Do What You Love

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 30 is Do What You Love

My current obsession is Diamond Painting. I tried not to be sucked into it as I wasn't really keen on the idea of using lots of little dots of plastic to make a picture. However I was gifted a small kit and really enjoyed doing it. It is like cross stitch but builds up quicker and depending on how large your kit is can be quite portable.

This kit is from Craft Buddy and is a cool perspex tree that has LED lights inside the frame which is made of thick mountboard covered with a wood effect paper.

It is the same panel front and back, you peel off the cover sheet, stick the sparkly gems onto the colour coded adhesive dots and then peel off the protective white backing so it is clear. I took these panels on the Baltic cruise we went on late September/early October so this will always remind me of visiting Tallinn in Estonia, Helsinki in Finland, Copenhagen in Denmark, Kiel in Germany & Visby in Sweden.

I have just put together the actual tree part following the instructions in the kit. It was quite awkward as the slots were not wide enough so they had to be trimmed a little with a craft knife to get them in. 

It looks quite nice on it's own without the lights but with them on it is such a warm glow. The tree is a decent size at 21.5 cm wide by 37.5 cm tall so is a great decoration to have at Christmas time.

They do a snowflake one which was out of stock when I bought this. It is available again so I will more than likely be making a purchase. We do not buy Christmas presents but I may buy this for myself......

It has been absolutely wonderful to be able to participate in this years challenge. 

I really missed it completely last year. Crafting and cardmaking has to be on the back burner due to being so busy with 2 jobs. I feel like I lose myself when I am not able to be creative and wanted to make a big push to take part this year.

Thank you Beccy for running this challenge once again, for all your hard work, lovely comments and generosity with prizes.

Project Details -

Size - 21.5cm wide x 37.5 cm Tall

Kit - Baubles LED Light Up Tree (Craft Buddy)

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 30 - Do What You Love

Z is For Zoology

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 29 is Z - My card is Z for Zoology (The Study of Animals)

Now Z..... not a huge amount of choices for this one so I thought out of the box a little and thought Zoo / animals and then you have a whole host of critters you can include.

Hunkydory do a club gift every 2 or 3 months and you can get a curated collection of topper sheets and co-ordinating foiled and printed cardstock. You have enough to make 8 cards if you use all their items but I tend to use the elements separately so I can get a lot more cards from each pack. It should cost £11.99 but all you pay is the P&P of £3.95 so they are a great bargain. I usually order staples like glitter glue, foam pads or tape when I get mine and I only order it if it is my style of cardmaking as sometimes it just does not appeal at all so I don't bother with those ones.

I chose one of the images of cute penguins which also had a die cur border. The card has been covered with the darker blue snowflake paper and I added the silver peel off edging around the card.

The sentiment has been popped up on foam pads and laid on top of the lower frame border.

Card Details -

Size - 6” Square

Image, frame & Sentiment - Penguin Party (Hunkydory)

Designer Paper - A Sparkling Winter (Crafter’s Companion)

Embellishments - Peel off border sticker 

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 29 - Z is for Zoology

Yellow & Gold

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 28 is Y - My card is Y for Yellow

This is another 8" card made with one of the largest diamond painting stickers and some of the small stars as accents.

I covered the base with the reverse of one of the papers from the Winter Berries pad which was a free gift from the Birthday event at Crafter's Companion Evesham store last month. Considering it still retails at £15 it was a fabulous bargain. I added a thin gold peel off border to edge the card.

The main focal image is so large I didn't want to over embellish the card so I used some of the small stars from the kit and added a die cut sentiment created with 2 different gold cards. The lower part is just a scrap of plain gold, the upper layer with the outline is a sparkly gold scrap.

Card Details -

Size - 8” Square 

Image - Christmas Wall Art Stickers (Craft Buddy)

Dies - Merry Christmas (Crafter’s Companion)

Designer Paper - Winter Berries 12” (Crafter’s Companion)

Embellishments - Gold peel off border sticker

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 28 - Y is for Yellow

Monochrome Snowmen

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 27 is X - My card is X for Xmas

Right, I have to be honest and say I really, really dislike the word Xmas. 

I am not religious in any way so the whole Christ in Christmas thing is not something I really think about. For those that do fine, but not for me.

