2014 Ornament Swap

My co-workers are so creative! Here are this year's holiday ornament swap ornaments. I saved some room on my tree for these new guys. It's hard to choose which ornaments to put on my tree as my collection is growing bigger each year!

Peppermint Christmas Tree Garland

After I made all my glittery hot air balloon ornaments, I had a LOT of scraps left behind. 
It would've been a waste to just throw them away. So I used a big hole puncher and punched out some circles.

Then, I sewed them together side by side to make a lovely peppermint garland for my tree.

Hot Air Balloon Ornament

I found this tutorial online to make paper hot air balloons. I used glittery paper to give them a holiday sparkle. They were relatively easy to make. The only hard part was cutting out the pieces. The tutorial video shows a fancy paper cutting machine. My paper cutting machine consisted of an X-acto blade and a rather sore index finger.

Snowflake Stamp Gift Wrap

I had received a package the other day. The box was stuffed with kraft paper to protect the contents. Instead of throwing the kraft paper out, I decided to reuse it and make some pretty holiday gift wrap! I bought this snowflake stamp at the East Bay Depot for Creative Reuse during my last trip to San Francisco. It's one of my favorite spots to visit if I'm in the Bay Area. 

I also got to find gems like these to decorate my holiday cards:

I learned Christmas seals were bought as an extra charitable stamp for the holidays in order to raise money for tuberculosis and lung disease.