Today I'm sharing a card using the current sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches that is also perfect for the challenge over at Time Out and the current Festive Friday challenge:

It's not often I make a tag card but Jacquie's FMS sketch this week had one front and centre so I thought I'd have a go and use it to showcase a sentiment for a quick and easy Christmas card - take a look:

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

Christmas Means More - I just love this sentiment and have had a few ideas on how to feature it on a card but not gotten around to it yet, so today was the day to remedy that and get at least one of those ideas onto paper! The bell patterned paper from the 'Tis The Season stack was crying out to be paired up with it, with all those little silver bells, so I went with a full patterned background and created a simple layered tag to bring in a little more red and stamped my front tag with that famous movie quote from 'It's A Wonderful Life', just colouring the bells with some Smoky Slate Blends for a little added colour.

Sounds Of The Season - I used the Sounds Of The Season dies to diecut two tiny silver bells and some holly out of foil to embellish my tag and paired it with some (retired) twine from last year to finish my card:

Festive Friday Checklist - Having made my card, I realised I'd ticked off 5 of the items on the Festive Friday checklist: holly, tags, bells, red and green. That's all there is to it - a great card for some last-minute crafting!

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

I've had a fun day today; I managed to get a run in first thing after a week-long hiatus and spent a pleasant couple of hours with some lovely ladies on a Zoom call unboxing my Spring-Summer pre-order; I can tell you there were 'oos and ahs' a plenty! I'm now off to the postbox and then back in time for a Zoom quiz!! Enjoy your evening and I'll be back tomorrow with another project and a guest appearance over at CASology, so don't miss it. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

CHRISTMAS MEANS MORE PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (£13.50)

WHISPER WHITE A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)

GARDEN GREEN A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)

TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK PAD (£5.50)

SMOKY SLATE STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)

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 you to work with:

I'm also linking up with the challenge over at Festive Friday, where I used diecut, pattern paper, ribbon and sentiment from the inspo list. The colours I chose for this week's challenge are some of my favourite to work with when creating cards and projects for the festive season, and whilst you are free to create whatever you like with the palette, I couldn't resist creating a card and matching gift box ready for Christmas. This is a rather photo-heavy post, so here goes! First up - here's my card and co-ordinating gift packaging together:

Pretty, right? Let's take a close look at each on turn. First up - here's the card I made:

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

Sounds of The Season - A pair of silver foil jingle bells from the Sounds of the Season Dies are the centrepiece of today's card. I used these larger-than-life bells to frame my sentiment from the 'Wrapped in Christmas' stamp set and paper-pieced the holly leaves with a second set cut from green foil for contrast. I added Real Red Rhinestone jewels for my berries, added some diecut pine sprigs and finished with a Real Red sheer ribbon bow to each. These bows do make the card a little less post-friendly, but I think the extra detail is worth it. You can see the detail on the bells on the close-up below:

'Tis The Season - I used a combination of a Shaded Spruce/Real Red/Black/White plaid and a holly pattern from the 'Tis The Season designer series paper pack to compliment my silver bells and added a thin border of silver between the layers for added shine. I love the white splatter on the plaid pattern - and it's part of the design, no extra effort required!

Rectangle Gift Tin - I liked my card so much that I decided to create a belly band wrap for one of the silver rectangle tins that are in the Autumn-Winter catalogue. Available in packs of 4, they are great for a gift card or to hold a small item such as a piece of jewellery or item of make up, for example. Here's my finished tin:

I've decorated it in much the same way, strengthening the band with a piece of Real Red cardstock for the base layer and adding a wrapped bow in the wide Shaded Spruce ribbon from the Wonder Of The Season Ribbon combo pack. Here's a close up from another angle with a better view of the bell decoration: 

Here are the visual summaries of the key products used on today's projects for you to pin for easy reference:

 And for the tin:

You can see all of my Product and 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day; I'm hoping to do a little bit of crafting, a little bit of cooking and generally catch up on everything I've avoided doing whilst I've been at Stampin' Up!'s Onstage at Home virtual online event these past couple of days. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

SOUNDS OF THE SEASON DIES (£20.00)	STITCHED SHAPES DIES (£28.00)	'TIS THE SEASON 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 CM) DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£10.75)	SILVER FOIL SHEETS (£4.75)	RED & GREEN FOIL SHEETS (£9.25)
WRAPPED IN CHRISTMAS CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	REAL RED 3/8" (1 CM) SHEER RIBBON (£6.50)	WONDER OF THE SEASON RIBBON COMBO PACK (£8.25)	RECTANGLE TINS (£11.25)	WHISPER WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)
TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK PAD (£5.50)	REAL RED A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	RED RHINESTONE BASIC JEWELS (£6.50)

Happy Monday everyone! I've had a super busy and productive day and am finally getting to today's blog post! Today I've a couple of cards to share with you for a couple of challenges, both featuring the Warm and Toasty stamp set. My first card features this week's Color Throwdown colours:

And the first animal to feature is the reindeer, resplendent with his red bow:

I've coloured the reindeer in the challenge colours with my Stampin' Blends and my card also features a couple of sneak peeks: the sentiment is from a new stamp set called 'Curvy Christmas' and is paired with a fabulous die from the Curvy Die set, both of which will be available to customers from the 1st November as a special release - exciting stuff! I couldn't resist adding a large red enamel dot to christen my reindeer Rudolf:

My second card uses the polar bear from the 'Warm and Toasty' stamp set, this time using this week's CAS Colours and Sketches colour palette:

I've seen some great examples of sponging recently, so wanted to have a go at creating a sponged background and decided that the blues would make a great backdrop for my iceskating polar bear:

I added a snow drift using my Freezin' Friends Dies and cut an ice rink freehand from vellum and coated it with a liberal dose of clear Wink of Stella for an icy sparkle, before adding my polar bear to the finished scene.

I did a little extra stamping on the inside of this one too:

So what do you think? I think creating sponged backgrounds, whilst messy, is also quite addictive; and to that end, I have another one for you tomorrow!

Here are the visual summaries of the key products used on today's projects for you to pin for easy reference:

And for the second one:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used - Card 1:

WARM & TOASTY CLING STAMP SET (£20.00)	'TIS THE SEASON 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 CM) DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£9.14)	VERY VANILLA A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)	TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK PAD (£5.50)	CHERRY COBBLER CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)
CRUMB CAKE STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)	CHERRY COBBLER STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)	STAMPIN' BLENDS BRONZE & IVORY COMBO PACK (£8.50)

WARM & TOASTY CLING STAMP SET (£20.00)	FREEZIN' FRIENDS DIES (£27.00)	TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK PAD (£5.50)	CRUMB CAKE STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)	WHISPER WHITE A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)
MISTY MOONLIGHT A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	NIGHT OF NAVY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	NIGHT OF NAVY STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)	MISTY MOONLIGHT CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	MISTY MOONLIGHT STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)
FROST WHITE SHIMMER PAINT (£7.50)	ADHESIVE-BACKED SNOWFLAKES (£5.50)