More Snowflakes!

Happy New Year's Eve!! 

Today's the last day to enter the December Let's Squash It Challenge, then Gail & Jo are taking a hiatus from new challenges. Since I'm guest designing this month, I thought I'd pop in with some last minute inspiration. Yesterday my sister-in-law and I went shopping at my favorite Minnesota paper warehouse, Anchor Paper. AP had 30% off all Christmas items but, after all my shopping in Arizona, I only allowed myself to get an embossing folder.

Supplies: Paper - Parklane A2 cards; Neenah White;

Hero Arts Glitter Basics

Embossing Folder - Sizzix Winter Sweater

Dies - various snowflakes

Other - Taylored Expressions sentiment strip

And here's a Twofer:

Additional Supplies: Poppystamps Oval die, 

Simon Says Stamp sentiment (with the Peace cut off)

mini star gems

I can't decide which color shows the embossed pattern better - what do you think? Besides the reindeer, there are bunches of bitty snowflakes (a bit hard to see). Perfect for the LSI challenge to include either snowflakes &/or stars.

I'll also link up to Darnell's December NBUS Challenge, since my ef is getting first play, and to the December Christmas Kickstart Challenge looking for Anything Christmasy-y.

Thanks to all these challenges for a wonderful 2022 & thanks to you for stopping!!

 

A Final Christmas card for 2022

Hey there - sorry to be offline for a while! I spent two weeks in Arizona with my sisters who live there, plus Dad visited too! We had loads of fun playing cards and eating holiday foods, missing Mom of course. My brother and his wife spent Thanksgiving in AZ so they stayed in Minnesota. Anyway, I'm home now & getting ready for 2023 to arrive.

Before that, I'll share a final 2022 Christmas card I made while in Arizona. My sister invited a friend to Christmas Eve dinner so I made him a card. I was giving cards to family members attending the dinner so couldn't leave out Frank. Forgive the bad photo - I had none of my usual staging props & just popped the card onto a piece of paper :(

Supplies: Paper - MFT Holly Jolly; glitter cardstock

Dies - Lawn Fawn Snow Flurries Backdrop

Stamp - Hero Arts Merry Christmas Messages (retired)

I picked up the LF die set at my favorite Arizona craft store Scraps of Love. They also have a discount outlet next door and I got an old MFT Christmas kit at a deep discount, along with a bunch of other items. I'm entering this card in the December Christmas Kickstart Challenge to link up anything Christmas-y. Plus, since the LF die is newly used, I'm also linking up at Darnell's December NBUS Challenge.

I came home to a pile of mail that my neighbor collected for me, including a bunch of Christmas cards. Here's a quickie photo of the cards I received from my crafty friends, including a machine stitched one from a dear friend from Wisconsin. So much crafty goodness & if you sent me a card, many thanks - I appreciate you!

Thanks for stopping & I'll get back to visiting blogs and commenting soon!

 

Merry Christmas Wishes!!

Sending Merry Christmas wishes to those celebrating! I'm enjoying time with family so sorry if I've been offline a lot. We miss my mom (who passed in April) but she's in a better place after all her health struggles. 

I went all out with my decorating this year since I had plenty of time at home. Note - I'm not sharing any cards today so skip the rest of this post if you don't care to see my holiday decorations. I won't be offended :) First up my living room trees - yes, trees plural.

I donated my big 7.5' full tree since it was simply too heavy for me to set up. I brought the pencil tree upstairs this year but it look so lonely, I bought two slightly shorter slim trees to frame it! The tree at left contains my collection of Hallmark Barbie ornaments with others to fill it. They really are straight vertical even though the perspective is a bit off in the photo. Next, a series of mini trees (my room, upstairs guest room, family room, various Hallmark designer trees):

 

 

Here's my favorite Hallmark wreath with mice ornaments:

Dining room table with several Hallmark displays (sorry for the bad angle):

And here I am with Santa and my friend Connie at the chorus Christmas party on 12/5:

Wishing you happy holidays and happy crafting! I'll be back sharing cards soon and hope to visit your blogs and reciprocate your kind comments!!

