Make it Simple Monday Frosted Gingerbread

 So with only 75 day's till Christmas is  your Christmas card making in full swing? Are you a last minute dot com? Or do you start in January?  Me I don't begin till September... well maybe October .. or sometimes the 24th of December 🤣🤣🤣 What makes it possible at all is the great selection of stamps, dies and pattern paper that is available in the Stampin' Up! July to December mini catalogue.  And this week I'm going to be sharing projects I've made with the first suite of products in the catalogue.  CalledGingerbread and peppermint suite .

Now as it's Monday that means it's Make it Simple or #simplestamping here. So that means I get to play with the super fun Frosted Gingerbread stamp set.

 I decided that I was going to create some cards that were #simplestamping in a bright and bold look using the bauble stamp.

I  choose to use ink in a bold purple called gorgeous grape, bright turquoise called bermuda bay and magenta madness a bright and bold shade of pink.

I then made my card bases and decided that would make one version in a portrait orientation so I made that first.

 Next I made one in a landscape orientation using the same layout, colours and stamps.

 So the question is which do you prefer 🤔? Me I can't decide 🙃 

As this is Make it Simple Monday it also means that I shall be doing a Facebook Live over on our page at 4pm BST.  Now last week was a bit of a disaster due to  Facebook crashing but fingers crossed it will all be good today 🤞. 

So please join me and see how I made today's cards and let me know which you prefer Portrait?  Or Landscape? 

Oh and if you can't join me live I'll add a link to it Here 😉 

Fun Fold Friday - Peaceful Deer

Well we are at Friday again this week already. I have really enjoyed playing with the Peaceful Deer stamp set so much that I will be making many more ready for my Christmas card collection. I always make so many cards and often send loads to the charities too. It's pointless me keeping them if someone else can make use of them, why not! 

Today's is a sort of gatefold card but it has a bit of an extension on. I had this idea in my head and played with lots of printer paper to eventually get it to work out. Now that I have the plan, I will be making many more in the coming weeks. I started with the gorgeous red of Real Red card. I cut the piece of A4 card in landscape position at 14.85cm by 29.7cm. Then another piece of red 11cm by 14.85cm. The smaller piece was scored along the 11cm width at 5cm and 10cm. The longer piece of card was scored from the left at 9.9cm, 19.8cm and 24.75cm. One of the smaller sections was adhered to the front of the 1cm section on the other, smaller piece of card. You now have a very wide card base. I have reversed mine so that the larger panels, the 9.9cm one are to the right of the card. They really can be either end. Then it was down to the decoration. As this is like a concertina folded card, I ended up covering all of the panels on both sides. My choice but not totally necessary. The deer paper is from the Peaceful Prints DSP from Saleabration. I added the stag and the doe over another half of the deer on the papers.  The mesh panel on the inside right of the card is from the called Gingerbread and Peppermint Memories and More card pack. There really are some gorgeous cards in that pack!

 I hope you have been found some ideas for your own cards this week. Please do let Cary or me know if you have made something based on our ideas as we would always love to see or hear about them. 

For more information on the products that I have used this week, please follow the link HERE and it will open up in a new page. It will at first take you to the Peaceful Deer stamp set and punch but you can have a really good browse around there without being pestered. 

If you live in the UK, please shop with us and we would love for you to join our Stampin' team of demonstrators too. We have a really great diverse bunch of people. They are all wonderful.

 

 

Above and below is the front of the card which has been joined using the beautiful Real Red Sheer Ribbon. 

 

Above is the front of the 4 x 5cm panels that you would see on opening the card.

Below is the 4 x 5cm wide panels as you would see on the reverse of the card. I haven't as yet decorated them but may do in the days to come.

 

 Above is the left hand inside main panel and below is the right hand panel.

 

 Above is the last panel which could act as a message panel and below is the stamp set and the punch which goes with the leaping deer.

 

 Below is the instructions for the panel layouts of the card. I hope the instructions are clear enough and that I don't confuse you too much.

 

Above is the large main panel of the card and below is the extension of the card.

 

Thank you for stopping by this week to see my creations. I do hope that you have some inspiration to make your own projects as a result. 

 

Cary will return on Monday with some of her amazing creations to show you so please stop by. 

 

Until I return in a week, please take care, stay safe and well but most of all....

KEEP ON CRAFTING :) 

😍😍😍

Throwback Thursday - Peaceful Deer

Today's card is another of the technique type of card that I always love to make. Using Peaceful Deer stamp set, I have matted and layered this card once or twice! I started with a Deep Gray card base called Basic Gray then added a soft, silvery grey in the Smoky Slate. On top of that, I added the gorgeous piece of Double Sided Paper or Designer Series Paper from Stampin' Up! The papers are called Peaceful Place. They are all shades of grey, black and white and on one of the sides are silver foiled patterns and designs. They are simply stunning. Well worth buying. Please click HERE for the link to see these stunning papers.

Then I started with the deer. I stamped several of them using the Memento Ink pad and coloured them in using the Ivory Stampin' Blends. I also added a strip of the gorgeous sparkly silver mesh ribbon. 

The disc for the message is made up of 2 silver foiled circles and 2 smoky slate circles. It was fun trying to get them all in different sizes but I managed it!

 

Watercolour Wednesday - Peaceful Deer

 Today's card is one that I had great fun making. a little fiddly but it was great fun to make. I started with a piece of White card and took a large acrylic block and stamped it onto the soft blue of Balmy Blue. This enabled me to get lots of ink onto the block. Using the large waterbrush in the set, I dropped a few drops of water onto the ink on the block....picking up the ink with the brush I literally spread it from the outside of the white card mat to the centre from left to right and repeated it until I had the colour that I was happy with. Yes, I could have used a piece of Balmy Blue card, but there wasn't any mixed texture showing on the mat which I have now.

