Hi, crafty friends! I have a fun gift tag to share today, featuring Flappy’s Christmas Delivery from the Tofu & Friends holiday collection from Purple Onion Designs. I love the quirky nature of the cuties in this collection from the new illustrator.
I stamped the image with Extreme Black ink from My Favorite Things, colored it with Copics, then stamped again, this time using Obsidian ink from Altenew for crips, dark lines. I decided to fussy cut right against the stamped lines, and put this cute dog to the side while I worked on the rest of the tag.
I die cut a tag from white cardstock using the Stitched Trad. Tag STAX die set from My Favorite Things, before using Polar Bear, Icy Water and Winter Lake inks from Altenew to ink blend a soft blue sky. I die cut a couple of trees using the silhouette snow trees from Mama Elephant and adhered them on top of my ink blending. I used a die in the Stitched Hillside Borders die set from Lawn Fawn to create the faux stitch hill, then used the tag die again to die cut the bottom part and adhered it to the tag also.
I added my dog using foam squares. stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from the Julehilsen stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS onto Wild Cherry cardstock from My Favorite Things, before trimming it down and adding it with foam squares to the tag. I die cut a reinforcement piece from white cardstock using a die in the Fold-up Tags die set from My Favorite Things and adhered it to the top, before threading some ribbon through and adding a charm. I used some May Arts Natural Twine to tie a bow to secure everything.
On the back of the tag, I stamped the Til/Fra frame from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Obsidian ink from Altenew. I used Dark Chocolate and Classic Kraft inks from Papertrey Ink to stamp the images that make up the background. The stamps are from North Star Design, Inkido and Ladybug and Friends. I believe none of these companies are still in business, but I love these particular stamps and use them regardless.
Simple color palette for this one. No wonder, as it’s essentially just brown, gray and red.
I colored the image with Copics, and after a couple of cards recently with very muted, vintage colors, I went super bright with this one. I love penguins done with BGs instead of grays, it’s like they’re happier, somehow.
I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from Huldra Designstudio directly onto my card base, which I made from Oceanside cardstock from Concord and 9th.
Above and below the colored panel, I added strips of patterned paper from the Party Patterns paper pad from My Favorite Things, before mounting it all on foam tape for dimension. I finished off the card with enamel dots. The bright green ones are from Papirdesign, the teal and yellow ones from the Cool Summer Nights and Pocketful of Sunshine packs from Altenew. The Papirdesign ones have more dimension to them than the ones from Altenew, which creates a little more variety.
By using an untraditional color palette and a non holiday sentiment (winter hug), this image can be used for more than just Christmas. I’m thinking this would make a great wintery birthday card.
Fun colors used for this one!
I stamped my critters using Extreme Black ink from My Favorite Things, added a mask and stamped the trees in the background using Stormy Sky ink from Papertrey Ink. It’s a nice grayish green that goes really well with the colors I used for the coloring of the trees. I created my signature winter sunset behind it all, and did my best to create depth in the background by varying the intensity of the coloring of the trees. Once everything was colored, I stamped the critters again, this time using Obsidian ink from Altenew for a crisp, black outline.
At the bottom, I stamped a sentiment from the 
I used lots of Copics for this one. Lots!!
I dry embossed the Snowflake Confetti fancy die from Hero Arts on a piece of Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I cut the panel down and added strips of green cardstock near the bottom. The colors are (bottom to top) Pinefeather (Papertrey Ink), Evergreen (Concord & 9th), Jalapeño Popper (My Favorite Things), Clover (C9), Parsley (C9), Vintage Jadeite (PTI) and Mint Julep (PTI). I white heat embossed a sentiment from the Sentiments from a Yeti stamp set from Mama Elephant and mounted my strips of green with a little bit of dimension behind them.
I mounted my white dry embossed piece with the green strips onto a top fold white card base using foam tape. Using Shadow Creek Ink from Altenew, I stamped the Peace banner from the Sentiments from a Yeti stamp set from Mama Elephant and die cut it using the Yeti banner die from Mama Elephant, which coordinates. I added foam to the back and adhered it over the white heat embossing to complete my sentiment.
I used foam tape on the back of the snowman too, so this card has a lot of dimension. The dry embossed panel is on fairly thick foam tape, the green strips on a bit thinner foam tape, and the banner and snowman on thicker foam tape. I finished the card with a few gems from the Festivities mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
This snowman looks so content, I love it!
Peace, love + happiness. With a little bit of hope. Sounds like the perfect Christmas to me.
I’m trying to limit the amount of Copics I use for my cards, but I’m failing miserably. I really don’t mind.
