Uh-oh it’s THAT time of year again when you are SO stinkin’ busy that you can bearly squeeze in a few Zzzz’s let alone a shower so what in the world do you do with your kiddos when there are holiday parties to plan…a house to decorate…cards to make…. AND….send……..Presents to buy… AND….wrap……. cookies to bake… carols to sing…….Plus….do all of those other mundane tasks like keep your house clean (enter *snicker* here)….pay bills (insert *snort* here)….cook meals…pack lunches….work,  whether it’s your paid job or never-ending mom job…. craft…..blog hop….sheesh!Do you call out for Calgon to take you away  OR do you hop online and visit Olive Juice Studio to see if Kim has any clever and seasonal super fun and unique projects for you to do with your kids?  BINGO!  You want to come here to see if I’ve actually posted something new (yeah, yeah…I know….my reputation for disappearing acts has made you question whether I am the Great Hodini instead of a creative lil’ olive…)!!!

Here’s a few ornaments that are not only adorable and personalizable BUT easy to make AND inexpensive!  The ornaments in the photo were made by the Cub Scouts in Pack 534.  We made a total of 203 ornaments and this was their spin on the sample ornaments I provided.  I will be providing closeup photos and instructions for four different ornaments that I think you and your children will enjoy making together for your own tree or gift giving  -  make sure to check back often because new ideas will be posted over the next couple of days!

Happy Holiday Crafting!

xKim  

Here’s some closeup photos of two of the ornaments….more to come..!

ENTER THE DECEMBER CONTEST FOR A CHANCE TO WIN EITHER… “PAPER LACE” OR  “WRAP IT UP” CRICUT CARTRIDGES – THE WINNNER GETS TO CHOOSE!

I’m a dollar short and two days late on posting the details for the December Challenge Contest!  I have been so absorbed in holiday thoughts, moving and ACTUALLY crafting that two days slipped by without me even thinking about the December Challenge! *ENTER GINORMOUS GRIN HERE* (I’m corny, what can I say?)

AnyWAY, I’m going to do something different this month!  This month YOU are in control of the challenge!  Is that cool or what?!  So what exactly does that mean?  Well….there is just a couple of things I need to share to make it an official challenging challenge *wink*……

Here’s the DIRTY DETAILS:

The only thing I’m going to say that is a MUST is that your challenge entry MUST be something that YOU  made that can be given to another person.  That’s it!  So as you can see, it could be anything from a card, a layout, a scrapbook, a mini album, a calendar, a cd of your adorable children bickering in the background,  a fabulous ornament you created, a video of your cat climbing your Christmas tree (or what-have-you), a Menorha you created for Hanukkah,  puppets you made from your husband’s dirty gym socks,  a journal, a cookbook, a collage, a quilt, a pillowcase made from your granny’s bloomers or your Great Aunt Gertrude’s famous fruit cake (aka door stop..)…..whatever you can come up with works!  AND…guess what else?  You can enter more than one time this month!  

(Here’s my sample project for the Challenge!)

To enter the challenge please send your project photo(s) to me at olivejuicestudio @ yahoo. com (because of spam reasons you will need to copy and paste the email address and remove the spaces before sending.) I will then upload your photo to this post.  IF you have a blog please send your URL with your project so I can post it with your project =it’s a great way to get more traffic to your site!  Please provide your name and a way for me to reach you if you’re the winner.  Also, if you could give your project a name that would be helpful too.

All entries will be placed in an open voting poll on January 2nd and the winner will be announced on January 3rd.   I need to stretch this challenge out a bit longer because I will be out-of-town over the holidays and won’t be able to set things up until then. 

You have until 11:59 PM January 2nd, 2011 (wow that seems crazy!) to enter so get on with it and get creating!  I am going to try REALLY REALLY HARD to share something with you for this challenge since I skipped out on everyone over the past two months.  I can’t promise this is going to happen but I’m going to try!   I did get something made for the challenge sample this month!  The photo to the left is a 3D Glass Block Snowglobe I made using the awesome Winter Woodlands Cricut cartridge that came out last year.  I cut the house, tree and snowman at just 1 1/4″ to fit in the display – working with such small pieces DID require reading glasses! I’m hoping to make a few other designs (keep your fingers crossed that I can get them done by next Tuesday before we head out of town for the holidays! If so, I’ll post them here!)

Now, I am off to build 85 gingerbread house forms for our homeowner’s Christmas Party scheduled for December 11th….and to think I’m trying to sell our house right now…what kind of nut job is going to appreciate a house full of stale gingerbread houses other than a gingerbread man or a baker?  Sigh….I need to move into a warehouse, I swear!

Happy Holiday Crafting! 

xKim

A SPECIAL THANKS TO MEMORY MISER FOR BEING OLIVE JUICE STUDIO’S MONTHLY CHALLENGE SPONSOR!  CHECK OUT MEMORY MISER BY CLICKING HERE!

Check out the clever and creative projects that are starting to come in!

These adorable little boxes were made by Debbie Harris.  She says, “I made 12 of these, they are little boxes that perfectly hold a mini hand sanitizer from Bath and Body Works.”

A Christmas themed mini album designed by Jamie Larsen.  Jamie shared several photos so you can see all of the hard work she put into designing the pockets and tags! 

We’ve all seen those adorable sock cupcake cuties that were all the rage for gift giving in 2010.  Now you’ve just got to see this Sock Ice Cream  Cone designed by Roberta Lima from over at TX Scrapper Mom.

A “Ginormous Grin” scrapbook layout designed by Billie Wills.  Super duper cute!