For more information on the products that I used on this card, please click on the link HERE and it will open a new page for you. 

 

I took a piece of the Stampin' Up! white velvet paper and cut to half a C6 mat then ripped the edges of it to soften it and make it into the background. Stamping the deer and trees onto scrap white card then using Stampin' Blends, I coloured them in. 

Yes, it had to be done. I fussy cut the trees and deer. I then fixed them onto the card using dimensionals to add more texture. A piece of the cotton ribbon and a message inside and out completes this card.

Tips, Tricks and Techniques Tuesday - Peaceful Deer

 For today's card using the Peaceful Deer stamp set, I have used one of my favourite simple techniques and that is Heat embossing. It is so simple to do as long as you have the heat embossing tool, embossing powder and ink pad such as the amazing Versamark. This is really an upgrade of the card I made for yesterday's Make It Monday or #simplestamping project. I have used another of my favourite techniques called matting and layering. I love the layers on a card as it always adds dimension to any card. 

My first action was to use the embossing buddy (a very fine powder to clean up finger prints from the card) and wiped it across the whole of the card that I was going to ink onto. Instead of using the Memento ink pad as I did yesterday, today I used the Versamark ink pad and stamped the deer first and then the stars repeatedly over the upper half of the card. Versamark is Watermark stamp pad and will stay wet for quite a while, even a day or so! Once stamped all over, I poured white Embossing Powder over the wet ink and then heat set it using the Heat tool. It literally takes less than 30 seconds to heat set all of that powder. Watching it change from very dull greyish-white to the shiny white is AMAZING!!! I love it! I stamped a further deer onto the blue card scrap in the same way and once heat-set I punched it out using the matching punch that goes with the stamp set.

I used the Misty Moonlight card and Basic white once again keeping to my monochrome look again. A strip of the gorgeous cotton ribbon, loads of Rhinestones (a big change for me) and a few messages, completes this card for today.  

For more information on the products that I have used today, please click HERE The link will open up in a new window for you.

Make It Monday - Peaceful Deer

 Hello and welcome back on this very damp Monday. As you may have gathered by Cary's posts last week, we are talking Christmas for the next little while. Saying that, we will be popping other celebrations in as well. This week I'm using the beautiful stamp set called Peaceful Deer. There's something about reindeer that I've always found interesting. From the tiny little fawn to the majestic, stately stag, just amazing. This being Monday, we like to do the Make It Monday or #simplestamping This card is exactly that. The cards that we make on a Monday are aimed at the beginner crafter. By adding a few more ink pads, different colouring mediums, a punch and gems to bling the card up, we can make this card again by adding the little extras. I haven't as yet done that but will aim to step it up and show you the different ways in which it can be changed for the more competent crafter.

My favourite colours for the Christmas season is Red. However, saying that, I have used the lovely shade of blue like the early night sky in Stampin' Up!s Misty Moonlight. It's not dark like Navy but more subtle. Combining the blue with simple white mats is the perfect monochrome effect that I love. I cut the 2 white mats then stamped the leaping deer into the upper centre, then surrounded it with lots of the stars. Having borrowed the grandchildren's colouring pencils, I coloured the deer in with a very soft brown.

A simple message on the front and the inside mat along with some more of the stars to complete this one.

Fun fold Friday Be Jolly

 Last Sunday I was lucky enough to take part in some team training, I must admit  to loving a bit of training 😀, and as part of the day we were lucky enough to take part in a creative session with the lovely Kim Fee, a fellow demo.  For part of her session she shared the fab fun fold that I'm sharing with you today. I'm  not sure what she called the fold but I'll  be calling it the Kim fold! 😅 Of course my sample had to use the oh so cute Be Jolly stamps. 

The super fun fold starts life as 2 pieces of cardstock 1 measuring 14.85cm x 10.5cm and piece 2 measuring 14.85cm x 28cm. 

Then take piece 2 and score at 5cm and 9.5cm in from both ends. Then fold the score lines as a mountain then a valley from each end.

Now take the folded piece, closed up, and carefully center it onto piece 1. Making sure that it is equal adhere the two pieces together and voila your base is made!

Now the fun really begins!! Decorate as you wish . I have used some of the lovely pattern paper that was available during Sale-A-Bration that is sadly not available now 😢 I also stamped , coloured and fussy cut out the tree and a santa from the stamp set. 

I have also used a fun sentiment from a stamp set called Holly Jolly Wishes.  This set is full of fun Christmas sentiments that work for so many cards inside and out!

I used the Jingle all the way sentiment as the santa I used lookes like he's  dancing, well he does to me 😅

 Now yesterday was my wonderful mum's birthday and I used the same fun fold but made it larger. My Christmas version fits into a standard C6 envelope but for my Mum's card I made one that fit inside a C5 envelope . I also chose to use pattern paper, stamps and dies from  the gorgeous Expressions In Ink suite . 

I used a beautiful bold pink and gold as my colour palette. I think it is both elegant and contemporary as well as a little bit sassy just like my Mum  😉

So that's  it from me this week. I'm  off to look at a venue for our weekend crafting retreat held next March this afternoon.  Thwn Saturday we're  celebrating World Cardmaking Day with some lovely crafters creating cards to donate to a local mental health charity . And Sunday I'll probably get a little crafting prep done for our regular classes next week. So all in all a busy crafty weekend! What about you? What are you upto?

Have a great weekend and don't forget to join us here next week when Gill will be sharing her inspiration with us.

Have fun

Cary xx