Simple Christmas Cards

Here are some more simple Christmas cards I've made recently. I've been really enjoying keeping them clean and simple this year, not sure if it's because I've been so busy or if it's because I like the look so much. Either way, I've been pretty happy with how they've been turning out.

I've been waiting to post my favourite cards last so stay tuned! Also, I will be getting together with friends on Friday and making some more so there will still be more Christmas cards on the way.

Card Details
Snowman: Stamps - Inkadinkado, All Night Media; CS - unknown, Recollections, Colourbox ink, Versamark ink, and Ranger silver EB powder; Punch - unknown; Diamond Stickles; CB swiss dots folder and slide die cut.

Christmas Tag: Stamp - Heidi Grace, CS & PP - ATD Momenta; Tag Punch - unknown; Fiskars Threading Water Punch; Memories Dye black ink, Colourbox Ink - red and green; Ribbon - Ruban.

Stamping 411 Sketch Challenge 128

I've already posted several below using a similar sketch as this one at Stamping 411, but here is one more. I just love red and white on Christmas cards! Of course I like red and green too! TFL
Card Details: SU - Patterned Pines stamp and Pointsettia EB folder; Ranger Seafoam White EB powder and Versamark ink; Recollections CS; Bling and punch unknown.

Oh Christmas Tree

I found this tree stamp at Michael's in the $1.50 bin! The sentiment came from the same bin last year. Gotta love a good deal! So this is my first card with the tree stamp. The holly are my own stamped embellishments. I'm really into the clean and simple look this year for cards.

One of my favourite tips I once learned is to take a silver (or you can use gold too) metalic broad tip marker, use an exacto knife and cut a small slit in the middle of the broad tip, and slide it along the edge of your cs for a nice silver edge! It comes out straight and even, and looks like another layer without having to mat it.

Card Details: Stamps - Recollections (tree), Studio G (sentiment), Heidi Grace (holly); Pilot silver metalic marker; Bling - Hero Arts; Candy Cane Stickles; Diamond dust Gelly Roll pen; Ink - Colourbox (pheasant gold), Versa Colour (Bark), Memories black Dye, Versamark; and Ranger silver EB powder.

Another Christmas Card

Here is a winter scene I made with my new SU Lovely as a Tree stamp. I frosted the ground and tree branches with Diamond Stickles to give it the look of snow, and sponged on a grey/blue winter sky behind the trees. Sentiment is embossed in silver.

Card Details: Stamps - SU, All Night Media; Memories Dye Ink, Versamark, Colourbox; Ranger silver embossing powder; CS - Recollections; Diamond Stickles.

Finally! Time to Post Christmas Cards (365 Cards Day 275)

I have been sooo busy lately it's been unbelievable! However, I have managed to squeeeeeze in some time to work on Christmas cards. I just haven't been able to get the chance to take pictures and post them until today. I'm going to post a few a day for the next little while as I finally have them all ready to be posted, I just don't want to do it all at once. I need to give you a reason to keep visiting me here!

These 3 cards are all fitting for today's challenge at 365 Cards. The 'Tis The Season challenge calls for using lots of red and green on your cards. They are my favourite colours to use on Christmas cards - I'm a traditionalist as you will see!

I made my own embellishments using a couple of different holly stamps and a flower punch. I punched out the star shaped flower in red and green, and pieced it together to make my own pointsettias. The holly stamps were embossed in gold, cut out and popped off the page with 3D foam tape. TFL!

Card Details
Top: Stamps - SU Patterned Pines, All Night Media (Sentiment); Ink - Versamark; Ranger Seafoam White EB Powder; CS - Recollections; Ribbon - Ruban "Berry Christmas"; Popped with 3D tape.

Middle: Stamps - SU (Lovely As a Tree), All Night Media (Sentiment), Whispers (holly berries);
Ink - Versamark and Colourbox; Ranger Gold EB Powder; Stickles -Candy Cane, Diamond; CS - Recollections, Unknown.

Bottom: Stamps - Inkadinkado (snowman), Heidi Grace (holly); Ink - Memories Dye Black, Versamark; Ranger Gold EB Powder; Stickles - Candy Cane, Platinum; CS - Recollections; Punch - McGill (Petite Petals); CB Swiss Dots Folder.

