I’m always looking for ways to use my stamps in different ways.  Sure I love making cards, but sometimes you need something different and its fun to use your stamping supplies to add that personal touch.  In this case, my sister-in-law’s birthday is 2 days before Christmas.  So, when I bought her a gift at the local soap store, they offered to decorate the box as a gift.  I couldn’t turn down free gift wrapping but after they gave me the wrapped gift, I realized it was really Christmas wrapped.  My birthday is a week before Christmas, so I’m pretty sensitive to differentiating birthday and Christmas gifts, so I wanted to make sure her gift was definately “birthday” and not “christmas”.  So, stamps to the rescue! 

 The turtle is from a hostess set from the last catalog, but the tag is from the new Party Hearty set and the Happy Birthday under the turtle is from A Little Birthday Cheer.  This was also my first time in a long time using water color pencils.  They are like magic!  🙂  If you haven’t used them before, you color in an image with the pencils and it looks like normal pencil.  But then, go over the colors with a water pen and suddenly the color blends and instead of pencil marks, you just have a smooth watercolor image.