Calendars, Stockings and Trees

Well, here are the other items I finished making a few days ago, but I didn't want to post them just incase any of the recipients saw them here first!
All have been sent out now, and most of them got them today, so it should be safe to post them!
As always, click on the images to view in better detail!

I bought the calendar tabs in March or April and since then I was struggling to decide how to use them, at first I thought maybe my son could make Christmas cards with them, then I saw the easel card and the lightbulb went off, perfect for desk calendars!
It wasn't until a few days ago that I saw quite a few other people have made them too!
Great minds think alike huh!

On the left is the first one I made ages ago, it wasn't until I got around to finishing them all off that I added the handmade flower. My son has claimed this one as 'that thing in the middle is cool!'
The middle one, maybe went to my brother and his girlfriend?
The one on the right went to William's teacher.

I think the one on the left went off to the states, and I *think* the middle one went to another Aunt. I know for certain that the one on the right was sent to my Mum.

I think the left one was reserved for my sister-in-law, and i know for certain that the one on the right was sent to my Uncle, and in his words 'they are great!'

Once again I am not 100% sure who got the one on the left, maybe my Aunt.
And the other one is sat on my desk as a spare!

I will post each one individually over the next few days with what goodies I used on each one, otherwise this post would be really huge!

All of the calendars together, laid down flat.
I think the first three on the bottom row are my favourites! But then again, I like the Smirk ones also!

My son was given this at school, to decorate at home. He had a whole week to do it, but we only managed to get it finished on Saturday night.
And here is the end result.....

I'll post the details in later as I have to go and finish off making a very special card right now!

Ooops, almost forgot.....

The tree was put up at the end of November! It is a new tree, (well, we got it in January when the sales were on), as out last tree would have been 12 this year (older than our son!), and was starting to look a bit threadbare. This tree is full of (fake) life and is nice and bushy and has no unsightly gaps between the three sections!
It is not fully decorated yet, but I will post a pic as soon as it is done and there is a little story surrounding the lights!

Birthday Goodies

It was my birthday on Monday (27th), so I thought I would share some of the awesome handmade cards I got!

Since I started making my own cards, it seems all of my family have followed suit!
Which is a great thing, not only does it mean that people get great homemade cards, it means that we are saving money and the environment too!

My awesome Uncle has tonnes of crafting stuff though he tends to stick to PC CD Rom programs to make his cards, which is cool too!

As always click the images to view in full size.

The cards my Uncle made from himself and my Aunt. Thank you!! xxx

My Mum also started off card making using PC CD Roms, maybe a year or so after I started making my own. She has since progressed to making her own using various media and quite recently she has purchased some stamps and inks, though I do not think she has used them yet.
She doesn't often buy kits, as it is more cost effective not to, but she saw a set of kits on QVC and thought one of them would be perfect for my birthday!

The middle one is an awesome Elvis card that my Mum made from her and my Step-Dad. I am a total Elvis fan, so I was very pleased to receive this. It is a découpage card :)
The card on the right is from my little brother, which, I believe was his first time at making his own card! Usually my Mum makes his lol (The same brother who features in the post previous to this.)
The card of the left is from one of my other Aunt's. She started making her own cards 2 or 3 years ago!
Thank you to all!! xxx

Close up of Elvis!

I did get mostly money for my birthday, which I don't mind at all!
After using some of it to buy a subscription to genesreunited.co.uk as I have recently picked up my other newish hobby of family research again, I bought some craft goodies, as I hadn't bough any since about March (ain't I good???) and as there was a sale on, it would have been rude not to ;)

I got; The Big One by Clare Curd (200 sheets of awesome papers), Paper Shapes (which I thought would be great for my son also), Couture Ribbons, 4x different Clangers backing papers, 4x different Looney Tunes backing papers, 2x different Scooby Doo backing papers, 2x Sets of Clangers découpage kits (4 in total), Masking Tape, Oriental Spice, Colossal Strips (only bought them as a tester really, to see if it was nice enough to buy a large pack, and for 50p you can't really complain, and yes, they are quite nice really!), 2x Message Tags, 2x Jolly Nation découpage kits (Movie Star Lady and Movie Star Man), 3D Birthday Stickers, Anita's Calendar Tabs for 2010 (which I plan for my son to make into New Year Cards for family - any tipos on how to use them are most welcomed!), Assorted Craft Wire, White and Clear Beads, See-D's Magical Christmas stamps (£1!!!!), See-D's Personal Labels stamps (£1!!!!), Marie Curie Daffodil Stamp (50p COME ON!), and 2x Vintage Bauble Ribbon Stickers (1 blue, 1 red).

My next purchase will be a paper crimper, as I really want to make some of these cool Crimped Envelope Pocket Cards (Tutorial available here) for maybe next years birthday cards!

Also for my birthday I got this tiny but cute plant! After some research I found that there are several different ones to collect and take care of. You only need to water them (by dipping the bottom into a bowl of water for a few minutes), every four weeks or so. Then when it is fully grown (after 4 - 6 months), you can tranfere it into a bigger pot, though I haven't quite figured out how to get it out of the casing yet, though I have plenty of time to find out still! You can read all about Pet Plants here. The one I have is Xing, which means Happiness and is symbolised by the Finger Plant.

And finally, I seriously need to have a sort out with my craft stuff and the boxes I keep them all in! I have a couple of spare boxes to put my goodies in, I just haven't got around to doing it yet lol
I think I will have a sort out in the next week or so after I have made all of September's birthday cards, which I will be starting very soon!