A Short Christmas Train

Hey there - it's been a while! I've been busily mailing my Christmas cards, plus making more. You may remember I donated 41 cards to Hero Arts for their Holiday Cheer Drive in November. I also donated 6 cards to a chorus raffle basket. We had 15 amazing baskets to raffle at our show on 12/3, including this one to which I contributed:

You can see my cards at the back, each in a plastic sleeve & mounted on two cardboard sheets I'd covered with designer papers. The raffle coordinator said my display panels worked perfectly when she arranged the basket - yay! Besides the cards, I donated some cookie cutters plus an exclusive Hallmark snowman ornament that came in my VIP bag this year. You can't buy it in stores but I have enough snowman ornaments so donated it. At the chorus show we raised $1460 for a local shelter called Lewis House. The chorus has supported this charity for many years & it's been so rewarding! The show went great, by the way, but attendance was down due to weather and other conflicts. Oh well, we had fun!

With a total of 47 cards happily disappearing from my stash, I had to ramp up production in a big way this past weekend! I sent out a total of 81 cards, including 4 Hallmark cards to people I knew wouldn't miss a handmade one. On Sunday I went to the UFO bin to find bits to add to cards and came out with a few train pieces left from doing a previous card that went to Hero Arts' drive. 

I colored the train with Copics and put lacquer on the peppermint wheels. The star was left over from a colorful watercolor star card I made for the Hero Arts Holiday Stamp Along (Day 2 - class 10 by Channin Peltier). A Tim Holtz sentiment label and preprinted birch paper from BoBunny's Woodland Winter 6x6 collection finished the card. I'm entering this card in the December Christmas Kickstart Challenge to link up anything Christmas-y.

Next I looked at past cards for something quick and easy. I remembered doing one with embossed trees for the November Kickstart challenge but pared it down even further. I made 8 of these cards, definitely boosting my stash. I rubbed some of the embossed panels with white ink and others with green. The pre-foiled sentiments come from Pink Fresh Studio.

The silver foiled one in the upper right says "let heaven and nature sing". I didn't photograph the other 4 cards but each had a different sentiment with the same embossed trees and one glitter tree. Then I raided my Spellbinders Merry Wishes kit (Nov 2020 & finally opened!) for ephemera & put together a bunch more quick cards. Won't share those but I thought they turned out cute. Whew - now it's on to making thank you cards for gift received at the chorus Christmas party last week....

Thanks for stopping and have a wonderful day!!

Embossed Snowflake Fun - Guest Designing at Let's Squash It!!

Hey everyone - I'm excited to be Guest Designing for the December Let's Squash It! Challenge!! I was Empress of Squash in October, winning with my tree card - woo hoo! Hosts Gail and Jo have become great friends of mine since I started playing at LSI and other challenges they host like The Card Chain Challenge and Christmas Kickstart. This month's theme at LSI - SNOWFLAKES & STARS!! I have oodles of embossing folders with either one but I went the snowflake route. Here's my card:

Supplies: Paper - Park Lane A2 card; Spellbinders White;

Hero Arts Glitter Paper Basics

Embossing Folder - Hero Arts/Sizzix Snowflake Background Set (retired)

Dies - A Jillian Vance Design Stitched Dot Rectangle Backdrop Set;

Art Impressions Lg Snowflake Dies;

 Spellbinders Snowflake Splendor & Holiday Greetings (both retired

but found HERE & HERE at Frantic Stamper; FS calls the latter Snowflake Bliss)

Other - Hero Arts Glitter Hero Paste; 

TH Salty Water Taffy Distress Stain & Villanous Potion Reinker;

Hero Arts Taffy Reactive Ink; 

Taylored Expressions Simple Strips in Reverse Christmas

I was playing with a bubble technique in the opposite corners of a card, like I did HERE, but my bubbles were too large. I wasn't getting the same subtle corner effect  that I did on that previous card. My solution - bubble the entire panel - fab! Then I decided to spritz a bit with Salt Water Taffy Distress Stain. That got a bit heavy in spots but the large die cut snowflake covered the worst spot - LOL.

