The Last Tag of Christmas.........

Hello, I'm back with my last tag I've made for the 12 Tags of Christmas, I've only made it to 10, these last two weeks before Christmas are just so hectic, I had to get my Christmas cards finished and I still have gifts to make . First of all though I'd like to thank the guys from City Crafter Challenge Blog for choosing my Christmas Tin as last week's winner, I was thrilled when I found out. Stella was the sponsor and I've won a fabulous stamp set, my favourite craft item !!!!
Here's my final tag, I'm not sure what I will do with them, they may go on next year's Christmas cards.

I'm going to embarrass Paige now but the other night her boyfriend Dan came around our house to see her and a couple of  hours later I was called up to have a look at her bedroom, keeping in mind they are 17 and 16 and not 7 years old, they had made  paper chains and Christmas Decorations from copier paper. I thought is was hilarious !!!!

Paige made the snowflakes, Dan couldn't get the hang of the them, they kept turning out rectangular, so they were thrown out but he was very proud of his candy cane, he even made it double sided, it was very well thought out,lol. Paige also used my Tim Holtz Winter Wonderland die to cut some snowmen out, she even coloured in his nose and hat, I didn't even know she'd still got felt pens. Very inventive, don't you think, I still keep chuckling now, they were so proud of what they did,lol.

Have a great weekend !!!!
xxxxDebxxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas.........tag #9

When I saw Tim Holtz's tag this morning and saw that he'd used the candelabra die which I hadn't got, I started trying other die shapes but wasn't happy with how they looked on the background. When I was going through my dies though, the dress form fromTH The Sewing Room caught my eye and realised I could make the stand into a candle stick, so using grunge paper I cut one out, then drew and cut a candle out of grunge paper, painting the candle stick in gold metalic paint and the candle in white, the flame was coloured with Wild Honey ink.

I stamped SU French Filligree with TH Iced Spruce from the new winter colours and embossed with clear embossing powder, then using a blending tool added Festive Berries ink all over the tag and added more clear embossing powder, then inked Walnut Stain around the edge. I made up the candlestick and added the foliage, lastly adding PEACE.

xxxxDebxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas.........tag #8

Hi there, just popping in with yesterday's tag, I didn't get it done until late last night, I was wrapping Christmas presents all day, listening to the Michael Buble Christmas C.D. I love Christmas !!!!!

Take a look at Tim Holtz's tag here, Tim went with a steampunk theme, I took the softer approach,lol. I'll be back later this morning with Day 2 of the Inspired by Stamping DT Blog Hop.

xxxxDebxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas......tag #5 and My Trip to London...

Tag #5 and today's technique is using alcohol ink onto acetate and lifting off using a stamp and archival ink, very clever !!!! I inked my acetate tag with Wild Plum Alcohol Ink and used the SU French Filligree background stamp, inked with black archival ink, stamped onto the inked side of the tag, immediately start blotting the black ink off (don't rub), which also takes the alcohol ink off too leaving the pattern.

I made the wreath using TH Festive Greenery die adding some pink pearls and a metal 'happy christmas'. Lisa asked if I was going to use them as tags or for cards, I'm definitely not using for tags, maybe cards but I would like to keep them, I thought of making an album, has anybody got any idea's of what I could do with them. Click here to see Tim Holtz's tag and tutorial.
Now to my trip to London with my girls, for the last few years we have gone to The Clothes Show where we always have a good day but this year I suggested going to London for the day which they both thought was a good idea. On Saturday morning, we caught the 6.15am Wolverhampton-Euston train , I thought there was only one quarter past six in the day,lol and arrived at Euston at 8.00am.

I had a little itinery for the day which they thought was funny and called me Griswald after the Dad in the Vacation films, we caught the Tube to Covent Garden which is my favourite place to go when I'm in London.

First stop was  breakfast at Laduree's, we had coffee and pain au chocolat sitting outside watching the world go by with Christmas songs playing, to me this was just perfect.

