A New Year Surprise

Good afternoon everyone, this is the first day I have had time to get into my craft room and am hoping to get something done, everything was put away for Christmas and it will take a day or two before everything is back out and in use, so it may only be a little bit of blogging and commenting today. 

A wonderful start to the new year for me, I opened my copy of Craft Stamper, which arrived in the post this morning, to find a Valentine card I sent in had been published in the Ready, Set, Stamp! section.  There are some fabulous cards in there, here is mine:

My card blank was made using Papermill white linen card and paper for the insert, the other textured card is Docrafts Papermania premium textured cardstock.  For the main image and sentiment I used Paper Artsy Urban Snapshots Young Love, this was stamped onto Papermill smooth card and coloured with Promarkers and the background coloured with distress ink.  The heart doily was in my craft box, a freebie I think, and the roses are from years ago when I made some wedding invitations.  

Just a reminder while I am blogging that there is still time for you to pick up a bargain over at the Papermill in the sale, the make your own calendars and artist pads are half price, pop over and check out the offers.

I am working on my calendar pages and here is my January page, I intend to have a childrens' rhyme theme through the months, "January brings the snow, it makes your face and fingers glow" - "February brings the rain, it thaws the frozen lake again" etc.  The calendar and card used are all from The Papermill of course.

I want texture on my pages so started by embossing a piece of navy card with a snowflake embossing folder, I swiped a white ink pad over the raised areas to give the contrast.  The image was stamped in black and clear heat embossed, a little colour was added to the girl and the background was coloured with distress inks.  A little white flock was added to give the snow and a few die cut snowflakes embellished with pearls.  I used this idea the year before last and thought the rhyme theme would be great to carry on through my 2014 calendar.