Merry Christmas to All

And to all a good night.

Hope you all have a safe and wonderful Christmas.

Mini Sled Ornament

I made this sled using mini popsicle sticks, so it's the perfect size to hang on a tree.  I got the pattern for the sled from Serendipity Refined, though I didn't sketch it, so after making a few that didn't look right, I had to look at the post more closely to get the proper placement of things.

I put the sled together with hot glue (I tried regular white glue first, but it took so long to dry and didn't seem stable).

It looked a little plain so I decided to spruce it up with some mini pinecones I'd found last year that I partially spray painted gold (so you get gold tips but brown elsewhere), two leaves with glossy accents (so they would have a bit of dimension) and a tiny poinsettia (using one of the new Spellbinders dies).

White and Silver Christmas Card

I embossed the snowflake swirl on my card base and die cut an oval.  I die cut a hill and glued some buildings and trees that I'd cut out on my Silhouette.  After attaching the oval to the base I glued down some silver 'greenery' and a poinsettia flower.

Holly Branch Clean and Simple Card

This is another CAS card I made with the Simon Says Stamp Holly Berries stamp set.

Bird Nest Ornament

The idea for this ornament came from Favecrafts.

I took a mini plastic shot glass and applied puffy paint to the rim, then spread chunky glitter on it. Once that was dry I glued some faux snow (ie stuffing) to the bottom of the glass, then added some real twigs and 2 punched leaves with glossy accents on them for the nest.  Finally, I glued the bird on the little 'nest' and hot glued a hanging cord on top out of giftwrap ribbon.

Pine Branch Clean and Simple Christmas Card

I made this card using one of the exclusive Simon Says Stamp sets that came out last year.  I love that you can stamp the pine cones separately in a different colour.  It makes for easy, clean and simple cards.

Ribbon Angel Ornaments

I got this ornament idea from the wonderful tutorial at Happybird's Crafting Haven.

I did two of these ornaments, one using the 'correct' number of ribbon folds, one one with fewer.  I like how they both turned out.  I glued a bell on as a head and attached the cord for hanging.

Skating Christmas Card

This is a card I designed for one of my sister-in-laws who loves to skate.

Bird Feeder Ornament

This ornament was patterned off the one at S.C.R.A.P..  The craft is designed to help you reuse some old scrap, specifically a pill bottle and a juice bottle cap.

I started off by painting my cap black and filling a mini bead bottle with bird seed.  I glued the pieces together and glued on a small branch.  I found a set of 3 mini birds at a local craft store, and glued one on to the branch.  For the metal top, I used a circle cut from a previous year's Christmas cracker, and glued it into a cone and then glued it to the bottle.  It's a bit fragile, so if I did this again I'd either use cardboard for the cone or glue the paper onto cardboard or cardstock so it's firmer.

Christmas Portal Card

This is a joke card I made for one of my husband's friends.  I was looking at the peppermint stamp background and this idea came to me, fully formed.  What if the twist were a black hole style portal, and a kitty were being sucked in?  I really love how the second kitty is looking down and holding its hands, as if it's just done something bad.

Christmas Tree Hot Chocolate Mug Ornaments

I didn't have much time for making Christmas cards this year, so I ended up whipping some clean and simple cards.  I did, however, find some time to make cute Christmas tree ornaments I'd pinned in previous years.  Here's a hot chocolate mug ornament, patterned off the one by Loraine at Breakfast for Dinner.

I wasn't able to find mini plastic mugs, so I took a mini shot glass and used hot glue to make the handles.  I drew a handle on a piece of scrap paper, then squeezed a think line of glue over it.  The glue peeled off well, but was flat on the paper side, so I squeezed a second line of glue on the flat side so it would have dimension as well.  I then glued the handle to the cup.

I painted the edges of the mug with brown paint, then when it was dry, took a circle of construction paper with the edges clipped in and carefully shoved the edges inside the mug while leaving a flat top.  I painted the top and cut a hole.

Once the paper was dry I twisted a red and white pipe cleaner together and bent it into a small candy cane, snipping it to size, then glued it in and glued some white pom poms around it as marshmallows.

Thank You Card Sets

I decided to make a bunch of Thank You cards and give sets of them away to friends for Christmas this year.  Towards that end, I took a took a look at the cards I've done in the past and recreated a bunch of them with different colours and slightly different designs.  Here's what I came up with.

