Christmas a la Tim

Good morning, peeps and a chilly one it is too!  The frost was so thick this morning it looked almost like snow!  Still, it's appropriate waether for a post about Christmas cards and I have four of them to show you this morning!

 

All of these cards are for a workshop that I'm teaching at Samuel Taylor's, Brighouse tomorrow.  The objective being not just to loosely follow the style of Tim Holtz but to make quick Christmas cards as well.  There is plenty of Distress Inking in evidence as well as embellishments made fom Grunge Paper.

The stamps featured in the above card are from Indigo Blu, Hero Arts and Viva.

This one has stamps from the same sources and I've added Distress Stickles holly berries to the Grunge Paper holly sprigs.

There's not quite so much of Tim in this one because I've used some wonderful DP from Kaisercraft.  The die cuts are Marianne Christmas Tree 1, the white one being distressed with Forest Moss DI and on the green one I tried all sorts of things to get the snowy effect.  Adirondack Dabber in Snow Cap went really cream when it dried so I went over it with a white wax crayon.  When that wasn't white enough, a white gel pen finally got the result I wanted!

All the little snow flakes were produced using a Martha Stewart edge punch - these are the bits you normally throw away when punching a snowflake border!

Finally, this is a card that has the wishes for the season from another Indigo Blu stamp, as are the trees at the bottom.  The Christmas wishes I've used for the background are from the Viva plate and are stamped in Antique Linen DI.  The ribbon is from my stash.

Well, I hope this has given you some ideas for some quick Christmas cards for your own needs.  I think everyone's beginning to think that time is getting short for making cards - including me!  Although I only send handmade cards to close family and friends who appreciate the effort that goes into them.

Keep warm!

Hugs

A distressed card

Good morning, peeps!  Thank Crunchie it's Friday again - don't they roll around fast?  I'm trying not to think about it frankly and at least this week's challenge at Polka Doodles isn't to make a Christmas card!  (we're going to be needing those far too soon!)  It's 'Distress it', which is really good because I don't seem to have done any distressing for a while and, when that happens, we can often forget these techniques so it's good to revisit.

This little cutie pie is Bella and she appears on the new Simply Sweet CD.  Here she is on her garden swing under a lovely blue sky with just some light fluffy clouds - she clearly doesn't live in Yorkshire, that's all I can say!

Anyhoo, I distressed the edges of the main image with a distressing tool and Pumice Stone DI and the put some Stardust Stickles over the top, which almost obscures the distressing!  Well I did say that I hadn't used this technique in a while!  I also applied the same DI to the sentiment and the lovely DP, both of which were printed from the same CD.  The leaves were cut from a Marianne die and the flowers are Sweetheart blossoms from Wild Orchid Crafts.  The ribbon is from my stash.  Speaking of which, have you ever noticed that however many spools/lengths of ribbon you have, you've never got quite the right one?  Who wrote that rule then?

Of course, Bella is coloured with Copics and Flexmarkers and the shading is enhanced with Prisma pencils blended with Sansodor but I'm sorry that, in the chaos that is my craft room, I didn't keep a note of the numbers for you.

I do hope that you'll join us for this challenge and hop over to the Challenge blog to see all the wonderful work that my teamies have put in.

Whatever you're doing this weekend, have a good un.  I'm teaching a colouring class at Samuel Taylor in Roseville Street, Leeds tomorrow and there's great excitement about the place there at the moment because a new store opens in Harrogate tomorrow - let's all wish them every success because it's great to see a new craft shop opening it's doors.

Hugs