Beautiful goodies in the mail...

Would you like to see some beautiful goodies that came in the mail for me this week? Gorgeous crafty goods from Annabelle Stamps AND deliciously fragrant candles from Elixir Natural Candles on Etsy.

I bought peppermint tealights from Elixir because I've been thinking about Christmas, and they make the house smell and feel like Christmas! I was going to stow them safely in a cupboard ready for December, but the fragrance was so, so enticing I had to light some up straight away...and I might have used two or three already.....so I guess I'll be shopping for more peppermint tealights soon.

Then, I could hardly wait to have 30 minutes to myself today to take out my Annabelle goodies and create some gift wrapping. I thought my delicious peppermint tealights would also make someone a lovely gift. They come elegantly boxed from Elixir, but I felt like playing around with them anyway...you know, any excuse ;-). This is what I have come up with...

For the card and matching wrapping I have used Decorated Christmas to stamp the flower centre in orange ink on orange cardstock. The flower petals and centre have been created using orange and purple hemp twine, and the kraft layer has been embossed using the Borders 1 Cuts by Design die. The  Happy Birthday sentiment is from the pretty Fanciful Flowers set. I am very pleased with the end result.

If you are interested in how I made the hemp twine flower...take a quick peek at the back...

I just lay down some tape, and then looped the purple twine straight off the roll, and around the circle edge, sticking it down as I went. It really is very simple and quick, sure you use a lot of twine, but it is very reasonably priced. I then taped over the purple twine with some heavy duty, double-sided tape and repeated the process with the orange twine, making slightly larger loops this time around. Hey presto, twine flower!

I'd like to take this chance to thank Andrea (Annabelle Stamps) and Lisa (Elixir Natural Candles) for providing beautiful products for me to use, and for providing first-rate, friendly customer service. I'll be back girls :-).

To finish off....a daisy, a real one, just because!

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