Christmas Cards for 2018 #1

Hello dear friends!!  

Thank you for stopping by, I know how busy you all must be getting ready to celebrate the birth of our Lord and Saviour.  Hope all your Christmas preparations are humming along nicely.

I'm back to just quickly share a couple more of my Christmas cards.  As I stated in my last post, here, all my cards are very similar.  Same paper collections, same embellies, just different combinations and a couple of slightly different designs.

Some cards have a vertical aspect and some are horizontal.

Card 1

Most of the sentiments I've used are taken from the paper collections.  I simply trimmed them to size where necessary and then heat embossed the edges with gold.

The flower clusters are all similar with real little pine cones (found in a Homewares Store at the very beginning of the year) and little bunches of berries.

The ends of the diecut branches have also been heat embossed in gold. 

Card 2

The flowers are different but they have all been sprayed with Cherry Pie Dylusions Ink Spray. 

I know I've mentioned it previously, but I do love the traditional colours for my Christmas cards.  I also love the touches of gold.  Adds something a bit special to them, I think.

Thank you so much for your visit I truly do appreciate it.  In a few days I will share a few more of my cards.  Hope to see you then!!

Have fun with your preparations for Christmas!  Mine are well under way but I do still have quite a bit to do.   Mostly the food though and, this year, that is not going to be too complicated.  Keeping it simple but hope it will still be enjoyable for everyone.

Have a wonderful day!
Take care and God Bless.

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge # 224

Hello everyone!!  Thank you for stopping by.  I hope you are having a fabulous day!

The new Challenge is live at Crafty Cardmakers.  This will be our last Challenge this year (can you believe it??)  and I am happy to say I will be staying on the Team for another year!  Yayy!!
Mary is our host for this Challenge and the Theme, of course, is Christmas.
As always, you may create anything you like as long as it fits the Theme.

This is the perfect time to start showing you the Christmas cards I have created for my family and close friends this year.

Usually, the cards I make for Christmas are quite similar  to each other and, this year, I have made them even more alike.  All of the papers and the embellishments are the same, I have simply changed the combinations slightly for each card. 

I made a decision earlier this year that I wouldn't buy any more Christmas card supplies.  This year, I would make all of them with whatever I had left in my stash from previous years.  Well, that turned out to be quite a lot.  I probably have enough left still to last me for the next couple of years at least!

The papers are all from previous Kaisercraft collections.  Some from a 6 x 6 pad and some from a 12 x 12 pad and the sentiments are also, mostly, from those pads.

I will be sharing my cards over the next few days (or weeks) and I will then explain more about the embellies used.

I hope you will pop over to the CCM blog and take a peek at what the rest of the Team have created.  Lots of inspiration there to inspire you to join in with the Challenge.

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge #224 - Christmas

Thank you so much for your visit, I really appreciate you taking the time.  I know how busy everyone is at this time of year.

Enjoy the rest of your day!!

Take care and God Bless.

A Christmas Trio

Hello everyone and welcome to my bloggy place. 

Thank you so much for stopping by at this very busy time of the year.  I hope all your Christmas preparations are going to plan.  

Hubby and I have just returned home from Victoria where we helped my sister celebrate her 80th Birthday.  Just have to point out that she is a bit older than I am .. LOL!!  We had a wonderful time while we were there catching up with family and friends but, it is so nice to be back home again.  The only thing I don't like about coming home is all the washing that has to be done!!  I hate housework.  I can think of many, many better ways to spend my time .. such as crafting for one!  Ha! Ha!  I am looking forward to catching up on everyone's beautiful works though!  Might take a little while but I will get there!!

I would like to share a few more of my Christmas cards with you.  These three cards are basically the same design with just a few different elements.

The papers I used are a mix by Kaisercraft and Crafts Smith.  I die cut the top layer on two of the cards with a Tim Holtz MM die.

I found those little plastic pine cones in one of our cheaper outlets but I can't remember which one.  Duh!!   I only bought the one pack and have been trying to find them again but not having any luck.

The pine branch is a die by Impression Obsession and the flair is handmade.  Simply printed out the greeting, used a circle punch to cut it out and then covered it with an epoxy sticker.

The poinsettia was made with a Poppy Crafts die and I simply added some prills for the center.

