Sweet Stampin' ~ Oh Christmas Tree

Get me! Blogging twice in one week!! I'm so happy to be back to my craft room and to my inks and pretty papers, but I am missing my wee doll and I saw her today at a Christmas function with friends. If I weren't too old now to be having kiddos of my own, I'd be well clucky! Little poppet was equally happy to see me which was lovely. But today, I'm here to share my Sweet Stampin' DT card, so to the job at hand...

Our theme this challenge is 'Christmas Trees'. I have a lovely Penny Black Stamp set which I've had a while now and has never before seen ink, so it had a little outing for this project. I actually made 5 Christmas cards using this stamp and the same technique for each card. Green ink for the image and sentiment, which is from the same stamp set. Then a sprinkling of snowy Frantage to complete the look. I had the perfect paper to use for the backing of these two cards, but as I only had a small sheet of it, made only two cards this way and the rest were mounted straight onto craft card. I really love how these first two came out. Still very CAS in design, but the designer paper just added that extra little touch.

The first of these two cards I popped the image up on foam and added a little gold bow to finish. I also edged the image with the same green ink as I used to ink the image and sentiment. The second card, I didn't use the ink around the edges and attached it straight to the card, but this time added a little strip of lovely glittery gold paper below the image. I love both versions and was so pleased with how this little experiment with Frantage went. I don't use it often at all, quite frankly I'm afraid of it! I seem to mess it up every time I try to use it, but this design worked a treat!

I hope you'll come on over and join us for our last Team Abi challenge of the year. We are being sponsored by the fabulous Crafts & Me. I LOVE their gorgeous stamps. We've had such a great year with wonderful challenges and fantastic sponsors. I'm looking forward to more fabulous challenges in 2017. So come and join us again before this year is out. Hugs, Wends xoxo

Challenge Entries:
Cute Card Thursday: #456 ~ Snowflakes
Crafty Gals Corner: #101 ~ Anything Goes
The Ribbon Girl: December Card Challenge
Crafty Catz Challenge: #351 ~ Anything Goes
Come and Get It Challenge: Christmas Challenge
Moving Along With The Times: Christmas Scenes
Simon Says Monday Challenge: Let There Be Snow
Pile It On Challenge: #123 ~ Any Holiday/Celebration
613 Avenue Create: #192 ~ Anything Goes + Holiday Happiness
As You Like It: Favourite Christmas Song/Carol ~ That's Christmas To Me - Pentatonix. I just love the beautiful harmony's in this song and I also love their song Mary, Did You Know? These two songs I've played more this year than my previous Christmas favourite song, River sung by Sarah McLachlan.

Update: Thank you for the 'Top Rocker' mention 613 Avenue Create! That made my day :)
(Entry #226 ~ Dec 11-17 2016)

Fab 'n' Funky ~ Glitter & Sparkle

Hey there my lovely blog pals, it's time for a new challenge at Fab 'n' Funky and I finally am back after my long break. Just in time for us to do our last challenge before the whole team takes a wee break over the Christmas season. Gosh this year has flown by. I can't believe how much we've packed into it! Right, onto the challenge at hand.

I've been caught up in the Christmas rush so chose to make a CAS card for this challenge using a lovely Lili of the Valley precoloured image. I've simply added some glitter to the snow and a simple sentiment from a Lili of the Valley Christmas Sentiment set. I had such fun making this one, I decided to make a whole set! I kept them completely CAS as I wanted to whip up a whole batch in a big hurry. So here's a few I created, all with a CAS similar theme.

I've drawn around the little snowfall spots on both these cards with a glue pen and sprinkled loose glitter over them. There was more glitter on me than the cards by the time I'd finished! This second card, I also added a little strip of gold glitter paper for an extra bit of Christmas glitz. I love how that simple touch elevated the whole feel of the card.

For this card, I used a lovely warm toned kraft card base and added pearl drops to the snowfall and used another lovely LOTV Christmas sentiment to finish the CAS design. Simples!

I made a few more cards using this fab combo of LOTV precoloured image and LOTV sentiment set and pulled together quite a few sweet quick Christmas cards. But I think that's enough pics for now! I was going to add the extras to the bottom of the post, but PicMonkey isn't playing nice right now, so I can't edit any more. But the rest are using images from the same precoloured LOTV image pad and similar layouts and sentiment stamps. So you get the gist. 

Come on over and join us for the last Fab 'n' Funky challenge of 2017 with your own Glitter & Sparkle card. I wonder if yours will be a Christmassy one or perhaps something else inspires you right now. We are being sponsored by the lovely Aurora Wings for this challenge. So there's a lovely prize up for grabs. I hope you'll come join in the fun and I'll see you again soon with another Christmas creation. Big hugs and wishes for a happy and healthy lead up to Christmas, Wends xoxo

Challenge Entries:
Creative Moments: #108 ~ Anything Goes
Creative Corner Challenge: Christmas Time
Crafting By Designs: Here Come The Holidays
Crafting From The Heart: #140 ~ Anything Goes
Creative Inspirations Challenge: White Christmas
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Ice Inspiration
Come and Get It Challenges: Christmas Challenge

Simon Says Monday Challenge: Let There Be Snow
Pile It On Challenge: #123 ~ Any Holiday/Celebration
Cupcake Inspirations: Poppy, Cream & Gold Colours (Last Card in Lineup)

Update: Delighted to have won the 'Make It Crafty' prize from the Come and Get It Challenge. Thank you ladies! I'm truly thrilled. Lovely crafty start to 2017!

