Rudolf Day Challenge # November 2021

It is that time again so here are my last Christmas cards for this year. In fact all my cards for UK are already written and posted to my sister who will post them on next month. But I still needed a few for local friends, so I made these three simple box cards.

They are made with a cutting file purchased from SVGCuts, and cut on my Silhouette Cameo machine. Fortunately there was a video showing the best way to assemble them.

Each 'box' has three main layers. I chose to add some embossed panels to the front of each one, but this was optional.

Before assembling them I added a stamped sentiment on the back of the first panel.  (Stamp from an old set by Sentimentally Yours).

This shows how the three layers fit together, and it does all fold flat for easy posting.

There were extra layers for the star and angel to give them some dimension, and I added a tiny holographic star to the centre of the card star, just for a tiny bit of sparkle.

As my Cameo machine was in the mood to cut really well, and I had a pack of American craft card in vanilla which happens to be the best card I have found for the machine, these cards were relatively quick and easy to make.

Now I think it is time to stop making cards and concentrate on a couple of decorations that I have on my 'to do' list.

But first I will link up with the November Rudolf day Challenge with Scrappy Mo.

Rudolph Day Challenge#October.

I had a nice little surprise this week when my prize from the July challenge finally arrived. (Not Mo's fault I hasten to add. I think it had been 'resting' in customs!)

It was a very pretty little nativity die so I decided to use it straight away, and these are what I made.

I am not sure but I think I prefer the one without the brown mat behind the frame. They are on the same colour base cards, somewhere between these two, but the camera saw them differently!

I have not used yupo paper before. I bought a pack ages ago. I can't even remember my reason but I must have had a plan at the time! Anyway I thought it was time to have a go and I used it with alcohol inks. It was great fun and kept the colours true and bright. I engineered them slightly to get the paler yellow area behind the crib, but other than that I let it do its own thing,

I chose the best place for the die to go, then glued it in place and cut round it. Then I cut a gold scroll frame from vinyl on my Silhuette Cameo, and also a brown mat for it on one.

I mounted it all on a 15cm card cut from a 12" x 12" sheet of American Crafts vanilla card, and added a die cut gold star above the crib.

I also received some black diecuts of the three kings, and for them I covered two sheets of yupo paper with shades of blue alcohol inks. When they were dry I lightly spritzed them with a very old silver mica mist, and glued the die cuts over this. 

Then I cut two white base cards and stamped a line of script using another ancient warrior, a Serendipity stamp, and glued my inked piece below it. This time I added a silver star.

Easy cards to make and quite efective so Thank You Maureen.

I will be adding these to the October Rudolph day Challenge.

Revisiting old techniques for Rudolph Day#September.

I was not sure whether there would be a challenge this month but I decided to make a card or two anyway. I have seen several posts recently of cards made using alcohol inks on Acetate instead of glossy card which I am more familiar with, so I decided to have a go. (There are plenty of youtube videos on this if you are interested).

I was surprised to find my inks were still fine, as it is years since I last  used them. The only ones that had discoloured were the metallic mixatives, and as I couldn't find anywhere around here that sells them, I ended up buying a set of three of a different make from Amazon.es. It turned out they were not really mixatives (language problem, lost in translation!), so they tended to stay where I put them and I used a pointed stick to move them around a bit.

I used two techniques for applying the ink to the acetate, first by dripping it on directly and adding drops of blender and letting it do its own thing, This resulted in the darker panels on two of my cards. The other two, which are lighter I used a felt applicater and 'pounced' it onto the acetate. It took several layers to get enough colour to show.

Then I cut two European size base cards (17 x 11.5cms), one A6 and one 13.5 cm square. I used a large embossing folder of holly to make the next layer for three of them, and then cut panels of the acetate and attached one to each card, edging them with ancient gold peel-offs.

Then I turned to my dies and cut the Memory box Holly swirl, and an ornate tree (maker unknown), and made a green mat for the swirl in my Silhouette cameo soft ware. I mounted these over the inked panels on two cards and added a die-cut sentiment.

For the third one I used an Altnew set of layered stamps and matching die to make the poinsettia and aded gold foliage from a Crafter's Companion set.

