Christmas is coming fast! STampin' Friends Blog Hop

Welcome to the November Stampin' Friends Blog Hop! We had a great hop last month and Cheryl Schuessler is our blog candy winner.  If you came from Sue's blog , thanks for continuing on the hop.
Stay tuned for details on this months blog candy. Tuesday was my birthday! Tombo took me shopping , it was strange to hear the Christmas music playing. It was November 14th! But the reality is Christmas is coming fast! I hope you have already started on on all your Christmas projects, but just in case you need some last minute ideas you have come to the right place. I have jumped on the Merry Cafe and Coffee Train this month. If you have been on facebook or very many blogs recently you have seen the coffee candles! They are everywhere. What a great little gift for a teacher, office mate, neighbor or as a table gift for a ladies luncheon or an open house. The ideas are endless. Aren't these cute?

You basically make a square box 2"x 2"x 2" and add a back piece. Decorate with Designer Series paper, stamp a greeting and your done. The back piece is doubled for strength, but can be made to hold a gift card.

The card I made is a gate-fold card. It was one of the first cards I ever made and I think it was what captured my interest. Take a 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" piece of card stock and score at 2 1/8" from each end. The DSP is 2" x 5 3/8" from the Be Merry Designer Series Paper in the annual catalog. For the belly band I used a 1" strip of Red Glimmer paper folded around the card with the cup from the Coffee Cafe framelits cut out of the same paper using the opposite side.

This card really is a quick one to make that looks like a WOW card.
I hope these projects have inspired you to create some great Christmas projects to share with your family friends and those you can bless at Christmas time. IMPORTANT-
We have blog candy this month, so be sure to comment on each blog with the #SFBlogHop2017. Tell the blogger what you love about their projects. Also be sure to leave your email so we can contact you if you win! Keep hopping because you are going to love Andrea Tracy-Tucker's projects! Have a great day!

Thanks for stopping by, please continue on the hop and Merry Christmas. Be blessed and have a great day.

 Love stamping in Dixe, 

Cindy

Happy, Happy, Happy Holidays Stampin Friends Blog Hop

 Hey Y'all and welcome to the November Happy Holiday's Blog Hop brought to you by Stampin Friends! If you came from Melissa's blog thanks for continuing on the hop. You can also click on the next button to keep on hopping! We have all been working on Holiday stuff for a while. While personally I am still in Thanksgiving mode, I have been working on Christmas stuff for my classes for a while. The holiday's are probably one of my favorite times to stamp! I love to make candy treat wrappers and small gift-ables for just about everyone! And of course, the every important Christmas card is a big deal for me. This month I'd like to share with you two decorated bottles! One is a Starbuck's Peppermint Mocha drink and the other is an empty bottle almost the same shape I found at Target for 2/$3.00. This screamed Candy Cane Lane DSP to me and the stamp set, plus the Cookie Cutter stamp set! LOVE them both! I made a bottle tag with as open-sided box to hold a cookie to go along with the Mocha. The empty bottle is filled with peppermints, wrapped with a piece of Designer Series Paper around it and washi tape added 

with a tag! Done. Great small gift to tuck into teachers' baskets or for co-workers. The card I made uses a card sketch I ran across last month. I used this same sketch for some of my swaps at Onstage. I really like the simplicity of this sketch but you can do so many  variations. This card uses the Christmas Pines Bundle. Another set I have fallin' in love with this season. the DSP on this card is from the This Christmas package that is actually in the Annual Catalog! I used the Copper foil to cut out the pine cones.

One of my most favorite things about Stampin' Up is the coordination of products! The DSP, Stamp sets, framelits and embellishments that all go together make projects so much easier and more fun to finish! Thanks for stopping by. Please leave a comment before Sunday the 20th. We will be doing another mystery give away and each comment gives you another chance to win some pretty cool stuff. Be Blessed and have a great day- Go out a be a blessing and you'll have a great life.

Blog Hop

Don't forget!

