Time to dust off the blog - Christmas creating

This must have been the craziest end of year, birthdays and back to school yet.  So these holidays while I had projects on the go, it was all I could do to keep up with them.  My holidays were well spent making memories and reading and relaxing.  Finally I am back to somewhat of a routine and am wanting to do so much more here.   First what have I been creating?  Christmas - yes I gave a sneak peak in this post and then didn't show the end result.  It all started with this card as inspiration.  With lots of great tags to use I mixed and matched the different elements and added some little details.

Colours: crumb cake, cherry cobbler, always artichoke, very vanilla, early espresso

Stamps:  vintage labels and postmarks (PTI), merry christmas (kaiser)

Finishing touches:  handmade holidays papers and tags (simple stories), rhinestones (SU)

Next there was the teachers gifts

 In our Stampin Up Christmas swap I received a beautiful set of Christmas cards.  The wise owl always works well with teacher gifts so I added some more using the sets that I have and I had my cards sorted.

Colours:  white, rich razzleberry, old olive

Stamps:  wise owl (PTI), all year fun (SU), dress up lily (PCS)

Finishing touches:  doily die (couture creations), dimensionals, dazzling diamonds glitter and rhinestones (SU)

 For the school teachers some stationery bits and pieces, clips, post its and magnets in fun colours.  And the kindy teachers, yummy apples with caramel dip.  

This one went down really well.  They all asked for the recipe.

And last on the Christmas front was my Stamp Club Christmas swap.  Sorry the photos aren't that great.  I realised in all the busyness that I hadn't taken any photos and my phone isn't that great.  I had pinned the ideas for recycling books and thought it would be great to fill with goodies to give as a gift.  Once I started making bits and pieces I was hooked.  As such I have lots that didn't go in so will have some fun creating my own cards.

Colours:  daffodil delight, baja breeze, not quite navy, certainly celery, garden green

Stamps:  just the ticket (PTI), punctuation (KP), ciao baby and a round array (SU)

Finishing touches: book, envelope, for the record papers (echo park), embosslits beautiful wings,  lots of tags die, round tab punch and chevron border punch,  7/8 scallop circle punch and petite curly label punch (SU), buttons, ribbons, just the ticket die , ric rac die (PTI)

As you can see I have been a busy girl.  Lots of fun when I get creating.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas - Card sneak peek

My Christmas card list seems to get bigger every year. While I plan to get onto my cards early in the year so I know they are done it hasn't happened. I had an idea started from this card by Maile Belles and I bit the bullet, put aside some other things that need doing and got into it. I was pleasantly surprised to find they didn't take that long and I enjoyed putting them together.  Now to do the year in review letter that goes with it.  I will post the final result when they have been posted out.

Colours: crumb cake, cherry cobbler, always artichoke, very vanilla, early espresso
Stamps:  vintage labels and postmarks (PTI), merry christmas (kaiser)
Finishing touches:  handmade holidays papers and tags (simple stories), rhinestones (SU)

Christmas Cards - It's Christmas in the Heart

For the last few years I have been making my Christmas cards to send out. Once I have settled on a design I get all the bits made and put them together.  {Note to self:  It all takes time from the creating, to the making, to the writing of addresses and posting.  It worked really well in past years to do it mid year.}  So this time, as not so much time was a factor, I put together a few cards for the lovely ladies that I create with at stamp club and came up with my design.

 

Papertrey Ink had posted some lovely colour combos with non-traditional Christmas colours that I used for the inspiration.  I was so pleased to have put them together and got them sent.

Colours:  very vanilla, garden green, tempting turquoise, old olive

Stamps: chevron stripes (PTI), heart of christmas (SU)

Finishing touches: christmas stockings embossing folders set(sizzix), peapod bakers twine (the twinery), button

    

More Christmas cards

I had more christmas cards that I wanted to send so put together a clean and simple card (for me anyway), starting with a die that came with my cuttlebug.

Colours: baja breeze, white
Stamps: circle of friendship (SU), favourite memories (TT)
Finishing touches: celebration stamps embossing folder and die (cuttlebug), carribean bakers twine (the twinery), button

A wise owl

My goodies from Papertrey Ink arrived in time to put together a card for my son's teachers. I have had the wise owl set on my wish list since I discovered Papertrey Ink so I had to have a play. I remembered the santa hat from Pink Cat Studio's Dress up Lily set. A great finishing touch.

