Christmas Kickstart Challenge #88 - Festive Frames

 

We have a brand new challenge starting today at Christmas Kickstart, and we're so lucky to be joined by the very talented to Leslie from Running With Scissors!

Our theme for July is

Festive Frames

We'd like to see a FRAME on your Christmas card!

I know that you will love what Leslie has created for our challenge, so please click on over and take a look.

Here's what I made:

I did a little shopping on Sid's Selling Site on Facebook, and bought a beautiful set from Waltzing Mouse Stamps. Anyone else remember that company? Gorgeous products, but sadly no longer in business. The frame is from Simon Say's Stamp, but I don't think its available now. I'm sorry I'm using so many older products, but us retired gals can't splash the cash like we used to!

Rudolph is offering a sweet Random Raffle Prize for this challenge:

 

Look everyone, it's a baby Rudolph!

Leslie and I hope you'll come and join the fun, and we can't wait to see what you create!

And how lovely to discover that it's Christmas in July over at Lost Coast Designs. 

My little card will jingle it's way over there to join the fun!

The Christmas Kickstart Challemnge #12 - The Elves and the Shoemaker

A new fortnight brings a new challenge at The Christmas Kickstart, and it also brings a new elf!

For this challenge I'm delighted to welcome Marina from My Perfect Life and The Library Challenge.

Marina's The Library Challenge quickly established itself as one of my favourites when she launched it February 2018. It's for crafters who love reading (that would be me then) and the idea is that Marina picks a book as inspiration and everyone creates a card on that theme. Here's the cover/title that Marina chose for Challenge #12 - isn't it a beauty?

I'm sure you'll agree there's so much to inspire us cardmakers in this cover! 

Here's what I came up with:

Card #1 features a sleepy VLVS elf leaning on some paper pieced presents - perhaps Santa has been working him too hard in the workshop!

I'm also going to link this little guy to CAS Christmas as their current challenge is Gifts. 

My next two cards are very CAS and not my usual style, but I had fun making them.

I decided that I wanted elf shoes or similar on a card to pick up the shoe-making theme. I was delighted to spot this fabulous elf shoe stencil over at The Stencil Studio and knew I had to get it. I'm going to have so much 'Elf on the Shelf' fun with this at Christmas! The sentiment is from MFT.

I'm going to enter this card over at Shopping our Stash (The sentiment stamp is an oldie!) as the theme for this fortnight is Stencil Me This. 

There's also a lovely stencil challenge over at A Place to Start - Stencil Me In: Use your Favourite Stencil. I think this one is already on my Top 10 of favourite stencils. Thanks for the push in that direction, Chana. 

For my final card I focused in on the pretty, blue bead and the elf to create this very clean, graphic make.

The elf is from Stamping Bella and the sentiment from the fabulous, and much lamented, Waltzingmouse Stamps.

I hope you'll feel similarly inspired by this cover and that you'll come play along with myself and Marina for Challenge #12 at The Christmas Kickstart Challenge. I'm sure you'll also want to visit Marina's The Library Challenge to join her for her latest book-themed outing, which is inspired by a stripey read until June 15th.

J is for Joke: Playing with the Sisterhood again!

Just look at Edna rolling her eyes!

I couldn't resist playing along with Challenge #56 over at The Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers as I love making funny/punny/jokey cards! The Sisters are a witty bunch and I love the DT cards for this challenge. Take a look: their cards are hilarious!

Here's the adorable Jean from AI (Still Livin') again. Sadly, I don't think she's available now so I'm glad I bagged this geriatric beauty when I did! Edited to add: Hurray, Jean is still available here!

I wanted a 'punchy' backdrop for Jean so decided to use my brightest green Distress Ink Twisted Citron and over-stamped Waltzingmouse's Mini Crackle background in Peacock Feathers.

I found a single sheet of purple paper in my stash and managed to get a base layer and a small embellishment from it. I love green, purple and turquoise together!

When I was looking at the Art Impressions site to see if they still stocked Jean, I discovered that they have a blog and a regular challenge. I guess because I don't buy from them (I'm in the UK and international postage is sooooo expensive) I've never really explored the site. I have to say that I like the blog and can see myself settling back with a cuppa to enjoy the videos and the excellent posts... and then searching for UK stockists!

The current AI challenge is 'Add a Brad'... So I added three for good measure!

Finally, I spotted that Allsorts Challenge Blog is running an April Fools/Humorous challenge this week. The DT cards are brilliant and certainly made me laugh-out-loud big time! So, finally,  I'm linking-up and playing along with the lovely Allsorts crew.

Have a happy day everyone!

Fly High!

Happy Spring everyone!
The sun is shining and the crocus flowers are fluttering gently in the breeze in our back garden.

 

Today, I'm sharing a card using this beautiful set from Waltzingmouse Stamps.

 

I made this card for my friend and colleague Jayne. Jayne teaches dance where I work and last week I took mom to see her latest show at the school. The children were fabulous, the costumes amazing and as always Jayne's choreography was brilliant.

 

Jayne loves sparkle so I added a tiny red gem and some glitter to the centre of the feathers, and used holographic paper for the layering.

Have a great weekend everyone!