Today I'm sharing my design team card for our new challenge over at As you See It where it's time for the often-dreaded speed challenge:

Yes - create a card in under 10 minutes, this time using shades of brown! I would usually say that brown is quite an uninspiring starting point for me, however I actually had a couple of ideas right off the bat for a change! I worked up one of those and am quite pleased with the results - take a look:

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

A Kennel of Dogs - Today's card features a kennel of dogs, brown dogs to be precise, courtesy of some Crumb Cake, Soft Suede and Early Espresso cardstock and my Dog Builder Punch. As an aside, did you know that there are a number of collective nouns for dogs and in addition to the more commonly used 'pack', you can also refer to a group as a 'kennel of dogs'. I much prefer the latter when it concerns domestic pups so decided to go with that as my dogs are certainly not at all wolf-like, which is what always comes to my mind when I think of a pack! I simply punched a whole bunch of dog shapes and then positioned them somewhat randomly on my card to create a pattern, allowing some to overhang the edges before trimming to size.

Puppies and Pawprints - The sentiment and pawprints on the heart come from the 'Happy Tails' stamp set and are perfect if you need one of those tricky cards to send to someone mourning the loss of their four-legged friend. I stamped mine onto Whisper White and used a heart framelit from the retired Sweet and Sassy Framelits set to cut it out and popped it up on dimensionals; the sentiment does just about fit into the straight-edged heart punch from the new heart punch pack in the Spring Mini catalogue, but is a little more snug. Using the punch would save some time too but I knew the sentiment would fit the framelit and I had mine ready to go!

I Feel The Need For Speed - So the key to a speed stamping challenge has to be simplicity, right? My card has very little stamping, so how long did it take to complete? It actually took me 9 minutes and 8 seconds on the first attempt, because the time was taken up arranging my punched dog shapes and glueing them in place with Tombo. Once complete, I liked the card so much I decided to punch a bunch more dog shapes and used the same layout to create another two identical cards, and did both in less total time than it took me to make the first one! If I had used Snail adhesive, I probably could have saved even more time. So I challenge you - if you CASE my card, do let me know how long it takes you to complete - it is an easy one for under 10 minutes once you have the layout! I'm going to make a few more using different colours and using the Cat Punch.

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. 

Before you put your creative thinking caps on, why not check out the blogs of the other As You See It team members:

Amy Jasper

Heather Cooper

Jan Clothier

Jane Knudsen

LeAnne Pugliese

Here's a summary of our challenge rules:

• Create any card, scrapbooking page, 3D project or packaging project that fits the challenge.
• Please include the challenge graphic and link back to the challenge in your blog post. Turn off word verification so we can leave you lots of lovely comments. Make sure you link the post not the whole blog to the Linky. Use #AYSI218 when uploading to a public gallery.
• If you’re unsure about ‘the rules’, check the details under the Challenge Guidelines tab on the As You See It Challenge homepage.
• In a colour challenge, black or other neutral can be used in outlines and sentiments but no other colours should be included. Stampin’ Up colours are used for reference but colours that are a close match are welcome.
• Don't forget to tell us how long it took to create your speed-stamped creation!

We look forward to seeing your creations in the AYSI gallery.

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Dog Builder Punch (£17.00)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)	Happy Tails Photopolymer Stamp Set (£16.00)	Heart Punch Pack (£32.00)	Early Espresso A4 Cardstock (£8.25)
Early Espresso Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Soft Suede A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Crumb Cake A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Crumb Cake Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)

The week is running away with me again - I can't believe it's Thursday already and I'm finally managing a blog post! Today I'm sharing a card that I made for a few challenges in an attempt to keep my 2020 Christmas cardmaking on track:

Armed with the codeword of 'Frosty' from the current challenge over at Addicted to CAS, along with the snowflakes, trees and pink sky in the inspiration photo at Hand Stamped Sentiments, I set to work and this is what I came up with:

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

This was another relatively quick and easy card to make: I used a 2 1/4" circle punch to make a mask and then sponged a combination of Melon Mambo and Blueberry Bushel inks on a Whisper White base to create my sky. I stamped a collection of trees from Rooted in Nature in Memento Black onto Whisper White and cut them out with my co-ordinating Nature's Roots Dies and popped them up on dimensionals in front of the sky. I added snow to the branches of my trees with a chalk marker then added a liberal application of glitter to the snowy branches and a few sequins to complete my frosty look:

How pretty is this? Given the crystalline appearance of all that glittery and frosty snow, I am also linking up with CASology for my take on the word 'Crystal'. I then stamped my sentiment (from the retired SU! stamp set 'Wonderland') in black onto vellum and wrapped this around the front of my card to finish. I do find it difficult to think about Christmas amongst all of the hearts and flowers that are prevalent at this time of year, so was grateful to the above challenges for some festive inspiration!

