5 favorite Christmas Cards!

Hi friends!

I found a fun Christmas card linky trough Tracy's blog: Debby at Scrapjourney asks you to link up your favorite 5 Christmas cards of 2014 here. I thought going through Christmas cards was a nice thing to do on a quiet Boxing Day evening... So here are my selections!

1) Deer in the Forest- card

I love how my 3d-idea for this turned out... And I even won CASology with this card + got a mention at Muse Card Club. Not bad! :)

2) Minimalistic Branch- card

In this card I used simple stamping and heat embossing on patterned paper... Along with Wink of Stella and small gems. Quite shiny and elegant IRL really!

3) Holly Leaves- Card

This was a quick one to make... I combined a simple stamped panel with red doily and textured card in kraft color. Quick or not, I like how it looks! :)

4) STAMPlorations Christmas Candles- Card

The candles are heat embossed with gold powder and colored in with Wink of Stella. Surprisingly enough there's a doily in this card... ;) And I tried to go for "rustic meets elegant". 

5) STAMPlorations Christmas Flowers

Another CAS card... Oh and there's a doily... :)

I enjoyed coloring these fab flowers with my Copics and wanted to really make them pop... So I chose an all-white bg.

That's it, these were my 5 fave Christmas cards of 2014! I wish I would have had more time for coloring in this fall but no... Hopefully that'll happen in the spring. 

Click the pic for Debby's Christmas Card Linky!

Merry Christmas!

Hi friends!

Here's a set of cards I made and sent to some of my DT buddies using a stamp set Simon Says Stamp -I think this might be a stamp set I used most this year along with my favorite Christmas stamp sets by STAMPlorations. I hope the girls have received these by now! 

I'd like to use this opportunity to thank my followers and all visitors for your support and lovely comments here at Korttikarkuri- Runaway cards during 2014. 

Have a very Merry Christmas and All the Best for 2015! 

5 Cards with Die Cuts!

Hi friends!

Five cards in one post, I know what you are thinking... Me getting the Cuttlebug has turned me into a card-making maniac! Truth being told I needed last-minute cards for friends who we are visiting during the holidays and playing with my new toy motivated me to make these. Let's get started!

Card one:

This is made for CAS-Colours and Sketches Challenge. The challenge was to choose a previous double challenge (containing both inspiration colours and a sketch) and I went for Challenge #40. Very inspirational DT makes in the blog. I used a large snowflake die from PTI I've got as a gift from Sandie along with small snowflakes I've cut with a die I got to borrow from Marika. Thanks friends!! The blue card has shimmer on it and the white snowflakeS are covered with Versamark and heat embossed with WOW clear sparkle embossing powder. Gems and sentiment from SSS finish this card.  

Card two:

This one started with the half snowflake I had as leftovers from the first card. The colors are a bit wild with blue, red AND green but I do like the layout! I love these big snowflakes -I can use them as doilies and everyone knows I love doilies. :) The poinsettia and leaf are gifts I got last year from Loll. I used all the poinsettias I had left in the next 3 cards. They are truly beautiful, thank you Loll for giving these to me! 

Card three:

Another one with Loll's poinsettia and leaf swirl. This time I was able to throW in a doily. ;) I quite like how easy it is to combine die-cuts with patterned paper. I have loads of paper waiting to be used! 

Card four:

Poinsettia, leaf and patterned paper again... This time combined with another large die cut snowflake from PTI. White and red always look very fresh together I think. 

Card five:

My last card has two ornaments cut with a die I bought second hand for 4,50 euros... I think it was a good price for two different ornaments (only one used here).  Surprisingly there's a doily and some gems in this card... Not repeating myself am I... But there's a fun heat embossed panel, stamped with an Impression Obsession background stamp. This is a bit too busy for my taste... But it's growing on me. 

Well done if you made it all the way here! Thanks for reading this very long and photo-heavy post. I hope you are all enjoying Christmas preparations. 

Photo Inkspiration at Inkspirational!

Hi friends!

We have the last challenge for 2014 for you at Inkspirational! As you can see from above it's a very cool photo inspiration. The Ink DT has made extra stunning projects for you -I absolutely loved the cards when I saw them! You'll love them too so don't forget to check them out and visit everyone's blogs. Our guest designer this time is Karen from Made by Meadie.  She is a very talented card maker who often has this cutesy feel to her designs I adore! Welcome to Inkspirational, Karen !

My take on the inspiration photo is very simple: I was inspired by the city skyline and colors -my purple is a bit more plum though! I bought this beautiful Crafty Individuals rubber stamp especially for making a Christmas card for my favorite London girl Sandie. I combined it with a sentiment from Simon Says Stamp, heat embossed with Liquid Platinum powder by Ranger. The image is stamped with Archival Ink and it stamped beautifully. I also used some Wink of Stella pen in the Christmas tree and London Eye but my photo didn't catch it! Sandie already has this card and she says she likes it so I guess I can be happy! :)

I hope to see you playing along in our final challenge for this year! Happy crafting! 

Christmas Candles by STAMPlorations

Hi friends!
I still have some Christmas cards to post... This one I made already a while back in a crafty meeting I attended earlier this fall. It's got a bit of everything in it: patterned papers, a doily, some gems and string... But the star of the card is the beautiful Christmas Candles stamp by STAMPlorations. I colored the image with Copics and added Wink of Stella glitter pen to some parts of it. I used another STAMPlorations stamp from the Holiday Artsy set for decorative frame.

We currently have two challenges running at STAMPlorations blog: The December Challenge (designer's choice: pick any previous STAMPlorations challenge) here and Sketch Challenge #24 here. I hope to see you playing along and have a great weekend! Not too many nights to Christmas now!

 

"Christmas is Love with All the Trimmings" at TIME OUT

Hi friends!
It's time for the last challenge of 2014 at TIME OUT. We have one of our Inspired by Words challenges for you and this time the words are "Christmas is Love with All the Trimmings". Remember you could be inspired of the whole sentiment or choose just one word like "Love". Our DT cas created beautiful samples for your inspiration and we have a guest designer too: Shirley Bee, a FAB, creative stamper and stamp designer. Welcome to TIME OUT Shirley!

My card is super CAS but I like the design I came up with! I bought this deer stamp already last year but didn't quite find a way to make it work (it's rather small) but now I think I found at least one use for it! That made me happy because it's a beautiful stamp. I've simply stamped the image and sentiment to my base card with black Versafine and then stamped the image on another piece of card with green ink... Cut the green image with a circle punch and placed it over the black image with 3 d tape. I also used a Wink of Stella pen to add glitter to the green trees.

By the way, how I was inspired by our sentiment... Obviously I was inspired by the Christmas theme in general... But also the word "Trimmings". Trim the tree! :) I hope you like! Have a good rest of the week and thanks for popping by!

I'd like to enter:
http://casology.blogspot.fi/ Snow (I quite like the way my snowbank is 3d!)
http://inkychicks.blogspot.co.uk/ Winter Wonderland
http://lovetoscrapchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/ Nature
http://musecardclub.blogspot.fi/ Inspiration card (below) I was inspired by the layout and "something popping up"!

Silver at CASology

Hi guys!

Here's my almost last minute entry to CASology: silver that I created with die cut baubles. The baubles are cut from a regular white cardstock and then heat embossed with WOW embossing glitter Vintage Amethyst. That stuff looks stunning!! I added some foil paper to the back of the baubles and all the shine and glittering made this card a nightmare to photograph... But I hope you get the idea. The sentiment is Finnish for Merry Christmas. I added some silver string and red gems for extra festive look! :) 

Since this is a Christmas card I'd also like to enter this to Kylie's Christmas Card Challenge where there is fab DT inspiration and beautiful cards in the gallery! Join before 21st of December!  

STAMPlorations is sponsoring CASology this week and the layout of my card is actually a very simplified version of the sketch we are currently playing with at STAMPlorations. I've added the the sketch below and you can check out our sketch challenge post here. I'd love to see you all playing along! 

Thanks for popping by and I hope you like my card. I'm quite pleased with it but very disappointed with the photos! Have a good week everyone! 

STAMPlorations Spotlight Project: Sweet Print Dress

HI friends!

I'll keep this post short and sweet and guide you to STAMPlorations... You'll find my post where I tell you about how I made this card. The stamps I used are:

Trendy Butterflies

Distressed Floral Swirls

Typografia: Encouragement

I hope to see you at STAMPlorations! :)

"Gold" at Inkspirational!

Hi guys!

Before telling you about our new challenge at Inkspirational, let me wish all my fellow countrywomen and -men Happy Independence Day! Finland has been independent since 1917 when we separated from Russia. I'm not at all a patriotic person in a conservative, politically narrow-minded sense that I feel too many are these days but I do enjoy of our welfare state where we don't have to suffer from war or extreme poverty. Congratulations Finland!

photo source: Safeplast

My card today has a fun connection to our Independence Day: my good friend met a guy in last year's Independence Day party where they both where working... And now they got married some weeks ago in a small wedding, just for the family. Talk about moving fast! :) I sent this card to congratulate the newly weds. The crane and sentiment stamps come from Altenew's Origami set. I paper pieced the crane using the same Japanese-style paper I used as borders in my card. The crane is heat embossed in white, sparkly powder... And the sentiment is heat embossed with gold powder. That brings me back to our challenge: use gold in your card! My gold is in the paper and in the sentiment. The Inkspirational DT has made beautiful projects so don't miss them... Our guest designer this time is the very talented Deborah from Deborah's Gems. Welcome to Inkspirational, Deborah! That's all from me this time. Have a good weekend everyone!

