CASE-ing the Catty - A Little Bit Festive

Hi there

Welcome to CASE-ing the Catty for this week. 

If you've come from visiting Monique, then welcome!  If you're visiting me, I appreciate you stopping by today! You can continue your journey to see the other inspiring creations from the CTC Crew by clicking on the button at the bottom of the post.

This week we are using the fabulous sketches on page 16 of the 2024 September-December Mini Catalogue for our inspiration.  There are 20 sketches for cards and tags and you can use the tags as an embellishment on a card as well.

I've chosen the sketch above for my project this week, which I've numbered #13 (first one on row 4). It has the 3 elements in row and you could interpret it with lots of options and of course you can also turn a sketch 90⁰ for a different orientation. A sketch is a starting point, so you can follow it exactly or let your creativity take you where it will! I have used the sketch as an focus panel on my card, rather than as the card front, if that makes sense.

I had the A Little Bit Festive Specialty Designer Series Paper on the table in my studio and saw the row of sweet stockings and thought it would be perfect for the sketch. There are actually 4 stockings in the pre-cut piece, but I've cropped one and used it elsewhere as you will see below. I wanted to add some Christmas sparkle to my card so started my focus panel with a piece of the Cherry Cobbler Festive Glimmer Paper. Next I adhered the panels of Garden Green patterned paper from the Take A Bow paper pack at the top and bottom and the panel of Basic White in the centre that I dry embossed with the Forever Plaid 3D Embossing Folder, leaving a narrow border of red sparkle between the layers. When adhering patterned paper to the glimmer paper, I recommend you use the Tombow glue as tape will lift after a time.

The photo above shows the lovely sparkle from the glimmer paper layer. I placed some Garden Green foliage behind the foliage on the stockings pre-cut to add dimension and then popped the stockings up on Dimensionals and added some Cherry Cobbler berries. I have to admit I'm a little fussy when it comes to die-cuts, so I have trimmed the border around the stockings down a bit, but it is just my personal preference. I added the greeting from the Joyful Sayings Mix & Match Ephemera Pack which was the perfect for the image and also the right size and shape. I finished with the gold bow and a trio of gold sequins, which seem to go with everything!

On the inside I have a Real Red mat for the writing panel and I stamped the greeting from the Greetings of the Season stamp set in Garden Green. I added some Granny Apple Green foliage behind the 4th stocking and finished with some berries.

 

Project Details
Stamps	Greetings of the Season
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Garden Green, Granny Apple Green, A Little Bit Festive SDSP, Festive Glimmer Paper, Take A Bow DSP, Joyful Sayings Mix & Match Ephemera Pack
Ink	Garden Green
Accessories	Cherry Cobbler & Pearl Adhesive-Backed Berries, Neutrals Adhesive-Backed Sequins, Gold & Silver 1/8" Trim Combo Pack
Tools	Winterly Tree Tops Dies, Forever Plaid 3D EF, Stampin' Cut & Emboss, Dimensionals

 

We would love to see your CASE of a sketch from page 16 of the 2024 Sep - Dec Mini Catalogue this week. Click on this link or the image below to go there. The first time you will need to click on the 'Join Group' button at the top. Once you have been added to the group, you can go ahead and post your creation and you do not need to have a blog. 

You can head over to Julia to see her lovely project and follow the hop to see the inspiration from the rest of the CTC Crew.

Thanks for visiting today!

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• Request a FREE Catalogue
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Heart of Christmas - Sentimental Christmas

Hi there

Welcome to another week of Heart of Christmas. Each week, the talented ladies from the Art with Heart team will bring you inspiration for your holiday craft projects. 

My day did not go quite go to plan, so this week I have a simple card using the sweet Sentimental Christmas DSP. This paper is the holiday catalogue Giveback and $4.25AUD will be donated for every pack sold. The money will go to local organisations focused on children's literacy, so it is a great cause.

This layout is fabulous for using your DSP and any coordinating patterned papers would work well and also great for creating multiples.

I started with a Basic Beige card base and layered on the Shaded Spruce striped design from the Sentimental Christmas DSP and then added a banner using the reverse side of the Cherry Cobbler and Gold Foil design from the Season of Elegance Specialty DSP. I chose one of the wreaths with the deer in the centre and cropped it with the largest of the circle dies from the Stylish Shapes Dies. It was layered onto a Shaded Spruce circle cropped with a slightly larger die from the Deckled Circles Dies and popped up onto the banner.

The greeting is from the Peaceful Season stamp set, stamped in Real Red onto Basic Beige and cropped with a circle from the Stylish Shapes Dies and popped up on the corner. I agonised over various options for the bow, but ended up with coordinating Shaded Spruce 1/2" Satin & Sheer Ribbon, but I thought it looked nice without it as well. I finished with a trio of the champagne coloured Adhesive-Backed Sparkle Gems, which worked well with the muted tones of the focus image. Not sure why I haven't used these before as they are super pretty and sparkly.

For the inside, I have fussy cut the streaming ribbon from another sheet of the Sentimental Christmas paper and adhered it directly into the card for something a little different.

 

Project Details
Stamps	Peaceful Season
Card stock & Papers	Basic Beige, Shaded Spruce, Sentimental Christmas DSP, Season of Elegance SDSP
Ink	Real Red
Accessories	Adhesive-Backed Sparkle Gems, Shaded Spruce 1/2" Satin & Sheer Ribbon
Tools	PStylish Shapes Dies, Deckled Circles Dies,  Stampin' Cut & Emboss, Dimensionals

 

Now it's time to hop along to see the fabulous project Kate has made for us this week.

