Holidays are coming!!

Hi Everyone, well Christmas week is finally here.. And am I prepared?? Erm... Nearly! Sunday Night was Pinnacle Crafts Christmas Party.. After a treacherous walk in the Ice and Snow and a couple falls on the way we made it to the restaurant for 8 O'clock and partied the night away.. A great meal, great company and a great time was had by all with the Pinnacles HARD CORE finally calling it a night at around 5am!! Work hard, play hard I say!!I can't believe after making hundreds and hundreds of cards this year for the shop, lessons, blog, magazines etc I still have not made some for my nearest and dearest friends and family.. So before the meal on Sunday I managed to get my closest friends cards finished and out of the way.. I'm not sure if I work better with a deadline, but at this late stage you have to just go with what time you have!I cut out a circle frame from Plantin SchoolBook using the Roly Poly function this was cut at 4 1/2". I also cut from Blue Mirror card a selection of 1 3/4" leaves using the Speaking of Fall cartridge. For all of my cards I cut out around 500 leaves! Well I say "I"! The machine did it in no time at all!!Once cut, I applied each leaf to the cut out circle using Pinflair glue. Initially I applied the glue to each leaf, but this was taking far too long! so I just ran the glue around a section of the circle and applied the leaves. This took a fraction of the time.Once I had done 1 layer I went round with a second layer of leaves to make the wreath look a bit fuller.Once the project was dry I attached it to some White card stock using foam pads. A simple bow and Peel Off sentiment finished the projects off.Although my theme was Blue, one of my friends just loves purple, so I did a special one just for her...They really do look quite effective don't you think?One of the ideas I had that didn't/Hasn't quite made it onto a card yet is following the same theme, So for those who do not have a Cricut machine you can still achieve a similar result.I took a sheet of glossy White card stock and randomly applied some Alcohol Inks in some festive colours.. Water Melon, Pesto, Oregano, Meadow and my favourite "Lettuce"!!I punched out several leaf shapes using my leaf punchand applied them in the same way as before..Finishing off with a little bit of glitter in the centre.
As I said this has not made it onto a card as yet, but just playing around thought it would make an ideal stand for our candles on our Christmas table..My last card is for an Italian friend of mine. I used my Winter Woodland cartridge to cut out the the letters to spell Buon Natale (which I believe is Italian for Merry Christmas!).I used Red and Green Mirror card and White glossy card to form the Italian flag.I also cut out the letters in Black Mirror card using the shadow function which when put together with the coloured letters gave the them a more 3 dimensional look..A few punched snowflakes and job done..
Now all I have to do is get my immediate families cards done and I'm already for Christmas.. Hope you are too??

Thanks for checking us out..
See you soon
Pinnacles..

Half Term Havoc!!!

Hi Blogland, how you doing? For those with kiddiwinks I hope you are surviving half term this week? I know I know, for some it's next week and for some it was last week.. It doesn't seem only 6 weeks since they went back to school after the Summer break does it? But with the arrival of half term it means firstly Halloween is just around the corner, I.E 3 days away!! and then Christmas begins it's rapid approach..
So I'll be out to Lakeside and Bluewater shopping malls very soon to do battle with everyone else, although I think I need to sharpen my elbows first....

Today's card encompasses, ooohh big word for me, 4 of my favorite crafting items.. Mirror Card, Stamping, Cuttlebug/Sizzix Embossing and of course my Cricut.

Firstly, I cut out 24 2.5" leaves from Silver Mirror card using my "Speaking of Fall" cartridge. Me and leaves at the moment are like best buddies and this cartridge has soooo many of them on it that it was ideal for this project.

Once they were cut out I positioned them inside the Summer Fun Sizzex Embossing Folder and passed them through my Cuttlebug. Although the leaves I had cut from the Cricut had the veins already cut into them, they were a little bit flat, so embossing them gave them a little more texture and dimension.

Once they had been embossed I added some high tack double sided tape to each stem and layered them one on top of each other slightly over lapping... I found I had a few left over so decided to do half a flower, I may use it I may not I thought!! In the end I did.!!

I then took my newest EK Success Punch (Morocco Lace EKPL8032) although to me it looks more like Art Deco than Moroccan Lace, but then again I have never been to Morocco and seen their lace so who am I to judge??!! Although I did have an incident with a rather jeleous camel in Lanzarote once so does that count? No! I didn't think so!

I punched out a border on some light Green Mirror card.

I tend to start in the middle of the card stock when doing a border and line up each side as I go..
I also cut out a 4" circle using Plantin Schoolbook Cricut Cartridge. I used the Centre Point function to then cut out an inner circle at 3".

Why I positioned these elements on the card where I did I will never know, I just fancied ringing the changes a bit..

Usually for me if it's not a right angle it's a wrong angle, however I'm pleased with how it worked out. Once the border and circles were stuck down I attached the full and half flowers to the card with Pinflair Glue..

Now, the centres of the flowers needed something. I came across these frosted brads which off set the shiny mirror card perfectly.

I removed the shanks of the brads with pliers and attached them to the centre of the flowers again with Pinflair glue.
Stamping is what I love best, no! Cricut, no! Stamping, no!.. oh you get the gist!! Any hoo, I wanted to show you how I got the greeting and border stamped onto the card.
It's probably not that clear on the final card so here it is on White card stock.

I used Cactus Green StazOn and the Poinsettia border from Inkadinkadoo Winter Borders (LM809529) and stamped out the image.

I then used my sentiment stamp which was inked up using Forest Green StazOn and stamped directly over the border image..

I hope you like the result and why not trying embossing an image which has already been cut out (like the leaves) it makes using your Cuttlebug or Big Shot and Embossing Folders more fun than just doing backgrounds for your projects...

Happy Halloween to you all and thanks for checking us out.
See you soon..
Pinnacles..