Aussie Scrap Source

handmade christmas: last minute gifts

Today we’re bringing you some fabulous ideas for those gifts you find yourself ‘throwing’ together at the last minute, or for having on standby in case unexpected friends drop by.. you know that awkward moment when they produce a gift for you and you have nothing to give in return?  Keep a few of these ideas stashed away and you’ll never be caught short again!

 

Vintage jewellery is in fashion nowadays and this has also been seen much in scrapbooking products. As crafters, this makes it easy for us to use these products not only in our pages and projects but also in creating last minute gifts. Iris quickly made these beauties in less than an hour. She forgot about a few gifts and just by adding some jump rings and lace to a few vintage trinkets from Prima, she was able to come up with these beautiful gifts.

 

Jane saw these plastic book covers and immediately knew that they would made handy gifts for family and friends. All Jane did was to cut Echo Park Country Drive papers to fit inside the sleeve, decorated them with a label cut from the matching paper and add recipients name. Jane even made one for herself 'Mums perfect day' that's for when she can relax and just read for the entire day!

These plastic book covers can be found in a few sizes and are available at newsagents, some book stores and larger department stores that sell stationery.

 

Suz Doyle might well be known as ‘queen of the last minute’ for good reason.  Midnight the night before last day of school isn’t a great time to start thinking about how she’s going to package baked cookie teachers gifts, but it was this great stamping and crafting site that came to her rescue. 

Natasha Zandenberg  has a super easy to understand tutorial here for this fabulous cookie box and even Suz was able to follow the directions and whip up a couple from Tim Holtz Kraft paper, and of course some scraps of Hambly Transparencies for the window.  Add cute October Afternoon ‘Holiday Style’ twine and gift cards from the Miscellany pack and you’ve got yourself two gifts that look like they might have come from a boutique bakery in under an hour! 

handmade christmas: from the kids

 

Never one to be left out of ‘making things’ Suz’s daughter Phoebe came up with this gorgeous artwork to give to her teacher this year.  She used a mixture of Glimmer Mists and Luminarte Twinkling H2O’s to create the christmas tree painting, and covered the Pink Paislee frame in white gesso and white Glimmer Mist Chalkboard. 

The beauty of this kind of present is that when Christmas is over Mrs S can just take the tree picture out of the gorgeous Pink Paislee frame and use it for something else.  We can totally imagine a teacher, family friend or grandparent appreciating this idea.

These cute little canvas pouches are a fun and simple gift that kids can make with just a little help (if they are younger). With the Prima canvas sheets easily cut into a circle, trim of your choice can be threaded through holes punched evenly around the edge. When pulled tight, a pouch is created and can be decorated however the child likes!

Websters Pages tinsel trim and Tim Holtz baubles have been used to embellish these example pouches.

handmade christmas: for girls

 

handmade christmas: presents for boys

 

Janine knows how much her own children love to play the game of memory, so when she saw the Jillibean Soup Monster paper, she knew exactly what she wanted to create as a present for little boys! Every monster on the sheet of paper is different, so you just need to have 2 sheets of the monster paper and a lot of patience to handcut out lots and lots of monsters!!

Janine used a piece of chipboard as her base and added a sheet of cardstock to the back of it with a coat of gel medium, making sure it was well stuck. When completely dry she cut the 12x12 sheet into 2 inch squares and used gel medium to apply all the monsters to the other side of the squares. It is important that there are no differences in colour or pattern on the side that faces upward during the game.

Just keep an old box and cover it to keep your game pieces in. Janine let her kids have a play with the game and they LOVED it!!

 

 

Leeann really had to get her thinking cap on with this assignment simply because her family is all GIRLS. But this was not going to stop her from thinking about how she could make a little boys Christmas this year! She wanted her gift to be more than something to look at. All children love to draw and colour and write. So Leeann decide to make a backboard.

Leeann found some placemat wood boards and also grab some black board paint from the hardware store. She wanted it to be boyish and used a Twiddleybitz - Bulldozer Silhouette cut and adhere it to the board. Then just follow the directions on the tin of the black board paint. Leeann also made a duster to go with the board using a small wooden block that she painted and adhere some very thick felt to one end. It’s an easy project gift idea and one that you could make for all the boys this Christmas.

 

 

 

handmade christmas: non-scrappy friends / co-workers

 

handmade christmas: crafty friends

We all have two kinds of friends, those who ‘get’ the crafting thing, and those who don’t, and many of us would need to differentiate between the two when Christmas gifts are considered.  So this week’s post is aimed at those friends who ‘get it’, who would enjoy and treasure something that you made, because they appreciate the thought and effort that when into it – because you made it. 

 

handmade christmas: for teachers

It’s time to turn our attention to those wonderful people who look after and educate our children for a third of each day.  Handmade gift ideas are great and can be economical when you have a more than a few teachers you’d like to acknowledge.

handmade christmas: for dad and grandpa

 

‘hand-made’ christmas

 

beyond the page memories: janine koczwara

 

 

Janine had never decorated a 7 Gypsies Printers Tray before and found it a wonderful experience. In many ways it is quick and easy as you know that you have set sizes within each of the compartments to decorate, so it is somewhat similar to creating a lot of little cards and then deciding on the correct placement of them within the tray for balance and design. Janine used the brand new Authentique ‘Uncommon’ range of papers for her tray and loved them.

 

beyond the page memories: suz doyle

 

 

Suz chose one of the beautiful 7gypsies receipt holders to play with.  She decided to use it to hold ideas and inspiration for little pockets and corners around her home that need some extra love and attention.  Although they’ve been in their ‘new’ house for five years, there are still a lot of areas that need decorating – they’re not necessarily whole rooms, sometimes it’s just a wall or a corner of a room that needs livening up.  It’s kind of like a ‘Pinterest’ that you can hold and touch and add to and use for reference and colour matching along the way!

beyond the page memories: jane clark

 

We hope you’re enjoying our 7Gypsies display items series so far.  We’re not finished yet but we’re excited to announce that 7Gypsies have sent us a bundle of goodies to give away to one lucky winner who sends us images of their own altered display tray!  We’ll give you another week or so to go shopping and alter your 7gypsies display tray or drawer.  We’ll put them all up in a post and announce the winner at the end of July.  Australian residents only please.  Email your pics to [email protected].  If you can’t find a 7Gypsies supplier, please let us know and we’ll try and help you out with a scrapbooking store near you.

 

Moving right along to Jane’s gorgeous ideas for the 7Gypsies Library Drawer…

 

beyond the page memories: louise williams

 

 

Louise W loves the printer trays and has done a number of them, but this one is a special gift for her mother. Having very few family photo's to access from her mothers childhood makes this one a very personal reminder of the past, while including some beautiful details from the scrapbooking present.

 

beyond the page memories: iris babao uy

 

 

 

beyond the page memories: leeann pearce

 

 

Leeann totally thinks these receipt holders by “7 Gypsies” are the “BOMB” and would like to get a few more, especially for the kitchen and office areas. Her husband Quentin thinks the same…lol.

Leeann decide to turn this receipt holder into a treasured memory project. Jorja’s first time at the beach.

 

beyond the page memories: caroline mclachlan

 

 

 

beyond the page memories: danielle quarmby

 

 

 

 

beyond the page memories: suzanne tonga

 

 

 

beyond the page memories: chris millar

 

Today we welcome back a familiar, talented name to our design team.  We’re thrilled that Chris Millar has agreed to return and become one of our resident card-making specialists!

 

Chris's family recently returned from a family holiday in Borneo. While she was there Chris collected many of these handcrafted wooden key rings from the markets. She didn't want to just put them away in a draw but couldn't use them all as key rings, so the 7 Gypsies Artist Printers Tray was the perfect solution for displaying them as well as a couple of photos from the holiday. She chose to use the Echo Park Splash range to go along with the theme of the photos taken on a tropical island.

beyond the page memories: lou nelson

 

 

Louise was more than a little daunted by such a large OTP project LOL :) but in the end still kept her approach to decorating it fairly simple. Louise has used a lot of the 7 Gypsies product packaging [corrugated board] to break up the 'white space' and then gave it a coat of white gesso.