Challenge: Christmas

Hello!

Welcome to a fabulous new challenge!

So if you didn’t guess from my hint in the last post, this fortnight we wanna see you craft with Christmas in mind (or any other type of holiday you have in mind for the season, e.g Hanukkah) Let’s face it, Christmas is only 39 days away and so it’s time to start whippin’ out the cards!

I started well this year; creating a couple of Christmas cards last month, but I’ll confess that I’ve hit a bit of a dry spell right now….but after creating a few different cards, I now know that my final design will feature the following elements:

Firstly, it has to be CAS! Not only to satisfy my CAS lovin’ side, but also for the convenience of mass production:
Card Deets
{Merry Christmas}
Stamps: Holiday Tree (Papertrey Ink)
Ink: Tuxedo Black (Memento)
Cardstock: Fine Linen (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Cuttlebug (Provocraft)/Linen and Canvas Impression Plate, Pure Poppy Buttons (Papertrey Ink)/Promarkers/Gem (Craft Supply)

It has to have a good ol’ traditional colour combo. If red and green don’t sum up Christmas, I’ve no idea what colours do!

Card Deets
{Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year}
Stamps: Holiday Signature Greetings (Papertrey Ink)/Musical Background (Kaisercraft)
Ink: Versamark/Tuxedo Black (Memento)
Cardstock: Stamper’s Select White, Hunter’s Green (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Pure Poppy Saddle-Stitch Ribbon (Papertrey Ink)/Gems (Zva)/Promarker (to colour gem!)

…and finally, it has to be a design that uses my existing stash (no new crafty Christmas goodies for this gal this year – not that I’ve been a bad girl of course, just that my stampy budget had to be spend on a new tyre the other week!)

Card Deets
{Season’s Greetings}
Stamps: Holiday Signature Greetings, Background Basics: Chevron Stripes (Papertrey Ink)
Ink: Rich Cocoa (Memento)/Hawaiian Shores (Papertrey Ink)
Cardstock: Dark Chocolate, Vintage Cream (Papertrey Ink)
Patterned Paper: Tickets from Daily Junque Collection (Pink Paislee)
Accessories: Shimmer Chalks (Dovecraft)/Gems (Zva)/Mat Stack 2 Die (Papertrey Ink)/Grand Calibur (Spellbinders)/Twine from Daily Junque Collection (Pink Paislee)

Those baubles have been cut from Mat Stack 2! When I saw the shape of it, I immediately thought of a bauble. The subtle one in the background is created by using the negative shape of the die-cut as a stencil with my chalks.

Over to Caryn:
I am super-in-love with this challenge – there is no other time of the year I love more than Christmas so making this card was no challenge for me at all!! I am looking forward to your entries more than any other time too – can’t wait to see your festive creations!

For our challenge I have cracked open and lavished some inky attention on my new Holiday Lights set as well as the Stylish Sentiments: Holidays set. I just adore both of them – think they’re both going to feature heavily in this years cards!
I LOVE Pure Poppy and for Christmas there just is NO OTHER COLOUR!! I have paired it this time with Hawaiian Shores and Raspberry Fizz – yum!

Here’s Kate: “Thank goodness for this challenge to get me kick-started into making some Christmas cards! I have to say it made me want to play with all my Christmas sets but for this card I decided on my Wreath for All Seasons set for a good old CAS card!”

Card Recipe:
Stamps: Wreath for All Seasons/Think Big Favourites 8
Card: Stamper’s Select White/Pure Poppy
Ink: Pure Poppy/Ripe Avocado/Basic Black
Other: Scallop Die/Ripe Avocado Twill

So now it’s your turn! Just to tempt you some more, up for grabs for one European-based peep is this li’l stamp set:

Mehndi Medallion!

Here are our challenge deets:

* All entries must contain at least one PTI product to qualify (please state what is PTI as sometimes it’s hard to see :D)

* All entries must be newly created (well, new to Blogland anyways!). Please don’t link to old posts that might happen to fit the brief of the challenge!!

* To enter, use our inlinkz thingy at the bottom of this post. Please leave the correct URL for your entry post and not just your generic blog address! If you’re having problems then just leave a comment with a link to your post featuring the project on your blog or online gallery.

