Saturday, November 30, 2013

Card Gift Set

I saw the November sketch on the Scrapbooker's Paradise blog and thought it would be perfect to create a set of cards that I could give as part of a teacher gift.  I didn't quite finish quick enough to enter it into their challenge, but definitely wanted to share none the same!

I used my 6x6 paper pads - I don't know how I lived without these before! and stamped images that I had in my stash, all watercoloured with Tombow markers, waiting for me to pull them out. The zigzag stamp is one of Dyan Reaveley's and I added some rub-ons on the right corner and a Tim Holtz Chit-Chat sticker on the top left. I left the insides blank so the recipient could write her own message.





I love the look of the rounded corners!
 
 

Since we are into the countdown to Christmas, and this being one gift I can check off my list, I'm entering into Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge - Countdown to the Holidays and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes!

Simon Says December Card Kit!

I got a wonderful package in the mail today! The December Card Kit from Simon Says Stamp. I am so excited to get started on making some fun cards. The great thing about these kits are the fantastic inspirational cards the design team comes up with. There is never a lack of ideas to create with these kits.
 
These two cards were inspired by Kristina Werner's cards she created using this kit.  I love this cute snowflake stencil! I've been looking for a good white gel pen and I pulled out one I've had for a while - the Gellyroll pen by Sakura - It worked amazing :)
 

You can see Kristina's post and video showing how to create this card on the SSS blog. I was able to very quickly make this card - I really like the woodgrain cardstock and the cute sentiment!


I'll be heading to my craftroom to whip up more cards using this kit very soon!

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Joy

The great thing about taking the Holiday Card Workshop 2013 from Online Card Classes is that you can keep going back to get more inspiration, watch the videos, check out the amazing gallery... Back on Day 3 I was inspired by Laura Bassen's card (love her plaid stamping!!) and so that's how this Joy card came to be. Since we're counting down to the big day (29 sleeps) I want to get in as many cards as I can before it gets too busy!

I started with Kraft cardstock and added some CTMH paper to the bottom, then I cut my Joy from the Create a Critter cartridge in red and black.  I love that when you start looking at all the cuts in a cartridge you get so many ideas and notice cuts you never did before! I sponged on some green Distress Inks, heat embossed snowflakes and swirls and a little gold border and then added a stamped sentiment to the center of the card.
Of course Stickles were added to the Joy die-cut and the center of the border!

I used the gold embossing powder again for the stamp inside the card and stamped a sentiment on the back side of the paper I used on the front of the card.
This really didn't turn out to be a clean and simple card like Laura's, but that's ok! It just seemed to need a little more, and more, and more...

Challenges:
Simon Says Monday Challenge - Count Down to the Holidays
Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog - Sparkle and Bling

Happy Birthday Fox

Even though my mind is on Christmas cards this month - I do have several birthdays to celebrate as well! My nephew's birthday is tomorrow and he definitely needed a cute little card.  I used the very cute fox cut from the Create a Critter Cricut cartridge and the party hat and windmill from the same cartridge. 

I used glittery cardstock to cut the green part of the hat and the windmill and a shiny orange cardstock to cut the fox, hat and windmill.  Of course I had to heat emboss my sentiment with Crystal embossing powder over Distress Ink.
Mr. Fox is sitting on a log sticker from a camping collection!
 I cut the center of the windmill out of brown cardstock, but it needed something else, so I added some Ice Stickles.
The inside cut is from the same cartridge and I again used the same shiny orange and glittery green cardstocks.

Hope you have a great birthday little man!

Challenges:
Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog - Sparkle and Bling

Scenic Trees

The final day of Holiday Card Workshop 2013 was once again amazing! Kristina Werner created a beautiful card with a scene of a black stamped trees against a blue and black inked background.  This 'scene' card theme went perfectly with the card I made with Scrapendipity's Make 'n Take card last week!

We used a die from Cheery Lynn to create this fun folded card, which has a matching die to cut the papers that decorate the card outside and inside. We first tore a piece of cardstock into a sloping hill and then sponged Distress Inks along the edge, moving the torn paper up to the top.  We then stamped the trees and heat embossed with white embossing powder that had glitter in it - so pretty! Then came the background snowflakes stamped with silver ink, the sentiment heat embossed with black and the die cut snowflakes and ribbon.
Inside:

When I got home I measured the cuts and created my own popped up card, using CTMH paper and creating a similar background for the front of the card.  I stamped this one with black trees using a CTMH stamp set, heat embossed the sentiment and stamped on snowflakes with Inkadinkadoo stamps. I used some sparkly Gelly Roll pens and Stickles to decorate my trees.
 Inside:
(stamp by CTMH)
 

With 29 sleeps to Christmas the countdown is on to get those Christmas cards made so we can start with the mailing out!

