Icy Polar Bears and Cosy Winter

ABC Christmas Challenge is "Y for Your Favourite Colours and / or Z is for Zoo Animals".  My favourite colours are blue and white, and I love them for snowy winter Christmas cards.  And polar bears are sometimes found in zoos.

 

 

I used a few shades of blue Distress inks, tapped them on my craft mat, added a bit of white shimmer paint and a bit of iridescent medium, spritzed all with water, and smooshed and dragged my watercolour paper in it. I die cut the polar bears twice out of white cs and glued them together before adding them to the smooshed panel. I die cut the sentiment, leaving the letters inside their outer section (much easier than gluing on each individual letter!).

 

Can You Handle the Pressure? wants an embossing folder and the theme of winter.  Sparkles Christmas Challenge wants "warm and cosy".

Stamped, watercoloured, popped up on fun foam on a background run through a snowflake embossing folder.

 

Supplies for card 1:
Ink - various blue Distress inks
Paper - watercolour paper, white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Tsukineko Frost White liquid paint, Windsor & Newton Iridescent Medium, polar bear die, sentiment die

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps - Stamplorations
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - white cs, mixed media cs
Size - A2
Accessories - watercolour paints, Cuttlebug snowflake embossing folder, fun foam

Cozy Winter and Santa Horses

Time Out's new challenge is "Cozy" and Shopping our Stash's challenge is "Time for a Hot Drink".

I love that sentiment - as much as I love summer and my garden, I also love being curled up with a blanket, a book, and, in my case, a cup of tea.

Stamped and coloured with coloured pencils, trimmed, popped up on fun foam on a wintery dp background.

And a second card, this one for Color Hues "Red and Black".

The horses are stamped in black and left uncoloured except for using a red Tombow marker to colour their Santa hats.  It's trimmed with a stitched rectangle die and bordered in red cs.  I added Fun Flock to the brims and pompom of the hats, and a thin line of glitter on the snowy top of the fence.

 

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Stamplorations
Ink - Versafine Onyx Clair Nocturne
Paper - white cs, unknown dp
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, fun foam

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps - Impression Obsession Santa horses, Penny Black                                                     Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - red Tombow marker, Lil Inker stitched rectangle die, Fun Flock, clear glitter

Cocoa, Candy Cane, and Marshmallows

For the new Peace on Earth challenge, I was inspired by the images of cups of cocoa with candy canes and marshmallows.

I stamped and watercoloured the image, and then laid a stencil over it and lightly stencilled the leaves in green Distress Oxide ink.  I bordered it with a similar green cs and used off white cs for the card base.

Here's the Peace on Earth mood board in case you want to be inspired by it, but if not, feel free to enter an "anything Christmas" card.  And be sure to check out the other cards by the rest of the Design Team.

I'm also adding it to the Stencil Fun Challenge.

And to Double D "Hot Beverages"

Supplies:
Stamps - Stamping Bella
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, Distress Oxide Rustic Wilderness
Paper - watercolour paper, green and off-white cs
Size - 4.75" square
Accessories - watercolour paints, leaf stencil

Christmas Cocoa

Reminder time for the CAS Christmas "Holiday Treats" challenge!

It's been a lovely warm week of summer weather here in Vancouver, so it's hard to think about drinking cocoa right now, but I do love this image:

Forgive the poor image - I find shimmer card stock very hard to photograph.

I stamped the image in archival ink on mixed media cs.  I started by watercolouring with my Gansai Tambi paints - they include a shimmery gold paint that I used on the background.  I did not get a very deep red on the cup and saucer so went over it with a red Intense watercolour pencil and got a much richer colour.

I decided to make the cup look more festive so I die cut some tiny holly leaves and berries out of shimmer paper and created a patterned band around the middle of the cup.  I went over the berries with Glossy Accents to make them more shiny.

I trimmed the image to have a narrow border of the mixed media cs, then added it to a piece of red shimmer cs, and popped that up on fun foam on a cream (very pale gold) shimmer card base.  It really matches the pale gold watercolour wash on the background of the image.

Looking forward to seeing what holiday treats you come up with between now and September 24th.  There's some more inspiration over at CAS Christmas from the rest of the Design Team and September's Guest Designer, Birgit (Rapport fran ett skrivbord).

I'm also linking my card up at Christmas Cards All Year Round where they want Christmas or winter food or drink.
 

Supplies:

Stamps - Stamplorations

Ink - Archival Jet Black

Paper - mixed media cs, green and red shimmer paper, pale gold cream shimmer and red shimmer cs

Size - 4.75" square

Accessories - Gansai Tambi watercolour paints, Intense watercolour pencils, Memory Box tiny holly leaves and berries dies, fun foam

Christmas Treats

Nance is hosting CAS Christmas this month and she wants to see cards with holiday treats!

It gave me the perfect chance to try out a new stamp given to me by wonderful Bonnie Klass.  She noticed that when we had the CAS Christmas "Elf" challenge, I had to borrow elf stamps as I didn't have any, so she thought she'd fill in the gap in my stamp collection.  And the elf stamp she gave me includes Christmas treats so perfect for this challenge:

I stamped and then coloured the image with coloured pencils, blending with Gamsol.  Then trimmed the panel and popped it up on fun foam on a green card base.

Thank you, Bonnie - it is such a great image!

I'm looking forward to seeing what cards everyone comes up with featuring holiday treats!  Check out the inspiration from the rest of the CAS Christmas Design Team and this month's fabulous Guest Designer, the very talented Birgit (Rapport fran ett skrivbord).

I'm also linking up with Christmas Cards All Year Round where they want Christmas or winter food or drink.

Supplies:

Stamps - Stamping Bella

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Paper - Bristol cs, green cs

Size - 4.75" square

Accessories - coloured pencils, Gamsol, fun foam

A Card for a Child

Two Christmas challenges right now are asking for cards you would give to a child: 

Christmas Kickstart Challenge - "Christmas Kids"

ABC Christmas Card Challenge - "K for Kids"

Here's what I made:

Stamped my image, coloured with coloured pencils, trimmed it with a deckled rectangle die, bordered with candy cane dp and a thin black border. Finished off with fun foam on the Santa hat.

I can't imagine drinking cocoa and wrapping up in a sweater and scarf today - it is so hot and sunny!

Supplies:

Stamps - Simon Says Stamp

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Paper - white and black cs, Paper Studio dp

Size - A2

Accessories - coloured pencils, fun foam, Spellbinders Deckled Rectangle die