Heart Of Christmas Week 19

 Hi!

Welcome back to my blog for the new week of the Heart Of Christmas Blog Hop. It's week 19 this week, which means that my Christmas card stash has over 76 cards. I'm well and truly ready for starting to send them out - apart from the writing on them bit! LOL!! I hope you are well on your way to being organised, too.

This week my cards are based on the January 2021 Sheetload Of Cards template. I combined it with Heartwarming Hugs DSP, Gingerbread Dies and the retired Christmas Greetings Thinlits. I chose to put the Gingerbread baubles on my card, as I had the Red Foil pieces floating around on my desk, and I was sick of shuffling them around! They were left overs from my HOC cards from a month or so ago, and were 'too good' to just chuck out. It was a simple matter of cutting the baubles in Pear Pizzazz (with Adhesive sheet on the back), adhering them to the white cardstock and then piecing the Red Foil bits into the Pear baubles. Fiddly, but I like the effect, so it was worth it.

The insides were completed with a strip of the Heartwarming Hugs DSP and a sentiment from Christmas To Remember.

Here's the four cards together. Do you see my 'whoopsie'? Although, looking at this photo, I think I prefer my whoopsie and wish I'd made all four cards the same way. Oh well!

Please do keep making your way around the Hop. Just jump around to the next blog and keep on jumping until you get back to where you started. The next stop tonight is the lovely Caroline Manwaring. Do you have a whole bunch of her card photos saved to CASE? I do!!

Our Hop Hostess with the mostess this week is Sharon Davern. She's done a great job of keeping us organised for the Hop. If you find a broken link, pop on over to her blog and pick up the trail again there. She's got a list of all tonight's participants on her blog.

Bye for now,

Tina

CTC 342: CASE Your Favourite Mini Project

 Hi!

Hello again! It's been about a month since I've been able to play along with the CTC Crew, and I'm so glad to be back! Last time I'd posted Hudson and I were both unwell, and it's taken me this long to get caught up with everything that needed to be caught up with. 

This week we are challenging you to CASE your favourite Mini Catalogue project. There's two months left to enjoy the products in this catalogue, so maybe this blog hop/challenge will help you to discover some new favourites. An old favourite of mine is the Heartwarming Hugs DSP, so this card caught my eye when I was flicking through the catalogue for inspiration.

I love the shimmer paste snowflakes, and the angled sentiment dividing the card is fabulous. I went for a completely different DSP and colour scheme though!

Many years ago, SU released a suite of Christmas products that included Whisper White,Coastal Cabana and Real Red. I've loved that combo for Christmas cards ever since! Today's card is a little different, as the DSP (from Pattern Party Host DSP) is Pool Party. I matched it with Poppy Parade and Silver Foil.

The snowflakes are from the Gingerbread Dies, and the sentiments are from Christmas To Remember. I applied Adhesive Sheet to the back of the Silver Foil before cropping the snowflakes. Way less messy than trying to apply glue after they are cut!

I actually made two of these cards, because the way you cut the DSP on the front suits two cards. I simply cut a card front sized piece of DSP and measured 3.5 inches down from the top left corner and up from the bottom right corner. I then cut from mark to mark. I cut through the DSP and cardstock at the same time so that they would be perfectly matched. It's never too much extra work to create a second card at the same time, and it's a great way to boost your Christmas card stash a little faster. We all need that at this time of year.

As always, you can join in with our challenge by posting a photo of your creation to our Facebook group. It's that easy!

Please continue your way around our blog hop tonight, as there's plenty of gorgeous inspiration to be found. Next up is Peta Stephen, with a beautifully, serene Christmas card.

Bye for now,

Tina

Heart Of Christmas Week 16

 Hi!

Welcome to a new week's Heart Of Christmas Blog Hop. We are up to Week 16 this week, and the inspiration flowing from the other ladies who participate in the Hops has not waned at all. It's been wonderful viewing everyone's cards each week.

But now onto my cards! This week I am using the October 2020 Sheetload Of Cards template. I actually skipped September 2020's, as it was for Slimline cards, and I wasn't in the mood for those. I liked the simplicity of this design, which allows the Red Foil bauble, from the Gingerbread Dies, to shine.

The sentiments I used on my cards are from the Words Of Cheer stamp set, and I have used some Heartwarming Hugs DSP to go with it. I was happy to see that the DSP had carried over from last year's Mini Catalogue, as it uses traditional Christmas colours, but not traditional images and patterns. It's a much more modern looking paper.

As always, here are my four cards. You can see that the baubles are a double layer of the Red Foil, and are finished off with a white Twine bow.

As always, thank you for your company on my blog tonight, but please do jump on over to the next blog. Michele Taylor is next, and she always has something totally gorgeous to see.

