on the twelfth day of christmas...

...I'm over in The Classroom at Ellen Hutson with my 12 Tag project. It's one of my favorite holiday traditions! Come on by!

Hugs!
Carly

die cut christmas card with right at home

I fell head over heels for the Right At Home Holidays Are On The Way die set as soon as I saw it. I had no idea what I was going to make but I had to have it. Does that ever happen to you? 

So with no idea what I was making, I started by just cutting the whole set from solar white cardstock. I was able to play with all the plain white pieces and see what they wanted to be, haha! Actually I really loved having a blank canvas and the pieces were super fun to color with my Copics. What do you think?

Thanks for stopping by! Hugs!
Carly

supplies:
Right At Home Dies, Holidays Are On The Way
Essentials by Ellen Stamps, Modern Christmas
VersaFine Onyx Black
Distress Ink Evergreen Bough
Copics R22, YG41, BG13, BG32, BG34, BG05, T2, T4 & 100
Nuvo Drops Gloss White & Ebony Black
ScorPal

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25 days of christmas tags!

I'm so excited to be joining in Tracey McNeely's annual 25 Days of Christmas Tags! And I'm excited to share some shaker tags I made with my Fuse Tool and the Essentials by Ellen Concertina Tags die.

To start I die cut the tags from plastic. It can be hard to cut plastic using wafer thin dies but I found that the Avery Elle storage pockets work when left whole (so there are two layers of plastic). Using a metal adaptor plate helps too.

If any plastic is uncut by the die, just use scissors and use them to cut the tags apart too.

I used a pre-heated Fuse Tool to seal the bottom and both sides before filling with sequins from the top and sealing too.

Once my shaker tags were made, I used shapes die cut from Craft-A-Board to decorate. I love Craft-A-Board for the dimension it adds to projects and also because it is a great surface for Nuvo Mousse. I used Aquamarine and Pink Flambe mousse.

I didn't have the right shade of aqua cardstock so I used my Copic BG32 to color white cardstock. Then I used it to make little "to" strips and loops to attach twine.

Thanks so much for stopping by and come back soon!
Carly

supplies:
Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps, Modern Christmas
Essentials by Ellen Dies, Modern Christmas
Essentials by Ellen Dies, Concertina Tags
Copic Marker BG32
Nuvo Mousse Aquamarine & Pink Flambe
Avery Elle Storage Pockets
Fuse Tool
Pretty Pink Posh Sequins Sparkling Clear Snowflakes, Heart Confetti, Sparkling Clear Confetti & Holiday Snowflake Mix

pretty pink posh's brilliant sparkle dot stamp!

Have you seen the new Sparkle Dot Patterns 1 stamp set by Pretty Pink Posh? It is so awesome and full of so many possibilities! I've only just started playing with it but I wanted to share...

The heart & star patterns are perfect to pair with the PPP Reindeer Friends set and the patterns are fabulous to use with Nuvo Drops.

I used the star dot pattern with Nuvo Silver Moondust glitter drops and then I create a shaker panel over the top, filling it with PPP Sparkling Clear Confetti Mix and Flat Silver Stars.

I stamped the heart pattern over an red inked background and filled it with Nuvo Ruby Slippers glitter drops. Then I added a panel with a heart window on top. The Hero Arts Infinity Nesting Heart dies match up to the heart dot pattern pretty well.

And I have a little reminder too...there is an embellishment sale happening at Ellen Hutson starting today, which means you can get 20% off sequins & Nuvo Drops!!! Head over to EH and use the code saveonbling17. You're welcome or I'm sorry for enabling, LOL!

Thanks for stopping by! Hugs!
Carly

supplies:
Pretty Pink Posh Stamps, Sparkle Dot Patterns 1
Pretty Pink Posh Stamps, Reindeer Friends
Pretty Pink Posh Dies, Reindeer Friends
Hero Arts Dies, Infinity Nesting Hearts
Nuvo Drops Silver Moondrops & Ruby Slippers
Copics E13, E33, E37 & R22

merry & very bright with new honey bee!

Do you have a favorite holiday "theme"? Is that a weird question? It might be but I do! *laugh*

I have a fondness for the word "merry" and I especially love "merry & bright", so you can imagine that I'm a little head over heels for the new Honey Bee Merry & Bright die set.

The set comes with beautiful skinny script words and also the shadows. The two combined make a great shaker card...

For this card I die cut the shadow words from an A2 panel. Behind the panel I adhered acetate and foam mounted it to a card to create a shaker. And on top of the acetate, I adhered the beautiful skinny "merry" and "bright" words. Since the die cuts are so delicate, I highly recommend applying a double-sided sticker-paper-like adhesive to the cardstock before die cutting, like Stick It.

I also used the skinny words on top of a glittery stripe background that I made. I used a vellum circle to ground them and give them a little more "weight". 

