OCC Holiday Card Workshop 2013 Day One

Starting off this week with the Online Card Classes Holiday Workshop. What a treat for a Monday.

Today’s lesson shared ideas for decorating the insides of cards that coordinated with the outsides. I based my card on the one shared by Kristina Werner, however, I haven’t added the vellum gift card pocket to my card. The idea is that the washi tape on the outside is used to adhere the pocket on the inside.

OCC Holiday Card Workshop 2013 Day One

I really liked the stamp she used on her card, a cute penguin from Darcie’s. Since I don’t have that stamp, I used a Paper Smooches snowman from Swanky Swanky Snowdudes instead. The sentiment is from the Papersmooches Warm Hearts set. There’s some Wink of Stella on the olive green scarf and some Stickles on the hat and buttons.

There’s so much material in today’s lesson – off to watch more videos. Hope you’re having a fantastic start to your week!

Twas the Night before Christmas

With the door shut on October, I’m making holiday cards! I wanted to create a card in one sitting, so I turned to some of my favorite winter-themed die cuts.

Twas the Night before Christmas

I had this finished with a plain background and sent a photo to my eldest son. He responded with “Shouldn’t there be some snow?” That was valid input, so I dry-embossed the card base with an embossing folder to give some texture and the allusion of snow.

Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!

Penny Black: Rudolph’s Portrait

Often when I make cards, I create a story behind the card, as was the case with this one using the Penny Black Whooo’s Wishing [30-190] stamp set (now discontinued). As the card began to come together, I pictured this as Rudolph’s portrait on the wall at the North Pole.

Penny Black: Rudolph's Portrait

I heat embossed the “Rudolph” stamp with white embossing powder. The sentiment, from the  Whoo’s Wishing set, was heat embossed with red powder. I really like the versatility of the Decadence background stamp [40-254] which I stamped in a dark grey. While it brings a formal component to the card, it’s not so formal that it doesn’t play well with the more casual elements on the card, such as the craft store pom pom and the baker’s twine.

Tim Holtz Style Holiday Tag

I’m still working through the techniques from the Online Card Classes Tim Holtz Creative Chemistry 102 class – there was a lot of material covered in just one week! I’m relatively new to the “World of Tim Holtz” so there’s quite a learning curve for me.

To continue practicing the techniques, I made a holiday-themed tag working with a Distress Stain tag base. I spent several hours testing color combinations and watching videos. I found the video in this post of Tim’s to be the most useful for creating the type of distress stain background I most liked. In short, the Mini Mister is my friend!

Tim Holtz Style Holiday Tag

As I don’t own many Tim Holtz Sizzix dies, I worked with some recently-released Savvy dies. The cardinal, cut from Craft-a-Board, was painted with Festive Berries Distress Paint before an application of Glossy Accents and Festive Berries Distress Glitter. I cut the branch and holly from Kraft Core cardstock and lightly sanded them. I stamped the snowflakes (from a discontinued October Afternoon set) with Broken China ink, and embossed with them with Sticky Powder before applying Clear Rock Candy Distress Glitter.

Supplies:

Poppystamps: Winter Scene

I’m sharing a card over on the Poppystamps blog today using supplies from the new release of 74 dies and 20 cling stamps.

In this post,  I shared a scene created with the new Grand Chalet window die. Today, I’m sharing another scene using the same die.

Poppystamps: Winter SceneFor my card, I envisioned a sunny winter day, one in which the snow is glistening and the deer are happily playing (one has decided to make its appearance at the window!). I cut the window by placing the die on the inside of the front card panel. After cutting, I folded the shutters to the card front. The Holiday Village was stamped and heat embossed before I colored it with Copic markers. I used its companion die so that I could put it on the horizon line between the sky and snow.

Supplies: