25 Days of Christmas Tags - Day 18

I'm so excited to be joining in the Day 18 celebrations of the 8th annual "25 Days of Christmas Tags" - the brainchild of Tracey McNeely! Pop over to her blog HERE to check out all the details!

Today we're highlighting Neat and Tangled whom I'm lucky to be a designer for. I just love their cute and whimsical images mixed with the hand-lettered sentiments that spark joy every time I create with them!

I made a set of two shaker tags, combining a few different products together (stamps, dies and sequins) but everything you see here comes from Neat and Tangled. I'm going to be posting a video on my Instagram account sharing the process behind creating these, so make sure you pop over there to check it out!

The angels and 'good news' sentiment come from the latest release stamp set called "Angel Wings", while the 'joy to the world' sentiment comes from an older set called "Art Deco" which is a great all-round stamp set to add to your collection.
The stars in the background is a really clever stamp called "Falling Stars" which I've been using over and over this season. And the tags are cut with a die set called "Classic Tag 2" which is one of my most-used dies ever!

Neat and Tangled are going to be sponsoring the prize for today, but check out the whole line up of fabulous sponsors and supporters behind this incredible event!

Find out all the details on how you can enter to WIN over on Tracey's blog post HERE!
Happy crafting!!

More melonisation

So remember how I was telling you about the awesome #melontierchen challenge on Instagram, and I shared the first attempt at a tag I made, but I thought it was too subtle? Well, I remedied that by having another go, and this time 'doing it right'!! 

You see, the idea is to colour an image to look like a watermelon, and there are of course, variations on that theme. But clearly the mainstay is going to be one section is red with seeds, and the other section is green, perhaps stripy green.
I am totally in love with this cute concept!!

Plus, I also had the new-release Neat and Tangled stamps in my hands finally, and that unicorn from the Magical Day set was just begging to be melonised!

But what's even funner than melonising your favourite images? When your kids want to join in the fun too! Both my girls took part in the challenge last time it was on, and both couldn't wait to give it a go this time around as well. They each had very specific ideas in mind about what they wanted to colour, and strict instructions on what I needed to make their images into!

First up was Moriah (she's 7) who wanted to colour a giant flower. The Sunflower set from Krumspring was perfect for the occasion because of it's large central area, as well as the many many petals, and she painted it with liquid watercolours.... without the water ;-)

Then she told me it had to be made into some sort of shaker card with lots of sequins, and so we collaborated together to come up with this tag.

Then Bethany (she's 10) jumped on the melonising band-wagon as well, and she requested the cute squirrels from the Neat and Tangled 'My Favourite Nut' stamp set. She wanted to try a few different combinations of colours to figure out which worked best, and I love that she's used an ombre approach to both her red and green colours!

Being the avid reader that she is, she requested I make her squirrels into bookmarks. Since I had made a shaker tag for Moriah I went with a similar idea and filled the bottom of her bookmarks with a little vellum pocket full of glitter. Granted, the vellum makes it look like coloured sand... but the thought was there!

Why not try melonising something yourself?
xx

Melonisation and other tag-related matters

You might have noticed but my main social media outlet is Instagram! I think it's fairly safe to say I post there every day and I share soooo much more there than anywhere else. If you don't already follow me there, here's a LINK to my account :-)

I also tend to get a lot of my inspiration from there as well. One of the ideas that's really captured my attention is the melonisation challenge that Pepita Hasenkeks started. The idea is to colour an image to look like a watermelon and there's some great examples under the hashtag #melonentierchen

To be fair, I think the tag I've created here is a little too vague and I'll probably do something more for this round. Last time I coloured THIS and THIS which I think captures the spirit of the challenge a lot more. But I still think it's a pretty cute tag. I've used the Medallion Flower Builder stamp set and it's matching dies from Neat and Tangled.

I love the instant interaction you get on Instagram too. Like when I put out a question about whether I should keep the googly eye on my diecut Natural Bird from Sizzix. I couldn't decide whether it was a bit too freaky, or whether it would pass as cute! To be honest, the majority voted that it was freaking them out...... but I kept it anyway!! LOL!!

And then popped him on a Hooray Tag I created to go in with my latest giveaway over there!

I've really been loving the size and shape of this Classic Tag 2 die, and all the matching elements that come with it are fabulous too. I've used it one other time recently as well, and that was to make this St Patrick's Day tag with all it's green and gold shaker elements.

