Secret Santa Gift Bag

Hi Everyone!

I hope you are all having a lovely Thanksgiving week!  Food, family, football... it's my favorite time of year!  lol!  Today I have a gift bag to share.  I participated in a Secret Santa Swap on youTue, hosted by Nicole Kerr.  (HERE is the link to her YT channel .  She is the owner/creater of My Style Stamps, and she is just a super talented and sweet lady!)  She wanted to do a swap for the holidays, so she decided to do a secret Santa!  I have always LOVED secret santa's!!  So I signed up right away!  The only requirements were that it be a 5" x 7" bag (or as close to those measurements as possible) and that it be YOUR crafting style, and then include at least 3 goodies for your partner.    Well, it's not really a "partner," I knew who I was sending my package to, but I did not know who I was getting it from.  That's the secret.  Here is the bag that I made:

The bag was to represent your crafting style.  I don't really think that I have a "style."  I mean, I like a little bit of everything!  My crafting style really depends on who I am making the project for!  So I just went with the clean and simple look.  I colored an image (which I am HORRIBLE at, but LOVE doing!) and popped her up on foam adhesive, made it look like she's sitting on the ribbon.  I added paper from The Paper Studio, a Christmas stack called, "Spunky-Funky Christmas."  I purchased it from Hobby Lobby at least two years ago.  It's a really cute paper stack though! :) 
Then, the bag I ended up using was just a regular lunch sack.  I glued down the bottom part to make a pocket on the front of my bag.  I did this intentionally, because one of my three goodies was going to be a gift card.  So this is what it looks like with the gift card in the pocket:

I made the gift card holder at another time from the bag, and so they don't really coordinate that well!  LOL!  Oh well, it's the thought that counts, right?! Hahaha!  I also added some pretty red adhesive flat-backed pearls just to give it a little something extra.  Here is the back of the bag:

Nothing too fancy, just some pretty paper and my handmade by stamp. 

I also made a small, simple 3" x 3" card to send along with my package.  I used my new die that I just purchased yesterday! YAY!! 

It's the Tim Holtz Tattered Poinsettia Die.  I went to Michaels last night, and it was just hanging there on an end-cap!  I had never even seen it before, but it's not at all new.  I don't know where I've been! Lol!  I just cut it out with some vintage looking Christmas sheet music paper, and added some yellow-ish pearls to the center.  It is a super simple card, but I think it turned out quite pretty.  I just needed something to write a little note in, and thought it worked out nicely.

I do have a video of the project, (since I try to record a video rather than write out a long blog post like this one! lol But today I was feeling well enough to actually post!)  Here's the video if anyone would rather watch:

 Thanks for stopping by today!  Let me know what you think!  And I hope everyone has a safe, happy Thanksgiving!!  :) 



"Don't glue anything I wouldn't glue!!"
               

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter Everyone!!

Did you have fun hunting those Easter eggs today?!  :)  I hope that everyone is having a lovely Easter!

I just wanted to share a few quick Easter projects that I've made over thepast couple days.  Nothing too special, just some quick and easy packaging mostly.

Here are a few of the gift bags that I decorated for the kiddos in my family:  

 Like those carrots?  :)  They are the same boxes that I make all of my cakes with, just cut very, very smaller!  (4.5")  I filled them with Hershey Kisses, surprisingly it fit about 5 of them!  Here's a better picture of the carrots:

  I ran them through my Cuttlebug with the ...whatever the 'branches' folder is called. (they really need to print the name of the folders ON the folders!)  I wanted them to have that look that actual carrots do!  And the leaves are manipulated versions of the leaf on the Doodlecharms Cricut cart. That was the closest I could make to an actual carrot leaf/stem.  :)

I also made some pillow boxes to hold gift cards:

  That IS a bunny head!!  My brother said, "Lori, I know you can't see .... but that Mickey Mouse head looks funny!"  I said, "That's because the 'mickey' is actually a BUNNY!!  Dork!"  Lol.  He must have forgot what holiday we were celebrating!  Haha.

Since we all know that gable boxes are my absolute favorite type of box, I had to make something Easter-ish with one!!

 I saw something similar to this on the Cricut MB the other day, and had to make one for myself!!  The nose/mouth is from the bunny on the Create A Critter cricut cart, but I free handed the eyes and whiskers, (and you can OBVIOUSLY TELL!!! lol)  The Gable Box is from the Elmo's Party Cart, and it's funny because I have cut that box out so many times, but I have always manipulated it some how. I have never cut the actual Elmo one!  Ha.  Here's the box before folding:

I also made a couple "Beside-the-Phone Notes" to give a gifts to a couple friends of mine:

(I don't understand why the Post-it notes came out PINK in this picture?!?!  They were a dark purple!!  Dang camera/lighting!!)
And here's the other one:

And with the notes attached:

And that's it for my projects, but I have to share a couple things my mom made recently!!  I've mentioned that one of my nephews is a Chargers fanatic.... so she made him PJ bottoms:

Awesome, right?  My brother requested a pair of 49ers PJ pants now! haha.  My mom also made a tissue box cover.  I have a John Deere Couch tissue box cover, and my nephew loved it and wanted one.  So my mom made him a Chargers Chair!!

I love how it turned out!!  One thing that I really wish I would have inherited from my mom is her sewing skills!!  I was able to do basic sewing before I went blind, but nothing ever like her!!  And now, I can't see to sew at all.  But that's ok, because I have my mom to do it!!! :) 

That's all for today.  I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!!!

-Lori