Holly Jolly - Mid month inspiration for Anything Christmas Goes

I know I said earlier that I was done with Christmas posts for the year. I have to admit I had forgotten about our reminder post for the month-long "Anything Christmas Goes" challenge over at Holly Jolly! We have a whopping nine sponsors for our last challenge of the year, so make sure you link up any Christmas related crafting to win some great prizes from our generous sponsors.

Our month long Christmas extravaganza is sponsored by  A Day for Daisies, All Dressed Up,  Bugaboo Stamps, Fred She Said Designs, Lacy Sunshine Stamps, QKR Stampede, Sentimental Susan, Stamp and Create and Stitchy Bear.

 

 

 

I decided to create a few gift boxes I could just grab when I needed them. I found free printables over at Homemade Gifts Made Easy, and made both a small square box and a pillow box in bright patterned papers, and decorated with the gorgeous Christmas Bulbs digi from the lovely A Day for Daisies. What's so clever about these boxes is that you can fully decorate them, and just pop in the gift when you need them. The pillow bow can even be stored flat, so it doesn't take up any space at all. And it's the perfect size for a gift card, so a nice and festive way to give a gift card.

I would like to link up with the following challenges:

Daring Cardmakers - All Wrapped Up

Just Add Ink - Gift Card Holder 

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Die Crazy (use die cut)

Crimbo Crackers - Die cuts

Crafting For All Seasons - Anything But A Card

My Time To Craft - Last Minute Christmas Makes

Card: Coloured 240 gsm kraft card grey, Ruby red, beige

Paper: Stampin' Up Nordic Noel and 

Stamps: A Day for Daisies digi Christmas Bulbs, Stampin' Up Endless Wishes

Ink and colouring: Tsukineko Versamark, Stampin' Up Real Red, Tim Holtz Vintage Photo, Copics

Other: Papermania Seafoam White embossing powder, Lawn Fawn Tag Your It, Tim Holtz idea-ology paper twine, Stampin' Up Bow builder punch, Glossy Accents

Holly Jolly - Stitching (real or faux)

As they days get longer and lighter it's time to start thinking about... Christmas of course! Just over nine months to go, and that time will fly, believe me. Now is the right time to start (or continue) to make Christmas cards. And over at Holly Jolly, we have a great challenge to help you do this. This time we ask you to get your sewing machine or stitched dies out, as our theme is Stitching - real or faux. As usual, you have two weeks to link up your fabulous creations, and if you need a bit of help to get going, hop over to Holly Jolly for fantastic inspiration from the team. You can also get inspiration and amazing images over at our sponsor's sites. This time we are sponsored by The Stamping Boutique, Oddball Art and Crafty Sentiments Designs. There are great prizes up for grabs

I used the adorable Christmas Mouse digi from the Stamping Boutique for my card. I coloured it with Copics and used foam applicators to apply distress ink around the image. I also added some stickles for added sparkle. I die cut all the panels using stitched dies. The sentiment is heat embossed in silver, and I used a silver Sharpie to draw the faux stitching around the banner. For embellishment, I created the bow using the Stampin' Up bow builder punch and added adhesive gemstones for a finishing touch.

I would like to link up with the following challenges:
The Glory of Christmas - Mouse
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra - Anything Goes
Christmas Cards All Year Round - Cute Critters
2015 World Wide Open Design Team Challenge - Any DT project 
The Corrosive Challenge - Our animal friends
Suzy Bee's Bloomin' Challenge - Anything goes with spots and/or stripes
Craft for the Craic - Bingo (image, more than 2 layers, die cut)
C.R.A.F.T Challenge - Christmas
Card: 300 gsm white card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, Dovecraft 110 gsm premium vellum
Stamps: The Stamping Boutique Christmas Mouse, Lawn Fawn Joy to the Woods
Ink: Tsukineko Versamark, Tim Holtz Distress inks Broken China and Chipped Sapphire
Colouring: Copics C1, C3, C5, R24, R46, YG11, YG13, YG17, Sharpie silver
Paper: Stampin' Up Designer Paper Patterns Stack Brights Collection
Other: Papermania Tinsel Silver embossing powder, Stampin' Up Bow Builder Punch, Lawn Fawn Stitched Journaling card die, Large Stitched Rectangle Stackables dies, Papermania adhesive gems Capsule Hot, Ranger Ice Stickles

Retro in green and brown

What a perfect combination of challenges, Retro Sketches and Retro Rubber. I absolutely adore the current Retro Sketch, so great for using up leftover pieces of DSPs. The colour challenge over at Retro Rubber was much more difficult for me. I'm not very good with green, but I had a nice selection of Stampin' Up DSP leftovers to use which turned out great for this challenge. Unfortunately it's impossible to take any photos in daylight these days as it's dark before I leave in the morning and dark when I get back in the evening, so the colours in the photo don't look quite as good as they do in real life. I guess I will have to wait until March or April before my photos stop being completely hopeless. In addition my iPhoto seems to have gone nuts, so I can't even edit the photos until I get the problem sorted. Sigh.