Just in case you run into a broken link along the way, pop back here for the list of all participants in tonight's Blog Hop:

Michele Taylor

Kate Morgan

Catherine Proctor

Andrea Sargent

Claire Daly

Rachel Woollard

Theresa Gerrard

Sharon Davern

Rosa Leyden

Caroline Manwaring

Ros Davidson

Christine Blain

Bye for now,

Tina

Colour Creations: Gorgeous Grape

 Hi!

It's Wednesday evening, which means it's Colour Creations time! This week we are featuring Gorgeous Grape, which is a colour that sits in the Brights colour family. It's my 'Goldilocks' purple - not too dark and not too light, it's jut right. LOL!! One of my younger sisters' favourite colour is purple, so I try to make her a purple Christmas card each year, so I took this opportunity to make her card, ready for December.

I started by using a Blending Brush on a piece of Expressions In Ink SDSP to create the ombre background. The snowflakes over the top are from the Gingerbread Dies. They looked a little sparse to me, so each snowflake is actually two layers, with the top layer offset from the first. The fuller look is very pretty! I also swished some WinkOf Stella over the top, but unfortunately is was too dull on the day I took toe photos for the glimmer to be seen. You'll just have to imagine how shimmery they are.

While I had the brush out, I also cut the sentiment label from Whisper White card with one of my new Tasteful Labels Dies. I then lightly brushed ink around the very edges before I removed the cardstock from the die, leaving a gorgeous white border all the way around the label. It's such a cool effect, as it allows the embossed detail in the border shine and frames the Christmas To Remember sentiment perfectly.

When I created the ombre piece for the front of the card, I cut the DSP an inch wider than it needed to be so that I could use the offcuts for the inside of my card. Such a great, time-saving idea. I finished off the inside with another double layer snowflake, this time in Gorgeous Grape.

Thanks again for joining me, but please do jump on over to the lovely Vicki Boucher's blog next. A few of her Gorgeous Grape cards came up in my google search for inspiration for tonight's card, so I'm sure that she's made another stunner this time.

As always for Colour Creations, pop on over to Cathy Proctor's blog if you find a broken link, or if you simply want to see the list of all the ladies participating in tonight's hop.

Bye for now,

Tina

Heart Of Christmas Week 11

 Hi!

Welcome back to the eleventh week of Heart Of Christmas Blog Hops. I hoe you've been following along each week, as we've had plenty of gorgeous Christmas inspiration for you to see.

I was a little more organised this week, so I was able to get back to the Sheetload Of Cards templates. This week I used the April 2020 template.

I based this design completely around the Silver Foil layer that is peeking out from under the spotty layer. It's the purplish foil in the new silver pack, that I don't particularly like. This was a good way to use it up! I cropped the Gingerbread Dies bauble from the centre of the foil panel before I embossed it with the Subtle 3D folder.

The DSP that I've used is the Hostess Pack, called Pattern Party. I've just used B&W papers so that I can use whichever colours I like with it - in this case I chose Mint Macaron. The sentiments are from Christmas To Remember.

As always with the Sheetload cards, I made four to add to my stash.

That's all from me for tonight, but please do continue your way around our Blog Hop - there's lots of wonderful cards to see, starting with my lovely friend, Kate Morgan.

I'm once again hosting this week's Heart Of Christmas Blog Hop. Pop back to my blog if you have a problem along with way with links - you'll be able to pick up your trail again here.

Kate Morgan
Catherine Proctor
Christine Blain
Michele Taylor
Sharon Davern
Caroline Manwaring
Rachel Woollard
Andrea Sargent
Theresa Gerrard
Rosa Leyden
Ros Davidson

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI 571: Just Add Lines

 Hi!

Thanks for joining me for the new Just Add Ink challenge. This week Kelly is challenging us to add lines to our cards.

Hmm, that got me thinking about all the ways to add lines to a project. There's a lot of choices - stamping, stencilling, DSP, scoring, just to name a few. Now, you know that I like to think out of the box for these challenges, and initially I was thinking about trying to incorporate a one-liner joke into a card, but I couldn't make it work. Then I was going through my Christmas supplies and found a subway art style stamp from Ink Road Stamps, called Subway Art: Christmas. It's perfect for the challenge - it consists of a whole lot of lines from Christmas songs.

I started by stamping the lines on Whisper White card in Garden Green ink, and then used a Blending Brush to apply some more ink around the edges. It was matted on a piece of Peaceful Prints DSP and then to a Garden Green card base.

One of the lines in the stamp was from Silver Bells, one of my favourite Christmas songs. It inspired the silver foil bells on the front of my card. The dies are from the Gingerbread Dies set, and both layers are cut from the Silver Foil - isn't it a cool effect?

I cut an extra bell to go on the inside. I backed the foil with adhesive sheet before cropping the bells. This helps to keep all of the little pieces in place. I removed them for the bells on the front, as they were double layered, but I kept them in place for the inside bell. The sentiment is from Words Of Cheer.

That's all from me for tonight, but please do head on over to the Just Add Ink blog, where you'll find the rest of this week's Design Team cards. You can also link up your card for our challenge. The hardest part will be deciding how to add lines to your card!

Bye for now,

Tina

CTC 334: Gingerbread & Peppermint Suite

 Hi!

Happy Sunday! And Happy Father's Day to the dads out there! My kids treated Rob to a sleep in, some thoughtful gifts and pancakes for breakfast. My daughter also plans to cook dinner, so I'm sure Rob will say he's had a great day.

This week for the CASEing The Catty Sunday Challenge, we are asking you to CASE the Gingerbread & Peppermint Suite. We've expanded that to include pages 8 to 15, so there is plenty of choice for you to CASE. I'm very much a blue girl, so this card on page 13 caught my eye.

I loved the gold snowflakes against the deep blue, and the soft sponging over the sentiment. I'm still tossing up about buying those snowflake dies - they are very pretty, but I don't often use snowflakes on my Christmas cards.

I do have the Gingerbread Dies, and so I used the snowflake die from that set on my card. I backed a piece of the Gold Brushed Metallics paper with some Adhesive Sheet before die cutting, so that the delicate snowflake was easy to adhere to my card. 

The background of my card is a retired embossing folder, I think called Winter Snow. I sponged over the top of it with a Blending Brush and Misty Moonlight ink, making sure that it was darker around the edges and faded to white in the middle.

I did a little more sponging on the inside so that I could add another gold snowflake over the top. The sentiments I used are from Christmas To Remember, with the front on cropped using a Stitched So Sweetly Die.

After you've finished checking out our Blog Hop, don't forget to pop on over to our Facebook group. You need to be a member to enter the challenge, but that's an easy process. We can't wait to see what you make.

Next up tonight is the wonderful Peta Stephen. You won't want to miss her gorgeous metallic card.

Bye for now,

Tina

Colour Creations: Cherry Cobbler

 Hi!

Well, hello, and welcome to this week's Colour Creations Blog Hop. It's Cherry Cobbler time! Despite having to wear a very similar colour as my Winter high school uniform, I quite like Cherry Cobbler, especially for Christmas cards.

Once again, my Gingerbread Dies are the focus of my card. I haven't used the bell yet, so this was a great opportunity. I cropped the top layer from Gold Foil, making sure I added Adhesive Sheet to the back of the foil. It makes it soooo much easier to adhere to the solid layer - no messing around with liquid glue that always seems to ooze out of the sides!

My sentiment is from Christmas To Remember. I toyed around with embossing the top, Whisper White part of the card, but decided against it, as I wanted to stamp the sentiment on the layer. If I wasn't so lazy at the time, I could have clear heat-embossed an image over the card. Maybe another time!

I cropped another bell from Cherry Cobbler card to go on the inside of my card. It looked a little plain, so I used some of the bits that popped out of the foil bell on the front to fill in the Cherry Cobbler bell. I quite like how that turned out!

Next up in tonight's Blog Hop is the wonderful Rachel Woollard. Please pop on over to her blog to see what awesomeness she's created.

Sometimes our technology goes wrong, so if you find a broken link please jump on over to Catherine Proctor’s blog, where you'll find a complete list of participants. You can pick up your trail there!

Bye for now,

Tina

Heart Of Christmas Week 5

 Hi!

Welcome back to Week 5 of the Heart Of Christmas Blog Hop. This week my cards were made using the November 2019 Sheetload of Cards template. I've also switched back to using the Pattern Party Host DSP, as I really love the non-traditional feel of the cards made with the DSP.

The Gingerbread Dies are a great way of adding some decoration to the front of the card, I made sure I backed my Misty Moonlight cardstock with some Adhesive sheet to make adhering the die cut to the solid Pool Party star much easier.

The sentiments on my card are from Christmas To Remember. I love that it includes this sentiment just for friends, as I send a lot of Christmas cards out to friends as well as family.

Here's my group of four cards that I've added to my stash. I have a good-sized pile now!

Please do continue on with our Blog Hop this evening. Next up is the lovely Rosa, with what is bound to be a gorgeous card or two.

If at any time you find a broken link please head to the blog of this week’s Host of the Heart of Christmas Blog Hop, Rachel Woollard, and she will have the list of all who are participating.