Do you use your Stampin’ Up! catalogues for inspiration? I find them such a wonderful source of ideas and this week I’ve taken my inspiration from the 2019 Stampin’ Up! Holiday catalogue.
The 2019 Stampin’ Up! Holiday catalogue had very clever instructions on how to use your paper trimmer and the small Gleaming Ornaments Punch to make quick and easy Christmas crackers. As these ornament punches are currently available to purchase in the clearance rack (on sale for $35.40) I thought I would adapt this design and make a set of Christmas Crackers using the FREE SALE-a-bration Peaceful Prints DSP.
I’ve used 6 of the patterns from the Peaceful Prints DSP to make 6 crackers – I will make another 6 crackers using the reverse sides of this DSP before Christmas.
Here’s my template to make the crackers using the small ornament punch.
Trim a sheet of DSP to 9 x 8 inches
Score along the 8 inch side at 1 inch (this creates the flap for adhering the sides of the cracker together) and score again at 3, 5 and 7 inches
Fold along all these score lines
Fully insert small ornament punch to the edge of the DSP, ensuring the score line is in the centre of the ornament
Punch every score line at both ends of the DSP
Also punch at the 9 inch edge, lining up the centre of the punch with the edge of the DSP
Now score in the opposite direction, along the width of the cracker at the top, bottom and the centre of the punched out areas (see photo above) and then fold these score lines as per the photo below.
To assemble the cracker, fold up the 1 inch fold flap so that the DSP side that will be on the outside of the cracker is facing up.
Place Multipurpose Liquid Glue on this flap and fold over the cracker at the 5 inch fold, lining up the punched out areas. Press together to adhere.
Cut ribbon of choice into 14 inch (36 cm) lengths and tie into a bow at each end.
You can decorate the crackers any way you want. I used the Peaceful Deer bundle, the FREE SALE-a-bration Be Dazzling DSP and the Tailored Made Tags Dies to create coordinating deer tags for my crackers. I used some Sahara Sand twine to attach them to one end of the cracker, but you could also simply adhere them to the top of the cracker.
These crackers are empty right now because I am going to fill them with yummy treats closer to Christmas, such a Ferrero Rocher chocolate, Lindt Balls and little jokes. To fill them at a later time, simply untie the bow at one end, pop the treats inside and retie the bow.
You can make these Christmas crackers out of any DSP to match your Christmas table decoration.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the incredible talented Michele Taylor. I wait to see what Michele shares with us today!
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, Sharon Davern, as she has the full list of links for everyone who is participating.
You can purchase any of the products I’ve used tonight here.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday.
In the meantime, wherever you are in the world, stay safe, stay calm … and keep on crafting xxx
This week I’ve used a sentiment stamp set from the new July-December 2021 Mini Catalogue that could be easily overlooked, but I was lucky enough to win from my upline Claire, the Well Defined stamp set.
I’m not sure why I hadn’t used this stamp set before as I love dictionary definitions. In fact, I’ve just finished reading an amazing novel called “The Dictionary of Lost Words”, based on the true story of the women who were involved in the making of the Oxford English Dictionary. It’s a part of history I had never heard of before, beautifully told in one of the best books I’ve read this year.
Although these stamps have been created to look like an official dictionary entry, I’m not sure they would have been included in either the official Oxford Dictionary or even in the Dictionary of Lost Words!
I’ve got plenty of ideas for cards to make with each of the dictionary definitions, however I’ve just used the “holiday” definition stamp today because I wanted to pair it with the Sweets & Treats stamp set for a fun, festive and food-themed card.
Stampin’ Blends in light and dark Old Olive, Real Red and Soft Suede give my card a traditional Christmas colour scheme, with scribbles of the light Crumb Cake Stampin’ Blend to anchor the images.
The sentiment is stamped in Soft Suede before being mounted onto the chopping board die from the Cookin’ Dies. I love how this little die embosses the card stock at the same time as it cuts out the shape of the chopping board.
I stamped two extra the holly sprigs from the plum pudding image and fussy cut them out to add a little more festive cheer. Red Rhinestone jewels are the perfect fit for the little holly berries and add a touch of bling to the card.
I must admit, although I adore the plum pudding stamp, I actually hate plum pudding, Christmas cake or any desserts that include dried fruit. I would, however, happily eat the cupcakes, toffee apples and definitely the cherry pie!
I had a lot of fun making this card – I hope it puts a smile on your face too!
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the incredible talented Michele Taylor. I wait to see what Michele shares with us today!
