Vintage style Christmas cards

Hello :o)

Should have posted these a while back, but when I came to assemble them I'd ran out of card and had to reorder anyway here they are now.

Supplies used -

1. Stardream pearlescent Antique gold card

2. Backing paper (front and insert )curtosy of Altered Bits. The snowflake border, bird, sentiment and snowflake are stamps by Inkadinkado all stamped with Versafine Sepia ink and dotted with Stickles gold glitter and Shimmerz Choc-o-lot paint.

3. Main image is mounted onto gold hessian paper, the ovals and snowflakes where made with Nestabilities and Shapeabilies dies.

4. Insert sentiment is computer generated and initial letters coloured with Atyou Gold glitter pen(doesn't show ) and the bird and holly stamps are again by Inkadinkado.

5. My little "calling card" on the back was cut with deckle edge megabilities. The web address is computer generated and the witch and other wording are stamped. Again mounted onto gold hessian paper same but larger die and then run through the cuttlebug with the snowflake impressabilites.

I made 20 of these for my Dad to send out, now I've just got to make my own :o/

Hope you're all keeping well and thank you for still popping by.

Take care & keep smiling from the worst blogger and slowest card maker in the world

Vintage 70th Birthday card - for my Dad :o)

It was actually my Dads birthday on the 29th September, and have only just remembered to take a photo of it !!!! Anyhoo I took lots of photos and I've uploaded them small to get them all on, cos as usual I couldn't make up my mind which ones I liked best :o/ So here goes...

I won't bore you with the details as to how I made the card, as there is waaaaaaay to much to list, but if there is anything you want to know about the card feel free to ask. All I will tell you is the photo's are of my Dad when he was VERY young :o)

Thank you for taking the time to look and take care & keep smiling

Vintage Christmas Angel

This card was intended to be entered in to last weeks Winter wonderland challenge - Very Vintage. But once I'd done the main image just couldn't decided what to do with it, so onto the shelf it went. Then today I got it down and had another look at it, and this is what I came up with...

The main image is a painting by Edward Burne-Jones (1878) called 'An Angel Playing Flageolet', I think it's rather beautiful. I made the frame for it from gold hessian paper and a Cuttlebug border embossing folder, then edged with gold peel offs. The backing paper is from alteredbits.com. The edges were stamped with Inkadinkado Snow flourish stamp using Versafine Vintage Sepia ink. The inside of the snowflakes was then painted with Shimmerz Candle Light paint and darker areas with Shimmerz Choc-o-lot paint. The centers of the snow flakes has a blob of Tim Holtz Distress Stickles - Frayed Burlap. The flowers are Flora Doodles white wild roses. The edges of the roses were stained with Tim Holtz Distress ink - Antique Linen, and then gone over again with Shimmerz Candle Light paint. The stamens of the flowers were painted with Smooch gold paint.There another Christmas card done, only another million to go !!!!!! :o/
Take care & keep smiling

Tilda with Roses or Roses for Rosella

I made this card about three weeks ago for my friend Rosella's birthday....


















































1. Backing papers inside and outside of the card are from Bearly Mine Designs CD Rom.
2. Magnolia's Tilda with roses and Rose rubber stamps. Colured with Derwents Coloursoft pencils, Sansodor, Atyou red glitter pen and Sakura clear Gellyroll glaze pen. Background for Tilda was made using Tim Holtz Scattered Straw ink pad.
3. Roses on the front where plain white but the edges where then painted with Shimmerz Royal red paint.
4. Frames for Tilda and inserts where made with Nestabilities and heat embossed (about 4 layers)
5. Leaves - L-Em punch and Bazzil card.
6. Sentiments are computer generated and gone over with Atyou red glitter pen.
7. Gold corner and border peel offs used on the inserts.
8. Metal corner embellishments and raffia bows on the front.
Take care & keep smiling

Winter Wonderland Week 15 - Frosty the Snowman

As I've been away from blogging for a while I thought I'd get myself back on the map by entering a challenge, and as I've been following the Winter Wonderland Challenge blog for a while but never entered I thought this would be a good place to start. And lets face it WHO can resist a snowman :o) ...

