Christmas card ideas from my stack of samples

Here are a bunch of Christmas card samples, to get you thinking about how you can take advantage of the Shiloh Stamps Early Christmas Special. I want to help you make homemade Christmas cards early this year, so I've thought about what could be most helpful. If you order a stamp set, cardstock, adhesive, envelopes, and embellishments (everything you need to make your Christmas cards), then I will mount your stamps, cut your cardstock into cards, and make you a page of custom return address labels. The last day to place an order is August 29th. E-mail me at alison@shilohstamps.com for more information.

If you would like to try out some new stamp sets (including some from the new Holiday Mini) and work together to design your Christmas cards, sign up to attend my Christmas in August Stamp Camp. I have one spot open for Friday evening and a few spots open for Saturday afternoon. Let me know ASAP if you would like to participate.

This was our Christmas card last year. It opens in the middle and uses the tree from the Loads of Love stamp set. It also uses the stipple brush for some shading. I made this card at an in-home workshop the previous year, and loved it. My generous stamping friends loaned some of the supplies I needed for this card. I liked Loads of Love so much, I wound up ordering it for myself!

This was Claire's Christmas card last year. It uses the City of David stamp set. I love how she put the Luke 2:11 scripture on the back of the card. She used markers to color in the star and palm trees on the front.

I made this card at an in-home workshop I attended last year. I love this color combination - mellow moss, always artichoke, and whisper white. It uses The Snowflake Spot stamp set. Hemp twine is one of lowest-priced embellishments, so this is a more cost-effective card.

I made this card at a Stamp Camp I attended at Claire's house years ago. This may have been one of the first stamping events I tried. This card uses a cool technique with glossy cardstock and reinkers. I would be glad to show you this technique.

My husband loves the blue and chrome color combination, so this may be his favorite card I've ever made. These silver snowflakes are raised up using a technique called embossing. It's lots of fun, and it looks fabulous!

This card uses a beautiful stamp set that is now retired. It also uses the crimper, my new favorite tool. I love how artistic this card looks with the splotchy paint look in the background. It's a stamp set called Itty Bitty Backgrounds.

This card was made by another stamper - Yolanda Croucher. When I signed up to be a demonstrator, Claire let me pick some cards out of her stash of samples. This is one of the cards I chose. I'm guessing she got this card through a swap.

This may be the first Stampin' Up card I ever made. I attended a Stamp Camp at Claire's house, and she had a drawing to give away her hostess benefits that night. I won! I got to order all sorts of goodies for free, and I was hooked!

Waterfall cards from an in-home workshop

When I do an in-home workshop, I try to demonstrate projects that the hostess is interested in trying out. For a recent in-home workshop, the hostess requested the waterfall card. It's what's called a "movement card". When you pull the tag on the right, it waterfalls open revealing a message inside. I demonstrated the waterfall card at a workshop last week. The hostess really liked the sage shadow/chocolate chip color combination that she saw on a sample at my Open House, so I chose a waterfall card design that incorporated those colors. I love the Baroque Motifs set looks with this color

combination. I think this would be a very elegant card for a wedding, since it says "cherish" inside. You could certainly change the sentiment inside to make it a thank-you or birthday card, too.

Here are a couple other examples of waterfall cards. I learned how to make waterfall cards when I participated in Stampin' Down the Shore with Claire and Kristin. (You can see pictures of the weekend if you click those links.) We spent the weekend at the Jersey Shore making all sorts of crafty projects.

Adding a layer of neutral cardstock on each layer of the waterfall can make for a more polished design, but it's a bit more complicated. Both these cards use hostess sets that I got for free when I signed up to be an SU demonstrator.

If you would like a template for making the waterfall card, e-mail me at alison@shilohstamps.com. PLEASE INCLUDE "WATERFALL CARD" IN THE SUBJECT LINE, SO I KNOW THAT IT ISN'T SPAM. I would be glad to mail you a sample if you will send me your address. There's also a tutorial about making waterfall cards on Splitcoast Stampers. They have an amazing gallery of waterfall cards, too. There is also a sample of a waterfall card on Claire's blog here.

Just a little something + fun with punches!

Here's another card we made at my recent Open House. I like how the polka-dots on the card coordinate with the ladybug polka-dots. It's super-easy to make, and involves very little stamping and coloring. You just punch out circles of cardstock to make the polka dots (using the 3/4" circle punch), then stamp the greeting, cut it in a perfect square with the square punch, it in using the blender pens, and then attach some gingham ribbon! I also like to stamp something special on the back as a "Hallmark" signature.

