Holiday 2015 Collection: Try Citrus for Christmas!

Boy, do you all know how to make a lady feel good. Thank you for the very kind comments on my blog post yesterday introducing our first set of the Holiday release (if you missed it, click here!) as well as all of your supportive comments on our Bloom Brigade’s blogs!

Today I’m sharing a glimpse of another brand new clear stamp set (there will be five total, culminating in a big ol’ blog hop celebration on Sunday, October 18th to coincide with the sets being revealed in their entirety and available for purchase). Today’s set is a little spicy!

Spicy for Christmas? Oh, yeah. Spicy for Christmas. I’m talking about mulling spices. Cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, star anise, nutmeg. And what am I going to do with these spices? Well, around here, we make orange pomanders decorated with spicy aromatic cloves in a variety of patterns. Then we float them in apple cider tossed with the mulling spices, simmer it all on the stove, and seemingly instantly the sweet smells of the holidays fill the house! I have been so giddy about doing this set, I can’t even tell you. I went ahead and prepared a batch of orange pomanders and mulling spices this very morning and put it on the stove—I don’t have cider on hand so I used orange juice and sliced up an apple and tossed it in the saucepan!—so the scent will be wafting through the house when the kids wake up for school.

Speaking of slicing up stuff, here are a few slices of the Bloomie’s cards to show you what we’re up to today!

Details from spicy new cards by Christine Okken, Kathy Jones, and Allison Cope

I hope you’ll find this clear set to have all kinds of possibilities — it is versatile enough to use for Autumnal cards as it is for the Holidays. Presenting: Spice It Up!

Have you ever made these balls of smell-goodie-goodness? If you haven’t ever made your own citrus pomanders, I recommend that this be the year you give it a try. It is SO EASY and you can make them with little kids, too! The tradition goes back to Medieval times, so you can even try to work a history lesson into it. The patterns can be totally random, or you can try more orderly designs. I actually asked Lulu (age 13) if she would help me make a few last night and she was kind of over it. Get ’em while they’re young, before they can say no!! :)

You don’t have to float the pomanders in mulling spices, you can set them in a pretty bowl as a table centerpiece, or perch a few around the house in teacups or on beds of greenery. Many will eventually dry cure (they go off if there’s too much humidity and get icky, you’ll have toss those) — and provide decorative interest throughout the season. I still have some from a few years ago in my stash, but I’m one of those keepers of everything....

Even if you aren’t feeling like making actual pomanders, how about giving Spice It Up a go in your cardmaking and holiday crafting? You aren’t going to believe your eyes when you see the cute ideas coming from the Bloom Brigade today... some adorable, out-of-the-box thinking from these wunderkinds of creativity!! Go take a look...

Allison Cope
Christine Okken
Cindy Lawrence
Julie Koerber
Kathy Jones
Leslie Miller
Tosha Leyendekker

Thank you so much for coming by for Day 2 of our Holiday preview. Three more exciting days to go! See you back here tomorrow, I hope!