Dala Horses and Sheep in Blue Sweaters

Try It On Tuesday wants "Animals - Real or Imaginary" and Cut It Up wants "More than One Die".  I'm using three dies, two of which are Swedish Dala horses -  these are stylized and therefore kind of imaginary horses.  They have been symbols of strength and courage in Sweden for hundreds of years. Little handcrafted wooden versions are sold as gifts, as Christmas decorations, etc. 

I die cut the horses in white twice and glued them together for more substance and added them to a star stencilled background with a silver die cut tree and a silver sentiment.

Sticking with my animal theme and lots of blue, I've got sheep in sweaters for the Addicted to CAS Challenge "Sweaters".

I stamped and coloured the sheep and star, stencilled some snowflakes around them, trimmed the panel, and added it to a blue card base.

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Savvy Stamps sentiment
Ink - Delicata silver, Distress Oxide Faded Jeans
Paper - white cs, blue shimmer cs, silver cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Charlie und Paulchen Skandi-Pferdchen dies, star stencil. Impression Obsession tree die, Ranger silver embossing powder

Supplies for card 2::
Stamps - Inky Doodle
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - white and blue cs
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, Memory Box snowflake stencil, Dreamweaver embossing paste

CAS Christmas and Shiny Stars with Sheep

AAA Card Challenge wants Anything CAS with an Optional Twist of Christmas and Simply Clean and Simple has an optional theme of Christmas (so of course I went with the optional twist / theme!).

I have the Tim Holtz Nordic Winter die and I like cutting it with different colours and mixing them up for different cards - which means there are always some little leftover pieces. I'm in the process of making some in rustic greens and browns and there are some leftover houses and reindeer so thought I'd turn a few of them into a CAS card.  I'll post the full versions later once I've finished inlaying all the little pieces - for an idea of what using the full die looks like, see this card I made a while ago in a totally different colour scheme.)  

I tore a strip of plain white cs for my snowy ground, stamped the sentiment on it, arranged my die cuts on it, then set it inside a pierced dot frame cut from white shimmer cs, and added it all to a white shimmer cardbase.

 
My other card for today is using the sheep in sweaters stamp that I love.  But this time I used it for the Stencil Fun Challenge's optional theme of "make it sparkle or shine" - I have surrounded the sheep with shiny stencilled stars.

I stamped the sheep and big star and coloured with coloured pencils.  I went over the stars on the sheep's sweater and the big star with a Gelly Roll clear stardust pen.  Then I laid the star stencil over the panel and sponged with Golden Glitz ink - the stars are very shiny in real life.

   

 
Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - PB sentiment
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - white and navy cs; green, white, and copper shimmer cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Tim Holtz Nordic Winter die, MFT pierced rectangle frame die

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps - Inky Doodle sheep, sentiment, and star
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Delicata Golden Glitz
Paper - white cs
Size - 5.5" square
Accessories - star stencil, coloured pencils, Gelly Roll clear star pen

Sheep in Red Sweaters

The Peace on Earth's mood boards almost always inspire me!  This time one of the images immediately made me think of my stamp of two sheep in Christmas sweaters.

A quick make - stamped and watercoloured and trimmed with a stitched rectangle before putting on the card base.  I used gold metallic paint for the star in the sky and the stars on one of the sweaters, and splattered a bit of gold paint and the grey paint I used for the ground.

Here's the Peace on Earth mood board:

Head over to Peace on Earth to see how the rest of the Design Team were inspired and then come and join us!

Supplies:
Stamps - Inky Doodles
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - watercolour paper, off white card base
Size - A2
Accessories - watercolour paints, gold metallic paint, Lil Inkers stitched rectangle die

Sheep in Blue and Red

52 Christmas Card Throwdown wants pale blue and red, and My Time to Craft Christmas wants Christmas animals so I combined the two for this card.  I'm also entering it in Inkspirational's Christmas in July challenge.

It's a simple stamped and watercoloured image, trimmed with a stitched rectangle die, and finished off with some gold splatter and a gold border.

 

Supplies:
Stamps - Inky Doodles
Ink - Versafine Clair Nocturne
Paper - watercolour paper, gold and cream cs
Size - A2
Accessories - watercolour paints, Lil Inker stitched rectangle die

Christmas Farm Animals

Christmas Cards All Year Round wants "Farm Animals" - I've gone with sheep.

The sheeps' sweaters are coloured with coloured pencils (including a metallic gold one for the stars on one sweater and the big star in the sky).  The small stars are stencilled with gold ink.  I used a matching gold cs for the card base.

Christmas Cards All Year Round  "Farm Animals"

Supplies:
Stamps - Inky Doodle Sheep, Great Impressions sentiment
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, Delicata gold
Paper - gold shimmer and white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, metallic gold pencil, fun foam, SSS falling stars stencil

A Twofer Featuring Winter Clothes

A Christmas card Twofer today.  First up for Christmas Kickstart "Wrapped up for Christmas" (have a scarf on the card).

My background is a not very well done attempt at embossing folder stamping (mixed media cs, a snowflake embossing folder, and Distress Broken China ink). I trimmed it with a wonky stitched rectangle.