 I stamped a floral design on my card base (flowers for women, cattails for  men) and then added a punched panel accross the bottom.  I stamped my sentiment and added a punched butterfly or dragonfly as an accent.  I used white ink on the dark pink card (as the other tones I tried seemed to clash too much).  The white ink didn't come out solid, so I filled in the flowers with a white pen (I could have embossed with white as well, but I like how it turned out).

Festive Deer Card

I made this card as a submission for Simon Says Stamp's 'Wrap It Up' Challenge.  I patterned it off of this card I found by Donna M on Splitcoast Gallery.

I started out by die cutting and embossing the buck from the Sue Wilson Deer Family die out of a glossy white cardstock.  I die cut a piece of black cardstock to frame it.  Despite the shading in the picture, the card base is white.  I took a piece of Donna K patterned paper for the center panel.  I didn't have any blue paper in the shade I wanted for the borders on the panel, so I coloured some white cardstock with a blue marker.  I glued the two strips on and made indents in the paper where the white thread would go (if I had silver thread I'd have used that instead for this).  I threaded the paper and taped it in place on the back before gluing the panel down.  I used pop dots to attach the deer frame to the card.

Purple Rose Birthday Card

I made this card for my mother's birthday.  I started by stamping the two tone roses in light and dark purple on white cardstock along with the leaves.  I fussy cut them out.  I scored the bottom of my card panel to give it some dimension, added a piece of purple velvet ribbon and stamped my sentiment before using pop dots to attach the roses and leaves to the card.  As a finishing touch I added a few crystals.

Angels are Friends... card

A friend of mine recently visited from out of town.  I normally have to send her cards I can mail, so I thought I'd do something a little less small and flat.  The card actually turned out so big it wouldn't fit in any of the envelopes I had!

As with most of my cards I started with the stamped image.  I wanted the angel and dove to sparkle a bit and so stamped them on a glossy cardstock and cut them out with a Spellbinders die.  The sentiment was masked and stamped (so it's on two lines rather than one).

I used a large square white cardstock for the card base, layered a piece of black cardstock and put a top layer of patterned paper with some flowers and curliques.

I die cut the window frame out of gold parchment paper, and the greenery on my Silhouette.  The purple flowers were punched and have glitter glue in their centers.  I also added a few pieces of fishing wire with some beads on the end.

Have a Fabulous Day

Sorry for the dark photo.  I started this card with a cream base and die cut two layers, one from patterned paper and one from a slightly darker cream paper.  I stamped a frame on the patterned paper (note to self, stamp first, then die cut to get it properly centered).  I stamped the sentiment on the upper layer and sponged ink around it.  To put it together I wrapped some ribbon around the first layer, lacing it through the upper layer, which I used pop dots to attach.  Then I glued the whole thing onto the base.  To finish the card I added some purple punched butterflies.  

Christmas in July - Winter Scene

I made this card to try out a new Spellbinders die set I bought to frame scenes, Regal Frame.  I started with a piece of glossy paper.  I die cut the frame and left the die in place to keep the edges ink free.  I then used a ripped piece of paper to help me ink a hill.  I stamped the cabin, snowman, trees and sleigh and then used different shades of blue ink to the page.

I die cut a darker blue frame for layering and added some light blue snowflakes.  Once the card was layered on the white card base, I dded some white gel pen snowflakes.

With Deepest Sympathy card

Sorry for the long hiatus.  I hadn't intended to be away from card crafting for so long, but my other blog and trip plans started taking up more and more time so...  And then when I started making cards again I was too lazy to photograph them and blog about them.  I'm hoping to get back to posting one or two cards a week.

This is a card I made a while back.  I stamped the vase, sentiment and shelf in black in, and the flowers in grey.  I then scribbled some pink water based marker on my stamp block and used a water brush to apply it to the flowers.  As a finishing touch I added glossy accents to the vase (which looks great and gives the card some dimension but warped the page a bit).

Birthday Flowers Card

I'm submitting this card to Simon Says Stamp's Birthday Challenge as well.  I used a stamp positioner to make sure everything went on straight as I used a set of rubber stamps for this (as opposed to clear stamps).  I stamped the shelf, then the vase, the sentiment and finally the flowers.  I coloured in the petals and used a bit of yellow glitter glue for the centres.  A quick card but I like how it looks.