After drying the panel, I die cut it with a stitched rectangle and ran it through the Vagabond with a snowflake embossing folder. Next I swiped some Hero Arts Taffy ink on the raised bits, then used my finger to spread some glitter Hero Paste here & there. Once thoroughly dry, I ran it through with the ef a second time - this really brought out the pattern and also flattened the areas that had warped.

Next I added various shimmery snowflakes and the sentiment, then adhered everything to an A2 card. Here's the funny part: I'm looking at the embossing folder (found in a box of unpackaged ones) and thinking - hmmmm, this looks like it should have more details. Then it hit me - this belongs to one of those old stamp & emboss sets! I have a bunch from a Hero Arts/Sizzix collaboration; the snowflake set was released in 2012 and retired long ago. Here's a shot of the ef with it's matching stamp - they are reunited!

And why not, since I found the matching stamp, make a card with the combo?! So here's your bonus:

Supplies: Paper - Paper Studio blues;

Hero Arts Glitter Paper Basics

Stamp & Emboss Set - Hero Arts/Sizzix Snowflake Background Set (retired) 

Inks - Hero Arts Navy & Cornflower

Stencil - Hero Arts Sprinkled Dots

Other - Docrafts gems;

Taylored Expressions Simple Strips in Reverse Christmas

I stamped the cling snowflake background onto pale blue cardstock using navy ink. I die cut the panel with a stitched rectangle and used the stamp's matching ef. I sponged some cornflower blue ink around the edges, then used the same ink to stencil some falling snow in the bare spots. Glued the panel to a navy card, added some gems & another TE sentiment strip backed with glitter paper - done! I'm curious - which version do you like better - plain embossed or stamped/embossed? Both were fun to make! 

And I couldn't resist a threefer. Was shopping (big surprise) at Hobby Lobby and they had 40% off a bunch of dies and efs. I found a beautiful snowflake set by Momenta (no name listed & it's not available at Hobby Lobby's website). Besides the ef, there are 7 dies - a great value!

Embossing Folder - Momenta name unk

I inked the raised bits with some white ink and popped on a couple snowflakes from the stash. The rather spiky looking purple one is from Elizabeth Craft Designs Snowflakes set. The sentiment is from SSS sentiment strips collection & fussy cut. Very quick and easy!

Thanks for sticking with me to the end of this long post! And thanks to Gail and Jo for inviting me to guest design. Hope to see you in the Let's Squash It! gallery!!

Thanks for stopping!

November 2022 Card Chain Challenge Reveal

Happy December 2nd everyone! Hope you're doing well preparing for the holidays! Chorus has been busy with our show coming up tomorrow!! If you're anywhere near the Twin Cities in Minnesota, check it out HERE.

Today we're revealing cards mailed around the world for the Card Chain Challenge. Twenty-nine people participated & my card went to dear Gail (Crafty Nomad) in Norway. She does so much for the CCC, along with Jo (Jo Blogs)!! You can see the full reveal HERE.

Supplies: Paper - Spellbinders A2 card; My Favorite Things Holly Jolly;

Paper Studio vellum; Hero Arts Glitter Paper Basics; Neenah white

Stamps with Dies - Hero Arts North Pole Express Bundle

Dies - A Jillian Vance Design Stitched Dot Rectangle Backdrop Set; 

Hero Arts Nesting Circle Infinity Dies; Art Impressions Lg Snowflake Dies

Other - Michael's gems; Hero Arts inks

I used the sketch this month but rotated it 90 degrees. Decided to make Gail's CCC a Christmas card & beat the International mail deadline! Since one of the patterned papers had text, I left off any additional sentiment.

Sketch Option

I received this beautiful stenciled card from Jeanne H. who also lives in the Twin Cities MN. We'll sometimes meet and head to Anchor Paper, a favorite paper warehouse/stamping store. Our November meeting had to be postponed because it snowed heavily. Oh well, maybe after the holidays... Thanks for mailing my card, Jeanne - love it!!

You still have until December 6th to sign up for the December chain - go HERE for full details.

Thanks for stopping!