Baubles & Music

So, still behind the times (but almost caught up) ........

Last Wednesday was the Friendship Service at church for the old folk who for various reasons are no longer able to get to regular services each week.   The Friendship Service is held on the first Wednesday each month and they normally have morning tea following.

Being December though, they are invited to stay for a lovely lunch with a bit of entertainment to follow.  Lunch is provided by a lovely team of ladies from our church who spoil us with a variety of salads, ham and chicken and a yummy mince pies for dessert.

My contribution to the lunch for the last few years, is to provide a small gift for each person.  This year my friend Gaye and myself, made Christmas Baubles.

Each bauble takes around an hour to make, although that doesn't include cutting the papers, and every one is different.  We put one on each place setting at the tables and they looked very festive with all their different colours.

After main course (and before dessert) we were treated to beautiful Christmas songs by an all female choir.
Think of a men's Barbershop Quartet, but with ladies instead!
They were absolutely magnificent!
 One of the choristers is a member of our church and she organised the entertainment.
  Afterwards, each of the ladies was also given one of the baubles as a thank you.

It was a really lovely day, enjoyed by everyone.

Happy Crafting!!!

Christmas comes in all colours!

Going back in time .......

..... a couple of weeks ago, I was going through all my papers putting together co-ordinated papercraft gift packs to donate to Anglicare's Christmas appeal.  I put in lots of papers and cardstock, with embellishments such as ribbons, bling, punched shapes etc and always make sure there are at least five cards and envelopes ready to go.  I package them in an A4 cellophane bag and attach a card topper.  There are lots of goodies to play with - much better value than a purchased kit!  The idea of these kits is twofold: firstly, someone will receive a lovely crafty gift at Christmas; and secondly, it helps me declutter some of my craft stuff, some of which is leftovers from classes and other projects.

Anyhow ........ I came across papers by Alison Ellis (discontinued) which had been used for a Christmas card class probably a couple of years back, and decided I would try to make this years cards from stuff that I already had in my stash rather than buy new goodies (yeah, like that worked, LOL!!!).

 

 

Now, I realise black, white & silver are not your usual Christmas colours, but these papers work very well together with the silver being either foil or glitter.  I quickly cut the papers to size, and cut around and popped onto dimensionals the feature embellishment, and "hey presto", finished cards!

I suppose I should count how many cards I need to send to friends and family this year, although I have a sneaky feeling I still need to make more!

 

Happy Crafting!!!

 

Vintage Christmas Cards

This morning I joined the scrapbooking ladies at Alice in Paperland, although only two of them were actually scrapbooking; one lady was making book covers and I was making more Christmas cards.  It is very rare for me to scrapbook although it is something that I think I should do more often.

The background papers came from a 6" x 6" pad from Bo Bunny which was a recent freebie on the front of a card magazine.  Included in the freebie was also a christmas stamp set with which I stamped 'Happy Christmas' on the front of each card using 'jet black' Archival Ink.

The papers are all double sided and some seem to look better on white cardstock while others look better on ivory cardstock, so I made five of each.

The vintage santas on each card came from Darkroom Door, as part of a "mystery pack" which was delivered to me during the week.  

These cards were all very easy to put together, just cut the paper to size, ink around the edges in Distress Ink "spruce", add a narrow strip (also inked on the edges) and pop up santa on dimensionals.

Happy Crafting!

 

Deer, oh deer, oh deer!!!

Christmas is on its way!!!

The shops are decorated, there is Christmas music playing, the inevitable lists are being written, and very soon there will be money pouring out of my purse - eeeeekk!!!

In the midst of this, is the need to make start on my Christmas cards. 

 So, for starters, let me show you the first batch!

The background on these cards was made the same way as the ATCs in the previous post.  I edged the torn edges with Distress Ink, and stamped the trees from Darkroom Door in the background.

The deer die cut is from Cheery Lyn designs that I thought was rather gorgeous!  Each deer has slightly different antlers to each other, as they were a bit too high for the size card, so they were clipped to fit  (No deers were hurt during this process, hehehe!).