December Challenge + DT Call at STAMPlorations!

Hi friends!

It's the first Friday of December and that means it's time for a new monthly challenge at STAMPlorations! Click here for the challenge post. The challenge this time is designer's choice: choose any of the previous monthly theme challenges or bi-weekly sketch challenges and make a project based on your choice. The inspirational DT samples in our challenge blog  will give you plenty of ideas! Our guest designer this time is LauraJane. I hope you'll visit her blog and leave her some love! This challenge will run until 31st of December and we also have a sketch challenge with great prizes running here.

Before going to the details of my card I'd like to mention about the DT Call at STAMPlorations. We are re-organizing the teams a bit and need new members to our challenge DT where also I will continue as senior (hee hee that sounds so super old!) design team member. If you'd like to join me at STAMPlorations... Click here and take part in the DT Call! 

The challenge I picked for my card is October Challenge: Stamps and Embossing. I've heat embossed the Christmas Candles with gold embossing powder. I added Wink of Stella glitter pen to the candles as well -there's a beautiful shine to them. This card is very simple and I guess very me too -I love doilies, clean layouts and heat embossing! :) The sentiment comes from Holiday Artsy set. Hope you like... And see you at STAMPlorations!

I'd like to enter these challenges:

http://trimmiescraftchallenge.blogspot.fi/2014/12/challenge-288-4th-of-december-christmas.html (Christmas)

http://colorthrowdown.blogspot.fi/2014/12/color-throwdown-321.html (Colors)

http://craftycreationschallenges.blogspot.fi/2014/11/challenge-277.html (Embossing)

http://craftingbydesigns.blogspot.fi/2014/12/anything-goes-with-twist-all-things.html (AG/Christmas)

http://crafterscafeblogchallenge.blogspot.fi/2014/12/challenge-93-use-doily.html (Use a doily) 

CASE Challenge at TIME OUT!

Hi friends!
It's time for the second last challenge before Christmas at TIME OUT Challenges! This fortnight we have fun CASEing with your own twist once again... And this time we CASE the card above by Amy Wanford. I hope you'll head on over to our challenge blog for getting to know Amy better, being inspired of all the DT cards and reading more about CASEing! Our guest designer is Milla, my very good blogging buddy who I've also met IRL. Welcome to TIME OUT, Milla!

Amy's beautiful CAS design has many possibilities to be inspired of and in between my busy schedule (how does having less work for 2 weeks make you busier than normally?!?) I chose one of the most obvious ones: falling snowflakes and white space. I used some patterned paper in my card along with my favorite Finnish Christmas sentiment and a die cut snowflake which I cut with a snowflake die my other good blogging buddy Marika let me try using my VERY OWN NEW CUTTLEBUG (well okey I bought it second hand but I now have a die cutting machine!!). The snowflake is covered with Stickles for shine and I added some string and a button just for fun and I guess they can be my twist to the design as well. :) Hope you like and see you at TIME OUT !

DT Call at One Layer Christmas Cards

Hi guys! I've been wanting to make cards for One Layer Christmas Cards DT Call for weeks... This is a new challenge blog that will start running in January. I make very little one layers and thought this would be a perfect opportunity for me to try something new and different... So thumbs up I'll make it to the team! I made my first one layer for the call already some time ago (I haven't posted it) but decided it's not good enough... The call ends on Friday the 5th so now I have no more time to ponder, these cards will have to do! :)

In my first card I've gone super CAS with a stamped mistletoe and Christmas greeting in Finnish. You can't see it in the photo, but the whole stamped image is covered with Wink of Stella glitter pen and it has a beautiful shine IRL. I also added white gel pen to the berries.

I'd like to enter my first card to Addicted to Stamps and More: CAS and Less Is More: Celebrations. Congratulations LIM for the 200th challenge!

The Finnish Christmas sentiment and Christmas bauble in my second card are both heat embossed with gold powder. I added color to the bauble with Copics and draw a string with golden gel pen.

The DT Call gallery looks beautiful with many stunning one layers -I hope you'll check it out here and maybe even join the call -you may add old one layers to the call too, you don't necessarily have to make new cards. Still 2 days to join! Good luck for everyone!