5-minute Christmas Cards!

Have you finished all your Christmas cards?  If not, I'd suggest that you challenge yourself to finish cards within a very short time.

I've mentioned that I like 6x6 paper pads for Christmas cards and when I flipped through the Lawn Fawn Snow Day petite paper pack, I found two identical sheets that are perfect for making a card by just layering that sheet on cardstock:

The patterned paper has created a beautiful snow scene and all I did was to emboss the sentiment Merry Christmas in green then layered them on brown and green cardstock.  It is a 5" x 7" card.  Easy peasy, right?

I have made another one that is almost identical except this time I embossed the greeting in red:

I think the red sentiment pops a lot more and gives this card a more modern look while the first one is more traditional. 

What actually prompted me to make these two cards was that my nickname in my family was somehow related to bunnies.  That was years ago when I was 5 or even younger.  That explains why I'm a big sucker for bunny stamps, paper and embellishments.  My family doesn't call me that nickname anymore but I know that a card with a bunny on it will bring everyone a smile. 

Do you buy supplies for that reason too?

I'm entering my card to the following challenges:
Brown Sugar - Winter
A Crafty Mess - Anything Goes/Christmas
Crafts 4 Eternity - Winter
Creative Fingers - Anything Goes
Fussy and Fancy - Happy Holidays
Jingle Belles - Christmas

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Crafting!

A Window Card

Just a quick post today sharing a window card, which is also a Christmas card!  Even though I am done with making cards for friends and family, I continue to make them.  Not only do I feel that Christmas brings magic to the season, I feel that making Christmas cards brings magic to my home!

Sometimes I like to use my cards as Christmas decorations for my home too!  I put them on a string and separate them with cloth pins (painted in red or green) and hang the string across my windows.  It's kinda cheesy and old-fashioned but that reminds me of what my family used to do when I was very little.  That fond memory always brings me warmth.

Onto today's card, just a clean and simple window card.  I've totally enjoyed working with the 6x6 paper pad from Lawn Fawn.  It helps me make Christmas cards so quickly and easily!  I literally whipped up a few cards within an hour.

The most tricky part of this card was to line up the circle die on all three layers.  I first die cut the circle on two patterned papers because they are thinner and a pass can cut through both of them, then I lined them up onto the card base, and ran through three layers at the same time.  Because the cut was already made on the patterned papers, the circle die would not affect them but cut through the card based.

I added a strip of green paper across the banner so the snowflake has a place to hold onto.  Another option would be using fishing cord or beading wire for the snowflakes.  I haven't done beading for a while so my those supplies are nowhere to be found.  I'm happy with the green strip with white embossed greeting anyway.

My card is entering the following challenges:
A girl who crafts - Christmas
Always something creative - Christmas
Crafts Galore Encore challenge - Christmas and anything goes
Crafty Hazelnut Challenge - Christmas

Thanks for stopping by!

12 Tags of 2014 - November

Just a quick post to show my not-so-successful November tag here:

I knew that I'd be playing the 12 tags rather late, so I bought the snowflake die + embossing folder set instead of the leaf set. 

Unfortunately I don't have the foil sheet that Tim Holtz used on his tag, so I tried using whatever I have on hand.  The distress glitter wasn't the best choice.  But the good news is that I could die cut a huge "NOEL" from a mirror sheet and stick it across the snowflake so the failure on the snowflake isn't that obvious.  LOL.

Go check out other entries at Tim Holtz's 12 tags of 2014.  You will find loads of inspiration there!
Thanks for stopping by!

It's beginning to look a lot like CHRISTMAS!

Don't you think it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas?  We already celebrated Thanksgiving and some of you may have grabbed the best deals on Black Friday, and today is the last day of November, which means that Christmas is less than a month away! 

I have most of my Christmas cards done and have to start mailing them out next week.  Many of my cards will be sent to friends and relatives overseas so it is not early at all.  My local celebration is starting the first weekend of December so those bulky cards for local friends will be given out at that occasion.  We all wish we had more time for card and gift preparation, don't we?

But I've learned that most people who receive my card do not care if the cards are not "publication-worthy."  They are happy to receive the card and never notice that the inks have smudged or if the placement of the snowflakes does not follow the rule of three.  To the contrary, many of them ooh and ah and wonder how certain things were done.  I said most people because most people in my life are not crafty.  For my crafty friends I do pay more attention to the details.  But I'll say, all cards were made from my heart!

