CC&S #153 Christmassy Sketch: Joy To The World

For my last post for CAS Colours and Sketches this year I have chosen my most favourite sketch of the year from challenge #124 in May. flipped it vertically and made it Christmassy! I have also taken the opportunity of combining my DT card with a few festive challenges along the way!

It combines two of my favourite card-making techniques (thus making it eligible for the HLS challenge)! Firstly the cling film technique used with my Cosmic Shimmer mists. Love, love, love this technique and while you're getting messy it's good to experiment with colours and make a few new pieces. The colour combos don't always dry how you'd imagined but that's half the fun of experimenting! Here I have simply die-cut three squares from a blue/silver piece, stamping the Wise Men image with black Versafine and raising this one with foam pads. The second technique involves my love of paper engineering/folding and here I have made a 3D star of Bethlehem from a 9cm square of holographic paper that itself has stars gleaming in it when it catches the light. A very clear tutorial for folding the star can be found on YouTube HERE. The sentiment is computer generated and the card is simply finished with a few silver star sequins.

Supplies Used:
Spray Mists: Aqua Lagoon & Silver (Cosmic Shimmer)
Stamp: Wise Men (DoCrafts)
Sentiment Font: Maiandra GD
Snippets: Silver holographic paper, Silver sequin stars

The challenges I would like to enter are:
Addicted to CAS: Challenge #78 Code Word 'Joy'

AAA Cards: Game #54 'Silent Night, Holy Night'

CAS on Sunday: Challenge #73 'Stars'

Happy Little Stampers: December CAS challenge 'Favourite Technique'

A very contemporary card but for me, this is a lovely reminder amongst the hustle and bustle of what Christmas is really all about. Thank you all for your visits to my blog over the last year and for your support for our CAS Colours and Sketches challenge. A few changes and some new faces joining the team in the New Year so please join us all then!

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Stef x

CC&S #153: 2015 Colours Revisited and Make It Christmassy!

For this week’s Christmas colour challenge at CAS Coloursand Sketches I have chosen a colour palette that I devised for one of our October challenges (#144). I wasn’t very happy with the card I made that week so wanted to see if I could come up with something better.

I really wanted to have another go at the bokeh technique and so for this card I sponged corresponding inks in the two blues onto a piece of watercolour paper. After letting this dry I sponged white ink from a chalk inkpad through a homemade circle template in vary levels of intensity. This was then mounted onto a piece of gold cardstock. Looking at internet images of bokeh, I’m not sure that my circles are really soft or out of focus enough but I like them anyway so I guess that’s all that matters.  

The snowflakes were a right faff to die-cut. I always seem to have trouble cutting very intricate dies though I have tried all sorts of tricks to make it easier without any real success! Eventually I cut enough (some in white, some in gold, one in felt) that were OK and layered them onto a piece of shimmery netting from a recycled wedding favour all held in place with a beautiful snowflake brad! Finally, after several hours with the snowflakes, the greeting was die-cut and added to one side.

Supplies Used:

Inkpads: Nautical Blue, Summer Sky (Memento), Cloud White (VersaMagic)

Dies: Snowflakes (Die'sire), Peace Word (Clearly Besotted)

Snippets: Gold, white, navy & watercolour paper/cardstock, White felt, Recycled netting, Snowflake brad

I would also like to enter my card into the following festive challenges:

CAS on Sunday: Challenge #72 ‘Christmas’

Time Out: Challenge #45 ‘Snowflakes are Winter’s Butterflies’

52 Christmas Card Throwdown: November Technique Challenge ' Sponging/Brayering'

Addicted To CAS: Challenge #77 'Dimension'

So sorry that my post for CC&S is late this week and that I've not managed to visit and comment on last week's entries - it's been a really busy week (and next week's not looking great either)!

Stef x