Crafty Creatives Christmas Box

In late September, Crafty Creatives offered for sale an optional special-edition box for Christmas to arrive in late November. I couldn't resist buying it, of course! I've had the glorious thing in my possession now for a few weeks and am finally sitting down to write about it!

I love the various CC stickers on the boxes. Excitement from the get-go! I didn't get a picture, but instead of the normal pink bag, this one came in a red one!

I save all my paper as well, so different paper = love!

And here we are at the art card. This will look great framed as a Christmas decoration- I may have to have one frame purely rotational for seasonal art cards.

When the Christmas box arrived, I was up to my ears in craft fair business and Thanksgiving craziness, so I didn't even get a chance to open it until December! My friend noted that she wished she'd taken a photo of it packed in the box so she could remember how to put it in, so here's mine! ;)

Before the wide shot, here's some smaller shots- so many snowflake goodies- really great bits and pieces to use. I'm planning on doing some great little trees for my dollhouses with the cones- I'll have to track down some appropriately-coloured Floral Soft! ;)

Wreath blanks and jingle-bells- two things I cannot get enough of! 

This box had three kits! The first one is great and will probably be the first I do- a glitzy beaded bauble! My daughter loves all things purple and was thrilled with the colour selection. Can you tell that I had to blur myself out of the bauble? 

Kit #2 was a great one as well- felt decorations look beautiful on the tree in every decade and are the epitome of 'crafty Christmas'. Look at those tiny buttons, too!

And finally, the third kit: lib scrub! Included are lots of little pots to make gifts for friends and family (and teachers!) I may go buy some popping candy so my daughter can add them to make a few for her friends- the Lush scrub I have with popping candy is very popular with her!

This box was massive- so many more things than I've mentioned, all pictured here. As always, you can click to enlarge and see everything- there was a TON of great papercrafting stuff that I've barely even touched on!

This box contained:

• CC Kit 1: Beaded bauble
• CC Kit 2: Felt tree decoration(s)
• CC Kit 3: Lip scrub gifts
• 3 wooden snowflakes
• Card cone 'family'
• jingle bells
• 10 chunky howlite-style Christmas tree beads
• 1m Berisford ribbon
• 2 wreath rings
• 2 double-sided craft papers
• 2 mini DIY gift boxes
• silver snowflake charms
• pack of card blanks
• Christmas tree stickers
• Christmas bells cabochon
• clear wrapping seals from Stix2
• Christmas sequins / table scatter

So all in all, it was an absolutely packed box. The CC format is changing in the new year and the only way we'll have these boxes of craft-inspiration supplies will be by this optional way of purchasing, but even if I end up not being a fan of the new format, I will definitely be getting the optional boxes!

And a note on the jingle bells... After the Crafty Christmas boxes shipped, the few that were left were offered for sale again on the website... along with some goodie bags from last year's Christmas Nostalgia box. Yes, I couldn't resist- but I got more jingle bells! YES!

CC Box 18 arrives this week, and I still have yet to share box 17 with you- so I may do it as one big post. We'll see!

Roll up, roll up! Crafty Creatives Box #16

I have been neglecting you, dearest blog readers. The past few months have been crazy with seasonal preparations for craftiness, but the good thing is that after this coming weekend, my main deadlines will be past, and aside from commissions, I'll be able to devote my time to blog posts and other crafty fun!

Last Wednesday, I got my latest Crafty Creatives box, and I've already had a break from my own crafting to play with it a bit.

The theme for this box (number 16, wow!) is Victorian Circus!

The art card is by Luke Spooner who also did last year's October box- definitely a flair for the creepy here.

I'm always drawn to these little bits the most, it seems. Some pretty purple glass beads and those printed buttons are great.

I think my favourite thing in this whole box was this tin of little circus stamps. They're less creepy and more cute, and I can't wait to have time to play with them a bit!

And this month's kit was to make a kitsch animal pendant necklace- as you can see I've already had a bit of fun playing with mine! I added a purple bell from last year's Nostalgia box, some glitter from the Blue box, and put him on a keyring instead of a necklace-- I want to put him on a handbag!

And here's a rundown of everything in the box.

• Art Card by Carrion House
• CC Kit: Kitsch animal pendant
• 4 stripey buttons
• circus stamp tin
• strand of purple glass beads
• 3 mask pendants/charms
• admission tickets- I got red and orange!
• 2 double-sided craft papers
• Materials for extra coaster kit including:
• two plain coaster
• sheet of tattoos (I got dragons)
• reversed circus images
• Stix2 PVA glue

I wasn't blown away by this box- but it's growing on me. Even though the kit wasn't really 'me', I had a lot of fun playing with the hot glue gun, and am happy with how it turned out. The stamps as well are a really great and I'm looking forward to have a moment to play with them.

Hopefully I'll have some blog entries for you after this weekend, and as I have a lot of CC kits yet to finish for my yearly goals (9?!), I'll have some entries showing those off soon.

Crafty Creatives box 15!

Wow, this month has been absolutely crazy so far. I have not had a second to sit down and craft apart from making more new displays for my things at the shop, and those were late-night panic-filled endeavours! I have however been acquiring a few crafty things, some of which work perfectly with this month's Crafty Creatives box!

Can I just say I was way too excited to see more new surround paper? This stuff is always neatly packed into my 'paper crafts' box for future use!

This month's box was 'Monochrome'! I have been working on covering my (currently unused) keyboard tray with a monochrome sharpie doodle and I've been looking at lots of inspiration lately- this art card provides even more! I can't wait to get this one up on the wall.

More felting in this month's CC kit! I have to say that while I'm ever-so-slightly sad that it's not a new skill, I'm happy to learn to 3D felt! This will be a fun one to do, and I know that the felting kit Woodland box was extremely popular (it's one of my personal favourites!)

I am a little bit crazy when it comes to collecting little notebooks/sketchbooks/what-have-you and this made me squeal a bit! The pen and pencil are of a beautiful quality as well so I'll be sure to fill this little book with lots of sub-par attempts at drawing, but I'll love it!

And here it is all out as usual:

• Art card by Jo Newham
• CC kit: felted sheep
• double-sided domino beads
• graphite pencil
• polymer clay rose
• mini blackboard peg- I love this!
• Stabilo Sensor pen
• Crafty Creatives doodlebook
• tea bag folding squares
• sheet of Aubrey Beardsley prints
• black and white sewing pins
• fat quarter of black and white fabric

It's a great box- while I love boxes with a strong theme, I think that this box (and the Blue box) provides such a good opportunity to get seemingly-unrelated items together, and it all looks so great together. I love that this box has so many crafty essentials, and that though the kit is a skill I've already been taught by the CC gals, it's another level up. I'm also interested to try the tea bag folding as I'd never even heard of it before now!

But of course, I am not one to leave things black and white... so I took my newly-bought pile of brightly-coloured Sharpies to my fabric... and I love it even more.

Crafty Creatives Box 14- 'Western'

Crafty Creatives box 14 landed several weeks ago, but we were away on holiday! Finally last Friday this box was redelivered, and though I hadn't managed to avoid seeing what this month's theme and contents were, it was still nice to get my pink parcel!

First I'm going to show off a few photos of where were were. My own ancestral homelands (not really) of Illinois. Flat, hot, and corn (and soybeans).

Ahhhh, the country life.

So perhaps strangely fitting that this month's box was very North American themed! Though, I was not in the wild west- this box's theme was 'Western'!

Native American culture is something I've grown up treading very lightly around. My American ancestors go back mostly to the Revolutionary War, so I know there have probably been some along the way who have not been the best of neighbors to those who were displaced. Appropriation is tricky, and in some cases inappropriate. That said, I think this art card is beautiful and I think for the most part this box was handled lightly.

The kit for this box was a dreamcatcher- an obvious choice! I look forward to getting the feathers in box 15 so I can finish this one off properly. Although I do have to point out that as they originated from the Ojibwe people they are technically not 'Wild West' but more 'wild north'!  

There was also a second kit in this box- a rope basket. This one looks a bit trickier, I have to admit.

There was a good selection of beads and charms in this one, including a generous amount of star studs.

click to enlarge!

A quick rundown of my box's contents:

• Art card by Anastasia Alexandrin
• CC kit- dreamcatcher
• Extra kit- rope basket
• two strings of turquoise beads
• lots of bronze star studs
• five feather charms
• 1 metre suedette floral cut trim
• piece of fleece
• purple stone bear bead
• two pieces of recycled denim
• two sheets of craft paper

I got some great fabric when I was back in the US and have some plans already- what do you think?

Read about the effects of the 1830 Relocation Act.

CC Makes Galore!

One of my one hundred mini-goals for 2013 is to do every Crafty Creatives kit. I'm a bit behind, and box 13 threw me a loop by having not one, but five kits in it! I've been managing to fit them in to free time here and there, especially as I wait for things I need for my main polymer clay business, as well as a few other things. I still have two left to do, but I thought I'd share what I had done so far!

The first two I did were the paper and the stocking flowers. Actually, my 7-year-old daughter did the paper one, which I think looks pretty good considering I only really helped her glue it! When she saw my stocking flower she wanted one for herself, so I made her one:

As you can see, by the time I'd photographed it, it got a bit squashed from riding in her handbag to and from her grandma's house! The kit has enough to make at least 2-3 more, so I'm sure I'll be drafted to make another, soon!

