Santa Train

Hello Everyone,
It now June so over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge blog we have a new hostess. This month Elizabeth has chosen what we will be doing with each of the different challenges.

With it being the first Saturday in June, Elizabeth has come up with a sketch for us to use.

If you have been to my blog before you know that I love working with sketches. One of the main reasons for liking them so much is that they can work in any orientation so this makes them so versatile.

As you can see with my design I have turn the sketch 90 degrees anti-clockwise. My decision to do this was decided by my elements that I chose to use on my card. First I found the Santa Train image which I cut from a Daphane’s Diary magazine; then I found this wonderful sentiment from the Crisp Christmas Sentiment Sheets by Paper Rose Studios. The sentiment made me laugh when I saw it and thought it went wonderfully with the image.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my design team make for the June Sketch from 52CCT. I hope that I will see your creations as well on our challenge blog. Please do stop by and check out what other team members have done with the sketch.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT May 2023 Stash

Hello everyone,
It is the 4th Saturday in May and my last as host of the challenges for 2023 over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge. I got to choose between setting a technique or stash challenge. As you can see by the title of this post I set a stash challenge.

So with this stash challenge I want everyone to dive into their scrap container – I’m 99% sure that everyone has that stash of scraps that they are keeping because they know that it will come in handy for a project in the future. Well this is that project 🙂

Because I had and still have so many scraps I actually made 4 cards for this challenge. Both using the same idea – first I’ll show you the cards and then explain.

Can you see how I got 4 cards?

I made 2 panels of strips of pattered paper and I cut each panel at an angle to get the top piece and the bottom. Then I used a hills border die to cut some white cardstock which I stamped the greeting and snowflake (?) images before adhering to the card which had the patterned piece.

The first set I made a boo boo in measuring my sentiment piece but instead of throwing it away I decided to work with it. With a pencil I drew the contour of the piece it was going to be paired with and cut it out with my scissors. When I adhered the pieces to the maroon layering piece I just left a gap which makes it look like this was how it was designed – no one receiving these will ever know unless they read this post. 🙂

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my card design for my stash challenge over on the 52CCT challenge blog. Please go to the blog and click on the links to the other designers and see how they used scraps in their designs.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT May 2023 Theme

Hello everyone,
It is the 3rd Saturday of May and over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge I got to set a theme as host.

I decided to go with music as the theme for the challenge because it is one of the most universal things about Christmas. No matter where you go or what you may be doing during the month of December you will hear music – from that being played on the radio, to carollers in shopping centres and in churches.

Singing carols at a Carols by Candlelight event I think is one of my earliest memories. Even now if I don’t go to an event live if I am watching them on TV I will still sing along but especially at our church Christmas family event.

I loved this digital image so much when I bought it and I have been waiting for an opportunity to use it. Before printing this image I added the sentiment below as a tree stand.

Once I had mounted this image onto some Maroon cardstock I added the Love from Lizi gold stripe stickers around the border. To fill it out a little more I added some circle holographic stickers in various colours and sizes.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my card design using my theme of music. I hope that you will stop on by the blog and see what the other designers have done with this theme. And I hope to see your creation as well.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT May 2023 Colour

Hello everyone,
It is the 2nd Saturday in May and we have a new colour challenge over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge. As I am host this month I got to chose the colours that we would be working with.

I find setting this challenge always interesting as I’m never 100% confident with my choices so I decided that I would let some experts choose for me. I found a patterned paper pad that I wanted to use with my challenges and chose the most predominate ones from those papers.

I loved this patterned paper pad as it was different to most others as there are no Santa’s, Reindeers or Christmas Trees to be seen. But it does have beautiful birds and holly. Now you can see where I got my colour scheme from – it was this beautiful paper. So I had to make it the main feature for my card design.

All I added to this paper was one of the die-cuts and a sentiment that I printed from my computer. I think that it turned out wonderful even if it is a more simple card.

Thanks for stopping in and seeing my card using the colours I chose for the 52CCT May Colour challenge. I hope that you will stop on by the blog and see what the other designers have made using my combination. Also consider joining in with us on the creative fun each week.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT May 2023 Sketch

Hello everyone,
It is May and over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge I am the hostess of the challenges. And it just happens to be my birthday month as well.

So anyway onto the first challenge which is a sketch. Now you know I love sketches but trying to come up with something that hasn’t been seen before is a challenge. I hope that you like what I came up with.

I took the photo of my card at such an angle because I was trying to get the gold foiled snowflakes to show up. They sort of did. I am really happy with how this turned out after I turned my sketch into reality.

I will let you into a little secret here – I made a run through card using a different paper pad just to make sure I had everything figure out properly before making this one. I don’t have a lot of the full sheets of paper of the pack left but I wanted to use it for my challenges.