I started by ink blending trees in pink onto white cardstock. I used the Wintry Forest stencil set from Pinkfresh Studio along with Rose Quartz, Puffy Heart and Purple Wine inks from Altenew. I then stamped a sentiment in the M-428 stamp set from Kort & Godt and heat embossed in white. The heat embossing doesn’t really show up too well in my photos where the trees in the background are pale, but it’s more visible in real life. And if you want more contrast, you could start the blending with a darker color.
I used a die in the Die 178 set to create the faux stitching on the sides of my ink blended piece. The dies in this set are banner dies, but I did partial die cutting and only used the top half of the die. I added a couple of layers of white cardstock behind it for a little bit of dimension and adhered it to a top fold landscape card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, which is the cardstock I’ve used throughout.
I die cut a sled (Die 321 from Kort & Godt) five times from white cardstock. I stacked them for strength and dimension and adhered my sled to the bottom of my panel, tucking a felt snowflake (ST105) behind it. I added another felt snowflake (ST103) in the top right.
The pink is very unexpected – at least for me. I never thought I’d ink blend pink winter trees, but this was fun! You could easily create this card in lots of other colors too, I wonder what it would look like in blue…
Shari Bresciani’s cast of characters is so fun and quirky. Michele at Purple Onion Designs is very good at finding illustrators with a distinct style. The left tag features 
For both of my tags, I used the Wintry Forest stencil set from Pinkfresh Studio to create my background of blue trees. I used Polar Bear, Icy Water and Winter Lake inks from Altenew to create my trees, die cut my panel into tags using the Stitched Trad. Tag STAX die set from My Favorite Things, then sprinkled on Chunky White embossing enamel from Stampendous which I melted from the back for a snowy look.
I love the expression on Scruffy’s face! This tree originally has a star on top, but I wanted Starla to add the star to the tree, so I cut off the star from the top and colored the cone shaped part of the star in green, so it looks like it’s the actual tree, even though the even curved line is a telltale sign that it’s not. I don’t think many people will notice, and even less will care.
I stamped the sentiment using two ink colors from My Favorite Things: Jalapeño Popper and Sour Apple. I would have preferred a green tone with more blue in it, but I don’t have that in the ink formulation that’s best for this kind of mostly solid stamping. I find that the squishy ink pads that have become popular in recent years do better with this kind of stamping than the old firm felt pad type ink pads.
Close to the sentiment, I added pearls from the Party Girl mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards. I was tempted to add lots of pearls in different colors to the tree too, to act as baubles, but opted not to.
I threaded some satin ribbon through the tag hole and tied it with a piece of Natural twine from May Arts. I also added a couple of gold bells from my stash, I love tags that make that jingle sound.
Lots of colors for this, even though I felt like I didn’t use too many.
It’s Carrie’s turn. She goes so well with this snowman, you could almost think they’re one stamp and not two. I don’t mind when things hang off the edge of my cards or, in this case, tags. Will the ears and the branch get bent once this tag is on a present under the tree? Possibly. But I don’t mind, because I feel it adds to the design. If I had cut off the ears and branch to make everything fit inside the dimensions of the tag, this tag wouldn’t be as fun.
For this one, I stamped the sentiment in Amarena Cherry ink from My Favorite Things. It matches her scarf nicely.
I managed to get something sticky in the middle of Carrie. There was no way to remove it, so I was very strategic about the placement of the clay snowflakes I added. They’re Snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards, and I love them.
I threaded ribbon through the hole at the top of the tag, tied a bow around it using more of that Natural Twine from May Arts and added a couple of gold bells to the top. Different kind of bell than on the green tag, but they still make that wonderful sound.
Lots of Copics for this one too. I just can’t help myself.
For the back of the tags, I stamped To/From from the B06 stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Obsidian ink from Altenew. The remaining stamps are stamped in Classic Kraft and Dark Chocolate inks from Papertrey Ink. For some of it, I used second generation stamping. The circle stamp with 24.12 in the center and the tree stamp are both from Inkido. The little snowflakes are from North Star Design, the smaller circle stamp with God jul in the center is from Ladybug & Friends. Unless I’m mistaken, none of these companies are still in business. It’s kind of sad, but I’m very glad I have these stamps!
I colored up the reindeer with my Copics and fussy cut him leaving a white trim around the edges. I added Glossy Accents to his nose for shine and put him aside while I worked on the rest of my card.
I used the Snowflake Confetti Fancy die from Hero Arts to make an impression into a white piece of cardstock. By dry embossing with the die, I add a bit of interest to the background without it being distracting.