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, Tina Gillespie, as she has the full list of links for everyone who is participating.
You can purchase any of the products I’ve used tonight here.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday.
In the meantime, wherever you are in the world, stay safe, stay calm … and keep on crafting xxx
The new July-December 2021 Mini Catalogue and SALE-a-bration catalogues go live tomorrow so I’m sharing another card that uses some of these beautiful Christmas products.
I’m not really a sparkly girly girl at all but I just can’t stop using this FREE Be Dazzling specialty designer paper from the SALE-a-bration catalogue. I’ve taken a zillion photos of my card to show you just how gorgeous this Be Dazzling specialty designer paper is!
I’ve also used one of my favourite bundles from the July-December 2021 Mini Catalogue – the Happy Holly-Days Bundle. Last week I shared this card with you that featured the adorable bird coloured in – this week I’ve used the holly stamp and the Holly Border Punch from the Happy Holly-Days Bundle.
What’s that stunning striped Designer Series Paper I hear you cry? It’s my favourite DSP from the new July-December 2021 Mini Catalogue, called Whimsy & Wonder Designer Series Paper.
I cannot begin to tell you how stunning this DSP is. The colour combination is: Polished Pink, Blushing Bride, Mossy Meadow, Mint Macaron, Misty Moonlight and Iridescent. It is foiled on one side, with gorgeous background patterns (like the stripes I’ve used today) on the other side.
This card layout would work with any Designer Series Paper – just pick up the colours in the DSP for when you colour in the holly. I used light and dark Polished Pink, Mossy Meadow and Mint Macaron blends to colour the holly and then I fussy cut it out. If you don’t enjoy fussy cutting just use the holly punch to punch out cardstock in colours that co-ordinate with your DSP.
An added bonus of this punch is the little dots it punches out – don’t waste them! Just like I did with the Deer Builder punch on this card, I’ve used these dots as tiny embellishments.
These tiny dots can be tricky to adhere as they are so small. I find the easiest way to do this is to place a small amount of multipurpose glue onto the silicon mat and then insert the sharp tip of your “Take your Pick” tool into the glue. Use this tip with the glue to pick up the back of the embellishment, place it on your card and gently press down as you slide the “Take your Pick” tool out from under the embellishment.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the incredible talented Theresa Gerrard. I wait to see what Theresa shares with us today!
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.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday. If you’d like a copy of the forthcoming July-December mini catalogue and the Sale-a-bration catalogueplease get in touch.
I’m loving the challenge of creating a Christmas card each week and I hope you’re being inspired to create some too.
If you enjoy colouring techniques the Happy Holly-Days stamp set from the forthcoming July-December 2021 mini catalogue is a must!
Both this bird stamp and the holly stamp could be coloured using a variety of watercolour techniques or the Stampin’ Up! watercolour pencils, but for my card today I’ve quickly coloured the images in using our Stampin’ Blends.
The holly is coloured in using light and dark Soft Succulent and light Poppy Parade Stampin’ Blends, while the bird is coloured with Light and dark Crumb Cake, light Flirty Flamingo and light Poppy Parade Stampin’ Blends…love this colour combination!
Basic Black
Crumb Cake
Sahara Sand
Soft Succulent
Flirty Flamingo
Poppy Parade
The softly patterned Sahara Sand DSP is from the Tidings of Christmas 6″ x 6″ Designer Series Paper – on sale until August 2.
It was very easy to fussy cut both the bird and the holly. This Happy Holly-Days stamp set is actually part of a bundle with the holly border punch, but I only used the stamp set on this card.
To ‘anchor’ the bird onto the card I used the light Crumb Cake Stampin’ Blend on the Basic White cardstock layer that has been die cut using the second largest Scalloped Contour die.
I inked up the word ‘Happy’ from the “Happy Christmas’ sentiment and stamped it first and then inked and stamped the word ‘Christmas’ below it. Crumb Cake twine wrapped around the card and tied into a soft bow finishes off the card.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the very talented Ros Davidson – I can’t wait to see what Ros shares with us today.
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, Tina Gillespie, and she will have the list of all who are participating.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday. If you’d like a copy of the forthcoming July-December mini catalogue and the Sale-a-bration catalogueplease get in touch.
Are you ready for some more Christmas inspiration?
It’s pretty cold here in Sydney at the moment so I’ve made a very wintery card for you today using a new bundle from the forthcoming July-December Mini catalogue.
