Christmas Gifts Blog Hop

Hello everyone and welcome to Nonna's Craft Corner!

I am really excited today to be taking part in the Christmas Gifts Blog Hop and I'm really happy that you have joined in on the fun!  Before we get started, I want to say thank you to Becka at Creations With Becka for putting this hop together and letting me play along!

If you stopped by here from Beckie's at Just B Creative Crazy, you are in the right place!  If you just stopped by my blog for a visit and would like to start at the beginning of the hop you need to hop on over to Becka's at Creations With Becka.

Ok, so let's get started!  Today's hop is going to be filled with great ideas for homemade Christmas gifts for the special people in your lives, like family, friends, co-workers and teachers.  With Christmas just around the corner, we thought it would be a great idea to showcase some wonderful Christmas gifts not only made by hand, but also made with love!  Now...on to my special gift...

My gift today is for a special friend.  She and I have a lot in common and we both share a love for two very yummy things.....coffee and books!  I think we both agree that one of life's great pleasures is siting down with a good book and a hot cup of coffee.  So, I decided to combine both of those pleasures into a Christmas gift for my sweet friend and this is what I came up with...

 How's that for festive?

Let me tell you how I put this together!

I started with a Starbuck's 4 bottle Frappuccino carton.  Now, the first step is very, very important and I can't stress this enough...the first step is to drink all the Frappuccinos!  Once you get that step out of the way, you're ready to get started...hey...crafting is a tough job!

Once I emptied all my bottles, I washed them out really well and peeled the labels off.  You may have to use some Goo-be-gone to get all the sticky residue off.  I also spray painted the lids white.  Be sure to let them dry and air out for a day or two to avoid any yucky paint smells!

Next, it's time to decorate your box.  Chose your patterned paper and get busy! I do recommend that you use some fairly sturdy paper so that it will hold up well.  You can see more instructions on covering the box along with more photos by clicking HERE.  

Once you are finished covering the box, it's time to decorate and the options are endless!  I knew that I wanted to incorporate something to do with books into my gift and I came up with the idea of using part of the decorations as a gift card holder.  So, when creating the mat for my cute little coffee cup, I cut two layers and used foam dimension strips to adhere the layers together.  This allowed room to insert my gift card...

*The mat is created using the Art Philosophy cartridge by Cricut.  This cut is found on page 47 and is cut at 4.5 inches.  The white portion is embossed with the Snowflakes folder and I added Martha Stewart's Garnet glitter to the red frame.

*The coffee cup is from the Winter Frolic cartridge and is cut at 3.5 inches.

*I placed my gift card onto the bottom layer (cut in red) of my mat to see how I needed to place my foam strips.

*After putting the layers together, I used Zip Dry glue to add my completed mat to the covered frappuccino carton.

*I also punched a small hole in one end of my gift card to add some tulle.  Be very careful not to punch anywhere near the black strip that is scanned at the store!

While all of that was drying, I worked on covering the frappuccino bottles.  I cut a strip of patterned paper and added a white strip that I created with a Martha Stewart punch.  I glued them onto the bottles using Zip Dry glue and added a bit of white ribbon.  You don't want to make the bottles too bulky or they won't fit back into the carton.  Next, I filled the bottles with different, flavored creamers....

 *I typed the name of each creamer and printed them out on white cardstock.  I used a circle punch to punch out each label.  Next, I inked up the white circles with red ink.

* Using Art Philosophy, I cut out red scallops from the image found on page 41 at 1.5 inches.  I covered them in the Martha Stewart glitter then adhered the white portion of the label.  These were glued to the top of my bottles.

For a festive look, I tied strips of red and green tulle around the handle of the carton...

And, I created a tag for the side of my carton...

*I cut this little tag out by hand, added some gems and some tulle.  The sentiment is from the Old Time Christmas stamp set by Pink By Design.  And that finished off my gift!

I have enjoyed sharing my little gift with you today and I hope you have enjoyed your visit with me!  Your next stop on the hop is with Anna Bee at Anna Bee Designs ....have fun!

Oh...but before you go...I do have a little gift for one lucky follower....

This is a super cute Christmas stamp set by Recollections!  For a chance to win, you need to do the following...

1.  Be a follower of my blog

2. Leave a comment on this post

3.  If you would like to have your name added to the drawing twice, just copy my cute little button over on the right side of my blog and add it to the sidebar of your blog.  Be sure to leave an additional comment on this post telling me that you have done so!

I will use Random Number Generator to chose a winning name on Tuesday, November 29th.

I am also posting this on Made It Myself Mondays!

Thanks again for stopping by and enjoy the rest of the hop!

Until next time,