Patience Required??

Patience - I would say so!!  I cut this die three times, once in white pearl, once in charcoal pearl and once in blue and then set about piecing them together, setting the various pieces back into the main outlines to form a complete picture.  What started out as a good idea turned out to be somewhat time consuming, especially when it came to the tiny window shapes and the spaces in the fence. In fact I did draw the line at trying to retrieve the snowflakes in the sky area - these were filled in with some glittery Stickles.  The window areas were all filled in using the white bits from the die and were then coloured with alcohol pen.  I reckon I will be coming up with a quicker idea if I use this die again, just using the houses and trees.  Never mind it is another Christmas card made but I don't suppose the recipient will realise how long it took to make.

Who Doesn't Love Owls??

I came across this stamped and coloured owl image during one of my many tidying up sessions and thought he just deserved to be popped onto a card rather than languishing in the bits boxes.  I used various scraps to die cut some shapes and a border, then found a piece of backing paper left from another project; a piece of ribbon and that's another card for the box.

Image - owl stamp which I think was a freebie a long time ago
Label shapes - Sizzix  Thinlets dies for Stampin' Up
Border - EK Success punch
Sentiment - computer generated, Stampin' Up punches

Nordic Christmas

Having said I didn't need to make any Christmas cards this year I've just made two using images and papers printed out from Crafters Companion CD which came along with their latest Inspirations magazine.  The two images were printed and then cut out with scissors before popping a background which I thought looked a bit like snow falling in the sky behind the houses .  The Nordic style backing papers were also printed and I simply added a die cut snowflake and a sentiment, keeping the whole thing fairly flat for posting.   I'm not sure which one I prefer so I'm sharing both with you. There are lots of other great ideas which came  with the magazine along with a stamp set and a die which I will be using very soon.

Images and papers - Crafters Companion
Snowflake - X-cut die
Sentiment - from computer on die cut labels (free dies from a while ago)

Snippets Time

Well Sunday has come around so quickly again - seems to be faster every week!!  My card for the Pixie Snippets challenge this week is one with some stamping and colouring.  I came across this stamp while looking for something else and realised that it was a favourite which hadn't seen the light of day for a while.  I've combined it with some borders cut and layered using snippets of different coloured card .  As the die was too long for a square card but a bit short for the 5" x 7" I used another die to cut out a half doily shape to hide the 'gap'on the left.  More smaller snippets for the sentiment and that's it for this weeks offering.

Stamp - by Little Claire
Lacy Borders - die from Crafter's Companion Downton range
Doily shape - Tim Holtz On the Edge Distressed Doily
Sentiment - computer generated on Cuttlebug die shapes

Noel

Something else seasonal to show today - this time a little  beaded Christmas plaque using a combination of  Peyote and Brick stitch.  The current issue of the Beadworker's Guild Magazine published designs for twelve of these little ornaments, each about 3.5 cm across and this is the one I've chosen to complete first.  I'm not sure how many I will be able to complete before the day this year - doubtful if it be all twelve!!  I hope the weather is better where you are - here it is very wet and windy but at least it is a great excuse to stay in and craft.

...in a Pear Tree

I've been doing my best to avoid visiting the newsagent and also decided I definitely didn't need to buy any new Christmas related 'stuff' as I have loads from previous years and don't  need to make a lot of Christmas cards. You can guess what's coming next - yes, this is a new die on the card I've just made but technically I didn't actually buy it as it was a freebie attached to a magazine; not from the newsagent but I was caught unaware in Tesco where they display magazines right where I go to pick up supplies of fresh fruit.  I really liked this Partridge in a Pear Tree die and I'm afraid I succumbed in a weak moment - well it was a very grey day and I needed cheering up so that's my excuse if I need one!!  The background paper is from a pad of seasonal papers which I must have had for several years, the white panel used a snowflake embossing folder, also a few years old.  The die shape was cut out from a scrap of Centura Pearl card and mounted onto some die cut circles cut from other scraps.  The sentiment was stamped using wording from a set of stamps received at a recent Christmas Extravaganza day which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Dies - freebie Partridge die and Spellbinder circles
Embossing - snowflake folder from Cuttlebug
Sentiment - from Stampin' Up Reason for the Season set

A 'Buckle' Style Card

I made this somewhat elaborate card some time ago as a demonstration sample following Sue Wilson's idea of using various die cuts  interlocked with each other and threading a strip of card through rather like a belt goes through a buckle.  I seem to remember it was a bit difficult to get everything lined up and glued in the right place but I think the result justifies the hassle involved (I'm sure an extra hand would have been useful at the time). Gilding flakes were used on the three Striplets pieces in the background and because these are quite long dies the card is larger than I make as a rule.

Background - Deco embossing folder Creative Expressions
Panels - Striplets dies by Sue Wilson
Circles - various Spellbinder circle dies