Thanks for stopping in and seeing my sketch for the 52CCT Sketch challenge for May. I hope that you will stop on by the blog and see what the other designers did with my sketch. And think about coming and joining in on the fun of the different challenges each week.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT April 2023 Technique

Hello everyone,
It is the 4th Saturday in April which means that it is time for us to have either a technique or stash challenge. As you can tell from the title this time we have a technique to use for our card designs.

So the design team and I want to see what you can do with vellum embossing. This can be any type of embossing that you can come up with.

I chose to use an embossing folder and my Gemini Jnr machine to create my vellum embossing panel. I also used my machine to cut all of the other elements as well. There is a panel of gold brushed card; a rectangle was cut out of it which was slightly smaller than the scalloped panel inner rectangle so I ended up with a border. I used the same gold and black card to cut out the elements of the sentiment die.

Thanks for stopping by and looking at my card design for the Technique challenge that is now happening over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge Blog. Please visit the blog and see what the other designers made with this challenge and consider joining us.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT BLOG

SUPPLIES LIST
Quill Vellum Paper
Craft Concept Secret Garden Embossing Folder
Paper Rose Scallop Rectangle Die (2 pc)
Paper Rose Rectangle Die (Australian Sized)
Paper Rose Holiday Blessings Chunky Layered Die
Crafters Companion Gemini Jnr Machine

52CCT April 2023 Colour Challenge

Hello Everyone,
Today is the start of the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown April Colour challenge. And the colours that Goga has chosen are …

We are allowed to use black or white but for layers, image outlines or sentiments. But predominately it needs to be these colours.

For my creation I used a large Christmas image from Graphic Fairy as the main element. I just loved the poinsettia flowers on her dress and thought it fit the colour challenge perfectly. I used some green gingham paper as the layer below the image. To give the card a little bit of pop I added some red holographic circle stickers.

This card was really easy to pull together with such a great starting image. I hope that you will visit the challenge blog and see what the other designers did with this image. Please consider liking my post it really does help bloggers.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT April 2023 Sketch

Hello everyone,
It is the beginning of the month and it is sketch time over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge.

As you can see I didn’t follow the sketch exactly but you can see the elements from the sketch. I went down this path because I tried adding stars to this and it just didn’t seem to work. So I found this bird image – if I was to do this again I would go with a different element.

The sentiment strip is from the die-cuts pack and I added a sentiment sticker from my stash. The main image is actually from a Daphne’s Diary magazine. I love using images from magazines in this way as they are a great resource and it cuts down on my printing costs.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my card for the sketch challenge that is happening over on the 52CCT Challenge blog at the moment. I hope that you will stop on by the blog and see what the other designers did with this sketch. And come and join in on the creative fun.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT March 2023 Technique

Hello everyone
It is the 4th Saturday in March and it is time for a Technique challenge over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge. This time the technique is

The definition of mixed media is to combine different types or forms of media together on the same project.

For my project this started with a watercolour background that I had made a little while ago with some leftover paint on my palette. I decided to make a tunnel card but first I had to find the image that was going to be at the bottom of my tunnel. I found this beautiful image that I had saved from The Graphic Fairy. I thought that using a more traditional image with a mixed media piece would help both elements to stand on their own.

To make the tunnel the first step was finding the right shape and size of dies to work with my A6 sized card base. I decided that I liked the look of ovals so to make this easier on myself I used my Gemini Jnr machine and the Hero Arts Oval Infinity dies. I cut 1 oval from each of the layers I was going to use. To make the tunnel I started at the bottom and worked my way up slowly getting bigger as I went.

I used some Christmas word washi tape across the bottom left corner. Then using the Stitched Star dies from Paper Rose Studio I cut multipuls from a piece of paper from a dictanary that I had sponged distress ink in red and green on 1 side and brown on the opposite. This gave me the opportunity to use either side when putting them on the card. To finish of the card I found some gold stars in my sticker box that had both the star and the outer edge sperate so I used some of these to bring together all of the elements.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my Mixed Media card for the technique challenge over on the 52CCT blog. I hope that you will visit the blog and see what the other designers have made and consider joining in on the fun with your own creation.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

52CCT March 2023 Colour

Hello everyone,
I am a little late in uploading my card for the colour challenge for March over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown challenge blog. But I loved what I made that I thought that I would still show you what I made with the colour combination which is.

I liked this combination that I decided to make 2 different cards. Both have as the main colour some black card stock which I printed different digi designs onto each with my Brother Lazer printer and then used some Silver Star Foil and my Minc machine.

This one I printed 3 different line art Christmas cupcakes and found the circle sentiment which I had previously printed and I put them through my Minc machine. Then I just added this to a white card base with a strip of silver metallic paper. This is a very simple card for me and the 2nd one is even simpler.

This is just a digital image printed then put through the Minc machine with the silver star foil which you can really see with this design. I have put a layer of the silver metallic paper behind this but it didn’t show up on the photo because I was trying to make sure that the silver foiling showed up.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my design for the 52CCT March 2023 Colour challenge. I hope that you will come over to the blog and see what the other designers did with this combination.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.