1. Carolina Evans
2. Steph Jandrow
3. Kirsteen Gill
4. Kathie Rotti
5. Twila Davis
6. Melissa Thomas
7. Cindy Waldroff- That's me!
8. Kim Lamos
9. Maureen Rauchfuss
10. Yolanda Nixon
11. Lynn Sterifert
12. Stacey Lane
13. Barbara Welch
14. Andrea Tracy-Tucker
15. Robyn Rasset
16. Kim Smith

Are you ready?

I've been hearing that question a lot lately, Are you ready for Christmas? It is a great question, but probably not what you're thinking. I know I am running around "like a chicken with its head cut off" trying to juggle all the balls in the air. I have done some craft fairs this season which meant some long nights making cute stuff! I went to a Cookie exchange, hostessed a Christmas Open House and still have another Christmas party at my house this week. I have baking to do for Darling's office, Cadiebug's annual cookie bake and Sunday School party.  I could go on but you get the idea. I know I'm not alone in this sinking ship-many of you are right beside me, well probably a little ahead- I tend to procrastinate. The point is, "What are we really doing to get ready for Christmas"? One of our favorite things to do this time of year is watch A Christmas Carol. We watch it on television or I love to go see it at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, but we always watch it. The whole of A Christmas Carol can be summed up, at least for me, in the phrase, 

“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach!” .

So, I am taking some time this week to really get ready for Christmas. To get my heart ready, to bring hope to a dying world, to bolster courage and mediate on truth. I want to celebrate the birth of the King of Kings with hope toward His next arrival and be like the shepherds in the field working and watching for Him!  My hope and prayer is that you too will take time to "Get ready for Christmas" and rejoice in this special time of the year.

One of my favorite cards this season has been this double Z fold using the Winter Wonderland DSP and All Ye Faithful stamp set. Never thought I'd love Christmas in Black and Gold! Hope you like it. Check out the End of year sale on my business page here. The paper is on Sale! Now, have a great day, be a blessing to someone else and you will be greatly blessed!

Love,
Cindy

Yikes! Christmas is here

Like it's some big surprise, December 25th comes around every year and I'm never even close to ready. Of course when you do the most of your shopping on the 22nd should you really be surprised? I love to make cards of course, bake, attend Christmas events at church and in the community, but I have realized I love to do all these things with company! It is most meaningful to me to stamp with my stamping sisters and bake with friends or family members. So thank you to those who took the time to give me your gift of friendship and time. It was most appreciated! I have a couple Christmas ideas I want to show yall. I made these little tags for the goody bags for Cadie's preschool class. They turned out really cute IMHO! The reindeer are made with the stocking punch #124095 and the antlers are one of the snowflake sizzlets. Most of the noses were just punch with a hole punch and covered with Crystal Effects. The angels for the girls were made with the Pennant punch, the Butterfly punch and 3/4 circle punch. The butterfly angel wings were run through the Big Shot with the Elegant Lines embossing folder for texture. These were really fun to make. I layered them on a scalloped circle so they could be hung on the tree as an ornament. Well, that's it for today. I am wishing yall a great Christmas season and don't forget the Reason for the Season. Be a blessing and you will be blessed.

Lots of projects, no time!!

Well, it's 18 days til Christmas, are you ready? For those of you who know me, I'm months behind!!!! I still have Halloween projects I wanted to share! And we won't even talk about how many Christmas cards I still need to make. We attended our first Christmas party of the season Sunday at the home of Mike and Diane, sweet friends from our Sunday School Class. It was a blast. We played Dirty Santa. Here is a picture of the lunch bag I stamped to conceal the silly reindeer tie Tommy took for his gift. It's a regular ole lunch bag, stamped with a pine branch and tied with Old Olive 1 1/4 inch striped ribbon. The reindeer tag is made with the Big Shot two tags die,the stitched stocking punch and one of the snowflake sizzlets. I love making different projects from punches. Of course I did not come up with the idea, but I'm great at copying!!!!There is a small bag of nuts attached to the bottom of this tag with a reindeer droppings poem on the back. Just an example of a quick and easy way to wrap up a gift that's really quite adorable! Need to get back to the worktable. Have a really blessed day and go be a blessing to someone else. Much love.

Happy to Be Home!

