Merry Christmas - Holly

Such a simple card, yet lots went into it. I embossed white cardstock with a provo craft folder, sorry don't know what it's called (they should name them on the foler itself don't yea think?), but it has vines and little birds on it. Then using Tim Holtz' Bingo texture trades (embossing folder) I embossed a pop can. Then cut out the number 25. I ended up cutting the pop can into little pieces, to just double the size of the number 25, placed all 3 under the 25 and embossed multiples at the same time. Then I just trimmed around the frame of the 25 and glued it on with Aleena's white glue.

The holly was cut using my cricut and an svg file. Then spritzed with homemade glitter mist. The leaves are done with a Martha Stewart punch. 

The little red berries were bought from dollarama. They are little foam balls, that came in a large bag and labeled for use as vase fillers. There must be 1,000 in the bag. Perfect for little berries.

A little Fired Brick inking around both edges of the card and the embossed piece and that's it.

Merry Christmas - Lights

Once again I'm using the Lights stamp and die set, colored with prisma pencils. A Martha Stewart leaf punch, and some Tinsle heat embossed snowflakes. Also some versamark snowflake stamps here and there. Season Greetings also stamped just using black ink.

Merry Christmas - Snowgal

This is a digi stamp colored with prisma pencils. Martha Steward punched border along the bottom, with the snowflake pieces used to surround the snowgal. And Peace was heat embossed with pure white.

Merry Christmas - Puppy under the tree!

Didn't we all want a Puppy to jump out of a box Christmas morning? I hope this brings back pleasant memories.

The digi stamp was colored with Prisma pencils. Merry Christmas was heat embossed with pure white. The tree was an svg and glittered around the edges with Martha Stewarts Crystal Glitter...as well as around the edges of the red paper.

As you can see I'm also making lots of Penny Duncans Poinsetta's .

Birthday, Guy and Girl

Slipping in some Birthday cards amongst the push to get the Christmas cards done. I'm trying to learn to use more layers and different angles. And I liked the way the blue one looked, so I made two more for the ladies. The flowers were hand made by my Mom.....material cut into circles and then sewing them together. We just learned how to do that at the Scrapfest. What a great way to use up scrap material! You may notice a funny looking button in one of the flowers. This button obviously came out of Mom's button tim, from a long, long time ago. I'm not even sure what it is, but it looks like an alien to me. :)

The below actually looks nicer in person...that bow really isn't so dark, it's a shiny, see-thru, flowered mauve ribbon.

Christmas lights and wreath

I had a lot of trouble completing this one. There was always a slip of the ink, or the scissors, or the wrong punch....I started over and tried again. Still messing it up. My intentions were for the pink to cover most of the card. That still didn't work out, and so not to waste the expensive shiny pink paper, I just shortened it and added snow flakes instead. It still needs something somewhere...but I'll get back to it another day when I don't feel so much hostility towards it :O

Bring on Christmas!

Thanksgiving is over for us up here in Canada, so I'm off and running with the Christmas cards.

This awesome stamp and die set is from Your Next Stamp. I just love it. I've been busy stamping pages of it and coloring them in so they're ready to use. I'm using Prima pencils for coloring.

For the above card, I used a Martha Stewart punch for the leaves. And Tim Holtz Tathered Florals die for the silver flower.....the paper came glittered up already. Got it from Curry's. Then I stamped the sentiment as well as the little glittery snowflakes.The glitter on the sentiment and the snowflakes are heat embossed - using my new Tinsel powder from Ranger. Entered in this weeks Simon Says Challenge - Stripes.

Here I stamped the trees in Pine Needles Distress Inks, then heat embossed with clear powder.The sentiment didn't turn out quite like I hoped. The red should be more like the ribbon. So I'm not sure if it's because it's on green paper or because I stamped it with D.I. Fired Brick, or maybe a combination. ??? But it is also heat embossed with Rich Red by Ranger.

Christmas Striped Poinsetta

At Scrapfest this year I bought this really cool Lights die and stamp set from Your Next Stamp. Love it. I was happy to find a way to incorporate it into this weeks Simon Says Challenge - show us your stripes. I also bought some tinsel embossing powder that I tried out here....wasn't so impressed. Not enough tinsel, it  didn't like to stick to the glue...just blew away. But I'll try heating it from underneath next time first. Maybe that will help.  So, here's my first Christmas card of the year...much more to come!

Paper Bag Mini Album - Romantic Butterflies

Good Morning. Lots and lots of tags went in this little mini album. Again it's a 6 x8. And as I like to do, I sandwhich some good sturdy chipboard btwn two layers of designer paper on the front and back covers, so it really feals like a book or album. Lots of heat embossed butterflies, lots of journaling pages, lots of envelopes to place the tags in and lots of embossed and punched paper. I made the front covers' flowers with the Tim Holtz die - tathered florals. Different textures of a cloth like paper, tissue paper for filler, and spritzed with a homemade Distress ink - antique linen and a mixture of two perfect pearls - gold and white. 

I just think these are so cool. So much potential for different design themes, AND you can put your special momentos in it, photos, love letters, or special cards you got from your kids.

Thanks for dropping in.

Paper Bag Mini Album - Knights and Castles

Here's my mini 6"x8", album I did for the little guy that loves Knights and Castles. What fantastic paper - it took the work out of my hands for this project. I didn't think younger boys were into journaling alot, so I didn't do any spaces for that. The paper was too nice to cover up anyways.  But I did keep the bookmarks in.

I recently purchased a Versamark pen. It's the coolest thing EVER. (Well until the next coolest thing) It has two end tips of different sizes, that allows you to add some embossing powder to paper without the use of a stamp. So here I picked a few places on the Knight and his sword, and the horse to emboss with antique gold. The hinges are Tim Holtz precut grunge paper, same with the key hole and key. I inked them up with Walnut Distress inks and added copper Perfect Pearls  - thicker in spots. I have alot of trouble with the Perfect Pearls rubbing off, even when misted, so this time I sprayed the pieces lightly with hairspray. The lock and key is held together by some crafters magnets. It's not very strong as it has to work thru the thick grunge paper, (it's underneath the key hole, and and the other visible, on the otherside of the key), but it holds for decorative purposed anyways. And of course, all pages are inked around the edges.

I did 3 tags for this album. One tag even has a secret hiding place for those secret notes he wants hidden away.

Sparkle fairy

Isn't it great when you get some great paper, and it's so great it just makes the whole card? All I did was add the bow and the sentiment.

What I bought at Scrapfest 2011

It's my first time going to Scrapfest. And man did I have a great time.There were tons of scrapping material, paper, tools, stamps, ink, stickers, chipboard....well I'm sure you all know what a great vendue it is. Some folks came from another province, and others drove hours to come.  Wow.

 I was mainly looking for Tim Holtz dies, which I only found a few. The few were dies not found at Michaels mind you, nothing I was looking for tho. But I wasn't disappointed in my shopping spree. I think the biggest thrill for me was this little bag of powder you use before using the embossing powder. Keeps the unwanted powder off your paper. But, yikes, it was $8 for this little etsy bitsy baggie. No time to google what's in it to make my own, and the lady said it would last me a life time, so I bought it. Whatever makes the job easier right!

I can't wait to use YNS's newest die and stamp set...it's like the almond in my chocolate...love it. Karen, you're a sweetheart, and isn't it nice to have a hubby willing to help out like that!

I didn't spend alot by most of your terms...but I'm a happy crafter today. Next year I'll go with lunch in my bag and a drink hat, and hit every make and take there. I had time for 4, make a card, make a flower from a zipper, snowman candy tags, and I tried quilling...which I forgot to put in the picture.

Bird House Card #2

These are fun to do and I'm thinking they might be an eye catcher at my craft show. And then to find out it's actually a card.....well - how could they resist - right??????

It's stands about 6" high, by about 1". I like to use the heavier two sided paper - K and Company in this case . Gives it some added strength  for all the embellishments and it stands sturdy too. Plus it looks nice when you look inside. I still have to find a little bird to cut out and then place it inside somehow. Maybe hanging from the center.

All the leaves are cut with a punch, and the flowers from Tim Holtz' Tathered floral die-  using a combination of tissue paper and the two sided paper that was left over from the roof. The swirly things were used from a grunge paper package already to paint and use. And I did use a green paint with some TH Lipstick  inks. Just about everything was spritzed with some homemade sparkle glitter. And for the final touch I added a metal heart charm.

Halloween Spider

Okay, so I'm not a big Halloween buff, but I thought this spider was kinda cute, so I went ahead and made a card. You can find the Spider digi stamp at Your Next Stamp. They are offering a free digi stamp this week when you enter their challenge....you can see more   at.... here for simple entery rules and for the link for your choice of one free from a variety of digis.

 I'm also entering this card at this weeks Simon Says Stamp challenge: Simon Says Stamp

Also entered in the ABC -Anything goes challenge:
ABC

The other three images are also digi stamps and can be found amongst all the generousity of artists here

Not every artist, (actually most artists don't - but should) incorporates their name into the digistamp name they design, so I'm not sure who I give credit to for the haunted house, the web or the sentiment.

So I used the newest Tim Holtz distress inks here....the Ripe Persimmon. What a fabulous color, deep  and easy to apply. I also used his Black Soot inks and his halloween paper to cut out the "Spiders". I used Glossy Accents all over the spider, and around his eyes, with  drop of two of the black glossy accents in the middle of them. It gives him some great texture. The black cardstack on the background was too plain for me, so I embossed the whole page with glossy powder and a Tim Holtz stamp.

Gloria's

So this one went out to our All Things Tim yahoo group's Mom. As she sailed away on a cruise with the man himself, we all stuck at home, sent her a card to show some love and appreciation for all the wonderful things she does for us.

This card doesn't really have any Tim stuff in it, just a bit of inking, but rather some reference of  some of the ship activities.... wink wink.... little drops of glossy accents gave the drink it a 'wet' look.

Victorian Card

One for the ladies this time. She was cut with an svg file, and inked a bit with TH lipstick ink.

A couple for the guys

I'm not sure what kind of tissue paper this first one is, but I call it designer tissue. It has some added texture to it that gives it some extra presence.  I used Tim Holtz inks around the edges, and half hazardly cut the edges with a pair of scalloped scissors. I also used some scattered straw inks to kiss stamp the butterflies. The jalopy inked with sage and peeled paint. And a few green gems to finish it off.
Wow almost a 1,000 enteres over at Simon Says Stamps challenge: this week anything goes:


http://www.simonsaysstampschallenge.blogspot.com/

This one also has lots of Tim Holtz inks around the edges, in scattered straw and antique linen. The image is from a Cricut Cart and also lightly inked with antique linen inks. If you'd like to know what cart it came from, just ask and I'll find out (it was a loaner and has been returned) A ribbon around the antlers, a drop of black glossy accents for his eye,  and some brownish gems complete the card.