However, Xmas to me is like text speak which I definitely don't do. I would never write it in a card to someone, Christmas is Christmas. It always was for me as a child and it always will be.

I didn't have any cross stitch to make a card with this year and other than xxx for kisses I could not think of another X. I was rifling through a bag of assorted sentiments I had rescued from a recycling death and found this lovely glittery Xmas and knew that could be my X.

A few days ago Beccy announced a random challenge of Black, White plus one colour and I nearly used it for that as this is pretty much what this card ended up being.

The dimensions of the sentiment made it quite difficult to place on a normal card shape so I opted for a DL card. I don't make them often but once I got my things together it only took me about 15 minutes to make this card.

The card base was covered with a thin black card. I used a lovely monochrome snowflake paper as the background. The sentiment was matted onto a scrap of silver holographic star cardstock left over from another project.

I went through my crafty stuff and had intended to add some glittery snowflakes but came across these cute snowmen stickers which are semi clear, full of glitter and sparkly gems and they are perfect and quite masculine.

Card Details -

Size - DL

Designer Paper - Merry Christmas Icy (Craft Sensations)

Embellishments - Glitter snowmen stickers (The Works)

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 27 - X is for Xmas

Wreath

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 26 is W - My card is W for Wreath

We are almost at the end of November I am so blooming proud of myself as I somehow managing to stay not too far behind the challenges. Some of that is down to using pre-coloured digital images. Some of that is due to these diamond painting stickers that I have already done the sticky stuff earlier in the year. 

I have however made every single card along the way though which has been a challenge in itself when juggling 2 jobs. 

I do love making Christmas cards the best of all though and was so very sad last year when I was just too busy for so long and I didn't get to craft and enjoy the run up to Christmas. If I am being honest last Christmas wss just too much hassle for me and I was exhausted. I very nearly didn't put my tree up!

Anyhoo, back to this card. The wreath is another of the lovely diamond painting stickers. It is one if the largest as this card is 8" so it pretty much needs nothing else. I trimmed the sticker closer to the design by fussy cutting all the way round inside and outside. Even though it is a clear sticker I didn't want to see a big border around the design when added to patterned paper.

This paper has a subtle layer of green glitter embedded into the snowflakes in the background. I was tempted to put a gem in the centre of each one but reflected upon it and decided that would detract from the wreath and it was probably busy enough without it.

The sentiment in the middle has been recycled from a card and mounted onto a scrap of gold glitter card used in a previous project.

Card Details -

Size - 8” Square

Image - Christmas Wall Art Stickers (Craft Buddy)

Designer Paper - Merry Christmas Vintage Style (Craft Sensations)

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 26 - W is for Wreath

Christmas Robin

 Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 25 is V - My card is V for Verde (green in Italian, Spanish & Portuguese)

I found I was clutching at straws a bit with V so I chose Verde as a lot of this card is green.

It started off with the lovely Robin, the quintessential bird we associate with Christmas in the UK. This is a really large sticker from the Diamond Painting kit. They are intended to be wall art but I trim them very close to the image and use them on cards instead. The background is the central panel which has been recycled from a shop bought card so the foiled sentiment and dots were already on there. The placement was perfect for the robin so I only had to mat this on gold and green cardstock.

The 8" scalloped edge card is decorated with alternating red and green Card Candi from Craftwork Cards which are mounted onto foam squares. 

I really like this card a lot so may give it to my hubby as I think it will be hard to part with this one.

Card Details -

Size - 8” Square

Image - Christmas Wall Art Stickers (Craft Buddy)

Embellishments - Card Kandi (Craftwork Cards)

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 25 - V is for Verde (green)

Under The Tree

 

At Kate Hadfield Designs there are so many fabulous sets it is really easy to get inspired to use them. There are digital stamps which you can colour, coloured versions you can scrapbook or make into digital layouts. Papers, patterned overlays and doodles galore. No matter what your skill level there are so many goodies to play with.

One of the most fabulous things about being in this Creative Team is that we have free rein to make anything we want to using the sets in the shop. This is amazing for inspiring creativity as there are so many amazing packs to play with. I feel very, very lucky to be able to have this opportunity.

