myasperations: Winter and Christmas Fun!

It’s Friday, so time for another challenge at QKR Stampede! Stop by the challenge, which is always “Anything Goes” and several prizes are awarded. Maybe you’ll be inspired to enter a card or two yourself? My DT card features a digi from QKR named “Christmas Cheer.” I colored this happy snow guy with Spectrum Noir marker and a Sakura Gelly Roll white gel pen. I attached him atop a few colors of cardstock with staples on the corners (love the rustic touch this adds and saves on the cost of adhesive. I go through a lot of the stuff!) The taped the layered image to the top of a Christmas card. I love the bold stripes… and also love that the box of 10 cards was 90% off at Goodwill last Spring! Another bonus is that I can just use the cards inside sentiment. This time I decorated it with a holly sticker I picked up at Hobby Lobby AND a candy cane picture that I fussy-cut from a candy cane box and highlighted with a white gel pen for realism. So fun!

Entered into:

Outlawz Challenges- Songs and Rhymes- Frosty the Snowman

Lil Patch of Crafty Friends- #118 Anything Goes

Outlawz Challenge- Festive Fridays

Crafty Hazelnut’s Christmas Challenge- #465 Anything Goes

Cute As A Button-#50 Anything Goes Optional Twist- Thankful for You

My next two cards feature a fun card fold that is a bit time-consuming but is sure to be appreciated by the recipient.

The first one I’d actually created nearly 20 years ago… but never finished it. Last weekend, I found it hiding at the bottom of a box of partial cards. It was stamped, but not colored, and the adhesive had come loose leaving a few discolored strips. (I think I used glue sticks back when I first started making cards, so it appears that the “stick” is long gone!) The cute bunny images were from a company named Uptown Stamps, which is out of business. But their Holly Pond Hill Bunnies wood mount stamps pop up (or should I say hop up?!) on EBay quite often. I colored the little cuties with Aquarelle colored pencils and a Gelly Roll white gel pen to fit into the current Bugaboo Color Challenge. I also added a few strips of dark card stock to cover the discolored adhesive. They don’t look great… but they look better than what was there. And they even highlight the sentiments a bit. (The "Hello" Sentiment is an old wood mount from Embossing Arts and the "Thinking of you" sentiment is from Printworks. Sadly, both companies are no longer in business. EA closed their doors many years ago, and Printworks in March 2018.) My final addition was to add some glitter to the snowflakes.

I wanted to provide info for the fold so headed to Pinterest. Took a while but I found the instructions under many names including a Hexagon Fold and Hexaflexagon. (The one that was most helpful to me is HERE. Plus this site has a TEMPLATE.)

I noticed that the points on some of the rectangles of my bunny skater scard held hand-sketched stars. I remembered that the person who showed me how to make these cards provided a little instruction sheet that helped the recipient use these little stars to “open” the hidden sections of the card. I couldn’t find those instructions in my stash so will need to re-write them before sending these cards. When I do that I’ll post them here.

I’m entering this card into several challenges including The Paper Shelter (2 decade-old images count as older than a year!) and Outlawz Saturday Challenge (making fun fold cards is one of my favorite things to do!)

Entered into:

Bugaboo Stamps- Color Challenge [photo]
Outlawz Challenges- Monday Greeting Challenge- Animal

The Paper Shelter- #408 Blast from the Past (use an image that is at least a year old)

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge-Anything Goes

Outlawz Challenge- Saturday Paper Ala Mode- Favorite Things

I used the instructions I found on Pinterest (noted with the last card) to make another Hexaflexagon card. This one is for the Power Poppy Challenge “Triple Play.” I did use the same image on my card three times, as required. But I also made a card that has three sides. So… yay! This time I used a Power Poppy digital set named Gingerbread Family that you can find HERE. I printed the gingerbread house and three gingerbread guys onto Kraft cardstock, then colored them with Spectrum Noir marker and a Sakura Gelly Roll white gel pen. Cute paper and rickrack borders from my scrapbook scrap, plus sentiments from the digi set finished up the three sides. So fun!

Note- I did leave some open spaces on the "side" with the gingerbread guys for messages to be written.