The fourth one is a bit different because I used a smaller piece of inked acetate to cut out two layers of a ponsettia, and added two filigree layers from gold mirri-card and red card. This was a set purchased for my cutting machine from a private designer via Facebook. I layered it up and added some gold holly sprays, also a file in my Silhouette library,  and a small peel off sentiment.

Now I will link up with Scrappy Mo for the September Rudolph Day Challenge.

Rudolph Day Challenge#July

Out here in Spain it is very hot, so we don't do more than we have to, and days and dates seem to all merge into one. But yesterday was my son't birthday so I was aware of the date and ready for today's challenge.

As it is still too hot and sticky to do too much paper work I once again relied on cut items but instead of my cameo machine, I used die cuts this month. The angels and the oval frame dies are all from an unlabelled die company online called Kokorosa Studio, and my cards are a take on one of their examples, but of course I added my own touches.

I am determined to work through some of my extensive stash so I searched through my drawer of pre-cut and folded cards with envelopes and found some 15cm squares in white with a scalloped edge and embossed dots all over, and plain ones in cream, and decided they would do. Basically I made my card in three ways. Because the white backing was embossed I left it uncovered and just added a frame and the angels.

For others I covered the base in backing paper before adding the die cuts.

And for a couple where I felt the backing paper was too dark to show the stamped wording, I cut a plain oval from inside the frame to reveal the lighter backing. 

On all of them the stamped wording is a Heartfelt Creations stamp and the two 'Happy Christmas' dies are a Britannia die and a Creative Expressions Craft die.

My husband was trying to sort a problem on my computer, so to keep busy and out of his way, I went through my oddments of papers, holographic card,  and mirri-card, and cut nine sets. Then I had an assembly line and made them all up. One design is different because I wanted to use up an odd, non-standard base card I found in my box, and this seemed like a good opportunity.

It is a while since I did a run of cards but it feels good to have this set of nine to add to my collection. So I will link them up to the Rudolph Day Challenge #July at Scraps of life by Scrappy Mo.

Rudolf Day Challenge for June 2021

I have been busy with other projects for my new Grand-daughter but I wanted one card ready for the Rudolph Day Challenge, so once again I turned to my Silhouette Cameo machine. It is too hot here now for lots of stamping and colouring etc, but I can manage to cut something with my machine. I bought a few new cut files from the Silhouette store recently and one of them was this reindeer mandala.

I wanted to use different colours for each round so I spent some time playing around with it in the software, to make separate files for each section.

I resized it making it small enough to fit on a 15 cm square card, which made some of the cuts very intricate so I decided to cut them from vinyl, as it is an easier medium to use than card.

I have started using a different make of blades instead of the Silhouette ones as my machine is now out of guarantee so it doesn't matter. They have good write ups on various Facebook pages I follow and I must say I am very pleased with it so far. This delicate cut worked perfectly first time, and it wasn't too difficult to weed out the unwanted parts.

I chose gold vinyl for the snowflakes and cut them first. Then used transfer tape to lift them all together and place them on the base card (not quite centrally as I wanted space at the top for a sentiment). Then I used dark brown for the larger reindeer - not black as they look in the photo!, and fitted them between the snowflakes, and finally I cut the inner ring of smaller deer with a light brown vinyl. See how well it has cut the antlers and snowflakes.

I chose an old sentiment stamp and heat embossed it in gold, but it isn't perfect as the card was too textured.

Then because I like a bit of bling on Christmas cards, I added some sparkly gems to the centre of each snowflake and a group of three in the lower corner to balance the sentiment. So there we have it, and I could easily make more the same or in other colourways, should I need to.

So now it is time to link up with Rudolph Day Challenge # June, on Scraps of life by Scrappy Mo.

Rudolph Day Challenge for May

My word, the 25th of each month sure comes around fast doesn't it? But here we are so time show a new Christmas card and here is mine. 

A few weeks ago a lady called Nicky Viner posted a cutting file for a simple tri-fold concertina mat, on a Facebook page that I follow, and I decided to give it a try. As it was a file for my Silhouette cameo I did use that though it was a straight forward cut and didn't really need a machine to do it.

