Artisan Wednesday Wow ~ Merry Christmas

Welcome back to one last week of Artisan Wednesday Wow for 2013!  It has been a lot of fun sharing our projects with you this calendar year and we are definitely looking to sharing more with you again in the New Year!  Thank-you for coming back each week to have a peek at what we’ve created for you!  With this post, I wish all of you and my fellow Artisan Design Team members a Merry Christmas and happy celebrations for whatever holiday you celebrate!  I hope your holiday is filled with family time, happy celebrations filled with love and laughter and good health!

Today’s project celebrates all of the things I’ve mentioned above in my wishes for you and more!  I have created a really simple ornament.  You’ve probably seen them all over the internet by now and if you’re one of my hostesses, you probably even made one at my Host Appreciation night.  This one has a little bit of a twist!  I made it into an ornament kit to use an a Memory Ornament.  Here’s how it looks and I’ll explain more for you below.

I wanted to gift this ornament to quite a few people and to fit quite a few purposes.  So, instead of filling the ball myself, I curled all of the paper and put it in the Decorative Window Gift Boxes.  I used two sheets (one of each pattern) from the Season of Style OR Winter Frost DSP stacks.  (I cut them at every 1/4″. You can see that the glass ball is nestled on top of the box.  I removed the window sheet from the window so that the ball could sit in the hole and stay put.  That also made it easy to toss the curls into the box as I went and once I had curled (with the help of my crafty little elves ~ my sons) the two sheets of paper, I moved onto the next box.

The little stack of Whisper White Cardstock is intended to record memories or a variety of other things on each strip.  Once the recipient has recorded memories, goals, traditions or whatever they wish on the strips of cardstock, they will curl each piece of paper and take turns dropping a piece of cardstock and then one of each of 4 patterns of paper into their glass ball ornament until it is full.  The intention is to then hang it on the tree to keep their memories close by at Christmas time.

Here are just a few things this ornament can help you to record or keep a memory of that year or of years gone by:

1. Favorite memories of Christmases past with a loved one that is no longer here (it is my intention to do this with my own family this year to record our favorite Christmas memories of my Dad).

2. Favorite memories of Christmases spent in a home that you have moved out of to keep with you hanging on your tree in your new home.

3.  New traditions to begin or that were enjoyed this Christmas after a big change in life.

4. The beginning of new Christmas traditions for a new family

5. Goals for the New Year to achieve by next Christmas (whether you’re faced with challenges or are a goal setter).

This ornament really has many different purposes that you can use it for to keep a memory on your tree of where you are right now or of where you’ve come from.  It has been our pleasure this season to gift this Memory Ornament to many different people and hope that they have (or will) enjoy doing this activity with their family or on their own when the time is right.

I tucked the box along with the strips and the ball into a big cello bag and tied it up with some ribbon and a snowflake ornament.  Instructions were given in a hand-stamped card of course!   I tried to co-ordinate the ornaments to go with each recipients Christmas decor.

Here is what the ornament looks like just full of DSP. This version is what my boys gave to the staff at their school.   They helped curl all of the paper and did a fabulous job!

This was a really easy gift that was lovingly put together with the help of my kids for many people whom we hope enjoy having them on their tree each year for years to come!

Wishing you a Merry Christmas and hoping you all stay safe this season! Let’s go see what Becky and all of the other girls have to share today!  Hop all the way through to Mercedes and we’ll catch up again in the New Year!