Xmas Sentiments

Well this is a record for me! Those lovely people at Bah Humbug Hall set such a tantilising challenge I had to set to it straight away! Luckily I was at the 'Range' yesterday and bought some Christmas die cut sentiments by Anita. I chose one and teamed it up with black mirri card, a gorgeous silver/white glitter card and printed acetate by Kanban luxury reflections.  I've been hanging onto the printed acetate for something special and I guess this is it. I finished off with some crystal diamontes on the oval sentiment.
I took the photo at an angle to avoid reflection of the flash and in reality the card sparkles, even through the acetate so the photo doesn't really do it justice I don't think. I hope you like!

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Here come the girls

A great challenge this week from Bah Humbug. It gave me the opportunity to use an image I've been hoarding for ages. Its from an old family photograph taken in the 1930s and includes my mother (bottom right corner).

First of all, I used a scalloped card from Papermania and gave it a red insert and trimmed the top corners.  The image was then mounted onto holographic red card and a matching tag made with ribbon and peel off lettering.I framed the image again with outline peel offs and added three little diamantes to the bottom right of the image. I also added some diamond glitter glue to the scalloped edges of the card. A sparkly snowflake embellishment finished off the card.
I can agonise over the design of a card so when I'm happy with a result I make more! This time I used black on gold and cream on green to make two extra cards.

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Something New

The Bah Humbug challenge this week is 'Something New'. That set a problem for me because there is so much that is 'new' in the craft world I would love to get my hands on but I just can't keep up with everything but at the same time I so appreciate the opportunity to do something different. I checked out craft videos on You Tube, new techniques, new ideas and just got overwhelmed with the possibilities.
I decided to make life easier for myself and check out my craft stash for new additions that had never been used. A pack of unopened promarkers were crying out 'use me'. I've had them for about six months but haven't as much as played with them! So for this weeks challenge it is using promarkers for the first time.

I could hardly believe how smoothly the ink flowed and fell in love with promarkers. Oh no! Not enough colours so I had a trip out to Hobby Craft to buy more. I gasped at the price of them but was pleasantly surprised at the check out when I discovered the price had been reduced by 50p each. Yeah!! Maybe its because there are new generations of pens out on the market - well they can wait 'cos I'm more than happy with promarkers for now (smile). I so enjoyed using these pens that I am currently making up another seven of these cards. Wow! My Christmas card box will be overflowing - happy me!

Materials used :

Dover clip art sample used as a digi image

Promarkers

Stardream card stock from Joanna Sheen

Outline peel offs

Vintage sentiments by Flower Soft

Comments are always appreciated.

'Kiss'mas

I had to use mistletoe for this challenge. It was the first thing that came to mind. So simple to make as well!

I got a royalty free clip art image from the internet and printed directly onto the cards. The resolution isn't good but hey! what can I expect it's a freebie. To enhance it a little I coloured over with Sakura glaze pens, even the red ribbon which you can't see because I stuck a real ribbon over the top...oops! Actually, I think it works better (smile).
I popped the cards inside acetate jackets that I had won in July's Bah Humbug monthly draw, how lucky am I? I made six in total and am really happy with them.
Pleasev feel free to comment. I hope you like them too.

Lace Christmas Box

I'm usually rushing at the last minute to create something for the Bah Humbug challenge but this time I'm rushing early because I need to go stay with my daughter who is poorly. I had to get it finished tonight as I so wanted to 'think outside the box' literally (smile).

 The challenge this week is to create something with lace and I chose to decorate a star shaped box. I first painted the box with two coats of emulsion in pistachio. I then threaded a double strand of thin brown organza ribbon through a length of vintage lace and made a gathered skirt for the box I then adhered the top edge of the skirt around the top edge of the box with glue. It was easier than I expected considering I had to attach the skirt in and out of the five pointed star and I secured the ribbon in a bow.
 I decorated the lid with a gold pine cone, leaves and dropped pearls and then added some gold glitter to each point of the star.
I enjoyed making my Christmas box with lace. Thank you Humbug Hall for the challenge.

Bah Humbug Beads

This weeks challenge at Bah Humbug Christmas item challenge is to use beads. I went for a black and white look using black card stock and a snowflake background paper. I think I made the background design myself but its been hanging around in my puter for so long I could be wrong.

The vintage image is from an old postcard I picked up at the market. Doesn't she look warm and cosy in that big hat! The hat has some kind of tassel on it so I decided to make it more prominent with silver beads. I finished the card off with a silver ribbon and an insert printed off with the same snowflake design but in draft. 

Here is a detail

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Acetate challenge

I had wanted to make some little boxes for this challenge but as is too often these days, I ran out of time.
I was lucky enough to find some acetate jackets in my stash already folded and printed with white wavy frames. I vaguely remember buying them eons ago ! They are perfect for this project and so I added some glittery gold peel off frames directly onto the acetate and mounted some christmas peel offs onto paper, coloured and cut them out for mounting onto the acetate with tiny sticky foam pads.
I love the intense blue of the foiled card I used (for 3yr olds and upwards). Why should kids have all the fun, LOL, and I stuck a white Christmas greeting in the centre then finished it off with thin white organza ribbon.
Hope you like.

ppp penguin

Its a ppp penguin challenge at Bah! Humbug Hall this week and I so enjoyed making this penguin themed Christmas card.
I designed and then printed the background and text straight onto watercolour card, then added penguin images and a star. I also added some glitter but its not obvious in the photo. The penguin images are just scans that have been given a digital twist. The larger one is mounted on navy pearlised card and the small penguin is a cut out.
Hope you like !

Scarves and Mittens

Only, I lost the mittens. I hope Bah Humbug doesn't mind that I have substituted a wooly hat for the mittens in this weeks challenge.
I must apologise that I have missed out on so many Humbug challenges, me thinks I will need to make at least two a week to catch up on my stash of Christmas cards. I like this card and may even do four of them! It says to me "the dark days of winter" but the little girl's face swathed in wooly hat and scarf brightens the day.
I have used old gold coloured card and an aperture frame cut down to fit around the girl's image. I used bog standard matt photo paper sold at my local computer store to print the girl's image. I think it has a dreamy soft appearance and am quite pleased with it. I distressed the frame a bit with a distressing tool and some green ink then added gold line peel offs. I touched up the white poinsettas with gold ink to tone them down and added a green ribbon which already had the jewelled embellishments attached. Finally I added the greetings sentiment.
The card is from Joanna Sheen
Girls image is from Crafty Computer Papers
Greetings is by Flower Soft
Ribbon and aperture are old stash.

Hope you like it, please comment if you can.

Simple card

In response to this week's Bah! Humbug challenge.
Its a simple card using a brass stencil for the banner and a mounted peel off coloured with Sakura and Staedler pens. Hope you like!