Good grief! I can’t believe its the 15th of December!!

We have had power loss on & off here due to bad weather. That means no lights, and no hot water or heat. NO EMAIL or INTERNET. So if you have contacted me, and I have not responded-I will get to it.

What is worse is my children have all juggled the stomach bug, and I am the designated bucket holder :C I have only slept a few hours total since Wednesday night. Then all the PTI excitement, that always gets me 😀 So much to do before the holiday approaches. I also need to re-evaluate my responsibilities and goals for the New Year! Reflection is never easy. I do enjoy the fresh start the new year brings. OK before I get way off focus-lets move on.

We have a light design load this month. THANK GOODNESS! I shared MANY samples with you over the last few days (just scroll down if you missed any) and samples using My Timeless Templates. I do have ONE more to share (for now anyway! LOL!) and a few samples with the New Releases. I have so enjoyed the excitement during the countdown with my templates 😀 Thanks for all the support and kind words. I can’t wait to see what everyone does with the new templates. I have so enjoyed hearing how your holidays were made easier :D, and you got to take some time to get creative this year, saving some $!

 Now to the samples.

Valentines was a VERY hard switch when you are really preparing for Christmas, but I truly love that holiday-so I had fun. Plus the sets rock, so how can you NOT be inspired?

First up I will share my card projects

Tree of love

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OK love the colors-and the layout.

When I saw Heart Prints I just fell in LOVE! Seriously. I have a million ideas that flooded my head, but only so much time. When I saw the swirly flower pattern, it reminded me of a tree. So I decided to go with that, and stamped it in spring moss, then rocked & rolled it in ripe avocado. There was my tree top.

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I used the solid trunk from Father Knows Best ( I really love that set!), and my tree was born. I used the little “cherry hearts” from Lisa’s set Love Songs, for my tree fruit.

Now my “grass” is the solid heart from the Heart Prints in avocado ink. I liked using all the little elements to create a cute scenery.

I used aonare piercing template for the swirly border, and free pierced the little hearts. I used a paint pen to fill in the color of the hearts. Cute touch I thought.

I also love the little buttons. I enjoy fitting buttons into my creations in fun ways.

The sentiment is from Heart Prints Sentiments. LOVING that set too!

So much so that I went on and make this card using it-

In dreams and in love-layering

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Now again this card used 3 sets! I love that.

The Heart Prints Sentiments , heart prints (the layered heart image), and Lisa’s set –Love Songs has the elements to spell out “love”. I wanted to be different in what I used from her set (trust me I made more stuff but am waiting to share :D) so I chose to use the sentiment and her words to create a different look, and show how awesome ALL PTI’s set co-ordinate together!

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Now when I saw the layered heart image it reminded me of a cookie cutter! I also love the solid floral heart image, so I stamped it 5 times in poppy, avocado, berry, and black-then cut and layered them all to create a cool look! I do have the heart punches, and they ROCK! I used the largest of them here.

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Now since we did share peeks through the week this is all I had to share for the release that you had not seen.

I do however have another template idea (and more to come) to share today.

A new and improved snowman soup

How many times have you given or received Snowman Soup?

If you don’t know what that is, then I will fill you in. Its basically a packet of cocoa, and marshmallows (maybe candy cane or candy pieces of chocolate to add), packaged up for a gift.

Its a very cute and popular gift in the holiday/winter season. Well, I wanted to step up my snowman soup gift giving to a more “gourmet” style presentation!

Wouldn’t you know that my newest template-the Lolli-pop Along© is PERFECT for such a gift D

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SO I created my base for my lolli-pop along using shimmery white cardstock.

I punched 2 holes for my Marshmallow Melts stick stirrers. I find that the Crop-a-dile big bite is a perfect companion for this template :D. Reaches in perfectly.

I then cut a long slot (using a ruler and finger hobby blade) to fit my 2 packets of cocoa mix (behind the skewers).

This has 2 packets of Swiss Miss Cocoa. You could get more expensive cocoa, but this matched my project and I had it on hand.

I then made some gourmet chocolate covered peppermint marshmallow stick stirrers. I had only ever seen these in candy shoppes so I tried my own, and it worked.

How to make Marshmallow Melts

Get some wooden BBQ skewers (cut down a little bit to fit my project).

 Put on 2 large marshmallows.

Melt some chocolate wafers (found in baking section of Michaels), and quickly drizzled all over the marshmallows. Be fast as they could REALLY melt.

Then lay the chocolate covered mallows on wax paper.

Sprinkle on crushed candy canes. YUM!!

Let them cool on wax paper, and then you are ready  to go!

Now to put them in a gift set. Once they were in place I adhered some of this Marabou (? is that what thats called?! LOL!) for some faux snow! It is a nice finished detail I think.

My base is tied in with the polka dot poppy ribbon, tied through a punched snowflake.

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My wrap was made using acetate. I stamped my snowflakes from  the Snowfall set, in white Stazon and sprinkled on some red glitter before it dried.

I used snowflakes for my top closure, with some bling brads. The handle is cardstock.

I made my tag using the 2008 Holiday Tag Collection, making my mug 3D.

The snow man was stamped, and cut out. Layered with clear glue dot.

A quick and easy, new presentation of an old favorite.

So that is it for today. I hope you enjoyed the release, and all the countdown projects. I’d love to hear what your favorite thing I shared over this last week was 😀

I hope you all have a super start to the week!