Christmas 2017

As I write this, we are still on the road in a caravan, doing the Big Lap around Australia. It is a fascinating thing to do and we are taking our time, staying a week here and a week there, till we are ready to move on to the next place. Caravan crafting has been less frequent than I would like, especially when we are free camping without power (so no heat tool, glue gun etc can be used) and water (so messy paint/inking and other things needing water cleanup are not a good idea). Still, I have been Christmas crafting! In this caravan!

I got to craft with Sharon in Qld when we stopped at her house awhile, which was fantastic, but after that I have not met up with many other papercrafters. 🤔 There was that lovely afternoon we crafted in the caravan making birthday cards, Chloe and Maddie, in the NT. Now I am in WA! I do hope to meet up with some more crafters pretty soon down south of Perth. Look out, Mandy!😁

So what have I been doing?

I took some Stampin' Up! kits with me this time, so I have had all the supplies and a good deal of the work packaged for me ☺ What a great idea these kits are for traveling crafters!

They are also good for people who are just starting out, building up their supplies and not wanting to make a huge outlay all at once.

They are great for beginning crafters too. The design work is lovely.

So, what have I been making?

1. Christmas cards!

One day I sat down with the Watercolour Christmas Project Kit. I had purchased the A Watercolour Christmas stamp set before I left home and had some ink and adhesive with me. I simply needed my paper snips, bone folder and a place to work and I was set. There are four designs in the kit, making 20 cards altogether. What a quick and fun project this was! I got them all done in an afternoon. Here are the four designs:

Aren't they cute? Easy to make, easy to mail, AND they come with gold foil lined envelopes too.

I then got busy on my own design of CAS (clean and simple) cards  to make in bulk. Armed with some of this pretty designer series paper from the Quilted Christmas bundle....

And the Wise Men from Afar stamp set, plus some Quilted Christmas ribbon and some die cuts for the sentiments which I made altogether, I made 15 cards with the same basic design. I stamped images directly on the dp and added ribbon, then popped up the layered sentiments. Afterward I added a single star sequin above the palm trees. Here's a couple of cards so can see how they turned out:

I thought they were pretty cute, and each one had a different background paper. I didn't have to repeat any one pattern at all.

2. Christmas Decorations!

Then I decided to make some decorations for the caravan. Now you cannot have a Christmas Tree in a caravan very easily. But you can make room for a banner and a string of lights! I had the Be Merry tag Kit for that! I didn't want tags though as our family and friends decided no presents were very practical to send to someone in a caravan, and also hard for someone in a caravan to gather and send, SO, I turned them into a banner. Here are the individual tags:

And here are all 12 made into a banner, with a string of lights shining over the top of them:

I really like them 😁

I hope your December is full of crafty fun like mine has been so far!

Susan

#quiltedchristmasbundle
#bemerrykit
#wisemenfromafarstampset
#watercolourchristmaskit