Keeping Christmas {Frosty Pines Tree Farm}

Hello and welcome to February's installment of the Keeping Christmas Blog Hop! This post is a little difficult for me to write as I have had a hard week with the unexpected passing of my amazing and wonderful Mother-In-Law! As I created this month's project this last week, I couldn't help but think of how all of our Christmases will now be so different!  I hope you will cherish your family and your traditions because you don't know when they will be gone! My mind was so focused on other things, that my creativity was lacking, so the only thing that I could think of, was to make something that I wished I made last year and didn't get around to. I don't want to be a black cloud, so please forgive me if I am sending that message! Christmas is a wonderful and magical time; especially with the birth of our Savior and He gives me the promise that I will see my MIL again! Before I dive into my project, don't forget to hop along to the rest of the designer's blogs to get some fresh inspiration, and maybe some cheer! ha ha!

Kelly Lunceford (you are here)

Anita Madden 

Broni Holcombe 

Claire Broadwater

Julee Tilman

Kim Heggins

Lori Tecler

Nance Salkeld

Nina Forsyth 

Vicki Finger

Nancy Guse
Also, we are saying a sad to goodbye to Rachel Bergfeld who has wowed us with her amazing creations! Thank you for all you have done and contributed to our blog hop!

The Dashing Through the Snow series delighted us all this past year and I had so much fun making a bunch of the sleighs that you can see in THIS post. I also was able to make a few Autumn inspired trucks that you can see HERE, but I never actually made any Christmas trucks even though it was on my "want-to-do" list! 

I bought some larger bottle brush trees last year and knew that I wanted to add them to the top of the trucks, like you do when you pick out your fresh tree. My daughter informed me that if I had a truck, the tree wouldn't go on the top, but in the bed!  Well, of course, but if you need to fill it up with gifts, then it goes on the top! LOL! I made these sewn Santa sacks for the sleighs last year as well as a few for THIS project. I'm not 100 percent certain what will end up in the back of these trucks, but at least they're made! 

I ended up by making 4 trucks in total; Pure Poppy, Pale Peony, Vintage Jadeite and Pinefeather. I was so tempted to make them the same colors as the sleighs, but decided I wanted to change things up this year! I do have a photo of how I assemble these trucks at the bottom of the post, so make sure to take a look if you are interested. I had promised some assembly instructions clear back last fall and I am just now getting it done! To begin, I used the Dashing Through the Snow: Pickup Die and die cut all of the pieces using the different colors of cardstock.

I used metallic paper for all of the hubs, door handles, grill, bumpers, and hood piece. I really like the realism that it adds to the trucks. The Frosty Pines sign is stamped using the companion set called Dashing Through the Snow Sentiments. All of these products are on sale right now, which is awesome!

 I like to give the trucks some dimension on the fenders and the "Frosty Pines Tree Farm" sign. Everything else is flush to the truck.

Each truck was spritzed with Shimmer Spray and the tree is hot glued to the top for security.

I follow all of Betsy's instructions on the first steps, but I do prefer to completely decorate the pieces when it is flat so that I can get things placed correctly. I just really find it to be easier this way. This photo gives you a good visual of how it looks before I start gluing all of the tabs. Betsy uses liquid glue on her tabs, but I like using ScorTape. I use liquid glue for the other pieces that are shown here, with the exception of the popped up pieces. I hope you have fun on today's hop! Thanks for fluttering by!