Laduree's do the most fabulous macaroon's and had to take a box home with me, the displays look so pretty but the miserable staff wouldn't let me take photo's, I did get a couple of sneaky ones though.

 Now we had serious shopping to do, I love the atmosphere around Covent Garden with the Living Statues, street performers there was even a man playing a police traffic cone which was hilarious and of course the huge Christmas Tree, Rudulph and decorations.

Back on the Tube to Harrods, it was heaving and couldn't really see much but I did buy my Christmas pudding and look around the Christmas hall.

A quick lunch then it was time for Regent St/Oxford Street, we had a quick in Liberty's and to be honest we wish we'd give Harrods a miss and had a good look around there instead, it's such an elegant store.

Then it was off to Top Shop's flagship store on Oxford Street where Paige was in her element by then we were exhausted and ready to catch the train home. We had a wonderful day but there was so much more I wanted to do so I think a return visit will be in order.

Two tired but very happy girls on the train home.

Thanks for stopping by.

xxxxDebxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas.....tag #4

O.K., so this is my second post of the day as I wanted to be up to date with 12 Tags of Christmas and today is tag #4.

I inked the tag with Distress Stains as shown by Tim Holtz's post today, I then stamped the tag with a pine fir stamp in white ink and the Joyeux Noel from Inspired by Stamping. I cut the tree out of grunge paper using TH Pine Tree, painted with white paint then added a thick layer of Rock Candy Crackle Paint when that was dry I dabbed on some Bundled Sage Distress Stain, drying with an heat gun to set the colour into the crackle, I added some Rock Crackle Stickles for a snowy, icy effect. The finishing touch were some buttons, a tulle bow and a snowflake charm.
Now for something completely different, as some of you know, I took up crochet this year and I am really enjoying it, I can sit with my family on these cold winter evenings, watching T.V. but still be doing something creative. I've also found some fab crochet blogs along the way, including this one called Stocki. When I was reading Jill's blog last week she had come up with an idea called Beautiful Blogger Blanket 2012.

The idea is to make a square, any size, any pattern and send it to Jill who will put them together to make a gorgeous, unique blanket and one lucky recipient who takes part will win the blanket. You can make more than one and each square you send will be one entry to the draw so the more you make the better the chance of winning. There are a few simple rules such as the yarn as to be 100% cotton but you can find the full details and why she's decided to do it, here. This is open for everyone and I hope all you crocheters out there will join in the fun if you can but maybe if you've always fancied having a go at crochet this might be the kickstart you need, Stocki has some helpful links to help us along, it can be the simplest square to something more intricate
I hope you've all had a good weekend, our day in London was great fun with lots shopping and plenty laughs but will tell you more tomorrow.

xxxxDebxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas.......tag # 3

Here's my third tag from the 12 Tags of Christmas.

I used the same technique as Tim but using SU re-inkers, I didn't have the stamp so made a collage using some stamps I already had. Check out Tim's tag, here.
It's short and sweet but I will be back later with my 4th tag.
xxxxDebxxxx

12 Tags of Christmas.....tag #1

Hello, the weekend is nearly here and I have a fun one planned, as I'm off to London with my girls for some Christmas shopping. First stop will be Covent Garden, then off to Harrods and lastly Oxford Street. I'm so excited !!!!!
Another thing I'm excited about is Tim Holtz's '12 Tags of Christmas 2011', it's now in it's 5th year and it just gets better, this year they have added an inlinkz so you get to see what everyone else has created. I shall be using the same technique that Tim uses for each tag but using what I have in my stash so some may be very similar but others will be totally different.
Here's tag #1

I love this window die by Poppy Stamps, I used grungeboard and painted it white, I added the snow using Rock Candy stickles and while still wet added some SU Dazzling Diamond glitter. I think you will be seeing this window on some of my Christmas cards this year.

Have a good weekend and I'll be back tomorrow with tag #2.
xxxxDebxxxx