I used partial die cutting with the Stitched Rectangle Scallop Edge Frames die set from My Favorite Things to create my scalloped borders on either side of the dry embossed white cardstock. I used patterned paper from Maja Design for this. The design is called Ornaments and comes from the Happy Christmas collection from 2021. I don’t use a lot of patterned paper on my cards, but I really like this green pattern with some sprigs, leaves and hearts in a darker green, along with some white dots scattered around like snow. The patterned paper from Maja Design has always been my favorite. It’s double sided and very thick. It’s so thick you can even use it for a card base.
I used the Snowflakes and Ornament die set from Hero Arts to create the ornament for my reindeer to sit in. I die cut the ornament die itself from the same patterned paper that I used for my scalloped borders. I then temporarily taped the two dies in the set together, so I could create an ornament with snowflakes. I cut a few from white cardstock and one from silver glitter cardstock from Kort & Godt, stacking them for dimension. I tied a bow to the top of the ornament using May Arts natural twine and added a few pearls from the Glossy Porcelain mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards on top of the knot for additional shine.
I added Rudolph with his shiny nose to the center of my ornament. I also stamped a sentiment from the Itty Bitty Holiday stamp set from My Favorite Things using Shadow Creek ink from Altenew onto a scrap piece of the patterned paper I’ve used throughout. I added a few strips of white cardstock behind it for dimension and adhered it below the ornament, centered on my white, dry embossed piece.
This card wound up very simple looking, but it’s still kind of technique heavy. Partial die cutting, dry embossing with a die and layered die cuts. All the layers make it a very thick card, and it’s not the most mail friendly card I’ve ever made – I love dimension!
For an image this simple, I sure used a lot of colors!!
This is for the 
Using the Precious Polaroids die set, I die cut four polaroid frames and stacked them for a bit of dimension, stamping a sentiment on the top layer using Winter Lake ink from Altenew. I added the stacked frame to the card at an angle, adhered my penguin and finished off the card with a few Snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards. To me, this is about as CAS as it gets. Whether it’s genius remains to be seen 🙂
Typical penguin color palette for me, this one.
I colored my reindeer with Copics and fussy cut him leaving a thin white border. I added Glossy Accents to the string of lights and his nose for shine, and used a black Glaze pen and a white Gelly Roll 05 for his eyes.
I stamped and white heat embossed the Christmas Background stamp from My Favorite Things on a piece of white cardstock, before using Hunter Green, Forest Glades and Frayed Leaf inks from Altenew, as well as Squeezed Lemonade Distress ink, to ink blend on top. I ten used a die in the Stitched Mini Slimline STAX die set from My Favorite Things to turn it into a nice panel that would fit my card. I used the Country Landscape die from Memory Box to die cut the landscape in the background, and used the same stitching die on the hilly die cuts for a continuous stitching border across the card. I die cut the windows from Buttercup cardstock from Concord & 9th and the doors from white cardstock from Papertrey Ink that I ink blended with the same colors I used for the ink blending in the background.
I used the Snow Globe Accessories die set from My Favorite Things to die cut the string of lights from a dark gray cardstock and the individual bulbs from Buttercup cardstock once again. I added Glossy Accents on top of the bulbs for extra shine and dimension.
I die cut the word merry from the Merry Christmas die set from My Favorite Things five times from white cardstock, and once from Gold shine cardstock from My Favorite Things. I stacked them, adding the gold on top, and adhered my chunky die cut to the card. I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from the 
I tried using a somewhat limited color palette for this.
I colored the strawberries and fussy cut them right up against the black lines. I put them aside while I worked on the rest of my card. I created a top fold landscape A2 card from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, used the Number Jumble background stamp from My Favorite Things to stamp on the front with VersaMark ink, then heat embossed using Iridescent Sparkle embossing powder from Judikins. I ink blended on top of the embossing in the center using Grass Field and Limeade inks from Altenew, as well as Squeezed Lemonade Distress Ink from Ranger.
Into a separate panel of white cardstock, I die cut the letters SWEET using the Impact Alphabet dies from My Favorite Things. I stamped a sentiment from the Scripty Bday stamp set from Mama Elephant below using Wild Cherry ink from My Favorite Things. I cut the panel down slightly, added two more layers of cardstock behind it for dimension and adhered it to the card front. I adhered one of the strawberries using liquid glue, popping the other one up using foam tape for dimension, before finishing off the card with a few bubbles from the Festivities mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
You wouldn’t think I’d use this many colors on images this small, but that’s kind of what I do.
Papirmølla 