Category: Christmas

CASE Me A Christmas Card series with Michelle Lupton!

Today it’s my turn to take part in my dear friend Michelle Lupton’s annual CASE Me A Christmas Card Series! Or rather, we thought it was today, it was actually yesterday but both Michelle and I were foiled by time zone converters, lol!

I’m so excited as Michelle and I are rainbow-loving-sisters-from-another-mister, so of course I had to use one of her many, many amazing rainbow cards as my inspiration.

This stunning card was just begging to be CASE’d. In case you haven’t heard of CASE before, it stands for Copy And Selectively Edit. It’s basically what we all do when we see inspiration and then put our own spin on it.

So I took this gorgeous design and put my own spin on it, two different ways. First of all I heat embossed the Holiday Sentiments Strips stamp from Hero Arts in Bright White embossing powder from WOW! Embossing, on two different panels. One on water colour paper, and one on Neenah #110 white card stock.

On the water colour panel, I used my DIY glitter sprays made with Liquid Pixie Dust from Inkon3 and reinkers from Pinkfresh Studios. With sprays you have very little control over where the colours go, and what is going to happen, so it’s best to just spray and let it do it’s thing.

On the second panel I ink blended Inkon3 Atelier inks in Bee Sting Yellow, Marigold Orange, Sweet Petunia Pink, Peacock Blue and Goddess Green. Over this I spritzed a little bit of the DIY yellow glitter spray, as well as gold splatters. Sufficient to say it’s very sparkly!

Because the stamp is perfectly sized for an A2/5.5″x4.25″ card size, I decided to simply add these panels to card bases. One of them isn’t perfectly heat embossed, so I wanted to cover that up.

I did that with Metallic Gold Pearls from Pinkfresh Studio on the ink blended card, and Clear Iridescent Pearls on the glitter spray card. Here I have done my usual ‘Lets. Use. All. Of. The. BLING!’ thing, but I love, love, love how it turned out!

That’s it from me for today but I hope you have enjoyed this post, as well as Michelle’s. Please do give her a follow if you don’t already do so, she’s amazing!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

In this post I have used some compensated affiliate links, at no extra cost to you. What that means is that if you shop using these links, I get a small commission from the company it’s linked to as a thank you for directing you to them. This doesn’t ever cost you, as the shopper, anything extra at all. It comes out of the pocket of the company. These earnings help me keep all of these crafting shenanigans going, as well as pay for things like blog hosting, cost for equipment and replenishing staples. Thank you so much for the support, it means the world to me!

From Crafty Meraki you can get the goodies listed below, and you can also take 10% off your order with the code ERICA10
Peacock Blue
Goddess Green
Bee Sting Yellow
Marigold Orange
Sweet Petunia Pink
Liquid Pixie Dust
WOW Embossing ink pad 
Mini MISTI 

From Inkon3 you can also get goodies:
Liquid Pixie Dust
Goddess Green
Peacock Blue
Sweet Petunia Pink
Marigold Orange
Bee Sting Yellow

Pinkfresh Studio September 2022 Stamp, Die, Stencil, Washi, and Hot Foil Release

Hi and welcome back to my little corner of the blogosphere!

Today’s post is all about the amazing September release from Pinkfresh Studio! You should have come here from Emily Midgett and the next stop on the hop is Heather Hoffman! If you get lost along the hop, you can find the entire lineup HERE.

For my first card I have used the lovely Tidings Of Great Joy suite. First off I heat embossed the outline stamp with gold embossing powder, and after setting that with the heat gun, I got the coordinating stencils out.

Tidings Of Great Joy stamp
Tidings Of Great Joy diecut
Tidings Of Great Joy stencils

I have only used three colours with the layering stencils, Sweet Mustard, Doe and Seaside, to create a Scandinavian look. It came out just as I had hoped and the colours went so well with the gold embossing too!

While I had the gold embossing powder and the Tidings Of Great Joy stamp out, I also did the large sentiment in it, and then I used the coordinating diecuts to cut out the middle of the panel, as well as the sentiment.

The background is done with the Dotted Scallop cover plate to create the look of snowcapped mountains, and this is then all adhered to a light grey card base. This is Soft Stone card stock from Gina K, and I love this shade.
The final touch was a smattering of Matte Gold Pearls.