I have to confess this card wasn’t meant to be this simple – I had intended to make a shaker card using the new cloche shaker domes that match the Classic Cloche bundle but I forgot to order them! Luckily, this bundle really lends itself to both simple and more complex cards.
I fell in love with this little snowy town which is why this bundle made it to the very top of my wish list. There is also an adorable pair of birds sitting on branches in the stamp set and plenty of dies to create different scenes – I’ve only used the cloche die in this this card and I can’t wait to play with the other dies on some more Christmas cards soon.
The little village image can either be used on its own and hand coloured, or you can use the 3 layer stamps as it I’ve done in this card. I stamped the cloche outline stamp and the village line image stamp in Tuxedo Memento, the background stamp in Balmy Blue and the stamp that shades the houses in Misty Moonlight.
The Wintry embossing folder was the perfect background layer for my snowy village. This embossing folder is available now and it is one of a pack of two – they will be getting a lot of use on my Christmas cards this year.
The Balmy Blue Adhesive-Backed Gems were the perfect embellishment to highlight the middle of the snowflakes on the embossed layer.
You don’t always have to use Christmas paper to make a Christmas card – this spotted DSP is from the You’re a Peach Designer Series Paper (currently on sale) and it reminded me of snowflakes! I really love this sentiment from the Classic Cloche stamp set.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, our very talented Art With Heart team leader, Claire Daly. I can’t wait to see what Claire shares with us today.
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, Sharon Davern, and she will have the list of all who are participating.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday. If you’d like a copy of the forthcoming July-December mini catalogue and the Sale-a-bration catalogueplease get in touch.
With our Art with Heart Team Christmas blog hop providing Christmas card inspiration for you every Monday night I should have all my Christmas cards made by December – I just need to remember to send them in time!
My pre-order of Christmas products from the July-December mini catalogue and the Sale-a-bration catalogue arrived this week. That’s right, Stampin’ Up! is holding TWO Sale-a-bration periods this year – this second Sale-a-bration period starts on August 3, the same day as the July-December mini catalogue.
I’m so excited to share a card I made using one of these FREE Sale-a-bration products, the Be Dazzling 6″ X 6″ Specialty Paper.
Isn’t this Be Dazzling 6″ X 6″ Specialty Paper so stunning! It will definitely make any card feel extra special. The colour is hard to describe – it’s sort of a pale champagne colour that will coordinate with either silver or gold, as well as many of the neutrals, including Sahara Sand and Crumb Cake.
The other new products on this card are from the Peaceful Deer Bundle, which includes the Peaceful Deer Stamp Set and the Deer Builder Punch, both available from August 3.
At just $62 for the bundle, this is such an affordable and a versatile set. The Peaceful Deer Stamp Set has great sentiments and a good variety of images, including a deer that coordinates with the punch – perfect for crafters who don’t own a die cutting machine.
The beautiful Designer Series Paper I’ve used as my background is not a Christmas paper from the forthcoming July-December mini catalogue, however, I think it works really well on this card.
This Bloom Where You’re Planted Designer Series Paper is available now and on sale for $17.00 – I’ve used the sheet shown on the bottom left.
I wanted to add a few embellishments to my DSP as it is such a dark background. Looking at the scraps on paper on my craft desk I realised there is a very small circle shape in the Deer Builder Punch. I think it is meant to be the deer’s eye but I used it to punch out my own embellishments.
I love the effect of these embellishments – it’s a great way to use up the scraps! This photo – taken outside in a brief moment of sun on this rainy day – shows my embellishments close up, as well as how sparkly this paper is.
I stamped the inside of the card to match, using another sentiment and one of the tree stamps from the Peaceful Deer Stamp Set as well as adding a narrow strip of the Be Dazzling paper top and bottom.
To get the three shades of green for the trees on the back of the envelope flap, I stamped the tree stamp once at full strength in Evening Evergreen and then a second time and a third time without re-inking the stamp.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the very talented, Sharon Davern. I wonder if she will share another fabulous fancy fold card with us?
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, Tina Gillespie, and she will have the list of all who are participating.
Thanks for visiting my site. I’ll be back with another card on Wednesday. If you’d like a copy of the forthcoming July-December mini catalogue and the Sale-a-bration catalogueplease get in touch.
I know it’s only July, but in this house it’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!!!
Why, you may ask? Well firstly, it’s Week One of our Heart of Christmas blog hop for 2021, yeah!
