Christmas Card Prototype

It's now 10:30pm and I have to be on a 7:20am flight in the morning for work. That means getting up at 4:00am or so. I told myself I would be asleep by now, but NOOOOoooooo! About an hour ago, I decided I'd check my front porch because the UPS people are sneaky. They leave packages late and don't knock on my door. I found a shipment of German scrap/Victorian scraps on my porch. I've been obsessing about Christmas cards - getting some easy ones done. Of course, I opened the box and started thinking about how I could use this stuff for Christmas cards (instead of sleeping !).

The Christmas floral scrap is new. It's on a sheet with 2 Santas. The red German scrap hearts have been in stock for a while. The girl is from the Bright Christmas collage sheet. The green paper is from the Making Memories Noel paper pack. The lace is the Collage Stuff red vintage lace. This is really easy. (Over the Thanksgiving holiday I watched some videos of other people's version of easy Christmas cards - not my version of easy!) I'm thinking of all sorts of ways to change it up - add stamping in the background, use some sheet music in the background, add some bling, add words, don't use the lace, use some German scrap borders or other ribbon etc. I put this together in less than 5 minutes after I got all the parts assembled and after the idea had gelled in my head. There are a lot of things I can do to jazz up this simple design. Maybe this will help you if you're like me, worrying about getting some easy Christmas cards done!

Skinny book page - Song of the Moonbeams

This is the back of the skinny book page. This one is called "Song of the Moonbeams." I'll hit the high points on how I created this. The background is a vintage dictionary page that been smudged with white paint, stamped with a scrolly stamp and then smudged with more paint and a little gold Glimmer Mist. I scanned in some old sheet music, sized it down, and printed it. I crumbled it up and rubbed Old Paper distess ink on it, and then ironed it flat. There's red patterned scrapbook papter at the top and bottom smudged with paint and stamped. The vintage vocabulary card was edged with the distress ink, stamped with the scrolly stamp and then part of the stamping was highlighted with a gold Spica glitter pen. I cut the flower from some old wide lace and applied Old Paper ink. I left the white lace white. The gold moon was smudged with white paint. The woman is from the Collage Stuff vintage image CD #1. I edged and highlighted her with a gold Spica glitter pen. The stars are confetti applied with rolled up glue dots. Another skinny book page done!

New Postcard

A new postcard! I liked my "tiny dancer" design in the previous post, so I decided to create a new postcard loosely based on that design. Collage Stuff products used in this design include the Vintage Image CD#2 and Tiny Treasures Collage Sheet. This postcard will arrive in 2-3 weeks and will ship with Collage Stuff orders then.

November Skinny Book Page - Tiny Dancer

The theme for this skinny book is "Grungy and Rusty" and the person likes vintage, doors, windows and etc. I've been agonizing over how to do this - no ideas period. So here's what I've come up with for one side of the page. It's called "tiny dancer." This page is 4 x 8". The background is a vintage French/English dictionary page that has been dulled down with some white paint. I printed off the red stamps, metal tag, window and fairy/flower image from an old Melanie Sage image CD that I have. I put the stamps at the top and bottom. The stamps at the top are all covered up. I dulled down the red stamps with white paint. After I had the stamps glued down, I overstamped with a Tim Holtz scrolly stamp.

The images of the school children behind the dancer are from the Collage Stuff Vintage Image CD #2. This is my favorite image on the whole CD. It's something like a proof sheet from school kids getting their yearbook photos taken. The image itself was damaged and grungy when I bought it. I printed this image on a transparency and painted it white paint on the back. I used gold brads to attach it to the background.

I cut the window image to the right size and edged it with black ink. The dancer is from the Collage Stuff Tiny Treasures collage sheet. This is another one of my favorite images. I cut her out of her background and highlighted her with a gold Spica glitter pen. She was glued down on the window image. I glued down the window/dancer image so that I could have the dancer stand on the "metal" tag. I added the flower/fairy image for a touch of whimsy. I decided the dancer image needed somthing, so I inked up a text stamp with blank ink, stamped off on a piece of paper and then stamped on the dancer image. I wanted the words to show, but not to be really dark.

At the top, I started out with two of the "metal tags" and I decided I didn't like it. I went through my vocabulary cards and found this one that starts with "fairy tale." I edged it with black ink and glued it down. It was too plain, so I took some German scrap stars, cut them down and smudged them with white paint, and put them in the corner.

The words "tiny dancer" were created at the Acme label maker website.

I think this is sufficiently grungy. The green letters on the vocabulary card echo the green in the leaves in the flower/fairy image. There's a hint of red in the flower/fairy image to go with the red stamps.

Tomorrow I will work on the back of this page. Not a single idea yet for the back of the page. My muse is hiding from me.

Thanks for stopping by!

September Calendar Page

I'm hosting a hand-made calendar swap at the Collage Stuff yahoo group and it appears that I'm going to need to conplete the month of September. Here's my design. The page is 4 x 6". I got the new Jenni Bowlin mini ATC bingo cards with the months in stock this week and I've been thinking about using them. This is the perfect opportunity. I also got the new Tim Holtz Mini Ornamental Mover and Shapers Die in stock this week too. It's the perfect size for a 4 x 6" project. The fairy and the roses are from the 7344 Victoian Scrap. I printed out the calendar from MS Word and sized it down smaller. I colored the calendar with a green Copic marker. I edged the page with a bronze Copic marker. I added three little jewels above the bingo card. This is a sinple design with just a lot of cutting and pasting. Twelve more to go!

October ATC Swap 2.0

I decided that my original ATC design really needed something. Here's the same ATC with just a couple of changes that I think make this design more pleasing to the eye. Change #1 - I used a Tim Holtz scrolly stamp to overstamp the sheet music. This adds visual interest. Change #2- I changed the placement of the brown German scrap border to better frame the focal point. Change #3 - I added red color to the "happy" definition. Now there is red at the top and bottom of the ATC which again serves to better frame the focal point. I hope this gives you some ideas how to upgrade your own art if you feel that it needs that elusive something else!

October Collage Stuff ATC Swap

Here's my design for the October ATC swap at Collage Stuff. The theme is "Precious Pets." It's simple! The background is some Seven Gypsies paper. I tore some vintage sheet music and colored it red with some of my home-made Distress Ink Perfect Pearls Mist. The girl is from the Christmas Fun collage sheet. I colored the flowers in the girl's hair with a red Spica glitter pen. I put the Brown Tiny Flower German scrap border at the left side and top. I added a jewel heart brad. I scanned in an old dictionary page to get the definition of happy. I printed this out and applied it at the bottom of the ATC. I used a black Copic marker to go around the edges of the ATC. If had more time this morning, I'm sure these ATC's would be a little more detailed, but alas, this will have to do! Thanks for stopping by!