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. 

Enjoy your day; I am without electricity today, which since it was planned is no bad thing; I've enough laptop battery to write this post and access to a wifi hotspot, and no means to do any washing, ironing, cooking or vacuuming  - an afternoon of crafting it is then!! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Rooted In Nature Cling-Mount Stamp Set (£39.00)	Nature's Roots Dies (£36.00)	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock (£7.75)	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad (£5.50)	Melon Mambo Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)
Blueberry Bushel Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Vellum A4 Cardstock (£9.25)	Snowflake Sequins (£5.50)	Dazzling Diamonds Stampin' Glitter (£5.50)

I've got a super-quick post this evening to share a card I made with Lee Ann's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches that I am hopefully just going to squeeze my entry in for:

The minute I saw the angle in Lee Ann's sketch I knew that it would be perfect for my first use of one of my favourite sets in the Spring mini catalogue - take a look:

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

Music From The Heart is the set inspired by Million Sales Achiever Dawn Olchefske and as someone who has a family of musicians of one form or another this was a set I've wanted for a long time! Today's card is super-simple, stamped in black on Whisper White to look like sheet music with a black card base, then the piano coloured with a black Stampin' Blends combo and just two pops of red from the paper-pieced red foil heart-shaped lid of the piano and a teeny-tiny red foil punched heart to adorn my sentiment. A little bit of overhang from the sentiment label and the stitched circle for interest, and that's that. Quick to create and fortunately quick to blog as time is of the essence today!

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. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Music From The Heart Photopolymer Stamp Set (£16.00)	Basic Black A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad (£5.50)	Stitched Shapes Dies (£28.00)
Basic Black Combo Pack Stampin' Blends (£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 my favourite, a sketch challenge, for you to work with:

My sketch involves an element of repeating pattern, which can be any shape you like. Whilst I used my stitched circles as a background for my pattern repeat, today's card is all about the shoes - and some rather special shoes at that! Take a look:

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

Words To Live By - I love the sentiments in the 'Dressed to Impress' stamp set but my favourite is without doubt this one - I mean, has there ever been a truer word spoken?! I am one of those people who love shoes; I don't own as many pairs now as I once did and I've never owned a pair of floral high heels, but I would love to - so I would love to receive a birthday card like this! I used the florals in the stamp set to decorate the inside too, with a birthday sentiment from the Peaceful Moments stamp set:

Best Dressed Shoes - This is one of those cards that looks pretty simple, but took a long time to execute! I stamped twelve shoes onto Whisper White cardstock and used my All Dressed Up Dies to cut them out, then added some colour to the Petal Pink and Mint Macaron Stampin' Blends to the inside contours of the shoes for a little contrast. Then I stamped twelve shoes (plus two for the envelope) onto a selection of the Best Dressed Designer Series papers, choosing a selection of the small floral patterns and making sure that the shoes were stamped in a similar orientation so that the designs would co-ordinate and the shoes would look like pairs, then I fussy cut the outsides of the shoes and paper-pieced them onto the white backgrounds. Time consuming yes, but I love the finished effect!

Pick of The Pastels - I decided to mount each of my pairs of shoes on a stitched circle and used a selection of pastels inspired by the Best Dressed DSP (although I used Pool Party Instead of Mint Macaron as the latter was too dark). My sentiment was stamped in Blackberry Bliss on a shortened Stitched Rectangle to complete my card.

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 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:

I'm looking forward to visiting your blogs this week and taking a look at your interpretation of this week's sketch.

Enjoy your day; we did all our sport Friday and yesterday, so today it's a quiet day with homework, ironing and maybe a movie. Enjoy the rest of your weekends and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

Dressed To Impress Bundle (English) (£45.00)	Dressed To Impress Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) (£17.00)	Best Dressed 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper (£10.75)	Stitched Shapes Dies (£28.00)	Stitched Rectangle Dies (£33.00)
Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad (£5.50)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)	Purple Posy A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Pool Party A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Petal Pink A4 Cardstock (£8.25)
Highland Heather A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Blackberry Bliss Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)

As promised, here's the second of the cards I made for this week's challenge over at the Global Design Project inspired by Steffi Helmschrott's pretty rainbow card:

This time I used the same basic colours but decided to incorporate my rainbow in a stack of hearts diecuts from the Stitched Be Mine Dies:

This time I used the 'Love You Lots' sentiment from the 'Heartfelt' stampset for my greeting, heat embossing it in white onto Basic Black and fussy cutting it out. I stamped a few small black hearts but didn't like the shape, so covered them up with some black diecut ones (ssh - don't tell ;-)) I took another picture so that you could see the depth created by the stacked hearts:

Isn't that cool?

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 think I prefer this card to my earlier one - if you missed it you can see that card here. I like the fact that the more generic sentiment means this card could be used for a ton of different occasions, not just Valentine's - after all, you can only send so many Valentine's, right?! What do you think? Do you have a favourite? Leave me a comment below - I'd love to hear your thoughts!  I'll be back tomorrow with my project for the latest challenge over at The Paper Players and this week I'm the hostess. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Stitched Be Mine Dies (£33.00)	Heartfelt Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) (£16.00)	Embossing Buddy (£5.50)	Versamark Pad (£8.75)	Rhinestone Basic Jewels (£4.75)
Smoky Slate A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Vellum A4 Cardstock (£9.25)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)	Basic Black A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	White Stampin' Emboss Powder (£5.50)
Real Red A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Pumpkin Pie A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Daffodil Delight A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Granny Apple Green A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Pacific Point A4 Cardstock (£8.25)
Highland Heather A4 Cardstock (£8.25)

Hello blog friends! Did you miss me? This has been a great week for crafting, but not so for blogging I'm afraid. I had an unscheduled service outage that meant my Wednesday and Thursday posts didn't happen unfortunately. We are though back online and today I'm sharing one of the cards I made for this week's challenge over at the Global Design Project that is also perfect for the current challenge over at Festive Friday:

I found myself inspired by Steffi's rainbow card this week over at GDP and armed with hearts, arrows and red (and some glitter sparkle from the rhinestones) from the Festive Friday inspo list, I created this rather unconventional Valentine's Day card:

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

I stayed true to the layout and rainbow colours of Steffi's card with my arrows and neutral card base, but decided to feature a bold heart-shaped Valentine sentiment. also from the 'Heartfelt' stampset, that I heat-embossed in black onto Whisper White and punched out using the co-ordinating heart punch. I added a sprinkling of black hearts that I centred with some retired epoxy hearts to echo the rainbow theme. I took another picture so that you could see the lovely shine on the heart:

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. 

Rebecca took one look at this card and declared it should be her Valentine - high praise indeed and clearly demonstrating she is past the 'pink and girly' phase!

Enjoy your day; we have a hockey league match this afternoon then are off to the theatre to see JB Priestley's 'An Inspector Calls'. I remember studying this play for GCSE English some 30+ years ago, so imagine my surprise to find it's still on the syllabus - clearly an 'oldie but goodie' from an examination perspective! If I can find the time I might be back later with another GDP entry, otherwise I'll double-up tomorrow; either way and I'll be back tomorrow with another project for the latest challenge over at The Paper Players. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Heartfelt Bundle (English) (£43.00)	Heartfelt Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) (£16.00)	Embossing Buddy (£5.50)	Versamark Pad (£8.75)	Black Stampin' Emboss Powder (£5.50)
Rhinestone Basic Jewels (£4.75)	Real Red Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Pumpkin Pie Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Daffodil Delight Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Granny Apple Green Stampin' Pad (£7.00)
Pacific Point Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Highland Heather Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Smoky Slate A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Vellum A4 Cardstock (£9.25)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)
Basic Black A4 Cardstock (£8.25)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous Laurie to host this week and she has a fun clean and simple challenge for you to work with:

I knew immediately where I was going with today's card and using the current layout over at CAS Colours & Sketches ended up making not one but two cards!  Laurie's theme gave me the perfect excuse to break out my new 'Dressed To Impress' stamp set and co-ordinating Best Dressed designer series papers to create a couple of clean and simple cards perfect for a fashionista. Here's the first one, featuring the lipstick:

I coloured my image with my Stampin' Blends and added just a small piece of designer paper behind to preserve the all-important white space. Finally I stamped the scrolled word in a contrasting colour and popped it up over my black sentiment for added interest.

I liked this card so much I made another, this time featuring the shoe:

On each of my cards, I stamped my lipstick/shoe image on a post-it note and masked my main image to stamp a second one. My first lipstick looked lonely and as for the shoes, it had to be a pair - I mean, who buys a single shoe?! 

