Snowflake Christmas cards

Here are a few Christmas cards. They are all basically the same idea, but with different bling. I wanted to use the things I bought on Friday. All of the cards have this really pretty ribbon I got on Friday (should have waited until Sat when they were even cheaper, but what if they were gone? They weren't though). The snowflake is from the Sizzlet Snowflake set #3. The paper is from the Paper Company Baby Boy collection. The acrylic snowflakes are cut out of a string meant for minature Christmas trees.


This one is my favorite. I used a Jelly pen to make the small snowflakes. The die cut snowflake is embellished with Glistening Snow Writer by Deco Art. It's so cool, and could become my new favorite way to add dimensional glitter.





Here's a closer look at the snow writer on the snowflake.







Same design. Used a self-adhesive rhinestone on the snowflake.






This last one uses acrylic snowflakes. They originally were stringed together to be used on miniature christmas trees. I cut them apart to use on the card.

Cards using Bubble Slot corner punch

I really like this new punch from EK Success. It's going to be great for adding photos to the scrapbook. It has a lot of potential for creating fun borders too. However, these first 2 cards came out horrible.



I love the circle with the border. I removed the corner guide, and punched across the bottom of the sheet. Then I cut them out, and adhered them to the circle. They even matched up pretty well, and it looks like they are continuous. However, the execution of the card leaves alot to be desired. I was just playing around, so didn't give much thought to the colors. And I didn't have anything to put in the circle. All my stamps were too small or too big. Definitely not a well planned card.



The upper corners are fake. Again, I removed the guide and punched across the bottom of the sheet, then cut them out. The bubbles were carefully glued in place to look like corner slots. Here I really like the colors of the paper - it's a lavendar with a putty colored paper (names unknown - they've been in my stash for years). But I was losing precious daylight to take pictures, so I panicked and threw something on it.

Black Friday Buys!

Yep, I'm one of them. I love the thrill of chasing a bargain. Cold, lack of sleep, only makes it better. This year I went through the ads on Thursday, wrote up my list, and layed out an agressive game plan all by 10 am in the morning. I had to analyze the sales, and determine which items would go really fast, and which ones would probably still be there later in the morning. It was tough, and I really took some risks. Overall, the shopping day was a great success!

For the first time, I went to the KB Toys sale. Normally the stores open at 5am and people have been lined up since 2am. This year I went to a store that opened at midnight. I expected the line to be huge and to miss out on some items. To my surprise, there were less than 100 people in line. The store is small, so it was still packed, but I got everything I wanted and was able to leave by 1am.

Then I napped for a few hours before waking up around 4am to leave for Target. Target doesn't open until 6am, so it was a pretty long wait. (I should have gone to Mervyns, because it was right next door, and I had my sister to hold the spot in line. I didn't see anything in the ad, but it would have been warmer than outside.) Target was so great! They came around and passed out goody bags. I got a re-usable shopping bag, a numbered collectible plush animal, cookies, granola bar, and gound coffee. Inside it was a madhouse. I wanted some items from Electronics, and they made us wait in another line. Actually that was good, there was less chaos in electronics. But the store is not set up for a big line of people and their shopping carts. While I stood in line, my sister did all the other shopping. We got some good deals on DVD's, clothing, an external harddrive, flash drives, video games. It felt like forever, but it only took us an hour at Target.

Next on the list was Best Buy. All the movies were really picked over, but we found the titles we were looking for. There were still plenty of inexpensive DVD players, MP3 players, and cameras.

Then it was off to JoAnn's. I was pleasantly surprised to find a few things on sale that weren't mentioned in the ad (unless I was missing a page). Sixxix die cuts were 40% off, add 20% on top of that, and you pay only 48% of original price. What a deal! Paper was on sale, so into my cart went the DCWV Ultimate Christmas slab, and the Extreme everyday paper stack. I used the 50% coupon on an item, add 20% on top of that, and I paid 40% of the original price. So many things were on sale, it was hard to find something to use the 50% coupon on. I settled on a bubble slot corner punch by EK Success. I'll have cards to show soon. Plastic storage containers and stickers were 50% off too!! I had a very full cart.

I crossed 3 people off my gift list, and I just need to work on 4 more.

More Butterfly cards

Here are a few more butterfly cards. They are all variations of previous cards. I made most of them with ribbon bought (except the burgandy) this week. The flourish is from Target -$1.99 acrylic stamp. The ink is from ColorBox. There were some great deals yesterday, but overall I though last year was better.


There's no sentiment, so these cards are ready to be used for almost any occasion. I've got quite a few more butterflies to use for cards. I might box up a set of 8 w/envelopes for Christmas gifts. Just a thought right now...