And secondly, as a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator I’ve already got my hands on the brand new July-December mini catalogue, jam packed with lots of beautiful Christmas products! My pre-order will be arriving in the next few days, so watch this space for upcoming sneak peeks. Here’s the cover…
For tonight, I’ve made a card that uses two products you can already get your hands on. Festive Foliage is a brand new background stamp set from the 2021-22 Annual Catalogue (p90) and the Poinsettia Petals Photopolymer Stamp Set (p92) and coordinating Poinsettia dies (p165) which have carried over from last year’s Holiday catalogue.
This Festive Foliage background stamp is a great alternative to using DSP because with a single stamp (I always use my Stamparatus for stamping background stamps) you get a large image that covers an entire layer. You can either stamp this image in any coloured ink and leave it uncoloured OR colour it in with blends, markers, pencils, pastels or even watercolour it using water painters and inks. TIP – don’t forget to use Stayzon ink instead of Memento ink if you are water colouring.
I’ve stamped in Memento and then coloured the image in with Evening Evergreen, Real Red, Crumb Cake and Soft Succulent dark and light Stampin’ Blends.
To add layers, textures and a sentiment to my card, I chose the Poinsettia Petals Photopolymer Stamp Set and coordinating Poinsettia dies as the images and die shapes work so well with the Festive Foliage stamp set.
I’ve die cut flowers and leaves and strategically placed them under the sentiment to add a bit of dimension to the card WITHOUT covering all of the lovely hand coloured background image. Some of the flower petals I used as leaves by tearing them off the main flower.
It’s hard to see in my photos, but I’ve used the new Soft Succulent 2021–2023 In Color Shimmer Vellum for the green sprigs – it adds such a lovely subtle shimmer to my card. This photo from a Annual catalogue gives you a better idea of the shimmer.
Finally, the Poinsettia Petals Photopolymer Stamp Set was perfect for decorating the inside of my card and the back flap of my envelope too.
Now it’s time to hop on over to our next participant, the very talented, Claire Daly.
If you find a broken link or have come to this blog hop from a different entry point, you can view the full list of participants on Sharon Davern’s blog.
To purchase any of the products used in my cards today you can add them to your cart here.
Welcome to week twenty-six of our 2020-2021 Art With Heart Colour Creations Showcase.
Each week various members of our Art With Heart Colour Creations team will be bringing you weekly colour inspiration as we showcase our range of over 50 beautiful Stampin’ Up! colours in alphabetical order.
Week 26 – Merry Merlot
Hello crafters. This week I’m sharing a Christmas card I’ve made using an entirely neutral colour palette – I really love any combination of neutrals together on a card.
Merry Merlot is our colour for this week and I’ve only used a tiny bit of it on my card because it is a very rich colour. Hopefully I’ve used enough to show you how nicely it pairs with these other neutrals.
If there ever were two bundles just crying out to be used together it’s the Beautiful World bundle on p26 of the annual catalogue and the Peace & Joy bundle on page 18 of the August to December Mini catalogue. I love how Stampin’ Up! co-ordinate their products right through their range.
The “faux embossed” background of my Gray Granite slimline card was easy to make using the globe dies and adhesive sheets. Just remember to attach a sheet to the back of your card stock before you die cut. Next time I make this card I think I’ll add more globes and space them more closely together for even greater impact.
The joy sentiment uses all three joy die cuts from the Peace & Joy bundle. Adding adhesive sheet to the card stock for the thinest joy on the top layer makes it easy to adhere.
Apart from the middle layer of the joy sentiment the other touch of Merry Merlot on the card is the Rhinestone Basic Jewels which I have coloured using my Merry Merlot Stampin’ Write Marker.
The pine fronds were stamped in Mossy Meadow and fussy cut out using my paper snips.
I can’t wait to see what the rest of the Art With Heart team have created with Merry Merlot today. Click on the links below to see what they’ve made.
If you’d like me to post you your very own copy of the August–December 2020 Mini Catalogue, 2020-21 Stampin Up! Annual Catalogue, the 2020-21 Beginners Brochure, or to simply find out about more about Stampin’ Up! contact me.
In the meantime, wherever you are in the world, stay safe, stay calm…and keep on crafting xxx
Welcome to the Heart of Christmas 2020 where the Art with Heart team share their Christmas inspiration with you on the third Monday of each month.
Today I’m sharing with you an advent calendar that I made for my 4 year old niece – it is the Christmas Countdown kit. Advent calendars are a tradition in our family, in fact last year my boys turned 18 and 21 and it was the first Christmas they didn’t have an advent calendar!
