Snowman Soup by Charmaine Ikach

Each year at this time, I try to come up with some type of holiday treat I can mass produce for my girls to take to school for their classmates. Each year I try to keep it cute but very simple! I never seem to have the time I expected to have to create the treats! As I went shopping to look for candy that looked festive, I couldn't find anything that I liked or if I liked it, it wasn't safe for Savannah's allergies. We were on our way to the cashier when I saw it and decided on the treat. . .a box of Swiss Miss Hot Chocolate packets! I picked up some mini marshmallows and mini candy canes, and I was all set to make some SNOWMAN SOUP!

The most time consuming part of assembling the treats was the coloring, and that didn't take all that long! I put both the image and sentiment on one block, so I only had to stamp each piece once. I used the Snowman Cuppie from the Home Sweet Home set, and the sentiment is from the old Tag Treats set.

First I filled resealable treat bags with a packet of hot chocolate, a handful of mini marshallows and two mini candy canes.

Next I stamped, punched and colored all of the images, cut the belly bands and added foam dimensional adhesive to the backs of the scallop circles and Scor-Tape to the end of the belly bands.

Finally, I wrapped the belly bands around the packets and attached the snowman to the front! Easy peasy! The kids just loved them. . .and that's the important thing, right? SUPPLIES USED: Stamps- Home Sweet Home, Tag Treats (Taylored Expressions); Ink- Tuxedo Black (Tsukineko); Paper- Pure Poppy, True Black (PTI), Choice Snow White (Taylored Expressions); Accessories- treat bags, Jumbo and Mega circle and scallop circle punches (Marvy Uchida), Copic markers

Christmas Gift Tags

I have a quick little project to share with you, using both Wings of Joy and Holiday Wonder and the Cosmo Cricket "Jolly by Golly" papers, which are available as part of the Christmas Key Ingredients kit and the Very Merry Christmas Bundle.

Now if you know me, you know I prefer quick projects. It can take me hours just to decide what I'm going to do, so once the decision has been made, I avoid adding even more hours in production. So these little gift tags are perfect and you can "code" them by image or colour to the gift recipient.

Christmas gift tags are one of my favorite projects, and I even love to do with my kids, because they are small and don't require a lot of design work, and my kids love to colour! They like to make their own tags that will go on the gifts to them...it makes keeping track much easiere LOL! Gift tags are also a fabulous way to use up those scraps, because let's face it, you are just not going to want to use this year's designer paper next year. And while I do love to design and embellish, I try to hold back with gift tags, because they are just going to get ripped off and tossed without a second look.

For this group I used an old punch by Emaginations, that I'm pretty sure is no longer available. However, there's good news! Taylored Expressions has gift tags available, only 10 for $1.00. That's a pretty easy add on when you pick up one of these fabulous stamp sets.

All of the tags use the "Jolly by Golly" designer paper, and all images were coloured with the Copic Marker Christmas Kit To embellish I simply added some detailing with Sakura Glaze and metallic gel pens. The images were cut out and popped up with pop dots. The "to - from" stamp I borrowed from a retired SU set.

The string is embroidery floss from my stash and that's all there is to them!

You know, if you haven't already signed up to receive Taylored Expressions newsletter, you can easily do so by adding your email addy to the link on the upper right. Then you'll know when all the cool new items that arrive in the store!

Thanks for letting me share these little tags! The images from Holiday Wonder and Wings of Joy work perfectly on these small tags as well as on a card or scrapbook page. They are a quick fun project and a great way to get in some quality Mom and me time!

Happy "Heart" Day!

Remember a couple of months back when I created this Cupcake Kit? Well, I thought for this post I would actually MAKE the mini cupcakes rather than just give the dry ingredients as a gift. I made the Origami Box that was featured for one of the Technique Lover's Challenges on Splitcoaststampers a couple of weeks back. I added my own little insert to hold the cupcakes inside.

I've included a mini-tutorial for how I created the cupcake insert. The directions for the Origami Box can be found by following the link above.

Cupcake Insert

1. Start by cutting a 5" square piece of cardstock.

2. Score at 1/2" on all four sides.

3. After making the score lines, punch out 5 circles from scrap paper using the 1 3/8" circle punch from Stampin' Up. Arrange these circles on the 5" square piece of cardstock (inside the score lines) for spacing.