First day of Christmas Shopping

I just finished my first day of Christmas shopping- very unsuccessful. ToysRus had a sale on Wii games, buy 2 get 1 free. They all had to be purchased on the same receipt. Do you know how hard it was to get all 3 games at the same store? I drove 63 miles, and visited 3 stores. I have 2 of the 3 games I set out to buy. I wanted to get Legos Star Wars, Simpsons, and Brain Academy. Instead I have Harry Potter, Simpsons, and Brain Academy.

Next time I'll try to read the ads on Sunday. But I was working this Sunday! I didn't finish reading the Sunday paper until Monday night. And this is Tuesday morning, and I can't find all the games. Though the store people were nice and very polite, they all said I should have been here on Sunday for the best selection. And I agree. Next time I'll read the ads first. I learned my lesson.

Black Friday - While I was at the first store, I say a stocker with an ad. I think it was for Friday. I asked and he avoided my questions, while remaining polite. Do I dare stand in line this Friday? ToysRus has one of the longest lines...I'd have to be up pretty early. I've been thinking about starting my Black Friday shopping at the Camarillo Outlet Center; some stores open at midnight with really good deals. And then just staying up for the rest of the night standing in line for another store.

It's really hard to decide where to go on Black Friday. In the past I've gone to Michaels, JoAnns, Circuit City, Best Buy. I can't wait to see the ads this year, and plan my all day, sleep deprived, shopping spree.

Side note: Met a cute guy while at the last Toys R Us. He's polite, and funny - always good if you're trying to return an item. It worked on the Customer Service people. They called two managers, but he finally was able to exchange his item. He had a badge in his wallet, so he's a firefighter or a policeman. We talked for a bit, but I don't have a name. What was the deal breaker? He's exchanging a PSP3 game. I'm buying Wii games. We have incompatible gaming platforms. Sigh!

I have married friend who has a theory that you should marry young. Then you and your husband will grow together and form ideas and standards . If she had waited until now, she would have all these standards to judge people by. She thinks it would be harder to meet someone who fit all the criteria. I think she's right. I mean I just rejected someone based on their game system. And I knew what I was doing, yet I still did it. Crazy.

Challeng card for Expressively Me

This is my card for Jen's challenge on her blog expressivelyme.blogspot.com. (I really need to learn how to hyperlink websites) I really like her website. She has really great tutorials and lots of card designs.

I made the card with acrylic paint and foam stamps from Michaels. I wrote the sentiment with a brush pen used for writing kanji.

The card was another contender for my co-worker's babies 1st birthday. I was going for the three basic colors, but the blue was too light. And the white behind the lamb didn't show up well. If I repeat this card I'll use a darker blue behind the seal and red behind the lamb.

I ended up liking this card the best, so it's the one she got.

Birthday Cards

My co-worker's twins will be one year old tomorrow. Here are some cards I made for them. All cards were made with acrylic paint. The animal stamps are $1 foam stamps from Michaels. The circus tent is from a stencil set also from Michaels. The Oh Happy Day is from a Fiskars set.

The ribbon is a $1 roll from Michaels. It's a little retro, and I really need to find more uses for it.

Listening to Christmas music, maybe

So one of my fave radio stations has already started playing Christmas music. KOST 103.5 fm or www.kost1035.com has a live music. If only my Quicktime would work! I don't know what the problem is. I have the latest free version. When I click on the ListenLive button, a Quicktime symbol with a question mark comes up. So I will be denied Christmas music while I'm at the computer. My boombox (does anyone still call it this?) doesn't get super good reception. My other options are to: 1) go to bed because my clock radio is programmed to the station, 2) forgo Christmas music until the next time I'm in the car, 3) put in my Christmas CD's

I guess I'll forgo for now. I'm not going to be before 8 pm. I'm not putting in a CD because I'll forget to change it out, and I'll end up listening to the same 12 songs all night long.

Plus, I think it's a little ridiculous to start Christmas songs before Thanksgiving.

A Trio of Butterflies for Caardvarks Challenge

Here is a trio of butterfly cards for the sewing challenge.

The butterflies are made of velveteen ribbon (found in the floral and craft section). They were tied with coordinating ribbon on sale at Michaels this week 5 spools for $1. What a deal! The butterfly trails were stitched using 2-ply DMC embroidery thread. I tried a few different trails, and I don't know which one I like best. Maybe tomorrow I'll try a double trail with 2 butterflies.

There Thanks was hand written using a black brush pen. The For You sentiment is a $1 stamp from Michaels. And the last card has no sentiment yet. This will go in my any occasion file.

Basket full of flowers

This is for the caardvarks challenge to use stitching. I can't take any credit for this card - I case'd it from a Martha Stewart card idea booklet. Worse yet, I didn't even buy the book. How bad is that? At least I gave her credit.

If I do this again, I will use a darker color green, and a heavier weight thread (or even yarn). Though it's not shown, Thank You is stamped on the inside.