The Baby Card

This is the baby card I made to go with the gift for my niece's baby shower. I used a Fiskar's border punch to make the fancy square. It is popped off the page with 3-D 2 sided tape. I stamped the rattle (using a dollar store stamp), cut it out, then added glitter and a bow to make my own embellishment. I will try to add the card details tomorrow if I can find the time.

Why I've Been So Busy, Busy, Busy!

My niece is expecting a baby girl (her first) in February, and several of us got together and threw a big (and I mean BIG!) shower for her inviting all sides of her family. A total of 75 women attended! I made several craft items for the shower beginning with the invitations.

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to the talented ladies at Splitcoast for their wonderful inspiring ideas. I couldn't have done it without them! The invitation, favour, and thankyou card ideas all came from the Splitcoast gallery.

Can you see why I haven't had time to post anything for a long time?

The Invitation!

All 75 invitations!

The Favour
The favour, showing what I put inside.

75 Favours!

Thankyou card.75 Thankyou cards.

Table card I made explaining information about a couple of the games.

All 9 table cards.

Advice card I made for a special album. We also used it to draw for door prizes.
All 75 advice cards.

Helpful Hints album.
I bought a cheap photo album in the dollar store and exchanged the covers for ones that I made. This is the front cover and is computer generated.

Back cover of Helpful Hints album. Also computer generated.

365 Cards - Day 231 Imagine This: The Sky

Day 231 challenge at 365 Cards calls for a card using the sky for inspiration. I needed a sympathy card for a friend who lost her father suddenly, so decided to use this challenge for my inspiration. The card LO came from Lynn Hadley, my SU Demonstrator. I cased one of her LOs because it was perfect for what I had in mind. I stamped the flowers and sentiment with Versamark and embossed with white powder. Then I sponged on 3 or 4 different colours of blue ink.

Card Details: CS - K&Company, Bazill, Recollections and SU Glossy CS; Stamps - Artemio, Heidi Grace Greetings; Ink - Versamark, Colorbox, MS; Ranger White EB Powder; Ribbon - Dollar store.

"Take a Bow"

Create a ***NEW*** card using ribbon in a wonderful way! This is the challenge at Caardvarks where the sponsor this week is May Arts. I used 4 different kinds of ribbon on this card. Each flower was done using ribbon in a different way. Of course I had to add ribbon with a slide as well!

Card Details: CS - White (Recollections), Yellow & Green (Bazill), Stripes (unknown); Ribbon - Whites (Ruban), Pinks (unknown); Pearls - Recollections; Buttons - unknown; CB die cut & swiss dots EB folder; MS leaf punch; Ink - Pamass.

Thanksgiving

I have just a moment between turkey bastings to make a quick post, so I want to wish a Happy Thanksgiving to all my Canadian supporters! We have my Dad and step-mother, as well as my DH's parents coming for supper tonight. My DH has gotten very energetic and made a squash soup and pumpkin chessecake to go with my turkey dinner. I made fresh dinner rolls yesterday as well. Am I making you hungry yet? I'm getting hungry just thinking of it! The turkey smells soooo yummy!

I feel very blessed, and have so much to be thankful for. I hope you do too! Have a very Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Blessings,
Dorie Ellen

Happy 90th Birthday

Grammie Hanson is 90! My friend asked me to make this card for her grandmother who is celebrating her 90th birthday today. She has a very weak heart and lately has had lots of health issues as a result. She's been in the hospital for a bit, and last week wasn't expected to live more than a couple of days, let alone make it to her 90th! Turns out she is a fighter and much stronger than expected because she has had a couple of good days, and today the family celebrates not only Thanksgiving, but her birthday. Now that is something to be thankful for!
God sure is good.

The stamp and background were coloured by sponging on ink. I stamped oak leaves to create my own pp. The sentiment was computer generated. TFL

Card Details: CS - Recollections, SU Glossy; Inks - Colorbox; Stamps - SU (Lovely As A Tree); Ribbon - Ruban; Eyelets - Dollar store; Sentiment - Computer generated.

25th Wedding Anniversary

3 days after my husband's parents celebrated their 50th anniversary, his sister and her husband celebrated their 25th! I made this card for them. This was a new type of fold for me that I wanted to try. I attached the smaller, folded card to a larger base to make it a bigger card to give. I used lots of embossing and vellum on this card. I really like the look of vellum, don't you?