Next up I have used a mix of fun products to create a couple of pastel themed holiday cards. The Swirl Background stencils and the Brushed Sentiment Holiday suite. It comes with a stamp set, coordinating diecuts, coordinating layering stencils as well as coordinating hot foil plates.

Swirl Background stencils
Brushed Sentiment Holiday stamp set
Brushed Sentiment Holiday layering stencils
Brushed Sentiments Holiday hot foil
Brushed Sentiment Holiday diecuts

When I ink blend, I tend to make more than one, in case of mishaps or total flops. In this case, both Swirl Background Stencils backgrounds worked out and turned into cards.

On this one I have ink blended all the five Swirl Background stencils with inks, and pastel colours. For the yellows I used Sunshine and Sweet Mustard, for the pink I used Sparkling Rose and Bubble Gum, for the blues/turquoise I used Ocean Breeze and Aquamarine, and for the green I used only Grassy Knoll.

On this background I splattered some gold water colour to create some sparkly details and it instantly made the card even more fun!

I also added a Stitched Scallop Rectangle diecut, cut out of gold mirror card stock, and adhered this to the background. This one is layered up with another two pieces to create dimension.

I have heat embossed all of the Brushed Sentiment Holiday stamps with gold, and then used the coordinating diecuts to cut them out, as well as extras to layer the sentiments up with.

For this card I used Happy Holidays, and adhered these to the card as well as a few Glacier Jewels and then the card was done. Time to move on to the second card. On this one I used Nuvo Glimmer Paste in Moonstone, on the last layer, for a sparkly touch!

This card is finished off with similar elements as the first one, with a Stitched Scallop Rectangle diecut and heat embossed Brushed Sentiments saying Merry Christmas.

I think that Moonstone Glimmer paste is such a fun touch, and love the sparkle! It also goes so well with the Glacier Jewels.

I can’t pick which one I prefer out of these two, to be honest. I love how they came out, and I am definitely a fan of pastel Christmas cards.

I also made a YouTube video, you can find that over on my channel, or by clicking the thumbnail below.

A release celebration is not a proper celebration without a GIVEAWAY:
-We will be giving away the full release on the Pinkfresh blog & YouTube channel.
-We will be giving away a total of TEN $25 gift cards along the hop. As per usual with blog hops – the winners will be picked from the comments, so the more you hop and comment, the bigger your chance to win!

Winners will be posted on September 20, 2022 on the Pinkfresh GIVEAWAY PAGE. You must check that page and claim your prize within 2 weeks, if you are one of the winners. Make sure to mark the date and earmark the page.

Thanks for stopping by today, I hope you enjoyed this post and the rest of the hop! I have linked the products used for your convenience, with compensated affiliate links. If you shop using these links, I get a small commission from the company it’s linked to, at no extra cost to you. The earnings I get from these links help keep all of these crafting shenanigans going, as well as going towards the renovations of my future Craft Room that I will hopefully move into by the end of the year! Thank you so much for the support, it means more to me than you will ever know!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

Easy, Breezy Holiday Cards with Pinkfresh Goodies!

Hi guys!

I’m back with some more Pinkfresh flowery cards today. For these cards I have used the colour scheme from the December challenge but mixed it with the Blooming Branch set. I’m slightly in denial about Christmas being so close so any excuse to use flowers and blooms, I’m in.

First of, I heat embossed the Blooming Branch stamp set with Opaque Bright White embossing powder on one panel, and with Rich Gold embossing powder on a second. Both of these are from WOW! Embossing.

First off I used the Cottontail Embossing Tool from The Rabbit Hole Design, all over my card stock. Then I stamped the Blooming Branch outline stamp with WOW! Embossing ink, with the help of my Mini MISTI.

The idea was to get a softer look on the white and more vivid on the gold. The opacity of the ink blending is actually about the same, but it does make the colours pop or soften up, with the different colours. My fave is the Rich Gold.

To add colour I have used the Blooming Branch layering stencils and the inks I used are Sparkling Rose, Berrylicious (the colour in the graphic is closer to Candy Apple, but I went slightly lighter) Sunshine, Meadow and Aquamarine.

