Sunday Snippets - almost Christmas Day!

My Snippets card today uses a cute unbranded die set, that Dudley bought for my Birthday back in September ...... with his very own pocket money from car washing on stilts at weekends  (just checking if you truly read this!). 

This is my Christmas card to you all:

I used:

- 5.75" x 5.75" square white card blank, side opening

- the dear little unbranded die set, featuring either a Christmas Gnome or at a stretch, Santa himself - let's refer to him as Santa here!

- selection of little snippets of card, to firstly die cut and assemble the 'Santa', sticking the parts together with glue pens and a teeny snippet of sticky tape on the back of the black lantern to pop the little flame coloured 'inners' in place. So fiddly and thank goodness for a pick-up tool by We R Stampers, rarely needed in the many years I've had it, but priceless when it does come to the rescue

- one assembled Santa, after I gave him eyes with a fine liner pen - but what to put him on, as a background? A further rummage in my easily reachable snippets basket threw up pieces of card in plain white, snippet of patterned snowy sky background (kept from making a recent card) and a scrap of Tonic 'Majestic Gold' pearlescent card

- first of all I glued the hand curved by 'moi' snippet of white card to the snowy background for later use and set it to one side

- then glued both background pieces as a single panel to a thinnish piece of white card for stability

- took a snippet of Tonic 'Majestic Gold' pearlescent card and die cut the outer part of the frame, the set of dies I used is Penny Black's 'framed' - gorgeous albeit fiddly! 

-next was the tricky part - I put the double gold frame, with it's wide apertures over the background piece of card(s) and carefully drew a cutting line along the centre of the empty parts of the frame itself then trimmed along those lines. This was so that the background wouldn't poke out beyond the frame on any side. NB, easier to plonk it straight onto a plain piece of card IMHO! 

- glued the panel to the back of the frame then glued the die cut white inner parts of the frame in place

- added a 5.5" x 5.5" white panel to the card front. using Collall glue as usual

- then added the framed image onto the the card front using narrow self- adhesive foam strips - which made it so much more robust and 'together'!

- final touch - my favouriite Merry Christmas die cut, double layered, in Tonic 'Majestic Gold' 

I'd like to enter my card into the following challenges:

- Darnell's NBUS challenge #69 HERE

 - Allsorts Week #812/3 HERE under the 'Use your Dies 'theme'

Dudley Pupdate: The magic in Dudley's eyes is so beautiful to see. He sat and watched, utterly enchanted, as Len and I decorated our twinkling Christmas tree. He's getting the vibes and is ready for his Santa hat any day now. Happy times indeed.

Remember, I've just kicked off a new challenge over in the Snippets Playground. It's our second challenge for December/Christmas with four bumper mystery prizes to be won.   

Love as always from Dudley Dog and me - and a Very Merry Christmas to one and all! 🎄🎅🎄🎅

Sunday Snippets - Decoupage 'Chee-wow-ah'!

I made this card for one of my best friends from boarding school, way back in the early days of the Beatles! She has a dear little Chihuahua - a real cutie called Patch! Now and then, as Dudley was outgrowing things like his puppy carrier and his baby harness etc., it was so nice to send them to Angie: 

I used: 

- 5.5" x 4.25" square white card blank, side opening

- a decoupage sheet by Hunkydory which was ready cut. I just trimmed off the little 'pips' holding the images to the sheet and layered then up using snipped up thin sticky pads. 

- added a layer of Tonic mirror card in 'inca Gold' to the front of the card blank - it was a snippet and only needed a teeny bit of trimming

- then I took a really precious snippet of the absolutely last piece of a Christmas paper design by LOTV in the 'Merry Christmas' pad (sob!) and trimmed just a little from the edges. That pad was much loved and so very versatile

- then glued the dear little decoupage pooch image onto the Christmas words panel - all done using Collall All Purpose glue

- final touch, added the little circular sentiment from the decoupage sheet onto the bottom right corner of the card, using a sticky pad, and called it done! 

The leftover snippets were so tiny, just little strips and I binned them without thinking to take a photo.

Dudley Pupdate: Poor little guy still has some straggly hair since his trim, so is scheduled for another session with Len. He'll be doing the Egyptian 'Sand Dance' all over the grooming table! Never mind Dudley ........ Santa tells me has something in his sack just for you! No doubt it will be loved, kissed and well licked then added to the pile as he returns to his 'True Love' - Honka! To be fair, he does return to each one of his 'babies' to give them a cuddle and a wash ............. in turn. 

Very importantly, the results of Challenge #494 are now published HERE. 

Do please come and play in Sarn's current challenge over in the Snippets Playground, we've moved onto mince pies and Christmas punch now - yay! Just scroll down from my results post - over in the Playground.