The basket was stitched freehand using light weight crochet thread. The flowers are EK Success paper punches.

Inking the edges

I love to ink the edges of paper. I think it adds more definition and dimension to the paper. It also hides the white backing or core of the paper/cardstock. (There's nothing wrong with the white outline. Some people like it; I only like it in certain applications.) It's easy to use the ink pad to get the edges of square or round paper, but how do you get into the crevices or curves? Especially if you're talking about a diecut piece or a finely cut out stamp.

In cases like that, I use a marker. Make sure the back side is facing you, and edge around the paper with the marker. It won't matter if you accidently write on the paper, because its the back and won't show. I've done it on almost all of the cards posted.

That's my tip for the week. I hope someone finds it useful.

Card for WSC27 Challenge

Here's my card for Beate's weekend challenge. I thought I'd do several cards - I really like this layout. But the weekend's been way too busy. So this is my first card. I'll probably post several more cards this week, just to get the ideas out of my head. The flowers are EK success paper punches. The saying is from a Fiskars stamp set (I think it's called paisley). The paper is from Provo Crafts slab.

A few more birthday cards

I made these birthday cards for a few co-workers. The first one is just like my previous post. The card and the pink border paper are cardstock. The flower paper and the silver paper are origami paper. The flower boquet is by Cuttlebug. The ribbon is by Trim it Up from Michaels. This is going to a very nice lady at work. She's great to work with, and much to my dismay, she was just transferred to another group. But I can still eat lunch with her.

The flower boquet is pretty significant because we both like gardening and flowering plants. We regularly exchange plant cuttings and seedlings.




This birthday card is for a male coworker. I ususally have a hard time making the cards neutral or masculine. I hope this fits. The star and streaks were cut out free hand. It's hard to see, but the streaks say "MAKE A WISH".

Way to Go Card for Captain Crafter's Challenge

The flower paper and the silver paper are origami paper. This is a great value for card makers. I paid $1.50 for 150 silver 2.5inch square paper, and $1.25 for 200 patterned origami paper. The paper is thin, but when used like this it almost doesn't matter. The sentiment is by Cuttlebug. I added the same size card stock to the back after embossing. Otherwise, the silver paper would bend when put in the envelope. The ribbon is Trim It Up from Michaels.

Some Old Cards

These are some old cards I made a few years ago. The originals were given away, and these are copies made so I wouldn't forget. Well, it's a good thing I made the extras, because I forgot! I found them tucked away in a drawer tonight.


The Thank You is a gate folder card with a flower boquet stamped in the middle, and thank you underneath. It's been so long, I don't know who made the stamps, though I still have them.



The Thinking of You was created using the masking technique. Again, I don't remember the stamp set. At that time, I wasn't keeping the boxes or labeling items well. It was fun to make, and really colorful. These two are the same design, just different colors.



Missing You card created with Disney stamps. I love classic Winnie the Pooh. These stamps are really old. They were bought from the Disney store at least 15 years ago.


The inside of the card. Promise you'll never forget me...

...actual and dim

This is a label that came on a FedEx package. I have no idea what it means, but it makes me laugh. Actual and Dim. I took it off the box before I threw it out. Unfortunately, it is really stuck to the jerky bag, so it will probably be thrown out soon. What do you think it means? Besides the obvious...

Some Scrapbook pages

I haven't been making any cards lately...too busy working on 6 scrapbooks. Yes, 6. I started in July working on a gift for my father's 70th birthday. Then I decided to archive all the family photo's at the same time. I've scanned hundreds of photos. I even bought my own scanner.

Right now there are 5 boxes of photos to go through, and no they are not in order. Then as I was scanning, I thought maybe I want a scrapbook. Then maybe my brother and sisters, and my cousin. That's how I ended up working on 5 scrapbooks. The only ones even partly done are my dad's and brother's. This is mainly due to their birthdays. I work better if I have a goal. Then I can procrastinate and stay up all night working really hard.

So my brother's party is tomorrow. I"ve finished about 20 pages. It may almost be finished - he's not that old.

The top is a page dedicated to some of the retired family cars. We spent alot of time in them- vacation trips, carpooling to school, field trips. Good Times!


My brother was in the Indian Guides. Pinewood Derby was an annual event. He did pretty well, and earned a few trophies.

My confused garden!

My pomegrante is flowering!! In a few weeks it should be dormant. All the other pomegrantes in the neighborhood are just about ripe. I think it may be confused because it is close to the brick wall. Maybe heat is radiating off it and throwing off the shrub.

Whatever the reason, this is not nomal. The shrub has flowered three times this year. Once during a freak warm spell in the winter, then again at the end of spring (Santa Ana winds took off all the flowers), and then again this Halloween. Flowered three times, and no fruit. I'll give it a few more years, and if it doesn't figure out the seasons I'm going to replace it.

How to make a shaker card pt. 2

Continued from part 1.

Step 7: This is the tricky part. Outline the foamie cut-out with adhesive. I used Terrifically Tacky Tape so you could see, but any strong adhesive will work. This needs to be all around the window. If there are any gaps, the confetti will fall out. Wow, I should not have picked such an elaborate design for the example! This took me at least 10 minutes. Normally, the card is super fast to put together.
I also added adhesive around the edge of the foamie to adhere the DS.

Step 8: Add confetti, glitter, whatever to the design window. Remove the backing to the tape. Carefully position the DS on the foamie, aligning the window. Press to seal all around. Give it a shake to make sure there are no gaps.

Step 9: Continue to embellish the card. I added curling ribbon and triangles to look more balloon like. If this was a snowball, I would have added an base. I've also used this technique to make mini-shadow box cards, so a frame would go around the window.

Finished!!! If you make this card, please let me know!!

How to make a shaker card pt. 1

I like making my own shaker cards, rather than using the CD holder because my cards are not the same size as the CD holder. I rarely make square cards. Most of the time they are 4.25 x 5.5 inches (or half of a 8.5 x 11 inch paper). I use this size because I have envelopes that fit. Or I use the precut cards with matching envelope sets.

This is an easy method to make any shaker card. Most of the time I stick with circles, squares, and rectanges. For the demonstration, I'm going fancy with a bunch of balloons. It's for my co-worker's 36th anniversary at work. That's a heck of a tenure, and she deserves a celebration! So my card will have festive balloons.

Step 1: cut a piece of sticky foamie the same size as the card front. I'm using a 5 x 6.5 inch card. Next trace your cut-out on the foamie. I like to use stencils to make the designs. The balloons are from Fiskars.

Step 2: Cut out the design.

Step 3: Trace the design on the DS paper which will cover the foamie. If the design is not symmetrical, make sure you line up the back of the DS paper with the front of the foamie. If you don't, your DS will have a mirror image of the design.

Step 4: Cut the design out of the DS paper. Then turn over the paper and match up the DS paper to the foamie. If the foamie shows through, make the cut out in the foamie just a bit bigger.

Step 5: For this card, I added the Dots DS paper to the card. Or you can add a photo to the card, whatever you want to show through the window. Remove the backing from the foamie and stick to the card. Make sure the corners match perfectly.

Step 6: Cut out a piece of acetate (transparency film) and attach to wrong side of DS paper.

Christmas card for Captain Crafter's challenge

This Christmas card was made for Captain Crafter's challenge (http://captain-crafter.blogspot.com/). The Challenge was to make a Christmas card without Christmas stamps. Really tough! All my stamps are Christmas, Halloween, flowers, or animals.
This was my only idea. I made several different types of trees (using different flowers) and I tried to make a mistletoe, but the flourishes didn't look right.
I hope this card fits the Challenge. The flourish kinda looks like a bird, but I added the eye and beak with a pen.

The paper is Provo Craft, the stamps are Mini Make a Flower and Family/Scroll by Autumn Leaves. Sentiment is hand written.

PS: Autumn Leaves are $1.99 clear stamps from Target. What a deal!

Acetate Card

Here's an acetate card I made a few months ago for a coworker. I don't remember who made the stamp, sentiment is a Cuttlebug emboss folder. I really like these colors together.

Get Well Card

Here's a get well card I made for my supervisor. His dog had hip surgery and needs 6 weeks of limited movement to recover. Since my supervisor is a man, I tried not to make the card too girly. The paper is from ProvoCraft. The paper flowers are from Making Memories. The brads are from JoAnn's. The flower stamp is by Fiskars. Ribbon is JoAnn's. The sentiment is hand written.

I need to practice making more masculine cards. All my stamps and embellishments are girly. I don't really want to invest in more stamps...my objective this year is to use what I have in more creative ways.

Challenge card for WSC24

Here's my entry for the SCS24 weekend challenge. I found it on Beata's blog fresh n fun.

http://beate.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/ (wish I could figure out how to add links)

The paper is from an old Provo crafts Slab, red cardstock from BigLots, snowflakes are Snow Burst SU!, I handwrote the sentiment with a Jelly pen, and I made the 3-D tree.

Another Shaker card

Here's another shaker card. I stamped the polar bear stamp twice - once on green, and again on white. The trees were cut out of the green, and the bear cut out of white, then they were layered. I used foamie to make the shaker globe. I hope this picture is clear.

Thanks Card

For my birthday, a friend gave me a Sixxix die cut that makes a card with a square window. I really love it, except it doesn't fit!! Argh! I have the classic Sixxix, and the die is too wide. This thing was so expensive 3 years ago. Should I trade it in for the Big Kick?

So I made this card. The window isn't straight, but I think it came out OK.