Yes, that’s right.  Tonight, the eve before the start of the lead up to Thanksgiving is the start to my holiday season.  I love this time of year when people gather in the kitchen and cook piles of food and feast together.

I know this is a very stressful time of year for many, but this is the time of year where I find myself getting settled and centered.  I spend the entire end of the year forcing myself to side step the small stuff and focusing on my family.  And I have the most amazing family, flaws and all (and yes there are a lot of flaws, but to me they are perfect).

So for the coming weeks you just will have to deal with my Mary Poppins attitude and the plethora of holiday cards.

And for anyone wondering where I was all last week, I was practically living at the elementary school doing demos for kinder and first graders.  I will hopefully post those fun stories here in the next few days.

But I am back in my routine and have some fun cards for everyone to enjoy.

Up first today is a pretty card from the challenge group Less Is More.  This week they are asking for a CAS vintage card.

I decided to do a vintage Christmas card.  I pulled out an Inkadinkadoo wood block stamp and loaded it up with Distress Ink vintage photo ink.  I gave the ink a bit of a spritz and stamped it onto some watercolor paper.  I stamped a Hero Arts sentiment in a darker brown Distress Ink (I can’t remember which one, sorry).  Then because I wanted some sparkle, I added some white Wink of Stella on the places where snow should be.  I did purposely blend out some of the distress ink to soften the
stamps lines.  I trimmed up the paper, and added it to a kraft card base.  I think I actually hit the nail on the head with this one.

The team over at Freshly Made Sketches have the best CAS sketch this week.  I saw this sketch and immediately knew exactly what to do with this sketch.  I know, I know, this is not a statement I normally make, but this sketch was just perfect for what I need in my stack of the cards for the holidays.

I knew I wanted to play on Christmas red, and a very non traditional xmas color, pink.  So I pulled two very graphic printed papers in these colors, and loaded them up onto an A2 frame.  I pulled out a circle die set from Little B, and die cut four circles in three different sizes.  I then stamped out some Paper Smooches snowmen onto the circles.  I colored them in in two different copic marker coloring combinations.  I did all the hats and scarves in red and highlighted the snowmen in shades of pale pink.  I stamped out the greeting from the same stamp pack and added the circles with a bit of dimensional tape.  This came out better than I hoped it would and I think it is such fun.

This week over at Muse Card Club there is the most fascinating muse card.  It is a block of color in shades of yellow, orange and red with what I thought was a turkey feather over it in a die cut out.  Come to find out after closer attension, it is a leaf, but I saw turkey feather, and I went with it.

I love the look of stamps without the color being filled in, so I decided to not die cut an image, and instead leave one all sketchy.  I grabbed some Distress inks and a bit of watercolor paper and smooched ink over the paper, adding a few splatters to help add more color.  I used the shades squeezed lemonade, mustard seed, carved pumpkin, ripe persimmon, and candied apple.  I then pulled out a My Favorite Things thanksgiving stamp and stamped it out with some black archival ink.  I then grabbed a brown distress ink (again can’t remember which) and added it to the turkey.  It didn’t end up being dark enough, so I grabbed a brown PH Martins Hydrus and added it to the turkey, her shoes and bit to her hair.  I trimmed up the watercolor paper, and added some orange printed paper under everything.  The color didn’t turn out right, but the idea was.  I am going to try this again with a different stamp, and hopefully get better results.

Finally, this week the gals over at The Paper Players have a fun challenge on their blog.  This week they are looking for a Clean-and-simple christmas card.  And frankly, I was happy to oblige.  

I pulled out a Hero Arts block stamp, and loaded it up with stormy sky Distress Ink.  I stamped it out onto some white card stock and trimmed up the card stock around the image.  I added the card to a black A2 card frame, keeping it flush to the card.  I added some white glitter wink of stella and a Hero Arts sentiment in white pigment ink.  I added two gemstones and a couple of good flicks of blue Perfect Pearls spray to added a bit more shine and glitter.  This didn’t quite hit the mark for me either, but it was along the right ball park.

That’s it for tonight.  Hope you all are finding yourself on the low end of stress, despite the up coming holidays.  And if you’re not, find some time to color.  Apparently it is good for the soul.