I just love this little tradition.  They write their most wanted toys in the book and then after Christmas I write down what they actually got.  Anyone who knows me knows I like to document EVERYTHING.  These little books will be so great to look back on years from now.  Here are books I have made in the past.  When I get this years' done I'll post them too.  (I hope to have them done before Saturday as we go visit Santa that day!).

These books are so quick and easy to make.  Just joing together 6 pieces of 5 1/2" x 4 1/4" card stock with a band of DSP and the jumbo brads.  Wa-low!  You have a little booklet.

Stay warm and have a GREAT day!

Tam

Gifts of Christmas

Happy Sunday All!

I hope you all had a fun weekend.  We had fun but as always it went so quickly!  Just a quick post tonight - the girls need an early night (or maybe Mommy needs the girls to have an early night!  I'm already dreading the loooong winter months of being cooped up inside most of the day!!)

This is a card we did last February in our technique class.  We stamped the dove on Vellum card stock with Versamark and heat embossed it with black embossing powder.  We then flipped the vellum over and DRY embossed the dove.  A few punches and a little silver elastic chord (I still can't BELIEVE it's discontinued!!!) and wa-low (Alicia's version of voila) a pretty card.  Obviously for Christmas I would be doing this in silver and/or red but I was trying to showcase that this stamp set can be used for occasions other than just Christmas.  Hope you enjoy it!

Have a fantastic week (and don't forget to order that Starter Kit for $107.50!!!)

Tam

Teacher Gift

Happy Friday! 
Well I was supposed to be having a morning date with my husband this morning (breakfast at the new "Cora" then paint color shopping) alas ... the "A Factor" kicked in.  The A Factor is my "Alicia Factor".  It never seems to fail ... every time I have something actually PLANNED in my week Alicia "happens".  This time it's a sore throat, missing voice and cold.  She's home today so the date os off :(  Oh well - I'm off to Toys R' Us and then I'll get some cleaning done before packing up for my Fundraiser tomorrow afternoon.  Maybe Craig and I will be able to stay awake for a movie tonight :)

Yesterday was quite a productive crafting day.  The kids played all day (stopping for a minute of silence at 11:00) and I worked on some fun projects.  I was trying to come up with a fun gift for the teachers for Christmas.  Here is what I came up with:

The small glass balls are from that "M" place.  I added a few rub-ons and some elastic gold chord.  I made the tag (which doubles as a bookmark) with the "Two Tags" Big Shot Die.  Do you love it?  I do!  Hopefully the teachers will too!

OK - I'm off to play Snakes and Ladders with my sick little Poppet.  Have a FANTASTIC weekend :)

Tamara

Peaceful Season

Good Morning! 

I have been itching to use this BEAUTIFUL stamp set for over a month now but just haven't found the time.  Last night, rather than preparing for my upcoming Stamp-a-stack, I decided to play a little.  I absolutely LOVE the font of these sayings.  They are fantastic!  I don't think I have ever made such quick, simplistic cards in my life - the sayings really are all you need to create a beautiful card.

I hope you all enjoy your day and take a few moments to be thankful for all you have, remember our fallen soldiers and pray for our standing ones.  Lest We Forget.

Christmas Mailing Dates

Heidi Ho Stampers!  Hope you had a fun weekend and enjoyed that extra hour today.  I had an extra hour of organizing today!  I know, I'm not normal but I LOVE organizing so I had a great day!  The girls played (or should I say destroyed the house with every toy they have ever owned) and I "putzed".  We headed to the park for an hour - it was CRISP but sunny so I enjoyed it despite freezing my ears off!

OK - down to business!  No card to post today (although I did stamp today but just more of the same cards you have already seen) so I thought I'd save you the trouble of looking up your holiday mailing deadlines and post them for you.  Only 6 weeks until the big day so get those projects started and finished and pop 'em in the mail!!

Canada - Holiday Cards
Local Delivery - send by Dec 20
Within Province - send by Dec 17
Outside Province - send by Dec 16

Europe - for Letter Post - send by Nov 29 (Helen??  Are you paying attention?? - that's 3 weeks from now!!)
Asia, Australia, Central/South America, New Zealand, Middle East, Carribean - for Letter Post - send by Nov 29
Africa - for letter Post - send by Nov 22

Have a fun week!

Tam

My New Favorite!

Wow!  I'm in LOVE with this card!!!  You just KNOW you "nailed it" when you prop the card up beside your computer and stare at it over and over all day long!  I went down to the craft room yesterday fully expecting to make a "Reflection" card using velum card stock for my upcoming technique class.  I just wasn't happy with the results so I did some "research and development" (as fellow demonstrator Trish Miles "Queen Of All Things" puts it) and stumbled across another reflection technique that just uses regular Whisper White card stock.  Thanks to fellow demonstrator Patricia Hargrove for the tips and inspiration.  Here is the result:

I have to work on my photography skills at some point but hopefuly you can see the reflection of the trees under the ribbon.  I found this result MUCH more realistic than the vellum technique.  For this card I stamped the image on the clear image sheet from my Stamp-a-ma-jig and then turned the SAMJ over to "blot" most of the image off on a scrap piece of paper.  Then I pressed the image sheet onto my card to transfer the light image.  Does that make sense?  It worked PERFECTLY!  I used sponging with Bashful Blue and Night of Navy - I tore the paper and sponged the tear then reassembled it. We will be doing this technique at my class on Friday, Nov 19th.  Hope you can come!

Hope you have a GREAT weekend.  Thanks for looking in :)

Tam

Santa Gift Card Holder Tutorial

Happy Tuesday!  I have another tutorial for you.  With Christmas fast approaching I'm starting my mass production of items I like to have on hand for teacher gifts, hostess gifts and/or friends who pop by over the Christmas season.  Of course there ALWAYS seems to be someone on your list that you accidentally forget - the bus driver ... the UPS delivery man ... the gymnastics coach ...

Gift Card holders are becoming a "must have" in my bag of tricks these days.  It is so much more personal to put a $10 Tim's card in a cute, handmade holder than the standard envelope that comes with the card.  Here are the instructions to make this quick gift card holder. 

Happy Crafting!

SUPPLIES REQUIRED:

·         (1) piece of 11” x 4 ¼” strip of Whisper White card stock

·         (1) piece of 4 ¼” x 3” piece of Real Red card stock

·         (1) piece of 1” x 9” Basic Black card stock

·         Scrap of Yoyo Yellow card stock

·         ¾” square punch – retired – if you do not have this punch you can use your hobby blade

·         1 3/8” square punch

·         Word Window Punch

·         ¾” Circle punch

·         Sticky Strip

 Step 1:  Score Whisper White card stock at 3”, 5 ½” and 8”:

Step 2:  Turn sheet over and apply sticky strip as shown, making sure to place the adhesive as close to the edges as possible.  If too much space is left there will not be enough room for your  gift card to slide in.

             

            Step 3:  Tape together and use Word Window punch to punch out a slot on the seam.  

              Continue punching along the seam until the opening is wide enough for your gift card to fit. 

Step 4:  Use your ¾” circle punch to punch out a semi-circle in the middle and decorate if desired: 

Step 5:  Attach the red piece of card stock to the front of the holder then loosely wrap the black strip around the closed holder and secure it with sticky strip.

 Step 6:  Using your punches (and/or your hobby blade) punch out your belt, attach it to the black strip and you are done!