Happy New Year!

Happy Chinese New Year, that is...

The Lunar New Year begins on January 23rd. Will you be ready?

2012 is the Year of the Dragon, a most auspicious astrological sign. It also happens to be the astrological sign of my twins, who were born in 2000, a golden dragon year, triply full of luck. Coincidentally, their father and paternal grandfather were also born in dragon years, so I'm surrounded by these fire-breathers!

So, of course, I had to make the effort and make a few cards... I'll definitely make one for my mom, who really was psyched about the whole golden dragon thing (and she's normally not into that kind of thing at all, but my pregnancy suddenly had her spouting off strange superstitions like an extra from the Joy Luck Club).

I found some lovely artwork depicting the twelve animals of the Chinese horoscope, which adorns the front of this card:

The inside of the card is blank... in fact, there is no writing on the card, in English or Chinese, making it appropriate for other cultures celebrating the lunar new year. Or as a notecard or birthday card to someone who happens to have been born in the year of the dragon.

For full details, check out my Etsy listing for the card:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/89725988/chinese-new-year-dragon-pop-up-card

Thanks for looking!

Holiday Gift Card Pop-Up. Free Download!

Time for some holiday crafting! I love sharing these freebies with you!

This year, the nieces and nephews are all getting gift cards... to make them a little extra special, I designed a pop-up holiday gift card holder. With a very simple mechanism, the recipient opens the card and.... snap!... the gift card is presented with a little pop...


Here's how you do it....

First download these two pdfs:

Then follow along with the instructions and photos below....



1) First print out one of each pdf on some nice stiff cardstock. The outside of the card (with the elf) is 2-up, meaning that there are two of that piece on one piece of cardstock -- you only need one for one card, but I figured you might want to make a second one (and I hate wasting paper). 2) Cut those two pieces apart, as shown. I could only fit one of the inside piece (on the tan background) on one piece. Cut that piece out, close to the colored area, as shown.

3) If you have a scoring board, score the inside (tan) piece along the three vertical lines -- scoring is optional, but it does make your folds nice and crisp. 40 Score the outside piece in half.

5 & 6) Fold the inside (tan) piece in half (unprinted sides facing). 7) Find the diagonal slash mark along the fold and cut that.

8) Fold along the other vertical lines to make the little mountain as shown in the last image, above.



1) Fold the outside (elf) piece in half. 2) Put the adhesive of your choice on the first panel of the inside (tan) piece. 3 & 4) Line the outer edge of the inside (tan) piece to the outer edge of the outside (elf) piece and adhere. 5) Squish down the folded inside piece so that the folds are compressed. 6) Put adhesive on the back panel of the inside (tan) piece. 7 & 8) Fold the card closed, adhering the back panels together.



1) Open up your card. It should look like the first image, above. If you like, trim the edges so that they're all even (no matter how careful you are, the edges won't ever meet up exactly right). 2) Partially close your card and place your gift card in to the diagonal slash.

When your recipient opens the card, the gift card will "pop" into place!

Enjoy! I hope you like this holiday freebie! Let me know if you make this card!

My Favorite Handmade Holiday Tradition

This post is part of the EtsyGreetings Team Holiday Blog Hop. 

My absolute favorite part of the holidays is giving. I really love is thinking up small, but thoughtful gifts to share with the neighbors. Since I'm on a budget, they are almost always handmade with all the creativity I can squeeze in during the busy season!

I've shared a few of my gifts here... they're all simple, relatively inexpensive and you can make enough to blanket your whole neighborhood with a generous blanket of goodwill!

Christmas Riddler

Remember these? We called them fortune tellers when we were kids, I've also heard them referred to as cootie catchers. I dusted off this old playground favorite and designed a fun holiday-themed gift for the neighborhood kids, chock full of the cheesiest riddles I could find.

The free download and all the directions are here on my blog post last year. The kids all loved them!

Find out how to make it!

Spicy Glazed Pecans

These spicy glazed pecans were a HUGE hit! People couldn't get enough of them (they're really addictive!) -- I ended up making many, many pounds of them and sharing with neighbors, coworkers, friends. They're also a terrific addition to holiday parties.

My blog post includes the recipe and a free download for the cute label for your holiday gift-giving convenience!

Go there now.

Hot Chocolate Mix with Homemade Marshmallows

Homemade marshmallows are easier than you would think. Pair them with hot chocolate mix and you've got a thoughtful holiday gift for the neighbors. The kids helped make everything and then we packaged them together along with a candy cane for stirring. Everything looked adorable all packaged up and ready for distributing.

My blog post includes links to the recipes and photos of my happy elves working away!

Find out how!

Personalized Tacks

Just one more:

These tacks, personalized with my coworker's images, made for some inexpensive workplace gifts. Packaged in repurposed Altoids tins, they were curiously cute.

Find out how to make your own!

Did you enjoy this story of my favorite homemade holiday tradition? If so, please continue with our Blog Hop to read about more wonderful holiday traditions! You'll learn about Kate, from Birdcage Cards, and how she LOVES the tradition of wrapping gifts! It's a great post, so read on! It's really inspiring what she does with the humblest of materials....

Jen and Jason's Wedding Invitations

My friends, Jen and Jason, were married in September. As a wedding gift, I offered to do their invitations (and a better client I've never had!).

Jen wanted a brocade pattern, which we used as a formal, classic background. The quote for the front read: "Love is friendship caught on fire." I love the gorgeous label she selected!

(in addition to the invitations, I helped her with commemorative bookmarks that they gave away at the wedding -- you can see them in the above image. I've enjoyed having Jen and Jason peer at me over the pages of my books, helpfully holding my spot for me)



Open the cards and they pop up at you... it's a fun and fresh idea for an unusual wedding invitation!

Their daughter, obviously an important part of their lives, was a fitting addition to the invitations, peeks at us from a hidden support in the card.

The invitations were placed in translucent vellum envelopes which allowed the black damask pattern on the backs of the cards to show through, which made for an intriguing preview of the contents.

The invitations were fun to do (it's great having easy, laid-back clients!) and I have been compensated by boxes of comics gifted to me by Jason, which my boys (okay, along with me) have loved (especially the Star Wars ones!)....

Congratulations, Jen and Jason!

Birthday card for the nephew-in-law

As part of the 52 Weeks of Mail effort, I decided to mail my great nephew-in-law a belated birthday card, rather than just settle for sending him a greeting through Facebook.

This is my favorite card that I make... when you pull the lever on the right, he raises his beer in a toast and says "A birthday? I'll drink to that!"

The envelope is a page from a comic book (it's a duplicate that the boys had) that I thought would be fun to use my Martha Stewart Scoring Board on.... LOVE making envelopes with that thing!

On the back, I stuck on a label for 52 Weeks of Mail:



I love this effort! It's been motivating me to use mail more... and this way of reaching out has encouraged my friends to reach back out to me. Love it!

Glitter Werewolves

I'm all about glitter werewolves this Halloween!

I found this wonderful artwork from Cindy Mindy Pindy's lovely blog:

http://papercutting.blogspot.com/2009/10/template-tuesday-halloween-werewolf.html

I made some slight adjustments and cut them out of black cardstock.



Working outside, I sprayed them, a few at a time, with spray adhesive and then sprinkled black glitter on them. I like to press down lightly on them with my hands before shaking the excess glitter off.

If I'm being particularly good, I'll give them a coat of clear acrylic spray to seal the glitter on better.

I think they're lovely!



I was so enamored of how cute they looked (the very delicate handles on the jack-o-lantern and the tiny teeth in his mouth) that I ended up cutting out probably dozens on my robo/silhouette and sending them out to all kinds of people.

I didn't mount them on cards -- they were so sweet just as they were -- but I put them in some old glassine envelopes that my husband no longer wanted.



 I wrote a short message on the backs with a white pen.



And sent them off to people all over the place!

It was fun because I know most people wouldn't be expecting a Halloween greeting from us, so it will be a nice surprise.

It's my week's offering to the 52 Weeks of Mail that I've signed up for: http://www.facebook.com/52weeksofmail

Cycling Girl Silhouette

I have been completely enamored of glitter!

Combine an intricately cut silhouette (cut using the Craft Robo/Silhouette) with spray adhesive and a little bling from glitter and I'm transported...

I love this blog: http://papercutting.blogspot.com/  It's called Scherenschnitte ("scissor cuts" in German) and is the papercutting blog of the very talented Cindy Ferguson.

Her work is FABULOUS! And I can't believe that she cuts her work by hand... and awesome feat!

On Tuesdays, Cindy has a feature called "Template Tuesday" which I very much look forward to! She features an original work that you can download as a pdf, so that you, too, can be a papercutting genius!

I really loved this particular Template Tuesday offering, of a girl on a bike:

You can read all about it (and download your own pdf) at her blog post:

http://papercutting.blogspot.com/2009/08/template-tuesday-end-of-summer-bike.html

I cut some of these adorable girls out in black cardstock, sprayed them with spray adhesive and covered them with black Martha Stewart glitter.... the results were absolutely divine!

I happily sent my first one (adhered to a card) off to a friend to congratulate her on her recent participation in a 10k run (20th place in her age division! Go Linda!).

(It also counts as my week's participation in the 52 Weeks of Mail event... yay! This was a fun one! And it encouraged me to reach out when I wouldn't have done so otherwise!)