It’s Christmas Time!

Once a month I get together with my upline and her team of demonstrators. At these meetings we discuss some business but it’s mostly a chance to get together and discuss craft. We make some sample projects, “show and tell” other projects we’ve each done and share swaps.

Swaps are cards or other projects which we make and give out to everyone else at the meeting. Everyone does this and the result is that each month I get three or four great cards from my fellow demonstrators. It’s always exciting getting swaps as everyone has different design styles and use different colours and stamps than what I have in my stash. They often showcase different techniques and are a great source of inspiration for what I could make next.

Of course this means that I need to make something to swap! After my card classes I usually make a few extra of one of the projects to use them as a swap, but one month recently I needed to come up with something else (probably because my class used designs and projects my team had already seen). As Christmas is coming soon, I decided on a Christmas card and had a go at a technique I’ve not used before.

I was really pleased with the result. The “tree” is made by selectively embossing the card topper using the Big Shot and a mask. I made the triangle shaped mask out of two layers of thick cardboard (the type you get when you buy specialty DSP packs, which keep them from bending in the post). When the sandwich is run through the Big Shot, only the area under the mask is embossed, magic! (Ok, there was a bit of trial and error involved, especially as the first cardboard mask I made used normal corrugated cardboard, which the Big Shot just flattened!).

This card uses Cherry Cobbler cardstock, seam binding ribbon and ink along with Whisper White cardstock for the topper. The embossing folder is Decorative Dots and the star is done using the Decroating Stars Mask.