I’m having trouble deciding which of these two cards I like best! Can’t decide which one looks better – I love the silver ribbon, but the flowers seem too big on the second one – on the first one I like the flower placement, but seems like the colors don’t match up just right. In any case – I have completely used up this paper pack – 35 cards, mostly rather embellished. Anyway, please help me pick – it’s for a VIP!
Below is the inside of the first card – both are practically the same.
This is the second card – you can see subtle differences.
And of course, a couple of closeups of the flowers from each card:
Thanks for stopping by, and truly, I need your help on deciding which one to give!!
The problem with my Christmas card production is my love for embellished cards, with lots of florals. I tell myself, “just 2-3 cards a day, simple, flat, easy to mail” and what do I end up with? Big fat cards that need to be hand delivered, that’s what! but I am in love with this latest one. I started out rummaging through one of my drawers looking for something, inspiration, I suppose. Anyway, I found some old card bases, and thought maybe I could play around with it, so I had to rummage some more, and found some dies that were designed to go with these type of card bases.
For this card, I used Heartfelt Creations Holiday Star paper, and one of the 6”x6” shutter fold cards, as well as the small Festive Poinsettia stamp and die set.
Here is a close up of the flowers
I did something a little different, at the bend of the shutters, I threaded in an organza ribbon to tie it together, and I used some little Velcro dots to keep the shutter flaps together (now that I think about it, I guess I could have glued them together). Then I just started fiddling around with flowers – decided to stamp these in lavender to go with the paper color – and hot glued them down. I have a little video below of the full card.
I think it turned out pretty good, and I really like it! I hope you do too. Thanks for stopping by, and please leave me a comment sometime!
All of these are using Heartfelt Creations Holiday Star paper, and the first two also use the Small Festive Poinsettia, and the Holly Berry stamps and dies.
The second card uses the same sets, and as you can see, is a very winter cool, ice color – the picture, unfortunately, makes the poinsettias look all blue, but they are in fact, only stamped in light blue (on fomiron) but it gives a very icy feeling.
This last card uses only the Holiday Star collection. I personally think the lovely silver and blue lend themselves delightfully well to Hanukkah cards, as silver and blue are the traditional Hanukkah colors (at least in my house) – so wintery it could even be used as a birthday card!
We finally succumbed to opening up the Christmas paper packs this weekend. It’s hard, when you live in Florida, to think about Christmas much before Halloween, as it stays warm here 10 months of the year. But as crafters, we know that we need to get a head start on our Christmas cards, or we’ll be resorting to Hallmark cards in December!
Sometimes I think the hardest part of sending Christmas cards is addressing all the envelopes. Nowadays, it’s the cost of postage – especially with dimensional cards! Fortunately, Heartfelt Creations came up with a collection that lends itself to a more flat card (= less postage) this year. I think my long distance cards will have Shaker Boxes on them as the most embellished part this time. (Close friends/neighbors & those I’m sending a package to, will still get the dimensional flowers – because I just don’t feel like my card is complete without them!
I just love the paper colors in this collection – purple and blue – a nice step away from the traditional colors – it has a very “cool” look to it – like ice or snow. This first card has two different colors of shiny metallic paper to add to the glitz.
My second card is my take-off from one that was demonstrated by the HFC design team – note to self, that corrugated white glitter paper on there requires hot glue to get anything to stick!
The shaker element for the second card did NOT come from a kit – the die cut set has several nesting stars that made it possible, with a little foam tape — I’m just not a fan of making my own, so I have several kits coming in the mail!
I fell in love with this paper – I am in love with Steampunk, and adding Santa with poinsettias to the mix, was just too much to pass up!
The above card is my absolute favorite one, not sure why, maybe I liked the flowers I made a little better, not sure, but I sure had fun! I grabbed some “floral picks” up from Hobby Lobby to fill in the foliage around the flowers, they came with large berries and tiny pinecone, that added just the right touch!
