Christmas Card Number Six

Hello

Sorry for the delay this week, I've just had one of those weeks where everything I touch seems to fall apart.
Today's card features the humble Christmas tree again and a really bold colourful background.

Materials needed:

• 3 pieces of green patterned paper, one striped pattern paper, and two light coloured patterned papers.
• Sliver embossing powder and embossing ink
• "holiday greetings' stamp
• A sliver and black gel pen

To make the card:

• Cut the striped paper to fit the front of the card and adhere.  Cut a small strip of one of the light coloured papers and adhere towards the bottom of the card.
• From each of the green papers, cut a Christmas tree in three different sizes.  If desired add some embossing or glitter to the trees.  Cut a heart from the other light patterned paper.  From a scrap piece of paper cut out three small rectangles to be the trunk of the trees.
• Stamp and emboss the sentiment on to the heart.
• Adhere two of the Christmas trees directly to the front of the card.  Using dimensional foam adhere the third Christmas tree in between the first two.  Also with dimensional foam, adhere the heart towards the right side of the card.
• Using the black gel pen create dash lines around the outside of the heart.  With the silver pen do the same around the background piece.

I hope today's card has provided you with some inspiration.

Till next time

Stacey

Christmas Card Number Five

Hello!

Today's card features a new stamp set I got last week that says exactly what I feel about Christmas, that it should be about family.

Materials needed:

• Green, red, and two different patterned papers
• Gold ribbon
• Gold embossing powder and embossing ink
• Sentiment stamp
• Gold gel pen

To make the card:

• Stamp and emboss the sentiment on to the red piece of paper.  Trim the two patterned pieces of paper down to create small sections to adhere on to the red piece.  Use the gel pen to create a few dash lines and cut a triangle from the bottom.
• Pinch the ribbon in the middle and tie it loosely with some string, adhere the middle down onto the green paper and the ends of the ribbon on to the back of the paper.  Secure the green paper to your card base.
• Using dimensional adhesive, adhere the red piece over the center of the ribbon.

There you have it.  I love what this sentiment says, it goes into the deeper meaning of Christmas not just the 'buy everything' kind of Christmas that we are subjected to every year.

Till next time

Stacey

Christmas Card Number Four

Hello!

Welcome back, today's Christmas card has a modern sleek look with purple and sliver colours.

Materials:

• White and purple card
• Sliver embossing powder and embossing ink
• A 'Merry Christmas' stamp
• A star shaped punch
• Gems

To make this card:

Punch out 15 stars from the purple card and three from the white.  Adhere 5 purple and 1 white star together with the white star on the top, do this two more times.  Adhere the stacked stars onto the card base and form a line of gems from the top of the card down to the top of each star (I only used silver coloured gems and coloured every second gem purple with a sharpie).  Stamp and emboss the 'Merry Christmas' on a small piece of white card and cut a slightly bigger piece of purple card to be adhered behind the sentiment.  Adhere the sentiment with dimensional foam to the bottom portion of the card.

There you have it!  The stars are a little fiddly and you do use quite a few gems, but if you want to replicate this look in large quantities using a couple of gel pens in place of the gems would make the card much faster and cheaper to produce.

Till next time

Stacey

Christmas card number three

Hello!

Sorry I didn't post yesterday, I had a job interview in the morning and ended up spending most of the day out of the house.
So this week is another Christmas card which features the classic image of Santa.

To make this card you will need:

• Green and white card
• Swirly embossing folder
• A Santa stamp and a Merry Christmas stamp
• Felt pens (I used a combination of sharpies and colouring pencils)
• Black and embossing ink
• Silver embossing powder
• Clear glitter
• PVA Glue
• Sliver gems

To begin, emboss the green card in the embossing folder and adhere to the card base.  Stamp the Santa in black on a piece of white card and colour him in.  Mix a small amount of glitter with the glue and gently paint it onto the Santa (I put the glitter along the fluffy edges of his coat and hat).  Set aside to dry.  Stamp and emboss the Merry Christmas on a strip of the white card and cut a triangle out of one end to make a banner.  When the Santa is all dry adhere the white strip with the sentiment behind him with dimensional foam.  Place dimensional foam behind the rest of the Santa and regular adhesive behind the sentiment and adhere to the front of the card.  Place a few gems on the background because its for Christmas and Christmas is supposed to sparkle.

And there you have it! It is quite an easy card as it doesn't contain many elements, but the colouring can take a long time and the drying of the glitter/glue mix just adds to the time taken.  I still think its cute though, what do you think?  Let me know by commenting, don't be shy!

Also, check out the new facebook page for Confessions of a Card maker!
https://www.facebook.com/ConfessionsOfACardMakerBlog
Don't forget to like and share it with your friends. :)

Till next week!