* Worldwide entries are more than welcome to share the inspiration and can be in with a chance of being a Top 3 PTI Passionista, but unfortunately prizes can only be shipped within Europe!

* Challenge closes on Monday, November 28th 2011 at 9.00am GMT

* As well as a randomly picked winner, we’ll select the top three creations we like the most and feature them on the Blog. The top three PTI Passionistas will have chance to display a Top 3 Passionista Blinkie on their own blog.

We can’t wait to be inspired by your creations 🙂

Aimes, Kate & Caryn
xxx

Challenge: Mad for Tags!

Hi everyone and thank you for joining us for another challenge! This time we’re going mad for tags! Yep, we want you to make and tag and then incorporate it in a card or other papercrafting project. Remember, if you don’t have any tag dies or punches you can always cut one yourself!

This is the first of many Christmas cards I’m embarking on – amazing for me in September! I went straight for one of my favourite Christmas colour combos – red, cream and kraft, and used the super-cute Tiny Tags Christmas set. I’m so looking forward to getting a lot of mileage out of this set this year!

Recipe:
Stamps: Tiny Treats Christmas, Fillable Frames 9
Card: Kraft, Vintage Cream
Paper: 2008 Bitty Dot Basics
Ink: Memento black, Vintage Cream
Other: Fillable Frames 9 die, Pure Poppy button, twine, Corner Chomper, Copic markers

Over to Caryn…

As I am now in proper panic mode in the run up to the BIG day – virtually every card that I create from now until December 24th (yes, I am NEVER completely in control) will be a Christmas card of some description. This year I am not putting myself under pressure to make the usual 150 plus that I do every year. I’m not a fan of the mass production approach as I get bored too easily so it’s rare I make the same card twice. With that in mind I have set myself a target of 50 cards, all different for those people that I know will appreciate them. For those distant relatives and friends of the family that I don’t really “know” but nevertheless exchange cards with every year, there will be a card, just not a special hand-crafted one! I know that’s a bit naughty but I would rather put that time into making something for my dearest friends and family members who will feel that little bit more special knowing not every one got one!!

{Recipe}
Stamps: Big and Bold Holiday Wishes, Wreath for All Seasons.
Card: Rustic Cream, Kraft
Others: Bakers Twine (Pure Poppy), vintage button (Ripe avocado)grosgrain ribbon (SU!), gems (Papermania), woodgrain impression plate.

Over to Aimes:
For this tag-tastic challenge I adopted a miniature approach and found this the perfect opportunity to play with my tiny tags die and stamp set 🙂

Surprise, surprise – I actually used the other side of my linen and canvas impression plate *gasp!* I’m hoping that the plaid will give my card that guy feel as this was made with my nephew in mind who turns 12 soon. I assumed with the whole ‘HB 2 U’ sentiment it gives it that kinda cool edgy look *wink*

Card Recipe

{For You, Party, HB 2 U}

Stamps: Tiny Tags, Birthday Bash Sentiments

Ink: Tuxedo Black (Memento)/Pure Poppy (Papertrey Ink)

Cardstock: Stamper’s Select White, Pure Poppy (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Bakers’ Twine, Linen and Canvas Impression Plate, Tiny Tags Die (Papertrey Ink)/Spellbinders Grand Calibur/Nestabilities

Ready to join in the fun? Here’s what you can win:

Flower Fusion 1 set

And here are the deets:

* All entries must contain at least one PTI product to qualify (please state what is PTI as sometimes it’s hard to see :D)

* All entries must be newly created (well, new to Blogland anyways!).  Please don’t link to old posts that might happen to fit the brief of the challenge!!

* To enter, use our inlinkz thingy at the bottom of this post. Please leave the correct URL for your entry post and not just your generic blog address! If you’re having problems then just leave a comment with a link to your post featuring the project on your blog or online gallery.

* Worldwide entries are more than welcome to share the inspiration and can be in with a chance of being a Top 3 PTI Passionista, but unfortunately prizes can only be shipped within Europe!

* Challenge closes on Monday, October 3rd 2011 at 9.00am GMT

* As well as a randomly picked winner, we’ll select the top three creations we like the most and feature them on the Blog. The top three PTI Passionistas will have chance to display a Top 3 Passionista Blinkie on their own blog.
Have fun!

