I-Zink Snowflake

     This card was made using I-Zink droppers on acetate, with a twist. The droppers come in a variety of colours, some are pearlescent too.

     The acetate is coloured when the inks are dropped on one sheet and another sheet is 'squished' on top of that, it's a bit like making ink blots but with acetate instead of paper. Once pulled apart, when still wet, the result is two pieces of unusually patterned acetate.
     The twist for this one was a die cut snowflake made from masking sheet was added to one piece of acetate before using the inks, the fun came when I tried to peel the masking sheet off without messing up the snowflake, but it worked.
     Having masked off part of the acetate I had some clear area showing so my backing card had to be something simple but special, for a snowflake this had to be white and sparkly.
     Sticking acetate down can be tricky, the adhesive has to be strong and invisible. Double sided sticky sheet is perfect for this, nice and strong and with an all over sticky there are no marks showing.
      The white glitter card was cut just a little larger than the acetate so there would be a sparkly mat layer before going on to a purple mat to bring out the odd bits of matching colour in the inky background.
      Using some white texture paste and a stencil I added some randomly placed snowflakes over the card and sprinkled them with iridescent glitter. The greeting was stamped and embossed in silver, then die cut with a hole in the middle and mounted on foam pads to show the tiny snowflake underneath.
     

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

International Art & Soul - Add Some Sparkle

Winter Wonderland - Anything Christmas

Creatalicious - Christmas Snowflakes

More Mistletoe Magic

     Mistletoe has featured quite a lot in my cards this year, all because Lavinia Stamps have a gorgeous stamp that is also available in a stencil and die from Sweet Poppy.

      The stamp is smaller than the stencil and die so makes for some easy batch making of A6 cards. When cards are batch made by hand they will always come out a little different so I don't feel it's cheating atall.
      Using watercolour card I stamped and embossed in white, then spritzed the card with water before lightly sprinkling Brusho over the card. Once dry I felt the edges needed a little definition, so I used Distress ink to add a touch of darker green all the way around.
      For the Brusho panels I used some gold paper and a little dark green card to mat and layer them.

     The panels looked a little odd on a plain white card so i used the stamp and some gold ink to stamp all around the edge before adding the panel.
      To finish off I added some tiny half pearls as berries and a small gold organza bow, after watching some YouTube videos I bought a nice fork in a charity shop that I now use just for tiny bow making.
      For the other two cards I stamped the same image on to white card and embossed with a dark green powder. I used the same card and paper as before but switched it around so the green was first and then the gold.
      Again I used the stamp to decorate the white card blank but this time using a very pale green. They also have tiny pearls and a little bow.
      Both card styles have the same greeting, just embossed with different colours and die cut with a small oval die, then mounted on thin foam pads.
      This is one stamp that won't be put away in the Christmas stash, upside down it looks like seaweed so I can use it all year round. I've really enjoyed making these cards so the Christmas stash will probably stay out for a while longer so I can get a head start on next year!

I would like to enter these cards in the following challenges:

ABC Christmas - Y~ Your Favourite Thing   (a stamp with multiple use)

      Christmas At Sweet Stampin' - Anything Christmas

The Holly and Ivy - Anything Christmas 

The 12 Months of Christmas - Anything Christmas

Mistletoe Paste

     My apologies for a quiet blog these last few weeks, things here have been very busy, sadly not all of it creative but that's life. Crafting can be the most therapeutic pastime for many of us, so over the next few days I'll share some of my creations and spend some time drifting around blogland catching up with everyone else's festive posts.

     I spent a wonderful day with friends visiting Sweet Poppy Stencils for an open day, which is where I bought this gorgeous stencil...and a few others, well it would have been rude not too, right?!
     This image is silver paste on black card, one thing I learnt on the open day is it is much better to have a magnetic sheet under your card and stencil when spreading the paste.....can't believe I didn't think of that before! The other thing I have discovered is not all stencil/masking tape is the same, Stix2 stencil tape is absolutely brilliant, it holds firm but comes off without a single snag on the card.
     Once the paste was dry I mounted it on a green pearl card, the mirri layer is also a very pale green, it didn't look right flat so I used a snowfall embossing folder to give it some texture.
     The last thing to go on once all the layers where done was a sprinkling of half pearls for the mistletoe berries and a silver bow cut with a Sizzix die. There is no greeting on the outside of this card as I felt it would spoil the image, it will also be hand delivered so it doesn't get squashed.