Even though in Sydney we are as far away from a cold, frosty scene as you could imagine, I wanted to do something just a little different this time.

Now, all I need to do is find what I did with these cards.  I obviously put them 'in a safe place', but where???  H E L P ...............

 

Happy Crafting!

 

ATC Challenge - Christmas

As you would know from previous posts, I've been part of a Stampotique ATC swap over the last few months which has been lots of fun.  I send two ATCs to my allocated recipients and in return I also receive two back.  I love the thrill of finding out who my ATCs are from (and what part of the globe) and then a second thrill when I open the package/envelope to see what I have been sent.

November's ATC swap was "Christmas" which was quite appropriate as the season was fast approaching.  After putting on my thinking cap and with some suggestions from my friend Jenni (who also participates), the following are the ATCs that went flying across the world.

I sent three this time, one each to Canada, UK and the USA.  Each person received a card and an ATC inside a protective sleeve.

The background of each ATC was made from leftover cardstock from some Christmas cards I had been making (which also have the same background).  I started off with a mid blue sky, and some torn pieces of a lighter blue.  Once I had seen how high my hills would be, I then stamped the trees (Darkroom Door) in jet black Archival Ink, before glueing the hills into place.  I added just a touch of Distress Stickles to the tops of the hills for snow and using a white Posca pen, dotted in the stars.

The snowman is "Global Warming" from Stampotique.  I fussy cut him, coloured some highlights and arranged him and his head to fit.  His buttons are green stickles and the heart is liquid pearls.

 As you can see above, each ATC is similar but are slightly different.

The lovely girl on the card is "Holly" from Stampotique and the Merry Christmas sentiment on both the card and the sleeve is washi tape.

I'll be back very soon to show the Christmas cards I was making with the same background.

 

Happy Crafting!

 

 

APC Challenge - Week 12

Altered Playing Card Challenge

Week 12

This weeks challenge was to use designer paper on both cards

along with the letters "I" and "W".

"I" was the beginning of the sentence "I am thankful for ......."

with "W" the beginning of "What I like about myself"

All the words on the "I" card came from a couple of word sticker sheets that were in my stash and I simply chose ones that I felt I was 'thankful' for.

The second card was much harder as the statement "what I like about myself" takes a bit of thinking about.   These words are computer generated in different fonts as none of these words were on the sticker sheets. 

I think there needs to be a little embellishment or something just to finish these two cards off, but until I figure out just what that is, they will remain as you see them.

Happy Crafting!

 

APC Challenge - Week 11

Altered Playing Card Challenge

Week 11

Playing "catch-up" is fun and I'm almost there, but in the meantime have a look at my interpretation of Week 11 of the challenge.

This week, the challenge was to use a piece of paper towel used for mopping up.  The ink on my mop up paper towel has become quite dark but very sparkly (which unfortunately doesn't show up in the pic) but I went with it anyway.

On card #1 I adhered the paper towel to the playing card using a thin layer of clear gesso and left it to dry.  On card #2 I did the same but after say 30 seconds pulled it back off and it left colour from the inks on the towel behind as well as any pattern the towel may happen to have.  Pretty cool, eh? 

 

I stamped "Schu" from Stampotique, coloured him with Distress Markers and cut him out.  I thought I would add a touch of glitter to his wings using a clear Wink of Stella pen.  Wow!  This is so easy to use and SO glittery!  I then stamped the quote (also from Stampotique) cut it out and adhered down the side of Schu.

On card #2, I stamped the hearts (Stampotique again) three times and coloured them with Distress Markers.  I covered the end of a bamboo skewer (snapped off) with washi tape and fashioned a couple of leaves from the same to form a flower stem.  Hmmm ...... bit odd, this, and I'm not sure I like it very much, but hey, it's there and it's all a bit of a learning curve!

 

 I'll be back before you know it with Week 12, see you soon!

Happy Crafting!