Pops of red

It's been many years since I have remembered to buy and pot up an amaryllis. I usually see everyone's blooming beauties after Christmas and realise that I have again missed the boat. However recently I spotted some in a garden centre and decided to treat myself.

 The kits are really worth buying as you simply put the bulb in the pot, add the soil and water and voila...the bulb ready to grow.,

It's on my sunny window sill and I have my fingers crossed that I will get some lovely blooms around Christmas/New year. I do love to have something growing at this time of the year when it's so dark.
There are pops of red in some of the Christmas catalogues appearing on the high street too.....Only 40 days left until the big day!

There are also pops of red on the bushes, the berries are ready for the birds for the winter months

and the very last of my acer leaves gave a last pop of red in my garden,

I have been designing some new Christmas cards with my Visible Image stamps and decided to use a pop of  red in my latest card design. Did you know that Visible Image ship worldwide? They are also able to ship immediately on ordering as they are no longer manufacturing their stamps in house. In the UK that often means next day delivery.

 I like to make small batches of Christmas cards and this design has already been popular with my friends.

Here is what I got up to. ..

I took some black card and randomly stamped their enchanting snowflakes. This set of snowflakes makes for some brilliant backgrounds. I used Picket Fence distress ink for a subtle effect.

After drying with my heat gun I stamped the Smile, sparkle shine set with Versamark and added sparkle glitter embossing powder.

I then stamped "Merry Christmas and a happy new year" from their brilliant Go to Christmas words set

again with Versamark but this time used my gorgeous red geranium Wendy Vecchi embossing powder.

Here it is pre heating

and then post heating....a great shine!

Once I had made my 4 card fronts 

I matted them onto red card before attaching them to white card blanks. I added a little red gem star as an extra pop of red.

Here is my finished card

In real life the sentiment has such a sparkle with the glittered embossing powder but I found it impossible to get my camera to show it off!

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges.

Penny Black and More 2/3Anything Christmas
Craft Stamper take it make it November anything goes
Stamping sensations 2/3 Christmas greetings
Crafting Musketeers  Christmas wishes
Noor UK Winter
Sparkles 1/3 Christmas is coming
Let's craft and create 1/3 winter

My stash of cards is growing nicely but I am still beavering away here. Thanks for visiting me today and for the kind comments that you leave.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x