I would like to add this card to the following challenges:

Christmas Cards All Year Round - Anything Christmas for December

CraftyHazelnut's Christmas - Anything Christmas

52 Christmas Card Throwdown - 2017 challenge : June Gems/Pearls/Sequins

House Of Cards Blog Hop

     It's sad to think that this will be last card I make for House Of Cards, the challenge is closing this month so please pop over and join us for one last time, we have a blog hop with a prize kindly donated by Beccy's Place.

   

      When I saw the photo prompt I thought this would make a great masculine Christmas card. Having just invested in some more Tim Holtz stencils I was itching to use them, the pattern on the plate made me think of plaid, oh what luck I just bought that one!

      With Distress Ink Black Soot and the Plaid stencil I inked up a square of white card for my background. The stencil only covered half the card but with a bit of careful positioning and some clean masking tape I managed to repeat the pattern so you can't see the join.

     The image I chose to use from Beccy's Place is called Champagne, it has three strawberries in front of the ice bucket, very nice but not quite right, so I die cut some baubles to cover them.

     The image is coloured with watercolour pencils and a touch of metalic pen, the glasses have a slight blue tinge to them that doesn't show up well in the photograph.

     The tiny baubles are part of the Merry greeting, so I used the dark red bauble frame that was left over to hang at the top of the image panel, then filled it with the bauble from the gold greeting cut.

      The image panel was stuck on to a dark red pearl mat layer, the same card used for the baubles, this went on to the plaid background and then the gold greetings were added, with the gold frame bauble filled with red to match the ones at the bottom. I was going to add a fir branch too but I think it's busy enough as it is.

      Please come and play along with our final challenge at House Of Cards, you never know, you may win the prize.

House Of Cards Blog Hop

Make sure you leave a comment at each person's blog along the way because the prize is hidden and we'll be doing a random drawing from the blogs where it is hiding! :) 

You have come from Michele and your next stop is Rosi, good luck.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Digi Choosday - Anything Goes

Watercooler Wednesday - Holidays

Snow blind

     Making Christmas decorations is one of my favourite things to do, so when I found a huge roll of vertical blind fabric and some broken chandelier pendants in a charity shop I thought snowflakes.

      This fabric is amazing stuff, it doesn't fray when cut, you can stamp on it, heat emboss on it and alcohol markers don't bleed when you colour on it. A good thing it's so very versatile when you see the size of the roll!
      Using Tim Holt Sizzix die Layered Snowflake I cut four flakes and embossed them with the folder that accompanies the die.
      Once cut and embossed I used some silver gilding polish to run over the raised areas, this looked good but it lacked something, so out came the iridescent glitter.

     Using some fishing line I threaded it through one of the single round gems and made a loop which was sealed with a crimp bead. Most of the gems have small hooks and loops on them so assembly was easy.
      I glued two of the flakes together on one side to form half of the finished flake. Then I glued the longer end of the fishing line to the centre channel, making certain to have enough to form a finishing loop before cutting it off the reel.
      With the loose end of the line I threaded on a small round gem attached to a drop gem, making a loop through the top of the gem and fixing again with a crimp bead. The end of the line was then stuck inside the channel so there would be no end visible.
      With the gems in place I stuck the remaining flakes to the made half and left it to dry before easing into shape as a three dimensional snowflake. The weight of the glass gems make the flake hang straight and the whole thing sparkles beautifully.
     Over at Altered Eclectics we love to see altered art and recycled projects like this so please pop over and join us with your creations.

I would like to enter this decoration in the following challenges:

CraftyHazelnut's Christmas - Anything Christmas Goes
The Holly and Ivy - Anything Christmas Goes

Scrapy Land - Anything Goes
Fussy and Fancy - Winter/Christmas
Crafty Cardmakers - Anything But A Card