My Favourite Cards of 2020

Today I'm sharing my favourite five cards of the year...for more details of any of the projects, click on the photo to go to the original post.

Succulents

This first card was one of my first makes of the year, and features gifts I received last Christmas...it was alos my first attempt at no line colouring.

Sketched Flowers

This is similar to one of last year's favourite cards, but with a different layout & in a different colourway. This stamp is still a favourite, and I love how the colours of the flowers stand out against the burgundy background.

Big Butterfly

This stamp has featured of previous years favourite lists, but I still love it! I love the way the watercoloured rainbow background looks behind it on this card.

Cheesecake Parade

I of course had to pick some Penny Black critters...and I'm choosing this card to remind myself to use more washi tape on my cards!

Spooky

I had a lot of fun making this card. I don't usually send Halloween cards, but as I wasn't going to be able to hand deliver my usual treat boxes this year, I made a couple of cards to send instead. 

Thanks to all of my lovely blog visitors this year - I've loved reading all your comments, they're very much appreciated!

Wishing you all a Happy & Healthy New Year!

Bauble Border

According to the tally in my sidebar, I made 119 cards for Christmas this year. Today, I'm starting over and have a couple of cards to start my Christmas Card tally for 2021. I must have been a very good girl this year, as I received a lovely little pile of stamps and other crafty goodies for Christmas, including the gorgeous bauble stamp (by Marianne Designs) I used on these two cards. I kept them really simple, stamping the images and sentiment (from a Lili of the Valley set) using white pigment ink, then heat embossing them using white embossing powder to get a really crisp image.

On red card:

And on teal:

Challenges for these cards:

• Christmas Kickstart - Anything Christmas
• Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas - Anything Christmas Goes
• Crimbo Crackers - Anything Christmas Goes
• Lil Red Wagon - Merry Christmas
• Simon Says Stamp (Mondays) - Celebrate

Les Chiens

Today's card features a few of the pooches from the 'Les Chiens' set by Katzelkraft. I stamped them off the bottom edge of a piece of watercolour paper, then coloured them using watercolour pencils. I added a sentiment from the 'It's Your Day' set by Penny Black...masking off the couple of little hearts on it before inking.

Challenges for this card:

• Creative Moments - Anything Goes
• Cute Card Thursday - Anything Goes
• Gem of a Challenge - Anything Goes
• Lil Patch of Crafty Friends - Anything Goes
• Polkadoodles - Anything Goes
• Simon Says Stamp (Mondays) - Celebrate

Favourite Five Christmas Cards 2020

It's become a bit of a tradition to share our favourite five Christmas cards each Christmas Eve...this year I had 119 cards to choose from, so it took me some time! Anyway, here are my favourites of 2020 (for more details of any prejects, the photos are linked to the original posts):

O' Christmas Tree

I had made some similar to this last year, and loved the effect of the doodled decorations on the simple watercolour trees, so had another go.

Snowboard Ride

There had to be a Penny Black critter in here somewhere...I love this fun chicken!

Trio of Trees

More Christmas trees...this time stamped and coloured with pencils on coloured card blanks.

Embossed Snowflakes

This simple card took me quite a lot of time to make and I love the blend of blues & pruples of the inky background with a touch of gold.

White Christmas

Finally, one of my most recent cards...more Christmas trees, and this is another one that took some time, but I love the end result.

Before I go...I also usually share my Christmas cake on Christmas Eve too...quite minimal this year, but here it is all the same:

Merry Christmas to all!

Guest Designer - Christmas Craft Creations Challenge

I'm back sharing another card for the Christmas Craft Creations Challenge having been asked to guest design for this month's challenge. The theme of this month's challenge is:

'Winter Blues'

This time, I combined one of my all time favourite Christmas stamps. 'Snowy' by Penny Black, with those lovely blues. I stamped 'Snowy' on to watercolour paper, paper piecing his scarf with some blue paper from the 'Vintage Dreams' pad by Craft Sensations...it's spotty, and, although it's difficult to tell from the photo, has a 'knitted' texture printed on it. I made a snowy sky background for him by blending Distress Inks (Stormy Sky, Faded Jeans & Chipped Sapphire) on to smooth white card, then stamping my 'Snowfall' background stamp by Simon Says Stamp using Versamark Ink, and heat embossing it using 'Diamond White' embossing glitter by WOW. I carefully cut around the top of 'Snowy', then added him over the top, matting the panel onto a snippet of navy card. The sentiment stamp is from a set by the Colorado Craft Company.

Thanks very much ladies for inviting me to guest design - I really enjoyed the theme!

For more inspiration from the fabulous design team, please pop over to the Christmas Craft Creations Challenge.

Penny Black Calendar

I'll warn you upfront...today's post has rather a lot of photos! Every year I decorate a couple of the 'Create a Calendar' blank calendars to give as Christmas gifts. This one is for my Aunt. I always use Penny Black images, combining them with papers from many different companies...these are always a great way of using up lots of snippets! I make the panel for each month A5 sized, so that they can easily be recycled into cards once the year has passed.