All of these have been ink blended with blending brushes, because that is the blending tool that works best for me to get a smooth blend.

I wanted a bit of a rainbow look still (surprise, surprise, I know… ) so I started with the Sunshine in the middle, and then went pink and red towards the top and the teal and turquoise towards the bottom.

You don’t actually need that many colours to get a rainbow look, as by blending the colours together you get more than the actual numbers of inks you use. For example, yellow and red/pink, will make orange and yellow and blue makes green, and so forth.

To get this look, you add the colours in the same areas on each layer of stencil. Think in terms of lines across your stencil, if you will. You just keep building it up as you go through your stencils, and eventually you end up with this fun rainbow look.

With the colours all added, I cut them both out with the coordinating diecut and on the back of these, I added foam tape to raise them up on the card. However, I had to make my backgrounds first and the sentiments too, of course.

I’m totally obsessed with the Abstract Triangle hot foil plate, so I used it on two panels with my Spellbinders Glimmer Hot Foil system. One with Matte Gold and one with Opal, which I at first thought I might have actually hot foiled the plate with instead of the paper…

Luckily for me, it was foiled to the paper, but the Opal hot foil is very subtle. It looks more like an embossing folder, than hot foiling. Which is another use for your hot foil plates! You can actually use them to add dry embossing, and add pattern to your card stock as well as use them for hot foiling.

While I had the Glimmer Hot Foil system out and hot, I decided to use the Thrill Of Hope hot foil plate for the sentiment. On these I used gold foil, and then I cut these out with the coordinating diecut. I also cut out an extra piece to layering up the hot foiled piece to make them slightly sturdier.

The background pieces were trimmed down a little and then directly adhered to a card base each. On top of these I added the Blooming Branch pieces, the sentiments and then I just had to add some Jewels to add even more pizzazz! I can’t help myself, I love these Jewels and they are such a perfect finishing touch.

The colours I have used are from top to bottom: Ballet Slipper, Sunshine and Ocean Breeze. If you like jewels like these, you might as well grab the Essentials Jewels Mix, which has 12 different colours in it.

That’s it from me for today, but I hope you found some inspiration here and don’t forget that you can still take part in the December challenge. You can win a $50 gift card to the Pinkfresh Studio shop just by taking part, so what are you waiting for? Go on, have some fun and play along. The deadline is December 28th, so plenty to of time and you can enter 5 projects!

Right, I will stop jibber-jabbering now and let you go. Thank you so much for stopping by, lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

You can find me on various social media platforms, by clicking the links below.
My blog
Instagram
My YouTube channel
CaCaCraft on Facebook

Happy Holidays card with Blooming Branches

Hi guys!

Today I am popping in with another Pinkfresh card, but not with the new release. Nope, at the time of writing this, that package is still on holiday somewhere here in Spain.

The upside, if there ever was one to not having the new release to work with is that it gave me an excuse to play with the Abstract Triangle hot foil plate and the Blooming Branch set. Two of my faves from the earlier releases! Instead of going summery, even though they are flowers, I went for a red and green holiday card!

First off I have heat embossed the Blooming Branch outline stamp on two pieces of card stock, in gold embossing powder. On top of these I then used the Blooming Branch Layering stencils and inkblended Passion Fruit, Berrylicious and Candy Apple for the flower petals, plus a little Apricot for the middle of the flowers.

For the leaves I used a VERY light touch of Grassy Knoll on the first stencil layer, on the first panel. The second panel got a more rich layer of the same colour. On the second stencil layer I used a very light touch of Olive on the first panel, and Grassy Knoll on the second one again, but a much more intense layer.

When I was all done with the layering stencils, I used the coordinating diecut on them both and set aside. While I had worked on these, my Glimmer hot foil machine had been warming up with the Abstract Triangle hot foil plate on it. I do find that I get much better results when my plate is very thoroughly warmed up, so I pop mine on the platform as soon as I click it on.

I used shiny gold foil on white card stock, and then on top of the pattern, I ink blended more Grassy Knoll ink, but left some white space at the bottom left corner. This panel is also trimmed down to 4¨x5.25¨, and adhered to a white card base with foam tape. On top of this I arranged the two Blooming Branch images to create a thick wreath of sorts, and this is also adhered with foam tape, for that lush dimension.