I do have a snowman stamp but didn't want to use it, so I went scouting round the Internet to see what I could find, and found this lovely snowman on a children's colouring page. Do you think I can find that page again ???? No, argghhhh I hate it when that happens. Anyway I've changed it slightly from the original picture, and so as I could colour it in without the ink smudging, I printed it in a pale grey colour and then went over it with a waterproof ink pen and then coloured it with Derwent coloursoft pencils and Sansodor, and the band on his hat was gone over with Atyou Spica clear glitter pen. The owl and birds are Magnolia stamps coloured the same as the snowman and on their beaks and their eyes I went over SEVERAL times with Sakura clear Gelly roll glaze pen. The snowman's nose was gone over again several times with Sakura Gelly roll Christmas red glaze pen. The sprig in his hat is the top part of Martha Stewart's branch punch and the berries were made with Stickles Christmas red glitter glue.

The arched backing paper is one I made on the computer, and the snowflakes where then painted over with Shimmerz Angel Wings paint (not that you can see on the photo's).This was then mounted onto silver Mirri silk card that had been run though the Cuttlebug with Impressabilities Snowflake embossing plate. Because the card is bigger than the embossing plate I first cut away the frame that surrounds the plate so as to get a nice continuous pattern. oh and by the way the arches were both cut by hand. The backing paper is from Bearly Mine Designes Designer Extreme Vol. 1 CD. The icicles are from a Christmas tree garland I got in the sales, and the snow at the bottom of the snowman's feet is Flowersoft Polar White, I was expecting it to be white but as you can see it's transparent :o( Oh well. I think I covered everything. As I can't find the site I got the snowman picture from here he is... But remember this is NOT my art work and I take NO credit for it...

And here's my altered version.

PS. I did a waistcoat for him, but me and my Dad thought he looked on this occasion better without it, but I think I may well do another with his waistcoat as this was such a fun card to make.

Take care & keep smiling

PS. The bottom photo may look like a blank but when you print it it comes out a pale grey. That's so as you can go over it with what ever colouring medium you chose :o)

Vintage Wedding Card Box

Hello :o)
Won't bore you with details for this, but it's the box I made for the Vintage Wedding card to go into. Sorry for the photo's but the card has to be given to Mary tomorrow in time for her daughters wedding, and there won't be time in the morning for me to take any decent daylight photo's, so here it is...

























1. Nestabilities
2. Impressabilities
3. Inkadinkado Gemstone Flourish clear stamps
4. Tim Holtz Distress Ink pads - Antique Linen and Frayed Burlap
5. Martha Stewart Border Punch

Thank you for looking.
Take care & keep smiling

Vintage Wedding Card

OK, so this took me a while to do, but other than knowing I wanted to do a vintage style card, I really had no idea as to what I was going to do. But here it is a last and now I've just to make the box for it, which shouldn't take me that long to do...

1. Base card cream 300gsm

2. Front of card - Both DP's are from Bearly Mine Designs - Designer Extreme Vol. 2 CD Rom. The floral design wa printed on to white linen card, and the beige spot was printed on to Stampin' Up Whisper White card.

3. The photo was one out of a pack of photo's I bought from Joanna Sheen. The frame to the photo was made by cutting round the Nestabilitie I used to cut out the photo (it was a standard rectangle photo) Then I hand pressed the Nestie into the cut out to get a border. Then taking a Versamark pen I went round the outline and then triple heat embossed with Moon Glow two tone EP "Gilded Burgundy Brass" (the car used for the frame was Stardream pearlescent Chocolate brown card).

4. The roses I bought from Joanna Sheen, and I painted the tops of the petals with Shimmerz "Candle Light"

5. The Cream heart lace and silver metal corners I bought from eBay and the organza ribbon was from Raspberry Ribbons.

6. The Cherub is a button from Dress It Up

7. The card insert papers are the same as the front, only both are printed onto Stampin' Up Whisper White Card. The edges were distressed with Tim Holtz Antique Linen Distress ink. The stamp is from Inkadinkado Gem Stone Flourishes which was stamped with Tim Holtz Scattered straw Distress ink.

8. The heart lace border and Butterflies are from Martha Stewart, punched from the same SU card and sponge coloured with Tim Holtz Antique Linen and the butterflies also had Mr Holtz's Walnut Stain sponged on to them, then they were painted with the Shimmerz Candle Light.

9. The sentiment is from SU, I have the stamp but I wanted the "Love" more in keeping with the card so I printed off the computer using "Comic Sans" and "Beautiful" Fonts.

There I'm not going to bore you with every single detail as there was a lot more involved in making this card, but those are the main details. Any questions ? Just email me :o)

Take care & keep smiling

Tea Bag Gift Box Template

All credit is given to Lotti (Stampalotti) for this template, as all the measurements given are the ones she used to make the one she sent me. And the measurements I used to make mine.

Hopefully these scans will print out at the correct size.