And here's another picture of both cards together:

So which one do you prefer? I liked the solid pink lipstick DSP on the first one ... until I used the shoes DSP which whilst it has larger images, is on a white background so feels a little 'cleaner'. So now I'm not so sure - as always, I welcome your thoughts! Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's projects for you to pin for easy reference:

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; we have a family lunch planned and a day of homework for the Juniors and ironing for me! Hope you have an enjoyable rest of your weekend. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

Dressed To Impress Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) (£17.00)	Best Dressed 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper (£10.75)	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock (£7.75)	Stitched Rectangle Dies (£33.00)	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad (£5.50)
Lovely Lipstick Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Gorgeous Grape Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Lovely Lipstick Stampin' Blends Markers Combo Pack (£8.50)	Smoky Slate Stampin' Blends Markers Combo Pack (£8.50)	Highland Heather Stampin' Blends Markers Combo Pack (£8.50)
Stampin' Blends Color Lifter (£4.25)

It's been bitterly cold all day today here in the UK and both of the James Juniors have braved the outdoors to play hockey for their respective teams (a 2-1 win and a 0-0 draw respectively) but instead of braving the freeze to watch today I decided to hibernate and make a few cards!

I couldn't resist the colour palette over at Color Throwdown so decided to create another pair of cards using the masked spotlight technique that I shared with you earlier this week - you can read that post by clicking here if you missed it. I had some lovely comments on those cards and they were a 'Fab Four' pick over at the Fab Friday challenge so I used the same 'Beautifully Braided' stamp set, but this time heat embossed in gold and used a layered circle framelit to create my spotlight. I first did an experiment on So Saffron coloured cardstock to see what it would look like with a coloured background. Here is the first card on a Night of Navy base:

And the second on a Night of Navy base with a Bermuda Bay mat:

Here is the pair together:

I quite like the effect, but the inks are not as vibrant as they are on a white base. I made a second pair that are exactly the same design, but on a Whisper White base so that you can see what I mean - here's the first one:

And the second one on a Bermuda Bay card base:

I love the brightness of the colours on this pair. I added a few of the Holiday Rhinestones or gold sequins to each card for a little subtle added bling to finish my cards. In hindsight, I should have sponged a narrower central section of Bermuda Bay so that the circle elements had a little more of all three colours on them, but that aside I really love this colour combo with the gold on a white base. Here they are together:

So what do you think - do you have a favourite pair? Leave me a comment below, I would love to hear your thoughts. 

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. 

Enjoy your evening and I'll be back tomorrow with another project for our new challenge this week over at The Paper Players. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Layering Circles Dies (£33.00)	Beautifully Braided Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) (£16.00)	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock (£7.75)	Versamark Pad (£8.75)	Embossing Buddy (£5.50)
Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder (£5.50)	Crushed Curry Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Bermuda Bay Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Night Of Navy Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)	Bermuda Bay A4 Cardstock (£8.25)
Night Of Navy A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Holiday Rhinestone Basic Jewels (£5.50)

Today I'm sharing my design team card for our new challenge over at As you See It where it's time for a timely theme challenge:

I used the current Freshly Made Sketches layout for my card and despite Heather's beautiful rustic heart image on today's badge, I chose to go full on red for today's love theme - take a look:

 Here's the low-down on today's card:

A Card That Is All Heart - When I saw the new Detailed Hearts Die in the Stampin' Up! Spring-Summer mini catalogue, I knew I would have to have it! This is such a versatile die for layering and works not only for Valentine's Day but lots of other occasion cards too. It's also great for making multiple cards at a time: by running it through the die cutting machine with a few different colours of co-ordinating cardstock, you can switch out and mix up the hearts and have a few cards made with relatively little extra effort - and I'm all for saving time! Here I paired mine with some retired Real Red Glimmer paper left over from my Christmas crafting and switched out some of the hearts and left others empty for the white mat layer to show through. I like the added texture this gives whilst retaining the monochromatic look. 

A Crafty Curveball - Whilst I love the Detailed Hearts Die 'as it comes', I feel obliged to point out that I didn't use it that way on today's card! I saw Jacquie's sketch over at FMS this week and paled at that vertical curve, knowing that I didn't have any dies that would work. Whilst considering my options (one of which was sponging - check out Amy O'Neill's card on the FMS challenge page (link above) to see a great example of this) I suddenly had a brainwave! The Detailed Hearts Die has an irregular edge to it anyway, but I carefully strategically snipped away some of the hearts along the right hand side to create a more defined curve. I also stuck some of the hearts that I'd removed elsewhere to my base in some of the gaps, to further emphasise it. Clever, right? Well, I thought so ;-) You can see the actual pattern of the die in the product table link below, so be sure to check that out.

