Christmas in January ....

Well, well, well - who would have thought it - lol.  I'm not the biggest fan of the season and as the CEO of the West Midlands hub put it - 'you can't be bah humbug' - and that was only on Boxing Day!  

Moving on ... At the beginning of December, while journeying through blogland as you do, I came across a beautiful project of a Christmas Village which was absolutely stunning.    It was a big piece - three foot long and was made of twelve houses (representing the twelve days of Christmas), with trees and was lit.  It was made by a very clever lady, Anita, and you can see it here ... 

I kept going back to Anita's blog and decided that I simply had to make me my own Christmas village.  So I emailed Anita to ask if she would mind me using her village as the inspiration for mine (which she didn't) and here's where I am so far ...

Nos 1 and 2, Christmas Lane ...

All of the houses are based on the Tim Holtz Artful Dwellings Die. Each one is cut from grunge board, a heavy weight cardboard and whichever decorative paper I'm using.  For the project I'm using TH Holidays Past paper stash and Christmas Emporium by Graphic 45 and a pad of Papermania Kraft Ledger type papers, plus making inroads into my box of Bazzill off cuts.
Love the cross on top of the Church (from the TH Mini Ornate Crosses Movers and Shapers die).  The heart on the door was on the string that a tied up a parcel from Art from the Heart (hands up everyone who is loving her new stamps being launched this week - waving hand vigorously in the air, while typing with the other one - lol)
No 2 was bigger than this - but I have deconstructed it and the other half will become No. 8.  The tinsel created a bit of a quandry and then on one of three trips to The Glitter Pot over the Christmas break - there it was - TH Tinsel Twine - love it.

Here's No. 3 Christmas Lane ...

This is the biggest house so far and is based n the biggest size of the Church.  As I don't have any of the Christmas Mini TH stamp sets this proved a bit of a dilemma 'cos the snowman on the stamp set that I do have didn't look right in scale, nor did the size of the TH Holiday Snowman die that I had - but like everything else the solution came at the oddest time.  I'd gone to bed to have an early night and only been there 20 minutes and bingo - lol.  So there I am up again and destroying one of TH's Christmas Tags from a couple of years ago - that snowman is so cute.  Just love the windows too - made with cocktail sticks - and that snowflake, made from the Mini Snowflake Rosette die ....

And Nos 4 and 5, Christmas Lane ...

The eaves of the roof of both of these were made with the TH Vintage Lane strip die. The holly wreath, which was cut from the TH Mini Wreath and Bow Movers and and Shapers die on the door looks a bit big but I used the holly leaves and berries from the Holiday Lamp Post die to give it some height.  I even had a rummage around and found a tiny star punch and then added some star shaped self adhesive gems.

Here they all are together (at the moment) ....

I have it in my head as to how the final project is going to look and I've had a chat with my employer's preferred carpenter who's going to make the base for me; and I'm looking at forms of non-electrical lighting. I think this would be really cool on a sideboard (do people have those nowadays - lol) or on a windowsill. 

Before I saw Anita's village, I was in the garden centre looking for possible suitable decorations for the Christmas cake (which was yummy by the way) and saw some trees.  Then I had to go back and get some more - aren't they fabulous ....

Then I found these dinky and gorgeous Christmas lights on the Calico Crafts site ....

So that's where I am so far - and I'm already thinking I could make a seaside town next - I have the cutest wooden lighthouse and a couple of beach huts upstairs which would make a good focal point - lol!

Off to make more houses ....