Click on scans to see the details - The dotted lines are the score lines. Solid lines are the ones you'll need to cut or punch.

Scan 1. This is the outer case. Cut out with the measurements provided. Now I didn't use a score board, all I used was a very small embossing tool and a ruler, this was because I didn't actually draw the guide lines on my card as I didn't want them showing. I used double sided tape as opposed to glue, this is just my personal choice, you use what ever your comfortable with.

Scan 2. That's the inner case. This is where your tea bag envelopes are going to go. The middle section is what is going to be the top of the box. I've just noticed, where the small shaped cut out pieces are (on the sides) I've put glue or tape, you actually glue or tape ON THE OTHER SIDE. So when you fold it to stick it, these pieces will be inside the box so therefore need adhesive on the other side.

Scan 3. This is the envelopes for the tea bags. You'll need to cut three of these. When you punch the half circles, to make sure they match up fold it along the length ways score line (the one running top to bottom on the left hand side of the photo) You'll notice there are three different coloured measurements. Score the first envelope using the RED measurement, second envelope using the GREEN measurement and of course the third using the last measurement. So why three measurements, that's so they'll nest inside each other nicely. The blue measurements are the over all dimensions.Once you've cut all your pieces this is when you want to decorate them. Once decorated, just assemble.
This doesn't have to be just for tea bags, I made mine to hold chocolates. Looking at it you could alter the measurements to have it hold small photo's, ATC's, whatever you like.If you need more details or something explained just email me.Take care, keep smiling and have fun

Raisa and the reluctant Reindeer :o)

ROFL, I just HAD to show you this. Raisa my Finnish friend has been off on holiday in Lapland. When she said she was going I told her to stroke a Reindeer for me, LOL, and this is as close as she got. She says in her blog she had to chase after it to get the picture, doesn't that just conjure up a comical scene in your head like one of those slapstick silent movie chases :O)

clipped from tuulentuvassa.blogspot.com

How I made the flowers for the Pack a Picnic Gift Box

I had an email from a lady named Diane from South Carolina USA who asked for a little more information on how I made the flowers for the Gift box. Sooooo, I thought I'd have a go at a tutorial LOL. So bear with me as this is my first time (blush).... Oh and small photo's to get them all on, so click on them if you want to see more detail...

Here are the tools I used (ignore the white tool, I used that on another flower, sorry) The card is about the same weight as Bazzil card, but this is two tone - dark pink one side light pink on the other.

1. Punch out two large daisies, two medium daisies and one of the little daisy.

2. With the tear drop punch or any punch that will give you a notch, punch each petal end on both of the large daisies, until you have these...

3. Put the flowers (both large and medium) on the foam mat then with the etching tool (that's the one with the pointy end and the scoop on the other end) or follow this link HERE for tool substitutes, score down the middle of each petal (wrong side of the card or what will be the underneath of the flower), keeping the point as flat to card as possible, and press as hard as the paper or card will allow...

Until you have these...

4. Then glue the flowers together, I used Art Glitter Clear Adhesive, but any quick drying glue will do. I say quick drying because you're going to be moulding them and you don't want them to slip whilst you're doing that...

5. Then with the shape mate (that's the one that looks like an embossing tool) place it in the centre of the flower and with circular movements go round and round the centre until the petals have raised...

6. Take the littlest daisy, again on the foam mat and with the shape mate "stroke" the petals right way up until they have curled...

7. Then glue the little daisy into the center of the large flower and on the foam mat with the Shape Mate really push down into the flower so as all the petals raise up. You may want to do those circular movements again, it really all depends on the thickness of the card/paper you are using...

8. Then with the scoop end of the etching tool I pulled the center petals up and pulled the bottom petals down...

PHEW!!! So there you have it. I got my inspiration from these two ladies. They are what I would call experts at making flowers...

http://joanne-mainlyflowers.blogspot.com/search/label/floral%20punch%20craft

http://peejays-crafty-bits.blogspot.com/search/label/Tutorial - The flower tutorials are towards the bottom of the page.

I made some other flowers that were going to go on the gift box before I decided on which design I was going to go for...

All the flowers were made with Vellum/ parchment paper and EK Success Retro flower punches as were the leaves on the bottom flowers and the leaves on the top flowers is a punch by L-Em. The stamens on the top flowers (big and small) where made with a snowflake punch and a Cuttlebug snowflake die :o) Hope I haven't confused you too much, the links above give much better tutorials.

Right I'm off to catch my breath :o)

Take care & keep smiling