Peace, love + happiness {Lili of the Valley}

Hi, crafty friends. We’ve reached the end of another week, and I have another holiday card to share today. I’ve really been in a holiday making mood the last few weeks, and I’m loving it. Not loving that they’ve started decorating for Christmas at the malls nearby. It’s too early for that!! Then again, it was too early for the snow we had last week too.

This cute snowman is from the Snowfolk stamp set from the recent Lili of the Valley release. I colored her in with Copics, fussy cut around her leaving a white trim and went over the black lines on the cookie with a white Gelly Roll 05.

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.

Color burst {Mo’s Digital Pencil}

25Hi, crafty friends. I’m back today with a very simple, yet colorful card, featuring Mrs. Claus from Mo Manning. I had a birthday card to make for a day care worker, and I thought this image was perfect for it. By choosing a very bright, colorful palette, this no longer looks like it was created for the holidays (if you look closely, you’ll see that the “kids” (elves) have pointy ears, but this card is so colorful I’m hoping no one will mind).

I knew one of the elves at the bottom would get his head cut off (the one wearing blue), so I created a copy with just his head, rotated it and put it in the top right corner to include another kid peeking in.

I colored in the scene with Copics, choosing very bright colors. I then took my white Gelly Roll 05 to create patterns on most of the kids’ clothes. I used the largest die in the Watercolor Rectangle STAX die set from My Favorite Things to create a fun edge to my panel, before using the Connected alphabet die set, also from MFT, to spell out the name of the recipient. At first, I thought of cutting them straight, but realized that a wonky look would work well with the card and also be less time consuming.

I wanted to include her age too, but didn’t have any number dies that matched the letters. There was just enough room on her apron for me to sketch in a couple of stick figures holding signs. I used my 0.03 Copic multiliner, and I think it’s running out of ink, which only enhanced the sketchy look I was going for. I die cut six more of each of the letters from True Black cardstock from Papertrey Ink, stacked them and added the colored pieces on top for a stacked inlay look. I mounted the panel on foam tape and adhered it to a card base I created from True Black cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I decided not to add any embellishments, I figured this card is colorful and really doesn’t need it.

For the inside, I stamped a fun sentiment (You’re not thaaaat old – you were just born too soon) from the Til mannen stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Summer Splash ink from My Favorite Things.

I stamped a sentiment from the Go’klem stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS onto a Summer Splash envelope from My Favorite Things using Summer Splash ink. I thought the envelope and ink matched the dress nicely.

Here you can see those popped up letters a bit better.

I used a lot of Copics for this one. Skin tones (and hair) make up that entire top row. I wanted different skin tones for the kids, and even though they don’t look that different in my photos, the difference is more pronounced in real life.

It’s the most magical time of the year {Purple Onion Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. Christmas Eve is in exactly two months. Yikes. I’m trying to be prepared, but I still haven’t bought a single present. I’ve created gift tags for these imaginary presents, though, and today I’m sharing two with some really fun images Shari Bresciani illustrated for Purple Onion Designs.

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 Starla, Scruffy and Christmas Tree, and the right tag features Carrie and Snowman. I also added sentiments from the Holiday Blurbs II stamp set, the blurbs match these characters well.

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!

Aussie Christmas {Rachelle Anne Miller}

Hi, crafty friends. I have a fun holiday card to share today featuring Light up emu, which is a stamp from this month’s release from Rachelle Anne Miller. I love creating Aussie themed cards, and thankfully, all the Aussie images I have are cute ones. I’m staying far away from blue-ringed octopus, red back spiders and Eastern brown snakes (as well as cassowaries, box jelly fish, stonefish, great white sharks and salties, among other things). Today’s card has an emu, which maybe should be on my list. It was certainly on the Australian government’s list about a century ago. The Australian government actually declared war on the emus. I’m not making this up, it’s called The Great Emu War. The emus were destroying wheat crops, and the government wanted to curb the population and launched a military operation to do so. Weird, huh?  Do you know what’s even weirder? The emus won. Twice!! My emu’s not destroying anything, he’s lit up like a Christmas tree, and he even has a koala wrapped around his neck, which I thought was so cute. I really can’t resist a koala.