Some of the supplies:

• Figures of Speech stamp set
  
• 3/4 inch circle punch
• square punch
  
• blender pens
  
• gingham ribbon
• I Did It stamp set

Stampin' Tip: Did you know that you can align images in punches pefectly by just turning the punch over? For example, instead of punching out the square in this card first and then trying to line up the stamp perfectly in the center, you can stamp the image first and then punch it out.

Thank you very much + an experiment with brads

This is one of the cards that we made at my Open House last weekend. I love its simple design and crisp palette. I made a bunch of these cards, and I just changed the sentiment at the bottom to "Birthday Hugs and Wishes" on a few.


This card was inspired by a few stampin' things I've learned on the web. First, I was hoping to use up my Vintage Violet cardstock, since it's no longer available. I discovered the Color Combinations Tool, a website that helps you coordinate Stampin' Up colors. I selected Vintage Violet, and then clicked "search". It gave me all sorts of color combinations that use vintage violet. I don't think I would've put these colors together on my own. There's a link to the Color Combinations tool in the Stampin' Links list on the sidebar of my blog.


Also, I have new favorite tool, thanks to this card. I'm really enjoying the paper piercing tool and the paper piercing template. Using the guide, I can punch evenly spaced holes in my cardstock. It makes a really cool effect, and I like how it looks with this stamp set that already has dots around the edges. I can punch holes wherever I like, which means that I can punch holes to put brads in the center of these flowers.


I got this stamp set for free when I signed up to be Stampin' Up Demonstrator. It's called "In the Spotlight" and it's a hostess set from the new Fall-Winter Collection 2007 which debuted July 1st. You can get it for free when you host a Stampin' Up workshop in your home. I got it in May, though, so I got a head start on making projects with it. (My stamping friends were jealous!) I'll be posting some other samples soon.



So I learned a lesson with brads while working on this card. I haven't worked with brads very much before. I was trying to use up my stash of non-Stampin' Up brads, while I was waiting for my SU brads to arrive. (It doesn't make sense to demonstrate products that I don't sell.) I discovered that these pewter mini circle brads (pictured on the left) are really hard to open. You know how the legs on brads are usually two different lengths, so you can open them up? Not so with these brads... so you have to try and pry them open with your fingernail, and they don't come open easily, let me tell you. I chipped my nail and risked sending a brad under the fingernail trying to get these open. When the Stampin' Up brads finally arrived, I discovered that not only do the brad-legs have different lengths, but that they're already slightly open, thus saving the fingernails. Only SU brads from now-on for me!

By the way, the other thing I learned online before making this card is that the dotted line in this stamp set can actually be used as a flower stem! It wasn't until looking through the In the Spotlight gallery on Splitcoaststampers.com that I connected the dots, so to speak.

Loads of Love - for Father's Day

This was the other make-and-take from Amy's workshop. It uses a signature Katy slant.
I sent this card to my dad, my father-in-law, and my grandfather for Dad's Day. My dad loves cars, so I think he'll like this card. Trucks and blue means its instantly masculine, even though it doesn't say Father's Day.

Supplies:

• Loads of Love stamp set
• Itty Bitty backgrounds stamp set
• brocade blue cardstock and classic ink
• chocolate chip cardstock and classic ink
• watercolor pencils
• blender pen
• crimper - such fun!

Thanks

This is one of the Make and Take's I did for my first workshop (at Amy's). It has an artistic, forgiving style so you don't have to be perfectly precise.

The color scheme just shouts, "Spring!" to me.




Supplies:

• Heartfelt Thanks stamp set
• barely banana cardstock
• ruby red cardstock
• whisper white cardstock
• ruby red classic stamp pad
• mellow moss classic stamp pad
• so saffron classic stamp pad
• mellow moss 1/4" grosgrain ribbon
• Crystal Effects
  

This card uses a technique called Two-Step Stampin'. You have to use a set that has an outline stamp and a base stamp, like Heartfelt Thanks. Stamp the base image in a lighter color (or you can stamp on scrap paper once to get a lighter color). Then stamp the outline image in a darker color. In this card, I used Ruby Red for both the base stamp and the outline stamp. This is an easier effect for frugal stampers like me!

Crystal Effects is fun to work with. It's kind of like puffy paint in that it adds a shiny texture to everything. I used Crystal Effects on the center of each of these flowers.

Celebrate!

Celebrate!

(from Tiffany's party)

Supplies:

• chocolate chip cardstock
• chocolate chip stamp pad
• orchid opulence cardstock
• orchid opulence classic stamp pad
• whisper white cardstock
• chocolate 1/4 inch grosgrain ribbon

Super-Demonstrator Claire demonstrated this card a while back at a party. I love the simple design!