Flowery Easter Card

If you celebrate Easter, I wish you a very happy one, with lots of chocolate. ;D

I started this card by carefully laying the flower die on the unmarked fold line of the card.  It pops up over the fold line when it's cut.  I then scored and folded the card base.  I coloured the stamped image using spectrum noir markers and die cut it out.  I cut a small printed panel and attached some purple ribbon to it, lacing it through the die cut frame before attaching it behind the panel.  Finally I stamped Happy Easter.

SSS Challenge's 6th Birthday.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately.  I've had several other time consuming projects come up and haven't had much time for card crafting.

This is a birthday card I made to celebrate Simon Says Stamps Challenge's 6th 'birthday'.  I've enjoyed entering their challenges a lot the past few years.

I stamped the two frames and the sentiment (I stamped off the 'Happy' so the words would be visible despite the overlap) and then die cut them out.  I die cut the bottom of my card base and then the patterned panel.  I added some ribbon and then layered the die cuts on top, finishing off with a punched butterfly (with some glitter pen for accent).

Congratulations Card

Sorry I haven't been around much.  I've been busy with a bunch of other projects and haven't had much time for card crafting lately.  I did spend a few days making and adjusting silhouette cute files for greenery and cutting them out in different colours so I have quick access foliate.

I used some of that foliage for this card.

I die cut and embossed the bottom of a black panel of cardstock.  I then die cut some flowers out of red cardstock and used black paint to add interest.  I scrunched the petals and added some white foliage.  I stamped the sentiment in dark red ink on the white cardstock base.

I'm submitting this card to Simon Says Stamp's Anything Goes challenge.

Blue Butterflies Card

I made this card for another Papertrey Ink challenge, to create a blue ombre effect.  For this card I tried something I've wanted to do for a while, make stamps out of die cuts.  I cut the four butterflies from the Beautiful Butterflies die collection out of craft foam.  Because the foam was thin, I decided to ink it up on my desk with some scrap paper underneath and use my fingers to apply the stamps rather than put them on a stamp block, which would likely have transferred ink from the edges onto my card.

Before I stamped the butterflies though, I inked my sentiment, from the Daydreamer stamp set, using white pigment ink and then heat embossed it with white embossing powder.

I used 4 shades of blue dye ink, starting with the lightest at the bottom.  To make the sentiment stand out a bit more I wiped a tiny bit of ink on a make up sponge over that part of the paper.

The foam stamps performed beautifully, making great impressions.  Indeed, the foam held the ink much better than I expected.

Birthday Airplane card

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's use an unused stamp challenge.  I can't believe I've never used my map background stamp, so I used several water based markers to ink it up (with some shading) and stamped it on a white cardbase.  I stamped their airplane and the happy birthday sentiment (again with markers) and fussy cut them out.  I attached the plane with pop dots.

The card seemed a bit plain, so I added score lines to make a frame and tied some thread through 3 small red buttons and hot glued them on.

Admire & Love You card

I made this card for the Papertrey Ink challenge to make a card inspired by the work of Maile Belles (one of their designers).  So I decided to case her "Wishing you a lovely birthday" card.  I liked that there was a space between the panels and started with that.

I started with a piece of pink cardstock and stamped the couple from the Papertrey Ink Simply Jane set in red ink.  I then used a paper trimmer to cut the straight line around shoulder height and fussy cut around their heads.  I trimmed the bottom so it would fit on my white card base and lined up a second piece of pink cardstock with the heads tucked under.  I stamped the frame in black ink, so it slightly overlapped on their feet but, with the heads covered, not their heads.  I then trimmed the top of the second piece so it would fit the card.

I stamped the sentiment, from the same set, on the bottom of the card in black ink.

I used a tape runner to stick the top piece on first, then the panel with the figures, with the heads stuck to the top piece.  For accent I added a few sequin hearts.

Japanese Dividing Screen Card

This is a card I made for a former student in Japan.  The card had to be fairly small in order to fit in the package I'd put together, which is why I made it into a dividing screen card.  I stamped the images on glossy cardstock (Stampscapes and a Torii stamp I carved myself), then used two shades of red, brown and black ink to shade in the image.  I left the path to the mountains lighter than the surroundings to draw the eye.

I cut a piece of black cardstock and scored it twice.  I carefully trimmed around the legs on the bottom.

When the glossy panel was dry I cut it into strips and used adhesive to attach the strips to the card base.

Glamour Card

I started this card by stamping and colouring the image with markers.  I die cut it out and lightly inked around the edges with green ink.

I die cut a larger panel to layer the image on and embossed it with a striped folder.  I laid three stripes of gold glitter ribbon on a dark green card base and layered the image on top.