Winter Wishes Pals Blog Hop

Welcome to the last Pals Blog Hop of 2014. This month we want to help you start your holiday wish list by sharing projects featuring our favorite Stampin’ Up! papers, stamps, tools and accessories. Get your wish list ready as you move along through the blog hop.

You may just be starting the blog hop or may have come from Patti MacLeith www.papercraftsbypatti.com on the Pals Hop. If you get off track at any time, the full lineup below will help you move along from blog to blog so you see all of the project.

When I first saw the 2014 Holiday Catalog, I pretty much wanted the whole catalog!  I found myself marking my catalog, not by products that I wanted, but by pages!  Seriously, I wanted everything on page 5 and page 43, and so on!  (And I did actually buy almost everything in that catalog too, by the way!)  But I knew that Ornamental Pine was the set that I would use to make most of the Christmas cards that I would mail out.

Here is my most favorite card I’ve made yet using the Ornamental Pine Stamp Set

I started with a card base of Soft Sky and stamped the pine needle image in Lost Lagoon.  I added a Lost Lagoon banner that was cropped using the Project Life framelits to balance out the Lost Lagoon color on the card.

Then I thought I wanted to step up the card a notch; so I recreated the card but this time added a  Lost Lagoon panel.  Here is my stepped up card:

What do you think?  The little panel really adds a lot, doesn’t it?   A simple one-layer card is always nice but I really think adding a layer of a contrasting color just adds a whole dimension and really makes it classy.

Here they are side by side so you can really see the difference:

Nothing wrong with the 1-layer card, but the added layer just makes the card look more finished and polished, at least that’s what I think, and I’m sure you’ll agree because I know that great minds think alike 🙂

But the jewels on this card are the pinecones.   I heat embossed the pinecones in Pewter embossing powder onto Whisper White card stock.  My heat embossing tool is one of my favorite tools.   I used my paper snips (another tool I couldn’t live without!  – proof that all scissors are NOT created equal) to fussy cut the pinecones.  The pewter pinecones and the ‘snow’ resting gently on some of the pine needles add just enough sparkle without going into glitter overload.  I know you really want to see the sparkle up close so here it is:

Yes, the snow capped pinecones look so real you don’t believe that I stamped them.  You think I went outside, picked some pinecones from my pine trees, don’t you?  Nope, they are stamped, heat embossed, fussy cut & popped up on a stampin’ dimensional.

See the snow glistening on the pine needles?  I used my white chalk marker to draw snow on some of the pine needles and then added a little bit of Dazzling Details to select snow.

How did I get such a crisp white sentiment on the Lost Lagoon cardstock?  Heat embossing.  Great for putting light colors on darker colored cardstock.

Because I chose to make a square card, and a fairly large square at 5″ x 5″, my Envelope Punch Board is another favorite tool of mine.  It makes simple work of making custom sized envelopes so my cards are no longer limited to a standard size envelope, leaving me free to create whatever works best for me and the stamp set I’m working with.  How liberating is that?

To recap: Ornamental Pine is my favorite stamp set from the Holiday Catalog and the heat embossing tool, the paper snips and Envelope Punch Board are my favorite, must-have, can’t live without tools.  If you don’t already have them, be sure to put them on your wish list.  Then let your friends & family know that you have a wish list, and let them know that your wish list can be fulfilled right here!

BTW, I’ve seen the 2015 Occasions Catalog AND the Sale-A-Bration catalog and all I can say is you better have lots of paper;  you’re wish list is going to be very long!  The good news is that the more you buy from the Occasions catalog, the more you’ll get in FREE items from the Sale-A-Bration catalog.   If you are a regular customer of mine, than your catalog is on its way to you.  If you are not, but you’d like to be, just contact me. I’d be happy to be your demonstrator if you don’t already have a relationship with another demonstrator.

So now, please tell me which card you like best, and if you enjoy heat embossing as much as I do, or if you’ve never heat embossed at all.  Then hop along to see the rest of the projects from our amazing talented Pals.    The next stop is Maggie Mata at www.MaggieMadeCards.com on the Pals Blog Hop!

Thanks for visiting and I hope to see you in 2015.

1. Michelle Gleeson at StampinMojo
2. Shannon Hokanson at Paper Works by Shannon
3. Dawn Tidd at Tiddbits from Dawn
4. Sherrie Gross at Stampin Sunshine
5. Beth McCullough at Stamping Mom
6. Kalyn Shubnell at The Stamping Chronicles
7. September Gray at www.septembergray.com
8. Debbie Mageed at Secret Stamper
9. Patti MacLeith at Papercrafts by Patti
10. Nancy Gleason at MyStampinSpace – – – YOU ARE HERE – – –
11. Maggie Mata at Maggie Made Cards
12. Debbie Crowley at expressivelydeb…
13. Wendy Klein at Doggone Delightful Stampin’
14. Amy Whelan at Amy’s Inklings
15. Brian King at Stamp with Brian
16. Amy Williams at Stamps and Spice
17. Mary Fish at Stampin’ Pretty
18. Pamela Sadler at Stampin Pink Rose
19. Jackie Diediker at Stampin’ Jackie
20. Candy Ford at Stamp Candy
21. Susan Lankford at Stamp and Create With Susan
22. Peggy Noe at Pretty Paper Cards
23. Nicole Watt at Pixel Maven’s Retreat
24. Amy Hoptay at Inking of You!
25. Lynn Kolcun at Stamping with Avery’s Owlery
26. Beth Beard at My little craft blog
27. Sue Becker at RnR Stamping
28. Lisa Ann Bernard at Queen B Creations
29. Kerry Willard Bray at Peonies and Paper Chains
30. Rae Harper-Burnet at WildWestPaperArts.com
31. Deb Cozzone at Deb Cozzone’s Stamping Zone
32. Debra Simonis at Deb’s Stampin’ Grounds
33. Susan Itell at Simple Stampin
34. Jane Knudsen at see jane stamp
35. Katy McGloin at Just Fun Stamping
36. Martie Pollard at The Crafty Bandit
37. Natalie Bradley at Natalie Bradley Events
38. Becky Volpp at InkBlossomWithBecky