Do you make tags? Share in the comments below because I'd love to see!

xx

Tag You're It!

It's been ever such a long time since I participated in a challenge (at least, not one that I wasn't on the Design Team for, or affiliated with in some way) so it was so refreshing to be able to carve out a bit of time this weekend to play along with the Tag You're It! Challenge.

Here's what I made:

The idea of the challenge is pretty easy. Simply take some inspiration from the example tag that is posted and make your own version of it. My inspiration came from the general way the tag was assembled... some stenciling in the background, a cluster of background leaves and flourishes, and a brightly coloured focal point to catch your attention. 

I make my own tag cutouts using the Sizzix Framelits Tag Die Set by Tim Holtz, and my layered hummingbird is also a Sizzix Die Set, called 'Free Bird' (which just so happens to be on sale I noticed!)

I asked my daughter Moriah if she wanted to create alongside me and participate in a challenge too and she was so excited! This is what she made:

She made all the design and colour decisions herself, I only helped with the cutting out. She chose the Sizzix Wild Hedgerow Die for her glittery leafy branch, and the Sizzix Gerbera Set for her flower.
She was thinking of her older sister when she picked out the sentiment sticker! ;-)

Not bad for a 7 year old hey?!

Thanks for the challenge Tag You're It! Me and Moriah both loved playing along!!

Same Same, but Different

Bethany had two piano teachers this year. Wonderful, beautiful, lovely, identical twin piano teachers.

She still can't tell them apart. 

Either can we. 

So she was in such a dilemma when it came time to giving them a Thank You / Merry Christmas gift each at her last lesson this week. When she sat down to address the tags we made to adorn each gift she realised that she wouldn't know which gift to give to which teacher!! We settled on the idea that she would just write a very generic (but meaningful) message without mentioning any names! Cheeky!

We had already purposefully made some tags earlier in the month. Tags that were very similar, but also very different. I thought that would be about right?

The tags were created by combining some letterpress labels, with the Printable Journal cards released last month with the Walden kits at Studio Calico.

I stacked those two elements up on top of a watercoloured tag and added a few extra pieces like the enamel dots on the reindeer horns (which has become a bit of a standard decoration for this little fella!)

And finished them off with a bit of my stamped Christmas ribbon.

I'll also be entering these tags into the 12 Days of Christmas challenges hosted by Papercut Labs. It obviously fits the criteria for Challenge #12 'Make it Chrismtassy'! Have you checked out the challenges there? They're quite straightforward, and you could easily combine lots of them into one project. For example, I could possibly pass this off for Challenge #4 'Stitch Something' because I ran them through my sewing machine as I usually do.

There's some pretty amazing prizes up for grabs, sponsored by all these generous companies. It's worth having a look at, trust me! You'll be hearing more from me about this in a couple of days as well...... but don't wait for that ;-)



Supplies:

Walden Printable Christmas Cards Letterpress Bundle Letterpress Plate: Magical Sentiments Studio Calico Craft Die: Labels Letterpress Plate: Labels Letterpress Ink: Red Letterpress Ink: Gold Color Theory Enamel Dots: Aqua Color Theory Enamel Dots: Yellow Christmas Ribbon Stamping

InLinkz.com

Tim's December Tag

Back in the day when Tim Holtz did his 12 Tags of Christmas it became one of the highlights of the season. Bethany and I would sit down each night and read through the tutorial and figure out how we were going to tackle the tag. You can see previous years attempts at them here (2009, 2010 and 2011) which is always an interesting trip down memory lane.

But as you already know, the last couple of years has seen Tim doing monthly tags rather than all at once at Christmas time. I have to admit, I've been really slack at playing along. But when the December tag popped up in my newsfeed I had a sudden flash of inspiration and once again Bethany and I sat down to make this one together. Just like old times ;-)

We prefer to work with the supplies already on hand, and readily substitute ingredients and techniques to suit ourselves. So you'll see this tag looks nothing like Tim's, but I'm ok with that! I had so much fun creating this. Might need to go back and revisit some of those old tutorials hey?


Supplies:

Studio Calico stamp: Holiday and New Year Kellie Stamps: Joy Stamp Set Walden Printable Christmas Cards Color Theory Enamel Dots: Yellow Color Theory Enamel Dots: Aqua Color Theory Ink: Poppy Color Theory Ink: Deja Blue Versamark Watermark Ink Zing Embossing Powder: Gold Glitter Zing Embossing Powder: White

InLinkz.com