Brand Ambassador Inspiration - Christmas Tree Tuesday

Good morning, 

Steph here with my Uniko Brand Ambassador Inspiration post. We are focusing on Christmas in July this month and I have specifically chosen Uniko stamps which include Christmas trees. 

To start off I heat embossed the Uniko Background Blocks Arts Decoratifs Christmas stamp. I then used a craft knife to cut some apertures behind which I laid different colours of tissue paper. The idea being that the light could shine through the tissue paper like a stained glass window. 

For my next card I used Uniko Rustic Christmas stamp set and created a 'forest' using different colour inks before decorating my main tree with fussy cut small elements from the stamp set.

And finally a super quick card made using the outline tree from the Uniko Christmas Pop stamp set and coloured using alcohol markers. I then teamed this with a sentiment from the Uniko Christmas Wishes set.

It's never too early to start your Christmas cards! And hopefully there is a style here to suit most tastes. 

Much love

Steph x

Christmas In July - Vellum Frosted Christmas Trees

 

Happy Weekend. 

Today I am off south with Uniko for Stamperama Bracknell, the show is tomorrow and I am super excited to be going somewhere new. 

In between show prep and restocks arriving, I still managed to squeeze in a little creative time. On Thursday I shared a card on the Seven Hills Crafts blog HERE and seen below using the Kristina Werner Merry Trees, yes, I am doing Christmas in July over there too! 

I stencilled the background, but wanted to add a sentiment. So I decided to add a vellum panel to do that. It adds a wonderful frosted feel to the card and perfect to stamp a gold heat embossed sentiment. 

Anyway, I thought I would replicate the look with Uniko products and this is how it turned out...

I decided to use Background Builders Christmas 2018 and stamped the line of trees in black ink up my card panel. I then coloured the trees with a Stampin' Up! Stampin' Blend. For the sentiment I used the popular Christmas Wishes and added a few Poppy enamel dots to finish. 

I love how you can use the same layout and similar supplies, but achieve different looks. Well, that's two more Christmas cards added to my stash. 

That's all from me today, but I will be back tomorrow with more to share. 

Crafty Hugs

Merry Monday, some more Christmas in July BA Inspiration

Good morning, Julie here with a few 'krafty' ideas for some Christmas makes. Here are my ideas using various Uniko stencils and stamps and kraft card.

I was looking through my stash the other day and came across a couple of panels of kraft card that I'd made a while ago and not used, so decided as my Christmas card pile is not what it should be, I should turn them into cards.

This first card started off as a stencilled panel using Winter Foliage stencil. I made it and used a snippet for this card back in 2022, so it's about time I used it!

I first secured the stencil to a panel of kraft card then inked through with Hero Arts Unicorn White pigment ink. Carefully removing the stencil so as not to smudge the ink, I set it aside to fully dry and washed the stencil. Using the white ink allows the dye ink I used after to pop off the kraft, otherwise it would soak into the card and be rather dull in comparison.

Once completely dry, I replaced the stencil over the panel and inked through with a mix of Evergreen Bough DI for the holly leaves, Festive Berries DI for the berries and Mowed Lawn DI for the ivy leaves. The evergreen sprigs were a mix of both greens. My pine cones were inked with Ground Espresso DI.

To make this card, I cut the panel into two, and attached it to a kraft base card, for sparkle a strip of red glitter paper was added and finally a sentiment embossed with gold EP.

This second card uses the smaller of the two panel pieces, glued to a red base card, a thin strip of gold mirror card and a large heat embossed sentiment in gold.

Finally I had a sentiment panel that had gone wrong, the top half was smudged but I didn't throw it away, just cut the messy section away and trimmed it to form the central panel of my card.

Trying to think what to do with the piece I had left, I went looking through my ideas folder and found this.

No name so I can't link back but I also found this by our old BA Hannelie, here, so mine is a bit of a mashup!

I found some tape in my stash, Lidl I do believe, and cut a triangle from the sentiment panel. Here is one using blue that I made at the same time. It's so easy to make loads at the same time as arranging the small individual sentiments does take some time, even in a MISTI! The tape was wrapped around a panel of kraft then the center panel added over on pads, a simple punched white card star and gold embossed sentiment completes.

