2011 Christmas Planner

Every year around this time I think about participating in one of the many Christmas scrapbooking "events" that go on all over the internet.  But I find the idea of scrapping a page every day of December really overwhelming, to be honest.  I already have four million things to do and although scrapping is a great stress reliever it sort of stops being fun if it's just one more thing to add to your to-do list.

So this year I came up with an all-in-one mini album that combines a planner AND a place to put important memories and photos.  I like the idea that I can use the organizational section up until the big day and those lists will become a neat record of the past all on their own.  But I can also use the other sections after Christmas when I add highlight photos, reflections on the holidays, and even our family card.

I used the fabulous Echo Park Season's Greetings collection for this, with Cinch book boards and my Bind-It-All. 

The 6” x 8” outer Cinch boards are covered in cardstock and embellished in a way to avoid getting punched in the binding. 

All inner pages are cut to 5.75" x 7.75" and the organizational pages are all printed free from this site.

The planner is divided into three sections: planning, details, and memories.  The planning section includes a monthly calendar page, lists for card giving, to-do, and gifting, and a receipt pocket.  The details section has space for photos of some of the parts of the holidays that make it festive and your own like the baking you do, the crafts you make, and your family’s decorations.  The memories section rounds out the year with more photo mats, a spot for your family card, and places to journal about what happened this year. 

You can read my full tutorial at A Cherry On Top if you want to know dimensions, full details, and see the rest of the pages.

And while you’re at it you should totally link up your “Holiday Madness” creations at Paper Issues!  There is already a staggering amount of awesomeness over there!!

Happy planning!

Last Minute Thanksgiving Table Runner

If you’re like me you start out with grand intentions for a million holiday projects and end up feeling stressed and overwhelmed. As much as I keep thinking I just need to start planning for these busy days in June, well, that’s just not going to happen! So here was my solution for an unbelievably quick and pretty Thanksgiving table runner using May Arts ribbons. Simply change the colors to fit the holiday you need it for.

Supplies
- a piece of burlap about 22” wide and slightly shorter than the length of your table
- hot glue and gun
- 2.5 yds. 372-15-32
- 2.5 yds. 372-15-33
- 2.5 yds. QN76
- 2.5 yds. EH28

- Begin by cutting your burlap down to about 22 inches wide. To cut a straight line with burlap simple snip where you want to cut and carefully pull out an entire strand of the fibers. That will create a gap in the burlap that is completely straight. Cut along the gap line. Make the burlap just slightly shorter than your table length.

- Fold the edges of the long sides over about an inch and use a sewing machine to sew a clean hem. If you do not have a sewing machine I am sure your hot glue gun would work.

- Do not hem the short ends. Simply pull out several strands of fibers to create a nice fringe.

- Cut two lengths of about 40” of each ribbon.

- This next step can be done by hand but will go infinitely faster if you use a machine. Set your stitch length to the longest possible. Leave long thread trails and sew a straight line down the middle of each ribbon:

- Take up the end of each ribbon, hold on to just the bottom strand and carefully begin to bunch the ribbon down the thread line creating a ruffle:

- Continue until you have ruffled each ribbon to about half the length… just enough to fit the width of the burlap, plus a little extra:

- Now the part where I cheated and made this project super simple!! Usually “the done thing” here is to sew a more permanent line down the center of the ruffle and then remove the basting stitch. But frankly, the entire point of this décor project was to fool people into THINKING it took me forever… not to have it actually take forever! So what did I do? I hot glued those ruffles right on there!

Make sure you put something under the burlap when you do this. I used a non-stick mat and any glue that leaked through the burlap just peeled right off.

Fold the edge of your ribbon over so you have a clean end and begin gluing. Work in small sections so the glue doesn’t get cold and you can make sure you are laying it the way you want it. When you get to the other end trim (if necessary) and fold the edge again.
- Continue gluing until you have one ruffle of each color on both ends of the table runner.

Annnnnndd…..DONE! I told you this was easy!

Phantom Canvas Banner

I don’t know about you but I never seem to get my Halloween decorations down on November first… and I seem to also have trouble getting all my blog “decorations” UP by Halloween!  Ok, so it’s a little late, but the techniques I used on this could be used for any theme so mix it up!

This tutorial will show you how I created this spooky Halloween banner from Maya Road canvas and Pink Paislee Phantom papers.

Accordion Flowers
- First we need to make the little banners by cutting 1.5" x 6" strips. You will need six of these. Cut notches in the ends and ink the edges.

- Cut six 2" x 12" strips and then border punch one edge. Score every 1/4" and accordion fold the strips.
- Cut six 1" x 12" strips. Score every 1/4" and accordion fold the strips.

- Adhere the strips end to end. Cut circles and adhere the folded strips flat to the circle backs. Hot glue is great for this! Ink the edges. Repeat this process for all large flowers and all small flowers.

Canvas Pennants
We have six pennants to our banner. Two will be misted green, two will be stamped black, and two will be stamped orange.
- Lay the chevron mask over one of the banners.

- Gently mist over the mask. Take your time so you get the amount of coverage you prefer.

- Carefully peel off the mask and let your banner dry. Do this again on a second banner.

- Put your acrylic word stamp on a hard acrylic block. I used a stamping tool with a foam pad to transfer ink from the larger ink pad to the stamp. I feel like I get better coverage that way.

- Gently but firmly press the stamp onto one corner of your banner. Repeat three more times so that the entire banner is covered. Try to line up the stamping so that you don't have gaps but don't worry too much because there will be embellishment over the seems. Repeat this a second time on another pennant.

- I stamped the orange banner the same way but instead of using a traditional ink pad I switched the foam pad on my stamping tool for a cotton alcohol ink pad. I then sprayed orange mist on the cotton pad and dabbed it on the stamp. This method makes the color bead up a little on the stamp but since we are stamping on fabric the color sort of bleeds out to look more even once it is on the canvas. Repeat this on a second pennant.

- You should now have six pennants:

Putting it Together
Now we are going to assemble all the parts.

- Begin by adhering a small accordion flower atop each large one. Mix up the patterns in a way that you like. I still prefer my glue gun for this part!

- Adhere each flower to a banner strip.

- Adhere each flower/strip to a pennant.

- Punch a small hole near each of the bottom points. Add a brad to each side. I used my glue gun to put a small amount of hot glue on the back of each brad where it met the canvas to ensure that they did not pull out of the fabric.

- Punch six black 1.5" circles from cardstock. Draw a border around each with a white pen. Add chipboard alpha stickers to each circle to spell out "spooky" or the word of your choice.

- Thread your banner pennants onto a long black ribbon. Tie bows between each pennant.
And that's it! It takes a while to do the accordion flowers but this project is actually extremely simple.

Thanks to A Cherry On Top for providing these super fun products!

And of course I am linking this to Paper Issues for the tail end of our Halloween Theme.  Check it out if you want to see the HUGE amount of inspiration!