The idea behind Retro Rubber is to use your old, possibly long forgotten stamps. The stamp I chose to use is quite old, among the first stamps I bought back when I first started stamping. I haven't used it that much, but it's a pretty little stamp. A lot of the papers I used are also quite old, so they might well make the retro category. I also did a bit of stamping inside the card.

Card: Stampin' Up Very Vanilla and Crumb Cake
Stamps: Hobbycraft Clear Stamps Thistle, Paper Smooches A Little Lovin
Ink: Stampin' Up Baked Brown Sugar
Paper: Various scraps of Stampin' Up DSPs
Other: Stampin' Up Basic Pearls

Holly Jolly Christmas Challenge - Christmas Elves

It's that time again, a new challenge at Holly Jolly Christmas Challenge. This time we are challenging you with Christmas Elves. Our sponsor for this challenge is Bugaboo and there will be a pick of digis for the winner so get your elfin' on and join us with your elf-y creations. Head over to the Holly Jolly Christmas Challenge for lot's of elf-tastic inspiration from the DT, and don't forget to visit our sponsor. Bugaboo has the greatest digis, and there are so many elves to choose from.

I have used the cute Elf Candy Cane digi stamp from Bugaboo. I coloured him with Copics and added some accents with a white gel pen. I used Christmas crafting paper called Gingerbread Lane and matted everything onto red cardstock and finished with a large red bow and sentiment stickers in gold as I didn't want to force in a larger sentiment as I liked the layout as it was.

I'm entering the card in the following challenges:
Sparkles Christmas Challenge - Christmas candy
Christmas Stampin' All Year Long - Anything goes
Jingle Belles - Christmas Feast
Addicted to Stamps - Make your mark


Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, red cardstock from my stash, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card
Stamps: Digi Bugaboo Elf Candy Cane
Colouring: B00, B04, B06, C1, R20, R24, R46, Y15
Paper: Jennifer Ellory Gingerbread Lane DSP
Other: Red ribbon from my stash, sentiment stickers from Hobbycraft, Signo gel pen, Ranger Ice Stickles

Poinsettia card

The inspiration for today's card is the first inspiration sketch for November from Viva La Verve. It also comes with a colour combo, so all the inspiration you need to create a card. With a colour combo of green, red and kraft, of course it had to be a Christmas card. I think I'm starting to build up quite a good stash of Christmas cards by now! I was also inspired by The Card Concept where the theme is Krafty Christmas, and I think the style would be Freestyle Collage.

I used a selection of papers from Dovecraft Back to Basics Christmas collection and matted onto beige cardstock. The poinsettia is a digi from Fred She Said (I have also used it here). I coloured the poinsettia leaves with Old Olive Blendabilities and Copics, and added a rhinestone in the centre. I stamped the sentiment inside the card.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, Coloured 240 gsm kraft card beige
Stamp: Digi Fred She Said FSS-Poinsettia & Pine Boughs, Dovecraft Tis tthe Season S'Jingle
Ink: Stampin' Up Real Red
Colouring: Stampin' Up Blendabilities Old Olive, Copics R24, R46
Paper: Dovecraft Back to Basics Christmas 
Other: Papermania Adhesive gems capsule sunshine

Christmas Robins

Christmas is coming soon. Although that's probably not news to anybody, least the community of card crafters out there! This is a just a quick post with a few quick cards I made using some free toppers and papers that came with Cardmaking & Papercrafting magazine, inspired by Completely Christmas challenge where the theme is Anything goes with a twist - Add a Robin . I'm also entering Crafty Hazelnut's November Extra challenge where Anything Goes, The Christmas Card Challenge where the theme is No Embellishments, Jingle Belles where the theme is Creature Feature

Card: Craft UK kraft card, coloured 240 gsm kraft card red
Papers and toppers: Free with Cardmaking & Papercraft magazine
Other: red ribbon from my stash

Fun sketch

This is just a super quick post to publish an extra card for today as I realised the challenge deadline is coming to a close in just a few hours. I made this card inspired by the My Favourite Things sketch challenge. You just have to hop over there to check in the designer card, it's one of the most gorgeous cards I have ever seen.

I thought the sketch was perfect for using up some of those paper scraps which I can't get rid of. I would have loved to have the MFT square grid die which would have made this card so much easier to make, but alas I had to fussy cut my little squares, and live with the fact that they are just a little bit crooked. I cut the squares from lots of leftover papers and adhered to black cardstock. I stamped the sentiment from Just Sayin' and heat embossed it using white powder onto black card. I then used my 80's Glam Sharpies to colour the white embossed sentiment. I love that technique, it's so much fun. I'm also entering the card in The Pink Elephant Challenge where Anything goes this week.

