Milestone Mini Album Gift by Lara

Today, I've posted a scrapbook mini album video walk-through of what my sister made for her friend who was celebrating a couple of milestones at the same time. My sister is one crafty kitty! There's lots of room for photos in this 5 page album.



Her friend likes black and red and also purple. So the album base is black and there are some spreads in red and some in purple. Her friend also likes sparkle, so there's plenty of glitter papers in this album too.

My sister was in charge of the design, papers, and embellishments. I helped with the measurements and was a sounding board for the design. (Plus I have a pile of tools so we used my stuff in the making of the album.) The cover was done with a bit of mixed media, so it is made out of black Kraft Tex for durability.

The album base is a pre-made album by Heartfelt Creations. It is 9 x 7 inches on the outside, so the pages are only 8.5 by 6.5 inches. It's too bad they didn't make it a touch bigger because you can't fit a 5 x 7 in landscape. So, we designed it with 4 x 6 inch photos in mind. (The recipient is not a paper crafter.)

The album holds a total of 44 photos in 4 x 6 size. Of those, a maximum of 32 can be horizontal (landscape orientation) and a maximum of 42 can be vertical (portrait orientation). You can see the video on my FairyCardmaker YouTube channel.

2018 Handmade Christmas Cards Received

Hello, creative world! We got a nice crop of Christmas cards this year. All of them are always appreciated - both physical and electronic versions. Some of the ones we got this year were lovely handmade holiday cards. I thought I would show case them here.

This first one is from my sister-in-law's family. She used some of the die cuts from our holiday card kick-off workshop. The circle has a cross-stitched edge and is cut from silver glitter cardstock.

This one we got from my husband's cousin, Chad and Nicole and family. Look how cute the punch art is! The chimney is embossed with a brick texture and the sentiment is a lovely red glitter. I believe Santa's sack is made from the owl builder punch by Stampin' Up! I love when people find creative uses for punches outside of their original design.

This next one is from our friends, Claire and Jim. She gave us a dog-themed one as we do have a single furbaby doggy. She used some sparkly metallic green background paper and put dog-themed strips of paper on a diagonal with a gold foiled sentiment. On the inside, she put our dog's name on the dog house (even though some of it is behind the cute doggy).

The last card is from my sister's family. She also gave us a dog-themed card. She used a gold foil background paper and a layout we used in our holiday card kick off workshop. She water-coloured the cute puppy stamp on the front.

I am certain that much care and effort went in to these cards. Did you get anything handmade for Christmas?

Have you started your Holiday Cards?

Some people start their holiday preparations right on December 1. Some people start right after Thanks-giving (which is earlier in Canada then in the U.S.). Me? I usually start feeling the pinch mid-December and then I start rushing through it all.

I do have a small handful of cards in my stash, though, because I sprinkle a few holiday cards into my workshops throughout the year.

Our last workshop of 2018 was in November. It was our holiday card kickoff! Each participant was given a bag of ephemera (made by me from die cuts) and some holiday card samples that I posted earlier. The participants dug in to their own stash of holiday papers and embellishments to bring their own ideas to life with my initial inspiration cards, the die cuts, and my stash of stamps. (I provided measurements for my cards in case they wanted to make the exact sample.)

Here's what they came up with! I hope you will find some inspiration in these layouts! (Click on ANY of these images to see them LARGER.)

(Another for Lara, separately. She had not glued it down yet.)

Hope your holiday preparations are joyful and as stress-free as possible!