Sunday 14 September 2014

Christmas Wishes --- A Mixture of Retired and New

I love the new products in our Holiday Catalogue but I'm also nostalgic for some of the great products that have retired from Stampin' Up!  The card which I've made is entirely Stampin' Up! but it's a mixture of the retired and the current.  Come with me and take a nostalgic look back at some of my favourtie things.

To prepare my card, I used a base of Old Olive cardstock and then had three different strips of cardstock or Designer Paper for my next layer.  From the top down I used Early Espresso which I first embossed using my Woodgrain embossing folder.  The middle strip is a lovely "knit-look" design from the Trim the Tree Designer Series Paper Stack.  The bottom strip is the sparkly Champagne Glimmer Paper.  Dividing the Glimmer Paper and the designer paper is a narrow strip of Cherry Cobbler which I cut using my Finishing Touches Edgelit.  I also added a piece of Early Espresso Seam Binding approximately half an inch above that. The long, tilted banner is cut from Sahara Sand and embossed using my Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder.

If you haven't guess already, I'm designing this card for a couple of challenges.  The sketch is from the Paper Craft Crew Challenges:

Paper Craft Crew Card Sketch #109

For the next layer above the banner, I wanted to have a sled.  I found one but it was a stamp and not as large as I desired and so I made my own.  First of all I took a piece of Cherry Cobbler cardstock and stamped it with Cherry Cobbler ink using my Hardwood stamp.  Then I cut it out, using the lines within the Hardwood stamp for convenience.  I had sufficient stamped cardstock to cut a couple of cross-pieces for the sled and I think it looks pretty good, considering I didn't have a pattern.  I mounted the "sled" over the slanted banner using Dimensionals after sponging around it with Cherry Cobbler ink and adding a "rope" to the front of the sled.  That rope is actually a piece of Baked Brown Sugar Thick Baker's Twine.  


Instead of that little square at the bottom right of the design, I chose to stamp and fussy-cut the skates from the retired Winter Memories stamp set.  Before adding them to the bottom right of the sled using Dimensionals, I coloured the holly and berries using my Blendabilities and the blades using my Silver Stampin' Dazzle Marker.  I also carefully covered the holly and berries and blades with a layer of Crystal Effects.  









I wanted mittens for the small embellishments that sit diagonally across from each other on the sled.  The only current mittens that I have are the tiny ones from the Project Life Holiday Cheer stamp set so I went back to my retired stamps.  The Make a Mitten stamp set was perfect but I still wound up fussy-cutting them because I didn't want the white margin around them.  (What is it with me and fussy-cutting?)   I used Old Olive ink to stamp the mittens and then coloured in the white very carefully with my Blendabilities.  Finally I mounted them onto the card using Dimensionals.

So I'm in the home stretch with this card.   You can see from the sketch that I need a banner with a sentiment and some embellishments in the top left corner.  I didn't want the banner to take over the card.  There is so much detail and I prefer that it shows through and so I reached for my Vellum and heat embossed it with Gold embossing powder.  I used the sentiment from the Ornamental Pine stamp set.  So that the adhesive wouldn't show through the semi-transparent vellum, I carefully traced some Crystal Effects along several of the letters from the reverse of the vellum and then used that to adhere the banner to the card.



I chose the embellishments carefully.  I want to enter this card into the SUO Challenges which are calling for one or several embellishments from pages 208 or 209 of the 2014-2015 Annual Catalogue.  And so I chose three little Baked Brown Sugar star sequins (the colour is incredibly close to the colour of the Champagne Glimmer paper) and then set an Early Espresso Candy Dot into the centre of each star.
And that's my card.  It was a long road getting there, but it's finished.  I love the way the new products enhance the retired ones.  

For more cards using this sketch, please check out the Paper Craft Crew Challenges.

For more cards using Stampin' Up! embellishments, check out the SUO Challenges.

And finally, for more Christmas cards, check out the Christmas Card Challenge.


22 comments:

  1. Great job mixing the old with the new! Love the use of the Candy Dots with the Sequins and your sled with all of the mittens and skates looks fabulous!! Thanks for playing along with us at SUO Challenges :-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you very much, Julie. I'm glad that Stampin' Up! has so much great retired stuff to fall back on.

      Delete
  2. Heidi, I love the nostalgia in this card. Some of the stamps that you used are still on my favourites list and I could never part with them. I love that you created your own sled.... it's beautiful, and well made. You've certainly built a card with much care, love and attention to detail. TFS.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Penny. I agree about those stamp sets. They'll be mine forever. The images are so perfect. Thank you, the sled was something I really wanted on the card but the one that came with the stamp set was way too small. We stampers have a way to get around little difficulties like that, right.

      Delete
  3. Lovely card!
    Thanks for entering our Christmas card Challenge this week!
    Monica - CCC DT

    ReplyDelete
  4. a 5 star card in my books; TFS!! (LUV your blog!!!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you very much, Susan. That's a wonderful thing to say. :)

      Delete
  5. So many lovely elements on this card Heidi! Love the skates, coloured and with Crystal Effects and the greeting on the Vellum. Thanks for joining us again this week Heidi :-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Love your card, Heidi. Brought back the days of my childhood! Thanks for joining us at Christmas Card Challenges.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Marsha. My daughter loves the card because of the skates...she used to skate competitively back in BC.

      Delete
  7. LOVE the card and pops of gold!! Thanks for entering our Christmas card Challenge this week!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks so muh, Wendi. I loved making this card.

      Delete
  8. Very pretty Christmas card! I love that skate! Thanks for playing at Christmas Card Challenges.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Donna. The skate is my favourite stamp in that set.

      Delete
  9. How fun to create the little "winter" scene on your card. The candy dots look great on the stars, too! Thanks for playing along with the SUO Challenge this week!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks so much, Connie. I had so much fun with your Challenge this week.

      Delete
  10. Replies
    1. Thank you so much, Karen. It turned out better than I had hoped.

      Delete
  11. Heidi, I just love all the elements of this very wintery card! The color combinations remind me of a "norwegian" sweater and just getting cozy around the fireplace. Thanks for playing along with the paper craft crew and look for your card on this weeks Featured Artisan post for Card Sketch #109.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you very much, Pam. It was a fun card to put together with all those elements. My daughter loves the skates the best. And thank you for including my card in the Featured Artisans. That's fantastic news.

      Delete

GDPR (for my EU visitors)

In line with new Data Protection legislation (GDPR) coming to the EU, please note that in commenting you do so with the knowledge that your name & comment are visible to all who visit this blog and thereby consent to the use of that personal information for that specific purpose, only. I do not collect information stored on my blog. If you have left a comment and prefer that it not be seen, please delete it. Followers: If you follow my blog (thank you!) you do so in the knowledge that my followers list is open to anyone who visits my blog. Your photo, name and links will appear and can be seen by anyone. If you don't want this data shared, please remove your name from my followers list.