Colours: very vanilla, always artichoke, riding hood red
Stamps: wise owl (PTI), merry christmas (Kaiser), dress up lily (PCS)
Finishing touches: spiral punch (SU), stitching, button, red and copper embossing powder, bakers twine (the twinery)

Christmas Cards with Dasher

Christmas is here. Back in June I did what I set out to do and made my Christmas cards so I didn't have to stress now at getting what I wanted done. I am so pleased that I did. Next year I will add starting to write and address them earlier to the list, with a senders address stamp on top. I like the look of these .

Colours: chocolate chip, bravo burgandy, garden green, white
Stamps: dasher, snow swirled and party punch (SU)
Finishing touches: a little argyle embossing folder (cuttlebug), Christmas ribbon (american crafts), stitiching, button, stamps die (cuttlebug), white embossing powder

Mid Winter Christmas

I made a promise to myself that after rushing to get my Christmas cards done in December for the last few years that I was going to get organised and do it mid year this year. As it is something that I want to do why not make it a priority. I am a design one and then mass produce girl. One day I might have a go at doing different ones spread out over the year but I love putting effort into creating it and making the most of it. So far I had put together a few bits and pieces as starters and this weekend I designed the card. While I had the bits and pieces out I started putting together the different parts ready to make them up. This is a sneak peak at my favourite part. I loved the fact that I didn't feel pressured to get it all done and could spend time making something that I liked

Christmas cards

After stressing last year about getting cards made and putting together our family letter for the year I was determined that I would get ahead of myself and not be doing it at the last minute. But wouldn't you know I was actually later this year and just got them posted before Christmas. The big difference I guess has been that I didn't stress about it. I just got them done when I was able to do it. Next year however I am determined to learn my lesson. You heard it here.

I actually had a lot of fun putting together my card for this year. I wanted something different. I love looking at all the creations as I blog hop but I can't bring myself to do a winter christmas card with the snowflakes and snowmen etc. So it had to be kiwi. One of the things that sticks out for me at Christmas time is the pohutakawa as it comes in to flower in December, especially now that we have a fabulous tree in our entrance. So when I came across the pohutakawa stamp at Kiwi Impressions it got me thinking. I wanted to keep it fairly simple so carried on the pacific theme by creating a flax look background and the paua to finish it off.


Colours: crumb cake, cherry cobbler, wild wasabi
Stamps: pohutakawa (KI), wavy christmas sentiment (elzybells)
Finishing touches: texture plate basketweave (fiskars), stamps die (cuttlebug), red glitter, linedn thread (SU), paua shell (ocean shell beads)

November Stamp Club

The challenge for this month is Christmas. Having thought about it for a bit I liked the idea of using silver embossing to create decorations and teamed it up with purple for something a bit different to the usual Christmas colours. I even used my sewing machine for the stitching! Have also been wanting to use the new in colour ribbon Looking forward to catching up with the girls tomorrow night and seeing what they have come up with.

Colours: elegant eggplant, silver
Stamps: snow swirled (SU)
Finishing touches: silver embossing powder and concord crush stitched ribbon (SU), peel craft borders, stitching, rhinestones.

Christmas cards

To say that this Christmas time has been busy is putting it mildly. All the grand plans I had for doing cards early in the year just seemed to get put off somewhat until the ultimate last minute where I did post before Christmas but know that they wouldn't get there til after. Still it meant that I made more of an effort with our letter that has much more to say.

With so many design buzzing around in my head, I went for something way more simple and was very pleased with the end result. A big thankyou for the idea from Amy R as I was drawing a bit of a blank as to what to do. You can see her designs here.

After doing so many using my stamp spots (SU) it certainly made up my mind to start buying the larger stamp pads. I think the end result would have come out better as well.

Big NOTE TO SELF: Get busy on your christmas cards wayyyyyy earlier next year!!!!!

Colours: certainly celery, Handsome hunter, real red, pretty in pink, night of navy, brocade blue
Stamps: snow swirled
Finishing touches: Ribbon (various unknown, rhinestones (Kaiser)

Feeling a lot like Christmas

Where did last month go? I know we have been sick for most of it. Kind of thrown a spanner in the works of all the projects that I intended to do. Never mind one thing at a time. I just don't have the time to blog about them thats all.

This is a card that I did for our last stamp club for the year. The challenge was to create something for Christmas using Christmas colours and a neutral. I had seen buttons used to make a christmas tree at Jillibean soup and wanted to try it out. With this as a starter it was a case of finding colours to match. I am loving using my kraft paper as a neutral base.

Colours: kraft, so saffron, always artichoke

Stamps: snow swirled (SU)

Finishing touches: buttons, so saffron ribbon and lines thread (SU), copper embossing powder and glitter, pearls.