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Color Hues #31

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There's just one challenge this month leading up to the holiday season. And not surprisingly, Cindy has chosen the traditional colors of Christmas: Red and Green.

Color Hues #31 Anim.

I've had two of Papertrey's Bold Borders: Yuledtide in my stash that I die cut during a crafty session before the pandemic, but never used. They worked perfectly for this challenge. They'd been die cut with PTI's Pinefeather paper which I layered on cards made from Concord & 9th's Cranberry cardstock.

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The sentiment is a combination of a die cut and a stamp. The Savvy "Joy" die cut has been in my stash for years, and has appeared on many of my Christmas cards. I never tire of it. I added a stamped sentiment from PTI's "Big Hugs" stamp set.

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I debated for a time about whether to add any embellishments but decided the tiny red pearls from A Muse would work well here. The pearls are another item that I've had in my stash for many years. Years ago, A Muse decided to become an online company, and I was afraid I'd run out of the red pearls. I purchased multiple packs of them, and still have plenty, but no unopened packages are left. I have some other colors as well, but the red ones are my favorite.

 

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Thank goodness classic items don't go out of style! I'd label this a pretty classic Christmas card, and would love to have had enough borders to make a whole set. I hope this color combo inspires you to create a few holiday cards, and I hope you'll share them with us in the gallery at Color Hues. Please check out all the inspiration from my Design Team members and our fabulous Guest Designer, Michele Ferguson.

Nancy

Hannelie

Cindy

Julie

 Sheri

Kristie

Lindsey

   Tracey

 

 

 

A CAS Christmas Card

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Over the weekend I sat down with a pile of designs I had die cut last year and some ephemera from my scrapbooking days to see how many Christmas cards I could make. I ended up with ten, some of which I'll share soon. Today I want to share one of my favorites that was such a challenge to photograph. It's a beautiful gold snowflake that came in a package of ephemera with a kit, perhaps one of the Christmas Journal kits. I used several of the pieces from that kit on my cards, but this one won me over with its simplicity. 

So I'm entering it in the Time Out Challenge where the inspiration quote focuses on simplicity as well as the CAS on Friday Challenge where the theme is "Winter." 

TimeOut

Here's the card. I have no idea who manufactured the snowflake. The beautiful sentiment from Penny Black's "Happy & Bright" was gold embossed on a cream card.

CAS-Snowflake

The challenge was to photograph the card so that you could see the shine to the snowflake. After multiple tries, I finally leaned it on an angle. It's actually much brighter in the photograph than in real life but there didn't see to be any middle ground.

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It turned out that the challenge in posting the card was much greater than the creating the card for the challenges!

 

 

A Bit of This, A Bit of That

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It's been a busy weekend. In addition to Thanksgiving which we celebrated at Tracy's mom's, we also celebrated Ella's 7th birthday. Ella invited two of her friends and two of Skylar's friends to join them and the rest of the family for a petting zoo party. Ella has only attended one birthday party since the pandemic started, and her friend also had a petting zoo. She immediately knew what she wanted for her party. The two women who brought the animals to the party (celebrated in the garage), were wonderful, helping all of us hold, pet, enjoy, and learn about a nice variety of animals. Here's a collage of a few of them.

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Ella petting the goat, the cutest hedgehog, Skylar with the boa
The girls checking out the armadillo, a chinchilla (the softest fur ever), Ella holding a bunny
Skylar with the fox, a prairie dog, one of two long-haired bunnies

And here's the birthday girl, all decked out for the big event! Ella is our glitter girl. Her mask was covered in sequins. 

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Knowing that, I made my first infinity shaker card, filled with glitter and sequins. 

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Thanksgiving was also lovely. We celebrated at Tracy's mom's for the first time. She's no longer able to negotiate stairs, and my sister-in-law's home has many steps to get into her house. There were eleven of us, and as always, the food was delicious and far too plentiful. I took zero photos—not the first time I've neglected to get my phone out at a family gathering.

I also have a couple of Christmas cards to share. I shared these on Instagram a week or so ago, but blog writing has fallen to the wayside with all the activities, Christmas card making, tutoring, and trying to organize and decorate for next holiday. Early this month, I enrolled in the Online Card Class: Holiday Cards 2021 even though I knew I'd be in Wisconsin for the first week of it. I watched all the videos, and once I got home I worked on some of the techniques. The infinity shaker card was also featured in the class. 

