Christmas Ideas with Amelia Paper

Are you still contemplating what to get that hard-to-buy-for lady person in your family? You know, the one that seems to have everything already? Well, I have an idea for you...it's homemade and it's easy to do!!

I've been working on getting some candles ready for an upcoming Funshop. We're going to stamp "on" the candles. But, I also wanted to show some other ways that you can decorate candles using paper & stamps from The Angel Company and the candle pictured above (and below) is one of the ideas that I came up with. Let me tell you this was such an EASY and FAST project and it looks so elegant...and it looks like you really spent some time working on it too!

How do you do this? Simple!

For this candle I cut a strip of TAC's Amelia paper that was about 9 1/2" long. You may have to adjust that to the thickness of your candle. The wonderful thing about this paper is that except for the small pieces of green paper at the top and bottom of the candle, all of this paper is ONE SHEET! It looks like multiple pieces of patterned paper, but it's not..what a time saver! Like I mentioned, I did cut two small strips of the green paper that is included with the Amelia paper pack and used double sided tape to attach it to the top and bottom of the Amelia patterned paper strip.

After I had the paper strips like I wanted them I put a piece of Wonder Tape also sold by TAC (this stuff is super strong adhesive tape!!) on each side end of the paper and then wrapped the paper around the candle, securing it with the tape. Now, since I was attaching the candle to wax, I wanted to make sure that it was good and secure so I poked holes through the paper and candle using my TAC paper piercer and then pushed copper brads through the holes to give the paper a little more stability. Here's what the backside looks like:

To finish the candle off, I took one of the tags that are included WITH the Amelia paper pack and used a stamp from the TAC "Trendy Tags" stamp set and stamped on the tag with Moulin Rouge Palette ink. I then took a piece of burgandy ribbon and tied it around the candle and tag and attached 2 pop dots to the back of the tag and attached it to the candle. Wa-la!! That's all there was to it! This project literally took me less than 10 minutes to make and ALL of the paper supplies that I used were included in one $6.95 Amelia paper pack and I still have lots of paper and tags left over to use on other projects!

Another project that I made at a team meeting in Salina is a Amelia Ornament coaster.

For this project we took a coaster, covered it with Amelia paper and then used our Coluzzle to cut out the square in the corner. We then took the Gold Leafing Pen (page 120 of the TAC catalog) and outlined the outside of the coaster and the inside of the square with the pen. We glued a piece of cardstock on the backside of the coaster and left an opening where we could slide a sentiment or a picture behind the square hole in the coaster. Then, we attached a brad with the crop-a-dile and tied a brown piece of ribbon through the hole. A fun and easy ornament to decorate your Christmas tree or shelf!

Christmas is Coming!

Christmas is just a little over a month away and that is so hard to believe! Time has just flown.

Have you started your Christmas cards yet? It won't be long until you go to your mailbox to find that your first cards from family and friends have started to arrive. It's time for you to get started on your cards, if you haven't already!

Here are two Christmas cards to get your mind going.

The first one is a fairly traditional colored card with snowflakes. It uses TAC's new "Ornamental Snowflake" set that was featured in the Fall Supplement. Gotta love those stamps!! It is fairly simple but there are a few "extra" touches to make the card special. The snowflake in the middle of the card that is on the circle punch is popped up with pop dots and then I added Stickles to the center of the snowflake. Also, did you notice at the very bottom of the snowflake strip panel that there is a small burgandy piece of ribbon that I've made into a tabbed loop? This adds a little more visual interest to the card.

**A Handy Hint: Ribbon Loops are a great way to use up your small pieces of ribbon scrap!! You can use these ribbon loops on all themes of cards too!**

The other card is not traditional at all but that is what I really like about it--it's bright and cheery! It uses a lot of colors that are not usually associated with Christmas--Raspberry, Orange, Periwinkle & Apple Green (these are all TAC's Matchmaker white core cardstocks). It also has a white base.

I found this color combination by using my color wheel. I don't often use these colors so it was nice to find a color combo that utilized cardstock that I had but don't usually reach for.

The Joy stamp is from TAC's "Simply Christmas" stamp set and the Merry Christmas sentiment comes from the "Faith Hope Love" set. I crimped the green strip with the awesome paper crimper that is also found in The Angel Company catalog and then sanded it using a sanding block to get the white that you see on the piece.

**A handy hint: if you want to sand your paper but either your core isn't white or you don't have a sander, take a white ink pad and gently rub this on your paper and you'll get a similar look.**

I hope that this post has either inspired or motivated you! Enjoy making your Christmas cards!!

Another Spinner Card

These spinner cards are so much fun to make! This one is for my parent's 35th wedding anniversary that was yestserday. The wedding cake spins across the card--it's so much fun! I colored the cake with gelly & souffle pens and then added stickles to the tops of the flowers.

The paper is TAC's Mimi collection and black bazzill. The stamps that I used are So Girly Swirly, Everyday Events & Trendy Greetings.

These are so much fun and really quite easy to make!!