Peace . Joy . Love

Hello, Crafters.

Yesterday was one of
those delightful days when I was in overdrive – 100% focussed on the jobs
in hand!

I’d written all the jobs I needed to do in my planner, and
then worked out all the other jobs I need to do for the rest of the week.

I succeeded with my goal yesterday –
let’s see if I can do the same today!

My tasks for today are to make my
Thank You gifts for my September online customers, as well as making two
for my October customers. 

If you saw my blog on Sunday, you’ll have
seen I uploaded a video onto YouTube showing the gift I’ll be sending to all my October
customers.

Although it’s an easy project, it’s quite involved, and I’ve decided that I’m going to make two a day, so at the end of
the month I’m not in a panic with lots of gifts to make!

I
enjoy making some cards more than I do others, and I loved making
today’s card. 

It helps that I love this little drummer boy!
 
When I first
started this card, my idea was to use the mistletoe branches to create a
wreath, but it worked out too large, and another idea quickly formed in
my mind!

Using
Basic Black Archival, and a top layer of Whisper White Cardstock (CS)  I
stamped two mistletoe branches with the ends of the branches about
0.75″ away from each other. 

I stamped a third branch on a separate piece
of Whisper White CS and die cut it using the co-ordinating Musical
Instruments Framelits. 

To colour the images I used my Marker Pens: Pear
Pizzazz for the leaves, Soft Suede for the woody parts of the branches,
and Clear Wink of Stella Glitter Pen for the berries. 

I played around
with positioning for a while before adhering the third image in place using
Dimensionals.

Earlier
I’d be practising with the Peace Joy Love stamp, and had decided I
wanted to colour it using the Old Olive and Early Espresso Marker Pens.

I
also thought I wanted it to go in the bottom right hand corner, but I
needed an image on the left hand side to balance everything! 

The drummer boy was an easy decision, and I started playing with
different ways of stamping him. 

This included using Early Espresso, but
I decided it was far too dark and would be too prominent.

Then I tried Pear Pizzazz but this went too far in the other direction and was far too light!

I was successful when I inked the stamp in Versamark, then in
Old Olive Ink, and stamped it on a scrap of Whisper White CS. 

I quickly
dipped it into my box of Clear Embossing Powder, tapped off the excess,
and then heat set it. 

I die cut the image and added to the top layer
using Dimensionals.

I
adhered this top layer onto a layer of Pear Pizzazz CS, and then onto a
Whisper White CS card base. 

Inside the card I adhered a layer of
Whisper White CS onto a layer of Pear Pizzazz CS. 

Using Basic Black
Archival Ink I stamped a Mistletoe branch in the bottom right hand
corner, and coloured it the same way as the three images on the front of
the card.

That’s about it for today. Until tomorrow, happy crafting.

JanB.