Mouth Watering - 365+1

My festive lunch for one today was a toasted bagel with ham, cheese and homemade cranberry jam, finished with some watercress for 'greens' and it was 'mouth wateringly' delicious.  Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all my fellow 366ers, I'll be back posting on the 26th.

Janice

Something Red and Christmassy - 365+1

A little festive 'Something Red', a cupcake Christmas tree bauble.

Another Christmassy themed layout, this year we won't all be together although I will see both my sons, just not on the same day in the same place. Maybe next year. This photo is from Christmas 2009.

Tradition - 365+1

Scrap Shana - Tis the Season

What is more traditional than mince pies at Christmas?  I loved making this layout with the lovely Christmassy kit by Scrap Shana.  Don't forget to check out my 1000th post Giveaway

365+1 New

Kit: Gingerscraps Scrap your Life

Art Journal - Christmas

Art Journal time again.  Kaz suggested that we create a page around the Christmas theme, she has already announced one for New Year, so I thought I'd better get on with this one and get it posted!

I used Red Velvet Glimmer Mist sprayed over one of those little reindeer tree decorations.  I pasted bits of lovely red tissue paper decorated with snowflakes onto the page and wrote titles of Christmas songs onto them.  I used the Tando Creative snowflake mask and gessoed through it to make textured snowflakes.  Then stuck more of the tissue paper onto card and die cut the letters for Christmas, a bit of doodling round the edges and some glitter on the reindeer and that's it done.

Image from My Vintage Vogue

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays 

from Serial Crafter

Vampires in the Library!

No, not Buffy the Vampire Slayer! Just a combination of two projects I'd like to show you.

First a Library Card pocket made from a template from Mirkwood Designs and inspired by Linda at the Funkie Junkie.

Papers are Websters

Stamp is Hero Arts

I made a little stand to put on the back of the pocket so it would stand up as a Christmas Card.

So we've been to the library, now for the Vampire!  We are having a fun Art Journal challenge at BubblyFunk Forum and I am trying to find the time to take part.  The first prompt is:  

" Life is short, so smile while you still have teeth"

Dylusions Paint, Glimmer Mists Sprays, Christopher Lea and Stamp Linda by Daniel Torrente for Stampotique.

 

At last...some crafting!

As you will know, if you read my blog regularly, I have been without a proper craft work area for several months.  However it is now finished and I am in the process of re-instating my stash!  Last night I decided to stop shelf stacking and make something.  We received a couple of late Christmas presents last week, so I made these two thank you cards using some Simply Fabulous Collection 'Meg' papers from Making Memories.  I've had these papers for a very long time,but they are so fresh and pretty, I like to go back to them every now and again.  The 'thanks' stamp is Studio G.

Here is a the new craft area before the stuff started to go back in, it looks like a lot of space, but I have an awful lot of paper, fabric and bits and pieces.

and finally... I managed to make a card for Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Card Challenge, this week the challenge is a 'square card' which is my favourite kind.  Papers are Winter Wings from Websters Pages with some stickles to lift the medallion embellisment.

 

I'll be back with an update on the shelves and hopefully somemore crafting!

Pearls, Peel-offs and Paint!

Over in Daring Card Maker land, it's time for 'jewel of the month' or rather, birthstone and ...

 

The birthstone for June is the

Pearl

We'd like you to use lots and lots of beautiful pearls on your cards this week - or maybe you'll take inspiration from Pearls in another way, for instance the Pearl symbolises loyalty, faithfulness and friendship and is associated with modesty, chastity and purity. 

 

 

 

When I started to make this card, it was not intended to be a DCM entry, but rather a late entry for Bubbly Funk Forum 25th Club, where we have pledged to make a certain number of Christmas cards each month, and the theme was red and green for May. 

I started with the stamped image, which came from a swap, as it had been stamped in Stazon, I couldn't use copics, so decided to dig out my watercolour pencils, which I haven't used for ages.  I also used some other gold paint for the letters.  Then I wondered how to present it and toyed with making an easel card, well I wasn't happy with that, but thought I'd use the fold I'd already made and create something a bit different.

 

As it was a fairly formal image, I didn't feel that inked edges would be right for this, so once again I rummaged about till I found some straight gold peel-offs, which just finished it off as I wanted.  

 

The 'dior' ribbon was made using a tutorial on Gingersnap Creations and when I went to find something to add to the centre I found this little link from an old bracelet with a PEARL on it -  Bingo!

This is the second card I made for the 25th Club.

Jingle Bells!

Its time for the 25th Club on Bubbly Funk Forum, where some of the forum members have challenged themselves to make a certain number of Christmas cards each month. 

I'm in charge of the challenge for April and I thought I would go with a sketch.

And here is the card I made, the ribbon doesn't look quite that squint in real life!  The stamped image came from an image swap and is coloured with Copics.  Jingle Bells stamp is Studio G.

Reindeer Romp!

Yes, it's time for another Christmas card for the 25th Club on Bubbly Funk Forum. This time TraceyR suggested the theme of 'animals' inlcuding her own favourite Reindeer!

Some of my Christmas Presents

I thought I would share a little slide show of some of the lovely gifts I received from family and friends.

The story begins...

