Merry!

There are so many fun new products in the new 2012 Holiday Catalogue!  I've been "itching" to play with them but had so many card-swapping commitments that I had to control myself.  Yesterday I finally began playing around with some of my new products, mixed in some old favourites, and created a really fun card.

One of the brand new products in the new catalogue is the Core'dinations card stock.  Simply explained, the paper is textured on one side, smooth on the other, and the inner core is a complimentary colour to the outside colour.  For my card I used the Early Espresso Core'dinations paper.  After putting it through the Big Shot in the new Woodgrain embossing folder, the Core'dinations paper already showed a little of the inner core colour, in this case it's Crumbcake.  With a bit of gentle sanding along the raised embossing lines, the inner core showed a lot more and I love the effect. 

I decided to cut the embossed image into three pieces.  The original was 3 3/4" x 5" and I cut the top 1 3/4" away and then cut the bottom in half vertically.  I trimmed about 1/8" away from each of the bottom pieces so that when they were separated, they would be the same width as the top piece.  Since the inner core of the Core'dinations paper is Crumbcake, it made sense to mount the pieces onto a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of Crumbcake cardstock.  I mounted that onto a 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" card base, folded in half. 

I decided to make a wreath out of flowers punched with the Boho Blossoms punch, using Gumball Green and Garden Green cardstock and then used the Tombo glue to adhere them.  I added some small Cherry Cobbler circles punched with the Owl Builder punch and, after glueing them to the wreath, brushed some Crystal Effects on them.  Love the glossy, berry effect!

I was really vacillating about whether to use the Christmas Tree or the Gingerbread Man from the Scentsational Bundle but finally decided on the tree, stamped in Gumball Green on Whisper White.  I didn't like the strong contrast with the white around the tree after using the matching framelit to cut it out so I used my Crumbcake Stampin' Marker to colour the white and loved the result.  I would suggest doing the same since if you begin with stamping onto a coloured cardstock such as the Crumbcake, you wouldn't get the true colour of the stamped Gumball Green tree.

Finishing off, I added a piece of Cherry Cobbler Scallop Dot Ribbon, tied a little tag on with the Linen Thread, added the new Silver Dazzling Effects to the wreath and tree and put a few pearls on the wreath.

I absolutely love the result and am anxious to try more of these fun products.  Wait until we get together for my Open House.  We're going to have some fun with the new products!