Valentines

Valentine's Day is right around the corner.  Typically I don't send many valentine cards. Most of my crafting around this holiday tends to center around treat bags or punny valentines for the kids. This year I agreed to assist our youth group with creating cards and gifts for our shut-ins. Still working to come up with some ideas. I'm finding it a bit more challenging as I'll be working with teenagers...punny valentines seem too young and most of the items I've pinned in the past, much too complicated for the time allotment.  I'm sure I'll get there.

In the meantime, here are a few cards I created to send. No stamping, just paper, dies (Concord & 9th, MFT, Mama Elephant) and shimmer pen. Not that you can see the shimmer very well in the images but trust me, it's there. I would not create a valentine without sparkle!

Thank You

Happy Monday. 

Kicking off a new week and finally kickstarting the new year. It's a rough start. My niece is home sick so all my big goals for the day need to be modified to account for spending most of my day with her. Usually, I'm better organized and prepped. Full of energy and eagerness to set goals, clean out and very productive. Last week, not so much. Procrastion was my first, middle and last name. We did manage to get all the Christmas decorations put away. And I did get to spend some time in the craft room building a stash of Thank-You cards for the coming year. I'll require many more but it's a good beginning and I'm counting it as a win in an otherwise pretty lazy, laid-back start to the year. 

This was really more of a color challenge for me. I've had the turquoise cardstock from Paper Source for a number of years. I believe it is called Pool. Decided it was time to put it to better use than sitting on a shelf. Why I don't use this color combination more often is a mystery to me...I really like to cool greens and blues complimented by the warm brown. And it's not like this combo hasn't been everywhere during the past couple of years. Figures I'm picking it up just as it's going out. 

Stamps and dies are from Altenew, Concord & 9th, Mama Elephant, MFT and I might even have one from Simon Says in there. 

This first one uses the C&9 double cut alphabet dies. This is still one of my all-time favorite alphabet dies. And, yes, I'm still hoping they'll release some phrases because lining up the individual dies, even with a temple, is still a major pain. The fact that I do it is just an indication of how much I love the results. I've paired it with Altenew's Leaf Canopy stamp set. Another new favorite. 

This card uses a free little stamp set Altenew sent to their customers. It was such a wonderful year-end surprise in the mail. Though I'm pretty sure this meant I spent way too much money with them last year.  No matter, my loyaty is easily bought with kindness and great customer service. 

The sentiment is from Mama Elephant. The set contains the word thanks in several languages. Love that!

The final card is using the remaining die cuts and MFT Distressed Patterns stamp. Of all the stamps I purchased last year this one is definitely in the top 10 favorites. I predict it will get a healthy workout in the coming year. 

Deck the Halls

Happy Monday! I'm coming off a very busy weekend with family and prepping for the holidays. No decking of halls buts lots of gift wrapping. With a large family, there is definitely more of that in my future.

Today sharing a card made with Concord & 9th's Deck the Halls turnabout stamp set and PTI Holiday Double Cut dies. Lots of gold embossing and sparkle on this more traditional color schemed card.

CN9 Cozy Christmas

Been holiday crafting and baking since mid-November. Every year I make a promise to myself to start earlier, plan it all out and then something or another disrupts my best intentions. I try not to stress about it too much after all this is supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year...and honestly if some of the items don't get completed the only person usually disappointed is me.

The good news is my church's holiday cookie walk and bake sale is done! We had a great turnout and some wonderful cookies, candies and desserts. I feel like I gained inches just walking by the displays of goodies. I'll post some images at some point, mainly of the decorated cookies I create for the sale. I like to do a comparison on my decorating progress and capacity. Five years ago when I began learning to use royal icing it took me an entire week to decorate a couple dozen cookies, this year I managed to complete 247 cookies in the same amount of time. Progress!

Along with baking, I have been busy creating some holiday cards. I always read about the super organized starting their holiday card production in mid-summer. Yeah, so NOT me. Envious? Yes! But I can never seem to break out the Christmas stamps earlier than November.

Today I'm sharing a card I created with Concord & 9th's Cozy Christmas stamp set. I'm a sucker for knit patterned stamps. The minute I saw the release this baby made its way into the cart. Washi tape from Michaels and those cute little mittens are from Simple Stories.

I'll be posting more this week as I finally got around to photographing all my cards and crafty things for the holidays.

PTI Twig Wreath

Another autumn inspired card for Thanksgiving. This one is using PTI's Twig Wreath along with the new dies from CZ. I stacked several die cuts for some slight dimension. I stamped the envelope with a set from Concord & 9th, pulling the colors from the wreath.

CN9 Wreath Turnabout Fall

Another Fall card this time using the Concord & 9th Wreath Turnabout stamp set. I've pulled this stamp set out a number of times this year. I'm guessing I'll pull it out one more time to try a holiday-themed color palette.

The sentiment is from a PTI set. I copper embossed the sentiment onto a strip of vellum.  I used a strip of light purple vellum behind the sentiment strip to give it a bit more pop and prevent it from blending into the background. And just for full transparency, that purple vellum is older than my nephew who's turning 24 this year. Well past time it got put to use!

CN9 Thank You Cards

Few more thank you cards this week. These are made using Concord & 9th products.

The background image is using the Lace Leaf stamp set. I see many people doing beautiful swashes of watercolor and inks as backgrounds. I've tried a few times but I'm just not very good. What I envision and the results are far different. More practice is needed but with so many nice messy background stamps available I really have little motivation to improve my hand at watercolor. I much rather expand my background stamp collection! This one is a winner. Like the results and it's a good size. 

What I'm really swooning over at the moment though is their Double Cut Alphabet dies. Nice modern, bold feel lending itself well to masculine cards and clean design. I'm hoping they come out with the same font as already formulated words. I made 8 cards and by #6 I was a bit tired of lining up  YOU to create the shadow effect. Maybe they can help a gal out?!