Hello Stamping Friends,

I held two Christmas card making events this year- A Stamp A Stack and A Card Buffet.

Thank you to those of you who were able to get away.  Order products now for next year- the catalog expires Jan. 5th.  Click Here to order.

Drum roll – May I present:

The Stamp A Stack

#A –  the Snowflake Flip Card using the Snowflake Card Thinlits Dies (page 22 of the holiday catalog), the All Is Calm Specialty Designer Paper,  Frosted Sequins, and the Lost Lagoon Silky Taffeta Ribbon, all on that same page.  The card uses the Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer Paper to make the snowflakes, two large and one small layered here, and  —  the Joy greeting from the Thinlits Set is punched out twice, once backwards;  layering the two makes it look wonderfully 3D- almost like our clay with glitter.

Inside we have Jackie Topa’s design for making a gift card holder by punching out a snowflake with the die, rotating it 90 degrees and punching again.  Cool Technique!  Jackie has a nice video at Jackietopa.typepad.com.  The Holiday Invitation stamp set from page 49 is perfect for a gift card – well maybe not Borders or Home Depot- but definitely a Starbucks gift card which is what each attendee received from me.

#B – The second card used the Cheerful Christmas stamp set on page 15 of the Holiday catalog.  I cased this from a posting on Pinterest  by Inkandpapercafe.com.   I have used the Deco Labels Framelits to frame a circular punched image but liked using a punched circle cut in half to frame the deco label.  The Filigree Frame Textured Embossing Folder was perfect for lots of little scrollys.

Masking Tip: I taught the stampers how to mask the stamp by stamping the green sections on the sticky edge of a post it note, fussy cut the masks and put them on the stamp before stamping in Real Red Ink.  Ink up with Real Red ink, remove the masks, color the green evergreen bows with the Garden Green marker and stamp on your cardstock!  Voila – a much richer image than coloring all the red of the image.

I was able to be creative on the inside, (love making the inside special), which you will see as you follow Stampalosopher.  I turned the main image upside down for one lovely scrolly to use for hanging ornaments, stamped the message from a retired set – Joyful Christmas – (remember those lovely poinsettias?!), stamped the ornaments, and then drew a line with a ruler to each ornament being careful to not draw over the greeting.  Or, as one creative stamper did, draw the line for the middle one over top of the greeting and then stamp the middle ornament on another piece of paper, fussy cut it, and attach with dimensionals for a different 3D look!

#C – The third Stamp A Stack card was a more formal card cased in part – the banner part – from one of my many convention swaps.  I wish I knew to whom credit should go but the name is lost.

The greeting is from Seasonally Scattered, page 43 of the Holiday catalog.  For those who thought it was too ornate a simple Merry Christmas was stamped instead.  One stamper liked the silver snowflakes but not the greeting, so she stamped Merry Christmas,  punched it out with the large oval punch, and then mounted the greeting with dimensionals on top of the silver snowflakes.  So nice!

For the inside I used the greeting from the Bright and Beautiful stamp set on page 25 and a strip of silver foil paper:

Leftover card kits from the Stamp A Stack were available at my next event The Card Buffet!

The Card Buffet

We had such fun at the Card Buffet and everyone went home with a door prize – a kitchen towel angel.  Well okay, they did have to make their own door prize but it was fun.  Here is a picture of Michele’s angel:

The angel uses one kitchen towel, a matching rectangular potholder, a dishcloth, several rubber bands, lots of ribbon, a pipecleaner to attach all, and decorations for her to hold.  Here is a pdf file with one of the poems I found on Pinterest printed inside a frame from My Digital Studio:

Kitchen Angel Poem

#1 – Moving right along we have the Chapstick holder from Angie Leach at TooCoolStamping.com using leftover silver circles from the November Paper Pumpkin kit.  Walmart had peppermint striped chap sticks for $1:

#2 – The November Paper Pumpkin had eight cards in the kit so they were available to make at the Card Buffet, I added Blue Lagoon to the front for an upscale version:

#3 A revised case of a card from the StampWithSandi.com blog.  I used three gold embossed middle sized stars from the Bright and Beautiful stamp set instead of two and stamped them on white instead of gold foil paper.  I glued sequins on the card instead of using gold embossing and I used a retired stamp set, The Sounding Joy.  But wait until you see the inside…….

I used the Confetti Stars Punch-page 30 of the catalog – and taped on a strip of gold glimmer paper underneath to sparkle through the top and tie in the gold of the front! Thanks to my darling husband for that touch of creativity!

#4 – I purchased a Simply Sent Noel Notes card kit from the Clearance Rack and it turned out to be a favorite of all the stampers.  The Noel was precut and the card used textured card stock. The envelope and liner were all included.  The kit was meant to be for a Christmas family picture but I made it into this card with the alphabet from the photopolymer stamp set and the Merry Christmas greeting from Petite Pairs.  The kit had a scalloped inside layer to tie with the scallops on the envelope. I used a greeting from the Many Merry Messages stamp set -retired.    I have a new appreciation for the wonderful kits SU offers!

#5 – The Card Buffet would not have been complete without using the White Christmas stamp set, pg. 31.  I sponged the Organza ribbon and used the Project Life Cards and Labels Framelits for the greeting.  One stamper put the Santa and sleigh from Holiday Home, pg. 16,  in the top left which was a very cute addition.  I used the Northern Flurry embossing folder and we used the brayer to make a beautiful inside.  Stay tuned for specifics  on brayering an embossing folder in a later post.

Embossing Folder Tip:  To avoid getting little creases in your cardstock from an embossing folder – use a piece of cardstock larger than your embossing folder,  for example 6″ wide instead of 4″.  Run your folder and extra sized paper through the Big Shot and then cut to size.

#6 –  Last but not least is the card I designed for the swap at the Unite and Excite event.  Jesus is the reason for the season and The Newborn King stamp set on page 19 says it beautifully!

“May we remember Him this Christmas season and throughout the coming year!”

Merry Christmas Dear Stamping Friends!

Karen

So which is your favorite?  I would enjoy hearing from you.  Click in the upper right of the main site (not a post) to add your email and  follow Stampalosopher.  The site is a Model T right now but will improve in 2015 as I learn more about blogging.

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