I colored my emu and koala with Copics, and fussy cut the image leaving a white trim. Cutting around that string of lights was tricky, but worth it.

Onto a piece of white cardstock, I stamped the Christmas Lights Bold Prints stamp from Hero Arts using VersaMark ink, and poured on Iridescent Sparkle embossing powder from Judikins, which I then heat embossed. It adds a sparkly, but subtle shine to the background and I love that the lights are just like the colored lights on the emu.

I cut off a strip of the panel on each side and die cut a star in the top center using the Stars Five die set from Spellbinders. I mounted the panel on foam tape and added it to a card base I’d covered with the Gum leaves patterned paper that was part of the Aussie Christmas digital paper pack that was also part of this month’s release. This green color is dreamy!

I mounted the emu in the star opening, making sure to adhere the delicate lights directly to the white panel, while the emu itself is backed with foam tape. I stamped an white heat embossed a sentiment from the Christmas Wishes stamp set from My Favorite Things onto a scrap piece of my gum leaves paper, before using the coordinating die to cut it out. I backed it with four white die cuts and adhered it underneath the emu’s feet and dangling lights, before finishing off with sequins and star confetti from the Starry Night mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

You can see a little more of the sparkle in this photo.

The emu and the koala are very muted, so I chose bright colors for the lights.

Oh, and before I go, just because I feel like it – a little light-hearted “everything wants to kill you in Australia” meme:

Merry everything {Mo’s Digital Pencil}

Hi, crafty friends. I’m still in a holiday card making mood, and today’s card features a cutie from Mo Manning. I couldn’t resist Sneaking a peek, she’s such a cute (and quick to color too, since she only has a head and mittens).

I had a plan for this one even before I started coloring. Things changed as I was creating, but I still love the end result. I colored the little girl and fussy cut her, leaving a thin white trim around the hat and no trim at all around her mittens. I used The Stitched Snowflake Frame die from Lawn Fawn to create my large snowflake frame. I die cut four from white cardstock that I stacked for dimension and one from Soft Stone cardstock from Papertrey Ink that I adhered behind the white ones, you can see the gray peeking out from the points on the snowflake. The die also cuts a circle inside the frame. It has the same faux stitching as the snowflake, but I wanted a plain circle for this and used a circle die to cut a circle that was slightly larger than the frame opening. Inside the circle, I sprinkled on chunky white embossing enamel from Stampendous and melted the granules from the back for a snowy look. I put foam tape on the back of the girl and added her to the opening in the frame.

Using the Stitched Snowflake Backdrop die from Lawn Fawn, I created some texture to a plain white panel. The die actually cuts a panel that covers an A2 card, but I wanted a bit of a border on mine and pulled out the A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX 2 die set from My Favorite Things to get it a little bit smaller. I adhered it to a panel of Cornflower cardstock from My Favorite Things, which I then adhered to a top fold card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink.

I adhered the snowflake frame at the top center of the card and created a stacked die cut merry using the Merry Script die from Mama Elephant. There are four white layers topped with one in Soft Stone. I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from the Holiday messages stamp set from Mama Elephant onto a scrap of the blue card I used previously. I cut it down to a strip and added four small cardstock strips behind it for dimension, before I nestled it in with the die cut and finished off with a couple of pearls from the Glossy Porcelain mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

There’s quite a bit of dimension on this card. I love dimension!!

I tried to limit the amount of marker colors for this one. Did I succeed? Up to you 🙂

Merry Christmas {Lili of the Valley}

Hi, crafty friends! I’m back today with another holiday card. I love creating holiday cards, and the recent releases from Lili of the Valley have left me with plenty of opportunities to play.