I love to go away- you know visiting, vacation, road trip, stamping sleepover- that kind of get away. However, I love to come home too, especially if Tom Terrific didn't get to travel with me! I had a great time at Camp Chandler this weekend with the some old stamping friends and met some new ones. We didn't get much sleep, but we had a fun time stamping and eating and laughing and eating! You have never seen so many yummy snacks in your life. If you think this sounds like fun- the watch for post on our next one in the Spring! We'd love to have you join us. I will be sharing the candy wrappers we made at sleepover over the next several days, I will also be offering this class this month for the ladies in my stamping circle who didn't get to join us at camp. If you are interested in that class, PLEASE let me know.

However, today I am back to sharing Christmas card ideas. This one I think you will love. It's called a Tri-fold card. It is definitely awesome! This card uses Old Olive, Cherry Cobbler and Very Vanilla Cardstock, Jolly Holiday Designer series paper, Perfect Punches stamp set and Four the Holiday greeting inside the card, Old Olive 5/8 in ribbon is layered on front. It's pretty, but wait til it's open!

Isn't that cool. I just love this card and I'd love to show you how to make it! Hope you like this one too. Now, go bless someone today and you will receive a blessing back! Love yall!

I'm on a Roll!

Two days in a row, that hasn't happened in a while. While it is 90 something degrees outside, it is fall and Christmas is 98 days away. So, I'm sitting in my bathing suit creating Christmas cards. Sweet, wonderful Hubby had to go to the office today, so I am alone in the house which doesn't happen very often. I have been looking on the web at several different sites were stampers go to post there creative ideas and others can leave comments. I have some cards on these sites. The statistics tell you how many times your card has been viewed and marked as a favorite by some unknown stamper friend. What struck me today was how excited I got when someone let a small encouraging comment! What I also noticed was several cards that had been viewed alot of times and even placed in a number of "favorites", but no one let a single comment. It was a great reminder to me that I need to be an encourager for someone everyday! Just a kind word goes so far to lift another persons spirit or mood. Who do I encourage each day and who encourages me? Do I appreciate these people? DH and I live alone now. All the kids are "on their own", so Tombo is the person I try to really encourage everyday. He has a difficult job like many people, and doesn't necessarily get a lot of encouraging words at work, but I can change his mood fast when he comes home by just thanking him or encouraging him, his work is not in vain. Another great way for a stampaholic is to send CARDS! Don't you love to get snail mail that is happy? Whose day can you brighten this week by sending a great, made by you card?

The card I am sharing with you today is made out of Night of Navy and Sahara Sand, using the Come to Bethlehem stamp set. This is a great stamp set. It has everything you need for wonderful Christmas cards in this one set. I stamped the image in Night of Navy and sponged around the top note die with Cajun Craze and Daffodil Delight. The wording is in Night of Navy and punched out with the modern label punch and a little piece of ribbon added in the top corner. Simple, yet really striking I think. I hope you like it and it inspires you to create your own special Christmas card. If you need help just drop me an email. Now, be blessed and go bless someone else today.

Still Alive, but can't kick too good!

I know some of you think I have passed...(pause) but no I am still kickin' just not so fast or far. The leg is still not back to pre-surgery condition and I stay frustrated at how long it takes me to do everything! Nevertheless, I keep on going as best I can. It has been a hot summer here is the south. I have spent a lot of time in the pool with Cadiebug (precious 3 yr.old granddaughter) and I have been stamping, just not posting! Sorry, I am again trying to correct that problem. Can you believe Christmas is almost here. It's like 99 days til Christmas! I am on a Christmas card binge! I had a Christmas Stamp a stack in August. Here is a card we made that night. The cardstock is Cherry Cobbler, my new favorite red, Marina Mist and Whisper White. Ink: Marina Mist and Cherry Cobbler. Stamp sets: Delightful Decorations, Sparkle and Shine jumbo wheel and Occasional Quotes which is a level 3 hostess set. I used the ornament punch, scallop trim border punch and a little bling with our rhinestones. It is an easy, quick card and I really like it! I hope you do as well. Need to run, so be blessed and be a blessing to someone else today.