ICC058 Christmas Greetings

Every time I say I don't need any more Christmas cards, I find out I DO!  The Inspire Create challenge had a lovely color palette, so I thought I would give it a go:

The colors are Blushing Bride, Cherry Cobbler and Old Olive, and I chose the swag from Shine Bright, stamped in Stazon ink for the focus of my card:

I had a piece of Old Olive gingham DSP already diecut with a Stitched Rectangle die, so I used that to kick off my design.  I watercolored the greenery in Old Olive, added Cherry Cobbler berries and believe it or not, when you use full-strength Blushing Bride, you get this color, which I used on my bow!  After coloring and fussy-cutting the bottom portion, I popped it up with dimensionals on top of the gingham panel:

I also used Cherry Cobbler for shadowing as well as the sentiment from Greatest Part of Christmas; I accented the words with a couple of pine boughs from Winter Woods:

 I added some thick Baker's Twine as a final accent.  Thanks for popping in today!

I always try to make Cassidy a little felt ornament for Christmas; Pinterest is full of ideas, I could spend hours looking at them!  I ended up buying a pattern from Etsy to make this rather fierce-looking owl:

The colors were not as nice as the sample, but I just used what I had on hand; he also has cardstock eyes, as I didn't have any black beads...I didn't want to make a trip to Walmart just for two beads!  I did add the twine, holly and berries (SU's Quilt Builder die for the holly and French knots for the berries) on my own:

 I know Mommy likes owls so hopefully Cassidy will too!  Enjoy your day and be blessed!

IB102 Warm Winter Wishes

Happy Thursday, peeps!  Hope your week is going well!  It's time for another Inspired By challenge!  I have all my cards mailed out, so this will go in next year's stash, LOL!  So here we go with today's card:

And here is Laurel's prompt!  Aren't these little lanterns and bells cute?

I chose to emboss the tree from Shine Bright on some Real Red cardstock in white embossing powder, then added some gold accents and white gel-pen "snowflakes":

I added a little sentiment, again embossed in white on kraft cardstock:

And finally, to replicate the little blue scarf, I added a light blue vertical panel embossed with the Cable Knit embossing folder:

It all went on a Naturals White card matted with a white woodgrain-pattern DSP!  And the sketch that I used is from Try Stampin' On Tuesday:

Now we want to see what you create with this pretty photo challenge!  Share it with us at Inspired By!  Thanks for popping in today!

 Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Shine Bright, Winter Fox (Lawn Fawn), Just Treats (Close to My Heart--snowflakes)
Card stock & Papers	Naturals White, Kraft (Close to My Heart), Real Red, Meadow DSP (Authentique), Wonderland DSP (Kaisercraft)
Ink	White Craft
Accessories	Gold Half Pearl (ret), Linen Thread, Dimensionals, White Embossing Powder
Tools	Big Shot, Cable Knit EF, Stitched Rectangle Dies, Stitched Shape Dies, Heat Tool

FMS414 Brightly Shining

Happy Wednesday, peeps!  This week has been a week of issues!!  Computer issues, sinus issues,  appointment issues, bank issues...you name it!  Blessedly, most of them are resolving themselves but my stamping time has been limited!  When I saw the cute sketch at FMS this week, I just sat myself down and went to work!  Here's the sketch:

I'm trying to use up the supply of DSP I have, so I went to the Night Before Christmas pack, which I find a little challenging to use, as there are so many colors in it!  I found a couple that seemed to coordinate, and as usual, once I started working with them, I ended up liking my final outcome:

I used a sentiment from Shine Bright (and after looking at the DT's cards,  I should have oriented it the other way, oops), stamped on Very Vanilla, and a little tree from Holiday Haul to accent it:

I stamped the stars on top of the tree with  Delicata Gold ink and then heat-embossed them with Gold embossing powder, and added a little scrap of Gold glimmer paper for some extra pizzazz!  I forgot to use my Embossing Buddy on my tree before sprinkling the powder on, so the whole tree itself got a little sprinkle....but it looks cool!  A happy accident!  Thanks for popping in today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Holiday Haul, Shine Bright
Card stock & Papers	Very Vanilla, Night Before Christmas DSP, Gold Glimmer
Ink	Night of Navy, Pear Pizzazz, Gold Delicata
Accessories	Dimensionals, Gold Embossing Powder
Tools	Heat Tool

More Toile Christmas

Happy Monday, peeps!  Boy, it was a cold weekend...yesterday, in the space of three hours, we had rain, snow and sunshine!  We are gearing up for Thanksgiving, too...looking forward to it!  I wanted to share a couple of projects made with Toile Tidings DSP, Toile Christmas and Nature's Beauty; they all coordinate so beautifully!  The first one is a buckle card; this is the card my club girls learned to do, and I got the idea from my sweet friend Cindy; you can see her YouTube video here!  She made a fall card, but I changed it up to make a Christmas card.  The cardinal is big, but he is quite easy to watercolor..it works up fast!  

And here is the inside of the card...you can see where the "belt" fits into the slot from the front, underneath the stitched oval on which the cardinal is attached:

I had an extra card packet cut, so I decided to make another, changing the image to the deer from Nature's Beauty because the patterned paper featured the wildlife:

I fussy-cut him out, then adhered him on top of the same image I stamped on the stitched oval, and I added different sentiments from Itty Bitty Christmas:

While I had Nature's Beauty still on my desk, I noticed a little branch stamp....I am bad for ignoring the little images in a stamp set and just focusing on the big ones!  This little branch is a real sleeper!  I lightly traced a circle on a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock and stamped the branch around it in Garden Green five times; I then stamped again, filling in the "gaps" and stamping off once on my scrap paper to get a lighter image.  It created the nicest wreath! 

