Welcome, 2018!

Happy New Year! I hope this year brings health and peace and wisdom to you.

I had a haircut today to start the new year right, and I made the above goofy eyeglasses for my hairdresser as a gift for her 8 year old daughter. You can find the free SVG file at the Simply Crafty SVG site.

I also made her this card, which has lots of glittering sparkly fireworks (heat embossed glitter embossing powders) in real life.

Thanks for visiting today!

Last Two 2017 Christmas Cards

How has your Christmas season been? We have had a lovely time and I am now back in my craft room tidying up. I have two more cards I made for Sylvia Durocher's monthly Christmas Card Challenge that I can share with you today. In November the shape was Scallop Square and the colour was Navy. Here's my effort:

Stamp City Snowman with Cardinal circa 1999; Penny Black sentiment

I created the background with a slatted stencil and Clarity Stencil Brushes. I need to work on that technique some more. My soft red ended up looking pink! The Scalloped Squares are made with Spellbinder dies. The parts that might look black are actually Navy. I black embossed the Snowman with Versafine ink and coloured with Zig Clean Color brush markers.

In December the shape is Rectangle and the colour is brown. I didn't stamp anything on this card - I used Tim Holtz "Remnant Rubs" in gold foil for the Wonderland title and to add Season's Greetings up the side. The deer paper is from a small Memory Box "Tinsel" paper pad. I added glitter to their scarves.

Thanks for visiting today. I look forward to seeing what Sylvia's challenge will be for 2018!

Free Gift Card Holder File

I did not have time to make greeting cards for my staff this year, but I wanted to present them with gift cards in a novel way. Dreaming Tree has a free file to create a clever pop up gift card presentation. I made an assortment.

In the upper left is the prototype but I was rushed for time so fussing about with ribbon was a challenge. I discovered I could affix these pins, that I picked up at Winners, to close the pouches and skipped the ribbon on the rest.

I forgot to take a photo of the inside which is elegant and clever, so pop over to the Dreaming Tree site to see that and if you have an electronic cutting machine, be sure to snag this freebie!

And here is a card I made this year that made me smile. It is very simple, for my great niece who is only 18 months old. The penguins are mounted on Action Wobbles so they shimmy and make me laugh. I hope they make her laugh, too!

Dreaming Tree Christmas Card

I have not been feeling well this season so the Christmas Card production came to a bit of a halt and I feel bad some folks won't be getting a card this year.

However, I did find time to make one very special card to put in my parcel to my Mom. This is a Paperscape Box Card SVG file from Dreaming Tree that folds flat for mailing, but also works as a luminary with LED lights inserted in the base. Dreaming Tree files are a dream to work with, very well designed, and Leo provides video instructions on the website that are very clear to follow.

Here is a bit of a side view. There are four layers including the background.

A Quietfire Design stamp in Brilliance ink provided the greeting. I added crystals later.

These were supposed to be cardinals but I wanted a blue and white card, so Mom gets blue jays instead.

Finished card with gemstones.

Here is the card with the LED lights inserted, next to my Mom's Christmas tree. She is enjoying it.

Santas (yes, plural) are coming to town

I recently joined a Canadian papercrafts swap group on Facebook. Twenty years ago I was involved in a lot of swaps on Canadian Stamp Talk (a Yahoo Group) and have missed it. The cost of postage makes swapping with crafters in the USA prohibitive.

A recent swap was vintage Christmas cards. I had just got this vintage Santa stamp in a craft store garage sale and this was a great excuse to try it out. I needed to send out three cards.

Sylvia Durocher's challenge for October was a banner shape and turquoise. I used a vintage flashcard with muted turquoise trim and a matching "banner" tag, as well as a scalloped red banner above St. Nick. The message is a Waltzingmouse Stamp (retired). I "dusted" the vintage sprig with white paint to give it a bit of frost and tied it with jute.

The second Santa was a bit more subdued.

I adore the metal tokens Tim Holtz designs, and this "25" seemed just right, tied on with twine. The sentiment reads: It's the most wonderful time of the year.

Last comes the frosty turquoise snowflake Santa with a wee banner for Sylvia's challenge again.

The sentiment is stamped into metal, too, and tied with baker's twine.

So that's my tale of three Santas! I am entering them in the throwback challenge running all this month at Christmas Card Throwdown, which is:

I chose: