Non-traditional Christmas cards

Hello,

Well, we had our Christmas this morning and all the presents have been unwrapped. The girls sure were excited when they did their scavenger hunt for their new bikes! I received a lot of useful things for my month long trip that I am embarking on Christmas Eve day. I will be off to Central America, spending time in Guatemala, Honduras, Belize and Mexico. You can catch the details of this exciting adventure on the blog my friend and I have set up at http://karenandstaceyadventures.blogspot.com We are sure to have an exciting time and I expect to come back several pounds lighter with all of the activities we'll be doing. It's not a 4-star comfort trip, it's a backpacking and hostel trip.

So on to the cards. I have a couple of non-traditional cards to post first. They are non-traditional in terms of the colours used. You'll also note that I got a Cuttle bug for Christmas. Whoot! Naturally, I made use of it today while working to get my cards done.

Card #1

Black and red were the colours of choice today. I decided to use some of the black Gemstone paper as my A2 card base. My friend, Tasha, had given me some pretty red paper that has embossed swirls on it. She knows I like papers that have an aged appearance. I cut it at 3.75" and 5" and used it as my first layer. Then I took smaller piece of the black cut at 2.75 x 4". I used my Cuttle bug and embossed it with the Victoria folder. I stamped the image using black ink on the ivory gemstock and cut it used my Antique scissors. I then lightly inked the edges with a dark gray to meet up with the black stamped image. I used my antique scissors to cut the edge of the paper. I used a black checked ribbon to make a bow for the front.

The inside is a piece of the ivory paper cut with my antique scissors and inked with gray.

Card #2

Using the same card stock, I made a second A2 card. For this one I used the red paper from my Mistle Toe pack (CTMH) and embossed it using Spots & Dots. As the paper has a white core, I used the sanding block from my distressing kit (I had just gotten it from CTMH and had not yet used it) to lightly sand off some of the colour off the raised circles and dots. I layered some of the ivory Gemstone paper on top of this and applied a cute dimensional snow lady sticker. The edges of the ivory paper have been distressed with a tool from my kit. Finally, I stamped "Deck the Halls" (CTMH) layering a creamy brown ink from Box Colours and a dollar store red ink to get just the right shade.

The inside of the card is a simple rectangle of ivory paper with a sticker of red boot skates on it.

Card #3

Cuttle bug fun! This is actually the first card that I used my new machine on. I used the Spots & Dots folder to emboss white paper which I layered on a card of blue Gemstone paper. A bit of ribbon to complement the blue. An interesting snowman dimensional sticker from WalMart and a simple stamped sentiment to finish it off. I was amazed at what embossing can do to fancy up a very simple card.

A few snowflake stickers from the same sticker pack and a white rectangle of paper to write on is all that was needed to finish the inside of the card.

Card #4

This card was made using papers and stickers from Close to My Heart. The tree, sentiment and strips on the top and bottom of the patterned paper are all stickers. I ran the ivory strip underneath the tree sticker through the Cuttle bug using the Victoria folder. To give it even more depth, I lightly inked the raised edges with some green and creamy brown inks. A few gemstones here and there added a little bling to this card.

The inside has some ivory paper edged with sticker strip.

Well, that's it for today. I hope to make a few more cards yet this evening. Tomorrow will be a busy day with school for the kids, taking hubby to the airport to fly back to work for two weeks and I'll start packing for my trip! At some point during that, I must get more cards done and a whack of them mailed away. Time is running out!