Tag Archives: Wondrous Wreath

Northern Flurry for Merry Monday

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I’ve been thinking about the Merry Monday challenge for a few days and after discussion with Jen, finally managed to figure it out. The challenge is snowflakes, dry embossing and neutral colours.

I was happy to use my Northern Flurry TIEF for double duty on the challenge requirements – that’s the dry embossing and the snowflakes checked off. I like to do clean and simple cards so often it’s quite tough to meet a challenge requirements as well as keeping the card as I like it. Here’s the end result:

northern flurry crumb cake coloured

I knew that using the dry embossing folder was a predictable route so tried to only emboss some of the snowflakes but that just wasn’t working out too well. So the next approach was to accent some of the embossing – I like how the Stampin’ Write marker in soft suede looks on the crumb cake card stock. The plan was to use gold as well but it just seemed to disappear into the crumb cake so a metallic bronze sharpie was used instead.

I used the sentiment from the Stampin’ Up! Wondrous Wreath set and heat embossed it in early espresso. I also lined the crumb cake envelope with the backgrounds DSP in early espresso. I would not think to use brown on Christmas cards (although my sister is currently creating some great ones in brown) so I’m glad that this challenge pushed me in this direction.

Fall wreath for a swap

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Susan Itell hosted a card swap recently where readers sent in a Halloween or Fall themed card and she would send everyone back another card. It seemed like an interesting challenge especially as I had no Fall or Halloween themed stamp sets or DSP. It took me some time to create my card therefore and I mailed it off on the Wednesday hoping it would make it from NJ to Maryland by the deadline of Saturday. Actually, it took 2 weeks! But Susan kindly featured my card on her blog anyway. And she said that I’d get something from her as I’d missed the swap – I wonder if it will take 2 weeks in the reverse direction! I hope my card enjoyed its scenic adventure.

celebrate swap card

To make this card I used the Wondrous Wreath stamp set along with the coordinating Wonderful Wreath framelits. I also used Fabulous Four – the sentiment actually has two lines – AMAZING.SPECTACULAR.FANTASTIC.YOU is underneath the celebrate. I decided that I’d use the celebrate more often on its own and so cut off the second line. It is easy to put them back together whilst putting them on a clear block so I think this is more versatile. I stamped the sentiment in versamark and then used the crushed curry embossing powder.

Since I did this card, I’ve read in Stampin’ Start about cutting out the middle of the wreath before stamping. This makes it much easier to line up – I am looking forward to trying this tip because it really is hard to line up after cutting. I coloured the stamp using the Stampin’ Write markers in crushed curry, cajun craze, pumpkin pie, pear pizzazz and wild wasabi. After huffing on the stamp to moisten the ink I stamped it and then cut it out with the framelit.

I adhered my wreath using stampin’ up! dimensionals.

A traditionally coloured Christmas card

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I seem to have been stuck on making Christmas cards in non-traditional colours lately. There’s nothing wrong with that, but I realised that almost all of my Christmas cards were that way. So, to prove that I’ve nothing against tradition, here’s one in red!

ornaments cherry cobbler noel

I love the gorgeous old-fashioned (sadly a set that retired last month) ornament here and I’ve paired it with the happy Noel text from a current set.

Base: 8.5″ by 5.5″ cherry cobbler

Top layer: 5.25″ by 4″ very vanilla

Stamp set: Ornament Keepsakes with matching framelit dies

Ink: Cherry cobbler

Other: Wondrous Wreath framelit dies

I stamped the ornament on a half sheet of very vanilla in cherry cobbler. Since I’d be running it through the big shot, I stamped other ornaments from the set at the same time so that I could cut out four for each crank through the big shot. Very useful if you’re trying to make multiple cards. I then grabbed my wax paper (liberated from the workshop in the basement where it’s used for all sorts of woodworking projects – I’d better buy more) and putting it between the card stock and the Noel die, ran it through the big shot. I find that a paper-piercing tool is very useful to poke through the holes in the die to get the card and die apart. Instead of the wax paper, I have tried using the embossing buddy or parchment but neither are as effective.

All that’s left now is to assemble the card. I like to use the grid paper to work on, finding that the lines are helpful in finding the centre of the card as well as helping text and images be straight. As you can see from the shadows, I popped the ornament up on stampin’ dimensionals; I tried stamping the ornament on the card, but it didn’t have that wow factor. I adhered the Noel text with the tombow glue carefully putting a splodge of glue on some spare card and carefully dotting it onto the noel with the small tip of the tombow. The adhesive remover is essential here for any slight errors. I finished the card off with the backgrounds DSP to line the envelope.

Christmas in September

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I’m still hooked on making Christmas cards; I’m having so much fun playing with bright colours and sparkly gold glimmer paper and heat embossing as you may have noticed. Today my new order was delivered so I can use garden green and cherry cobbler now to my heart’s delight. But before I get to that – here’s another in non-traditional colours – although it does have gold glimmer paper!

embossed trees noel pear pizzazz

Base: 5.5″ by 8.5″ Pear pizzazz folded in half

Mat: 5.25″ by 4″ very vanilla

Top layer: 5″ by 3.75″ pear pizzazz

No ink!

This is very easy to put together. First run the pear pizzazz through the big shot in the On Point embossing folder. Then get out your wax paper and put it between the noel die (from the Wondrous Wreaths framelit set) and some wax paper. This makes it much easier to get the Noel off the die, but it does take a little patience. It helps to poke something through the holes in the die. Just adhere the Noel to the embossed layer and then that layer to the mat and it all to the card. Done!

I tried this without the very vanilla mat but in old olive (because I ran out of pear pizzazz!); I’ll put that in a later post so that you can see whether you prefer it with the mat.

Ornament Keepsakes

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Since I read on Facebook that there are only 16 Saturdays until Christmas (which is crazy seeing as I’m still in shorts here), I think it’s time for another Christmas card.

ornament cream on cherry cobbler

Base: Very vanilla 8.5″ by 5.5″ scored and folded

Upper layer: Cherry cobbler 4″ by 5.25″

Stamp set: Ornament Keepsakes (retired Aug 28)

Other: Wondrous Wreath framelits, ornament keepsake framelits, cherry cobbler embossing powder, embossing buddy, heat gun, stampin’ dimensionals

Ink: Versamark

I’m really enjoying making these cards with various ornaments and in various colours. I first rubbed a scrap of very vanilla with the embossing buddy and then stamped one of the ornaments on it. I sprinkled on the cherry cobbler embossing powder and used the heat gun to make it shiny and raised. I then easily cut out the ornament with the matching framelits and attached it to the cherry cobbler mat with stampin’ dimensionals. The noel is part of the Wondrous Wreath framelits and I cut it out using a scrap of very vanilla.