The lesson for these cards was taught by Jennifer McGuire who challenged us to make our own patterned paper using strips of cardstock. I opted to use strips of striped patterned paper from Sunny Studios, and I'm pleased with the way they turned out. I used a Christmas card die from Papertrey Ink and got 2 cards for each cut as you'll see below.

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After die cutting the opening for the striped Christmas tree, I was left with the tree itself. I decided to use a gold metallic oval to create gold "ornaments."

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I also used tips from the card class to make multiples of both of these, ending up with 12 Christmas cards for my stash. This week looks to be another busy one. I'm almost done with the Christmas cards, but nearly all of them still need inside sentiments. Hoping to get the international cards in the mail later this week. Sometimes it takes 2-3 weeks for them to arrive. It's hard to believe December is just two days away!

 

Snowflake Kisses

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There's a great Color Throwdown Challenge now:  navy, gold, and white. I knew right away that I'd love working with that combination, and I did. Photographing that navy, however, proved to be more of a challenge than I expected. Here's a mini slimline card that could be a Christmas card or a winter birthday card.

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I chose a Concord & 9th Midnight cardstock for the card base and layered two snowflakes, one gold and one white die cut from My Favorite Things "Stylish Snowflakes."

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The sentiment, from Penny Black, is a new one I picked up at Ellen Hutson's birthday sale called "When Snow Falls." I expect to use it frequently for birthdays in January and February. Lots of fun "snow" sentiments but some lovely ones referencing winter as well.

Snowflake

Along with the Color Throwdown Challenge, I'm entering this in the My Favorite Things Slimline Challenge which asks for mini slimlines this time around. They're becoming a favorite of mine, so I may be back with some more since the challenge runs until mid-December. 

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Color Hues #30

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Carol picked an elegant combo for our next Color Hues Challenge: Silver and Gold. 

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Last year I acquired several new snowflake dies, so I knew right away what I wanted to use for this challenge. I chose a group of snowflakes from Gina K, "Snowflake Trio," which I believe were part of a kit last year. Recentl,y I've ended up with more than one card for these challenges, and this is no exception. Here's the card I set out to make:

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I die cut multiple snowflakes from silver and gold glitter paper and arranged four of them on a black die cut mat (by Pinkfresh Studio). Once I had them carefully glued down, I decided the card base would be best in a shimmer silver (Papertrey Ink). That left just the right space for a circular mat and embossed sentiment from The Greetery's "Speed Tagging Christmas."

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The final step was to add gold and silver gems by Trinity Stamps.

I still had quite a few snowflakes laying on my desk, and thought I could layer silver and gold snowflakes for an A2 card.

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This, of course, appealed to my CAS heart. I die cut a diagonally stitched circle from the Pinkfresh Studio "Slimline Essentials," and layered the snowflakes on top of it and added another gold gem.

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The gold embossed sentiment here is from Papertrey Ink's "Rustic Wreath," a purchase made many years ago. 

Once I finished the A2 sized card, I realized that really the best size just might be a mini slimline, and luckily, I still had some snowflakes to spare. 

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All the products used here are the same as those used on the A2 card, just in a different format.

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In the end, the mini slimline is my favorite. I definitely prefer CAS cards, although I do like the multiple snowflakes on the slimline. Since it's a larger card, it can carry the weight of four varied sized snowflakes. I'd be curious to know which one is your favorite.

The new Just Us Girls Challenge was posted on Saturday. It's Trend Week, and the challenge is for mini slimlines. Perfect timing!

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But, most importantly, go check out the gorgeous creations made by the Design Team and our Guest Designers, Carol and Hilary, and join in the fun. 

Nancy

Hannelie

Cindy

Julie

 Sheri

Kristie

Lindsey

  Tracey

 

 

 

Winter Whites

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I love white on white, but have to admit photographing it in an (always) dark house can be a challenge. Nonetheless, this is one of my favorite Christmas cards this year.

Peace&Joy

The Less is More Challenge is "Winter Whites," and I knew what I wanted to do. It's hard to see in the photos above, but I started the design by scoring seven lines of different lengths on the left side of the card. Then I added a series of snow flakes from My Favorite Things "Stylish Snowflakes." It's easier to see the score lines in this photo.

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The silver embossed sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's "Beautiful Berries: Winter." The last touch was to add a pearl to the center of each of the snowflakes. Although they appear silver in the photo above, they are white pearls.