This advent calendar was so easy to make using the Christmas Countdown kit. All I needed was some adhesive because the kit includes the paper for the front of the drawers, the numbers and stickers to personalise each drawer.
The big decision with a refillable advent calendar is what to put inside the drawers. My boys would receive a gold coin and a chocolate coin each day. On Christmas Eve we would go shopping and they would use half their coins to buy a gift for their brother and then we would visit a local street renowned for their Christmas lights where my boys would donate the rest of their coins to a charity.
For my niece I’ve mixed things up a bit. She is just getting into LEGO so I bought a little LEGO set for her and split the pieces between 1/3 of the drawers, filling the other drawers with baubles to hang on her Christmas tree and of course some chocolate coins!
As this will be my niece’s first ever advent calendar and I won’t be there to explain the concept to her I made a matching card and envelope to go with the calendar. I used the left over stickers and paper drawer fronts to decorate my card and envelope.
The tree for the envelope and the card is made by adhering the stickers and paper to some card stock and then punching it out with the tree punch. I’ve also punched out the star from the die cuts included in the kit and used a red bow sticker, also included in the kit.
I don’t want my niece to lose her tiny LEGO pieces so I cut out the front of the LEGO box and stuck it to a mini Paper Pumpkin box. Inside the box I put the LEGO instructions and a ziplock bag to keep everything safe.
Here’s the inside of the card – the “no peeking” sentiment comes from the Itty bitty Christmas stamp set, as does the sentiment on the front of the card.
Once I’d written inside the card and explained the concept of an advent calendar to my niece, I placed the card on top of the mini Paper Pumpkin box and tied them together with the Mossy Meadow diagonal striped ribbon.
I’m so excited to be carrying on this Christmas tradition in our family with this beautiful Christmas advent calendar.
The lovely Judy May is hosting our Heart of Christmas showcase this year. To see the other Christmas creations go back to Judy’s post.
If you’d like me to post you your very own copy of the August – December Mini catalogue (AKA the Holiday Catalogue), the 2020-21 Stampin Up! Annual Catalogue, the 2020-21 Beginners Brochure, or to simply find out about more about Stampin’ Up! contact me.
In the meantime, wherever you are in the world, stay safe, stay calm…and keep on crafting xxx
Click on the photos below to purchase the items to make this Advent Calendar and matching card.
Welcome to the Heart of Christmas 2020 where the Art with Heart team share their Christmas inspiration with you on the third Monday of each month.
Today I’m sharing with you three cards that feature a brand new suite of products that will be available to purchase from 3rd November: the Curvy Celebrations bundle.
You can purchase these products together as a bundle and get 10% off or you can purchase these products individually.
Quite Curvy Stamp Set
Curvy Dies
Curvy Christmas Stamp Set
Classic Christmas 6″ x 6″ (15.2 x 15.2 cm) Designer Series Paper
My first card is a simple folded card that uses one of the curvy dies to cut the card stock and the Classic Christmas 6″ x 6″ (15.2 x 15.2 cm) Designer Series Paper.
Here is it folded up.
Unfolded once.
And fully opened up.
Look at this beautiful Designer Series Paper and the detail in these Curvy Dies. I’ve used the Sahara Sand tree pattern DSP for this card because it matches the Curvy Tree Stamp – how cute is this line of trees!
I really love this DSP – it comes in Sahara Sand, Cherry Cobbler and Shaded Spruce, 48 sheets of double-sided patterned paper; with 4 each of 12 designs.
For my next card I used the sprig die to cut out Sahara Sand and Whisper White card stock sprigs to make a wreath.
My little red robin was coloured in using Crumb Cake and Cherry Cobbler Stampin’ blends and the bow was coloured in with Cherry Cobbler Stampin’ blends before fussy cutting out with my paper snips. Holiday Rhinestone Jewels add a touch of bling.
Lastly, for the square card I also used the Gold Hoop embellishments and the sprig dies.
There’s just so many possibilities with this amazing suite!
The lovely Judy May is hosting our Heart of Christmas showcase this year. To see the other Christmas creations go back to Judy’s post.
If you’d like me to post you your very own copy of the August – December Mini catalogue (AKA the Holiday Catalogue), the 2020-21 Stampin Up! Annual Catalogue, the 2020-21 Beginners Brochure, or to simply find out about more about Stampin’ Up! contact me.
In the meantime, wherever you are in the world, stay safe, stay calm…and keep on crafting xxx