I'm sharing a card today that was inspired by Day 3 of Kristina Werner's Holiday Card Series 2014.  I love her sky background and have to try it out myself:

I love it so much that I've actually made two!  I made one starting from the lightest color (bottom, Antique Linen) and the other starting from the darkest color (the top, Black Soot).  I would think that it is natural to start from the lightest but guess what?  I like the one starting from Black Soot better.  I think that one has colors blended much better but that could be due to the practice from my first attempt.  Looks like I'll have to make a third one to decide which is the better way to go.  LOL.

I'm entering the card to the following:
Catered Crop - Anything Goes
613 Avenue Create - Anything Goes
Amusing Challenge - Anything Goes
Weekly Christmas Card Challenges - Anything Goes
Crafting When We Can - Clean and Simple
Craft to Celebrate - Waiting for Christmas
My Perfect Life - Christmas

Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Turkey Day everyone!

I am grateful for a lot of things and I'll share those that are craft-related here.

First, I am grateful that I have easy access to craft supplies.  There are a lot of wonderful companies that manufacture craft supplies of excellent qualities, and I understand that those who live in certain parts of the world do not have quick and easy access to them.

Second, I am grateful that the crafting world is a wonderful community.  Many papercrafters love to create hand-made gifts for others and preserve memories by scrapbooking.  They are some of the greatest and kindest people in my life.

I am grateful for each of you that stopped by my little blog and spend time with me.  This blog has always been my "creative diary" and I'm thankful that you are here to leave me kind words and comments.

I've made a simple card for today:

I'll admit that any simple card could take me ages to finish.  For this card, the longest time was spent on creating the background - I used Cricut Explore and Close to My Heart Artiste cartridge to cut the leaves.  The next challenge was the big leaf you see on the left.  I've tried many many leave images as I wanted to do some coloring so badly.  Unfortunately none of them went well so I opted to die cut this one from the Stitched Leaves set from Lawn Fawn.  For the last step I added a banner with an embossed sentiment to finish off the card.

I'm entering my card to the following:
4 Crafty Chicks - Die cuts
Crafty Creations - Embossing
Inspiration Destination - Anything Goes
Penny's Paper-Crafty Challenge - Anything Goes
Crafty Sentiments - Die cuts
Bitten by the Bug 2 - Thanksgiving

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Crafting!

Hello Deer

It seems that it has been forever since I last entered any card challenge.  I miss challenges!  I miss my craft desk!  There has been quite a few impromptu visits from friends and relatives and thus I have not been able to sit at my craft desk and create.  I'm back, even though it will be a short window between now and Thanksgiving.  Are you ready for the holiday season?

I have not got everything ready but I have decided that that if I can't finish everything, everything will still be just fine.  This season is about being thankful for what we have, not about focusing on what we forgot to prepare.  I am thankful that everyone in my family feels the same way.

Now onto today's card.  I wanted to make a Christmas card and started with the sketch from Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge:

Do you see the subtle stars in the background?  That got me into thinking what to do for the longest time.  I first wanted to use a stencil but most of my stencils are too small.  I thought about using patterned paper but I couldn't decide which one to use.  Finally I thought I could use one of the overlays in the Cricut Artbooking cartridge.  I tried out the star overlay and it worked very well!

I've added a deer die cut from Maggie Holmes Open Book collection.  When I bought it I could never imagine that I would be using it at all.  I like everything else in the die set but that deer.  How nice I could put it on a Christmas card!  That reminds me to go through my stash again because what I didn't like before could make me feel different now.

I tied the ribbon in a way that there wasn't any knot.  I punched two holes on the front then loop the ribbon through from the front, and criss-crossed it at the back, then thread it through to the front again.  I used to do it a lot on invitation cards but I doubt that I ever did it on other cards.  I guess I will do it more often though, I really like that I adds quite a bit of dimension but not as much bulk as a regular knot or bow.

In addition to entering my card to Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge, I'm also entering it to the following:
Crafty Calendar - It's all about Christmas
CHNC - Getting Ready for Christmas
We Do Doobadoo - Christmas
My Perfect Life - Christmas
Stamping Sensations - Simply Christmas

 

 

 

Mass production again

Even though I say mass production, I normally do not make more than 4 copies of the same card.  I like to switch up things a little bit to give it a new look, or at the very least, a different look.

The cards I am sharing today are almost identical, except for the color of the background.  Do you like the red background better or the green background better?

I first made the green one:

Then I thought I could make it in a different color so I went to grab my red cardstock to make this:

I wish I had some green baker's twine then the two cards could be a true mirror image of each other.  Oh well, red baker's twine is just as fine.

Here's a collage of both of them:

I can't decide which one I like better.  What about you?

I'm entering my card to the following:
Christmas stampin' all year long - Anything Goes
Completely Christmas - Anything Goes
Creative Corner - It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas
Fun with Shapes and More - Christmas

Thanks for stopping by!