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Along with Less is More, I'm sending this off to Happy Little Stampers Dies: Anything Goes.

455 Lucky Dip Winter Whites HLS Dies

 

More Christmas Poinsettias

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My watercolor session with Altenew's "Modern Poinsettia" resulted in three different cards. I posted the first one here, and the second one here. Today is the last of the cards.

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These were watercolored with the Altenew 36 pan watercolors and then splattered with white ink. I decided not to add splatter to the black background to keep a cleaner look. 

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The background panel was die cut with one of the Pinkfresh Studio "Diagonal Stitched Slimline " dies. The sentiment from Colorado Crafts "Slimline Poinsettia" was embossed on gold. It was added to a white card base before arranging the poinsettias. The last touch was to add a group of small gold pears to the centers of the poinsettias.

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I'm linking this card to three challenges:  Addicted to Stamping and More: Christmas, Simon Says Monday: Any Holiday Occasion, and Happy Little Stampers Christmas: Anything Goes.

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Color Hues #29

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October flew by for me, and here it is—November 1st! The good news is it's time for a new Color Hues Challenge. Sheri's choice this round is Brown and Orange, and I had quite a good time with it.

Color Hues #29 Anim.

I find it interesting how frequently I end up creating two cards for the Color Hues challenges. The first card I made was CAS on steroids, and I was was pretty happy with it. It didn't end up being the one I posted on the Color Hues Challenge site, however. Here's Card #1:

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There are a couple of fall anniversaries to celebrate and I thought this did the trick. I started with the Papertrey Ink "Leaf Silhouette" die and cut it from a piece of Bristol that I had watercolored in shades of orange. I die cut the white rectange and cut two rectangles, one from a scrap of orange cardstock and one from a piece of Ellen Hutson's Woodgrain paper that I darkened with Distress ink.

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The sentiment from Pink and Main's "Special Day" was embossed in gold and I used a very old punch to cut a heart from metallic gold paper. I glued it to three additional hearts cut from cardstock to give it some dimension. I also added dimension to the white rectangle with dimensional tape.

And then I was lucky enough to spend a crafty afternoon with two friends, one of whom had the Papertrey Ink "Bold Borders: Foliage." I die cut a couple of them from white cardstock. Once I was home, I wondered what would happen if I tried to ink blend the entire frame. It worked quite well, and here is Card #2:

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I used the Distress Oxide inks Spiced Marmalade and  Carved Pumpkin for the leaves with a bit of Catherine Pooler's Orange Twist toward the bottom. The branches and the frame were ink blended with Vintage Photo Distress Oxide ink. 

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After carefully gluing the frame to a piece of Papertrey's Rustic White cardstock, I gold embossed one of the sentiments from The Greetery's "Everyday Labels." The open space in the frame was just the perfect size.

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It took some time to get the frame and leaves ink blended, but I think it was time well-spent, and I'd do it again. The only embellishment are three gold gems from Paper Studio.

I hope you'll hop over to the Color Hues blog to see what the rest of the Design Team and our Guest Designer, Åsa, have come up with . . . and join in the fun!

Nancy

Hannelie

Cindy

Julie

 Sheri

Kristie

Lindsey

Tracey

 

 

 

Happy Halloween!

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It's Halloween, and I can't think of a better place to be than with grandchildren who are SO excited about going Trick or Treating! Sarah and her family moved to a fabulous neighborhood with lots of kids. Both Caleb and Hannah have good friends just down the street. I've shared a couple of Halloween cards here and here, but made five more for the grandchildren. We gave the three girls their cards and Halloween gifts before we left.

I made four different cards, creating two of the same for Hannah and Ella. It's thanks to my crafty friends that I had a huge pile of die cuts to choose from when it came time to create the cards.

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Aside from the sentiments the cards are just the same—Royal Purple (Simon Says) cardstock splattered with silver metallic paint and layered onto a cardbase of Orange Zest (PTI). The silver glitter paper is several years old and came from a cute shop in Milwaukee. I used a clear glitter pen to add glitter to the cats which you can see better here. The cat and the moon are from PTI's "Boo Black Cat" set. 

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I also wanted all the cards to have some kind of interactive feature. The cats have a wobbler behind them. Try as I might, I never got a very good photo, but when Ella opened her card at home she "wobbled" the card, and I got a better photo,

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Next up is Maddy's shaker card. 

