January 2018, Rudolph Days Challenge

Seems hard to believe that we are starting our first Rudolph Days Challenge of 2018! I just want to remind everyone that once again we will be having a special prize draw in December for all those who enter our challenge every month this year, January through November.

Here are the rules for the Rudolph Days Challenge:

 1. The Rudolph Days Challenge will start each month (January to November) on the 25th, and will close at midnight PST, on the last day of that month.
2. The theme is always Anything Goes, as long as it is Christmas.
3. One entry per person and you just need to enter one Christmas card or Christmas project.
4. You may combine your entry with other challenges (maximum of 10 in total).
5. Your card (or Christmas project) should not have been previously posted to your blog. It should be posted to your blog during the current months Rudolph Days Challenge, (between the 25th and last day of the current month)
6. Please link back to or at least mention, the Rudolph Days Challenge.
7. Please leave a comment on the challenge post.
8.   The winner will be selected by random draw and announced on the first day of the following month. Prizes will be mailed anywhere in the world.

9. A special draw will be held at the end of the year, in December,  for all those who submitted a card or project every month that year, January to November.. 

Our designers have been busy this month.

First up is Dr Sonia from Cards, Crafts and Kids Projects blog.

Sonia has done three projects for us today!

 She has taken this darling Santa die and created two fabulous cards. The first has a plethora of beautiful dies. I love the Santa, but especially love that fabulous background die  And how did Sonia know that those are my favourite Christmas trees!

Her second card has a wonderfully 3D look. This is a great scene with lovely 3D Christmas trees on either side of that cute Santa! As always, Sonia has fabulous tutorials and writeups on her blog here

Lastly, she has made this gorgeous Christmas bauble! I love all the details here, including the fancy embellishments at the top, as well as the sweet scene she has created inside. Looks like there are wee snowballs in the bottom of the bauble. Santa and the elves must have just finished a snowball tournament!

Next up is Linda from A Snails Space blog.

Linda has made this pretty Whipper Snipper Snowman card. As always, Linda has done a gorgeous job of painting this image. I love the soft, pretty colours. The red mat helps pop this image off that Christmas treed background!
Pop over to visit Linda here, and you too can read how she made this card.

The last card is mine. I did not have a lot of time to colour an image this month as I still have that horrid flu.cold. Al is much sicker than me as he is still chesty and has a rattling cough that keeps him awake.  I just have that lingering dry cough which never lets you get to sleep either. Funny how we drift in and out during the days but can not sleep at night!

My card is features a decoupaged image made from a NBUS set of poinsettia Christmas invitations that I picked up at my local hospital charity shop. I will get 5 two layer decoupaged cards from this set, and I had fun fussy cutting them out while I was recuperating. I coated the leaves with clear Wink of Stella  and then went over the leaf edges with Nouvo glitter gel. The poinsettias were done with a liberal coat of the Nouvo gel and then the edges done again with Xmas Red Stickles.

The rest of the card was made from stash on hand. The DP was snippets of left over 12x12 scrapbook paper and even the sentiment was stamped onto a snippet. of white card. I used my  Cheery Lynn Fanciful Flourishes die on some snippets of VOS green card. The inside has a couple of fish tale flags from some leftover snippets of DP and a stray leaf from the leaf swirl die..

Our prize this month is a choice of this Tim Holtz Snowman Scene die

                                   
or this Stamping Bella stamp, Little Christmas Collection Santa's Loot 

Christmas Card Club - Christmas Baking

It was my turn to choose a theme for our fortnightly Christmas Card Club and I chose Christmas Baking. I wanted to use this NBUS Marks Finest Papers Cookie stamp which I have owned for a few  years now. I won this stamp in one of their challenges, and I am sad to say that this company appears to be no longer trading. I stamped off several different cookies from this stamp set, and will be featuring them in the next couple of posts.

Todays cookies are still on the cookie sheet...either they are very large cookies, or my cookie sheet is quite small! I fussy cut them after colouring with copics and using a white Sharpie pen for the zigzag details. A quick lick of clear Wink Of Stella gave them a festive feel.

I started with a 6x6 Hunky Dory  square easel card and envelope, and covered the top with Doodlebug Designs Here Comes santa claus. I overlaid the top of the sheet with a candy designed paper from my  VOS Martha Stewart, Peppermint Winter Mat pad.  I know it is wasteful, but sometimes I just want the ease of overlaying, rather than stopping to measure and cut so the two pieces line up exactly. This MS mat pad has lots of embossed glittery candies.

A strip of silver glittery washi tape grounds the various silver finishes in both the pearlescent silver cookie sheet and the chrome utensils. I cut the cookie sheet from a snippet leftover from cutting up a  silver finished 4 1/2 x 5 1/2 inch premade card. I thought it was just the right shade and finish to resemble a cookie sheet.

The mixing bowl, tools, and oven mitt are all 3D stickers from Dollarama. I pick these up whenever I see them as the workmanship on this set is quite good for $1.25
.
I covered the inside with another Doodlebug Design paper from the same paper pad. I am pretending the tray on the inside flap are tarts...if you squint really hard, I think you just might agree...

If you would like to check out the other ladies baking cards, the hyperlinks are imbedded on my right sidebar. I know there are some wonderful cards there. If you are interested in joining out little club, drop me an email.

I am entering this card in the following challenges:

1. Christmas Card Club - Christmas Baking
2. Pixies Crafty Workshop - must use snippets. My snippets are the cookie sheet and all the stamped cookies themselves.  I always save my snippets of stamping card as it is pricey and little pieces are perfect for any stamping that needs fussy cutting..

Christmas Card Club

A very unwanted bout of flu has kept me from posting earlier. DH came down with it just before me and is still feeling very poorly. I must be getting better as I remembered my Christmas Card Club deadline was this morning.

I am entering a substitute card this fortnight as I forgot to take a photo of my 3 pixie cards before I mailed them off! My card was made just after Christmas, with some snippets that were laying about on my desk since finishing off with the 2017 Christmas cards. Rather than file them away, I decided to create a card around them.

I managed to not even have to trim the DP...just had to trim the red glitter paper to fit as mats.
Not a very exciting card, but a good use of snippets nevertheless. The sentiment is a cutout from the sentiment page that you can often find in 6x6 pads. I rarely use them. but in this case is worked out quite well.

The Christmas trees were already in my inked and cutout die files. Just had to glue them on and pop dot the largest tree a wee bit forward. A gave the trees a good coating of Stardust stickles along the edges of the branches They have a lovely glimmer now.

Recipe
Card and envelope - hand cut  4 1/4 x 5 from my stash
DP -Simple Stories  - DIY Christmas -from my stash
Sentiment - DP cutout - from my stash manufacturer unknown
Dies  - Sue Wilson Festive Cllection Winter Trees
Glitter paper - red glitter - from my stash, originally from Joanne's
Glimmer Finish-  Stardust stickles

I am entering this card at Pixies Crafty Workshop where you must use snippets!

Surprise Challenge Winner

The winner of the surprise challenge for all those bloggers who entered every Rudolph Days Challenge in 2017 is #9 Sandra H.

Congratulations, Sandra!!!

Could you please drop me an email to maureenkane@telus.net and let me know your mailing address and which prize you have chosen,

Thanks to all who entered. I will be holding this extra challenge again next year, so if you wish to participate in the "extra",  get those Christmas cards or Christmas projects ready and enter every month!!!