Stamp Book

This was another non-ornament present Amanda sent me for Christmas. She really thought ahead on this one! Each page includes a snippet of the image from every card or letter I sent her this year, along with the stamp. Fortunately I sent her a lot of postcards when we went on vacation or otherwise it might have been a little thin as there was a long drought of letters for a few months after we moved!

Christmas Ornament Exchange 2014

Do you recognize this unicorn from Despicable Me? After I made the minion ornaments last year, Amanda decided to make a Despicable Me themed ornament as well. It's remarkable how accurate it looks! She actually made the cone herself out of Sculpey, because she couldn't find one the right size. It just cracks me up, it is so cute!

Craft Tray

When my mom sent me this tray a couple years ago, I wondered what I was going to do with it. However, it has come in handy for collecting my crafting tools like scissors and rotary cutters. It's designed to display photos, but I never bothered to put any in.

It sits on the keyboard tray of the desk where my cutting mat lives, so it's very convenient, but here's how much of it I actually see, if the tray is pulled out all the way:

Finally I decided I might as well make it a bit prettier, even if I don't usually see most of it, so I put in some stamp themed scrapbook paper and stickers.

Pretty Paper Balls

I saw this polyhedron tutorial and thought these would be another ideal decoration for my office. The balls are connected by embroidery floss and will hang from the light fixtures in my office. The larger one is made from 3" circles and is approximately 5.5" in diameter. The smaller one is made from 2" circles and about 3.5" in diameter. I used 2 sheets of 12"x12" scrapbook paper and connected them with mounting squares. Cutting out circles is tedious, but they didn't take very long to put together. I absolutely love this paper! However, the tutorial does say to use lightweight cardboard. I probably should have at least used card stock, but that wouldn't have been nearly as pretty. I do hope they don't fall apart.

Butterfly Wall Art

Another decoration for my office. I decided I needed something more colorful to complement the owls. This one also has a bit of sparkle. I added some gold glitter glue to coordinate with the butterfly. It's only 9.5" square, so I still have quite a bit of wall space to fill.

Mod Podge Book Art

Our new library director created a new department, so we've been moving offices at work. I am part of the new department, and as it turns out, the new department is going to be located in my current office. My old department is moving down a floor, and they took all the decorations with them! The walls were completely bare. Based on their current offices, I didn't think my new office mates would have much to contribute in the way of wall decorations. Fortunately, while recently decluttering the apartment, I had come across two 8.5 x 16" metal posters I had stashed in the back of a bookshelf. I was going to donate them but decided they would be recycled into office decorations. Conveniently, we are also weeding quite a few books to make room for the relocation of my old department, so I grabbed one from the recycling pile.

I decided an owl would be a cute and appropriately bookish graphic to complement the book pages. I had never used Mod Podge before except for the small bottle of Puzzle Saver I used for my scissor holder because I happened to have it on hand. I ended up using half an 8 oz. jar. First I watched the tutorial videos at Mod Podge Rocks, which were very helpful. I used matte Mod Podge and am very pleased with the results.

154 Cranes

Over the last year, Amanda has been folding and sending me paper cranes. She numbers each one to keep track of her progress to 1,000. This is 154 of 156 (two were a little too floppy to include). They've been living in their envelopes for far too long so last night I decided to string them. This mobile consists of 10 approximately 12" strands of cranes attached to a plastic hoop with thread. She sends a crane report with each packet so I know the origin of the paper for each crane, our favorite being her library receipt for Stargirl and Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli.

Tiny Forest

Last weekend I cut out these little paper trees. I plan to use them for cards, I just haven't settled on a background yet.

Snowflakes

I saw an Instructable about how to make impressive snowflakes by simply sketching a design on the paper before you cut. I must say I think this method produces lovely results! It does help to have a very sharp pair of scissors though.