Week 18, 19 Christmas Cards - Three cards including a Squidgy Santa

Afternoon All,

It's turned out lovely here after the awful storms of last night and we now have bright sunshine. The birds are really enjoying it and singing their hearts out. I even spotted a squirrel earlier. I've been working on Christmas cards to keep up with my personal challenge to make one a week, even managing to make two for last week and one in advance for this week. Here's the first.

Squidgy Santa Front

Some time ago my DH surprised me by bringing in a pack of Christmas Squidgy Stickers he'd found in one of the pound shops. That was 15 stickers for 99p - quite a bargain though at the time I did wonder what I would ever use them for! However, they do have just the sort of texture a small child would love to touch and squeeze so this card will be going to one of the tots in the family this year.

The black and white script card was scanned as a jpg so that it could be imported into a graphics programme to create the insert and also printed out for layering. A red chalk ink pad from docrafts was used to distress the piece of card used on the front.

Materials used: White cardstock for 5.5" x 5.5" base and for print out of script layer; black/white script card from paperbox.co.uk; white copy paper to print insert; red car die-cut; red chalk ink pad; squidgy Santa topper.

Snowflake card

The second card kind ofgrew out of the first, though I did originally intend using the gorgeous snowflake die cut as something to put a stocking topper on. However, while I was working on it, it became clear that it wouldn't work so it was back to the drawing board. And that's when I decided to double up the snowflake, distress it a bit and bling it up. I lifted the tips of the topmost snowflake to add a bit of dimension to it too.

Materials used: white cardstock for 5.5" x 5.5" base and for print out of script layer; red paper from Cock-A-Doodle Christmas Page Packet; Two white snowflake die cuts; Tim Holtz Distress Inks, Black Soot & Fired brick; Perfect Pearls, Forever Red; docrafts red glitter; flat-backed rhinestone from stash.

insert

The inserts for these cards were the same and the backs were similarly decorated.

back

The third card uses the stocking topper intended for the second card - one thing just led to another this week :)

Christmas Stocking Card

This card proved impossible to photograph face on because of the silver embossed card reflecting the light. So these are the two best shots taken at two different angles.

Christmas Stocking Card

The top of the stocking has been decorated with fluffy stuff - I love the texture - and a sprinkling of silver glitter. No insert for this one but it's decorated inside, as is the back, with the design paper.

Inside

This card I'm submitting to Crafty Hazel's Christmas Card Challenge - the challenge this week is based on this cute photograph.



I've a busy week ahead of me with several cards to make. My wee brother, Colin, turns 60 on 20th May - I can hardly believe it. It doesn't seem so long ago I climbed up onto the sofa to peep at my new baby brother in his pram! And my son's daughter, our lovely granddaughter, Jolene, is 11 on 24th May - she's growing up rather too fast too. Living as they do in rural Aberdeenshire we don't see them as often as we do my daughter and her family, so we are travelling up this coming weekend to pay a visit - it will be lovely to catch up. 

Anyway, I'd better get on - I've a stamp to colour!

Take care and happy crafting,

F1 Racing Birthday Card for a Grandson

Good morning to you all, and Happy Birthday, Alun!

Alun is my youngest grandson and today is his 12th birthday. Ever since he was a tot he has loved cars and this has developed into a fascination for F1 racing. In fact, he is something of an expert and knows the names of all the top drivers, current and past, and all the racing cars, colours, etc. So this year I've made him a card dedicated to the racing car.

This card was simple and easy to make because I found the toppers already pre-printed and the design paper was printed from a My Craft Studio CD. The insert needed a bit of tweaking, a change of colour from yellow to red. The image isn't of a racing car but this karting image fitted in nicely with today because our gift to him was a voucher to go karting - a taster for the real thing!

Materials used:
1. White cardstock for base; red A5 textured card from Create & Craft TV for matting
2. Paper from My Craft Studio's CD 'The Finishing Line'
3. Toppers from Create & Craft (bought at Wilkinson's)

I printed the design paper off in A4 size so that I could use it to cover both the front and back of the card. So there it is, an easy card to please our own wee car racing enthusiast.

I have another card to post so will be back when I have photographed it.

Hope you all have a very happy crafting day.

Valentine Card

Good Afternoon

This must be a record for me - three times in one day. I've just managed to photograph the first card made using the marbled cardstock I made on Sunday using the shaving foam technique.

Materials used:

• rose coloured pearlescent cardstock for base
• the marbled card in shades of pink & green
• green gingham chipboard frame
• green gingham heart-shaped topper and gingham edged insert created on PC using Basic Grey's 'Carlie' digital paper from the 'Oh Baby Girl' Collection
• embellishments: pink heart-shaped toppers from The Works and pink & green ribbon from Funky Scrapbook Barn

Sticking to my resolve to use up some of the stash I've got before buying any more I finally found a use for this chipboard frame. I bought it in a collection when I was making a scrapbook layout, used everything else but not this frame but I thought it would look really good with the pink and green of the marbled paper.

The pink heart shaped toppers were a cheap find some time ago at The Works but really pretty and a perfect match.

The insert and the heart shaped greeting were made using My Craft Studio's graphic programme and Basic Grey's digital paper. The ribbon is gorgeous, green on one side and pink on the other - not sure it shows up too well in the photograph.