I chose this snowman stamp because he has such a wonderful large scarf.  When I stamped him, I got a big smudge of ink off to the left of him so I trimmed it down with an oval die, going right up close to the fringe of the scarf to avoid the smudge. Then I coloured his hat band and scarf with a red marker, and added some shading to him and to the ground with a blue coloured pencil that was close to the colour blue of the background. I added a small sentiment in the little space left and popped the oval up on fun foam on the background.

For the Sparkles Christmas Challenge "Warm Winter Clothes", I went with some warmly dressed sheep.

I stamped and coloured the sheep with coloured pencils, framed them with a rectangle with a die cut semi-circle opening and finished with the addition of a thin blue frame die and several glittery snowflakes.

Challenges:

Christmas Kickstart

Sparkles Christmas Challenge "Warm Winter Clothes"

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Inkadinkado snowman, SSS sentiment
Ink - Versafine Clair Nocturne, Distress Broken China
Paper - white and mixed media cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Spellbinders oval die, red marker, blue coloured pencil, snowflake embossing folder, MFT wonky stitched rectangle die, fun foam

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps - Inky Doodle sheep, unknown sentiment
Ink - Versafine Clair Nocturne
Paper - white and blue cs, white glitter cs
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, Gina Marie snowflake dies, foam tape, semicircle die, SSS thin frame rectangle die

Winter Scene with Sheep Two Ways

A bunch of challenges inspired this card.  The top left image of the sheep on the Four Seasons challenge started me off as it reminded me that I have this stamp of a lovely winter scene with sheep.  It even comes with the sentiment built in.  And then two challenges wanted sparkle or glitter, and another wanted a snowy day.  See below for the challenges.

I stamped on white cs and coloured the image with coloured pencils.  Then added sparkle with a quickie glue pen and glitter to all the snow lines.  Instead of bordering it with black cs, I took a fine point black marker and a ruler and simply made black lines around the edges.  Keeps it nice and flat for mailing!

 It's also a perfect image for watercolouring so I did a second one using watercolour paper and paints:

To my eye, I don't see much difference between the coloured pencil version and the watercoloured version.  I like using both mediums so can't even say I prefer one over the other!

Challenges:

Four Seasons Challenge "winter"

 

Once Upon a Time "The Snowy Day"

 

Stamping Sensations "add some sparkle" to a stamped focal element  - I added glitter to all the snow lines

Sparkles Christmas Challenge "add glitter accents" - I added glitter to all the snow lines

 

Supplies:
Stamps - Sheena Douglass Country Christmas
Ink - Versafine Clair Nocturne
Paper - white cs for the first card; watercolour paper and cream cs for the second card
Size - 6x4.25"
Accessories - coloured pencils for the first card; watercolour paints for the second card; glitter, black fine point pen

Inspired by My Pyjamas

My friend Darnell entered a challenge I wasn't aware of - Shopping Our Stash.  They have such a fun current challenge - Pyjama Day (make a project inspired by our favourite pyjamas).  

I was inspired by my very cosy flannel pyjamas covered in sweet little sheep, many of them wearing patterned sweaters:

I had the perfect stamp in my stash.  I stamped and watercoloured the image, and framed it with a pierced dot square frame die.

Shopping Our Stash "Pyjama Day" 

Supplies:
Stamps - Inky Doodle sheep, unknown sentiment
Ink - Versafine Clair Nocturne
Paper - watercolour paper, cream and red cs
Size - 5" square
Accessories - watercolour paints, pierced dot square frame die

Sheep in Woolly Sweaters

Back in July, Jane (of Purplejet Loves Crafts) created an adorable card using two sheep in woolly sweaters.  See her card here.  I fell in love with the image and went searching for it but sadly it is discontinued.  Jane kindly stamped a few off for me and mailed them.  Here's the first card I've made from them:

 

I coloured the image with coloured pencils, including a metallic gold pencil for the big star and the stars on the red sweater. I went over the stars with Wink of Stella and over the snowflakes on the blue sweater with a Stardust Glitter gel pen for some shine and used a dark gold shimmer cs for the card base.

52 Christmas Card Throwdown is asking us to choose any challenge from 2020.  I chose "Winter Sweaters".

       

I've also posted it at Splitcoaststampers for two of this week's challenges - the CAS Challenge "Sweater Weather" and the Ways to Use It Challenge "Inspired by a Song".  The sentiment is two lines from the carol "The First Noel".

Supplies:
Stamps - Inky Doodles Christmas Jumpers
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper - white cs, dark gold shimmer cs
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, Stardust Glitter gel pen, stitched circle die

Showing Something New

Over at SCS, the CAS challenge for this week is "Show Me Your New".  A great opportunity to use a new stamp. 

Since it's unusually snowy and cold here, it definitely felt appropriate to make a card with a snowy scene.  And it's never too early to start the Christmas card stash for next year!

I used the MISTI to get a good impression on watercolour paper, and then painted with my wonderful Gansai Tambi paints and added some chunky white Frantage for falling snow.

It's popped up on fun foam that is adhesive on one side - this has the added bonus of smoothing out the slightly warped watercolour paper.

Supplies:

Stamps - Crafters Companion cottage, Wordsworth sentiment

Ink - Ranger Archival Jet Black

Paper - white cs, watercolour paper

Size - A2

Accessories - Gansai Tambi watercolour paints, fun foam, Frantage chunky white embossing powder