Love from myself and Dudley, xxx

Sunday Snippets - 'Special Delivery'

My snippets cards this time are heading off to Germany very shortly. We transfer funds to Kai, Mum of our two teenage English/German Grandaughters and she pops it in cash form into a card each for the girls. I usually send unsealed but already written cards from us for her to use as it seems a little more personal. Trust me - it's much easier all round and the girls have the fun of money to spend after the festivities. So, I made each of the girls a card and envelope:

I used:

- 5.75" x 5.75" square white card blank, side opening

- the stamped image was in a Gummiapan (UK Meissen) sale a year or so ago, no name but to me he's 'Skating Reindeer'. I bought three very similar different reindeer images and they too also come with matching dies, they cost me very little and one is still to make an appearance on here!

- stamped the image onto the reverse of a Tim Holtx piece of Mixed Media card, using a VersaFine Clair 'Nocturne' ink pad

- coloured the image using Arteza Watercolour pencils and a small brush and water for blending Faber-Castell Polychromos Pencils and Sansodor blending solution and then die cut it - using the matching die. I made a little jig of the image for best placement - always best to pay safe after spening precious time colouring an image!

- next, took a background 'snowy hillside with frozen pond' piece of card from the KanBan 'Christmas Wobblers' backgrounds pack and die cut it using a 5.5" x 5.5" Heffy Doodle 'Stitched Squares' die - now that I knew where the skating deer should be positioned

- glued the scene panel onto the card front which left a nice white outside border

- added the white 'snippets' sentiment, already made in two layers, using my favourite Tonic Christmas sentiments die - using a  glue pen

- the final touch on the card is the reindeer in action! The mixed media card was quite robust so I just added him to the scene using thin sticky pads and the usual glue stick trick whilst placing him

- made two whilst at it of course! Finished .......... Part One!

- Part Two - the 6" x 6" envelope needed something adding to make it a little more special - initially I thought about putting the German yellow post box onto the card scene itself - with a card in the reindeer's mouth as if he was on the way to posting it. Wasn't going to work though by any stretch of the imagination! Sigh

- so, I used the German post box idea on the envelope instead. The box itself with the 'extras' are all part of a delightful Charlie & Paulchen set of small dies - called 'Weihnachts Post' (Christmas Post) - bought not long after I discovered the delights of teeny tiny dies.

- used snippets of yellow card to cut the vertical sentiment strip and the actual post box plus leftover snippets of TH Mixed Media card for the envelope and the embossed panel on the little door - showing collection times, which I edged with a border of Tombow Black brush pen. Then used a glue pen to add the 'collection times' and also the envelope to the post box. The letter box itself opens to tuck things inside - cute! Glued both the sentiment strip and the post box onto the envelope

- finally, finally, die cut the sentiment 'Special Delivery' using an unbranded die and a snippet of Tonic pearlescent 'Red Velvet' card and glued that to the envelope front as well, leaving blank space above to write in the name of the recipient

I'd like to enter this card into:

Darnell's NBUS Challenge #69 - the reindeer as well as the post box dies were having a first outing!

Also Allsorts Challenge #810 - where the theme is 'It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas' or, 'Anything Goes'

Dudley Pupdate: a neighbour is having some indoor house alterations carried out and Dudley has generally coped well with the noises drifting over our garden .......... until the other day. We quickly realised that he was padding to and fro from the back to the front of the house upstairs and was evidently very anxious. He was terrified by an imtermittent sound and it took us a while to figure it out. Eventually it emerged that one of the numerous guys working indoors at our neighbours house was nipping outside to use a nail gun to assemble some woodwork. So it sounded like a faint shotgun such as we would hear during the hunting season around here - but much closer, for want of a better description. This is a pooch who is unfazed by storms, fireworks and thunder and lightning. But - take him out in a car OR get out of bed to get ready for the day and there's a real pantomime! He does keep us on our toes!

Speaking of Dudley, a couple of people mentioned it would be nice to see his new haircut. Instead, for now, I have a 'Spot the Dudley' photo - taken during this last week on our bed, in his favourite safe place where he'd literally built a circle of his most loved toys to act as his 'look out' spot with a bit of meditation thrown in:

I find it a rather sad photo, it's the pink around his eyes - which comes with being a fairly newly trimmed white Havanese. Aw, one of his ears was flipped back - they're like little pink shells inside. BTW, he literally gathers all the toy circle with his mouth and paws, no human intervention at all! And his chin is resting on Honka's neck .............. needless to say!

We have a new Challenge #495 being run by our lovely Sarn over HERE! AND, it's the first of our December/Christmas Challenges with more than one bumper prize bundle per challenge - go and take a look! Then get your snippets out.

Goodness knows what the latest storm Darragh has done to the Playground decorations ... just don't try to fix them back up with a nail gun, otherwise Dudley will go into total meltdown!

