A Wreath and a Milk Carton Project

Friday afternoon was my first stamp camp of the new school year, and several of my coworkers, past and present, joined me to make Becky Roberts' milk carton project.  It was fun getting the gang together again to stamp and visit.  The only problem was that I had dropped my key tag punch when putting together my box of stuff to bring for stamp camp, and we found out early that the drop had damaged the punch and it wouldn't work.  So, I improvised making a template that everyone could trace to make the handle for their milk carton box.  Bummer, to say the least, as SU! just retired that punch!  Hopefully I can get it back aligned and working again.  Anyhow, I put together the Autumn Meadows milk carton I had designed last weekend while everyone else was working on theirs, and here it is!

Today was my upline's team meeting (hi Jeanne!).  This month I hosted our project instead of having Jeanne do all the work.  I shared the Big Shot Wreath project that I first saw on Jenny Moors' blog, and everyone had a great time creating their own version.  Here's what I came up with:

I used Chocolate Chip craft ink to color in the letters, and it came out much darker than I had wanted (Something told me to bring along the Close to Cocoa craft pad, but did I listen to myself?  No...).  So with the suggestion of Jeanne and our other team members, when I got home, I added faux stitching with my gel pen.  It helps tie in the stitched Chocolate Chip ribbon, and now I'm happy with it.  I hope you like it, too!

Have a fabulous week, and once again, thanks for stopping by today!

Something I Can Share...

This weekend, I finished my fourth and final project for the upcoming Stampin' Addicts Holiday Mini Blog Hop (August 29 - 31). I feel a sense of relief knowing that they're done before I head back to work tomorrow. The only thing left to do now is to photograph them, which I'll do when I've got some good lighting to work with.

Tonight I finished a project I started last night. I was inspired by Jenny's beautiful wreath, and wanted to make one of my own. I didn't want to flat out copy hers, so I did change a few things. I used the small and medium daisies from the SU! Daisies Big Shot die, using So Saffron card stock. I assembled the daisies and then sponged some So Saffron ink on the petals. The centers are Chocolate Chip courderoy buttons/brads. I was having a tough time keeping the buttons/brads in the center of the daisy, so I punched a circle punch that was a little larger than the circle in the daisy die cut (1/2 inch circle for the small, 3/4 inch circle for the medium size) and adhered that to the back of the daisy. After punching a hole in the middle, it was much easier to keep the button/brad centered. I adhered the daisies to the wreath with dimensionals. The wreath was made using a compass. It measures approximately 8 inches in diameter. I took two of the backing sheets that you get in a pack of designer series paper and glued them together as Jenny did (I always keep these - they've come in handy many times in the past). I then covered it with a piece of Chocolate Chip Patterns DSP. The leaves were made with the SU! Leaves #2 die, punching out from some retired Old Olive Patterns DSP I had on hand, as well as from some textured Pumpkin Pie card stock. I used a piece of the So Saffron ribbon for the bow (the So Saffron ribbon came as part of the Ribbon Bundle back from Sale-A-Bration earlier this year). I left the center part blank. You could put anything there that would fit with chipboard letters. I'm putting our last name on mine, but the ink is still wet. Thank you, Jenny, for the inspiration! I should reshoot this during daytime (it's a little before midnight as I post this), but I couldn't wait to share! Hope you have a great rest of your week!