So this month's Creative Challenge with My Favorite Things was Countdown to Christmas - and to create whatever that meant to us.
I gotta say this project took on a mind of it's own while I was creating it LOL! It started out in my head as a much smaller, simpler idea then I started playing around with Die-namics and felt and shimmer spray and it turned into this:
It's SO hard to convey scale via a picture on my blog - but this is a bulletin board from IKEA (I seem to have a few of these around the house for whatever reason - prolly b/c they're cheap LOL!) and it's about 15.5" high and 22.5" wide.
I covered the wood frame with some Wild Cherry ribbon (that I attached with hot glue - but now I'm thinking Scor-Tape would have worked even better) - then got started on the embellishments:
The bows were created with Blu Raspberry felt and the Jumbo Beautiful Bow Die-namics - so quick and easy to assemble - just a few dabs of hot glue and done.
The snowflakes were another thing that started out as one idea and morphed into something else LOL! I originally cut a few snowflakes using the Jumbo Snowflake Die-namics that I was going to adhere to the board. Then as they were sitting on it the wheels started turning....so I pulled out the MFT Shimmer Mist that I just got, my bottle of Sweet Tooth ink refill, and a Mini Mister bottle:
I basically just filled the Mini Mister bottle 3/4 full with the Shimmer Mist, then squeezed in some of the Sweet Tooth ink. After shaking it all up really good I used the snowflakes as "masks" and sprayed over them.
FYI I did that part outside - and even then I made a mess and got it all over me LOL - but it turned out so cool! I wasn't sure if it would actually go white like I hoped (I assumed it would get absorbed into the cork and not show up very white at all) but it did! So then I went nuts and sprayed the ribbon, the bows, pretty much all of it 'till I used up the entire Mini Mister bottle of my custom shimmer/pigment ink spray. It took a little while to dry on everything but the cork - but it was worth the wait.
Now for the actual countdown part! :)
I decided to go with tags - since I have the new Pierced Tags STAX Die-namics and am obsessed with them - that was what started this whole project then everything else fell in around it.
I die-cut a bunch of tags from Kraft cardstock and stamped them with the trio of snowflakes from the Snowflake Splendor stamp set. I added a strip of Blu Raspberry cardstock that I stamped with the woodgrain stamp from the More Washi Patterns stamp set. The numbers were all die-cut from a piece of Wild Cherry card stock with the Big Numbers Die-namics . And then I decided to add an extra embellishment to them by die-cutting a snowflake using the Snowflake Splendor Die-namics and stamping that with the largest stamp from the companion set.
All-in-all the tags were probably the most "time-consuming" part of this project - but I did them all in stages assembly-line style and that made it all go faster. I did all the die-cutting at once (tags, strip of cardstock, numbers, then snowflakes), punched the holes using my Crop-a-dile - which I did in only 2 punches as it fits quite a few layer of card stock, then stamped all at once. Once that was all done I adhered everything together and addd bakers twine that I tied off in a knot.
The area of the board that houses the countdown is a full sheet of Sno Cone cardstock, which I stamped with more snowflakes, then I added a piece of Kraft card stock to the lower portion that is stamped with more snowflakes (I was going for a theme here if it's not painfully obvious LOL!).
The letters were all die cut with the By the Letters and By the Letters Uppercase Die-namics. I added some faux stitching with my new Sharpie White Poster Paint pen - I'll do a review on that one sometime soon hopefully.
Now I needed something to put all the tags that aren't being used in - and that was what started the expansion of this whole project as I wanted them to be stored WITH the countdown - b/c if they were just sitting out or in a drawer or something they'd just get wrecked/lost/forgotten about.
So I pulled out my Scalloped Treat Box Die-namics and more Blu Raspberry felt and made 2 "tag holders" (one wasn't enough - there were too many tags and it just made it simpler to make two). These were pretty simple to make as well - I considered sewing them together with the bakers twine for about 2 seconds - before remembering how rotten I am at sewing and the high likelihood of me stabbing myself. So I just used my trusty hot glue - and I'm glad I did as the glue gave them a bit more sturdiness as well. I could have used card stock for this but the felt was more fun.
And of course I had to embellish them a bit with more die cut felt snowflakes - those I DID sew on (carefully - and managed to not stab myself this time) with bakers twine and a button.
Last but not least I *had* to add a few die cut poinsettia's. I *just* got the Poinsettia Die-namics and couldn't not use them on this - they're just too pretty and I LOVE them :). I used Wild Cherry card stock and sponged the edges with Wild Cherry ink (trust me it just finishes them off and gives them extra dimension), the embossed lines make it really easy to curl the petals, and I used one of the included die shapes for the centers.
I had a LOT of fun making this - and my girls are pretty excited to start switching the tags every day as they start counting down the days.
Make sure to check out the MFT blog to see what some of the other DT Members have come up with - there are so many great ideas!!
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