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I started by ink blending the Pretty Pink Posh "Spider Web" stencil on Bristol paper. I die cut the letters with the Pinkfresh Studio "Adore" alphabet, backing it with acetate and filling it with a variety of sequins and tiny stars.

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I found the cute spider sticker from "la petites" at Hobby Lobby. 

Skylar's card was a spinner card. I made this one twice trying to get the spinner to work effectively. I now know what kind of thread I need to make it work even better than it did. 

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Putting a greeting inside the card proved to be tricky, too, since I didn't want it to show through the opening for the spinner piece. In the end, it worked out really well. The ghosts are die cuts from Poppy Stamps and the greeting from The Stamp Market's "Halloween" set. The patterned paper is from an old 6X6 pad by American Craft. 

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Last, but not least, is Caleb's card which I thought would appeal to a nine year old boy.

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The center ghoul on the card is mounted on the card with a large Wobbler like the black cat  cards above, There's a narrow strip of patterned paper from the same paper pad behind the three ghouls from Papertrey Ink's "Grins and Ghouls." 

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I found the perfect sentiment in an old Papertrey Ink Make-it Market kit, "Halloween Pin-ups" which was die cut with an Essential Oval by Ellen Hutson. A slightly larger oval from My Favorite Things "Black and White Stripes" served as a mat.

Yesterday, one set of neighbors arrived to carve pumpkins on the back porch so we have a set of jack-o-lanterns to decorate the front porch tonight. It's going to be a chilly evening for Trick 0r Treating, but thankfully, it's not raining or snowing!

Hope you have a great Hallow's Eve!

 

 

Happy Holidays

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I've been slowing chipping away at the number of holiday cards I want to make. I have one to share today with one of my favorite poinsettia stamps from Altenew: "Modern Poinsettia." I posted another holiday card with the same poinsettia here. 

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I stamped the poinsettia on hot press watercolor paper. Although it does not have as much texture as cold press paper, it does require two stampings to get a clear image. Thanks to the MISTI, that's easy to do. The next step was to watercolor the floral and die cut it with the accompanying die.

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After I die cut it, I decided it would benefit from a few black splatters. It's taken me far too long to finally master the art of splattering, but I'm no longer afraid I'll ruin the whole thing!

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I added a wide strip of black and white patterned paper from My Favorite Things to the left side of the card before adding the poinsettia with dimensional tape. The beautiful greeting is from the Colorado Crafts "Slimline Poinsettia" stamp. I'm using three of those greeting repeatedly this year on my cards.

I'm sending this off to two challenges: Addicted to Stamps and More: Christmas, and Happy Little Stampers Christmas: Anything Goes.

Addicted HLS Christmas

I'm also adding this to a new (to me) site: Falling for the Holidays Blog Hop, sponsored by the Build Your Stash Holiday Cardmakers.

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With Sympathy

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Sympathy cards are never anyone's favorite card to create, and I'm a firm believer that CAS and subdued colors are the best bet. I recently acquired the wonderful "Leaf Mix" dies by Altenew, and I think they might become a "go to" set for just this kind of card.

Sympathy

This was a pretty quick and easy card to assemble since I had earlier die cut multiple leaves from four different metallic papers. I chose a gold, bronze, and brown leaf and carefully glued them to the front of a ready-made card by Memory Box. I love these cards because they are white inside which make them good for writing notes of condolence. 

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This lovely sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's "Warm Regards" set which hasn't seem much love for awhile. It was gold embossed on a piece of Cocoa Bean cardstock and added to the card with a layer of dimensional tape. 

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The card is for one of our dearest friends. Her mother-in-law passed away recently. Ruth lived a long life. She was 99 years old and outlived her husband and both her sons. That just shouldn't happen to anyone. The last several years were difficult, so it's good to know she's no longer struggling.

There was a beautiful memorial service this weekend. Ruth was the oldest of 10 children and grew up on a farm in Massachusetts. Her youngest sister who is in her early eighties was able to attend, and spoke so warmly of her older sister, who she saw as a second mother. Ruth was a phenomenal quilter, and both Sarah and I are recipients of one of her beautiful quilts, all done by hand.

I'm entering this in the CAS on Friday Challenge where one of the options is Autumn. This card definitely has an autumn feel to it.

 

 

Eek!!!

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Halloween card making is finally complete, and over the next week I'll be sharing the cards I made. This one is for my mother-in-law who has always loved Halloween. In the days when she ran a very successful bed and breakfast, she often closed it over Halloween weekend to entertain her grandchildren with games, hide and seek, and lots of Halloween treats. 