Apologies, especially to Ciara, if my photographs are dark but it is dark here in Scotland today (and most days, if I'm honest) - even with the lights on. I shall have to look into the possibilities of investing in a daylight lamp. It would be nice if some kind person would run a course or tutorial on how to photograph cards because I'm useless at it :(


I'm at the reading group tonight so won't get much more crafting done today. We are reading 'A Fine Balance' by Rohinton Mistry. It's a thick book, a very thick book, but it's proving to be very good. It's a family saga, set in India in the middle of the 20th century, the period after the British left and in a time of great political unrest for the country. I'm only half-way through - I did say it was a big book - but I have to finish it because I want to know what happens to the people in it - I'm well and truly drawn into their story. 

Hope you like this card - it's a departure from my usual style, no stamp, no colouring, very little paper, no ink, though I did sand the edges of the frame to distress it a bit. I'm not even sure I like to rely so heavily on toppers for effect - my fingers are too clean :)

Bye for now
Elizabeth

Wild Poppies Card

Good evening to you all,

This is for all of you, especially Neet, who wanted to see the finished card that I featured in my WOYWW post this week.

As I said on that post I did not have all the materials suggested by Barbara Grey in her tutorial for this card but I think I've done a creditable substitution job : ) This is the second attempt at the stamping - I was not happy with my first stab at it. This I'm much happier with.

Materials used:

Card:

• White card for base
• Stampin Up Crumb Cake for matting
• Create & Craft A5 Textured Card in Red for matting.
• Clarity Stamp Wild Poppies
• Sheena Douglass A Little Bit Sketchy 2 Optimism (sentiment)
• Memento Tuxedo Black ink pad
• Krylon 18kt Gold Leafing pen

Insert:

• My Craft Studio Professional
• White copy paper 80gsm
• Nitwit Collections digital Cookin' Cookies Too - Red Striped

I made masks from a post-it pad and used Barbara's technique of ink, stamp and stamp again to get the effect that some poppies are in the foreground and some further back. It was a bit tricky working out the spacing of the pieces after cutting it up but I got there in the end and I think the edging with the gold pen just finishes them perfectly.

I just made a fairly simple insert and was lucky to find that I had digital paper already on my PC that picked up the red/brown/gold colours used in the card. And, I don't know what I'd do without the graphics programme in My Craft Studio - I was able to digitally punch a strip from the paper and use it to decorate the insert.

I've been experimenting with shaving foam and Cosmic Shimmer Mists today to marble some card. It worked out very well and some of the results are lovely. I'm hoping to make a card using some of the card later and maybe it will feature on a later post.

That's me lot for today and thanks for reading. If you wish to leave a comment it will be much appreciated as I love to hear from and you and enjoy receiving feedback.

Bye for now.
Elizabeth

Football Fanatic Card + Another Recycle Challenge Card

Happy Thursday to you all,

Materials used:

• Cardstock - white & green
• Papers - Super Smooth Matt paper 100gsm & White Multipurpose printer paper 80gsm
• My Craft Studio Professional The Finishing Line
• Martha Stewart border punch
• Stamp Away's useful words set
• Kelly Green ink pad

My grandson #1 is football mad (sigh, so is #2 & #3) so I just had to make him a themed card for his 22nd birthday recently. Now, I know nothing about football, not even enough to write on the proverbial postage stamp, but I did know that he is a Celtic supporter so I tried to find something in green and white in my crafting stuff. Not easy, I have very little football related stash anyway and no stamps either but I did find some football themed artwork in My Craft Studio's The Finishing Line CD. Problem was the colours were all wrong and I'd never be forgiven for giving him a card showing the wrong team colours - that would be the crime of the century! However, I was able to alter the colour even though the players' legs were now a fetching shade of green too :)

I thought I'd pulled it off when grandson #1 described the card as 'crackin' - and I breathed again. Too soon, it would appear the stripes are going the wrong way. Well, how's a grandmother supposed to know that, I ask you?

Thankfully, the challenge card was a tad easier to design. I just had to recycle something from the many commercial cards received and this time I decided that, for a complete change, it would be a very feminine birthday card.

Materials used:

• Kraft Notecard from Hero Arts for base
• Dotty design paper from Papermania's Summer Bloom 6x6 pack
• Green trim leftover from a previous project
• Recycled glittered rose trim & hat box topper
• Freebie greeting stamp
• Versafine Olympia Green ink pad

Several items on this card are recycled, leftover from another project or a freebie - very frugal of me :) Having spent the better part of a year succumbing to the temptation of acquiring tons of crafting items - card, paper, stamps, more paper, ribbons, inks, embellishments, more ribbon, equipment, even more ribbon etc., etc., I've called a halt before I bankrupt myself completely. That said, I'm really relishing the challenge to use up all this lovely stuff before I purchase any more and, at the same time, recycle stuff too. It's a very satisfying exercise.

Just for a change, and also because I loved it, I lined the inside of the card with the dotty design paper - as the dots are pastels on a white background it should be okay to write a greeting on it.

That's my cards for today. I've just realised that the only stamping on these cards is in the greetings - did I say they were easy to make? Still not found the time to create a scrapbook layout - too many other projects to do and I still have to make my Christmas card for this week - I've made a start so I'd better finish it off this evening.

Bye for now,
Elizabeth