4. Once you are happy with how they are spaced, use temporary adhesive to hold them in place while you trace them.

5. Remove the scrap circles and then use the 1 3/8" circle punch to punch out the four corner circles using the traced circles as your guide.

6. Cut on ONE of the 1/2" score lines at each corner so that you can fold them and attach the "tab" behind the neighboring side. Attach your sentiment circle over the center traced circle. NOTE: If you happen to cut out the little squares at each corner, it's okay! The insert will still stand in the box, just not alone. Having the little tabs and connecting them to the neighboring sides just reinforces the insert stand.

7. Place insert inside box and add mini cupcakes!

I have a mini muffin pan that makes 12 mini cupcakes at a time. . .that's enough mini cupcakes for 3 of these gift boxes! The origami box doesn't take too much time to make. . .it's the embellishing of the box! :) You could be working on your boxes while your muffins are baking! I used the Love Is Sweet set for the image on the front of the box, and the Tag Treats set for the sentiment inside. You can make the box as decorated or as plain as you like. The recipient will be just tickled with the mini sweetness that's inside! SUPPLIES USED: Stamps- Love Is Sweet, Tag Treats (Taylored Expressions); Ink- Tuxedo Black (Tsukineko), Pure Poppy (PTI); Paper- Valentine Key Ingredients, Choice Snow White cardstock (Taylored Expressions), brown and rose cardstock (DCWV); Accessories- Copic markers, 1 3/8" circle punch, scallop border punch, scallop circle punch (SU), heart brads, grosgrain ribbon from Valentine Key Ingredients (Taylored Expressions), Scallop Heart and Plain Heart Nestabilities (Spellbinders).

Hot Cocoa Gift

Hi everyone! Here's a quick and easy gift. I loooove hot chocolate and especially WITH marshmallows...gotta have it! The mug is filled with a clear bag of mini marshmallows and two packets of hot cocoa mix.

The Snowman Soup sentiment is from the new Tag Treats set. It was stamped in black ink and then cut out with a Nestabilities scallop oval die.

The white tag was run through the cuttlebug with the snowflakes embossing folder. It was layered with the MME Be Merry DP from the new Christmas Key Ingredients pack and the die cut oval sentiment. I punched a snowflake out of the same Be Merry DP with my Martha Stewart snowflake punch, popped it up on foam tape over the sentiment, and added a red rhinestone to the center.

RECIPE ~
Stamps: Tag Treats (Stamp a Sweet Impression Collection)
Paper: White Precut Tag, My Mind's Eye Be Merry DP, PTI Select White
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Scallop Oval Nestabilities, Red Rhinestone, Martha Stewart Snowflake Punch, Gold Cord, Red Organdy Ribbon, Clear Bag, Hot Cocoa Packets and Marshmallows, Foam Tape
Technique: Dry Embossing

**ETA**
Sarah asked where I found the snowflake mugs. Believe it or not, at my local grocery store (LOL!)...Redner's Warehouse Markets.

Have an awesome week!

Taylor Tuesday

Good morning! This one's going to have to be short (and of course, sweet!) because I'm running late today. I hate rushing around in the morning, but sometimes it just can't be avoided, you know? I found these cute Christmas gift sacks on one of my latest excursions to Target! Have I mentioned lately how much I love Target!? *grin* They're perfect to hold a little something for a friend or even a cutely decorated stocking stuffer. I don't know about you and your family, but Jon and I plan to make a lot of the gifts we give this year. Not only is it fun for us to do together, but it's economical too which is totally important in this not-so-friendly economy! I added a bag topper stamped with the snowflakes from Home Sweet Home and a white tag using the "do not open until December 25th" sentiment from the Tag Treats set and the mistletoe cuppie from Season's Sweetings. I colored cuppie with Copic markers, added a red Candy Dot for the cherry, and Crystal Stickles to the cupcake. The red grosgrain ribbon is from the TE store. After finishing the bag, the set just didn't seem complete. I always keep a stash of Hershey Nuggets around (as long as I don't eat them all first!) so decided to create a little six nugget box. I used the same snowflakes to stamp address labels and the only inked the 'merry' portion of the 'merry & bright' sentiment from Season's Sweetings. I used the same cupcake for the lid, popped it up with foam tape and added some red brads. You can see a close up of the nugget box above. The whole ensemble took about 30 minutes to make... quick and easy gift giving! Thanks for stopping by today! Stay tuned tomorrow for a sweet treat from Jami!