The final thing was to add a sentiment, and I used the Glimmer hot foil machine again, this time with the Thrill Of Hope hot foil plate that says Happy Holidays. It’s cut out with the coordinating diecut, and I also cut out another two pieces to layer this whole shebang up. Gotta have those layers and dimension, lol!

So that’s the card finished! I hope you like it and found some inspiration with me here today. Thank you so much for stopping by, and see you soon again!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

Magical Wintry Forest stencilling cards | Pops of colour, without colouring!

Hi guys!!

Today’s post is all about ink blending extravaganza, using the lovely and totally dreamy Wintry Forest layering stencils and yummy inks from Pinkfresh Studio!

I absolutely love stencils because they are so versatile and affordable. Stencils that can cover several occasions also add to their allure. At first glance you might think that this Wintry Forest stencil isn’t going to be meant for anything but holiday cards, buuuuuut I’m hoping I will make you see that it’s actually rather versatile.

Ok, full disclosure, I DID end up using foiled sentiments from the Perfect Sentiments Holiday set, because I have finally cracked foiling after it eluded me for ages. It took watching many videos by Yana Smakula and Channin Pelletier to get to grips with it, so if you are struggling like I was, know that there is a knack to it and don’t give up!

Currently the Perfect Sentiments Holiday set is sold out, but the Perfect Sentiments set is in stock. If you definitely want the Perfect Sentiments Holiday set, make sure to sign up for back into stock notifications.

Having said that, these backgrounds would work for all sorts of occasions, like thinking of you, sympathy, retirement, masculine birthday and nature lovers birthdays.

Instead of going for the expected look with greens for the Wintry Forest stencils, I went purple, blue and then fiery with yellows, oranges, red and fuchsias. I also added a generous splattering of gold on all three, because I love that as a finishing touch.

For the first card I used all the purples, from light to dark, Soft Lilac, Lavender ,Candy Violet  and Regal Kiss. The last layer is LOTS of Regal Kiss for that deep, dark purple colour.

Because I love blues I also used the Morning Sky blues: Sky Blue, Summer Shower, Seaside and Storm. These are just dreamy. On this one I used Sky Blue for the first two layers, very soft on the first and a bit more saturated for the second layer.

For the last card I used Lemon Whip and Sunshine, Apricot and Persimmon, Coral Reef and Berrylicious, and finally Bubble Gum and Raspberry Bliss. I used the lighter colour first, and then added a little bit of depth and intensity with the darker colour after. On this one, I didn’t line up the stencils according to the markings either, to leave a little bit more white towards the bottom so you could still see that there were different layers.

IMG_2126

When I had finished the ink blending, I popped them, one by one, into a box and splattered some gold watercolour on them. After these had dried, I trimmed the blue and the purple down a little and adhered them to white card bases.

IMG_2129

The sentiments I picked out are done with both rose gold and gold foil, using the Perfect Sentiments Holiday set. I also cut out some extra pieces using the coordinating diecut, and layered the sentiments up for a little bit of dimension.

The purple card got a rose gold foiled Merriest Christmas. This one is layered up with two more pieces to pop it up a little.

The blue one got a Warmest Wishes in gold foil. This one is also popped up with two pieces.

The fiery forest got a rose gold foiled Merry & Bright. This one has three pieces for more depth and dimension. This one isn’t trimmed down, but I probably should have done that. However, I had adhered the sentiment already, so I couldn’t trim it. Oops.

Ok, that’s it from me for today, I hope you enjoyed this post too, and will try an unexpected colour combination yourself with your stencils. You never know how it will turn out until you give it a go!

As always, I have used compensated affiliate links in this post at no extra cost to you. Shopping with affiliate links does not cost you anything extra at all, the company it’s linked to will pay me a small commission as a thank you for directing you to them. Any earnings I get from these links go directly back into the running of this blog, my YouTube channel and Instagram. A little bit will be put aside to renovations of my forever craft room as well, as we are in the process of buying our forever home, which is so exciting! Thank you so much if you chose to support me by shopping with these links, I really do appreciate it so much! 

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

You can find me on various social media platforms, by clicking the links below.
My blog
Instagram
My YouTube channel
CaCaCraft on Facebook

WOW! Embossing Powder New Release

Hi and welcome back to a sparkly and glittery post!

