December Craft Projects

Before we get too much further into the new year I'd like to share a post on the crafty projects I completed last month.

For my girl besties and "down south book club members" I created small packages of handcrafted holiday gift tags.  I made approximately 25 individual gift packages throughout October, November and December.

Here's a closer look at some of the contents...

I had a lot of fun with these.  There's a lot to be said for cute projects that can be completed quickly and easily!



Also on my December crafty to-do list were the "infamous" Christmas cards. These were also a lot of fun to create however they were not quick nor were they easy."  Two different versions went out this year.

There was Beachball Santa...

and Surfboard Santa...

My crafty friends will already know this but underneath each of these cards was an average of one hour's worth of work.  Multiply that by 45 and you can see why these didn't go postal until mid-month.  Each of the elements was handstamped, die cut and then handcolored with Copic markers. The front panel was die cut (so as to get the pretty faux stitching) and then blended with inks to achieve the beach and the sky background.  As final embellishments, the sunglasses were covered with Glossy Accents and the the fur of his cap was sprinkled with glitter.  As is often not the case when I mass produce cards, I still loved this design all the way to the end.  That said, next year's cards will be clean and simple.  *smile*

(In addition to the above cards I also participated an online class which netted me a few other great holiday cards (not shown) which I gave to tutors, coaches, online friends, and of course my Julie Helpers...aka, my wonderful cleaning ladies.)


My third and final December project turned out to be more of a chore.  (I'm chalking that up to the guilt I felt by not being able to spend as much time on it as in year's past.)  Yes, I'm referring to my 2015 December Daily album.  This is my seventh such holiday album and while I'm not totally in love with the final product, I am in love with the fact that it is DONE.

Here are a few snippets from my 6x8 album...

Add in muliple overnight trips up and down the state, holiday shopping and baking, Christmas parties, two bookclub meetings, holiday photo shoots of friend's families, basketball games, homework help, etc, etc, etc, and you can see why I had absolutely no problem taking down all of our holiday decorations on December 26th.  I was soooooo over it.  LOL!!!  And now that my December Daily is finally complete, the craftermath that was JulieWorld is all cleared away and ready for January projects.  :-)