Love from myself and Dudley, 

For Brenda - 'A Winter Story'

I already entered over at Allsorts but really wanted to have a second entry with a Poinsettia theme. Brenda did almost throw down the gauntlet when I mentioned it, and I'll always try to take it up - so this is for Brenda. After almost burning the midnight oil here - it's done - ZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz:

I used:

- 5.75" x 5.75" square white card blank, side opening

- all papers are from the Stamps by Me' 'A Winter Story' kit - from last Christmas I should add, unused until now. There are various paper packs in 6, 8 and 12 inches square, plus printed A4 vellum. Some embellishments are also included and that's mostly the 6" pack I used today

- the 12" x 12" square pack of papers is plain on the reverse and, whilst too large a pattern on the front for my personal preference, the reverse using the same colour pallette is a perfect foil to pick up colours in all of the smaller patterned papers for framing purposes. Happy dance here when I realised that! 

- picked out the card front paper from the 6" square paper pack then found the perfect green for the 'frame' piece I had in mind from the 12" paper pack (reverse)

- die cut the sentiment circle from the 6" pack once again - using a Heffy Doodle 'Double Stitched Circles' die and pt it to one side

- 'fussy cut' a poinsettias embellishment from the 6" square 'A Winter Tale' paper pack, used a large ball ended rounding tool and a foam mat to round it a bit for dimension. Then 'shimmered' it using clear 'Wink of Stella'

- used the biggest die in the Heffy Doodles 'Double Stitched Squares' die set to cut the patterned paper to suit. To make it more 'lifted' I backed some plain 250 gsm white card with double sided 'Stick It' sheet bafore adding it to the reverse of the patterned sheet - before I die cut it 

- glued the green 'frame layer' to the card front then added the stitched edge wreath square of patterned paper - both using Collall All Purpose glue

- then popped the sentiment onto the front of the card, followed by the two poinsettias down below the robin. Used thin sticky pads for the sentiment and double layered thin sticky pads for the poinsettias

- final step once the topper parts were in place - added touches of clear 'Wink of Stella' shimmer to the purple berries in the wreath and one bauble in the sentiment. None of which I could captture in photos of course!

Naturally, I would like to enter this card into the current Allsorts Challenge, which is HERE - 'Winter Flowers and Fauna'.

Also, Darnell's NBUS Challenge #69 for December HERE - the 'A Winter Story' kit was having a first playtime!

Well, this was my first real toe-dipping into the wider world of predesigned and printed collections of papers, embellishments etc. Interesting and a different slant on making a card - once you choose the items to use, it's easy- ish!

Sunday Snippets - two cards in under an hour

My two identical snippets cards today were made in literally under an hour, on Friday just gone. That's a miracle for me as I'm a slow crafter at the best of times! My starting point was a couple of Penny Black Stickeroos that I'd already popped onto some gold pearlescent snippets. In the end I trimmed the gold off altogether, leaving just the images and taking it from there, although I did add a gold layer behind the image in any case later on. Basically, it's probably easier to pop Penny Black Stickeroos onto plain white card, trim to the edge when you need them and then work from there. Trying to trim totally even borders when a Stickeroo is on a snippet piece of card, which isn't even straight edged, is tricky-woo!! And none of my dies came near to helping me either. Anyhow, this is the end result:

I used:

- white card blank, trimmed to 5.5" x 4.25", side opening

- a piece of green backing paper, which is covered in little pine tree branches and snowflakes, from the Honey Bee 'Make It Merry' paper pad - trimmed to just an eighth of an inch smaller all round than the card blank itself. I LOVE this paper pad!!

- glued the 'Make it Merry' background paper to the card front using Collall glue

- after trimming the Penny Black Stickeroo, from the 'Woodland Splendor' set, back down to the image itself, I then cut a properly measured snippet of Tonic 'Majestic Gold' pearlescent card to form a narrow border around the image piece and glued them together

- the Stickeroo came with the word 'noel' as part of the design, thus I didn't need an additional sentiment on the front of the card, yay, a time saver!

- final step was to add the whole panel to the card front, using narrow strips of thin foam tape, at an angle for a change, which does seem to show off more of the lovely patterned paper - finished!

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenge:

- Allsorts Challenge # 809 - HERE -  the theme is 'Winter Flowers & Fauna'. I don't have actual flowers but from Brenda's wording she seems to imply that trees and greenery are fine - othrwise it's the 'Anything Goes' theme!

Dudley Pupdate: The moment of truth finally arrived and Len trimmed Dudley on Thursday, before he turned into a little Yeti! But, someone pinched our ball of fluffy white fur and left a tiny puppy in his place! Still got the same smile and beautiful eyes - and he insists that he really IS Dudley! He looks very small and also vulnerable right now. So cute.

Remember, the results from Sarn's Challenge #493 are now published in the Snippets Playground HERE. 

Do come and play with us in the Snippets Playground - Sarn and I are gearing up ready for the Christmas celebrations. She's Little Miss Organised and I'm more like Little Miss Scatty! I did spot her dragging a load of Christmas decorations, for inside as well as ouside, behind her in the Playground during the week. I kept my head down and stayed indoors keeping warm and dry, sorting through the Toy Box for our forthcoming bumper challenges. Sshh, I say no more! However, Dudley can be bribed to spill the beans for treats ...... no doubt!

Love as always, Dudley and yours truly,