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The design of this card was cased from a winner at The Paper Players Challenge several weeks ago. The original card was a fabulous example of a CAS card. I went a bit fancier with mine. I die cut the Pretty Pink Posh "Stitched Film Strip" from black paper and the Papertrey Ink "Corner Adorner: August" from silver glitter paper. Then I backed the opening in the frame with pieces from the die cut web.

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I layered that on a bright purple paper and embossed the sentiment from The Stamp Market's "Halloween" in silver. The cute spider (is any spider cute?) came from Hobby Lobby.

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It all went on a bright orange cardbase. I never used much purple and orange together in past years, but this year, it's been a favorite combination. I'm throwing this in the ring at the Simon Says Wednesday Challenge which is Spooky/Halloween.

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Botanical Print: Take Two

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I have a second botanical print for the CAS Mix-Up Challenge before it ends.

October 2021

As I was cleaning off my desk Wednesday night, I saw this vellum piece that I had printed with the same Distress Oxide inks and the same leaf as I used for my first botanical print here. It wasn't what I was looking for the first time, but I decided I really did like it and decided to see what I could do with it. I’m quite happy with the result.

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I cut the vellum piece and then added two very narrow gold metallic strips to the top and the bottom so I would have a place to adhere it to the card. 

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Before adding the vellum to the Terra Cotta card base, I stamped this lovely sentiment from Concord and 9th’s “Hey, Bestie.” The font is so elegant. 

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I might like this "after-thought" card better than the original. I wish every card I made came together so easily!

It’s been a crazy busy week, and the weekend looks no different. I’m still hoping to squeeze in some crafting, and hopefully, showing up here again before too long.

World Card Making Day Challenge

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On World Card Making Day, October 2nd, I was busy crafting, but I wasn't paying much attention to the many challenges available. After the fact, I saw the Pinkfresh Studio World Card Making Day Challenge which closes tonight. For most of the intervening days, a lovely new stencil from Pinkfresh Studio, "Holiday Botanical Background," has been laying on my desk waiting for some attention. Finally, on the last night the challenge is live, here is the card.

Holidays

It's a four-step stencil and very easy to line up. I used two Pinkfresh green inks and one Altenew green ink on the leaves and Pinkfresh's "Candy Apple" for the berries. The sentiment is from a new stamp set by Waffle Flower, "Cozy Holiday Sentiments." I like the simply graphic font, and it was the perfect size for the opening in the center of the card.

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I die cut the stenciled panel with the largest of Spellbinders "A2 Matting Basics" dies and added it to a red cardbase. Then I added some subtle shadows with a very light gray Copic marker and some highlights with a white gel pen. The only embellishments are some  Droplets from The Stamp Market. 

Happy to have another Christmas card added to the stash and happy to have finally put these lovely products to use!

Fall and Christmas

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It's that time of year when I'm creating autumn cards for birthdays and anniversaries, and Christmas cards since I know I'll need a LOT of them very soon! Today I have two cards–one of each–for two challenges. 

First off, a very interesting challenge on the CAS Mix-Up site. They're looking for a botanical print (from a real leaf or plant) as well as some stamping and/or die cutting.

October 2021

I found a few pretty leaves on a walk a day or so again, and it's taken two days to get the print made and the card assembled. It's not often I have very busy weeks with lots of commitments, but this is one of them. 

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I colored two leaves with Distress Oxide inks (Crackling Campfire and Carved Pumpkin) and then pressed them into cardstock. I found that using my fingers to press down on the leaves worked the best. I'm very happy with the way they turned out. 

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The gold embossed sentiment on vellum is from a tiny stamp set by Gossamer Blue. It harkens back to my scrapbooking days. I added some gold splatters and a narrow gold mat (thanks to the Gina K "Master Layouts 1 dies).

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The next card is for the Jingle Bells Pink Challenge. As you might guess this is a Christmas challenge, and if I've ever entered it, it's been at least a year. 

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It's been a long time since I pulled out my Polychromos colored pencils, but this turned out to be a pretty meditative task. 

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This is a mini slimline card. The poinsettias are from Colorado Crafts "Slimline Poinsettia" set and the sentiment is from Gina K's "Holiday Tapestry" set. 

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I decided on no embellishments for this one. It's not often I end up with a one-layer card!