October 2010 CTMH Spotlight Blog Hop

Welcome to the October 2010 CTMH Spotlight Blog Hop.  This month we are featuring Christmas Projects.  If you've just arrived from {Nikka's} blog, you are on the right path.  If you are just starting here, simply click on the link at the end of the post to go to the next blog on our circular hop.

My project is a My Creations Memory Keeper inspired by the talented Lisa Stenz.   You could make a box like this to keep the holiday cards and pictures you receive from family and friends this year, or make dividers from cardstock and use it to house special ornaments or decorations, or you can do like me and use it to store the Christmas cards that you make throughout the year (because we have all been so diligently working on our Christmas cards since January).  This box was decorated with cardstock and the lovely Evensong Creative Basics paper (which, I'm sad to say, is retired).  For the top of the box, I covered some chipboard letters in Evensong papers, and then used the Finishing Files to clean up the edges before using white paint along the edges of the letters (because unlike the wonderful CTMH Dimensional Elements letters, which are white, the chipboard I used was that oh-so-attractive blah gray-brown color).  For the letters that were stacked, I used 3-D Foam Squares (which I cut in half through the height so they wouldn't pop up too much).  I added snowflake brads to the corners, and now I have a great place to keep the Christmas cards I make throughout the year.  (No, really.  I really DO start my Christmas cards in January.  Last year I even had them finished by early December.  Mailing them, however, was a different story.)  I've had a box like this for a while, and one thing I would do different is use glue instead of adhesive runners to attach the papers, especially to the top of the box.  After some time, the papers on the top of the box that I used adhesive runners on isn't as smooth as I would like.  This is a project that you can make multiples of:  one for Christmas cards, one for Birthday cards, one for Thank You cards, one for gift card holders, the possibilities are limitless.  These would also make great memory boxes for newlyweds, new parents, or grandparents.  Heck, you can make one to give as a gift and one to keep for yourself.  Those are the BEST kind of projects!

Now hop on over to {Traci's} blog for some more Christmas project inspiration.