I randomly swiped the flowers and pine branches with Liquitex Matte Medium and then sprinkled on some glitter.
This time I used a scallop punch for the flair and covered it with Glossy Accents.

Lightly highlighted the flowers and pine cones with gesso and used some gold twine to make the bows.

As I said at the beginning of this post, the design of these cards is the same  but I used different papers and elements so they wouldn't all look the same.  Easy peasy!

Thank you so much for taking the time to come and have a look.

I would like to thank you all so much for the encouragement and support you have given me over this past year and would also like to wish you all  a very Merry and Blessed Christmas and a Happy and prosperous New Year!!

Have fun, take care and God Bless.
oxox Marg

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge #202 - Christmas

Hello everyone and welcome.  So pleased you dropped by, especially at this busy time of year.

The last Challenge for 2017 has gone live at Crafty Cardmakers.  June is our host and, surprise!, surprise!, the Theme is Christmas!!

As usual, anything you would like to enter is fine, as long as it is Christmas themed.

For this card I have used more of the papers from a 6" x 6" pad by Craft Smiths.

Instead of adding lace, I used some white cardstock which was edged with the Deep Edge Floral Vine border punch by Martha Stewart.

Placed some scrunched up cotton underneath the cluster for more texture and there is a small die cut doily hiding underneath there too.

Added micro beads and glitter to the flowers and, of course,  I scattered some prills around the card as well.

The chipboard pieces are by Scrapmatts.

I hope you are inspired to join in with our final Challenge for the year.
To have a look at the fabulous creations by my Teamies and to link up your entry

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge #202 - Christmas
Please read the rules and take note of the 15 Challenge limit.

Thank you so much for your visit and enjoy the rest of your day
Take care and God Bless.

More MM for Christmas

Hello again everyone and welcome to my blog space.  
Hope you are having a wonderful day!

Well, here I am, still creating Christmas cards.  Don't know about you, but I'm almost getting a bit tired of them!  Almost!!  LOL!!  Still have a few more to go and they have to be finished by the end of this week!

This is another of my Magicals cards, the background having been created with nothing but a few Lindy's Stamp Gang's Magicals.

 This one is very much like a card I created a little while ago HERE,  but the coloured area for the background is larger and I have used different embellishments.

The colours of Magicals used are Rizzo's Rowdy Red, Greased Lightning Green and Glory of the Seas Gold.

Love these cute little pine cones I found.

The sentiment was printed with my label maker.

Added some prills!

Et Voila!!

I really love this one and not sure I want to give it away .. might be giving myself a Christmas card this year .. LOL!!

Thank you so much for finding the time to pay me a visit .. I know how busy it gets at this time of the year so I really appreciate it.

Enjoy your day!!
Take care and God Bless.

A Watercolour Christmas

Hello lovely visitors!!  Welcome to my blog.  Hope you are all having a wonderful day!!

I am here to share another Christmas card with you.  This one is a little different in that I created a background just using Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals and,  I must say, I am really happy with the result.  Hope you like it too.

Lately, I've been playing around a bit with paints and sprays trying to create backgrounds for my cards instead of simply using dp.  I have quite enjoyed the process even though some things I tried  haven't worked  and, consequently, ended up in the bin but, some things actually did work.  
This one worked!!  It  is very simple but I really liked it and so, turned it into a card. 

To create that little bit of background, I used Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals in Rizzo's Rowdy Red, Greased Lightning Green and Glory of the Seas Gold.

I simply laid down some water on my watercolour paper and then sprinkled the colours on one at a time, spreading the colour out with a paint brush.

Not difficult and certainly not fancy but I really love how it created those patches of colour.

Once it was dry, I simply added my cluster and some coloured prills.

The greeting is a simple gold sticker.

What I really love about these magicals, is the gorgeous gold shimmer you get from the Glory of the Seas Gold.  It is very difficult to pick up with a camera but, believe me, it is beautiful IRL and adds quite a bit of pazzazz!!

The flower was coloured with Cherry Red Dylusion S.pray

Very happy with this one.  Hoping to make some more in a similar vein!!

Thank you so much for your visit today and a huge thank you for any comment you may care to leave for me.  I love reading them and appreciate each and every one.

Enjoy the rest of your day!

Take care and God Bless.