You Are Loved - I wanted my hearts to be the star of today's card, so kept my sentiment simple. I didn't want to use this card as a Valentine's card, so by using the 'You are loved' sentiment from the 'Forever Lovely' stamp set, I can use it anytime to let someone know how much they mean to me. This card will probably make it's way to Rebecca in her school bag at some point - even as a teenager, she still has a soft spot for anything with sequins, sparkle and glitter!

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. 

Before you put your creative thinking caps on, why not check out the blogs of the other As You See It team members:

Amy Jasper

Heather Cooper

Jan Clothier

Jane Knudsen

LeAnne Pugliese

Here's a summary of our challenge rules:

• Create any card, scrapbooking page, 3D project or packaging project that fits the challenge.
• Fill in the blanks with the words that are right for you and then create your project with those words in mind. Tell us, in your blog or on your site, what words you used.
• Please include the challenge graphic and link back to the challenge in your blog post. Turn off word verification so we can leave you lots of lovely comments. Make sure you link the post not the whole blog to the Linky. Use #AYSIXXX when uploading to a public gallery.
• If you’re unsure about ‘the rules’, check the details under the Challenge Guidelines tab on the As You See It Challenge homepage.
• In a colour challenge, black or other neutral can be used in outlines and sentiments but no other colours should be included. Stampin’ Up colours are used for reference but colours that are a close match are welcome.
• In a sketch challenge, you are welcome to rotate or flip a sketch. You can replace shapes used such as substituting a circle panel for a square panel. However, we must be able to still see the basis of the original sketch in your finished product.
• In a Fill in the Blank challenge, complete the sentence in the Challenge Banner with the phrase that is true for you and create your project using the words you used. Tell us what you said in your blog or on your site.

We look forward to seeing your creations in the AYSI gallery.

Enjoy your day; I'm still wading through paperwork, but will be taking a break to visit the hairdressers for my monthly trim - my one luxury that I look forward to each month! Not only does it keep my hair looking good, it's a great opportunity for a natter - I've known my hairdresser for 20 years and now consider her a good friend! We often joke that she could cut my hair with her eyes closed, although thankfully she's never tried it! Anyone else out there have a hairdresser who they wouldn't want to give up? If mine ever shut up shop, I'd be beside myself! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Detailed Hearts Die (£27.00)	Forever Lovely Photopolymer Stamp Set (£20.00)	Stitched Rectangle Dies (£33.00)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£9.00)	Real Red A4 Cardstock (£8.25)
Real Red Classic Stampin' Pad (£7.00)

Today I'm sharing a couple of cards that I made for my 2020 Christmas card stash; I always try and make some Christmas cards throughout the year, although I must confess I often get sidetracked as the year goes on! I was encouraged by a few challenges that are currently running:

The theme over at Christmas Kickstart Challenge is 'penguin parade' so I decided to use one of my (now retired) penguin stamps from the 'Making Everyday Bright' stamp set, along with the CASology cue word 'repeat' to create this little festive gang - take a look:

I used my Stamparatus to get all of my penguins in an even row across the centre of my Whisper White card base, and taking my cue from the current challenge over at Less Is More, used my Calypso Coral and Blueberry Bushel Stampin' Write markers to add colour to their hats. I punched out the central one and gave him a coral retired enamel heart to hold. I stamped my sentiment, from the (retired) 'Christmas Crowd' set in Blueberry Bushel and popped it up on dimensionals, using it to ground my row of penguins, and finished the inside with another sentiment from this set:

I had a few aborted attempts at getting my penguins in a neat line, but I liked the above card when I was done so I used my Christmas Bulb Builder Punch to punch out some of my leftovers and this time stuck them in a neat line (in hindsight I should have done this the first time, it would have been much quicker!) and coloured them in with a festive Real Red and Call Me Clover colour combo:

Here are both of my cards together:

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. 

The 'Making Spirits Bright' stamp set is one of the (many!) retired stamp sets I own that didn't see much love first time around, so it was fun to revisit it for today's cards. 

I have the first of my monthly card classes today using the Beautifully Braided Bundle so will be sharing some of those creations with you later this week. In the meantime, enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

No product table today as the stamp sets used on today's cards are retired; current colours are listed above.