Hi, crafty friends. There’s a brand new release out today from Lili of the Valley, and we’re getting in the spirit of the holiday season with penguins, snowmen, reindeer, mice and bears. Did I mention penguins? Oh, and there’s also a creepy but cute set for Halloween, so there should be something for everyone. Obviously, I had to start with one of the penguins.

There are five adorable penguins in this stamp set, and I chose two to color, with a vague idea for a card in the back of my mind as I was coloring. Once I’d colored both penguins and fussy cut them, I realized splitting them up and creating two cards would be better. For this card, I placed the Grid stencil from My Favorite Things at a bit of an angle directly on my top fold card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink. Using Sno Cone ink from My Favorite Things and a blender brush, I created a soft blend near the bottom of the card front, fading to white above and below.

The wishes die from Mama Elephant is probably my most used word die, I love it so much. I die cut it five times from Wild Cherry cardstock from My Favorite Things and stacked the die cuts for dimension. Onto the background I stamped a sub sentiment and the word Christmas from the Christmas Greetings stamp set from Lili of the Valley using Summer Splash ink from My Favorite Things. I adhered the stacked die cut between my stamping, mounted the penguin on foam tape and added a few snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to finish the card.

The good thing about small(ish) images is that you don’t need heaps of colors. They’re also fairly quick to color.