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Friday, November 7, 2014

Handmade Holidays Blog Hop

Hello and very welcome to my post for the 4th annual Handmade Holidays Blog Hop! During this three day blog hop, we will share handmade holiday gifts with you, and there will be so much inspiration. We've gathered over 100 of our creative blogger friends in the craft industry as well as some of our fellow product manufacturers to bring you a plethora of inspiring gift ideas you can make now to give to your friends, family, and colleagues.

Pin and bookmark these ideas for this holiday season and to use throughout the year! Each day of the hop features approximately 30 gift projects and you can "hop" from one blog to another to check them all out.

Handmade Holidays 2014 Hop Logo

Creating your own gifts, makes those gifts so special, especially because of all the heart put into the process of creating. And it is fun too!

I used new Sizzix dies by Tim Holtz for my project. I have had these plain fabric serviettes for probably ten years, and planned to use them for something but just never got to them. For this project, I thought it was time to alter them into something a little prettier. You can use the same techniques for a table cloth, fabric bag, apron or whatever you can think of, and it makes a great and quick gift.
 
These were the original serviettes.
 
Start by die cutting shapes from transparencies. It will work even better if you use Tim Holtz Masking Sheets, but I had ran out of them. I used ink jet transparencies, which means they are rougher on the one side, and that side sticks to the fabric a little bit, making it easier to apply the ink. I love using my dies to make stencils and masks and it is a great way to get even more out of your dies.
 
For this project, I used Ranger's Clear Fabric Medium to turn Archival Ink reinkers into fabric paint. Squeeze some medium into a disposable cup and add a few drops of ink. I used three blue/teal inks, but you can of course use any colour. Mix.

Place your homemade stencil on the fabric, with your craft sheet underneath, in case some ink leaks through. Use a mini round ink blending tool to apply the ink, holding the stencil in place. It might be easier if you dab some of the ink off on a piece of scrap paper first.

Continue until you have a shape in each corner of the serviettes. Vary the three colours so that the images are not uniformly coloured.

Use the Stacked Snowflakes die to die cut snowflake stencils.

Move the snowflake stencils around and add snowflakes here and there on the serviettes.

I like to add words to my projects and used a Tim Holtz Christmas stencil for that. Mix a little Sepia ink into the Fabric Medium. Use masking tape to mask out the words that you don't want to use. Continue until you have completed all four serviettes. 
 
Make a simple tag for the serviettes and tie them together with twine. To make the tag, I first smeared some Tumbled Glass and Picket Fence Distress Stain on my craft sheet, misted with water and pressed manila cardstock into the ink. The tag was die cut with the Tag & Tie die.

When dry, stamp with a deer stamp and Potting Soil ink. Stamp a snowflake background with Evergreen Bough. The three Mirrored Stars were coloured with alcohol ink.

Just to show you the finished serviettes. It might look nicer to let the angel face the other way, into the serviette, but I had run out of transparencies and wanted the rough side to face downwards when applying the ink.

I love this Prancing Deer die and also used it on my December Daily tutorial earlier this week.

You can add as many or as few images as you want.

These techniques will also look great on a linen shopping bag, or maybe an apron.
 
Fold the serviettes and tie them with a piece of twine and you have a one-of-a-kind Christmas gift to someone special. I hope this inspired you to use your dies to create your own stencils, which is great for papercrafting projects too.

Are you ready for lots more creative handmade gift ideas and projects?? Your next stop is Amy Latta from One Artsy Mama.

Follow along on our blog hop! Simply click on each of the links below to be taken to that post with additional information and photos on how to create a handmade gift project. Have fun and pin away!


There are also great prizes to be won!

a
Rafflecopter giveaway


Follow our Handmade Holidays Gift Ideas
Pinterest board for even more inspiration!

Follow Jennifer
Priest of RainMaker Media Works + Hydrangea Hippo's board Handmade Holidays on Pinterest.

 

A huge thank you to our sponsors for this hop - please visit
their blogs below and follow them. And be sure to come back tomorrow for another 30+ amazing Handmade Gift
Ideas!
 

 
 
 

Additional Sponsorship provided to bloggers by:

 

Thank you so much for stopping by today!
 
Happy holiday crafting!
 
Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Dies: Sizzix: Layered Snowflake, Angelic, Prancing Deer, Sleigh Ride, Stacked Snowflakes, Tag & Tie
Surfaces: Ranger: Manila cardstock; plain linen serviettes
Stamps: Stamper's Anonymous Tim Holtz: Styled Woodlands, Simple Sayings, Christmas Nostalgia
Ink: Ranger Archival Ink reinkers: Sepia, Ultramarine, Aquamarine, Manganese Blue; Archival Ink: Potting Soil; Distress Ink: Evergreen Bough, Gathered Twigs
Stain: Distress Stain: Tumbled Glass, Picket Fence
Alcohol ink: Ranger Adirondack: Sail Boat Blue
Medium: Ranger: Clear Fabric Medium
Stencil: Stamper's Anonymous Tim Holtz: Christmas
Embellishments: Tim Holtz idea-ology: Mirrored Stars, Linen Ribbon, Merriment Tissue Tape
Tools: Sizzix Big Shot; Ranger Mini Round Ink Blending Tool

10 comments:

  1. Wow! This is a heck of a hop! So many blogs to visit..
    Great idea to upcycle napkins in that way! I love mixing my acrylics with a fabric medium for these kind of projects... Your tag is so sweet too! :)
    X

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  2. I love how you varied the colors in the images. It really gives them more depth.

    Shawn ~
    Design Team Coordinator for The Buckle Boutique
    Personal Blog ~ Crafty Chics Blog
    and
    MyCutSearch.com ~ Find your Cricut images FAST!

    ReplyDelete
  3. by far one of my favourite projects/gift ideas yet!

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  4. beautiful. my MIL makes dish towels. i think i might have found my niche with this type of homemade idea. i learned several techniques from this. thank you.

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  5. Wonderful gifts and design and tutorial!

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  6. Beautiful gift set, love the stencils you used.

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Thank you so much for leaving a comment! Happy Crafting!