Christmas in Kraft and Black!

 

So Class 2 was held last night so I can reveal the sneek peek card......

 

You can see the depth of texture that the textured Holiday Frame impressions folder has.  This folder does have a right and wrong way up, there's a small fir tree near the bottom and a baubble at the top.  There's also cute little reindeer (right at the bottom, can you see his head and antlers?) and tiny snowflakes amongst the swirls, which could be cut out.

 

So here's how we made it:

1. We made an A6 card from a piece of crumb cake (kraft) card folded in half.
2. We embossed a piece of black card with the impressions folder in a big shot and then cut away the non-embossed card around the oval and glued with wet glue to the front of the card. The centre of the oval does not emboss, it's perfectly placed to add stamped images or sentiments or pre-printed toppers if you don't stamp.
3. We then stamped the oval and the Noel baubble from Joyous Celebrations (Stampin' Up! again) which co-ordinates with the embossing folder, in black onto kraft.
4. We punched out the oval with the SU large oval punch and then cut out by hand the shape of the baubble leaving a narrow kraft boarder, mounting both on foam pads. 

Et voila...an easy yet sophisticated card suitable for anyone in the family...could keep the children entertained looking for the reindeer, tree, baubble and counting the snowflakes....well...for all of 5 minutes....

November Class Sneek Peek

Kraft and black for Christmas? 

 

Oh yes!

 

A sneek peek of another simple card using stamping and embossing and die cutting, from Stampin' Up! Why not come back to see how we get on at 21st November's Class on .  Hopefully I'll remember the coffee this time!

Sweet Treats no trick

Ok, so I'm not the best painter, of small objects with a large brush, in the world...I prefer 'cutting in' around the skirtings when decorating rather than the whole roller thing...

So what do you think of these cheeky chaps?  I made them from salt dough, my first attempt...I should have used plain flour...but it does give an interesting rounded character to them...LOL...

So how did I make them? The marvels of Stampin' Up! again, I picked these biscuit stamps up in Canada, they're now available here!  The stamps are food safe silicon 6.5cm (2.5 inches) across and fit onto a chunky handle which any nursery aged child or older would love to make (the handle would be a bit large for the tiniest of children).

 

So how did I do it? 

1. Using your favorite salt dough or biscuit  recipie roll out to about 1cm thickness.  Use a biscuit cutter to cut out, (mine had a serated edge) but do not move the biscuits, remove the waste instead (reuse it and roll out more).
2. Insert the wooden base of the stamp handle in to the silicon Sweet Pressed Cookie Stamp and gently press in to the biscuits. 
3. Place the stamped biscuits on to a baking tray and bake according to your recipe (low and slow for salt dough). 
4. Remove from the oven and cool, decorate with acrylic paint and varnish the faux biscuits, or you could ice real biscuits or leave plain as the pattern is indented.   
5. For the faux biscuits: punch out circles or scalloped circles and a piece of gold cord.  Make a loop on the back of the biscuit.  Cover the circle of card with a very strong glue such as glossy acents or crystal effects and cover the end of the looop.  Once dry use to decorate the house for halloween.

The stamp set comes boxed, and includes two recipies for edible biscuits, one with and one without eggs.  I think I will be making some real buiscuits for halloween for the office.



Thanks for Caring

Our second card in the October Class of 'A Year in Cards' was a sympathy card.  I like to keep these cards simple and allow the sentiment and your own hand written thoughts to be the main emphasis of the card.

Here are two versions of the A6 black and white card using three stamps from the retired Thanks for Caring stamp set from Stampin' Up! (SU) (the orchid was so easy to line up with the sentiment because the cling rubber stamps are shaped and you can see through the acrylic block exactly where you're going, stamp the sentiment first.

We die cut out the sentiment with SU framelets 'Labels Collection', second from smallest one and another from black using the third from smallest one.  I guess other shaped dies would work just as well, but I recommend that you keep it simple.

Next we pieced holes around the black frame with a paper pirecer (or pokey tool) and the Festive Paper-piercing Pack from SU, it actually has the holes all mapped out for these dies!  It also has maps for the Holiday Ornament Dies (which I'll definately be using for my Christmas card classes) and the window frames collection dies.

Glue the black frame to the card and mount the sentiment on foam pads over the black frame.

You can stamp a sentiment in the middle.  Simple as I say.

Another wedding

 

 

This time a simple embossed rose design with a hint of baja breeze card and the bride's and groom's name printed on to white organza ribbon...all from Stampin' Up!  The retired stamp set too....Did I tell you I love their stuff!

A Special 30th Card

 

 

A card for my wonderful friend Josie who turned 30 a couple of months back.

Papers, 30 and happy birthday stamps and butterfly die from Stampin' Up!, square patterned die from Sizzix and a free stamp from a magazine.