Mission: EMBOSS-able!

As you may remember, your mission, this fortnight, should you decide to accept it, is to join the Jingle Belles in creating a holiday card that features heat and/or texture embossing. Hop over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's gorgeous card, and in the meantime here's how I went all EMBOSS-ible this week: 

I stumbled upon this background panel, which, at some unremembered point in the past year or so, I had (apparently) embossed using Memory Box's Poinsettia Corner e/f, colored the raised design with Wendy Vecchi's Leaf Green Ink and Sunflower Liquid Pearls and then set it aside. But this is a very good illustration of why I am a Setter-Aside rather than a Thrower-Out (ok apart from mild hoarding tendencies) and that is because although this did not originally meet whatever my goal or requirements might've been at the time, it was a beautiful background which seriously helped me out on a crowded and busy week. All I had to do to make the panel into a card was add Penny Black Poinsettia and Joy diecuts, plus a couple of coordinating mats et voila! Job done!

JB2407: Cookies for Santa

This fortnight at Jingle Belles, we're asking you to create a card inspired by this fabulous collection of holiday cookies from Kristen's Cookies. When you share your card, make sure you let us know which cookie you chose and how it inspired you!

I chose the cookie with the Charlie Brown-ish xmas tree inside a snowglobe...

...and I have to confess that part of the reason for that choice was that when I saw it, my Cardmaker's Brain kicked in and went, 'you've got Memory Box Nested Globe dies and Spellbinders' Bottle Brush Trees!' Then, when I was retrieving said dies, I found my Honeybee Layering Holiday Bells set, which has that cool two-part bow, so all that was left to do was find some teeeeeeeny Hero Arts enamel dots, a Doodlebug sentiment and a coordinating blue scrap of patterned paper for the background!

Be sure to check out Stephanie's super sweet card at Jingle Belles and then start planning what cookie-inspired  deliciousness you'll link up with us this time!

JB2404: Text Me

This fortnight's Jingle Belles theme is called, "TEXT ME" for which we'd like you to create a holiday card that celebrates text. That might mean using letter stickers, dictionary pages, texty patterned paper, or just creating a card where the sentiment is the star... just using a small sentiment doesn't count - text of some kind should be the star of the show. Use your words, get creative and make sure you get TEXTY!

Coincidentally, a couple of weeks ago I used a Memory Box's two-layer Brilliant Joy die set to make a set of holiday card kits for Paper Anthology, and wound up with... I suppose you could say... an excess of joy! I glued them into little stacks of three, so they'd have a little more depth, then used them to create a text-y background on a piece of Photoplay plaid paper, which I augmented with (ancient!) vellum poinsettia stickers, as well as Eyelet Outlet Poinsettia, Cardinal, Cardinal Profile and Female Cardinal Brads. I trimmed a sentiment from a red texty patterned paper (Elle's Studio, I think?) and matted the whole thing on another alphabet-patterned paper from Recollections. It's definitely different from anything I've made recently, but I love how it turned out!

Jingle Belles' Text Me challenge runs until Wednesday evening, February 28th and if you're reading this, you're officially invited to join us!

Holiday Jumpstart: Poinsettia Joy

"Poinsettia Joy" is the first Holiday Jumpstart Card Kit of 2024 and now available in-store and online at Paper Anthology!

Holiday Jumpstart is our pre-packaged kit that includes everything you need (except adhesives) to complete FIVE copies of this new original holiday card design. It’s called “Poinsettia Joy” since it features diecuts from Penny Black’s Stitched Poinsettia die set and Memory Box’s Brilliant Joy die set. 

All the details you need are in the Paper Anthology Blog Post or the Holiday Jumpstart Product Page!

The Last SOS of 2023

For this year's final challenge at Shopping Our Stash (we're taking a short break and will return on January 16th!) let's go with the creative flow and showcase the last HOLIDAY cards of 2023: Christmas, belated Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Solstice, New Year... if it's a December holiday, it's fair game!

I needed a few fast Christmas cards, so luckily I could Shop My Stash and use up all some of the leftover diecuts from the December Holiday Jumpstart kit I made for Paper Anthology, here's a pic of the final version, for reference:

I don't know about you, but a great many of my projects start out by trying multiple versions of the various pieces. In this case, you can see that I was already sure what papers and dies I'd use... but which would be used for which underwent quite a few different options. 

Luckily, even the "rejected" bits looked well together and by pulling in a few pre-diecut backgrounds and extra bits I made both of these A6 cards in about fifteen minutes!

For the record, the deer are from Taylored Expressions' Woodland Silhouettes 1 and the Evergreens are hers as well. The arched frame and backer are Memory Box's Winter Wood Dome Layer and Nested Globes, respectively; that coverplate is older and I *think* was Pinkfresh; Lawn Fawn's Knit Picky, Spiffier Speckles and Woodgrain Cardstock feature prominently, not to mention various scraps of metallic, velvet and glitter papers.

JB-23-11: No Stamping Christmas

It's *nearly* anything goes this fortnight at Jingle Belles: you can make a card of using any color palette and arrangement you like, any theme you choose, and any combination of products you have on hand. BUT... (you knew there had to be a BUT, right?!) ...you can't use ANY rubber stamps! So break out those stickers, diecuts, designer papers, journal cards etc; but close up the ink pads and let them have a little rest. Here's my card:

I absolutely love diecuts, so that's the basis of my card this week. I've used Memory Box's Serene Bird and Branch die set as well as Penny Black's Peaceful Pines plus a few papers from Photoplay's 2022 It's a Wonderful Christmas line, all of which came from my favorite papercrafting store, Paper Anthology. As a matter of fact, this card is doing double duty, as it's also the official sample for the May Edition of Paper Anthology’s Holiday Jumpstart Card Kit, Peaceful Dove, which you can read all about on the Paper Anthology website; but here's a little sneak peek. As you can see, the Memory Box Serene Bird and Branch die set comes with the kit, as well as all the pre-made parts and pieces you'll need to assemble five copies of this design. Just add adhesives and envelopes and you'll see why we call it "Holiday Jumpstart"!

The NO STAMPING Challenge runs through 6pm (Eastern) on May 31st at Jingle Belles. Hop over to see Stephanie's beautiful card and start planning what you'll link up with us this time.

Challenge #10: Hip to be Square

Welcome back to the big Paper Anthology 9th Anniversary festivities, I hope you've been hanging out on the Paper Anthology FaceBook page and following all of these cool challenges, there is some serious inspiration over there and there are raffle tickets awarded for however many you complete, with ten awesome prize packs to giveaway at the end! 

This is my last challenge for the weekend, and it's to embrace one of my favorite formats. I love square cards, they have such beautiful balance and they just always look good to me. Here's my square card, this one happens to be 6" square, which is probably my favorite size because there seems to be the best selection of envelopes:

For this card I was excited to be test-driving a brand new product at Paper Anthology: Picket Fence Studios Paper Glaze, which comes in sixteen beautiful colors AND can be mixed together to make even more. In this case I just used it straight out of the jar. I love how it retains it's bold color no matter what type of paper you use it on. I used a palette knife to spread Succulent Green through Taylored Expressions A New Leaf Stencil on glossy black cardstock, and also on white watercolor paper. In the second case, I also took a little bit of the Black Pansy, and spread it right on top of the green, so that it has a sort of feathery effect. However if you mix two colors together thoroughly (on say, a paper plate) you will get a consistent third color, which is handy!

After the glaze was completely dry, I trimmed around the white version of the design and adhered the cut out portion on top of the black one. I added Memory Box's Rose Sketch Flower Spray Die (cut from copper and purple shimmer paper) and finished off with some vintage lace trimming, stick-on pearls and Hero Arts Sequins.