I diecut it with a Stitched Shape square die and added a piece of (retired) Brushed Gold cardstock behind it.  The gold Metallic Pearls and some retired gold ribbon finished it off perfectly.  My sentiment was from Shine Bright, and it was stamped with the Gold Delicata pad:

I mounted it on some green Toile Tidings DSP and mounted it on a Garden Green card; the inside sentiment was from Shining Brightly as well!  What a gorgeous sentiment!

Thanks for popping in today!

While we were running errands on Saturday morning, Cassidy and I went to our neighbor's farm to get eggs.  She likes to go to the calf barn to see the kittens, but it was all closed up and the farmer wasn't around to open it.  When we got back in the car, we saw this:

Hmmmm...she is supposed to be IN the barn, not outside of the barn.  Someone left the gate open, so I went and got Mrs Farmer (we went to school together!) and by the time she came out to corral it, another one had escaped!  They weren't in any hurry to get anywhere...they were just eating the grass around the barn!  But we thought it was funny!  Escaping cows!  Enjoy your day and be blessed!

FMS410 Joy to All

Happy Saturday, peeps!  I have a really busy day today--Veteran's Day breakfast, stamping and shopping with my friend Debbie, a chili cookoff at church, and Cassidy is spending the night!  So this will be quick!  I decided to make a Christmas card in traditional colors (wait until you see tomorrow's!!) using the Freshly Made Sketches sketch:

And here's the sketch:

I had this little wreath sitting on my desk for a while, and I finally decided to use it; I backed it on some Let It Snow Specialty paper and added a panel of Shaded Spruce, embossed with a polka dot EF, both of them matted with a scalloped mat:

I added a Mint Macaron bow, a sentiment from Shine Bright, and my lower horizontal piece is also from Let It Snow!  Easy and traditional!  Thanks for popping in today!

Our little artist...she draws wherever she is!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Shine Bright, Beary Christmas Cardmaking (Close to My Heart)
Card stock & Papers	Thick White, Shaded Spruce, Let It Snow Specialty
Ink	Real Red, Shaded Spruce
Accessories	Mint Macaron Ribbon, DImensionals
Tools	Big Shot, Beary Christmas Dies (CTMH), Pinewood Planks EF

PP456 Poinsettia Tree

 

Hi peeps!  Time for another Paper Players challenge!  Laurie has a GREAT sketch for us this week...I even made two cards with it!  So here's the sketch:

And here's my card---a combination of new and old goodies!!!  I used a new set from the Holiday catalog called Shine Bright, and I stamped it in Mint Macaron ink, then used Light and Dark Mint Macaron Blends to color it in:

I used a gold Zig Painty pen to fill in the little berries, then added a Gold Foil scalloped mat, embellished it with a flower punched from the Triple Flower Punch and anchored with a gold brad.  For the lower panel, I used some Mint Macaron gingham DSP, stamping a partial sentiment (Christmas Pines) with the new Golden Glitz Delicata ink and mounted everything on a white card base that was embossed with the retired Petals A-Plenty embossing folder.  

For my second card, I pulled out some printed papers gifted to me by my friend Teri, stamped a cute little pup from a CTMH set, colored it with some Blends and added sentiments from Happy Tails and Picture Perfect Birthday:

This went to my nephew....he might think it's a little juvenile, but he always likes my cards, hopefully he'll like this one too!

Thanks for popping in today---I hope you'll play along with Laurie's wonderful sketch and share your creation with us at the Paper Players blog!  While you're there, check out what the DT created as well!

We have had a bumper crop of green and purple beans this year....our garden just keeps producing them and we couldn't eat them all, so I decided to freeze some earlier this past week.  Cassidy was itching to play a new game she got, so she actually pitched in and helped so that I could finish up and we could play!!

She was a good helper, and we had a lot of fun playing Sleeping Queens....I highly recommend it!

I am going to be taking a little bloggy vacation, spending time with hubby, so I will see you next Sunday, when I am the hostess at the Players!  Enjoy your week and be blessed!

Tags Tags Tags for Christmas

Happy Tuesday, peeps!  No challenges today, just some samples I made recently using another fun new set from the upcoming Holiday catalog called Tags Tags Tags!!  Talk about cutting your crafting time -- with this bundle you can stamp three holiday tags at one time, then cut them all out at one time!  What a fabulous idea!  Now, I usually don't make fancy tags for my Christmas gifts because they just get chucked in the trash, LOL!  BUT these tags are so cute, they make great embellishments for cards!!  Plus there are little extra dies to make them even more special!  I created a "package" with a piece of Pool Party cardstock I already had diecut and didn't use; I stamped it with a flower from Shine Bright, then added "ribbon" from some little DSP scraps I had left over from yesterday's project:

I added some narrow strips of Real Red cardstock to imitate ribbon, and a diecut bow from the Cup of Cheer dies, a little snowflake and a rhinestone that I colored red with a Real Red blend:

I used the second die for a simple 4 1/4" square card, simply adding it on top of a piece of Wrapped in Plaid DSP and adding some Call Me Clover Grosgrain ribbon:

Easy and cute!

Thanks for visiting today!

One last shot from Turkey Hill:

 Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Tags Tags Tags, Shine Bright
Card stock & Papers	Whisper White, Real Red, Pool Party, Wrapped in Plaid DSP, Let it Snow Specialty DSP
Ink	Real Red, Pool Party
Accessories	Rhinestone, Call Me Clover Grosgrain Ribbon
Tools	Big Shot, Cup of Cheer Dies, Trio of Tags Dies, Stitched Rectangle Dies