Challenges:
Simon Says Monday Challenge - Count Down to Christmas

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Peace - Trees and Snowflakes

I really like using non-traditional colours on my Christmas cards and Shari Carroll created a beautiful card for Day 4 of the Holiday Card Workshop 2013, featuring how to stretch your stamps. I used her beautiful card as inspiration to create my own card!

This week the Simon Says Monday Challenge Blog has a Mystery challenge.  So, I thought I'd show you my card and let you try to solve the 'mystery' of how I created it!


1) Stamp 3 trees on Ranger's Speciality Stamping Paper with archival ink
2) Stamp large and small snowflakes with Versamark and heat emboss with white embossing powder, partially covering the tree stamps
3) Stamp medium snowflakes with Versamark and heat emboss with Crystal embossing powder (it is clear, but sparkly, so stamp only on the white background.
4) Use a sponge to rub Distress Ink in Tumbled Glass all over the background of the Stamping Paper and then use Peacock Feathers around the edges, blending over the snowflakes well.
5) Stamp Peace sentiment with Versamark and heat emboss with Silver embossing powder.
6) Round 2 edges of the stamped piece and layer it on a card base with coordinating papers

Mystery Solved!

Hope you enjoyed :)

Happy Crafting!

Rudolph Die-cut Card

Online Card Classes' newest class, Holiday Card Workshop 2013 has so many great ideas for creating holiday cards! Day 2 featured die-cutting so I decided to make this cute reindeer to match the cute deer friend I made here.  I'm thinking I'll give one to each of my little girls for Christmas.  You have gotta love it when your 6 year old is excited about opening a card before a gift or when your 2 year old says "NICE!" when she sees a card!

This cut is from the Cricut Create A Critter cartridge and I used my Gypsy to cut everything.  I just sized it to fit on a 4x5.5" card and layered it on some CTMH Christmas paper.  Of course I added some glittery Stickles for some sparkle on his nose and ears and a real jingle bell tied on with bakers twine.




Challenges-
Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog - Use an animal cut

Saturday, November 16, 2013

Oh Dear!

Oh, I really like this little guy!! He is just so darn cute :) Day 2 of Holiday Card Workshop 2013 at Online Card Classes focuses on die-cuts, and I really wanted to use this cute cut from the Cricut Create a Critter cartridge.  I cut him with my Gypsy at about 4" high and layered him on some patterned paper from CTMH, the Evensong collection. I added some Stickles to his nose, ear, mouth and snowflake (which came out of the middle of the Joy phrase cut from the same cartridge) and added a dot of white in his eye with Enamel Accents.  He had to have a Christmas bow tied around his neck with a red button and some matching baker's twine, and now he's ready for Christmas!


Inside
Stamp by Inkadinkadoo
Challenges:
Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog - Use a ribbon and button
Die Cuttin' Divas - Use a button

Merry and Bright

Day 1 of the Holiday Card Workshop 2013 at Online Card Classes showed lots of fun ways to add details to the inside of your cards - something I often overlook.  I used Kristina Werner's card as inspiration to create this gift card holder greeting card.  For the front I cut a piece of Kraft cardstock slightly smaller than my card base and used an embossing folder first on the top portion of the card and then on the bottom, leaving part in the middle flat.  Then I sponged Distress Ink over the raised embossing and white heat embossed the snowflakes and sentiment from Penny Black.  I stamped the flower and ornament from a Penny Black Christmas stamp set on watercolour paper and coloured in with Tombow markers.  I hung the ornament on my baker's twine and added some Stickles.
 

For the inside, I folded a double sided paper and inked the edges with Distress Ink.  I cut a half circle in the top of the front fold and then put double sided tape, folded over the edges, on each side edge to keep the folder closed.  I added some silver glitter and then silver embossed the greeting.  I added a little sponged Distress Ink around the sentiment to highlight it and then hung on an ornament.


I love that a gift card is hiding inside this card - now to get to work making a few more!

Challenges -Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge - Add Ink!

