Merry Christmas

Today I thought I would do a quick post to wish everyone a very happy Christmas break. I hope we can all forget our troubles for a few days and just relax and enjoy family life.

I do have a couple of cards to share. These are ones that I hand painted earlier this year following a tutorial by Sharone Stevens. I love her style and she is such a good teacher.

I am linking my gingerbread man up to Christmas Kickstart #57, thanks Jo for all your work on this challenge and for inviting me to be your guest elf in August. It was such a pleasure and has taught me not to be afraid to make Christmas cards out of season.

My penguin is being linked to Christmas Card Throwdown pick a previous 2021 challenge. I have picked the August theme challenge which was birds.

Thanks so much for all the visits to my humble blog over the past year, it has been a pleasure and I have learnt so much from everyone. I am looking forward to seeing all the amazing creativity that comes my way in 2022, let's hope it proves to be a good year for everyone.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

WLS December Reminder

Today is the 18th of the month so time for a reminder for our current challenge over at We Love Stamping. The challenge where you can showcase your stamps and your skill at using them. Only a week until Christmas, I hope you are all feeling that you have completed your makes and can soon relax and enjoy the occasion.

This month our theme is:

**  Anything Stamping Goes with the option of CAS**

I stamped this wreath turnabout stamp in 4 colours onto white card and then decided to cut a circle from it. I then cut a smaller circle to use to showcase the matching dies that are available with this set. To add a little definition I coloured the edge with a red metallic pen and finished off with a few small gold dots.

The sentiment is from the same stamp set and was heat embossed in white.

I do hope you will find time to join us this month, just make sure that hand or digital stamping is the focus of your card.

Don't forget there is always chance to be guest designer and a prize to be won. This month the prize is donated by Stix2. Why don't you head over to the challenge blog to check it out?

I hope I have inspired you to join us this month, all you have to do is follow the prompt and ensure stamping is the main focus on your card. I am also happy to say that there are some fabulous prizes prizes to be won. The challenge will close on the 29th December.

I am looking forward to seeing you in the gallery.

I am also sharing this at:

Through the craftroom door - Anything goes

Watercooler Wednesday - WWC331  Anything goes

613 Avenue Create - Anything goes

Supplies:

Cardstock: White stamping card; Adorable Scorable coated card

Ink: Catherine Pooler, lemon grass, sauna, orange peel, rouge

Stamps: Concord & 9th Harvest Wreath Turnabout stamp set and matching dies; stitched circle dies

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

We Love Stamping December Challenge

Today is a good day as it heralds a new challenge over at We Love Stamping. The challenge where you can showcase your stamps and your skill at using them.

This month our theme is:

** Anything Goes with the option of CAS **

I do love using Catherine Pooler inks for stamping, the colours are so rich and choosing colours (something I find challenging) is very easy because the mini inks come in sets that are designed to work together.

At first glance this might look quite challenging to stamp but in actual fact it was very easy as it is one of Concord & 9th's amazing turnabout stamps. This is a particularly good one as it doesn't really matter if it is not lined up perfectly - that's the hard bit about turnabout stamps, for me anyway.

I have to say that I am quite pleased with this one and I was even brave enough to add some enamel dots!

Don't forget there is always a prize to be won. Why don't you head over to the challenge blog to check it out?

I hope I have inspired you to join us this month, all you have to do is follow the prompt and ensure stamping is the main focus on your card. I am also happy to say that there are some fabulous prizes prizes to be won. The challenge will close on the 29th December.

I am looking forward to seeing you in the gallery.

I am also sharing this at:

Krafty Chicks #588 - week one stamp act

Through the craft room door - Anything goes

Supplies:

Cardstock: White stamping card; Adorable Scorable coated card

Ink: Catherine Pooler, sangria, queen for a day, orange peel, rouge

Stamps: Concord & 9th Harvest Wreath Turnabout stamp set; Sentiment: Triple-Step Blooming Heart stamp set.

Dies: Create a smile stitched rectangle. Sentiment die from Harvest Wreath matching die set.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

November CCC Reveal

Here we are at the 2nd of December, so it's time for the big reveal over at The Card Chain Challenge. This month I sent my card to Pia in Norway and decided to use the colour palette, the sketch and the theme of snowflakes.

I have fallen in love with my Scan N Cut again recently as I have finally taken the time to get to grips with using my WRMK warm quills. I have seen such a lot of amazing foiling recently that it spurred me to get to grips with it. It is so cool, love it.

I found I already had some snowflake shapes as cutting files so I arranged them in an oval shape and used silver heat transfer foil to transfer the pattern onto my card. The sentiment was also created with my scan n cut, I tried to find the font I used but failed. I spent ages going through them all and still didn't find it. I must remember to write these things down, but then I would lose the bit of paper!

My card came all the way from New Zealand, thanks Suze. The front of this card is gold and silver mirror card, so pretty impossible to photograph. I am so sorry I can't do it justice. I was very impressed that it only took 2 weeks to reach me, I know that in recent times it has been over a month.

Supplies:

cardstock: Hunky Dory adorable scorable matt-tastic card; Hobbycraft silver glitter card; Gold glitter card; Gold card

Dies: Snowflake die; Stitched rectangle 

Scan N Cut and silver hot foil

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

Snowflake Decorations

Today I have a quick post for River of Creativity #7 where the theme is The Gift. I have made some gifts with these dies from Claina Palmer. There are 24 dies that can be mixed and matched to make really pretty snowflakes.

