More Christmas houses

I've run out of blocks of wood to make houses, so these are the last of the Christmas gifts I'll be giving this year.  The rest of my gifts will either be quiltlets or flags.

Starting with the block of wood on the left, I first applied gesso to the wood, then painted two sides Teddy Bear Brown.  I added some of my handmade paper tags I made one time at my friend Kathy's.  I suppose I should modify that statement.  I made the paper at home, then made the tags using Kathy's die cut machine.

I didn't have enough tags to go all the way around, so I used yellow tags on two sides and blue tags on the other two.  I cut all the crowns using various magazine images, or hand painted paper.  The words came from various magazines, also.

I tried to save these as large as possible, using more blogger space than I care to admit.  You might be able to read the middle tag.  It is for my friend Elizabeth.  When we get together with friends, everyone has trouble talking to us, so the "other" Elizabeth came up with a way for people to address the right person.  She stayed "Elizabeth" and I became "Dr. Liz."  I actually prefer "Dr. E." (because it rhymes with "Queen of Free") but she chose it, so I used it for her gift.

The crowns were really washed out in this photo.  I couldn't even make out any words except "Home."

This view is not much better, even though I took Sandee's advice and took the photos from quite a distance and cropped them even more than I normally do.

For this house, I used the colors pink, red, brown, and yellow.  You may not be able to tell, but the slide mount has both yellow and red in it.  The house front is a "formica-type" countertop chip.  The home improvement stores used to give them free, but I don't think they do anymore.  The hole is covered using a button.

 

On one side of the roof, I added a wood piece I painted yellow.  The wood block had been gessoed a few weeks back.  The gesso was so thick it cracked.  When I added the paint, it gave a crackled effect.

I used similar materials for the back and added the words "Back door friends are the best."  I also added a child's domino block.

A punch and sheet music completed both sides.

Did I not mention I was out of lumber?  The rest of the wood I brought home was too small to turn into houses.  I had to attach two pieces of wood together to make this house.  Another counter top chip was used for the front, and the rest of these buttons.  I used hand painted paper on the sides and added punched Fleur de Les'.   For the front, I used various book pages and printed the words "Love lives here."

This shows the side and back from a better angle.

The back has another counter top chip, a button to cover the hole, and a child's domino.  Although I have often said I'm not the most original person when it comes to composition, choosing to make all my pieces the same, this time I did it for a reason.  These houses (not the wooden block with tags or the wooden block I made for my friend Kathy), like the ones I posted here, are going to family members of my friend Scott.  I wanted them to all be similar in composition, since they couldn't be in shape.  Again, I printed the words "Back door friends are the best" for the back side of the house.

Another Fleur de Les completes the final side.  These are now ready to go and I must start sewing the final pieces I will give my friends this year. 

Is your Christmas shopping finished, or are you still making Christmas gifts?  Did you buy or make gifts this year?