Doe a deer a Christmas deer

I have lots of wonderful Christmas things around my house and some don't go away during the year as I love to see them all year round.

One of these is the sweetest bunny made by my ever-so-talented dear blogging friend Vivienne of Green rabbit designs. Vivienne and I got back to my very first blog posts 8 years ago and we have become very close friend, despite her living in Northern Ireland. On my wish list is that we will one day meet up in the flesh.

I bought Holly the Christmas bunny some years ago

 and she sits on my piano along with the sweetest pig called Priscilla. Vivienne made me her some years back for my birthday. (Yes Vivienne knows of my life long love of pigs)

When Vivienne lists her bunnies and animals on Etsy you have to be very quick as they hang about for about 30 seconds after being listed. I had spotted a rather wonderful soul she had made on her IG page and decided that I would try to buy her as a present for me when she went up for sale on Etsy. The day came last week I was just thrilled to be successful.

My parcel arrived...all beautifully wrapped

I carefully unwrapped her....just look at the darling cardi and dress..

Say hello to Doe a deer a Christmas deer!

She was a little shy at first..
but Holly took her by the hand and asked her to pose for a photo.

They have become the best of festive friends
and now all 3 sit together on my piano. They are so delightful.

So my card today had to feature deer didn't it.
This is another newbie up for sale at Dotty's Teahouse in Carshalton High Street, SM5 2AE

The hillscape die is by STAMPlorations, I used it to cut some lovely festive DP from my stash. The tree is a part of a memory box die, the snowflakes are Cheery Lynn, the sleigh is Marianne. The deer are Noor and The Works. I stamped some snowflakes on one of the deer in silver. The stamped sentiment is ancient form my stash but one I love to use.

 Here are a couple of close ups of the Wintry scene I created.

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

Crafty catz 2/3 anything goes
Fussy and fancy 2/3 Winter/Christmas
Crafty Calendar 2/3 It's Christmas time
Ribbon girl 2/3 anything goes
Simon says stamp Wednesday anything goes
Card Mania 1/5 Christmas
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas  anything goes
Crafty Hazelnut's patterned paper  anything goes
The paper girls 1/3 die cuts
Double D 1/3 run run Rudolph
Alphabet challenge  1/3 r is for reindeer

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope your preparations are going well? Remember to take the time to look at the little things too at this time of the year which makes it so magical. I hope that for you too, "All hearts come home for Christmas".

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Preparations for trimming the tree

We chose our tree yesterday and it will be delivered today ready for us to decorate during the week. As regular readers of my blog know Billy my cat likes to write that post and that will be coming up soon. I have lots of treasured ornaments and I decided that I would like to make something handmade for my darling granddaughter Daisy to hang on her tree. She really loves the Visible Image Wonderland characters so I decided that for my Monday design team inspiration I would make an ornament using the fab Cheshire cat stamp.

 I started with a plain wooden snowflake from my stash.

 I gave it a coat of gesso and then added a little sparkle to the edges.
I die cut 2 holly branches

 and added red Stickles to the berries.

 I coloured Mr Cat
from the Cheshire cat set

in festive colours using Zig watercolours. I fussy cut him out and added glossy accents to his eyes and some Glamour dust for sparkle

I wanted to date Daisy's ornament so out came the ever useful alphabetical set . I stamped and embossed 2018 in red.

So then it was just a case of putting everything together. Here he is;

ready with his stocking hung for the man in the red suit to fill to the brim!

I gave him to Daisy on Saturday and her little face lit up. We were lucky enough to see them get their tree and decorate it.

She was so thrilled, bless her and couldn't wait to hang him from the tree.

I would like to enter my tree ornament into the following challenges;

Crafty cardmakers 1/3 anything but a card
 Crafty catz 1/3 anything goes
Fussy and fancy 1/3 Winter/Christmas
Stamping sensations 1/3 winter sparkle
Penny Black and More 1/3 traditional Christmas colours
Love to Create 1/3 anything mixed media
Crafty Calendar 1/3 It's Christmas time
Ribbon girl 1/3 anything goes
Crafteezee a gift
Allsorts 1/3 fairies, fantasy, magical I think my red and green cat is rather magical 😸
Cupcake Inspirations The holidays
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas anything goes

All the Visible Image links can be found here;

Visible Image group page on Facebook. Our friendly Group is here ...it would be lovely to see you there. You can add work to the new challenge album where one randomly chosen winner each month wins a £40 coupon to spend on the website. For December and January the theme is "Christmas/Winter".

The main Visible Image Facebook page is here; there are weekly stamp giveaways...open world wide.

And the shop web site is here; where all their gorgeous stamps and stencils can be purchased. 

 The challenge ends on 31st January 2019 so you have plenty of time to join us.

I hope you might feel inspired to make your own Christmas ornaments, you don't even need any Christmas stamps to do this. There are only 22 days until the Big Day....are you ready?

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

It's my very favourite time of the year

Oh wow it's December 1st and the start of my very favourite time of the year...the countdown to Christmas. It's time to open the first window of my advent calendar,  to light the advent candle

and to go up to the nursery to buy our Christmas tree tomorrow.

It is also time for the last Country View challenge of 2018 and of course the theme just had to be "Christmas". You can enter our challenge as many times as you like and there is combine with other challenges. There is also a £20 crafting voucher up for grabs to the lucky randomly selected winner. You could treat yourself over on the Country View Crafts in the new year to any crafting goodies that Santa forgets to leave you on Christmas Eve 🎅 All the details for the challenge can be found here.

For my first design team make I decided to use the fab new Tim Holtz stamp set

Yule tide. I ummmed and arrhhhed about buying this set in November and finally succumbed as I genuinely believe this is the best vintage Santa stamp available at present. To me it epitomizes the classic Father Christmas at his very best. I coloured a few up with watercolour pens.

I added some glitter to the fur and his beard for some magical sparkle. I also die cut some greenery with some inky card. 

I used Tim's snowflake stencil and some crackle texture paste on top of a distress ink background. 

The dried effect was awesome.

I also die cut some stars and his paper snowflakes.

So then it was time to put my design together.

with some close ups

and one final shot

You need to keep this under your hat for a couple of days as shhh this is my Hb's Christmas card..and he hasn't seen it yet!

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

Simon says stamp Wednesday anything goes

Crimbo Crackers 3/3 anything goes
Sweet stampin' 3/3 whatever the weather

Crafty Halzelnut's Christmas 3/3 #413
Addicted to stamps 3/3 anything goes
Try it on Tuesday 3/3 winter wonderland

Thanks so much for stopping by and for the kind comments you take the time to leave me, espeically at such a busy time of the year. I am really looking forward to sharing lots of my "Countdown to Christmas" posts over the next 24 days. Billy is warming up his paws to type his Christmas tree post too. This really is my very favourite time of the year....ho ho ho!! 🎅🎄🎅

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x