Today’s card is a super simple one. I colored up this bunny from the Christmas Friends stamps set, fussy cut around her leaving a white trim and put her aside while I worked on the rest of my card. Little tip: if you mask off the sentiment inside the balloon before stamping, you can make a wintry birthday card instead!

I used a die from the Additional A2 Layers die set from Waffle Flower to cut a rectangle from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink. You can easily cut this with a trimmer, but I had the die set basically at my fingertips and decided to use that. I then ink blended very softly from the top of the panel using Sno Cone ink from My Favorite Things. I wanted a super light background and this was perfect. I matted it on a piece of Autumn Rose cardstock from Papertrey Ink and mounted it to a top fold landscape A2 card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock, once again. It’s my favorite white cardstock, it’s whiter than anything else I’ve tried. I die cut the Silhouette Snow Trees from Mama Elephant from the same white cardstock, layering them up for dimension. I adhered the trees to my ink blended piece, then used foam tape to add the bunny on the side, before finishing off the card with sequins and confetti stars from the Starry Night mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

Very simple color palette for this one.

Today’s the last day of Designer Week at Lili of the Valley! This means you can save 20% on any item on www.liliofthevalley.co.uk by using the coupon code ELINVENGE20 – so Happy Shopping!  I hope you are inspired by all my LOTV makes!

Merry Christmas and a very happy New Year {Streamside Studios}

Hi, crafty friends. I have a fun shaker card to share today, featuring some tiny snowmen from the Snow Much Fun digi stamp set from Streamside Studios. These snowmen might be my favorite Streamside images to date, I love them!! There’s also a clear stamp set with these same snowmen, which you can find here.

I chose four of the snowmen in the set and scaled them to fit inside the windows on this Globies Grid Cover die from Mama Elephant. I colored them with Copics and fussy cut them leaving a thin white border.

I die cut the cover die from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, added acetate to the back and adhered my snowmen to the back of the acetate in a few of the windows. Onto a panel of Sno Cone cardstock from My Favorite Things, I did some very subtle ink blending at the bottom of each row of snowglobes, using Sno Cone ink, also from My Favorite Things. The ink blending adds a little gradient to each of the snowglobes. I stamped a sentiment from the Julehilsen stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Caribbean Sea ink from My Favorite Things.

I flipped the front over, added foam tape to the back of my windows and sealed the globe with the sentiment shut so no shaker bits would be in that particular window. I added a sprinkling of Distress Mica Flakes to each of the remaining 11 windows and carefully placed my ink stamped and ink blended panel onto the exposed adhesive to close my shaker wells.

I adhered my front to a top fold card base I created from Sno Cone cardstock from My Favorite Things. To finish the card, I die cut the bases for the snow globes from white cardstock and added a little bit of subtle shading on the edges with a T0 Copic marker, as well as the colorless blender.

These snowmen are super tiny, it’s a miracle I used so many colors. I may have gotten carried away with the red in particular. Five colors for these tiny areas is probably way too many, but there you go.

Happy holidays {Lili of the Valley}

Hi, crafty friends. I’m back with another card with an adorable image from the recent Lili of the Valley release. This time I’ve used the penguin in the Christmas Mugs stamp set. There’s also a Santa, snowman and reindeer in the stamp set, but I couldn’t not choose the penguin.

I colored my penguin mug with Copics and fussy cut the image right up against the black stamped lines. This image doesn’t have a whole lot of the whispy, perpendicular lines that are so characteristic of Lili of the Valley images, which was the reason I opted not to include a white trim around the edges. There are 3 or 4 lines at the top of his head that I had to cut off, but I was okay with that. I stamped some snowflakes onto a card base using Spring Rain ink from Papertrey Ink. The snowflakes are from an old Tim Holtz stamp set. I mounted the mug on foam tape near the bottom right of the card.