Stacey

Christmas Card Number Two

Hello

The Christmas theme continues this week with my second Christmas card and envelope creation.  This week I went with a blue and silver colour scheme using embossing powder to make the silver stand out.  If you don't have embossing powder you can use a silver ink pad instead, but the results wont be as bright.

Here is the card:

Materials needed:

• Navy card for the base and the panel piece
• Silver embossing powder and embossing ink
• Silver string
• A 'Merry Christmas' stamp and a star background stamp
• A circle die or template
• Corner rounder punch

Other materials for the envelope:

• Blue patterned paper
• White card
• Silver embossing powder and embossing ink
• Blue glitter glue
• Star border stamp
• Envelope punch board

To make the card:

For the panel, use the circle die or template to cut out a circle in the top half of the panel.  Stamp the 'Merry Christmas' below the cut circle, sprinkle over the embossing powder and heat set it.  Wrap the string around the top of the card to make the circle look like an ornament.  Round all the corners.

For the card base, stamp the star background over the top half making sure that it covers enough of the card so that it will fill up the entire circle when the panel is place over top (I stamped mine twice in order to cover the gap).  Use the embossing powder here too.  Round all the corners.

Adhere the panel onto the card base with dimensional foam.

For the envelope:

Create the envelope using the punch board with the blue patterned paper.  On the white card stamp the star border along the top and bottom edges and emboss with the powder.  Adhere the white card to the front of the envelope.  Using the glitter glue, add small dots of sparkle on the front for extra detail.

There you have it!  I was really impressed at how well this card turned out.  It could be easily replicated but could prove a bit costly with all the embossing powder so I would suggest ink instead.

Stay tuned for next weeks card.

Stacey

Here comes Christmas!

Hello

I'm back! and I'm here with my very first Christmas card of the year.  I have a love/hate relationship with Christmas, while I enjoy the family and the presents and all the glitter; I really hate Christmas Carols, the requirement to spend so much money and the fact that all Christmas items are winter themed (I live in the southern hemisphere so its summer at Christmas time and it seems weird to be singing about snow and sitting in front of the fire).  I guess I just wish there was more summer themed Christmas stuff out there so that I don't feel so left out.  Also, there has been Christmas decorations out at the bigger department stores since the beginning of October.  This annoys me as I want Christmas to be a more private experience between families and I don't like being rushed into it.  I'm only starting the cards now because it can take me such a long time to decide what I want to do, that and I currently don't have much on in my life so I've got time to spare.

ANYWAY.....
Here is today's card:

As you can see I also made an envelope for it.
Its a fairly traditional type card as it uses green, gold and white, but has a modern element with the triangle tree and the swirled background.

To make this card you will need:

• One piece of green patterned paper, green glitter paper, white card, gold paper and your card base (tall and skinny).
• a star shaped punch or a star shaped embellishment in gold
• a 'merry Christmas' stamp
• and the usual cutting knife, ruler, adhesive etc

additional items for the envelope:

• One piece of green patterned paper and a tag shaped die cut.
• gold embossing powder
• a border stamp
• gold string
• star shaped embellishments in gold
• envelope punch board.

So for the card it is as simple as adhering the green paper to the base and cutting a triangle from the glitter paper and sticking it on with dimensional adhesive. Then stamping the image onto the white card, trimming it and creating a border from the gold paper by cutting a slightly larger square from it.  Before you stick the stamped image to the gold paper you might like to punch out a few stars (I got six easily from my piece) out of the gold paper (because its too pretty to waste by hiding most of it behind something else).  I adhered this piece to the card with dimensional adhesive as well and used one of the stars punched from the gold paper to top the tree.

It is a good card for creating multiples of (which is needed at Christmas time).  If you wanted to make it a bit more detailed you could apply some decoration to the tree with gold thread or use a hole punch to make small circles out of coloured paper and stick them on as baubles.

The envelope is an extra step that isn't entirely necessary, I made the envelope for it as the card size I used is quite different from my usual size and also due to me recently getting one of those punch boards and I though it was a good chance to get to use it.  So I just followed the instructions that came with the punch board thing and then decided to decorate the front a bit.  The tag was one that I had hidden rather deep within my collection of craft items.  I gold embossed one of my border stamps along the bottom edge to give it more detail and to tie in with the colours of the card.  I threaded some gold thread through the hole and held down the end with one of the stars I punched out earlier.  I placed a couple of other stars onto the envelope front and called it a day.

So there you have it.  If you have any feedback or requests don't be afraid to comment!

Till next time.

Rorystar.

Next week I promise!

Hello!

 I know I said a while ago that I would be back posting cards again yesterday but I can't get at my desk as it is a complete mess!  However, I'm all done with my dissertation now so I actually have the time to make cards again.  I will be posting next with a Christmas card as Christmas isn't as far away as I'm pretending it is.  So stay tuned, I'm working on it!

Rorystar