This card (above and below) is fun because it is something to interact with – you kind of twist the top part, and it props itself up (see right at “tis the Season” – mounted on a bit thicker cardstock), but also opens up even beyond this for a message or sentiment page.
Loads of fun, a little fiddly – I really like the cardstock clock on this as well. Absolutely gorgeous paper!
I love my Heartfelt Creations Papers! This particular paper pad is being discontinued after this year, so sad, because these penguins are just toocute!!
I’m also in love with the little polar bear! Here’s the inside!
I have another little card I made from this collection, it’s got quite a bit more folds to it, but is super cute:
Hurry on over to the Heartfelt Creations website, and you might be able to score yourself some of this cute paper before they run out!!
I’m having trouble getting in the mood to make Christmas cards this year, because it’s nice and warm here in Florida! Not that I’m complaining!! I’m basically just using Graphic 45 papers this year, although I have to admit 99% of the flowers are made using Heartfelt Creations stamps and dies.
That being said, this is one of my more recent cards using “Joy to the World” by G-45.
This is my favorite card so far this Christmas Season. It’s also my very first Santa themed card. This is a retired paper pad from Graphic 45, and unfortunately I could only find one 8” x 8” paper pad.
This involved a lot of “cut and paste” in an attempt to conserve paper. Luckily, I know how to make flowers and bows, so they covered up where some of the paper joins are.
Cute little striped ribbon, purchased locally, it’s wired to help it hold its shape!
So I made 6 little “wild roses” – the white ones, 2 red rosebuds, and then the full rose – all from Heartfelt Creations Classic Rose dies. Didn’t even bother to stamp them, but I did gloss them up a bit.
Plenty of room to add a Heartfelt message for your recipient.
This is the inside of the card – the paper pad has two entire sheets of these little “stamps”, and the stamp was found at a local craft store several years ago.
Thanks for stopping by….it’s almost the weekend, so I’ve gotta get back to the craft desk!
Can you believe it’s already mid-September? How did that happen?!! I don’t know about other people, but I need a head start on Christmas, especially if I’m going to make it “hand made”.
One thing that seems to have fallen out of favor in the past 20 years or so, is Christmas Cards. It used to be that everyone sent Christmas Cards, and it was a scandal if they arrived late. Then people started to feel like, “better late than never!” and shortly after that people started sending the family brag letter along with the Christmas Card – the more creative of them would also put photos on the page, with cute little captions, like (and this was one of my favorites) “Future CEO of Crayola” showing a picture of their child creating yet another masterpiece. Mass produced, of course. Now it seems like you are lucky to get an electronic Christmas message, if old friends and distant family could be bothered to do even that.
It’s my personal philosophy that this should be the year of the card. The CoVid-19 Pandemic has forcibly separated friends and family, and many people have been pushed out of their old jobs, or forced into working from home, so depression is at an all time high. What better way to cheer someone than with a thoughtfully made, beautiful Christmas Card?
One additional blessing of the Christmas Card, is the economy. I know supplies cost much more than they used to, and I know postage is certainly expensive, but compare the cost of $5 postage and the priceless contents of a lovingly made, and usually quite unique and individualized Christmas Card with the cost of ordering some generic T-shirt or whatever from an on-line merchant — you’ve saved money, satisfied your creative urges, and cheered the heart of the recipient, probably much more than that T-shirt would. (Unless it’s a teenager, then all bets are off, lol!!)
Today I’m sharing with you two of my first of several Christmas Cards. I’ve used Graphic 45 paper (Joy to the World), and some hand crafted poinsettias (Heartfelt Creations), glossed them up with gold foil and glitter, and here you are.
I cheated on this one, these poinsettias were left over from some I made last year!These flowers are supposed to look like new Magnolias.
I hope you are all inspired to at least go to Hallmark this year, buy a card or two if you don’t feel up to making it yourself, and write a personal note to the ones you love. Get started now, time really flies this time of year!
My Celestial Creations 