Seeing Red

My friend Erin R. recently attended one of my Christmas Stamp-a-Stack sessions, and after making her set of ten vanilla/celery/olive cards decided she wanted to try the same card in white/red/black. We just spent the evening putting the card together in her choice of colour combination as well as coming up with a couple other creative cards. I think they turned out wonderfully - the colours are so crisp and dramatic. Great work Erin!

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Linda H. had the same idea after her attendance at my Stamp-a-Stack, but her vision was the card in shades of blue. I have a soft-spot for Christmas cards in shades of blue, and as a result seven of the past eight years I've sent out blue cards (I seem to continuously have a blue Christmas!) Here is her lovely addition to our Stamp-a-Stack colour family!

*It's great to see how many ways you can modify such a classic card design - keep up the good work everyone, and if you have another colour combination to share please send it in.

Being a Pack-Rat Pays Off

For the past three years I’ve been the Community Representative on Tecumseh’s School Council, which has led me to working on some very interesting projects. It’s a great school - very community and environmentally minded, and there are always lots of innovative fundraisers and events on the go. Recently the Community School program staged a play called “Street Signs”, based on anecdotes collected by students from members of the community, many of them seniors. The night of the performance handmade items donated by members of the Tecumseh community were given out as door prizes. My contribution was a set of 10 Christmas cards in a hand-crafted carrying box, and they’re a great example of why I keep most of the scraps from the many hundreds of pieces of card stock I cut each year.

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The three-layer strip of Vanilla, Old Olive and Certainly Celery card stock that runs horizontally on the card as well as the Certainly Celery rectangle with the embossed snowflake are scraps from my Christmas Stamp-a-Stack class. The circle with the smaller snowflake was punched from scraps of Very Vanilla, and both the handle of the carrying box and its tag embellishment were created using scrap as well. What a great way to recycle bits of card stock that might otherwise end up in the blue box and cut down on the supply cost per card at the same time! Take it from a consummate pack-rat… you really can find a good use for many of the things you just can’t bring yourself to throw out!

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Mailing the Cards & Getting a Latte

Christmas is one of my favourite times of year! This year promises to be even more special as it’s the first year my daughter Sophie understands the concept of the holiday and is excited about it. I want to be sure to have lots of time around Christmas to enjoy the season with her and have been working hard to get many of my holiday projects done early this year… no more last-minute panic for me! To that end, my Christmas cards have been made, filled out, addressed and stamped for about a week – I’ve just been waiting for December 1st to take them to the post office. As you can see, Sophie’s excited to help me put our cards in the mail slot too!

From there it’s off to Starbucks for a special drink… today is World AIDS day, and 5 cents of every Starbucks beverage will be diverted to the Global Fund for AIDS treatment in Africa. For the rest of the holiday season, 5 cents from the cost of any of their three holiday beverages will go to the fund. Did you know that it only costs 45 cents for the two pills a day it takes to provide treatment for someone with AIDS? I know that the next nine Starbuck’s beverages I drink will equal a day of treatment for someone living with this disease… and those of you who know me know I’ll be drinking more than nine lattes between now and the end of the holidays! Give yourself a treat today…and maybe I’ll see you at the Wellington & Commissioners Starbucks!