When it was folded I realised I could have done with more contrast between the two sides of the paper, but this was only one of two double sided Christmas papers I had in my stash. If I use it again I will try printing my own.

However, it fitted nicely on my favourite size base card (17cm X 11.5cm), but got a bit lost against the white background, so I cut a red mat to match the red in the paper. 

Then I wanted a topper that again didn't get lost against the mat, but didn't swamp the fold either, so I searched in my Cameo library and came up with this 'Joy' wreath. The green leaves and red dots were cut separately so it was fun sticking the berries on. The word Joy is also cut and I was pleased with the way my machine cut the very fine lines in it. I used the design feature in the Silhouette software to make a white scalloped circle to place the wreath on, and off-set it by a small amount to make a green mat, again to give definition between the topper and mat. 

The strip of green ribbon running under the topper has been in my stash for more years than I can remember.

I am not good with white spaces on my cards so I used a Britannia die to cut pairs of holly leaves for each corner.

And that is it from me for this month. Linking up with Rudolph Day Challenge#May on Scraps of Life by Scrappy Mo. Looking forward to seeing all your creations.

Rudolph Day Challenge # April

The 25th of each month certainly comes around fast, but here it is again bringing with it the April Rudolph Day Challenge.

As I said last month, I am not sure I will need that many cards this year, so once again I have refrained from 'batch making', settling for just two, but both of these could easily be made again if needed.

I am busy working on a big craft project so I wanted fairly quick cards to make for this challenge and turned again to my design library in my Silhouette Cameo software. The library is not good at labelling files properly so I am unsure where either of these files came from. I believe one was a die, maybe from a magazine, that I put into my silhouette so that I could resize it. And the other - I just don't know.

Anyway, I cut them out and mounted them onto base cards cut from my stash of plain card. The first design was cut from my last snippet of a favourite paper that I have had for at least 15 years. It is ivory with gold marbling on it, but sadly it is now all gone, and is no longer produced so I cannot replace it. The word 'Rejoice' was another file from my silhouette library.

The second design was simple black card, and the lettering is black vinyl. I was pleased at how well the script cut. Before adding the Bethlehem image I backed it with some gold heavy vellum that I was given at the NEC show when I bought my first cutting machine - a Craft Robo in around 1998 perhaps! It cuts so cleanly, so they put a big pile of it in the starter pack that came with the machine if you bought it at the show. It just added some interest to my scene. I used some similar gold pearl paper for the stars, and used transfer tape to lift it all from the cutting mat and place it on the 13.5cm square cream card.

So I will link up with Scraps of Life by ScrappyMo, and go back to my other project.

Happy Rudolph Day everyone.

Going Green for Rudolph Day #March 2021

It soon comes around doesn't it? But here we are again on 25th of the month, or as we like to call it, Rudolph Day.

Unfortunately my title this month does not refer to an environmentally friendly card, but rather to the colour I used, starting with a dark green, 15cm base card. I added a mat of pale cream and stamped the lovely 'Indigo blu' bauble garland in Memento olive grove. Looking back through my blog history, I see it is around eight years since I last used this stamp, so it deserved another inking.

The tree is a cutting file I bought recently from an Etsy store - CreativeFabrica. It was a faulty file but I was able to make it usable with the png files instead of the svgs. The first layer was cut from the same green card as the base card, and then I added the second layer from a paler green card. I knew the top layer would be a bit tricky, partly because I has down-sized the file to fit my space, so I decided to cut it from gold metallic vinyl which cuts better than card for intricate designs. It was a bit of a chore to weed out the unwanted parts, and then I had to carefully align it with the underneath layers, but I liked how it turned out. I used some of the cut-out stars randomly on the image. (I don't like waste!).

Finally I used the same ink pad to stamp the sentiment which came from a Chocolate Baroque set. I have always liked it, and the font it uses, and it was a perfect fit for the corner of my card.

So there we have it, my March entry for the Rudolph Day Challenge. I am also entering it in the ABC Christmas Challenge # F for Fir tree and/or G for Garland.

Recycling for the Rudolf Day Challenge #February

 As I said last month, my January post for this challenge is usually cards I have made by recycling some that I have received, but this year I didn't get them made in time, so here are some now. I only recycle shop-bought cards, not hand-made ones as that wouldn't seem right, and I always try to make them as different as possible from the original, so that I feel I can say I have honestly crafted them myself.

Robins seemed to feature quite prominently this year. but most were just a big robin filling the card front, and they don't lend themselves to re-using, but smaller ones can be cut , framed, and mounted in a variety of ways. So here is my first one, along with some doves, a couple of church choirs, and a warm home scene, which worked very well.

Of course there were far fewer cards sent this year because of the Covid virus, but I had a nice one from one of my sons, again featuring robins, which seemed to have a lot of potential. So I started by scanning it into my computer.

The centre robin didn't fit into any of my plans so I die cut the pair on the right, and the left hand one on its own, and made these two cards with them.

I do like to add a bit of bling to my Christmas cards so all the snowflakes are cut from white glitter card and the gems are deep blue. There is also some glitter glue dotted on the robins as snow.

I have used oddments of card from my stash, and a variety of embossing folders and dies to make these cards, so I am not listing them all here, but if anyone wants to know what any of them are, do drop me a message and I will do my best to let you know.

When I am not under any pressure to produce a card by a given date, I sometimes like to just play around, designing new cutting files for my Silhouette machine, and using Youtube videos to learn how to get more from Adobe Photoshop.

So I decided to have a play and practise some of the skills I am trying to master in Photoshop. So I chose a sheet of scrapbook paper from a digital kit.

Then I cropped the line of robins I used above,  to just include the three on the right and added them to the paper. Next I tried a new trick I have discovered to blend a photo into a background without leaving hard lines around it. 

I cropped it down and resized it  to fit the front of a B6 card (11.5 x 17cm), and printed it out twice.

It looked unfinished so I turned to my favourite Silhouette cameo machine and designed a wavy line of script similar to the original, plus a larger sentiment that seemed to fit, and cut them both from dark red vinyl. The tiny print was fiddly to do, and I had to be very careful weeding out the tiny ares between the letters, without losing any of  them. I used transfer tape to add the script and the sentiment to the cards, and finished them off with some glitter glue snow. It took me a while to do all this, but it was good practice and I have two more cards for me stash.

I was quite pleased with how they turned out, glad that I had mastered the blending technique, and, of course, I now have the digital card front and cutting files on my computer, so I could replicate them any time if I want to.

So now it is time to link up with the Rudolph Day challenge for February, on Scraps of Life by Scrappy Mo, and go over to see what everyone else has made.

If you have started making Christmas cards already, why not join in the fun.

Rudolph day Challenge 2021# January

Well it has been a strange year, and I didn't get around to entering the extra challenge in December for anyone who had posted every month, although I did qualify. But I am going to try to do it again this year so here is my first card of 2021.

I have cased a card made by Liz Smith. I can't give you a link as it was on a closed group which I am a member of. Her's was done using a robin image.

This uses a metal stencil from Sweet Poppy stencils. I am not very clever with stencils but I was advised to try some  Sweet Poppy brushes, (almost identical to  much cheaper make-up brushes available from Amazon), and they did make a huge difference.

I needed to cut a circle frame the exact size of the stencil first to stamp my image in - reindeer and trees by Chocolate Baroque - and then a mask for the image and also the moon, while I dusted DI over the entire stencil.

I wasn't happy with the stamped image so I added some extra colour using a water brush and DI ink.

I stencilled two little trees in the bottom corner to hide a smudge of ink!

The sentiment is from a set by Hero Arts, stamped with Distress Oxide evergreen bough, and I added two tiny stencilled snow flakes in the same colour. I added a little glitter glue to the snowflakes and trees and around the deer's feet.

It was a bit of a fuss to do, but I think I'll be trying it again with a different, and perhaps a bit smaller, image.

So I'll link this up with the Rudolph Day Challenge over at Scraps of Life with Scrappy Mo. I hope it is the start of a good year of Christmas card making.

As the stencil was new at the end of last year, and inked for the first time, I am also linking this to the NEBUS Challenge. (Never Before Used)