Welcome to Day Eight of the 2017 edition of our always-popular 10 Holiday Tips & Tricks series here on The Digital Press blog!

Stefanie here today, bringing you a fun (and adult-friendly!) recipe for the milk and cookies you leave out for Santa. 🙂

As part of our family’s holiday tradition, we leave out a side plate with some milk and cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve. I don’t know about your Santa… but the one who visits our house is usually very tired and in need of a pick-me-up… so why not treat him to an adult version? We call them ‘milktart shooters,’ and we serve them up with some yummy crunchies on the side.

Here are the recipes…

Milktart Shooters

INGREDIENTS
— 375ml vodka
— 395g tin condensed milk
— 375ml tin evaporated milk
— ground cinnamon to serve

 

INSTRUCTIONS
— Mix the ingredients together and shake well
— Store in a bottle in the fridge for up to 4 days

Crunchies

INGREDIENTS
— 1 cup oats
— 1 cup cake flour
— 1 cup white sugar
— 1 cup dessicated coconut
— 165g butter melted with 15mls syrup; then add 5mls bicarb, pinch of salt*, a squirt of lemon juice* and 15-30mls boiling water*

*optional

INSTRUCTIONS
— Mix dry ingredients well.
— Make a well in the dry ingredients and add the wet ingredients; mix well and press down firmly into a rectangle-shaped oven pan.
— Bake at 180C for 12-15 min (but check often, as it can burn quite easily).
— Cut into squares while still warm (let cool for about 5-10 min after removing from the oven before cutting).
— Will keep well in a sealed container for at least 4 days.

 

If you’re thinking of giving one (or both!) of these recipes a try… head over to The Digital Press’s challenge forum and get the details about how you can earn challenge points for December 2017 at TDP if you try any of our “10 Holiday Tips & Tricks” throughout the month as they appear here in this blog series!

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About the author Stefanie is a member of The Digital Press creative team and a stay at home mother of three older children living in Cape Town, South Africa with her hubby of 29 years, two of their three children and 3 cats. She loves photography, traveling and digital scrapbooking, documenting the good and the ordinary everyday.

Welcome to Day Seven of the 2017 edition of our always-popular 10 Holiday Tips & Tricks series here on The Digital Press blog!

Today I’m here to show you how to make these adorable pom pom photo ornaments… with QR codes that link to video clips!

Every year I try to make at least one handmade ornament with my kids. They love it… and I love it! Each year when we decorate our Christmas tree, it is always so much fun to unwrap past handmade ornaments and remember the fun times we had creating them. I usually try to incorporate a photo or a hand print or something that shows how little they were when the ornaments were made.

This year’s ornament has a fun twist! Instead of leaving the back of each ornament plain, I created a digital element containing (a) a holiday sentiment, (b) my child’s name, (c) the date, and (d) a QR code! The QR code is a way to link straight to a video clip that’s stored online (think: YouTube, Vimeo, etc.). Why? I really want to take more videos of my kiddos. Time is moving way too fast, and I want to remember the silly way they mispronounce words… their sweet, raspy voices… their jolly holiday jokes… and their joyful smiles.

Therefore, I recorded a short video of each of my kiddos (and I also threw a Santa hat onto each, because they hadn’t gotten ready for the day yet and I was battling major cases of Bed Head! LOL). I uploaded the videos to Vimeo (where I host all my videos and slideshows), and then I used this site to create the QR code (I also use this app to scan/read the QR codes with my phone).

How To Create the Ornament

Supplies Needed:

• White cardstock paper
• Green and red craft pom poms
• Glue & stapler
• String
• Digital products of choice (I used Hello December Papers by Dunia Designs)
• I also used the information found in Tutorial Tuesday | Writing Text Around a Circle 🙂

1. First, create a file in Photoshop (or photo editing program of your choice) using 1.5″ circles… and clip photos to the circle shapes (in Photoshop, using the “clipping mask” function; a.k.a. Ctrl-Alt-G)…

2. Next, print your document onto plain white cardstock paper…

3. Use a circle punch to cut out the circles (or, you can use scissors and fussy cut the circles, if you prefer)…

As you can see, I decided to add an optional white border around each photo (shown above).

4. Next, I used a recycled box to cut larger circles that I could affix my photos to, as shown below…

My larger cracker box circles are about 3″ in diameter…

5. After attaching the photo to the cardboard, I stapled a jute string onto the cardboard to create a hanger. Then, I had my kids glue pom poms onto the cardboard portion to create a wreath shape…

Here’s a look at what the finished ornament looked like after my kids finished gluing the pom poms on to create wreaths around their photos…

How to Create the QR Code and Video Clip

1. Take a video clip (clip can be of your kid making the ornament… or saying something funny… or sending holiday greetings to family members who live far away… etc. Anything goes!). Upload your video to a video sharing service of your choice (I use Vimeo).

2. Create a QR code to link to the video (I use this site to create mine).

3. Create another file in Photoshop with 3” circles and clip patterned paper onto the circles. Then, add a smaller white circle on top of that (about 2.5″ or so in diameter? It depends on how much of a patterned paper border you prefer. Mine, below, is about 0.5″ border and 2.5″ white circle)…

4. Add the QR code image to the white circle, along with some text (optional). The text can be a date… a holiday message… information about the creator of the ornament… etc.

5. Print on white card stock and cut out. Adhere to the back of the ornament, as shown here…

And that’s it! Easy peasy! 🙂

 

If you’re thinking of giving this a try and making your own… head over to The Digital Press’s challenge forum and get the details about how you can earn challenge points for December 2017 at TDP if you try any of our “10 Holiday Tips & Tricks” throughout the month as they appear here in this blog series!

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About the Author  Krista Lund is a mom of 3, married to her high school sweetheart and living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of her favorite things are brownies, chips ‘n’ dip, taking pictures, and documenting her family’s story.

Hello, and welcome to Day Five of our always-popular 10 Holiday Tips & Tricks series here on The Digital Press blog! Today I am going to show you how to use your digital scrapbooking supplies to make a holiday memory album. It’s much easier than you’d think… and so much fun!

Supplies Needed

• Digital scrapbooking kit (or kits) of your choice
• White cardstock paper
• Scissors or cutting machine
• Other physical scrapbooking supplies, as desired (optional; for adding extra dimensional embellishments, etc.)

For my album this year, I primarily used the digital kit Hello December By Dunia Designs, as shown here…

Once you’ve gathered all of your supplies, there are just a few simple steps. I’ve broken down what I did on a page-by-page basis, below…

Album Cover

• I chose a patterned paper for the cover, and trimmed it a little bit smaller in order to create a border around that patterned paper background.
• I also chose two pocket cards and re-sized them in order to fit to my cover as embellishments on top of the patterned paper background.
• Next… I re-sized, printed, and cut some cute elements and word bits to add on top of the cards from the last step.
• Finally, I added a piece of pompom ribbon and two enamel hearts (I like to finish a lot of my hybrid projects using some traditional scrapbook supplies; they add more interest and texture to my projects).

Inside Cover / First Page

• I used a piece of vellum paper behind my front page to soften the first page view and to give more depth and interest to my album.
• Next, I chose a banner-shaped page from my physical supply stash and decorated it with a card and some elements. I re-sized both the card and the elements in order to them fit to my banner page without making it too full/busy.
• Finally, I added some washi / glitter tape.

Inner Pocket Pages

• For the first of my inner album pages, I chose two pocket cards from the digital kit and printed them to fit into my pockets.
• I added some digital sequins to my 3×4 digital card (see right page, below) and this created a new card. I also glued a border onto my 6×4 card, in order to give balance to the spread.
• I re-sized some digital elements (including the cute flair button on the right), and I glued these outside the pockets.
• I typed my journaling before I printed my 6×4 card, and I used a piece of word art as a title.
• Finally, I added some traditional embellishments… like a cute Christmas tree, a clear holly sticker, a clear word art sticker, and some other bling.

• For the next spread of pages, I used a page with lots of pockets on the left (to include lots of little individual photos, etc)… and I made a tag insert using a very beautiful patterned paper on the right.
• I also chose a 3×4 card, which I embellished with a cute printed border.
• Additionally, I chose some printed elements and put them into all of the non-photo pockets (see below, left side) along with some traditional embellishments like the sequins, the glitter stars, the cute bow, the Christmas twine, a word sticker, etc.
• I printed my little photos slightly smaller than 2×2, because I wanted to leave a white border around them.

• Here’s a look at the back side of that fun tag (from above), where I added some journaling…
• I also decorated my page with pompom ribbon along the right edge/border.

• Here’s a closer look at some of the small pockets, so you can get a look at the contents I added into each tiny pocket before sewing them shut (as you can see, I chose some patterned papers to be the backgrounds for some of the flat circular flairs that I printed… and the same elements I used in the front of the page. I glued them back to back as well. I used one more cute glittery Christmas tree to create a focal point almost in the middle of the page)…

• And here’s another closer-up look…

You could repeat different variations of these last few pages I’ve shown you… in order to accommodate as many photos/pages as you like in your own album! You’ll find that it’s so fun to fill the pockets with little decorative objects.

And that is all there is to it! Wasn’t that easy?! 🙂

I hope you have a chance to give this project a try! If you’re thinking of giving this a try and making your own… head over to The Digital Press’s challenge forum and get the details about how you can earn challenge points for December 2017 at TDP if you try any of our “10 Holiday Tips & Tricks” throughout the month as they appear here in this blog series!

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About the Author  Andrea Albuquerque is part of the Hybrid Creative Team here at Digital Press. Andrea has been a scrapper since 2010 and a photographer since 2012. Although she adores the flexibility and creativity of digital, she can’t resist playing with paper, paint, and embellishments… so hybrid scrapping is the perfect medium for her! She lives in Brazil with her hubby.

Hello there! Amie here (of Little Lamm Paper Co.)… wishing you a very Happy December and welcoming you to Day One of the 2017 edition of our always-popular 10 Holiday Tips & Tricks series here on The Digital Press blog!

Today I’m here to share a fun “book-a-day” style Advent Calendar that I am doing this December with my son, Ian. I’m hoping this post is early enough to be helpful for anyone who has kids (or book-loving adults?) in their household and still needs Advent Calendar ideas for the upcoming holiday season!

I’m not going to lie… originally, in the beginning, my plan was to wrap up 24 books individually and tag each one with the numbers 1-24… but then I found a really easy (and actually quite fun!) “lazy” way to get this project up and running — an awesome time-saver, and yet still exciting for the recipient!

I was saved from the work (and waste) of endless wrapping by none other than the Dollar Spot at Target (you red card holders know where that is!). There, I found some cute burlap-ish gift bags and bought one to use as a daily “Santa Bag,” of sorts, to deliver each day’s book. I decided to alter one of my own home decor designs — the Arctic Reindeer print — to make an iron-on transfer for the bag…

After making birthday shirts for 6 years now, I definitely have a few tips to share for successful iron-on transfers…

1. Don’t forget to reverse your image! If the image is not backwards on the paper, it will be on the shirt/bag. 😉
2. Don’t use the “iron transfer” setting on your printer. This has always come out with fuzzy images on any printer I’ve ever owned. Instead, I reverse the image myself in Photoshop… and I print it out as a photo on matte paper at the best printing level. This gives me a perfect crisp image every time.
3. LINT ROLLER YOUR CLOTH BEFORE DOING THE TRANSFER! We have 2 cats and a bulldog in our house, and no surface stays clear for more than 2 seconds. Most of my son’s birthday shirts have a cat hair embedded into the image if I forget this step.
4. Don’t forget to let the image cool completely before taking off the paper.
5. Save money by planning ahead. I’ve learned not to buy iron-on transfers from local big-box stores like Office Depot, etc. (where I have, in the past, spent $18 on the same item I could have gotten from Amazon for $8).

With regard to the book-a-day part of this Advent Calendar project… I have heard of some people who wrap library books or buy used books (BetterWorldBooks is a great used book source). Some people also just use any stories — they don’t necessarily have to be Christmas-themed!

For our family, we unwrap our last book on December 23rd due to the fact that we spend Christmas Eve with family. On that final night, my son gets a new book and a set of pajamas as his final gift. This year, we got him the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them book because it has a Griffin on the cover (a family name!)… and also some Star Wars PJs so he can wear them to the late showing of the upcoming The Last Jedi movie on his birthday, which is December 26. 🙂

To make sure I remember to re-fill the book bag each night… I have set a reminder on my phone for 9:00pm each night starting on November 30th — and that’s when I put a new book into the sack. Then, the sack will go into the basket with any books that we have already opened…

Every morning when Ian wakes up, there will be a new package under the tree.

In case you need some ideas for books… here are some of my of favorite Christmas/winter-themed books from over the years…

• Christmas for Greta and Gracie by Yasmeen Ismail
• The Day Santa Stopped Believing in Harold by Maureen Fergus
• Maple & Willow’s Christmas Tree by Lori Nichols
• Bear’s Winter Party by Deborah Hodge
• Bear Stays Up For Christmas by Karma Wilson
• The Gingerbread Man Loose at Christmas by Laura Murray
• Beyond the Pond by Joseph Kuefler
• The Tea Party in the Woods by Akiko Miyakoshi
• Du Iz Tak by Carson Ellis
• Harold at the North Pole by Crockett Johnson
• The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
• Olive, the Other Reindeer by Vivian Walsh
• A Wish to Be a Christmas Tree by Colleen Monroe
• The Christmas Wish by Lori Evert
• Olivia Helps With Christmas
• Walking in a Winter Wonderland by Richard B Smith
• Wendell The Narwhal by Emily Dove
• The Christmas Eve Tree by Delia Huddy
• The Lost Gift: A Christmas Story by Kallie George
• The Great Spruce by John Duvall
• The Wish Tree by Kyo Maclear
• First Snow by Bomi Park
• Little Penguins by Cynthia Rylant
• The Little Reindeer by Nicola Killen
• Pick a Pine Tree by Patricia Toht
• Red and Lulu by Matt Tavares
• Walk This World at Christmastime by Debbie Powell

If you’re thinking of trying this… head over to The Digital Press’s challenge forum and get the details about how you can earn challenge points for December 2017 at TDP if you try any of our “Holiday Tips & Tricks” throughout the month as they appear here in this blog series! Additionally, I’d love to see any photos of your December/holiday projects using TDP goodies in the gallery this month, so link me up after you’re finished creating and uploading! 🙂

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About the Author  Amie Lamm is the designer behind Little Lamm Paper Co. at The Digital Press. She is a work at home mom/graphic artist living in Fargo, North Dakota with her hubby, her almost 6 year old son, 2 lazy cats, and a hyper bulldog. She survives her days with copious amounts of coffee and recorded episodes of Fixer Upper.