Christmas Cardmaking Weekend

I confess that I can spend a lot of time making Christmas cards.  My husband is completely baffled by this because he doesn't understand why anyone wants to send cards much less spend hours making them.  He does always make sweet comments about the cards I make and the handmade I cards I receive but he still doesn't really get it.

I've always enjoyed sending holiday cards.  I used to buy at Hallmark right after Christmas for the next year getting the prettiest ones I could afford.  Over Thanksgiving weekend, I'd handwrite all my addresses and notes for a few friends we rarely see during the year.  Just a signed greeting for everyone else.  It was part of my holiday tradition.

One year I decided to make my own and used some clipart on the front. Coincidentally the next year just before Christmas I was invited to a Stampin' Up! event. My first SU! set was Lovely as a Tree and I made my cards that year.  Every year since then I've used new stamps on my cards.

Last year by mid September, I had a bunch of Christmas cards done or in process. I'd subscribed to Raisin Boat's rental stamp program and enjoyed all kinds of fun new images.  I spent a lot of time on my holiday cards as usual.  Last year it was all about coloring as most of Raisin Boat's images are designed to color.  It was fun, I loved the cards.

This year is a little different.  I still want to make my cards and ones for my mother to send, but I don't have as much time to commit. I have many scrapbook pages I want to make and I'm doing a few mixed media projects. I'd like to complete my next e-book before the end of the year plus getting my 2104 sketchbook ready.  So, I just don't have the time to spend an hour per card or whatever it turned out to be.  So I committed to one weekend to get as many cards done as possible.

I stretched this beyond the weekend starting late Thursday and working some even yesterday.  At present I have done or in process of assembling 49 cards!  Just about a dozen to go.  I've never made that many cards in just a few days.

Another thing different about this year is that I committed to making cards from my stash.  So far I've only bought one small roll of ribbon, two Silhouette images and some adhesive.  I think I can make the remaining ones without expenditures either.  With doing more scrapping, I'm doing less cardmaking. Operation Write Home doesn't need as many cards so I have a lot of 8 1/2 x 11 cardstock - a LOT - that needs to be worked down.

I did not video any of the card process. You should be glad I didn't for the Poinsettia card.  I only made 7 of these and they will go to 7 very special people :-)  I almost slipped into my old ways of spending hours and hours on just a few cards.  Here's the short version:  The Poinsettia is die cut from a Silhouette image and then coated with some acrylic glaze.  The background is book paper stamped with Archival Ink and treated with paints to get the effect.  The ribbon is from Hobby Lobby and another Silhouette image holds the stamped Merry Christmas.

I moved things along with the ornament card at the top of the post which uses a Silhouette image for the branch and just a little coloring and embossing.  I've used this image before but I doubt anyone will remember.

Later in the week, I'll share a couple of other designs.

Last Monday, I tagged Penny at Penny Scraps for the Scrapbooker's Blog tour.  Be sure to visit Penny and read her wonderful post about her journey in scrapbooking.

Thanks for stopping by.  Before all this card craziness, I did create and film a process video so I'll have that up tomorrow.