If at any time you find a broken link and the next blog doesn’t come up, please click on the link for our host of the Heart of Christmas Blog Hop, Sharon Davern, and she will have the list of all who are participating.

Thanks for visiting today!

• Shop my Online Store 24/7
• See the latest Stampin' Up! Promotions
• Request a FREE Catalogue
• Check out my Tutorial Store

CASE-ing the Catty - Reindeer Days Suite

Hi there

Welcome to CASE-ing the Catty for this week. 

If you've come from visiting Kathryn, then welcome!  If you're visiting me, I appreciate you stopping by today! You can continue your journey to see the other inspiring creations from the CTC Crew by clicking on the button at the bottom of the post.

This week we are taking inspiration from the Reindeer Days Suite. Oops, I should have looked ahead (I chose this bundle last week), but I love this suite and I'm very happy to show you another project using it. The suite includes the Reindeer Fun Bundle, Reindeer Days DSP, sweet Red & white Adhesive-Backed Peppermints, Forever Plaid 3D Embossing Folder and other coordinating products and I've used quite a few of them in my project today.

This week, I've chosen the project above for my inspiration. It uses the Book Treat Boxes that are also in this suite and as they arrived in my craft room this week, it was the perfect time to try them out. I love giving little Christmas treat packages to friends, neighbours and other people who provide great service to me throughout the year.

The Book Treat Boxes come in 2 pieces - the cover and the flat box in a pack of 10. This makes it very easy to embellish the book box in a number of different ways using ink blending, patterned paper, die cuts, stencils or a combination of these. I have mostly used patterned paper to give my box a very Christmassy look. I chose the cute holly design from the Reindeer Days Designer Paper and the red and white dot design from the Take A Bow DSP. I started by covering the spine of the cover in the red and white dot design and the front and back cover in the holly design.

Before adhering the back piece in place, I covered the closing in the red and white stripe design from the Take A Bow pack so it would go neatly under the larger piece. You could leave it white, or use the other 2 designs, but I wanted a contrast under the focus label.

The box is very easy to put together and there is adhesive already in place to peel off to make it super quick. Both the cover and box are super sturdy without embellishment and food safe as well. I decided to cover the sides of the box with the red and white dot design and as the Take A Bow paper is 6" x 6", you will need to use 2 x 1" (2.5cm) strips. I actually did mine in 4 pieces as I had some strips left from a previous project. 

There is adhesive on the inside right of the cover ready to adhere the box. You need to make sure the box sits inside the score line of the spine so that the cover can fold over neatly. There is adhesive under the closing flap as well, as it is intended that it be adhered shut after you have put your gift inside. I don't like the idea of having to destroy the front of the box to get it open, so I have added the striped paper to the other side of the closing as well (see the photo below). Depending on the occasion and type of embellishment, you could use velcro dots or tiny neodymium magnets under the papers to provide a firm closure that can still be opened easily by the recipient.

For the embellishment on the front, I adhered the red and white dot design to Real Red cardstock and then cropped it with one of the dies from the Spotlight on Nature Dies. I adhered the circle to the box with Foam Adhesive Strip, leaving an opening for the closure tab to pass through as I decided to use Neodymium magnets to keep the box closed. In hindsight, I probably didn't need the magnets as the embellishment covers most of it and makes it very secure. I fussy cut the sweet reindeer and popped it up on Dimensionals. The greeting from the Decorative Trees stamp set was stamped in Real Red ink and I used the (retired) 1" circle punch to crop it. It sits on the edge of the circle with a double bow of white Baker's Twine. I finished with a trio of cute Real Red & White Adhesive-Backed Peppermints.

On the inside of the box I added the holly design paper for a finishing touch. I have popped in a Loco Love chocolate, very appropriately flavoured Zingy Gingerbread Caramel. All the flavours are amazing and as they are organic, vegan and gluten free you also cover a lot of bases. However, you can put smaller Christmas candy or chocolates, a gift card in a pop-up holder, cash of course, jewelry, gift certificate, lottery tickets - so many options for using this sweet little box.

Finally, I added the greeting from the Reindeer Fun stamp set stamped in Garden Green and I used the label die from the (retired) Labels Aglow Dies to crop it with a cute red & white peppermint at each end. I hope you will add the Book Treat Boxes to your holiday craft list.

 

Project Details
Stamps	Reindeer Fun, Decorative Trees
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Real Red, Reindeer Days DSP, Take A Bow DSP, Book Treat Boxes
Ink	Real Red, Garden Green
Accessories	Red & white Adhesive-Backed Peppermints, Baker's Twine Essentials Pack
Tools	Spotlight on Nature Dies, Stampin' Cut & Emboss, Dimensionals, Foam Adhesive Strip, 1" Circle Punch (retired)

 

We would love to see your CASE of a project from the Reindeer Days Suite in the 2024 Sep - Dec Mini Catalogue this week. Click on this link or the image below to go there. The first time you will need to click on the 'Join Group' button at the top. Once you have been added to the group, you can go ahead and post your creation and you do not need to have a blog. 

You can head over to Julia to see her lovely project and follow the hop to see the inspiration from the rest of the CTC Crew.

Thanks for visiting today!

• Shop my Online Store 24/7
• See the latest Stampin' Up! Promotions
• Request a FREE Catalogue
• Check out my Tutorial Store