Even though Halloween is still almost two weeks away it really is time to think about Christmas. Many of these seasonal occasions involve similar tasks; deciding on the menu, shopping, organising and decorating. I often find as I’m working on one event it will trigger a thought about a future one. So to save myself the inevitable stress I’ve started to write things down as soon as I think of them. Therefore in order to keep track of my random Christmas thoughts I created this pretty and rather sparkly notebook.

CHRISTMAS PLAID

I don’t know what it is about Christmas but plaid just seems to suit the occasion. Maybe it’s a memory of cosy winter pyjamas. Whatever the reason when I wanted to recover a boring mini composition book this pattern immediately came to mind. It’s one of four designs in the 40 sheet 6″ x 6″ Designer Series Paper (DSP) packs from Stampin’ Up! I chose a sheet in Basic Gray from the Neutrals pack (there’s a separate pack for every one of Stampin’ Up!’s colour families).

From past experience I know that the binding over the spine of these books is rarely straight. So after putting Multipurpose Liquid Glue (Tombow) on the cover I slid the full sheet of DSP up to the edge of the binding. Then using my Paper Snips I cut off the excess paper using the edge of the cover as my guide. With the front done I repeated the process with the remaining paper to cover the back of the notebook too.

Next I pulled out the Glimmer 12″ x 12″ Specialty Paper Pack. Among my scraps I found a 2″ wide strip of Very Vanilla and glued it across the front cover. As before I used my Paper Snips to trim off the excess. Then in the Glimmer Paper scraps I found a 1/4″ strip of the gold colour, glued this above and below the Vanilla piece and trimmed off the excess.

VERY BEST OCCASIONS

All I needed now was a sentiment and the Very Best Occasions Stamp Set had the perfect one… “With a little more sparkle and a little less stress, let’s make this Christmas the very best.”

Using VersaMark ink I stamped the sentiment onto some Basic Black Card. Then I sprinkled the sticky ink with white powder from the Basics Embossing Powders pack. After tapping off the excess I removed a few stray specks. Then when I was happy I melted the rest using my Heat Tool set on 2 (high).

To cut out the sentiment I considered various dies but the ones I had to hand were either the wrong size or simply boring. So instead I punched out the embossed sentiment using the Label Me Lovely Punch.

That was much better, although while I liked the white on black effect I thought is could do with just a touch of extra sparkle. So I pulled out the Red Rhinestone Basic Jewels and added four to the holly sprig.

Finally with the embellishments pressed firmly into place I attached the sentiment to the notebook using Stampin’ Dimensionals. Job done.

How cute is this! Now I can begin keeping track of all my Christmas thoughts and plans…

PRODUCT LIST

BUNDLE BONUS – I bought the Very Best Occasions Stamp Set in a bundle with the Very Best Trio Punch (not used today). Using the single ‘bundle’ item number on my order meant I saved 10% off the cost of buying the two items separately. I’ve included a link to the bundle below in case you want to explore that option.