Merry Mice

I'd more or less finished with Christmas cards for a while until I came across these merry mice - there are quite a few in the set and I've only used some of them.   They are quite small so a great way of using up some of my snippets of white card to stamp and die cut them and also some other snippets to make up the card.  Shame it isn't the week for visiting the Playground with a card but worth taking a look all the same to see what might be on offer in the grand seasonal draw if you make and enter a card using some of your snippets.

I started with stamping, colouring and die cutting the mice and some of their 'accessories' and shuffled them around a bit to see what scene I could  conjure up.  Settled on some of the mice putting Christmas lights onto the side of a 'shed', accompanied by their mouse snowman and a little tree.  Santa is on his way to visit flying across the sky.  The shed was made from a scrap of card stamped with a woodgrain effect with a scrap of white for the snow on the roof.  Oddments of white card were used for the snow on the ground and a snippet of blue pearl paper for the sky. Finally a frame was cut to surround the scene, again cut from a snippet of pearl white. I really must put away all the Christmas bits and pieces for the time being although I do have pictures of a few cards which you've not yet seen.

Frame - Sue Wilson Noble Pierced Squares die set
Shed - stamped with Stampin Up Wood grain stamp
Santa - die from a Crafter's Companion set
Mice and Accessories - from Merry Mice set of stamps and dies Hello Bluebird
Tree and Star - lying around on my desk waiting to be used

Seasonal Greetings

With very best Christmas Wishes to my followers and those who take the time to visit this blog and leave lovely comments.  Have a wonderful time and ...

  Here's to a Peaceful and Healthy year to come.  

A simple card, white on a gold layer.  Stamped and embossed in gold.  Stamp used is a very old wooden backed one (remember when all stamps were on wood blocks??) from Papermania.

Pixie Snippets #368

Today is the start of the final Playground Challenge for this year which also means that the very generous Di has lots of lovely prizes going into the seasonal draw this time.  I'm in awe of her organisational skills in running this and the current post gives very concise details of what you would need to do in order to be in for an opportunity to win something.  Do pop along to see the super card which she has made using Prize A.

My card for this time uses quite a lot of pretty tiny snippets of various colours for the components.  I started with a piece of wood-grain paper to use as a background then die cut two banners, embossing the white one with 'snow'.  The next thing was to cut two twiggy wreaths, one brown and one kraft, which I then decorated with a selection of die cut flowers and leaves.   The final thing was to cut the word along with its backing.  All the 'bits' were cut from snippets in my scrap piles - the base card and piece of background being the exception.  While I had the dies out I'd cut another two wreaths and more flowers and leaves which I've made into a quite different card which I will show you another day.

Wood-grain - from a pad purchased in The Works
Wreath and decoration - die set from Sizzix
Banners - Sizzix dies by Stampin' Up
Embossing Folder - Snow Falling from Stampin' Up
Joy word and backing - dies from Crafter's Companion

Winter Window

I met up recently with friends for coffee and of course plenty of crafty chat - this time we swapped Christmas cards with the usual questions about the various products used.  I have to admit I succumbed to temptation and ordered a really useful window die which has arrived really quickly and the package also included a little gift of a cat die which was a kind gesture.  I justify this purchase - if I need to - because the window can and will be used on cards throughout the year although for the moment I've made a Christmas card inspired by the one I received from my friend.

The window was die cut and then I found lots of snippets of card and cut out houses, trees etc to make a little scene, adding a silver star in the sky. I used some woodgrain paper as a background so that it looks a bit like a cabin in the woods. Naturally I had to have the cat reclining on the window sill and some floral decoration at the top (left overs from another card). I even cut the houses in yellow and painstakingly paper pieced the windows in - mad or what!! It is a shame I've already popped over to the Playground with my entry for the current challenge because this card would certainly fit the bill.  There is still time to enter if you'd like to be in with a chance of winning a lovely prize - follow the link to see what is on offer.

Background - paper pad from The Works
Window - Grand Madison die by Poppy Stamps
Trees and houses - die set from Crafter's Companion
Cat - gift die which came with the window
Flowers and foliage - Sizzix dies (left overs from previous project)

Pixie Playground Challenge #367

Time to post a card for the current Playground challenge and it is yet another Christmas card - made entirely from various snippets of card apart from the blank card of course.  I've used a snow globe die which is a relatively recent purchase and built up a nativity scene inside using dies which came free with a magazine either last year or the year before, can't quite remember.  I used a snippet of printed paper for the sky and various shades of 'sandy' colours for scene - the tiny star was cut from a scrap of silver. 

Pixies Playground Challenge #366

Time again to post a card for the Playground challenge and this time it is a baby card which I made using up a selection of 'girly' snippets..  I started with a white card blank and added a fairly large snippet of pink patterned paper.  Snippets of two shades of pink were used to die cut the bunting, oval layers, elephant and the tiny hearts and flowers.  Some small alphabet stamps were used to add the word to the bunting.   Do pop along to see the cute and colourful card which Di has given us to showcase the current prize if your name is lucky enough to be drawn.

Ovals - Spellbinders dies
Elephant - Sweet Dixie die
Baby - Sizzix alphabet dies
Bunting - unbranded die
Flowers - punch from Stampin' Up

Another Crochet CAL Project

The last couple of weeks seem to have disappeared far too quickly and worst of all I'm not sure I've achieved a huge amount but that does happen from time to time and I try not to stress about it. Having completed my previous CAL project and made a couple of 'virus' shawls I decided to get going on another CAL (crochet along) and hopefully this one won't take me as long to finish as the first one.  However having made the first square - and there are two more of these to make - I'm not holding my breath!  The circular centre section of each of these is very attractive but proved a bit of a task to make and I struggled with the quadruple and sextuple trebles required on the outer rounds.  I know how to do them but found it very difficult to get them neat because the top of each of these stitches ends up very loose with a large loop so if anyone has any hints or tips on how to avoid this I'd be grateful.  I did the usual and watched a YouTube video and tried to do exactly as shown but was unable to achieve the neat finish shown in this video.  I imagine practice makes perfect but each of these was made and remade several times and they are far from perfect.  The 'blurb' about this CAL said it was suitable for an intermediate crocheter or an enthusiastic beginner and while I'm not exactly a beginner I thought 'enthusiastic' should cover it - now I'm not so sure so this piece might end up as a cushion cover and the yarn will be used to make something else although I don't really like to beaten so will persevere for a while.

Here is a photo of the first square - it hasn't been blocked yet and I've just realised I've not measured it to see if it is the recommended size. If it isn't to size I guess the final blanket might not go together when the various sections are made.  It is good to take on a challenge though ... or is it??

CAL pattern and yarn from Deramores - Mediterranean CAL project