Appreciation gifts for my team of secretaries

Bags prepped for 4 of the ladies: 

Slight variation of contents: 

For the past year I've been delegating workload to other med secretaries around the other NHS Lothian sites for the clinics and theatres undertaken by an external provider NHS Lothian employed to reduce waiting lists etc.  Sometimes the workload was such that it was expedited in time for any planned theatre.   Anyways there are around 10 ladies whom picked up the work up until Christmas time. They were received gratefully.  Some really liked how I presented the candles/chocolate treats - nothing done fancy unfortunately for the little bottles of wine though! 

Ferrero Rochet chocs placed and wrapped in a hand crafted box:

Little bath fizzers individually wrapped 

(Snowflake punch from Creative Memories which are sadly no longer around):

Candles in box base:

Candles boxed - handcrafted by myself:

Embellished and personalised bag and gift tag for another 2 ladies - the remaining ladies had received same hence no point in duplicating photos:

Some chocolate mints packaged in handcrafted pillow box - SU stamp and scalloped punch used:

These were another way of packaging chocolate treats for 3 ladies:

Ela is a bank staff member to assist with some admin work. Ela is Polish and lovely to work with - a quick learner and always very helpful too. As a token of my appreciation, this is what I put together:

Serif font for Sizzix; label from X-cut, silver embellishments from Dovecraft; hessian ribbon from The Range: 

A box I made for colleague at work:

Christmas countdown - applies to December only!

At work [my NHS job], we deal with a company who organises for consultants to take our out patient clinics at weekends in a bid to reduce the waiting lists for lots of specialties.  Each year they gift the staff a new calendar.  This being almost my first year in the post as departmental secretary, and an eye for altering/crafting, I asked my colleagues to keep some of these back for me so that I could recycle.

I saw the block style calendars in the Range at the weekend - they were cheaper than Asda's block calendars but even at almost £7 a set!  Those wooden block style calendars were quite popular to alter at one point I am sure but thought it a little expensive "just because" LOL.  Then it occurred to me that I still had the above calendars stashed away in a drawer.  I even chopped down the pre-printed calendar bits that flip over from month to month, and recycled those by covering them in patterned cardstock and cut out numbers from the Sizzix Lollipop number series.  

I must apologise now for the calendar I made was actually for a "sleep countdown" for the festive season - yes I am quite a bit ahead of time but I am never this organised and wanted to have this done.  I have another 2-3 to make.  This is the prototype!

 

How the back looks:

The front and numbers put in place:

yup, 'fraid so, this is Santa Claus!

I layered certain areas of this die cut, with a little chalking from Stamping Up, given Santa the rosy cheek look.

Nouveau was the Sizzix Sizzlet alphabet used for "How Many Sleeps.....?"

Jammin' on Christmas Day

Belated Christmas cheer to all my readers - many thanks and lots of appreciation for stopping by to read and keep up with my blog! I hope the festive period has been kind to you and you have enjoyed sharing with friends and/or family!! Thoughts went to families and friends who are no longer here.......

Just as Christmas was fast approaching, it was equally fast departing LOL ........

Photos above taken of my youngest 2 kids jammin' away on the XBox World Tour Band thingummy game....... I had a go at the singing - but it certainly wasn't quite as easy as it looks - gimme the PS2 Singstar any day LOL!!

The kids didn't get as much this year - partly due to gaining a lot over the previous years and partly due to the fact that my kids' birthdays sit around lateish November, late January and mid-February time and partly due to lack of funds this year - money isn't everything but special people and family means EVERYTHING.

Oh but we must not forget this having being a 'proper' white Christmas in a very long time indeed - really special - I am just wishing I had managed to capture an image on Christmas day just like I had planned - inevitably, I didn't manage to get round to it with getting dinner etc organised.

Black sparkly glitter discovery!

I discovered black sparkly glitter in Hobbycraft yesterday!! I had an idea/inspiration taken from a mass produced Christmas card. It had a black glittery snowflake on it - it was really quite pretty - not this is having the same effect though I quite like it just the same!

Tag cut using Sizzix scallop tag from the combo set. Red card. Versamark and stamp from an SU! Christmas stamp set. Glitter set [hopefully] with hairspray. Nothing too fancy but the final product looked quite good on these little paper bags from a Christmas set from Ikea.

Colleagues' Christmas presents all wrapped

Not the best produced image - this was taken using my mobile phone camera [which I hate using to take photos]. Kirsten's desk! The present at the rear of the photo with large silver florist bow + Gingerbread man gift tag is for Kirsten.

Basic ribbon start:

Handmade bow using ribbon + button - this was a labour of love combined with sewing, a plain button and a glue gun!

Neice and Nephew's Christmas Cards

I made these personalised Christmas cards for my niece and nephew:

A close-up of the star brads as tree toppers:

SU! Scallop edge punch used + Sizzix Snowflake die coated with SU! "Stampin Glitter"; PPs by Papermania Christmas pad:

Lettering cut using Sizzix "Fun Serif" and "Nouveau" Sizzlet alphabets.

Secret Santa at work

For the 1st time in years, I have been invited to take part in the office "Secret Santa" . I am not giving the game away as to what the gift was - unfortunately the £5.00 budget doesn't stretch too far - the recipient may well be disappointed after seeing how the gift is wrapped LOL!! I thought I'd make an extra effort with regards to the wrapping.

The paper is basic brown wrapping paper - it's not the thickest or strongest of paper so the paper was 'wound' round the gift a couple of times to prevent any inevitable ripping. I dug out some of the leftover Christmas wire edged ribbon and set to wrap it round the gift making a bow. At least with the wire edging, it's easier to manipulate the bow to the desired effect.

A lovely wire ribbon bow:

Once everything was in place, I stamped one corner of the exposed wrapping paper with an SU! sentiment stamp from a Chrismas set:

Next I got to work on the gift tag. Using the jumbo scallop tag die from Sizzix, I cut a tag using red cardstock. I then stamped the swirly image with an SU! stamp wheel with Versamark, added the gold embossing powder, set it with the heat gun. The "To" and "From" details were printed using my computer and printer overlapping the gold embossing - a happy accident!

Completely wrapped:

Some Christmas Cards

I managed a couple of weeks ago to get started on my Christmas cards...........

Heat embossed silver "Joy" Cards - Sentiment and Baroque Motif stamp from Stampin' Up!

Oval Scallop punch [Woodware] + SU! Scallop edge punch used here along with the Stampin' Up markers colouring in the Christmas tree [from an SU! stamp set]:

This card is slightly different from the card above in that I have embossed 1/3 of the card with an embossing folder:

Snowflake stamp and sentiment stamp from Stampin' Up! stamp sets. Scallop circle embossed with snowflake embossing folder. Circles cut using various sized circle punches.

More embossing with folders sentiment from an SU! stamp set:

I did the snowfall scene embossing on red card and using versamark then heat embossed with white embossing powder showing the design outlines in red greeting sentiment from an SU! stamp set:

A close up:

Santa embossed:

Scallop circle framing embossed Santa:

PP from a papermania pad; tag cut using Sizzix tag die; SU! scallop circle punch - stamps produced by SU!:

Silver embossed stamped snowflake [stamp from SU!]:

The Crimbo Tree is Up!

I'd promised the kids that I'd get the Christmas tree up on Sunday but due to the time I spent at work on Sunday, it was too late to start setting up. So the kids were happy with my suggestion that if I built up the tree in time for them finishing school for the day - they could dress it up.

It's an 8 foot tree so I could only get so much of the tree in shot but was too lazy to go look out the wide angle lens!

Without camera flash:

With camera flash: