Christmas Card Club - Candles

Every fortnight, the  Christmas Card Club ladies take turns choosing a theme. This fortnight  Rita at RMG Creations Blog chose the theme of candles. To see Rita;s work, just click on the hyperlink I have placed on her name and blog name. If you wish to see any of the others members work, just click on their hyperlinks that reside on my right sidebar.

My candle themed card features the Heartfelt Creations Sparkling Poinsettia Candle image and sentiment.  I must confess that I have owned this stamp for quite a while and this is the first time it has seen ink!

I stamped my image three times. I used my pencil crayons and gamsol to colour only the edges of the image on the first layer. Just enough to peek in sideways and still see the correct colours. The second layer was fully coloured and also the third layer, which features just the poinsettias. I used very thin pop dots to raise these two additional layers and even with the image having the three layers in total. it still makes the cutoff of regular postage!

The flowers and leaves received a generous coat of Wink of Stella clear glitter, as well as the flame and the dripping wax.

I cut the image with a stitched rectangular die and matted with a thin crimson sateen card. The larger mat is gold mirri from the dollar store. The sentiment was hand cut into a circle and given the same crimson sateen for the stitched circular mat..

I placed this finished card front on many different DP backgrounds and just about gave up finding anything suitable. Finally, I remembered to look at my 12 x 12 scrapbook papers, where I found  this silver and gold glittered bit of card,  featuring the glitter in diagonal stripes In certain light it looks like silver glitter but in other light it appears gold!

The card size is 6x6 and I off centered the matted image to allow for the sentiment placement. I rather like the off centered look! The envelope was stamped using just the edges of the poinsettia, and also coloured with pencil crayons and gamsol.

March Rudolph Days Challenge

Hi there. Once again, it is time for the Rudolph Days Challenge. Here are the rules for your perusal...

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 design team ladies have been busy creating lots of inspiration for you!
First up is Linda at Snails Space Blog

Linda has created a very pretty, vintage image card for your enjoyment. Methinks she has hand stamped that lovely background. Hopefully, Linda inspires us to eventually create some vintage image cards too!!!  I love the pretty swirl embellishment with the snowflakes tucked underneath. I also think the image  looks framed by that lovely blue mat!

Please be sure to stop over to Linda's blog here. You will not be disappointed!

Next up is Jenny at Cardsarus Blog. 

Jenny has two beautiful cards for our inspiration.
First up is this glittery, sparkly creation in non traditional colours. I am loving the piece of antique looking lace used as the border. This card proves that you can never have enough sparkle when you use it.!

Second up is this very vintage looking card. A close up seems to suggest a sort of paste or texture was used to help add to the vintage look and to suggest a dusting of snow. You will have to pop over to Jenny blog here, to know for sure!

I have a surprise for you today. With our Canadian schools closed, I am hoping to get my grandkids to occasionally be guest designers. Today, I am featuring Clare,age 13, who used to have a blog called the Pony Girl where she had to have me do her typing as she was only about 5 or 6 years old!

She has made up some Bo Bunny kits which I ferreted away in my stash a couple of years ago. These cards are for her teachers.

Although the kits were well designed for a youngster, the card bases are very lightweight for my liking. The kits are a combo of DP, card stock, chipboard accents, and clear stickers for the sentiments.  They seemed a bit plain, so a little Wink of Stella (WOS) made them sparkle a bit. Hard to capture that in my photo.

Her card is this Bo Bunny Snow Globe, featuring some lovely deer. The street light, and snowflake on the heart got the WOS treatment.

My card  is the  Penny Black  Snowy,  coloured with Copic pens. It  has a chalked sky feature which I pressed a wet sponge into to get the blended look.  The white fur on Snowy's toque has had a very liberal coating of stickles. 

The DP is a snippet from some 12x12 scrapbook DP, and the green glitter card border is from my snippets box.  I will take this card over to Di's blog, Pixies Crafty Workshop, Snippets Challenge. It has been a long time since I participated in challenges, but this is one I hate to miss.

Our prizes this month are this darling Gnome stamp set by C&C Crafts Consortium.

or this Penny Black Winter Tales stamp. 

Christmas Card Club - Garland or Wreath

I am posting a Garland card for the current Christmas Card Club challenge. We are a group of like minded ladies who prefer to make our Christmas cards throughout the year, thereby freeing up time during the Christmas Season.

Lorraine of Raineys Craft Room blog chose our theme of Garlands or Wreaths today. There is also a choice of Anything goes, but luckily I had supplies for a Garland theme.

If you wish to look over any of the others ladies work, there are hyperlinks on my right sidebar.

My card today is a decoupage card from a British kit called Hunkydory.

It has a cozy living room image complete with a garland over the fireplace. There are five layers of decoupage on this card. I used thin pieces of foam for the raised areas as I did not want the depth to get out of hand.

I cut a card base of red teensy dotted card from the Hunkydory card. A quick look through my DP snippets box found this border sized snippet of Lily of the Valley Krafty  Christmas, which has white snowflakes on a kraft background. The red velvet rickrack ribbon is from my ribbon stash which I store on inside of my closet door in the craft room. I love this particular rickrack as it never frays, and that is certainly a rarity with ribbon!

I usually forget to add ribbon and then remember too late, when I no longer have room to work it in. I am quite proud of myself for remembering today. I must say with that closet door closed, that ribbon is out of sight and out of mind as the saying goes!

Here is a photo of my ribbon storage. I used 3M hooks on a gloss painted door, There is a set of three hooks like this on each of the panels of the door. This door holds 9 sets of hooks! I then used ribbon tags for hanging the ribbon till sadly, they DISCONTINUED the tags!!!  Oh my!!!

A quick trip to the $ store found huge packages of key rings which I slip knotted the ribbon around (by colour or theme), and then slid those rings onto cheap curtain hooks. The rest of my hooks and ribbon are inside the closet on the wall. I can not get a decent photo for you of the inside closet storage. I just can not step back far enough to get a photo!

Tags -

Key Ring -

Christmas Card Club - Postbox or Anything Christmas Goes

I have just returned from a two day paper crafts crop. I got lots of cards finished up and have returned home tired, but very happy and relaxed!

My card today is for the Christmas Card Club Challenge, We are a group of ladies who like to get our Christmas cards finished up well before the busy season. To that end, we take turns choosing a theme and making Christmas cards biweekly. In the event that we do not have the supplies to follow the theme, we have an option of Anything Christmas Goes.

I have chosen the Anything Goes and have made up a card from another Thrift Shop find. Quite some time ago I purchased this box of new but never opened embossed winter scene, All the coloured bits of the scene are embossed forward. The photo does not seem to show it, but the white areas just above and below the log are snow drifts.

 I cut down and matted the scene with some copper Mirri card and pop dotted that matted scene onto a hessian paper background. I broke up the piece of hessian with some fish tale type flag banners made from my Wild Rose Studio Krafty Christmas stack.

I added a copper mirri card snowflake and then placed a white shimmery fabric snowflake on top of that. A teensy diamond in the center finished it off.

Hope you enjoy this upcycled card. If you would like to learn more about our club, drop me an email at  maureenkane@telus.net.  You can check out my club mates work by clicking on the hyperlinks to the right of my blog posts.

Hope you enjoyed my upcycled Christmas card.

Winner - February Rudolph Days Challenge.

52 glorious entries. I am very happy indeed. I have not finished popping round to visit you all as I have been at a two day pape rcrafts crop! I have made up so many cards and I am feeling very  happy and relaxed. Nothing like two days spent with good friends!

It is my 66th birthday today so will take me till tomorrow to finish  my visiting as my family have plans for me today...

I used Random Org to chose our winner and it is # 20 Jenny L. Jeeny could you please email me at maureenkane@telus.net and let me know which prize you would prefer.

 Jenny is a member of my design team and as the team members only design and comment on every other month, they are allowed to enter the Rudolph Days Challenge on their month off!

This is the second time so far this year that a design team member has won. It had never happened before this year! As the design Team members work so hard creating beautiful cards for our inspiration, it made me happy to draw Jenny's name.