I die cut a few snowflakes using a couple of die sets from Memory Box. The one at the top, that is partially hidden behind the penguin and speech bubble is from the Stitched Let It Snow Circle Frame die set. The die set comes with a stitched snowflake circle frame and three individual snowflake dies. The snowflakes with the stitching detail are from the Twilight Snowflakes die set. I added some blue diamonds from Kort & Godt to the mug, as well as a heart from the Festivities mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards. I stamped a couple of sentiments from the Holiday messages stamp set from Mama Elephant using Lazy Days ink from My Favorite Things and die cut them into speech bubbles using the Say Anything die set from My Favorite Things. I stacked a couple of additional white die cuts behind the speech bubbles for dimension.

Simple color palette for this one, and I realize now that I forgot to jot down the blue Copics I used for this, but I believe they are B93, B91 and B90, which is a color I’ve made myself.

This week is Designer Week at Lili of the Valley! This means you can save 20% on any item on www.liliofthevalley.co.uk by using the coupon code ELINVENGE20 – so Happy Shopping! The offer lasts from October 10th until October 17th. I hope you are inspired by all my LOTV makes!

Christmas Hugs {Lili of the Valley}

Hi, crafty friends. I have a super fun card to share with you today, featuring lots of cute critters from Lili of the Valley.

I did a lot of masking for this card, using two stamp sets from the recent release. I’ve got the Penguins and Reindeer stamp set, as well as the Festive Mice and Bears stamp set, mixing the two together and turning my critters into somewhat of a tree shape.

I colored them all with Copics, added black glaze to their eyes for shine, then a dot of white Gelly Roll 05 once the black was dry. I fussy cut my “tree”, added foam tape to the back and mounted it on a card base I created from Blue Breeze cardstock from My Favorite Things.

I used the Stitched Snowflake Backdrop die from Lawn Fawn to create some texture on the card base. This card measures 5 x 7 1/4″, so I had to get creative with the die, because it’s a standard A2 size die. I love the subtle texture in the background.

I used a die from Kort & Godt to create my sentiment (Christmas hug in Norwegian). I stacked four die cuts from white cardstock and adhered the top of the word to the bottom of my critter tree. I used Starry Sky ombré glitter drops from Pinkfresh Studio to finish off. I love the sparkle and shine to these.

This week is Designer Week at Lili of the Valley! This means you can save 20% on any item on www.liliofthevalley.co.uk by using the coupon code ELINVENGE20 – so Happy Shopping! The offer lasts from October 10th until October 17th. I hope you are inspired by all my LOTV makes!

Christmas wishes {Lili of the Valley}

Hi, crafty friends. I’m back today with a simple Christmas card made with the Snow folk stamp set that just came out from Lili of the Valley.

I colored my snowman and fussy cut him leaving a white trim.

Using the Snowfall Backdrop Landscape die from Lawn Fawn, I created a snowy background for my snowman from Sno Cone cardstock from My Favorite Things. I cut the panel down significantly and adhered it to a top fold card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink.

I die cut the Wishes script die from Mama Elephant four times from white cardstock and stacked them for dimension. I love this die, it’s probably my most used word die of all time! Onto a strip of Amarena Cherry cardstock from My Favorite Things, I white heat embossed the word Christmas from the Itty Bitty Holiday stamp set from My Favorite Things and paired it with the die cut word to complete my sentiment.

I mounted the snowman on foam tape for dimension, he fits perfectly next to the sentiment. To finish the card I added a few sequins from the Starry Night mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

Even though the background is adhered directly to the card base, I love all the dimension in the other elements. And here’s a little secret: I actually like the pops of red. Just don’t tell anyone 😉

Lots of Copics used for such a small image.

This week is Designer Week at Lili of the Valley! This means you can save 20% on any item on www.liliofthevalley.co.uk by using the coupon code ELINVENGE20 – so Happy Shopping! The offer lasts from October 10th until October 17th. I hope you are inspired by all my LOTV makes!