Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's my turn to host this week and I have a festive colour challenge for us to work with:

It's not essential to make a Christmas card with these colours, but that's exactly where I was headed - perfect for the word prompt over at Inkspirational too! I decided to have another go with my Altenew Winterberry embossing folder and coordinating stencils and this time use them to make a Christmas card - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

I flipped the embossing folder and stencils around so that they created something of an arch across the top of my card, with the white space towards the bottom. After embossing my panel, I stencilled the poinsettias in Poppy Parade, the smaller berries in Real Red and the leaves and stems in Shaded Spruce with the larger berries in gold, before adding a fine splatter of gold paint:

 A gold foil diecut sentiment from Memory Box and a few clear gold sparkly gems complete my card. I have to say I think this card looks so beautiful in real life, but I'm not sure that my photographs capture it. The weather here has been so grey this week lighting has definitely been on my side and I wonder if the photos make my stencilling look a little patchy? Which is a shame, as I was very careful and laboured in my execution! Ah well, you will just have to take my word for it!

I'm so looking forward to seeing what you make with this week's colours! Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

Enjoy your day; the hubby is out paddleboarding this morning (rather him than me!) so I am going to do a little ironing and squeeze in some crafting, before a lazy late lunch this afternoon. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

As promised I do have a quick second post today to share a card that uses the colour combo over at Color Hues that is my first of two entries for the 'anything goes' Stencil Week over at Just Us Girls: 

So today's card is a first outing for some new product that I finally got to play with at the weekend - take a look:

 Here's the low-down on today's card:

I recently treated myself to Altenew's Winterberry Poinsettias Embossing Folder and co-ordinating layered stencil set. I know, I know - I'm not big on embossing folders, but this one is just lovely and the addition of the stencils mean that colouring it is much easier than without. For my first outing I couldn't resist the purple and mossy green combo over at Color Hues - I considered a non-floral Halloween card, but I don't really send many of those so I succumbed to florals. Yes, I know poinsettias are not traditionally purple, but I am personally partial to a bit of purple and I decided to exercise some creative licence! I used a base of (retired) Wisteria Wonder cardstock and inked the flowers in Highland Heather and Gorgeous Grape, with the dark berries in Blackberry Bliss and the larger ones in white shimmer paint. Once I'd finished stencilling, I splattered the image with white craft ink and added a stacked Christmas diecut sentiment in silver foil (these are the retired Merry Christmas Thinlits Dies from Stampin' Up!). You can see the detail onthe image below, although my photos really don't do the embossing justice: 

I added a large diecut sentiment because I had used a 6" square card base, but next time I'm going to try it on a standard cardfront and go with something smaller I think. I think I can improve on my stencilling technique with this set, so I'm looking forward to trying it out in alternative colourways. Not bad for a first attempt though!

Enjoy your day; I need to crack on with a few other jobs, including a few outdoors as it's a lovely day today but the fine weather isn't forecast to last so time is of the essence. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!