So that's all from me for today, hope I've given you some ideas to get your Christmas makes up and running.

BA Inspiration - Snowflakes Framed Two Ways

 Good afternoon, Julie here with a little bit of festive inspiration using the newly released Framed Snowflakes stamp set. If you saw the release in review post on Saturday, you'll recognise this new stamp set. I had to make a card for the new challenge at Color Hues so thought I would share that card together with another made from a panel I had leftover from the release day blog hop that I didn't use. Here are both cards, same stamp for the main panel but two different looks.

This first card uses the leftover panel but I chopped it in half and turned each half around! To make the panel I simply stamped the stamp onto a white card panel and heat embossed with fine white EP. When cool, I inked in some bright DIs with a blending brush, Blueprint Sketch, Salty Ocean, Peacock Feathers and Twisted Citron, randomly over the top. All excess ink was removed with a soft cloth before biting the bullet and cutting it in half.

Each half was then rotated and glued to my base card, leaving a gap in the center. This I covered with my sentiment banner, from Christmas Wishes. I stamped a few matching snowflakes from Snowflake Serenade. before adding it across the center. A couple of strips of glitter paper just neatened up the central panel.

Finally this is the card I made for the Color Hues challenge, a simple almost one layer card. The stamp stamped as before but this time straight onto a base card. A mix of Wilted Violet and Salty Ocean DI blended over the top and a fussy cut sentiment from Stunning Snowflakes added on pads.

A few PPP sequins to add sparkle complete the design. I think it would be a great idea for batch making, simply stamp your sentiment directly onto the card to make it perfect for posting!

That's it from me for today, hope I've given you some inspiration for your Christmas makes. 

Don't forget the GIVEAWAY for the release in review, a chance to win a £20 eGift code to spend in store. Commenting will close for the giveaway at midnight GMT Sunday 5th November 2023 and Bev will randomly select a winner and announce on Monday 6th November.

Happy stamping!

Stencil Sunday BA Inspiration - One design Three stencils

Bonjour !

Izzy here with a Stencil Sunday for my Uniko Brand Ambassador inspiration. As my dear teamy Steph was mentioning it in her last Brand Ambassador Inspiration post, Christmas isn't all that far and I then realised that I don't have a lot of Christmas cards in my stash !

If my mojo is very low at the moment, Steph, with her gorgeous Christmas cards made me want to play with my Uniko stencils. So I took off my stash my favourite Uniko's stencil when it's about Christmas and I made this first card.

I love the In the Forest stencil, since it has been released, I have used it every year for my greeting cards. Here I used it directly on the double white card and I brushed two shades of green and a bit of black. The result was nice but I wanted even more firs. So I turned the stencil and I brushed another layer of the same inks.

On a piece of white card stock I stamped Santa from the Jolly Christmas set, I coloured it with coloured pencils and I fussy cut it. I die cut a square of Vellum paper on which I stamped and I black heat embossed the sentiment coming from the Background Builders Christmas 2018.

To finish my card I foam mounted Santa on the Vellum. I turn the Vellum and I put squares of foam tapes behind before adhering it on the card base.

As I loved how we can see through the lovely design made with the stencilling, I kept this design for my two other cards.

For this second card, I used the Winter Foliage stencil that Bev recently used for her beautiful card (see HERE). With a small brush, I applied the different colours.

On the Vellum, I stamped and I gold heat embossed the sentiment coming from the Christmas Wishes set. I stamped the foliage from the Winter Foliage set and I die cut each piece with the matching dies.

I assembled the card in the same way as the previous one.

For this last card I brushed non-traditional colours through the Let is Snow stencil to make my background. 

After looking for what I could put on the Vellum, I tried these little trees from the Background Blocks Scandinavian Christmas set.

I coloured them with Promakers, I fussy cut them and I foam mounted them on the square of Vellum on which I previously stamped and black heat embossed the sentiment from the Christmas Sentiments set.

To finish my card and to make these little trees even brighter I put some Stickles on them.

Well, that's all the Jolly, Bright and Merry I have to share with you today. Have a lovely Sunday and thank you so much for stopping by.

Hello July!

Hello July and welcome to...

