Festive Friday #38

This week at Festive Friday Challenge we have a nice simple sketch which leaves you with lots of possibilities some pop on over and see what the rest of the design team have made to inspire you and join in with us - every Christmas card made is one less to rush at the end of the year!

I decided that with such a lovely big open space on the card I would do the Emboss Resist technique. Can you believe that I have never tried this one before? It is really so easy and so fun to watch it come together.  The ink used was Baja Breeze, and I built the colour up from the centre of each 'snowflake' not refreshing the dauber as I moved out so the colour became lighter. The lovely sentiment is from Greetings of the Season and I have cut it with my Apothecary Accents Framelits. 

   

Because I went with Not Quite Navy for the base of the card I wanted to put an inside layer in for writing on and decorated the corners with the same image as on the front of the card but stamped in matching Not Quite Navy.

Happy Stamping

ESAD Blog Hop - Holiday Catalogue

Welcome to the Holiday Catalogue Blog Hop, whether you have come from Kristine at Inkspot Creations or are starting with my blog, just hop around following the links at the bottom of each post. 

I just love this Holiday Catalogue, the first in the new 'non-mini' format, it is so full of amazing products, not just stamps but heaps of accessories too.  I have chosen a combination of items from the Holiday Catalogue and some from the new Annual Catalogue to show you how well they all coordinate together.  I have chosen the stamp set Joyous Celebrations as the focus of all of my projects today, so grab a cuppa if you don't have one, and enjoy my projects and those the other ESAD ladies have created for you.

I wanted to use the new little Kraft boxes, they are great and really cost effective (4 boxes for only $4.95 on p161) which makes them great for gifts.  The new Holiday Catalogue items on this box are the Fabric Ribbon wrapped around the box, and two of the small stamps from Joyous Celebrations stamped onto the Fabric Ribbon.  I love how this new ribbon makes it so easy to stamp on, and you can coordinate your ribbon perfectly with your project!  The sentiment is also from a lovely set in the Holiday Catalogue called Greetings of the Season which has four lovely Christmas sentiments.

I thought I would show you the steps I took to stamp on the ribbon:

Secure the ribbon using tape at each end, and place over some scrap
paper and mark out the distance you want between each image.

Stamp the first image using the markers as a guide.  I used the
mistletoe image as the stem helped me line up with my marks.

Finally I went back with the little bow stamp and positioned it
between  each of the mistletoe  images.

Inside the box is a selection of gift tags and cards, this would make a lovely pre-Christmas gift for someone special or just a lovely way to store your own Christmas tags!

I made these with the Two Tags Die, backing the Joyous Celebrations stamps with the Decorative Label Punch.  I made three of each in a variety of colour and DSP combinations. These are so easy to whip up and are so very cute.  A touch of Dazzling Diamonds onto the reindeer nose (red would have been perfect) and also to add some faux-brads to the other tag, this is great for adding some bling without dimension, so great for cards to go through the post.

Next I made a series of 3"x3" gift cards, making two of each of the following designs.  The tree in the Joyous Celebrations set is a tiny bit larger than some of the other stamps in the set, so I used the oval Designer Frame to layer it onto the card, backing this with some of the Be of Good Cheer DSP from the Annual Catalogue. A little bit of Dazzling Diamonds on the star helps to make it pop, I used the new Paper Piercing Tool to gently drag the glitter into the points of the star.

The next two cards are both made using what I think of as the 'dotted oval' stamp from the Joyous Celebrations set, and I backed them with Be of Good Cheer DSP cut with one of the Apothecary Accents Framelits.  I added a sentiment to the reindeer one, from Petite Pairs.  

The last of the tags are probably my favourite as I decided to try layering them with the Champaign Glimmer paper instead of DSP.  Let me just say if you have been a fan of the silver and red glimmer paper from the Annual Catalogue you will LOVE this new champaign one, it is so rich and yummy. You might recognise the bows and the mistletoe as the images I stamped onto the ribbon that wrapped around the box.  To make the bow out of glimmer paper I just stamped on the back and used that as a guide to cut out.  I used a small amount of Dazzling Details on the star in the centre of each ornament.

I wanted to finish up my post today with the card I made to go with this little tag box, this one is a 10.5cm x 10.5cm one.  I used the new Paper Doily Sizzlits and Apothecary Accents Die to compliment the cute little reindeer stamp.  I think he is my favourite from this set, and I can see me using him quite a bit on my Christmas projects this year.  This whole set of stamps is so versatile, great for gift cards as well as full sized cards, it also fits perfectly within the new Holiday Frame Textured Embossing Folder also found in the Holiday Catalogue.