Today’s post is all about the newest release from WOW! Embossing powder. It’s been available in the UK WOW! shop for a little while, and is now available across the pond in the US WOW! shop. We are celebrating with an Instagram hop, full of inspiration and gorgeous projects from the design team!

Make sure to join in the hop over there as there are prizes up for grabs, not to mention a ton of inspiration from the design team.

For my cards I’ve used an array of the products, including stencils and stamps designed by my crafty friends! This is super exciting to see, and I’m absolutely thrilled to be showing them off today.

For my first couple of cards, I have used the Modern Winter Forest stamp designed by Verity Biddlecombe. The cards are both heat embossed with Rich Gold, and I’ve used the same colours on them both, with different techniques. Salvaged Patina, Chipped Sapphire and Black Soot were ink smooshed on one, and ink blended with Life Changing Blender Brushes on the other.

I’ve also used the gorgeous big Snowflake Stencil, another of Verity’s designs, in a couple of ways. On the first one, I ink blended some left over ink on my brushes to create a pastel look.

On top of this I stamped up Winter Wishes & Snowflake Kisses in black ink, and then added a generous smattering of clear sequins.

I loved this so much that I did it again on another panel. While I had the stencil in place, I dabbed on Embossing Ink with a foam ink blending tool and used Halo embossing glitter all over.

I did forget to use my anti-static tool on the panel before, so the left-over Pixie Spray made the Halo glitter stick to it. In the end I actually like the results, as it looks like snow falling around the snow flake.

The Merry and Christmas, are from the Merry Sentiment stamp set, were stamped up with the Embossing Ink on white card stock, and then I heat embossed them with Platinum embossing powder. Around the Merry I fussy cut, which I normally absolutely detest, but I didn’t want to cover up the gorgeous snowflake by keeping it on a banner.

The smart thing about this Snowflake stencil set is that you get both the negative and positive cut of the snowflake so I went ahead and used them both. On my third card, I decided to use the positive stencil too, with the help of Pixie Spray. This time I grabbed the Duo Transfer Gel to add glitter. This was more of a test as I had never tried adding glitter this way. I think I jumped the gun with adding the glitter though, I should have waited until it was clear and tacky, but oh well, I sprinkled some Made You Blush from the Pink-a-licious trio and some Icicle Teal from the Winter Dreams Trio, then heat embossed it with my heat tool from underneath.

If heat embossing intimidates you, you can still use the stencils without any of that. I did exactly that with the In The Forest stencils. With lots of green shades of Distress Oxide inks, I blended a big forest and then finished it off with a simple sentiment from the It’s The Season stamp set.

I had another ink blended panel, that I used the In The Forest stencil on. Here I dabbed the Embossing ink pad directly through it, and heat embossed Rich Gold on it. It still needed something else so I used the Starry Nights stencil too. Again, with Rich Gold to keep it cohesive. A simple Happy Holidays, from the Snowy Christmas stamp set, was stamped with black ink directly onto the card.

That’s it for me for today, but don’t forget to check out the Instagram hop. There are 2 x $25 gift cards to our online stores (both UK or USA). Leave a comment by Sunday, August 1st 2021 on each stop for a chance to win. Winners will be chosen randomly from the comments left on each participating designer’s post. The 2 x winners will be announced on the post on WOW! Embossing Instagram page on Wednesday, August 3rd 2021.⁠

I have used some compensated affiliate links in this post, at no extra cost to you, for your convenience. If you shop using these links, I get a small commission from the company directly. Thank you if you chose to support me by using these links, I really appreciate it!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

Christmas Card Collaboration with Courtney Kroeber

Ho, ho, ho, my merry peeps!

Today’s post is the corresponding blog post for a YouTube video that’s up on my channel today. I’m collaborating with Courtney Kroeber for her 25 Days Of Christmas Cards series and we decided on Copic coloring for our cards.

Now, this might come as a shock as colouring is basically the theme of this card, but I have not used a single stamp set here!! Not a one! Say whaaaaat? I decided to use the Strings Of Lights diecuts from Lawn Fawn and cut out lots of the baubles out of Copic friendly card stock, and these I have coloured.

