Christmas Card Ideas PLUS a little Candy

It's almost Christmas, did you know that? LOL I sure hope you are not stressed out by the merry season, and have everything under control. Cards written? Presents wrapped? House cleaned and decorated to the nines? Food in? No?? Oh well, you still have a few days :-)))

If you are still making the cards, here are some ideas. These are my Christmas cards this year, and yes, I too left it to the last minute. Next year I have promised myself I will start making them in July! LOL. These are not great pictures as I had to get them written and sent, just snaps on the window sill, so I apologise in advance for the picture quality:

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When I have a little more time I will come back and list products used in more detail, but here is a rough summary:

The girl on several of the cards is from our Download collection "Let it Shine". Her boots and hat are covered in Polar White. I coloured her in the same colours on each image, using Copic marker pens.
Paper and Embellishments used are from: Bo Bunny Blitzen - Fancy Pants - Melissa Frances - Graphic 45
Prima Marketing Christmas Flowers
Stickles
Liquid Pearls
Pearls
K&Co Christmas
Distress Inks
Spellbinders


Everything is available from Charmed Cards & Crafts.

Right! As promised here is a little candy. What better than some delicious Tim Holtz stamps! This set comprises five rubber stamps and RRP's at £19.95:

Just enter your name with a link to your blog in Mr Linky below. Winner will be drawn in one week. GOOD LUCK!

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These Owls are so cute.

I totally love these Owls, they are so cute. So when the challenge over at SFTW said Friends, I just knew I had to use this stamp on a card. Here is the card, hope  you like it.

I used some Prima and Graphic 45 paper, some Prima flowes and one of the new Hero Art/ Sizzic dies, the sentiment is Norwegian and say something about friendship. This one is kind of hard to translate, but in a way it can go like this: "Friends warm eachothers hearts." The white in the owls eyes are pearls. And I colored them with my copics.
Wish you all a great weekend.
Hugs Gunn :-)

MEGA CANDY WINNER!

Slight delay, but so worth waiting for! We had entries through email also, and all of these were allocated a number. The total number of entrants was 423.

The winner has been chosen randomly at random.org:

I was chuffed to bits to see that it was one of our forum members MELLIE BEARD who resided at this number. Congratulations to you Mellie, we hope you enjoy your prize. Thank you to all who entered x x x Watch out for the next one :-)

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Free Downloads...

I was creating a card for someone who is poorly at the moment, and as I was making it I thought what a good idea it would be to start a new series of downloads, called "time to...". So time to..make a cuppa - time to...fall in love - time to... chill - time to ...relax - time to...celebrate - and so on. We will be giving away this new series of downloads periodically. Make sure you follow the blog so you don't miss out.

So here is my card:



Obviously the wording may not be applicable to many people, so I made this digi instead to give away (although I did include the other one in the file, just in case you know a John LOL). Click on the image to be taken to the download page on the main Charmed Cards & Crafts site:

Back to my card where I also decorated the inside.

You know, the new Owl collection is FABULOUS for masculine projects. I used one of the owls to sit on a metal clock hand. It instantly transforms the card I think. I coloured the owl with Copic markers. Remember that the collection comprises both black & white and coloured images.

• I used a variety of Prima leaves
• The border is cut with a Martha Stewart branch punch
• Owl from our new Owl collection
• Basic Grey glazed brads
  

If you receive our newsletter you will have access to a lovely new bundle of autumnal digital backing papers that I created specifically for the latest one. These papers will go fantastically well with the Owls too :-)

Happy crafting! xx

Hello to you all from Norway

It`s been a while since I posted something here. I got this last digi collection- these so cute and adorable owls and fell in love. So I just had to make a christmas card with this cutie and I used this card as my DT card for STFW, the challenge is a sketch.
The best part with this collection is the extra bonus: backing paper, they are so beautiful and this delicate blue become one of my favorites and print so well.
Enough talk... here is my card

So if you like cute owls and great digipaper, just go visit the shop and you find it there. :-)
Wish you all a great weekend.

Tutorial - Quick Paper Piecing

• In this tutorial you will be learning how to create a professional looking  image within a minimum amount of time and without wasting a scrap of paper.
• The papers I have used here are my current addiction; BasicGrey Picaddilly 6x6*
• The owls are digital downloads from Charmed Cards and Crafts designed be me, Louise Brigden.*

* To view or purchase these items please click on the shop at the top of the page

Paper Piecing is my fave technique and if you use a simple, large enough image it is very quick and simple to achieve fabulous results.......

1. Open MS Word. In the settings alter your paper size to; custom/ 15 X15 cm
2. Now insert your desired picture and re size if desired.
3. Insert 4 6x6 (15cmx15cm) papers of your choice into your printer. NOTE two of these pieces will be the background papers for two cards so I would advise you to keep two of the papers fairly neutral.
4. Print out.
5. 
6. Now take your two patterned pieces of paper and cut the elements of the image you wish to adhere to your background image. All the little bits will now be pieced together like a jigsaw onto your neutral background image.

Please Note; On completion of the two owls I decided  I wanted the eyes to be white so I printed the eyes another two times onto white paper. If you have the 'know-how' it would be good to crop the eyes and duplicate them to save on paper and ink.

Now you can create your cards and use up all the little bits that are left over. Here I have made two easel cards. Making these torn crumpled flowers and leaves is a great way of using your scraps and it's cheap too!

Have a go It's easy!