Kate, Aimes & Caryn xxx

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Perfectly Pretty Pearls

Hi, Caryn here.

Firstly – sorry this is appearing a bit late – I’ve been suffering a wee bit with the lurgy over the last few days and thought we still had another week to run on our last challenge!! Oops! Luckily I was organised enough to have my card made so without further ado, here we are with our new challenge Pretty Pearls. As usual you can interpret this as you wish but we want to see you using pearls in some way on your creation (which must incorporate at least one Papertrey Ink product).

I am still in Christmas card-making mode at the moment so my card is another festive one! I used my beloved Peaceful Poinsettia set along with Big and Bold Holiday Wishes. The image and sentiment have been stamped in Versamark and then embossed in white filligree powder. I am loving this colour combo of Pure Poppy, Aqua Mist and Kraft – loads of my cards this year have used it! Caryn x

Recipe:
Stamps: Peaceful Poinsettia/Big and Bold Holiday Wishes
Ink: Versamark
Card: Kraft/ Aqua Mist/Pure Poppy/Spring Moss
Other: White Filligree embossong powder/Martha Stewart Edge punch/adhesive pearls and gem/Nestabilities: Lacy Circles and Standard Circles

Here’s Kate:
“My mum asked me to make some cards for her this Christmas and for two of the three designs I used the Wreath for All Seasons set, I can see this becoming one of my most-used PTI sets! The gaps in the wreath design just calls out for some pearly berries!”

Here’s a close up of the pearls:

I’d better make a start on my own cards now!

Recipe:
Stamps: Wreath for All Seasons/2010 Holiday Tags
Ink: Purely Pomegranite (SU), Versafine Black
Card: Vintage Cream/Purely Pomegranite (SU)
Other: Cuttlebug embossing folder/Purely Pomegranite ribbon (SU)/Adhesive Pearls/Rustic Twine/Mat Stack 4 die.

Over to Aimes
“OK. So I am in the middle of a huge panic. Breathe, Aimes. Breathe! It’s only 11 days until Christmas and I’m still making Christmas cards! *Argh!* Still, I like to tell myself it’s because I’m at my ‘most creative’ when I’m under more pressure – ha!

So here is my ‘pearly’ creation:

I’ve kinda cheated – hope you’ll forgive me. I know you’ve seen this card layout before (for the last challenge) and I’m using it again for my example for this challenge. I think the change of colours and the pearly touches certainly make it different from my other two….well it’s more girly anyways!”

Card Deets
{We Wish you a Merry Christmas}
Stamps: Holiday Signature Greetings, Fancy Flourishes (Papertrey Ink)
Ink: Fresh Snow (Papertrey Ink)
Cardstock: Spring Rain, Sweet Blush, White Shimmer Cardstock (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Cuttlebug, Snowflake Die (Provocraft)/Nestabilities/Fresh Snow Satin Ribbon and Spring Rain Button (Papertrey Ink)/Pearls (Hero Arts)/’Chompy‘ (Corner Chomper!)

As our featured stamper for December, here’s Aga’s fabulous take on the challenge:

“I’ve always been a fan of red berries on Christmas cards. There’s something so pretty about them. To create my card I used the leaves from the Blooming Button Bits set with white embossing powder and red pearls. Don’t they look cute together? I also added a baker’s twine, printed sentiment and a piece of red punched border.”

Ready to play along? Here are the deets:

Here are the deets:
* All entries must contain at least one PTI product to qualify (please state what is PTI as sometimes for us it’s hard to tell :D)

* To enter, use our inlinkz thingy at the bottom of this post. Please leave the correct URL for your entry post and not just your generic blog address! If you’re having problems then just leave a comment with a link to your post featuring the project on your blog or online gallery.

* Worldwide entries are more than welcome to share the inspiration and can be in with a chance of being a Top 3 PTI Passionista, but unfortunately prizes can only be shipped within Europe!

* Challenge closes on Monday, December 27th 2010 at 9.00am GMT

* As well as a randomly picked winner, we’ll select the top three creations we like the most and feature them on the Blog. The top three PTI Passionistas will have chance to display a Top 3 Passionista Blinkie on their own blog.

So here’s what you can win – A Fillable Frames #6 stamp set.

We can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Caryn, Kate, Aimes and Aga
xxxx