This month myself and the Uniko Brand Ambassadors will be getting into the Christmas spirit and sharing inspiration using Uniko's current Christmas products in preparation for a NEW release, with countdown to release celebrations and inspiration starting 31st July. New products will be available Sunday 6th August.

Don't worry, if you're not quite ready for getting in the Christmas spirit, we will still be sharing other inspiration too! 

However, I'm kicking things off with a couple of cards using Framed - Holly as the main feature of may cards. 

As you can see, I am still on this vellum technique. It's fun trying out different stamps with this technique and this framed was calling for it.

I've stamped the frame in VersaMark and heat embossed in white. I then used just a trio of Stampin' Up! Stampin' Blends to colour on the reverse. I then adhered this to my card base using a fine tip glue and embellished the card with a sentiment from Christmas Wishes and a cluster of Winter Foliage. I finished off with a few red Nuvo drops.

The creative inspiration was flowing, so I went on to make a second card using Framed - Holly. 

This time I decided to stamp the frame in black ink and colouring with the same trio of markers. I then added the same sentiment stamped and embossed in gold. 

I decided the card needed a bit of dimension. So I stamped the image again and selectively coloured a few of the holly leaves, before fussy cutting them out and adhering them using foam tape. This creates a subtle raised spotlighting effect. 

I trimmed the frame and adhered it with double sided tape to a piece of Concord & 9th Poppy card before adhering to my card base using foam tape.

That's all from me today, thanks for stopping by.

Crafty Hugs 

Festive Friday, BA Inspiration using Winter Foliage

Good morning, Julie here with a little bit of inspiration for your Christmas makes. 

Here are a couple of ideas using foliage stamps from Winter Foliage and Season of Beauty.

My first card was inspire by those turnabout stamp sets you can get but without using the jig and no masking!!!

I drew a circle in pencil roughly in the position I would later place my sentiment panel on an A6 panel of white card and stamped a variety of foliage in various green inks. I used some really old foliage stamps that are now sadly retired, Nature's Treasures 1 as well as the two newer sets to get a variety of textures no masking was required here. I simply used my MISTI, stamped one branch of the evergreen bough, then rotated my panel 180' and repeated. I did the rest of the green foliage the same but added the red berries, Season of Beauty and Winter Foliage free hand.  The berry stems were stamped in brown before colouring the berries with Copic marker, the holly berries I simply stamped and then shaded with a darker Copic marker. A few dots of white gel pen complete.

When dry, I rubbed out my pencil circle and added the central panel. I found the die cut circle in my bits box, used the sentiment from Christmas Wishes stamped in black ink and simply covered up the messy bit in the middle by gluing it flat onto the panel!

This second card was inspired by the latest sketch at CAS Colours and Sketches.

This time I cut a mask from a Post it note and then used the same die to emboss my A6 white panel.

I then added the mask and stamped the holly leaves and evergreen foliage. I stamped the holly berries and a couple of pine cones and used the dies to cut them out. The evergreen boughs were coloured in with a couple of green pencil crayons as were the veins on the holly leaves for extra interest.

Removing the mask, I stamped the sentiment from Season of Beauty in Versamark and embossed in gold EP before adding the berries and cones with glue.

So that's it from me for this month, hope I've given you a couple of ideas to kick start your Christmas makes if you haven't started!

Stay safe and keep crafting 'til next time.

Merry Monday, BA Inspiration using Winter Foliage and Christmas Wishes

 Good afternoon, Julie here with a little festive inspiration for you. 

I was inspired by the latest challenge at CAS Christmas Card Challenge and a video I saw on You Tube. In the video the designer used homemade coloured card to create batch Christmas cards and the ladies at CAS Christmas have the cue word Pine, so off I went!

Initially I got out all my sets which included pine branches but mainly used the large pine branch from Winter Foliage to create my two cards. Here are my designs.

My first step was to create my coloured panels. I did this by washing a selection of festive and neutral coloured DIs over some panels of white card, smooshing the leftover ink onto the panels to use up the ink and create some subtle texture. Once these had dried overnight under a heavy weight to flatten the panels, I used two of the neutral panels to create my cards.