Card Details: Vellum - White Floral by Colorbok, plain - unknown; CS - Bazill shiny gray, gray metalic & pearl white - unknown; Metal frame & bling - dollar store; Punches - MS (leaf), Marvy Uchida (flower); Stamps - Craft (numbers), All Night Media (Happy Anniversary); Ink - Versamark; Silver EB Powder - Wal-Mart.

50th Wedding Anniversary Card

My in-laws celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary on Saturday! Woot, woot!! We had an awesome celebration with 85 relatives and friends. I really think 50 years together is something definitely worth celebrating since we live in a society in which so many marriages end in divorce. They have a strong faith in God which got them through the rough patches and helped them reach this milestone. There's nothing better than leaning on the solid rock of Christ!

Anywhoo, this is the card that I made them. I did alot of gold embossing for this one! The base is shiny gold and the pp has raised shiny gold dots too. I also layered two different gold ribbons, one sheer and the other glittery. I stamped the envelope to match.

Card Details: Stamps - All Night Media (Happy Anniversary), Craft - (#50), Artemio - (roses & leaves); Spellbinders Nesties - Label 1; Bazill - shiny gold CS, Pearl CS - unknown; The Paper Company - white with gold dots; Metal frame and ribbon - dollar store.

Christmas Card

I started making this card for the MMSC19, but as usual, never got the time to finish it until now. I didn't add any embellishments like the sketch required, because I liked this card just the way it was.

Card Details: CS - Recollections (red, green, white), Crafty Bitz (green embossed), K&Company (red pp); Stamp - Inkadinkado; Ink - Memories Black Dye; Nesties Ovals; Image was coloured with pencil crayons.

Stampin Up Workshop

I have been wanting to learn more about Stampin Up so I recently held a workshop in my home. The workshop leader(Lyn Hadley) made the Halloween card with the candy in it and then gave it to me. The rest of the cards were made by me, but were her designs. The spider envelope has 3 Rockets candies in it. We had lots of fun and I enjoyed learning some new techniques to add to my repertoire!

**All items are Stampin Up.

Stamping 411 - SSC117

My son needed a card for his friend who was having a birthday party this afternoon. I finished it just in time before he had to go! Thankfully I have done a similar card like this before so it didn't take long to throw it together. Today's challenge at Stamping 411 involved using a shape with a point on it and since this one has 4 points on it I thought it would be a good one to use. I had to move the strip up from behind the fish though, because I wanted to put the sentiment on it. I hope I haven't strayed too far from the original sketch by doing that though.

Card Details: CS - Recollections, Unknown; Ink - MS (blue), Versamark with Ranger super fine gold EB powder; CB Folder - D'vine Swirls; Eyelets - Unknown; Sentiment was computer generated.

365 Cards - Day 198 "Make a Mosaic"

I made this card earlier in the week, but didn't get the chance to post it until now, and now it's too late to enter it in the challenge at 365 Cards! Oh well, at least I can still post my first Christmas card for this year! For this card we had to put a mosaic of some kind on our card. I made a mosaic out of punched images. The image was punched on red vellum so the mosaic would show through.

Card Details: Stamp - Heidi Grace Christmas; Ink - Memories Black Dye, Colorbox - Gold, Versamark Ink Pen (for the edges that I embossed); EB Powder - Ranger (super fine gold); Red Vellum - Unknown; CS - Recollections; Punch - Emagination; Bling - Dollar Store.

2 Challenges - One Card

This is a first for me, but I managed to combine two challenges on one card. First I used the Stamping 411 Saturday Sketch Challenge 116. (See the sketch above.) The second challenge was for 365 Cards - Day 196 "Just a Touch". For it, we had to stamp with black on white and add "just a touch" of colour. I chose to use this Hanglar Stanglar image (was a rak), and just colour the pumpkins. I actually like how the little bit of colour behind the girl gives focus to her and to the pumpkins at the same time! This is something I normally would never have thought to try, thus another reason I love these challenges!

Card Details: Stamps - Hanglar Stanglar, Artemio (flourish); Flowers and Leaves - raks; Ribbon - Stampin' Up; CS - Recollections, Cricut Rainbow; Punch - MS Lace; CB Folder - Swirls. I coloured the image with pencil crayons.

365 Cards - Day 192 "So Sweet"

This challenge involved using the word "sweet" on a card. I made this card using a new stamp set I've been having fun with. The roses are embossed in white and then filled in using fine black glitter. This is hard to see except where it is coming off of the flower and onto the card! The leaves are stamped with white on black cs, and the white background is embossed using the swirls CB folder.

