Stamped Gift Tags

These little cuties are from a while back. Maybe around February or March that I got my first Martha Stewart punch,the little birdie.  It's a combo stamp and punch set, so you've got a few options with the birds.  I found it easier to stamp the detail, then  line up the punch with the stamp.  Then I punched out the embellished square with the Martha Stewart Flourish Square Punch.  And while I'd love to say that it was simple to use, I had to put some muscle behind it, or it didn't get through the card stock all the way.  The birds very glued to the squares and the backs of the tags are stamped with TO: and FROM: once again using a Martha Stewart product, the Custom Stamp Setting Kit.  I wasn't very impressed with the Stamp Setting Kit.  Overall I though it gave only okay results, many tags were scrapped because the impressions didn't come out evenly or the letters worked their way out of position after several stamps.  In fairness I may have used it more heavily than intended as I probably made several hundred of these things, but if I make more, I'll just look for a static "To/From" stamp.   After the birds, more friends joined the party, sheep, birthday cakes, bees, etc.  There are still more that I don't have pictures of.  My new craft space should be ready within a week or so, and I'll be able to unpack all my goodies that haven't seen the light of day since I fled Church Hill to the suburbs!  Here's some pictures for now, more later...

Halloween is my Christmas

True Confessions from the All Hallows Eve Obsessed...

• I'm that girl who hits the post Halloween sales and stocks my attic with Styrofoam tombstones and skulls LED lights starting November 1st.
• I purchase skull decor items at Halloween and use them year round.  Skull salt and pepper shakers, skeleton salad tongs, skull and cross bone dish towels, the list goes on.
• When the Spirit Halloween store opened in the previous Border's location my children and I were literally waiting outside the door when they opened on August 31st at 11:00.  We were the first sale, I had to wait for them to finish installing the POS machine. 
• I finished my son's medieval knight costume in May.  
• And I'm just a few yards of black tulle away from the final stitches on my daughter's costume.
• In fact, my only problem with Halloween is that it only happens once a year. But if we start crafting now, we'll have at least two solid months of creepy, crawly, crafty goodness!

So, without further ado, please allow me to introduce to you the newest addition to my Halloween display, the Tabletop Halloween Curio.

I used A Tim Holtz Configurations Box*.  I think it's the Medium sized box.  This was my first time using this product, overall it was great.  Very easy to use and the options are pretty much endless.  I'm sure there are more of these boxes in my future because I've got lots of little collections. Here's some in progress photos of how it all came together.

Collection of possibilities.

The empty box. Each interior box is
separate and there are myriad of
configurations.

A dry fit of little pieces in the box. 
I removed a few of the individual boxes to make
room for the lion. 

Papering the back of the box.  The paper is from a 12x12 stack called
"Street Lace"

Dry fitting paper for the back of the trio of bottom boxes.

The bottom boxes are wrapped in black on the inside and bottom.

And this is the look once all the compartments have been papered.
I used ModPodge throughout and glued each object in place and well.  Originally
I used a silver Sharpie paint marker to color the front lip of each compartment, but then I decided to cover
them in ribbon for a more finished look as seen below.

Compartments lips are covered in purple ribbon.  Some objects on display include a
glow-in-the-dark LEGO ghost and Tim Holtz skeleton keys and escutcheons. 

This lion says Bordeaux, he came from the jewelry section, also a clip on glittered spider.

Here you can see one of the last additions, plastic skeleton hands, from my Halloween stash. 
I had a hard time figuring out how to adhere these guys because
they are not flat backed.  Finally, with assistance from my daughter, I used
Bendaroos.  If you have kids, you're probably familiar with
Bendaroos, if not, it's a bendable sticky stick thing.  Worked great.

That's it for now. I'm pretty new to this who Blogatorium thing, so my format will be changing.  But please to keep checking in, gentle reader, you never know what you will find.  However, I'll give you a sneak preview and say if you live in the Richmond, VA area and you are interested in paper crafting and/or scrap booking I will be starting to offer classes very soon at a very convenient West End location.  So, stay tuned for updates. 

*For more info about the Tim Holtz Configuration Box, visit his blog.