Snowflake Christmas Card

I DID IT!  I made handmade greeting cards for the entire year for 2016!  Inspired by my daughter, who makes all her cards, I challenged myself to make the cards I would need all year, and I DID IT!

I wrote out a calendared list and kept to it.  It did get a little dicey from July on, but I managed somehow.  

This is my Christmas card.  I knew if I were going to mass produce, it had to be simple.  But I loved this simple elegant card as soon as I saw it on Pinterest here.  Having an Embosser/Die Cutting machine makes life much simpler and funner.  

I stamped, then heat embossed the phrase, then die cut the sentiment for the card inside.  That way I was free to mess up without ruining the card.  

To say the least, I am quite proud of myself for completing this self challenge.

May you all have a very merry, bright & cheery, happy little Christmas!

xxx

Annie

Christmas Postcard Swap

I wanted to join in Sheila's fabric postcard swap.  But one of her rules is that the postcard front AND back are to be fabric.  Although I started my postcards way back in the beginning with fabric backs, I quickly came to prefer paper cardstock backs.

I find that a paper back is more accepting of creativity.  

I finally let Sheila know that I wasn't joining her swap because I'm too old to spend my time playing in a way that I didn't want to.

Sheila is so kind, she offered to swap with me herself.  She was also curious about my cardstock backs and would like to see one for herself.  Sheila received this JOY postcard from me.

And I received this beautifully stitched Dove postcard from Sheila.  The music is a great background for Sheila's beautifully appliquéd Christmas dove.  Thank you Sheila!

Ho Ho Ho

xxx

Annie

November 2016 Calendar Journal

For November I played around with some lettering practice with a single word each day.

This style lettering is easy when the brush tip of the pen is new and stiffest.  Once you letter with it for a short while, the tip gets softer and I find it is harder to make nice looking letters.

No surprise here, I'm getting bored with covering the "notes" section and the blocks with the blank blocks at the beginning and ending of the month.  Why won't someone who loves doing that create these calendars as blanks for me to buy?!!!

I probably should have a little Tequila with that whine.

Happy Day!

xxx

Annie

Happy Thanksgiving!

These are some of my very minimal simplistic Thanksgiving cards.  

I underestimated the pressure of the automated postage stamp cancelling machine and the branches arrived broken.  **big ole sad face here!**   

But, no one to blame but myself.  I did add a sheet of plastic foam as protection, but it didn't protect anything.  I did consider walking into the post office for hand canceling of the postage, but I went with faith instead.  Well, live and learn is the lesson here.  

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL!

xxx

Annie

Small Fabric Boxes

I was so inspired by Caroll"s detailed fabric box post, I could hardly wait to make a couple...so far.

This tallish narrow one will be living on my table housing my quick grab tools.  I have a jar inside this box because I have my Xacto knife in there and I don't want it cutting up the bottom of the box.

And this squattier box loaded with chocolate liqueurs will be a Thanksgiving hostess gift.

These cuties make up so quickly and are such fun.  I think there will be some more for Christmas time too.  

I've got to get those liqueurs wrapped up before they begin disappearing from the box!  **wink wink**

xxx

Annie

Dinner Place Cards

I was asked to make place cards for the Thanksgiving dinner table.  My hostess was going to send me an oak leaf pattern.  There would be 12 holiday guests.  I thought about my lack of interest in mass production and how I was already dreading tracing and cutting each leaf.  

Tim Holtz and his Layered Leaf Die and Embossing Folder to the rescue!  I added some inks to the leaves, and cut tags with the Tim Holtz Tiny Tabs and Tags Die.  I tied the leaves and tags together with Hemp strings and gold thread.  

Pinterest inspiration came to my rescue again with these.  

Happy Fall

xxx

Annie

Quick Birthday Cards

I needed a couple of quick birthday cards for a late birthday party invitation.  I am not a quick thinker-upper, nor a last minute procrastinator, so this was stressful.  Thank goodness for Pinterest!

Both card designs are inspiration taken from Pinterest.

I wrote the names for the envelopes on scraps...in case I had to write them a bunch of times to get something presentable in public.  Otherwise a whole lot of perfectly good envelopes end up in the trash.

I then cut out the names, inked around the edges and glued them to the envelopes.

I was pretty happy with these card results.  And so were my recipients.  Whew! 

Happy Day!

xxx

Annie

October 2016 Calendar Journal

My daily "bit" journaling for October 2016

Have a great day!

xxx

Annie

Bentley Postcard

My very clever, creative and inspiring art blogging friend, Donna Gray, has designed new rubber stamp sets for That's Crafty!"  Upon introducing her new stamp sets, Donna had a giveaway.  Lucky me, I won the "Bentley" set!  I could see immediately that Bentley could be a postcard.  

Here's Bentley as he arrived to me in all his rubber glory.  Isn't that a sweet butterfly too!  Donna created several stamp sets and you can see them on Her blog, here.  Thank you so much, sweet Donna, for this fun surprise win.  

Happy Mail Day!

xxx

Annie

Happy Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

This is one last Halloween greeting that I sent to my daughter.  I sent her 5 greetings.

But she sent me so many more!  She went crazy for Halloween artsy supplies and made a greeting for me for almost every single day of the month of October.  What a fun mail month it has been for me.

I wish everyone a safe and fun Halloween!

xxx

Annie