Card Details: CS - Recollections; Stamps - Artemio (rose set), Studio G (sentiment); Ink - Pamass (white), Memories (black); EB Powder - Ranger (Seafoam White).

Stamping 411 - SSC115

Here is my take on Saturday's Sketch Challenge at Stamping 411.

Card Details: Stamp - See D's; CS - Pink Pearl; Anna Griffin; MME - Behemia (Blossom Girlfriends Floral/Pink); Flowers - Forever in Time; Brads - Dollarama; Ink - Ranger Walnut Distress Ink.

MMSC17 - Using Bleach Technique

Talk about getting things done at the last minute! This card challenge for Midnight Madness needed to be done by tomorrow! Thankfully I've had a quiet and relaxing Labour Day and a chance to work on it. It was a fun card to do as I tried out the bleach technique for the first time. The bleach didn't take too much colour out of the cs I used, but it did take enough out to give a subtle difference. The flower is the bleached part.

I also tried out inking my CB folder for the first time. I used the Birds and Swirls folder with lavender ink and got a wonderful effect. These are both techniques that I will definitely try again! TFL

Card Details:
Stamp - Inkadinkado (Doodle Flowers); Ink - Versamark, Color Box Lavender; Clear EB Powder - Stamplicity; CS - Cricut Rainbow (light and dark purple); Recollections (white); Unknown (dark purple base); CB Folders - Swiss Dots, Birds & Swirls; Metal Corners - Dollarama; Ribbon - Offray.

Sad News

The Scrapping Nook

I was sad to hear this morning that my local scrapbooking store will be closed for awhile. They lease their space and some work was done recently on an electrical panel in the back of the building, and it turns out they had an electrical fire. A malfunction in the panel caused the flourescent lights in the store to blow and they ended up losing their entire "stash" to smoke damage. You can check out their blog here for more information.

The store is owned and operated by a very dedicated and fun group of ladies who don't deserve this kind of stress and loss. I'm just thankful to know that nobody was hurt and that things can be replaced. Hopefully the store will be repaired, restocked, and up & running again soon.

Stamping 411 Challenge Card

This is from an old challenge, but I had it half done so I decided to finish it. I guess I should pay more attention to the dates on my notes! It seems I just haven't had enough time to keep up with some of these challenges! Well, school will be starting in a few days and hopefully then I will have a bit more time to make cards.

I recently spent some time trying to find ways to take better photographs. I made my own photolight box and have taken a few pics using it, and so far I'm happy with the result. It's much easier to get a nice clear picture with it, especially if I stick it outside in the bright sunlight and don't have to rely on lamps!

Now I need to get busy ordering curriculum for my bible study which will be starting up in a couple of weeks, and for youth group which will be starting up also the same week. Doesn't it seem like there is always something happening to distract you from what you really want to do most (ie. make cards)! Don't get me wrong, I love leading both my groups, I just don't like having to make all the arrangements at the beginning of the year.

Card Details: CS - Coredinations Black Magic, Recollections, Crate Paper Blue Hill Collection (Cloud)
Sentiment - Computer Generated; Ink - Portfolia (Gifted Memories)
Nestie - Scallop Circle; CB Folder - Textile; Stamp - Inkadinkado (Birds Galore)

Day 185 - Feeling Blue

This card was made for a challenge at 365 Cards. The challenge was to use 3 different shades of blue on a card.

Card Details:
Stamps - Inkadinkado (Expressions & Frames, Doodle Flowers)
CS - Recollections, K&Company (Classic K)
Ink - Memories, Versamark; EB Powder - Ranger (Seafoam White)
Nestabilities - Label 1; Ribbon - Dollarama

Resist Techniques

Last night I attended my first SU workshop and learned how to do the resist technique 3 different ways. Each card was made using a different resist technique. It was fun and educational! I just love learning new ways to decorate my cards. I'm sure these techniques aren't knew for most of you, but for me it was the first time I had done this before.

The first card was stamped with versamark on glossy cs, and then embossed with clear powder. Then I sponged on the ink and wiped off the excess to smooth it out.

The second card was stamped with versamark on glossy cs and once dry, brayered with ink.

The third card was covered with pastel, and then versamark ink was stamped on it using a stamp roller.

Card Details: I don't know the names of everything, but I can tell you that they are all from SU!