Rudolph Days Challenge

 Well it soon came around to October Rudolph Days and Santa has arrived on his motor bike 😀.  I started by die cutting the pieces from card of various colours to build up the figure of the biker Santa with his sack of toys.  Good thing that I enjoy assembling these often fiddly die cut figures 🤣  Next I die cut a blue circle and a slightly larger white one to back it, placing them onto a piece of DSP left over from another project. Happy Rudolph Days everyone - the challenge runs from today to the end of the month so there's still time to join in.

Background - DSP from Stampin' Up (retired)
Circles - dies from a John Next Door Set
Santa - unbranded die from Amazon

Patterned Papers

 The theme for the latest Allsorts Challenge is **Patterned Papers** or of course the usual *Anything Goes* and there are some great prizes.  I have to say that I use far fewer patterned papers for my cards these days although that's not because I don't have any, despite having given away quite a lot in an effort to 'clear the decks' a little.  For this floral card I turned to a stamp set which had some double-sided matching design papers, selecting a floral paper for the background and then using the reverse of the design to cut a narrow strip to pop over the top.  The flower was stamped onto a piece of white card and cut out using a die from  the matching die set.  The sentiment was on my desk, left from a previous project but I believe it came from another floral set made by the same company.  The tiny butterflies were also on my desk in a little pot of 'useful bits'.

Stamps - Penned Petals from Stampin' Up with matching DSP and die set (retired)
Sentiment - from another SU stamp set

Floral

 I decided to make a floral card as a change from the autumn leaves.  I started out with mainly cream scraps of card which I used to die cut a circle and some flowers and leaves which were then coloured using Distress inks.  Found a scrap of green to back the circle and then popped everything onto a cream linen card blank.  The sentiment was computer generated using Office 365.

Flower Dies - Modern Floristry from Tim Holtz

Magical

 The theme for Allsorts challenge #802 is *anything goes* or *magical. myths and/or legends* and very appropriately prizes of beautiful Lavinia stamps.  My card has a fairy featured so I guess it covers the theme.  I used a round Gelli plate with some Distress inks to start off a background and then used a mask so that I could add the details of the hills, foliage and of course the fairy and goose. My next decision was to use a die to cut out this circle.  Some stencilling and second generation stamping has been added to the background for added interest.

Stencil - from Lavinia
Stamps - combination of Lavinia and Card-Io stamps

Snippets Challenge #491

 Whenever I set out to make a card I always try to include something from my Snippets mountain - I know I've said it before but somehow this collection never seems to diminish despite my best efforts.  Anyway this one is to take along to the Snippets Playground where I understand there's a conker match in progress and some hot drinks available.

Apart from the base card everything here came from my Snippets collection starting with part of a sheet of snowflake paper which was printed onto some pearl paper for another project.  I also have quite a lot of pearlised card snippets in various shades of white, ivory or cream so I decided to use some of the different shades to make a start on die cutting this elaborate 'Colorize' snowman using a die which I won in a challenge last year and had only used once previously.  These dies are quite elaborate with many layers and some concentration is required to get it all assembled.  I decided to focus on each colour and work methodically from the bottom up as it were - it's incredibly easy to lose some of the tiny pieces if you blunder in and cut them all at once.  No need to ask me how I know this 🤣 and I seem to recall that when I made the first one last year the die was put away with thoughts of 'never again'.  However, I'm pleased I tried again this year because I actually enjoyed making this one even if it did take me quite a long time - certainly not one for batch making.  Once he was assembled I decided the card needed something else so I cut some 'snow' to ground him and added a die cut tree from another set of dies - I didn't think it needed a sentiment.  Lots of snippets used and being in methodical mode I remembered to save them for a photo.

A great prize to be won this time so why not dig out some of your snippets and have a go

Background - Printed from Seasons Greetings CD Artylicious (possibly discontinued)
Snowman - Tim Holtz Colorize Snowman dies
Tree - set of unbranded dies

We Love Stamping

 The theme for the We Love Stamping Challenge for October is **Autumn** or of course *Anything Goes* and it so happens that the theme for Stamping Sensations is - you guessed it - **Anything Goes** or *Autumn Colours*.  I've decided to take my card along to both challenges this time as it seems to fit the criteria and there's a limit to the number of Autumnal cards I need in my box.

I started with a square of white stamping card and a circle mask so that I could put a faint line of ink to guide me in placing the leaf stamps for which I used a selection of yellows, greens and brown with a touch of orange for the berries.  I then decided to pop the little owl in amongst the leaves and he was coloured using pencils before being masked so that I could add a light dusting of yellow in and around the wreath with a some orange concentrated on the leafy area.  The final touch was to add some purple to highlight the edges (more Halloween than Autumn I guess, but - hey - artistic licence 😉).  As usual with this style of card I dithered over adding a sentiment but have left it blank for now.

The usual opportunity to maybe win a prize at the end of the  month

Stamping - All using Lavinia stamps
Inking - Distress Ink and Versafine Clair
Colouring - Polychromos pencils

Allsorts Challenge #801

 The theme for the current Allsorts Challenge is **Falling Leaves** or of course the usual *Anything Goes* and there are great prizes too as well as Design Team inspiration if you follow the link.  For my card this time I've splodged various Autumn colours onto some scraps of cream card before die cutting the leaves, adding a little gilding in places.  The base card is also cream, topped with a cream square and a die cut circular motif  using kraft card with three of the leaves added.  A few of the smaller 'fall-out' circles were also gilded and scattered around and a die cut 'Hello' in the centre.  Sadly the gold doesn't show up too well in the picture 🙄

 Circle Motif - unbranded die from Amazon
Hello - die from Gummiapan
Leaves - Leaf Fragments dies designed by Tim Holtz