Monday, December 19, 2011

On the 8th Day of Christmas Creativity...

'Twas the last Monday before Christmas
and all through the house
crazy people were running around saying,
"Only 6 days, till Christmas! What the CRAP?!?!"

Okay, maybe only one crazy person... named Jan.

It's the 8th Day of Christmas Creativity!  Today is Ileana's turn to host again.  I hope you've been enjoying her fun trivial questions!

For my part today, I've got a relatively quick and creative gift idea.  It looks pretty involved, but actually didn't take that much time at all!  I found a tutorial for it on Chic & Cheap Nursery.  I modified it a little bit for my kids to use as gifts for their teachers.

Crayon Monograms

I'm not doing a full blown tutorial here.  Mainly because I was really pressed for time to get these done for the last day of school before winter break.  I didn't take the time to take step-by-step pictures as I went a long.  Here's what I did in a nutshell:

1. I used a "floating frame" which is two panes of glass together with no back.
2. I printed out my letter as big as I could and taped it behind the glass.
3. I used super glue to glue the crayons on to the front of the glass, following the printed letter as best I could.
4. I cut the crayons using a sharp knife.  I held the knife over a candle before I cut the crayons.  I also rolled the crayon under the blade of the knife to cut through the paper before I cut all the way through. This resulted in a nice clean cut through the paper and the crayon.
5. I printed the sentiment on some nice cardstock, matted it, and the mounted it between the two panes of glass.

Done!  The whole project took me about 90 minutes. The frames were 11"x14".  I used a box of 96 crayons and got two monograms out of it by using the cut-in-half crayons on both projects.

Before you run off to try this, be sure to enter my 12 Day of Christmas Creativity drawings! In case you missed it yesterday, I've decided to give away more copies of my complete set of 12 Days of Christmas Tags. Be sure and enter by commenting on each day!

Here are the prizes:

1) Three Prizes: The whole set of 12 Days of Christmas Tags
2) $10 gift code to Sam & Hailey Designs
3) $10 Michaels Gift Card
4) The December VDBC Grab Bag (or a $7 gift code to Sam & Hailey Designs if you have already purchased it)

How can you win them? On the 12th Day (that will be the 23rd for our little blog-fest) I'll hold a drawing for each one of the prizes (that's four six drawings in one day... I think I can handle it!). All you have to do to enter is comment on my blog to enter. You can comment on my blog on each of the 12 days so you'll have up to 12 entries in the drawings! Each day I'll have a new thing I'll ask you to include in your comment so keep an eye out for that. It's as simple as that!

Today's comment requirement:

Leave a comment with either an idea for a teacher gift to make or a last minute gift to make.

Be sure to include some way to contact you in case you win the drawing (for example, your VDBC forum name, your email address, etc.). If you don't, I might not be able to get your prize to you!

Time to get crafty, people!

16 comments:

lilred said...

Great tutorial Jan. Thanks for sharing.

Kathy Serrahn said...

cool project

Sandra from NC said...

That is such a cool project! I would have loved to make these for my son's teachers! Wonder if HS teachers would like one - baahahahaha. I'm trying to remember teacher's gifts I made... oh I remember. I made Christmas vests one year. I had a simple pattern to use.

Denise Foor Studio PA said...

This piece is so cute for a teacher! I make a lot of journals with the school's mascot on the cover for teachers.

Jun Bug House said...

Oh now this is so hard........
My "Baby" is 34 or is it 35 now. LOLOL
I think a gift card to a office supply store would be great.
Or even Kmart, Walmart or Target.
Love the project, just love it!!!!
**U**
Nance
nworley@cox.net

TonyaKaye said...

No kiddies here .. my baby is 39 ..but what a wonderful gift idea.

Kelly S said...

Love today's project. Very cool. I haven't had to deal with teacher's gifts yet, but for last minute gift ideas, I love doing vinyl on tiles. It is super quick, but the end result is fabulous.

momof5 said...

Cute idea. Thanks for sharing. Well this year I made "Santa-tizer" for my little kid's teachers. I took a large bottle of hand santitizer and using red, black and gold vinyl covered the bottle to look like a santa suit. I also used white mulberry paper for the fur on the suit. I was thought they turned out really cute and the teachers seem to love them as this is an item that they go through often.

Barbara said...

Using our coasters from a chain restaurant, I covered them with pretty papers and ribbon then bound them with my Bind-It-All, and put Post-It Notes inside. A pretty notebook for all my grandson's teachers and his principal! I used a Forget-Me-Not theme in the papers.

Lucky Charm Crafts by Lynn Barwald said...

Hey Jan! This is a super cool project! Love it! Love all of your ideas! My idea for a last minute gift is a small, handmade journal. I use paint, inks, scraps of paper, clips, magazine pictures... whatever and then use Modge Podge on the cover & back to add a gloss and cover the embellishments. Thanks for all of your ideas! Lynn B

Pam S said...

Cute project, no teacher gifts needed here...but I am making some homemade dry laundry detergent, bought a cute glass container with a black lid at HL on sale, last night I cut out "Laundry" and some scrolls in black vinyl, it looks great, wish I'd bought more of those containers.

Renae said...

I like to cut vinyl and place on tiles for a last minute gift. This year I sewed santa and elf bags filled with rice that you can heat in the microwave to keep you warm or soothe those aches and pains.

rpcrafter at gmail dot com

bzyPTmom said...

I no longer need to make Teacher's gift, my daughter IS a teacher! But I'm making a gift basket for neighbor's and co-workers. I've purchased some "goodies"--hot chocolate mix, nuts, chocolates, etc--and I'm putting it all together in a pretty basket. I'm also adding some handmade ornaments--I used the clear glass ones, cut out small Christmas trees and deer out of acetate, ran them through the zyron and glittered them. Used clear glue to place inside the ornaments that I spot glittered form the inside with large snow looking glitter, after the tree and reindeer dried, added more "snowflakes" and cotton to look like snow.

Esther W-B said...

I love your project - so clever as always. I don't have teachers to make projects for but monogram tiles that could be used as coasters would be nice.

Anna said...

Wow how awesome!!! Very creative. I have made the hot cocoa for quick gift with the package of hot cocoa marshmallows and a candy cane to stir. Brought the cups at the Dollar Tree. Thanks for the chance to win.
annadowdy at gmail dot com

doodlingdebbie said...

Oh my goodness!! Jan, you are so clever and creative. I love this!!

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