Here is what I made with them:

I am hoping it is obvious what this is, but in case it isn't, it is a Christmas tree decoration. I used 2 different sparkly papers for this and 2 different snowflake die shapes. Each shape was cut 6 times in each paper. I could then stick the papers back to back so that I made a decoration that can be seen from the front and back and have a slightly different look.

I hope the following pictures demonstrate that.

Here is another one:

I also made boxes:

Eight in all:

I shan't bore you by showing all 8 decorations, but I think you get the picture. I love how these turned out, the possibilities are endless. The only downside is the time it takes to diecut all the little pieces. They are attached together with a white brad in the centre. If you saw my shaker card last week you will now know where all the little shaker circles came from.

I am also sharing this at:

Through the craft room door - Anything Goes

Supplies:

Cardstock: Hobbycraft glitter effect card; Hobbycraft no shed liver glitter card

Dies: Blooming 'ansome Snowflake edition by Claina Palmer

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

Christmas Shaker

Today I have a shaker card that I made with two challenges in mind, but before I tell you about my card I have to say how excited I was to find new frame dies.

I have been looking for some interesting frame dies suitable for A6 cards for a very long time as the only ones I had are stitched rectangles, which are great but sometimes it is good to have some variety. Finally I found some by Lisa Horton. There are 2 dies in this set the frame and a flowers outline that cuts out inside the frame when used together. I have just used the frame here, I was so excited to find these that I bought the 3 different sets as each frame has a different design. This is despite me telling myself that I mustn't buy anything else for a while! I don't know why there is very little choice when it comes to A6 cards, I am sure I can't be alone in wanting to see more options. Most UK manufactured nesting dies seem to be made for much larger cards. I have now resorted to buying US sized paper so that A2 dies fit properly. Anyway gripe over, back to my card.

I thought this wintry scene would make a good shaker card if I could make my shaker elements look like snow or stars. I have been making lots of snowflake ornaments recently and each die cut element produced a small circle. I collected up the circles and then glued them back to back so it wouldn't matter which way round they were in the shaker. They are made from 4 different types of sparkly paper. It was quite a fiddle, but I am pleased with the result. I finished off with some stickles glitter glue to give some shine.

Once I had completed the shaker card I decided to make some more cards with this die. For the ones below I used up some scraps of backgrounds.

For the final 3 I just mounted the panels onto some different coloured glitter effect card - so simple. You can see the different frame dies on these cards too. I think you will be seeing them a lot in the future.

My snippets are the shaker elements that are die cut waste, the black card background found in my snippets box and the shaker window.

I am also sharing this at:

Christmas Kickstarter #56 - Christmas Snippets

NBUS #32 - Both dies have been used for the first time on these cards

Festive Friday #ff0097 - Circles, shaker card, frames

Supplies:

Cardstock: White stamping card; black card; Hobby Craft glitter effect card

Ink: Versafine onyx black

Stamps: Uniko

Dies: Creative Expressions, cottage snow globe scene; Lisa Horton tatty layers lily rose panel

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

We Love Stamping Nov Reminder

It's time for a mid month reminder over at We Love Stamping where the theme is:

** Christmas**

Everyone is making Christmas cards at the moment so there is no excuse not to join us.

I think this little snowman stamp is one of the first stamps I ever bought, so it is a bit of a shame that I haven't used him much. He is designed to be doodled on, so I stamped him in black and took a black fineliner and doodles. His hat, scarf and buttons are coloured with gelly roll sparkle pens and the background is done with alcohol markers.

I diecut the image, found some glitter effect card (a recent find in Hobbycraft), diecut that and added some shiny foiled washi tape to add a bit of extra interest. This was mounted on a piece of black linen effect card and then onto a white cardbase. The sentiment is from Uniko.

What a happy looking snowman he is. 

I hope I have inspired you to join us this month, all you have to do is follow the prompt and ensure stamping is the main focus on your card. I am also happy to say that there are some fabulous prizes prizes to be won. The challenge will close on the 1st December.

Supplies:

Cardstock: White 300gsm card; Glitter effect card

Ink: versafine, onyx black; Fine liner pen; Gelly Roll sparkle pens

Stamps: Leane Creativ doodle stamps

Dies: Claina Palmer double stitched A6 nesting dies

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it. 

Gold and Silver

Today I am really please to be joining in with Color Hues #30 as a guest designer, but unfortunately there was something about my post that got blocked by blogger so it didn't publish on time. I am hoping that by re writing the post it might work. I have no idea what the problem was, the message just said it violated guidelines!

The colours for this challenge are gold and silver so I decided to have a go with my hot foil quill from we are memory keepers and my scan n cut. I am quite pleased with how it worked. I hope you like it. The panel was cut with a scalloped frame die and a couple of die cut snowflakes were added. They are very sparkly, the panel was mounted on some of the same sparkly silver paper but unfortunately you can't see it in the photos.

Thanks so much to all at color hues for having me and I hope you get a chance to join in, who doesn't love gold and silver? I bet the gallery will be really special this time.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog today, I really appreciate it.