I learned from my mistakes when I made the french beaded flower! I made two to start and let my daughter choose which one she wanted. She correctly chose the one on the left! I used some bigger 8/0 sized beads that I had for the stamens since my colours were similar. I'm definitely going to be making more flowers, especially since I bought this-

a bead spinner! I beaded about 3ft of wire in about 20 minutes. It's great and I love it. The kit had enough beads for two flowers but probably not enough for more unless I mixed the two colours together, but that didn't stop me playing with the bead spinner some more.

I made these triple-wrapped bracelets with some of the remaining beads and some that I'd found in my stash! They're 21" long wires that wrap, or I suppose could be worn as a necklace as well! 

The hummingbird pendant from the box was made into this simple necklace with some turquoise flower beads. Going to give this one to my mom, I think!

I also finished my cross stitch from box 12. I'm definitely going to be making at least one more of the four patterns supplied with the box, but this had to be the first. 

And I'm mid-project on this one- I didn't sew the outer beads on correctly and need to go back to reinforce them, so I of course set it aside for now. I have a lot of clay work to do this week now that I can get into it again, but this was a lot less daunting than I thought it'd be, so I'm not worried about catching up on it.

After that, and the other two flowers, I'll have just the blue bird mobile to do and the dreaded crochet mouse way back from box 5! I can make a very lovely chain... and that's about it! I will have it done though, and as another of my goals is to make a simple but nerdy amigurumi, I'll have to do it soon!

I'll have the other two flowers up to show you guys sometime next month- if I can stop making the beaded ones! 

Happy Birthday, Crafty Creatives! with CCBox13

It seems like I was just writing last month's Crafty Creatives blog post yesterday and here we are with another! I am seriously behind on my making- busy is good but not when it cuts into my crafty time, growl! This month marks the 1st birthday of the subscription craft box, and to celebrate it, we got something definitely unique compared to what we've seen so far!

More after the jump!

Crafty Creatives Box 12 and Thank You!

It would figure, that this month would be the one where the postie loses my parcel. It's definitely not the first time something's gone missing from my mail, but certainly the most frustrating! Finally, I have in my hands a replacement box from the lovely lovely gals at Crafty Creatives and I have a piece of what I was so lucky to be a part of!

I was pre-spoiled this month, making the cakes, but I only had 'pastel' and 'cake' to go on. I was excited to discover this even a month and a half ahead of time because one of my dream boxes is this one- The Treat Box!

Haven't taken this shot in a while... just a shot of how it looks when it's opened!

This card is one of my favourites and was one of the main reasons that I was disappointed my box got lost in the first place! It will probably be the first one I put up once I find frames that I like! The flamingo has a special place in my heart, as well.

One of my helpers, 'helping'. He had a lot to say about this box! He isn't much of a fan of lollipops but he has claimed them for his sister. We'll see about that!

Such a great assortment of beads and buttons in this box.

My charms, back home again! I rarely make things for myself so I'm tempted to just throw them back in my shop stash, but I will have to force myself to add them to something soon.

My daughter will be thrilled with the cookie cutter I ended up with! I loved Cathryn on the GBBO, so it's fun to have a recipe card featuring her own baking craftiness!

I think I mentioned on Twitter that one of my dream kits would be a cross-stitching kit, and here it is! With such great patterns, I'm not sure where to start! My mother cross-stitched a lot when I was small but I've never tried it, so I'm eager to start. 

Click to Enlarge!

As always, here is a run-down of the box's contents:

• Art Card by Louise Williams - yum!
• CC Kit- sweet cross stitch
• 3 cake charms made by yours truly
• Cupcake grosgrain ribbon 
• 10 'm' print cabochons- I got the mix named '70s Ice Cream'!
• Fat quarter of macaroon fabric- this is so beautiful and I'm planning on using it in my new display at the shop I'm renting a shelf from!
• Pack of alteration tags from Stix2
• Cookie Cutter- I got a butterfly!
• Recipe card from Cathryn Dresser
• Juicy beads
• 2 double-sided craft papers
• 5 ice cream buttons
• 2 Chupa Chups lollies

Lastly I want to say thank you to not only Crafty Creatives for including me, but to all the wonderful things that my fellow CC bloggers have said about my charms! On the first day the boxes were landing, I was terrified! But, they have been well-recieved and then some. I'm really grateful for the feedback and the love of my little cakes! It made all the (literal) blood, sweat, and tears worth it! ;)

Thanks guys, you rock.

S