The main focus of this card is the Christmas tree and presents underneath. The images are from the Under The Tree kit. There are 3 gifts in this kit and I digitally placed two on each side underneath the tree before printing it out.

The base of the card and the image mat are a lovely encapsulated glitter card from Crafter's Companion which adds so much sparkle with no danger of shedding everywhere ( I am often sporting some glitter on my face or clothes but some people are not so keen on the idea....)

The plaid paper is from a traditional pad from Craft Sensations. It's the perfect pattern to go with this image as it picks us bothe red and green well and looks nice with the gold.

I added some star gems to the stars on the image and some large circular ones to the baubles.

Finally the sentiment is a recycled one from a shop bought card, trimmed down, matted with a scrap of gold paper and a couple of small gems that cover tiny gold stars.

Kate is really generous with her freebies which are readily available. If you sign up to the newsletter you get access to an extra subscriber area the Doodle Den where there are loads more freebies. There is a gallery full of projects by the Creative Team and customers and so much inspiration for crafters and teachers. I would highly recommend you pop over there and join in the fun.

Card Details -

Size - A5

Digital Image - Under The Tree (Kate Hadfield Designs)

Designer Paper - Merry Christmas Traditional (Craft Sensations)

Embellishments - star gems, small and large circular gems

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 24 - U is for Under The Tree

Merry Christmas

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for day 23 is Black & White plus one colour

In my box of recycled elements from old Christmas cards was a fabulous panel of red metallic card with a big glittered sentiment that was just too good to throw away so I made that the basis of this card.

I covered the 8" card base with black card. This I felt was the perfect background for the largest of the dies from the Holly Frames set by Chloe's Creative Cards. I cut this from white glitter card to co-ordinate with the glitter sentiment.

The card panel I trimmed to size and rounded the corners off with my 3 in 1 punch from Crafters Companion. They are a relatively new release and I do think it is funny how 'old' stuff that I have used for years and years is all of a sudden a 'new' thing. To be fair it is much stronger than my old corner rounder and does have the added advantage it cuts 3 different sizes of rounded corners so is an improvement on my old one.

After sticking the panel to the card I then added some stitching to the holly leaves with a very fine tipped pen and lots of gem holly berries.

Card Details -

Size - 8” Square

Image - Recycled from a shop bought card

Dies - Holly Square (Chloe’s Creative Cards)

Punch - Rounded 3 in 1 (Crafter’s Companion)

Colouring Medium - 0.1mm fine liner (Sakura)

Embellishments - self adhesive gems

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 23 - Black & White plus 1 colour

T is for Tree

 

Beccy's Place runs a month of Holiday Cards challenge throughout November. Most days are a prompt with the letter of the alphabet but as there are only 26 then we get a random prompt too.

The prompt for Day 22 is T - My card is T for Tree

The main element to this card is a diamond painting kit I got from TK Maxx for the princely sum of £2.20 The intention was to make a card from it at Christmas and I very nearly forgot. I had completed the actual image earlier in the year and stashed in a bag of UFO's (Unfinished Objects). I was rifling through this the other day to get something out I needed and found this.... This is my T I thought to myself!

The base card is and 8" and I trimmed the canvas close to the diamonds. I then realised that it was a bit too big and would not allow me to have a border so I carefully removed the outer line of dots and this was the perfect width for me to add a silver peel off border to it.

I used a lovely dark blue paper which has snowflake corners to cover the card and added some small peel off sentiments and tiny stars.

When mounted to the card I thought it was a shame the star wasn't 'twinkling' so I replaced the yellow dots with some gold gems and the red ones on the tree were also swapped out for a bit more bling.

IRL this is so sparkly as the light hits the dots and it bounces off in different angles. 

Breaking News - I have just bought a new Christmas Tree. Our local hardware store is closing down so I got the Christmas tree of my dreams for half price

Card Details -

Size - 8” Square

Image - Christmas Tree Diamond Painting Kit

Designer Paper - A Sparkling Winter 8” (Crafter’s Companion)

Embellishments - Peel off stickers

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges (in Alphabetical Order)

Beccy’s Place Challenges - Month of Holiday Cards Day 22 - T is for Tree