Second Update: I made 'Top 3' at Creative Inspirations! So stoked to see my card up there in the Top 3, thank you ladies so much!

Third Update: I was a 'Design Team Favourite' at Crafting From The Heart! So honoured, thank you so much!!

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner ~ Take 2!

Hey there lovelies, as promised, I've had a hunt through my stash and found a couple of extra Rapunzels, so I have two extra winners! 

Drum roll please!

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Second Rapunzel Stamp Winner

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Sarah Nancarrow

Third Rapunzel Stamp Winner

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Chris

Congratulations to you both. Please send me your address details by email or FB PM. For those who missed out this time around, keep your eyes peeled, as I have an awesome 'Some Odd Girl' candy going up in the New Year! Hugs to you all and Happy Yule (God Jul), Wends xoxo

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner

Okay, no chicken dinner, but 3 lucky winners!!!

I have some duplicates too, so I'll be back tomorrow with some additional winners

But for now, drum roll please

Random org chose...

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The Winner of the Candy Canes Stamp is 

Sarah Wills

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The Winner of the Rapunzel Stamp is 

Sammy Jean

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The Winner of the Joy Crafts Butterfly Die is 

Wendy Fields

Congratulations my lovely pals. I'm so excited for you!!!

Please send me your address details and I'll post your wins to you.

You can send me a PM on Facebook to keep your address private.

For those who didn't win this time around, please check back tomorrow,

I need to count how many 'extras' I ordered and will draw additional names then,

So be sure to check back!!

Hugs to you all and thanks for entering my candy.

(These hard to source stamps and die were purchased from Moa Pyssel in Sweden. Thank you Lotta!)

Sweet Stampin' ~ Let It Snow

Hey there my lovely blog pals. I'm late late late with this post. Forgive me! We had a family wedding up North over the weekend and I knew I had too many balls in the air!! Such a gorgeous weekend and a beautiful wedding ceremony. So nice to be with extended family and people we love but don't see so often. Especially meaningful to see my daddy's siblings now he's no longer with us. I'll share a couple of pics at the end of the post, but for now, I need to show you my card for the Sweet Stampin' challenge that went live on Saturday whilst I was away at the wedding. 

Our theme for the challenge this week is 'Let It Snow' and I happened to have this cute card ready to go. I used a sweet stamp from Nellie Snellen's Christmas Time set called 'Parcel Mount' and some fun tartan paper, which I'll have to hunt down the paper pad for as I've already cleared it away and can't remember what it's called! I kept the design simple for haste and added a diecut tree sprinkled in snowy silver and white glitter and a white organza bow with two 'jingle' bells to finish. Very simple design, but that's me at Christmas, no time for the fancy stuff as the day drawers ever near! But I do love this, because I love, love, LOVE tartan paper and this design really showcases it well, leaving lots of 'empty' space. I've used my Promarkers to colour the sweet image and edged the paper and oval image panel with Memento Rich Cocoa brown ink. Simples!

Our sponsor is the wonderful Marianne Design. So come and play along to be in with a chance to win the most fabulous prize. We'd love to see what you create and as it's so close to Christmas now, I'm sure you all must have a few snowy makes to enter our 'Let It Snow' challenge. Hope to see you again soon. Still more busy days in the lead up to Christmas, so no rest yet! Hugs to you all, Wends xoxo

Challenge Entries:
The Ribbon Girl: December Card Challenge
City Crafter Challenge: #341 ~ The Tree Is Up
Cute Card Thursday: #454 ~ Toys or Transport
Simon Says Monday Challenge: Christmas Gifts
Creative Inspirations: #263 ~ Christmas Creations
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Anything Goes
Passion For Promarkers: #375 ~ Mega Christmas Challenge
Moving Along With The Times: Anything Goes With Christmas
Deep Ocean Challenge: #143 ~ Santa Claus is Coming To Town!
Little Red Wagon: Santa Claus is Coming To Town! (Santa Bunny?!)

Update: I won the Di's Digi Stamps prize at Passion For Promarkers. Sadly I was too late to claim it. Shame, they're so cute!

For those of you who stuck around to see the pics. Here's a few from our beautiful wee family spot up the very North of New Zealand, (where it gets really skinny on the map!). Enjoy xoxo

 The view from the porch of our extended family's bach at Tauranga Bay

 The view from the kitchen window of the bach at Tauranga Bay
(Featuring a Pohutukawa, the New Zealand Christmas Tree!)

The little red tractor that towed the yacht out. Only in New Zealand!! 

 Beautiful Whangaroa Harbour, where the wedding church was.

Panaramic shot overlooking the Cavalli Islands

Panaramic shot of Zac & Georgie playing in the water at Tauranga Bay

Click on the pics to pop them up for a bigger view xoxo