And the stripes were super easy to make...I applied painter's tape to an A2 panel of cardstock. Then I used an ink blending tool to create "Barbie stripes" in pink & purple pigment ink. I'm really loving Tutti Fruitti, Orchid and Sweet Lilac.

With the painter's tape still in place, I applied Nuvo Moonstone Glimmer Paste with a palette knife.

The paste dries quickly so remove the tape right away.

Thanks for stopping by!
Carly

a mod christmas card + nuvo mousse

Hi and Happy Sunday! I just wanted to pop in share a quick Christmas card...

I love playing with Nuvo Mousse and I love the mod background I created with some of the stamps from the Essentials by Ellen Fat Pants & Modern Christmas stamps, both by the amazing Julie Ebersole.

Some quick Nuvo Mousse tips from me...

• create background paper/DIY shimmer paper like my card. The Nuvo Aquamarine Mousse matches the Hero Arts Tide Pool ink beautifully. And I love these for applying mousse to large areas.
• Mother of Pearl Mousse is super easy to tint with ink pads & reinkers. To create my green holly, I swiped Hero Arts Lime Green ink onto my craft sheet, added a little scoop of mousse and swirled until blended.
• Craft-A-Board is the perfect surface for mousse. I used it for my holly & berries.

And a little help from your friendly crafty enabler (me), the Fat Pants & Modern Christmas sets are on sale right now as a sweet bundle. 

Hope you have a wonderful, crafty day! Hugs!
Carly

supplies:
Essentials by Ellen Stamps, Fat Pants
Essentials by Ellen Stamps, Modern Christmas
Essentials by Ellen Dies, Modern Christmas
Hero Arts Pale Tomato, Lime Green & Tide Pool
Nuvo Mousse Aquamarine & Mother of Pearl
Craft-A-Board

concertina cards with new pinkfresh!

Hello Lovelies! Welcome to the Pinkfresh Studio September Stamp hop! I won't bore you with "small talk" haha, but let me just say thank you to Pinkfresh for inviting me to join in the fun today! I'm so flattered and I'm having such a good time! Thank you Pinkfresh! Ok, let's talk stamps!!!

The new release is awesome but I found myself most enchanted with the Festive Llama stamps & dies. He's just so cute, I wanna snuggle him!

And he's perfect for the concertina/accordion cards!

The easiest concertina card to make is a 3-panel accordion made from a 5-1/2 x 12 piece of cardstock, scored at 4 & 8 inches.

I decorated the front with watercolor over embossed gifts and a "belly band" to hold it closed.

When the belly band is removed, the card opens to reveal a stamped stack of gifts and a circular window.

The final panel has watercolored llama on a wobble. He's like a dancing llama, hahaha!

I created a second card inspired by the stacks of presents. It's a 4 x 12 panel, scored at 4 and 8 inches.

The stamps are created to be easy to stack without needing to mask. I purposely spaced mine apart and at angles for a little extra whimsy. I also added lots of Nuvo Drops...glitter on the gifts and white for the pom-poms.

And I love shaped cards so I used partial die cutting to create an accordion line of llamas and hearts.

I feel like I've barely gotten started with these adorable stamps, I certainly have at least 2 more llama cards I *need* to make! So follow me on Instagram to see more and don't forget about the hop prizes! One random and very lucky commenter will win the whole release so make sure to leave a comment at each blog hop stop to enter! And enter before 11:59pm CST on Monday October 2nd 2017.

I'm the last stop on the hop but here's the whole list in case you missed anything...

Pinkfresh Studio Blog
Amy Tsuruta
Rebecca Luminarias
Elena Roussakis
Isha Gupta
Laura Contoni-Bassen
May Sukyong Park
Julia Stainton
Amy Kolling
Carly Tee Minner

Happy Monday!
Carly

no peeking shaker card

I adore the sassy "It's Coal" from the new No Peeking set! I like sass and I had these adorable little charcoal sequins from Pretty Pink Posh just begging to be made into a shaker card!

I started with the rectangle from the Essentials by Ellen Mini Windows die set to create a flap on an A2 panel of smooth bristol cardstock.

I masked around the window flap and inked it with Distress Ink Spun Sugar & Worn Lipstick.

Then I added polka dots because they are my favorite "color", haha!

I inked the front of my card with the same pinks and the back of the window flap so everything would be PINK!

Next I added the sentiments, "No Peeking" under the window flap and "It's Coal" on the card front where the window will open.

Acetate and foam tape behind the window flap created the shaker and a little rectangle & bow on the front turned the flap into a gift. And I love it!

If you haven't picked up the No Peeking set for yourself, I suggest you go right now! And fair warning, I'm about to be a big time enabler...

This weekend is the perfect time to treat yourself because there is a 20% stamp sale at EH...

Hugs!

Carly