A Wreath & some ink blending

A few weeks ago, I made up several different ink blended backgrounds, and set them aside.  After colouring up my wreath from 4791 - Christmas Wreath Set, I chose one of the backgrounds that had the same yellowy-green tones in it:

 The wreath was coloured with Copic markers, and cut out using the coordinating die included in the set.  Using my trimmer, I cut a rectangle shape from the middle of my panel, about 1/2" in from each edge.  I cut a slightly larger rectangle from metallic gold paper, and mounted it on foam adhesive, under the panel.  The word 'merry' was diecut from the same metallic paper to finish it off.

More tags...

 I'm on a bit of a roll making up Christmas tags - I love tucking a few into cards that I send out to friends and family.  I think this makes 26 as the total for the week's efforts!

This is one of Studio Katia's dotted tag dies, using up some patterned Echo Park paper that I've had for a few years.  Sentiment is from The Greetery.  I cut out a second tag from some patterned red paper to finish off the flip side where you can add your To & From:

Snowglobe tags

I've put together some cute little snowglobe tags, using the wonderful Snowglobe Die set from Lawn Fawn:

I was inspired by Lindsay Larsen's sweet unicorn snowglobe tag on Day 14 of the 25 Days of Christmas Tags events on Tracey McNeely's blog.  You can see her tag here!  This was a blast doing a little assembly line of die cutting, stamping and Copic colouring to put together 8 of these little guys:

Christmas Wonder

 Hello Ai fans!

I have a sweet caroling trio that is up on the Art Impressions blog to share with you today, from the Christmas Wonder Set - 4936:

I coloured my image using Copic markers, and die cut it with the 5065 - Oval Double Stitched Dies, then mounted it on a slightly larger oval of dark red cardstock.

I ran an uneven line of stitching around my patterned paper with my sewing machine, adhered the oval, and added bits of pine boughs and berry sprigs.  A tiny tag was added with 3D pop dots, and a tiny bow of Baker's twine finished it off.  It doesn't show very well in the photos, but I added Wink of Stella to the Santa hats, and on the boughs and berries.

Happy stamping!

25 Days of Christmas Tags

 I love the 25 Days of Christmas Tags event that Tracey McNeely puts on every November.  I am finally getting a chance to play along today!  It's snowing like crazy outside, Michael Buble is playing in the background, and I got 10 Christmas tags made.  It's a good day.

                             

I was inspired by the really sweet tags made by Becky Roberts for Honey Bee Stamps on Day 15.  You can see her version here!

                              

I've used the ever-lovely Perfectly Plaid Christmas papers from Lawn Fawn, cut out with a stitched oval die and then cut in half to make the top of my touque.  I spattered the hats with white paint to suggest a hint of snow, before gluing on my pompoms.

Santa's Rocking Chair

 I am using a few of the newly released Art Impressions Watercolour and Bible Journaling sets today to create my little Santa's rocking chair scene.

I am painting on Bristol Smooth cardstock, as I have some fine details, and felt this would work best with my #1 paintbrush.  I started by diecutting the rocking chair from my masking paper, and then without sticking it down, I used it as a guide for where to draw the hat.  I sketched the hat in lightly with a pencil, then masked it.  I coloured up the 5360 - WC Rocking Chair Set stamp with my Tombow Dual Brush Marker #N65 Cool Grey 5 and stamped it onto my paper, then covered it with the die cut mask.  I inked up one of the pots from 4869 - WC Small Container Set in #N65, and stamped it over the mask, so that it appears slightly behind the chair.  To add the greenery, I picked the small pine-like green from 4867 - WC Foliage Set 2 New, and stamped it repeatedly with #249 Hunter Green to create my little tree (sometimes only colouring small portions of it).  Drawing directly onto the paper, I used my #969 Chocolate marker to add in the suggestion of the tree trunk.  The star is in one of the newly released Bible Journaling sets: 5390 - Mini Accents 2 - it was the perfect size!  I coloured it in #993 Chrome Orange. 

To the chair I added #476 Cyan, painting it quite loosely, leaving lots of white areas to suggest weathered wood.  The Santa hat and pot were painted with a mixture of colours, starting with #837 Wine Red, with a few layers of a blue/red mixture to create shadows and texture.  I sketched in the floorboards with my #992 Sand marker, and painted a few streaks with it, and #969 to look like woodgrain.  I also drew in the #992 on the edges of the star to create some shadows.  After touching the greenery with a damp brush, I added in some #565 Deep Blue to create some shadows on the tree, the chair and shadows on the floor.  A watery version of #177 Dark Jade was painted in as the wall colour.

My scene was cut out with the 5132 - Tag Stitched Dies, and I cut out coordinating rings using the tiny die that comes in the set.  I added the sentiment from 4514 - Snowman Shaker (retired!) and mounted it with 3D foam adhesive over a patterned tag.  I added a few enamel dots and tied on some organdy ribbon with Baker's Twine.  I love that none of my stamps were holiday themed, but together they made up a sweet Christmas scene!

New Art Impressions

 The latest Bible Journaling stamp sets are debuting today on the Art Impressions blog.  I am using 5375 Grape Border to make a gift tag:

I love finding alternate uses for the Bible Journaling sets, and being tall and slim, they work beautifully on the Art Impressions 5223 - Bookmark Die.  

I mounted the clear acetate stamp onto my block, and coloured directly onto the image with my Tombow Dual Brush Markers.  I used a Sandy Allnock approach, and somewhat randomly coloured the leaves in 2 colours - #346 and #126, and also used 2 colours on the grapes - #569 and #757.  For the few spots where the woody vine shows through, I coloured it in #947 Burnt Sienna.  I huffed on the stamp to revive the colours before stamping it onto my Canson XL Watercolor Paper.  I used my damp #1 paintbrush to pull out the colour, being careful to keep it inside the image.  I scribbled both greens, plus #993, and #177 Dark Jade onto my palette, and dropped them into the image to create multi-coloured leaves.  After pulling out the colour from the grapes, I went back in with #803 to add some brighter tones, and used the #757 marker directly on the paper to redefine any lines that got blurred.  Finally I added some #565 Deep Blue in a few spots to add a few shadows - and that was it.  I wanted a fun, bright image 

The sentiment is from the Roses Exclusive Set available at Scrapbook.com, stamped in Versafine Onyx Black Ink.  I die cut the grommet hole and a couple of the small feathers that come with the bookmark die, and threaded them onto some plum coloured Baker's Twine.  *After giving the tag as a gift, the recipient can use it as a bookmark.  Be sure to check out the Ai blog today to see what Dot & Tricia have to share.