CARD 1

The soft grey panel was created using Hickory Smoke DI and I stamped the large branch from Winter Foliage with Versamark along the edge, embossing with white EP. A few of the gaps were stamped with the smaller pine branch from Season Of Beauty. The panel was then trimmed down from A6 to leave a border when added to my dark silver grey A6 card base and the sentiment from Christmas Wishes added to match. For decoration on the boughs, I used some old silver crystals from Home Bargains, that I coloured with Copics and attached them to my branches. The soft colours complement the grey and white of the base.

CARD 2

This time my background panel was made using Old Paper DI which I inked over with the Winter Foliage stencil and the same Old Paper DI and glued to an A6 base card.

From a panel made using Pine Needles DI I cut two branches using the Winter Foliage dies and stamped the foliage in Evergreen Bough DI a couple of times. I used a handmade jig, simply a piece of rectangular card with a die cut aperture, in my MISTI to make sure the die cut stayed in place. 

The bauble was cut using a circle die from a panel of card made using Festive Berries DI. I did 2 layers of red as the initial covering as it wasn't quite dark enough for my purposes. A silver hanger was cut using a magazine freebie die.

The red die cut circle was edged with some more Festive Berries DI and the sentiment stamped and embossed in white EP. The first branch was added as is, but the second branch was cut in two before being added. A small gold ribbon bow completes and the whole bauble was then added to my background.

So that's about it from me, I hope I've given you some ideas to create your own cards.

Thanks for stopping by.

Merry Monday, BA Inspiration with Winter Foliage Stamps and Matching Dies

Good morning, Julie here with some more ideas and inspiration to encourage you to make a start on your Christmas makes. Today I'm using the Winter Foliage stamps and matching dies and a new to me technique I stumbled across on You Tube recently. Here's a look at the three designs I came up with.

I was looking at a Marion Emberson video and she was raving about a video of a technique she'd just seen, so I went to look too. In the You Tube video, Ann Melvin uses Kitchen paper to die cut foliage to give a 3D effect. You Tube also suggested another video here that pre dates the first by the Memory Box guy. Thinking this looked something I could use for my post I had a play. 

I wont go into the process of making the die cuts as the video does it much better but I will explain how I made each card!

My first card uses a couple of the pine branches and pine cones, together with a text panel I made a couple of years ago.

         

Once I had cut out my elements, I added some water colour paint to the die cuts and left to dry. Using the left over from the die cutting, I placed it in my MISTI to use as jig to stamp my elements with the matching stamps. The boughs I stamped with Evergreen Bough DI and the cone with Ground Espresso DI. Now in the video there was no mention of the layers parting from one another which happened to mine, but a little dab of glue secured them back together! To make it more Christmassy, I added in some Inka Gold wax watered down with a little plain water, with a fine paint brush.

My panel was made for this BA post a couple of years ago, the process is quite involved so I made a load at the same time and kept them for use later! I trimmed the background panel, clear embossing on kraft, then added stamped and die cut elements. The finished panel was finished with a twine bow and added to my off white, A6, base card.

This second card uses two of the holly leaves and one of the berry clusters over another sentiment stamped background. This time I kept it very simple and just added a circle from the bits box, stamped with Season's Greetings from Christmas Sentiments and the holly and berries. 

My text panel was slightly too small for an A6 base card, so I trimmed it down to leave a thin, white border down both sides. The holly was painted as before with watercolour, then stamped in Pine Needles DI and the berries I left unstamped, just watercoloured and a few dots of white gel pen. This time I added some Wink of Stella to the die cut and stamped elements.

My final card uses the last of the holly leaves and berry cluster in a more contemporary slimline design.

After adding water colour and stamping the leaves as before, this time I added some Versamark and clear EP and heat embossed. It took a couple of goes as the paper towel is very absorbent. The definition on the leaves was lost in the embossing process, so I scored in the veins carefully, with a craft knife.

On a panel of white card I stamped the large sentiment from Festive Sentiments in black and added the embossed leaves and berries. A doodled border using a black fine liner completes this element. 

When I'd finished the panel and placed it on the plain white card, it looked a bit uninteresting, so I stamped a couple of the Background Blocks Wonky Stripes in black on another piece of card, then added that to my base card before the top panel.

Well I hope I've given you some ideas to kick start your Christmas makes, so for the moment, thanks for stopping by.