I hope you have enjoyed my somewhat long post today.  Now it is time to hop on over to StampingT! to see what Tanya has created.

What is ESAD?

ESAD stands for "Extra Special Australasian Demonstrators" and it is an on-line group just for Australian and New Zealand Stampin" Up! demonstrators. 

We so love what we do and not only do we love to share it with our customers, friends, and wonderful blog visitors, but we share our love for what we do with each other as demonstrators. We run swaps, challenges, tutorials, product know-how, and cyberstamps, and we are always there to help and support each other when it is needed.

 So if you are a Stampin' Up! demonstrator located in Australia or New Zealand, then please feel free to click here to join our wonderful group

Happy Stamping

ESAD Annual Catalogue Blog Hop

Welcome to the ESAD Annual Catalogue Blog Hop to celebrate the start of the new Annual Catalogue released on 1st September. Whether you are starting with my blog or have come over from visiting Kylie at Stampin with Kylie, it doesn't matter, just follow the links at the bottom of each post to hop to the next blog. 

What is ESAD?

ESAD stands for "Extra Special Australasian Demonstrators" and it is an on-line group just for Australian and New Zealand Stampin' Up! Demonstrators.

We love what we do and not only do we love to share it with our customers, friends and wonderful blog visitors, but we share our love for what we do with each other as demonstrators.  We run swaps, challenges, product know-how, and cyber-stamps and we are always there to help and support each other when it is needed. 

So if you are a Stampin' Up! demonstrator located in Australia or New Zealand, then please feel free to click here to join our wonderful group.

Now onto the cards I have created to showcase the Daydream Medallions stamp set and the Floral Frames Framelits to show three different ways to use them incorporating them with some of the other products in the new catalogue.  I just love this set, the way the images neatly fits inside each other makes them great to use as a group, but equally the images are great on their own to either subtly enhance or bring focus to a project.

This one uses the new Floral District DSP, the more solid background sheet is primarily Rose Red, the other sheet, that I cut out using Apothecary Accents Framelits, has images printed all over it that match the Betsy's Blossom stamp set on a background of Lucky Limeade.  I added a flower made with images stamped with Daydream Medallions and then cut out with the Floral Frames Framelits. I cut two of them out and on the top one made some small cuts at each petal and then folded them in to give dimension. I added another layer of vellum stamped with the smaller image of Daydream Medallion and topped this with one of the lovely Vintage Faceted Designer Buttons. 

For this next card I used the Daydream Medallions to create a second layer of 'DSP'. The bottom piece of DSP is also from the Floral District set, I love the vesatility of this set of DSP as it has beautiful floral images, images to match stamp sets, and then some sheets with subtle images in monochromatic colours. I have taken the Baja Breeze and Rich Razzleberry out of the DSP colours and used them in my two cut out 'flower' images.  I think these make a great back ground to bring the focus to the butterfly.   

This one is punched using the Elegant Butterfly Punch after spritzing the card stock with Champaign Shimmer Mist.  I added some Rhinestones to the body for some extra bling and curled the wings to add dimension.

My last card today is again using the Daydream Medallions stamp set, this time I stamped the largest image directly onto the card stock using Raspberry Ripple.  I then stamped the descending images onto Vellum and cut out free hand, layering each one onto the card and again topping with the largest of the Vintage Faceted Buttons. You know how I like to add bling, well I decided to add some with small Rhinestones around the petals of the large image.  I just love these images stamped onto Vellum, it gives such a lovely soft feel to a card.

Thank you for visiting my blog, please hop on over to Karen at Viva La Stamping! to see what she has created. I hope you enjoy the remainder of the hop, if you started here just keep hopping around the circle until you come back to my blog.

Hoppy Stamping

Festive Friday

I am happy to be joining the Festive Friday Design Team, this week is my first project as a team member although I have joined in from time to time in the past.  This week we have an inspirational photo for you, isn't it great?  The best part about an inspirational photo challenge is that you can take any element from the photo as inspiration for your card, it could be the colour, shapes, theme, whatever catches your eye.

The first thing that caught my eye was the colours, the deep rich red that reminded me of Cherry Cobbler.  When I looked closer at the picture I noticed the baby's breath on the table and it made me think of snowflakes and from there just knew the sheet from Be of Good Cheer DSP would be perfect.  I then picked up some of the green from the plates, and while I appreciate the rather healthy looking food prepared for this Christmas feast I wanted to go a bit more naughty and so chose cute little gingerbread men.

I hope this has helped to inspire you to join in the challenge this week, if you need a bit more inspiration pop over to the Festive Friday blog and see what the other talented design team members have come up with this week.  

Remember every Christmas card made now is one less to rush to make later in the year!

Happy Stamping