A Penguin Birthday card designed by Sherri Andrea -look at that adorable little penguin face!

Make this for your Christmas 2010 photos!  Make your own by following the instructions below!    Ba-da-BOOM!  Third project in three days – oh yeah the mojo is back!!…… but I can only play for a few more days until I have to pack my toys away (isn’t this where I say I’m a poet and didn’t know it?! LOL!)

Ingredients:

Cricut or Imagine

Winter Frolic Cricut cartridge

Paper Lace Cricut cartridge

12 x 12  “Report Card – Science” by October Afternoon

Cardstock in the following colors:  Light turquoise, red, medium green, white (pre-embossed was used), black, cream,

Red & white striped (Paper Studio at Hobby Lobby) and silver.

1 library card or tag to use journaling (library cards can be purchased from any teacher supply store!)

13” in length piece of 2” wide ribbon – prewashed and dried while crinkling

13” in length piece of white and silver pom pom fringe

6 white/cream buttons in a variety of sizes

Stickles (glitter glue) in a clear shade ( I used Diamond!)

Small piece of turquoise glitter ribbon for library tag

1 small peach toned foam ball (found in Floral Dept at craft stores) OR use a small pom pom or button!

Scissors

Pop Dots

Paper Cutter

Preferred liquid adhesive to glue ribbon and fringe together and buttons to the layout

Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Antique Linen

Directions:

1.  Using scissors, lightly distress all four sides of the “Report Card – Science” paper by October Afternoon.  Carefully tear the paper in spots to “age it.”  Ink the edges with Tim Holtz Antique Linen Distress Ink.
2. Glue the white & silver pom pom fringe to the top of the red ribbon using a liquid glue.  Once dry, glue to the bottom of the “Report Card – Science” paper by October Afternoon leaving a ¼” or so space at the bottom of the layout for a border. (See photo for placement)
3. Using the Winter Frolic Cricut cartridge cut out the Santa following the handbook steps located on page 53.  I used the following papers for the layers listed below:
   •  Santa’s base cut:  black at 5 ¾”
   • Santa’s face/hat/beard and trim cut (Santa  base key + shift): 5 ¾” once in white and once in cream
   • Santa’s suit cut: 5 ¾” in red (I used the red from the Core’dinations Vintage Collection line)
   • Santa’s bag cut: 5 ¾” cut once in the turquoise and medium green.  Then I cut the bag out in black but adjusted the size to 7” so there was a more prominent shadow around the bag for extra dimension.
   • Santa’s belt buckle in silver cut at 5 ¾”.
   • Assemble Santa by using pop dots to attach Santa’s face to the black base cut.  Next, use your preferred adhesive to attach Santa’s suit pieces directly to the black base cut.  For Santa’s bag, glue the turquoise to the green and then use pop dots to attach the green to the black bag positioning similar to the photo above.  Attach to the back of Santa using more pop dots – you might have to double up pop dots on the back of Santa so he sticks to the paper evenly!
   • Cut the Santa hat border located in the handbook on page 53.  Cut the base in white (I used pre-embossed paper but you can emboss your own!) at 2”.  Cut the top layer using the same red used on Santa’s suit at 2”.  Ink all of the pieces and then attach the red hat portion using pop dots. 
   • Cut the phrase “Making spirits BRIGHT” found on page 45 of the handbook using the following colors all cut at 2” for the layers listed below:
     • The shadow cut  in turquoise
     • The base cut in black
     • The top layer in the same red used on Santa’s suit
     • Next, cut the stack of presents at 2”  found on page 66 in the Winter Frolic handbook.  There are a lot of layers to this cut!  Use the same paper colors/patterns as I did in the photo OR use your own color/pattern combination.  On this cut I used the following colors for the layers listed below:
       • Silver for the shadow
       • Medium green for the base cut
       • Red scrap paper used on Santa’s suit
       • Turquoise for layer and bows
       • Red & white striped paper for base cut + shift

          9.  Assemble the stack of presents by following the example in the photo above or from the handbook.  Mix and match the bows and gift tops to get your desired look.

       10.  Glue the phrase layers together so that the turquoise is on the bottom, the black in the middle and the red on top.  Lightly ink the edges.

       11. Using the Paper Lace Cricut cartridge, cut Lace 2 from page 37 of the Paper Lace handbook.  Cut at 6 ½” in black and then once in turquoise.  Ink the edges.  Attach the turquoise center to the  layout page by adding adhesive only to the four corners making sure to leave the right side of the turquoise paper untouched and then add the black frame around the turquoise center piece you just glued down. (NOTE:  The picture frame can be adjusted to a larger size to accommodate a bigger photo or reduced to fit a 5×7 or 4×6 photo!)

      12. Attach Santa to the layout using the photo above for placement.

     13. Attach the phrase “Making spirits BRIGHT” to the top left corner on an angle to the layout page.

     14. Ink the edges of the library card and glue a small piece of knotted turquoise glitter ribbon to the top center.  Slip the card on an angle under the picture frame.  This is to be used for journaling!

     15. Attach the Santa hat border across the top of the picture frame using pop dots.

     16. Using a strong liquid glue, attach the buttons to the top right corner of the scrapbook page.

     17. Add extra bling to your layout page by using a clear glitter glue ( I used Stickles Diamond!) to the white parts of Santa’s hat and trim, the Santa hat border and the bows on the stack of presents.

 I just LOVE the Winter Frolic and Paper Lace Cricut cartridges and hope that you do too!  For more great holiday projects, challenges/contests and more make sure to  visit us over at http://www.olivejuicestudio.com!

 Happy Holidays!

xKim