Challenges for this calendar:

• 2 Crafty Critters - Anything Goes
• As You Like It (Favourite Person to Create For (Family or Friends - Family, as they always appreciate the effort that has gone into making the items)
• Crafty Catz - Anything Goes
• Crafty Sentiments - Anything Goes
• Cute Card Thursday - Anything Goes
• Penny's Paper Crafty - Anything Goes
• Pixie's Snippets Playground - Use Snippets
• Polkadoodles - Anything Goes
• Sweet Stampers - Anything Goes

PBSC December - Anything Goes (Optional 'Winter Wonderland')...More Inspiration!

It's the third Saturday of the month, so that means it's time for some more inspiration for this month's Penny Black Saturday Challenge...where the theme is:

'Anything Goes'
or
'Winter Wonderland'

As usual, we are sponsored by the awesome 1-2-3 Stitch:

Prize - a $20 voucher!

I took inspirationd from copied a card from a video by Heather Telford (you can watch it here on YouTube), although I didn't have some of the supplies she used, so subbed in some different tree stamps, sentiment stamped and figured out a different way of making the snow as I don't  have any masking fluid. I started by painting the sky and snow banks on to watercolour paper, using Distress Inks (Stormy Sky & Chipped Sapphire). I then stamped my trees ('Before the Snow' and a smaller matching one from a little set called 'Wonder Collection')...using 'Evergreen Bough' Distress Ink...masking off the snow bank in the foreground. Once dry, I stamped each tree several times, then added a little more colour to them using more of the same ink (and a little of 'Pine Needles'). Once the trees were dry, I added my 'snow' by splattering a thick mixture of white watercolour paint all over the image. Finally, I stamped my sentiment (from a set by the Colorado Craft Company), then distressed the edges before adding the panel to a navy card blank.

Here's an angle where the 'snow' shows up a little better:

I'm also entering this card into the following challenges:

• Alphabet Challenge - S is for Snow Scene
• Artistic Stamper - Christmas
• Creative Inspirations - Ho Ho Ho
• Inkspirational - Snow
• Simon Says Stamp (Mondays) - Ice Cold
• We Love Chocolate Baroque - Anything Goes

For more inspiration from my lovely DT buddies, please pop over to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge.

Snowflake Tags

I'm sharing some gift tags today...made to match my kraft and gold wrapping paper. I stamped a large snowflake & sentiment (from a set by the Colorado Craft Company) on to plain kraft tags (from Amazon) using Versamark Ink, then heat embossed them in metallic gold, adding some sparkly gold ribbon to attach them to my gifts. 

And here's one of the tags on a gift:

Challenges for these tags:

• A Bit More Time to Craft - Anything Goes
• Corrosive - Anything Goes
• C.R.A.F.T. - Christmas - The Last Stretch
• Sweet Stampin' - Let it Snow

Sparkly Reindeer

I have a couple of simple embossed Christmas cards to share today...featuring a new (to me) set of Chocolate Baroque stamps that I won on the We Love Chocolate Baroque Challenge last month, and which arrived in the post this morning. The set is called 'Filigree Reindeer'...and I couldn't resist mounting them and inking them up after I'd finished work for the day. On the first card, I heat embossed one of the reindeer using WOW 'Metallic Platinum Sparkle' embossing glitter on a teal card blank along with one of the sentiments from the set. I couldn't resist adding a little red pearl for his nose.

On the second card, I used the largest stamp from the set...a beautiful snowy night time scene...heat embossing it using WOW 'Midnight Dream' embossing powder...a gorgeous blue, but with specks of of other colours in the blend. 

These embossing powders are so pretty, but a nightmare to get a decent photo of becasue they're so sparkly! This angle shows a few of the other colours:

Challenges for these cards:

• Allsorts - Christmas
• Crafty Creations - Anything Goes
• Creatalicious - Anything Goes (Optional 'Christmas')
• Creative Moments - Anything Goes
• Cute Card Thursday - Anything Goes
• Daring Cardmakers - Christmas Animals
• We Love Chocolate Baroque - Anything Goes

Quality Street Wreath

Today I'm sharing a wreath...this one's not for ourdoors though, as it's made from Quality Street chocolates! I make these every year (since 2012), and each year as the tubs contain fewer and fewer chocolates, they cover less of the polystyrene wreath shape I use as my base...this year there are actually a few bald spots on the back! I attached the chocolates to the wreath in a random pattern using my hot glue gun, then gave it a new bow made from silver sparkly ribbon as the one that had been on it for the last few years was looking rather tired.

Challenges for this wreath:

• Crafty Calendar - Christmas
• Crafty Catz - Anything Goes
• Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas - Anything Christmas Goes
• Incy Wincy - Christmas or Red & Green
• The Holly & the Ivy - Anything Christmas Goes
• The Sisterhood of Crafters - Anything Goes Christmas/Winter