Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 207

What a week this has been! Rehearsals for the Nativity Play, Parsnip getting sozzled on rum soaked raisins and me unable to do much except to listen in despair and very occasionally gawp at the total mess in the Playground. It looks as if there's been a full-scale battle out there!

Crafting has been out of the question as all I can do right now is try to organise Christmas, with Len's help, from bed. To be honest, it's been a real eyeopener just how much you can do on line - and my 'in-house critic' and all round 'good egg' now knows how to decorate the Christmas tree and also operate the washing machine - yay! :)

Thank you so much for your well wishes - if they had the power I'm sure I'd be running round the Playground, climbing trees and skipping with the best of you :)

Home visit from our new GP yesterday, who did lift me a bit from the depths of despair by promising that this will be resolved and am back on the meds that worked best (I was walking without aids, driving a bit and certainly doing some cooking, ironing and even a bit of crafting) - before the 'rebound flare up' and just hoping for improvement in time for Christmas. The craft room has just been abandoned for now - sheesh, just had to go online and order some money holders for little rellies. Lesson there, make 'em early in future!

But, the Playground continues as normally as possible (whatever that might be!) and luckily I'd already made my snippets card for today, as well as used a favourite Christmas stamp that always makes me chuckle. It's a Penny Black one and the expression on the duck's face has been captured so well in just a few strokes of a pen by the stamp designer - I love how they can do that:

I used:

- 7" x 5" white card blank

- snippet of SU 'Real Red' card stock, trimmed slightly smaller for the first layer

- patterned paper, trimmed slightly smaller again, from a Trimcraft paper pad called 'The Night Before Christmas' - free with Quick Cards Made Easy magazine not that long ago

- the image was stamped onto a snippet of white card approximately 6" x 5" (deliberately larger than the frame I used in the next step) using Memento Tuxedo Black' ink and Penny Black's 'Caroling duck' wood mounted stamp, then coloured with Pro markers

- the frame was die cut using another snippet of SU 'Real Red' card stock and the Die-namics MFT 'JOY photo card frame' which had been on my wish list for at least two years (see, I can wait!)

- layered the red frame onto the image using red line tape leaving a white border all round and then carefully trimmed all four sidesright along the red edge using a Woodware trimmer before running a red Whispers marker around the outer edge so that no white edge from the image layer shows when the card is looked at sideways

- added holly leaves and berries using snippets of green and 'Real Red' card - plus two die sets. The larger holly leaves were cut using Dee's Distinctively 'Wreath Builder' dies and the smaller leaves plus the berries were die cut using the Poppy Stamps 'Stitched Holly Leaves and Berries' set (a recent gift from a lovely friend, thank you again!)

- lastly I tickled the fur and bobble on Mr Duck's hat with a clear Wink of Stella pen, added some 'falling snow' using 'White Opal' liquid pearls and popped a little bit of Stickles 'Frosted Lace' where Mr Duck is stood standing quacking his little heart out :)

Gosh it's a while since I entered into any challenges so this card is for:

Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Challenge 'anything goes so long as it's Christmas' 

Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra for December 'anything goes, Christmas of course'

Penny Black and More Challenge - December - 'Anything Goes with a stamp'

I was lucky enough to win some fabulous ribbons over there last month, from 'Crafty Ribbons'. They arrived the other day, a beautiful selection, and are patiently waiting on my desk for me to have a play - thank you Brenda!

Penny Black Saturday Challenge - December - 'Christmas/Holidays'

Let's move straight onto the weekly picks:

These lovely cards were made by Janis - she who always makes me giggle :) I love the richness and such fabulous use of lots of snippets. And a great tip, if you have glued your panels together and they look a bit rumpled, run them through your embossing machine (Janis used an embossing folder but I've read elsewhere this past week that someone did similar without a folder) to even them out. Tee, hee - of course you must do this when any glue has dried properly, and needless to say before adding embellishments and such.

I picked this card by Kathy K because I totally adore the wonderfully shiny gold on her beautifully designed card. And, Kathy gives a lovely explanation of how you too can achieve the same effect so do hop over to find out more.

This is such a lovely tag, made by April. Of course, I adore pink, which goes so beautifully with the taupe - and the reindeer, lovely pink snowflakes plus the beautiful taupe bow are gorgeous!

Gold is really doing it for me this week - I really love this Christmas card made by Jane J - wonderful vintage look I think and plenty of snippets used. Oh, and Jane started off with a masterboard - which is so popular on quite a few blogs right now.

I do so love the clean and fresh elegance of this snippets card, made by Janice. I really do like the colour, leaves and little flowers plus the heart edged border across the card - everything about it is lovely.

Isn't this card just terrific - and so clever? Carol L made it for her grand daughter and I'm thinking that perhaps, even without a template to use, with planning and care this would be fabulous to CASE! It's a tent style card so the 'belt' runs along the top fold. And such a great idea to add the little size tag (yes, the recipient was 10 years old on her Birthday)!

And last but certainly not least, our little friend Lucy made this wonderful Christmas card and brought it to the Playground to show us. I just adore the whole card, image. colours and sensational colouring, the die cuts, lace and flowers - all so beautifully thought out and made by Lucy, who many of you will know struggles every single day with severe ME. And I do mean severe.

So, I was totally thrilled to pieces when my copy of 'Quick Cards Made Easy' magazine arrived through the post with the results of 'Cardmaker of the Year' - and Lucy triumphed in third place! Yay! What an achievement Lucy - you little star! I feel a bit like a proud Mama Hen here :) Our little chick has done brilliantly :)

I hear tell that Lucy will have signed a batch of her coloured images and Parsnip will be selling them behind the bike shed (to raise funds for his secret supply of choklit no doubt!) just before the Nativity Play commences later this month. Sigh, always a chancer is that little white furry rascal!

Drum roll for this week's winner of the Penny Black 'Santa's hat' wood mounted stamp and a Sheena Douglass 'Frosty Ice Border' embossing folder - who is:

Pat

Oh well done Pat! I'm really pleased for you, especially as you're such a regular playmate and always have lots of hints and tips in your posts. I do have your address here from a previous win and will get Len to post off your prize as soon as possible.

Thankfully I ordered a good few high value and normal stamps on line, plus airmail stickers and customs labels - so if Len digs out the padded envelopes, postal scales etc. and rummages in the toy box for me I ought to be able to sweetheart him into popping the backlog of prizes into the post box at our local Sainsbury's when he's next in the vicinity :) I'm sure he'd do that, not least because the thought of a Post Office at this time of the year brings him out in hives. That's my plan anyhow! Edit on Tuesday: All posted now, yay!

Time now for the prize(s) for this coming week - and you'll have to trust me that they're waiting in the toybox as I picked up these images from the internet - the toy box is tucked away in a corner of the craft room that I can't get to right now:

 

It's your very own Penny Black 'Caroling duck' wood mounted stamp plus a Die-namics MFT 'JOY photo card frame' die  :)

The Snippets Challenge will run for one week and the Playground gates will close at 11am UK time on Saturday 19th December. The gates will open again at midnight UK time on the same day.

Maximum of three entries and please say in a comment if you wish to play and be a possible winner of the prize. Do say if you only want one or other part of the prize (the stamp or the die) but both are up for grabs as one prize of course and will only be split if the first name out only wants one or other of the items, in which case I'll do a second draw for the other part of the prize. And please also remember to link back to the Playground in your blog post to be eligible for the draw.

Mr Linky is below - please let me know if you have any problems linking, it's easy for me to sort out so don't struggle on alone :) 

Di
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