To get these looking as lifelike as possible, I have used quite a few markers on each one. Going from dark at the edges and lighter and lighter towards the middle.

The screw tops I had to play around with several tries before I was happy with the look. I thought blending the colours would give the most realistic look, but I was so wrong! In the end, what I liked best was using C4 with light flicks, and then going in with C5 to add depth and the illusion of the curve.

With a huge selection of baubles coloured, it was time to think about the actual card base. I had an idea in my head, and went about trying to make it come to life but man… it was a bit more trouble than I thought! The idea was to use the Take A Bough Encore dies from Concord & 9th and create a Christmas tree look. Sounds cool, right? Whilst I got there in the end, it ended up being a very heavy card! This is not one to be sent in the mail, unless you are happy to pay a lot extra for postage.

First of all I cut out a slim line panel using the Slim Line Diecutting System from Picket Fence Studios. Using this as a guide, I then absolutely COVERED it with the Take A Bough Encore pieces. These, and the background panel, are all cut out of Evergreen card stock, from Concord & 9th. When I had a good coverage around the edges, I covered them with a strip of Press’n’Seal and picked them all up. To make sure all of them would stick to the background panel I used Pritt-stick glue. Yep, very old school indeed!

When the edges glued down, I just had to cover the middle with the larger boughs. To make sure the tree looks lifelike, I didn’t cover the backs of the bough dies with glue, only the middle part.

With my “tree” done, I could start the decorating with the baubles! I cut out lots of extra string from the diecut set and then got puzzling. What I realised here though, is that I should have coloured up more of the smaller baubles, instead of going to town with the bigger ones. Admittedly they were easier to colour.

As it’s pretty obvious what occasion this card is for, I didn’t add a sentiment to the front of it. The Man actually said ‘Nobody is going to look at that and think Happy Easter’, lol!

Well, that’s it from me but I hope you get a chance to hop on over to my YouTube channel to watch the video, and then drop by Courtney’s channel to see what she made.

I have used some compensated affiliate links in this blog post, at no extra cost to you, for your convenience. Thank you so much if you shop using these links, I really appreciate the support!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

Case Me A Christmas Card with Michelle Lupton and Friends!

‘Ello mates! (That’s me channeling my inner Aussie)

Today’s post is a collaboration with the lovely Michelle Lupton, who’s doing a fun Christmas card making collaboration with lots of crafty friends. The idea is to CASE/Copy And Selectively Edit a card from each other and do it in a Christmas theme.

I had a hard time picking one because Michelle makes AH-mazing cards! Check out her Instagram to see for yourself. After going back and forth and then back and forth again, I finally settled on this gorgeous card.

I started out with a stencil from MFT Stamps called Peace, Love and Joy, and Gold Deco Foil transfer sheets. To attach the foil to the pattern, I used Transfer Gel Duo with a spatula. Of course I sprayed the stencil with Pixie Spray first. Whilst waiting for that to set, I started working on a second card.

On the second card I used the HoHoHo background stamp, and heat embossed it in white. I used Opaque Bright White from WOW! Embossing as well as their Embossing Pad.

On top of this I used a light watercolour wash to add some colour, like the original card. These water colours from Gansai Tambi are really rich and pigmented so you only need a tiny bit.

When that was dry, I added it to a card base. To then achieve the look of the inspiration card, I adhered two panels cut out of white card stock, on each side of it. A little christmas sentiment stamped on a slim banner was the last touch to this one.

The first card was finished off by adding the foil to the pattern and the transfer gel, then run through the diecutting machine. It works so great, and you don’t need a laminator with the Transfer Gel Duo either.

This card also got a slim banner with a christmas sentiment added to it, and was adhered to a card base. The sentiment set I used is from MFT Stamps and is unfortunately not available any longer. Which is a shame as it’s perfect for winter/holiday/Christmas cards.

That’s it from me for today, but I hope you will make sure to hop on over to Michelle’s blog post and check out what card she CASEd from me.

I’ve used some compensated affiliate links in this blog post for your convenience. If you shop using these links I get a small commission from the company directly at no extra cost to you whatsoever. Anything I make from these links go towards the running of my blog, YouTube channel and Instagram. Thank you so much if you chose to support me in this way, I really appreciate the support and encouragement!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

25 Days of Christmas Tags 2019!

Hi guys! Or should I say ‘ho ho ho’?