Yesterday I showed you the front cover of my Christmas 2009 paperbag book, today you can see the first two pages. Hopefully I will manage to do some more pages and will post them as I go along.

Page 1 features my Secret Santa Advent parcel from Bubbly Funk Forum. We were all allocated a forum member to send a 'crafty' advent calendar and we have a lot of fun every day telling each other what we got in our little parcels and trying to guess who sent the
m! They are small things like buttons, gems, die-cut shapes nothing too expensive but it's just great to open a little parcel every day. My Advent parcel came beautifully presented in a box lined with vintage images and every little package made from folded gold paper with a red tag. I included the first tag in my page. There is a journallying tag tucked under the photo explaining about the swap.

Page 2 is about my Christmas Tree which is an eclectic mix of ornaments that I have chosen, made or have been given as gifts and there are a few that the boys made too. When I considered my tree I was very aware that it leans towards a 'folk art' style with a bit of bling thrown in, which probably sums me up too lol!
I wanted to show some of the tree decorations, so I made a little concertina book. Mickey and Goofy came from the Christmas Shop at Epcot in Disney World, my Mum gave me the rag doll angel last year and my crafting friend Tracey R gave me the gorgeous glittery shoe dec when we met at the NEC in November 2008. The one Karen gave me is on the tree too, but I couldn't take pics of them all or there would have been nothing but tree ornaments in the book!
On the back of the concertina, I have a pic of a salt dough wreath that I made about 15 years ago, I resurrected it this year as it hasn't been out for a while. The last pic is of the holly branches and pine boughs that I cut from the garden, they are soaking in a bucket of water....but you will have to wait and see what I did with them next, hee hee.

Paper Bag Writer

As usual I started out with good intentions. I signed up for the Jessica Sprague class, 'Holidays in Hand', however I have to say that it just didn't hit the spot for me. I'm not sure what it was, most of the prompts were really geared for people with children and things like 'taking a photo of everyone in your family' falls a little flat when it's only me, DH and MIL!!!

Anyway, I decided that I would just play it by ear and not be driven by a fixed plan, this seemed to work with my stated 'values' of being more relaxed about Christmas (not something I find easy). I decided to make a paper bag book after seeing the one made by Sarah on Bubbly Scrumptious blog, I left mine full bag size rather than cutting it down to 6 x 6 the way Sarah did.

I have done two pages so far, I'll let you see them soon.

Papers are Dream Street, label is digi by Ellie Lash.

Believe

Here is the card I made for my friend to send. That's William the Westie (West Highland Terrier) with a little PSE magic (I told you my role model was Samantha from Bewitched!) you can see what William gets up to on Christmas Eve.

Of all the trees that are in the wood...

"...Of all the trees that are in the wood, the holly bears the crown"

Those nice people over on the Something Completely Different challenge blog have a new challenge out for November, here it is:

So, its November...and a new challenge....this month we are changing the rules slightly. For this month each theme will be a colour and subject theme....we are hoping to help you get ready for Christmas by making Cards!...and this weeks theme and colour has been chosen by the very talented Dawn and she has chosen.....

HOLLY AND THE IVY - USING THE COLOURS, GREEN, RED AND GOLD

This was a simple card to make, I won the Holly stamp from Gez in a charity auction so it was an obvious choice for this challenge, I stamped the image with Dazzle Versamark in Champagne and embossed with Chinese Red embossing powder (it's sort of red and gold), then I used Ranger 'Worn Lipstick' Distress ink blended with a bit of sponge round the edge, a blast of Irridescent Gold Glimmer Mist, mount the image on gold card add a green ribbon and a pin featuring red, green and gold beads.

Merry and Bright - Bubbly Scrumptious Challenge

Here is my entry for the Bubbly Scrumptious Weekly Challenge.

DRY EMBOSSING

Whether you use a lightbox or a 'machine' for this you can make some really lovely patterns & there is so much you can do with the embossed card/paper.

I am beginning to think I need to start making some Christmas cards so as I have the snowflake embossing folder for my Cuttlebug, I decided to use this for the challenge. The card owes a lot to Kaz at Slightly Wonky Crafts in style, the papers were left over from last year and are by Dream Street, the stamped image was one I got in a stamped image swap, so I can't give you any details, I'm afraid.

Christmas Blogging

Christmas Day at home

Boxing Day at Mum's

Frosty Walk on Christmas Saturday

All digital papers and elements from Sunshine Studio and Ellie Lash.

Hang up your stocking!

I thought I'd show you the Christmas stocking I made for my DS1's girlfriend. I've made stockings with this pattern for all the family, it's one I bought in the US when I first went there in 1980, at that time you couldn't get patterns like this in the UK and even Christmassy fabric was difficult to find. It is a very easy pattern, the trickiest bit is putting on the name, I've embroidered most of the others but thought I would try to do this one with applique, it wasn't easy stitching round the letters, but I'm pleased with the effect.

Merry Christmas digi style

Wishing all my blog readers a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. These are the digital Christmas cards that I have sent this year. The top one for people who know us both and the bottom one for people I work with who don't know my DH.
Digital papers and elements are from Sunshine Girls Mega Freebie Winter Wonderland, including the fantastic snowflake overlay which I just love.