Stay safe and keep crafting!!   

Brand Ambassador Inspiration, One Stamp Set, Two Techniques

 Good morning, Julie here with a couple of festive makes. I've used the gorgeous Season of Beauty stamp set and two different techniques to get two completely different looks.

The first is simply a stamped all over design using the large solid and smaller detail poinsettia stamps and the smallest leaf stamp to create a crisp result.

After stamping the poinsettias, including the detail layer, I added some green bracts using Altenew's Moss ink with the smallest of the leaf stamps. I went in again to stamp the paler colour with the wrong side of the stamp and Altenew's Olive ink. The tiny flowers in the centers were stamped with Altenew's Maple Yellow.

My sentiment panel was cut from vellum and stamped with the large, bold, Christmas from Christmas Sentiments and the smaller banners with elements from Christmas Wishes, in matching red ink. I used the back of these banners and the solid sections of embossing to add my vellum with liquid glue.

My second card uses the exact same stamped elements, except the detail layer for the poinsettia, but using the water colour marker on stamps, to give a softer feel.

The technique is quite easy, especially if you have a MISTI. On a panel of hot pressed watercolour card, I inked up the main image and then stamped the first image. I then painted over the stamped image with clean water, reinked the stamp with a darker marker and stamped again. The water makes the ink blend with the lower layer but in a random way. It's not a technique for you if you like to be in full control of the outcome!! The process was repeated over the panel and then with the green bracts, using the same stamps as the card above but adding the solid stamp first and water to blend the colour before adding the detail.

 When dry, the flower centers were added with yellow ink and some yellow ochre shadows added with the tip of a Zig Marker. I then used a dark, red, fine liner to add veins to the the red bracts freehand.

This time I used the same sentiment stamps but was a little braver with the smaller ones, adding them with gold EP. Some gold, twinkling thread was added behind the vellum panel which I glued down using the sentiment to hide the glue.

It just goes to show that you can get such a different look just by changing the technique used. I hope you agree, this stamp set is so versatile!

That's all from me until the New Year, so I hope you all have a lovely Christmas and we can look forward to a happy and healthy 2022.

Merry Monday, Some Pastel Christmas BA Inspiration

Good morning, Julie here with a little bit of festive inspiration. I've been wanting to try the floating strip technique for awhile and decided to turn the end result into a Christmas bauble. I originally thought of a simple circular one but in the end I used a really ancient bauble die as well!

Here are my two cards. 

The technique is the same whether you use a basic circle die or a more complex shape die to create your bauble. All you need is a piece of acetate slightly larger than your die and some strips of card!

To make mine, I used Background Builders Christmas and Background Builders Christmas 2018 and a variety of pastel coloured card for a non traditional look. Some elements I heat embossed with white EP, others I simply stamped with ink. You could just use some bits of DP as well.

Using double sided tape I added the strips to my acetate background, leaving a small gap between each one. I used some scrap acetate that was from an old brochure, you don't need the good stuff. When covered, I trimmed off the excess.

Then, using a circle die I cut into the acetate panel, a couple off passes might be needed depending on the thickness of the acetate. If it doesn't work after a couple of runs through your machine repeat or remove the die and carefully run a pair of scissors around the impression to free the die cut.

I repeated these steps to create the decorative bauble die also and added a fixing using the matching die in silver and a cut down one from another die for the plain circle one.

Once I had completed each bauble I was ready to create my cards. After a bit of toing and froing, I used a Gelli plate background using the Let it Snow stencil for one and kept the other plain.

I used a 51/2" square base card, matting the stencilled background on some silver paper before adding the bauble. I used pads down the middle and glue along the edges to give it some shaping. A simple silver chord bow and a trimmed and fussy cut, white, heat embossed sentiment from Christmas Wishes on black completes. I fussy cut the sentiment as I wanted it to look a little lighter than using a solid sentiment panel.

My second card has the bauble attached as before but onto a linen effect, white, A6 note card and a simple stamped sentiment.

So that's all from me. I hope I've given you an idea to help you make your Christmas cards. I think I'm almost there with my Christmas makes but there are always last minute ones to make!

Stay safe out there 'til next time and keep crafting.