Today’s I’m helping Tracey McNeely celebrate 25 Days Of Christmas Tags with the Picket Fence Studio team! Every year since 2010 Tracey has been doing this fun event and this year is my first time taking part.

If this is your first time hearing about it or if you want to find out more, make sure to stop by Tracey’s blog HERE. There are so many companies taking part and sponsoring this event, that’s running for the 9th, yes that’s NINTH, year!!

Right, let’s get to my tag, shall we?

Making tags is really not my forte, at all. I see people make the most amazing tags and always think to myself that I should try it, because I do get inspired when I see them. And then I get to the craft room and I got zilch… nada. Zero. I don’t know what it is. Well, until I started looking through my stash for an actual tag die… and came up empty handed! The best I could do what this bottle gift tag die, which I have had for years, but never really used. Again because of the zilch ideas.

But I digress. We are here to talk tag making. Not non-tag-making. So, armed with my bottle gift tag die and some Neenah card stock, I cut it out. Step one complete!

Next I stamped the Santa from the aptly named Straight From The North Pole stamp set, with Hybrid Black ink, on the tag directly. I coloured in Santa with Copics and added some sparkle to his hat with White Blizzard glitter drops from Nuvo. I added a teeny tiny bit to his eyes too, because Santa’s eyes should always sparkle, right?

I also heat embossed one of the sentiments from the set, ‘this is straight from the North Pole’ in Gold Rush from Ink on 3. Obvi I used my anti-station tool all over it first. The final touch was a bow with a red ribbon with ‘Ho Ho Ho’ all over it.

Well, I must admit I’m pleased as punch about this tag, seeing as it’s my first in a long time! I will definitely have to invest in some proper tag diecuts though. Any excuse, right?

That’s it from me for today but thank you merry much for stopping by!

Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

Picket Fence Studios | SSS Stampteber Collaboration Card | 12 Weekends Of Christmas

Hi guys!
Today’s card is a quick one featuring the exclusive Picket Fence Studios Stamptember stamp set, Shake Your Flake, from Simon Says Stamps!

SSSStamptember

Unfortunately, due to the postal force not being with me or on my side, I didn’t get my stamp set in time to participate in the festivities on the day it was launched. So I’m making up for it now instead! I will also put this card in with my 12 Weekends Of Christmas Series as I’m scrambling to make up enough Christmas cards in time for the holidays! Even though technically it’s not the weekend.. unless we pretend it’s a really long weekend this week? Yep, I’m gonna go for it.

I stamped up the cute snowman with the kitty, as well as the dog, on Copic friendly paper and coloured them in. Once all done, I fussy cut them out and set aside while I worked on the background.

Armed with my Life Changing Blender Brushes and Distress Oxide inks in an array of colours, I blended a northern lights inspired night sky. On top of this I also splattered lots of gold for stars and then white paint for snow flakes.

As the scene was featuring snow falling, I thought it would look cute for the snowman and the dog to sit on top of a snowy hill. I cut one out of vellum and another one out of hammered white card stock. This was done with the Lawn Fawn Stitched Hillside Border die.

I layered these up and trimmed them down before adhering them to the background, which I had adhered to a card base. Then I glued down the snowman and the doggie too. As a last flourish I thought I’d add some snow around the bottom of them, but I had a little bit of a mishap with my 3D snow. It flowed out far too quickly and soaked my snowman!

After drying, it looks a bit better but if you look really close, you can see the 3D snow has ‘crawled’ up the snowman a little. Oh well, I will have to remember that for next time I use that stuff. Or go straight to Puff Powder from WOW! Embossing instead.

The sentient I chose from the stamp set is ‘you are my favourite reason for the winter season’. I heat embossed this on a piece of vellum, with Antique Gold embossing powder from Altenew. This is trimmed down and wrapped around the card at the top. With that the card was done!

I’ve used some compensated affiliate links in this post, mostly to Picket Fence Studios, at no extra cost to you. Any links that are not affiliate links are there for your convenience. Happy shopping!

Thank you for much for stopping by today. Lots of love and happy crafting from Erica

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