Cardstock: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Coloured 240 gsm kraft card black
Papers: Paper scraps from Stampin' Up DSPs
Stamps: Stampin' Up Just Sayin'
Ink: Versamark 
Other: 80's Glam Sharpies, Papermania Seafoam White embossing powder

Peacock inspiration

I haven't been crafting for a few days, and it was going to be a very quiet end of the week on the blog. However, yesterday when I was catching up on my crafting challenges I was reminded of this fabulous inspiration picture on Just Add Ink. I had the perfect paper in my stash for this card, which has been waiting for a challenge like this. 

For the layout I used the sketch over at The Challenge. For the smaller details on the card I was inspired by the current Addicted to CAS codeword which is Vellum and by CAS on Sunday where the theme is Emboss it. I used dry embossing for the blue panel in the background, and heat embossing for the sentiment on the vellum. Last but not least I'm linking up at Craft Hoarders Anonymous where the challenge is to use at least three layers. I seem to have quite a few more with the background, blue embossed panel, blue matting, peacock feather paper and finally the vellum. This was another card where I used only stash stuff, starting with the long unused paper, and old stamp set for the sentiment, and scraps of vellum and dark blue cardstock for the matting and embossed background. It feels so good to find some use for those leftover scrap pieces of cardstock, doesn't it!

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Coloured kraft 240 gsm card teal and navy, Dovecraft 110 gsm premium vellum
Paper: Free papers with Cardmaking & Papercraft magazine
Stamps: Stampin' Up Chalk Talk
Ink: Tsukineko Versamark
Other: Embossing folder Sizzix swirls, Papermania embossing powder silver

Perfect sketch for paper scraps

I absolutely adore the current Retro Sketch. To be fair, they always have amazing sketches, but as soon as I saw this week's one I had to jump into the craft room despite it being past my bedtime. This is absolutely perfect for using up all those scraps that end up in that "no idea how to use them but can't throw them away either" box (admit it, you have one too!!). I wish this sketch would have come around on a less hectic week, and I would have made a dozen cards with it (and still will, just some other week...) as I had so much fun going through my scraps and making this card. It would also be perfect for Washi tape, and I might have to make one with my newly acquired stash of Washi, even if it won't make it for the challenge deadline. I'm also submitting the card to Craft Hoarders Anonymous where this week the theme is "All the Pretty Flowers". I'm most certainly a flower stamp and flower punch hoarder, and I do use them a lot. 

For this card, I decided I have to limit myself to anything I can find in my leftover stash box. I started with a background I have stamped before but didn't end up using at the time. Then I took my sweet time to select paper scraps I thought would go well together, and cut the scraps into banners. I also punched a few flowers using the lovely Petite Petals punch, finishing it all off with a great sentiment from Paper Smooches and a few pearls. Quick, simple, impressive, AND a great way of using those paper scraps. Perfect!

Cardstock: Leonardo Stationery 350 gsm smooth white card, Stampin' Up Smoky Slate card
Paper: Various Stampin' Up Designer Series Papers
Stamps: Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler, Stampin' Up En Français
Ink: Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Stampin' Up Smoky Slate
Other: Stampin' Up Petite Petals punch, Basic Pearls

In the garden

This is one of those cards which was supposed to be a completely different card, but it just didn't want to go there. So it turned out like this instead. Sometimes that happens, you have a clear idea in your head what you want to do, and when you put it together it just looks wrong. So you have to change mid project. But that's what so wonderful about creating, just go with the flow and see where you end up. 

The inspiration for this week's card is the Clear it Out challenge blog which this week has the theme In the Garden and the stash item Ribbon. And I do have a huge stash of ribbon which I don't use nearly enough (isn't it strange how you feel like you don't want to use the nice stuff in your stash, but save it "just in case you need it later"). Anyhow, pretty much everything in this card is from my stash. The paper is from a free set that came with a crafting magazine, the doilies have been floating around for ages and I used scraps of cardstock for the butterflies and die cut letters. I am also entering the card at The Pink Elephant where everything goes this week.

Card: Craft UK kraft card, coloured kraft card 240 gsm in purple grape and lavender
Paper: The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady Designer Paper Collection
Stamps: Stampin' Up Bloomin' Marvelous
Inks: Stampin' Up Rich Razzleberry and Wisteria Wonder
Other: White and purple ribbon from my stash, doily from my stash, charm from Vintage Sewing Charms, Tim Holtz inside out alphabet and vintage lace dies, Nellie's multiframe's MFD 020 die