Die Cut Peace Card

On Day 2 of the Holiday Card Workshop 2013 class at Online Card Classes the focus was on using die-cuts on your cards.  For this week's Make 'n Take with Scrapendipity by the ever talented Holly, we used a very cute window die cut with matching shutters! We embossed the front of the card with a wood-look embossing folder and then layered a piece of watercolour paper stamped and coloured in with Tim Holtz' Distress Markers (which I love!), the window and the shutters.  We die-cut the snowflake piece at the bottom and stamped the sentiment and placed a bow at the top. So pretty!


Inside
Challenges:
Simon Says Monday Challenge - Add Ink!

Clean and Simple Holiday Card

Day 3 of the Holiday Card Workshop 2013 at Online Card Classes features clean and simple cards.  There are some fabulous examples and videos for inspiration.  C&S cards are not my usual style, and I was totally overthinking it, but I really liked the way it turned out!

I used pink cardstock from Michaels, which is white on the backside, so when the card is folded the pink wraps around to the back of the card and the inside of the card is white.  I cut a strip of blue snowflake paper and used a border punch on it and then layered a journaling type card that came on a 12x12 paper onto some red cardstock and used some foam dots to pop it up. Lastly I added some Stickles on each ornament, rounded my corners, and voila! Clean and Simple!






Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Nanny's Sewing Room

The challenge swap at Lefty Productions' Facebook Group this month is to make a Mini Book from a sheet of cardstock and decorate it with the theme of your favorite place. It took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do, but seeing some pictures of vintage sewing supplies in a Country Living magazine made it easy! My grandmother was such a big part of teaching me to be crafty and if I could spend one day visiting her in her sewing room that's where I would choose to go.

I made my mini-album with one sheet of cardstock, following the directions on these two You-tube videos, here and here.  Then I got out my stamps, inks, buttons, ribbon, twine and embellishments and started having fun!






 







Front Cover
Back Cover

Challenge - Simon Says Monday Challenge - Get Inky!

I (Heart) Summer!

It's definitely not summer here right now! We've already had snow for the past week, but that didn't stop me from making this cute summer layout.

I used a cute 6x6 paper pack from Simple Stories, which included the paper I cut for my journaling, the bingo cards and words and the paper I used for the butterflies, which I die-cut with the Simply Sweet Cricut cartridge. 


I added rickrack, bakers twine and buttons and cut the little tab on the side of the journaling with the same cartridge. I coloured in the heart with a pink sparkly Jellyroll pen and then added some Glossy Accents. 


Love these little buttons - they look like little eyes!


Supplies:
6x6 patterned paper- Simple Stories
Cricut Cartridge - Simply Sweet
Rickrack ribbon, Bakers twine, buttons
Distress Ink
Number stickers- Making Memories
 

Christmas Card Snowman

I am so excited to start Day 1 of the Holiday Card Workshop 2013 at Online Card classes! There are 3 amazing videos and more guest artist inspiration just for the first day!  

The theme today was adding creative insides to your holiday cards. For this snowman card, which is a digi image from Bugaboo Stamps, I spritzed the card front with Heidi Swapp Tinsel Spray and then sponged through a Heidi Swapp stencil with Distress Ink to create a snowfall effect.  I used a rub-on for Merry and die-cut Christmas with the Cursive 101 Cricut Cartridge. I used my Gypsy so that I could arrange the letters a bit rounded and welded them together, and then I added some punched hearts and used a Jellyroll glitter pen for some glittery highlights. 

 
I die-cut the snowflakes with the Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge and covered them with Ranger's Sticky Stuff (which is awesome!) and then fine white glitter and coloured over some of the snowflakes with Tombow Markers.


For the inside I used a die-cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge and sponged around the edge with Distress Ink. I used Christmas stamps from Inkadinkadoo and stamped a sentiment, which I embossed with Crystal embossing powder to give it a bit of shimmer, and stamped the holly leaves and border. Of course the last touch was to add some berry Stickles
 
 

Simon Says Monday challenge has an Inky challenge this week! Hop on over there to see all the details :)

 

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Embossed Christmas Tag 2

Well, it certainly feels like winter here in Alberta! We got a foot of snow last weekend and it looks as it's going to be here for a while!

I just had to make one more tag using Jennifer McGuire's video as inspiration! I stamped the script stamp and heat embossed with white embossing powder on a Manila tag. I then misted with Dylusions ink spray over 2 snowflake masks I made by cutting die cuts with the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge and added some shimmery spray on top. I then stamped swirls and snowflakes with some silver embossing powder.
 
 The sentiment is stamped on a die cut from Spellbinders and I added some white gel pen dots around the edge.




Challenges:
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes
Fantabulous Cricut - Anything Goes