All Spruced Up

I found this cute Winter Sprig digi at MelJen's Designs, and just had to use it right away for their "No Patterned Paper" challenge. Of course, in retrospect I hope that stamping onto the plain paper counts as not patterned... Anyhoo, I decided to use the digi for the Fancy Shmancy Challenge at Christmas Stampin' All Year Long.


The idea is to use a new-to-you folding technique, so I chose a Free Standing Pop-Up Card, which is one of their suggestions as well as something I've been wanting to try since seeing it on the Stampin' Dymonz Scrap Shack Cardmaking Group discussion board (SDSS). It really is easy.

Speaking of SDSS, I'm hosting a "Shrink Plastic" theme for the Off the Page group, so I just had to try the printable shrink plastic I bought (Huzzah for the 50% coupon!). I printed the heart at 3x the size of my original, punched and hole in the top and colored it after shrinking with my heat tool. The twine is glued atop the main image, but the charm used swing a bit.

Inspiration:
MelJen's Designs Challenge #74: No Patterned Paper
Christmas Stampin' All Year Long: Fancy Shmancy (try a new folding technique)
Stampin' Dymonz Scrap Shack Cardmaking Group

Free Standing Pop-Up Card tutorial: Splitcoast Stampers

Stamps: Winter Sprig digi by MelJen's Designs, Tim Holtz, Stampin' Up!
Paper: Recollections, Hammermill
Tools: Crop-O-Dile, SCAL & Cricut, EK Success corner punch, Marvy heat tool
Other: ZipDry glue, Stampendous embossing powder, Versamark & Tim Holtz inks, Celebrate It! ribbon, We R Memory Keepers baker's twine, stash brad & eyelet, shrink plastis
Copics: 100, B0000, B00, BG10, R37, R27

Coolin' off with Christmas in July (for Anne-Marie K, Ha ha!)

So one of my blogging buddies, Anne-Marie of Little-Applefalls, always leaves me the most ego-boosting & funny-bone-tickling comments, and she said this in response to my recent purple-themed card: "Purple....ok....I'm tryin' to like the colour....er...still tryin'....nope, can't do it....BUT...love the ickle birdhouse...lol! So....nuff with the purple, girlie!" Sorry sweetie, too late!!! So Anne-Marie, my challenge to you is to make something all in pinks 'cause I can't get into that color!

Like many of you, I've gotten caught up in Holiday card challenges, and this week there's a nice group of choices that I pulled from for this project:

• Christmas Stampin' All Year Long: Your Favorite Color (purple!)
• CDAC (cdacsc28) Sketch Challenge sponsored by Bugaboo (with freebie!)
• Polkadoodles Week 29 Challenge: Christmas in July
• Stampin' Dymonz Scrap Shack (SDSS) Christmas Card Club: Use Metal

I think one of my favorite things about the color purple is that it doesn't occur frequently in nature ...it's closest to Violet, but that's just sorta between Indigo and Blue... It's also the shared favorite color of myself & my husband, so it makes me feel good. I've enjoyed its incorporation into the Christmas Colors; as soon as I saw this Bugaboo image, I just saw her all dressed in purple! There's something so royal about purple...and red...and green!
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I bought paper especially for this project. I don't usually do that; I like to work with what I have. But I didn't have any real purples of anything (it's my favorite color, but I don't often craft with it). So I grabbed 3 different sheets for about $1.50 all together, and I think I made good use of it! Plus, I have some scraps for a future purple-themed project...Anne-Marie, I'm sure you're looking forward to that, ha ha!

I also took a cue from last week's Christmas Card theme at SDSS -- Make your own backing paper -- and made some complementary paper by spraying Haunted Shadows glimmer mist onto regular cooking parchment from the kitchen (Honey, remind me to put it on our shopping list before we bake anything!). I let the spray-ink dry for 10 minutes or so, then dried the parchment with my heat tool. There were still large dots of ink, which I mashed down by placing a paper towel on top on it. Those dots became the lovely soft glitter color. Then I folded a small piece as if I were wrapping a package.

Stamps: Bugaboo Digital Stamps (thank you!)
Paper: Recollections, Brazzill, Hammermill, kitchen parchment
Tools: Martha Stewart border punch, Fiskars papercutter, Sizzix Texture Boutique
Other: ZipDry glue, ATYOU Spica glitter pen, Sakura GellyRoll pen, Simplicity lace, Tattered Angels glimmer mist, English Christmas gift wrap ribbon (thanks Sandra!), Sprite can, Around the Block brads, Polar White FlowerSoft
Copics: E000, E13, YR01, E17, RV02, BV02, BV00, BV000, B63, V17, BV04, BV08, V06