BAKING and making up a storm

We spent Monday night baking and making some of our traditional Christmas goodies. They are to be put into packages for our landlords and our neighbors. Here is what our neighbors gave us (gift basket)

We made oreo truffles and peanut butter oreo truffles


Pumpkin Cream Cheese Roll-Up

Dipped Pretzels



and Cranberry Noels (pecan cranberry shortbread)

and packaged it all up nicely like this...



complete with Italian translation for each item

Crafty Husband????

On Sunday my Beloved decided he really needed to wrap some presents and put them under the tree for me. He seems to always wait until almost the last minute. I don't mind I just think he is funny. Well, he was upstairs quite a while wrapping presents. I didn't think anything of it. I was preparing dinner for our English bible study group. We had a nice dinner and study. After everyone left I noticed something odd under the tree.

It was this envelope.


I giggled to myself. My dearest was trying to decorate the envelope quickly and this is what he came up with. Now he also made tags for the other presents he put under the tree. Here is what he did... He was trying to make them similar to the tags that I threw together for the other gifts. Like this...

He did a good job don't you think? He even made sure they matched.

Just so you know when I said I giggled I wasn't laughing at James. Rather I was tickled that he thought enough about making my presents pretty that he tried to make tags and embellishments himself. He was a little upset though that I didn't LEAVE my Christmas stamp sets out on my table so he could use them. Doesn't he know I put them away when I am done ~ I do ~ most of the time.

What a sweet guy! Gotta love a man that tries to make things pretty for his crafty wife.

Raspberry Suite Color Challenge #20

So I decided to join Dawn's challenge this week. Really got my mojo working. Wish I had the time to craft all day but alas that is not to be.

Here is my card for this week's color challenge. Except for Waltzingmouse vintage label stamp set all products and images are PTI.

I stamped the flourish type leaf from papertrey ink's Turning a New Leaf stamp set in Terracota Tile and then embossed it with clear embossing powder. Really makes the image pop off the card. I stamped polka dots from Polka Dots Basics II in spring rain on a strip of kraft cardstock. Then I used an EK success punch on the Spring Rain card stock which has Background Basics: Textstyle II stamped on it in Spring Rain. I distressed the edges of all pieces of cardstock with the Vintage Distressing Ink Duo. I used my cuttlebug and nesties to cut the label, stamped the label with a sentiment from Signature Greetings and stamped the label image with Waltzingmouse Vintage Label stamp set. I finished the card off with a beautiful strip of Dark Chocolate Satin ribbon. Hope you enjoy!

sorry the picture turned out a little blurry. Really is pretty IRL.

December 1 - Christmas Cards

In the previous post I added photos of my December Daily album. I thought I would I try a short post daily journaling what will go in my album. This will help me to stay on track with what I am doing and remember what I meant to do for each day.

I finally finished up my Christmas cards. Every year I say I am going to have them done early and every year I am running behind. In my defense, this year I did make 4 other Christmas card sets for other people. I mailed out the last two sets on Black Friday (for the moms).

For my Christmas cards I used all papertreyink products. Ink, cardstock, decorative paper and stamps. I even stamped a cute image on the envelopes. The most fun detail of these cards, I think, is the glittered frame. There is glitter all over the house - little bits of sparkle here and there. I have had 2 separate people mention the glitter on my face. Ah, the joys of using superfine glitter.