SSS DieCember® Blog Hop

Hello and welcome to my blog! I am happy to take part in the Simon Says Stamp DieCember blog hop, to celebrate the release of the new DieCember dies. You should have arrived here from the very creative Marge Yoon, and I hope you are enjoying all the inspiration along the hop.

The DieCember release is a really big one, with 44 sets of wonderful and versatile dies. You can find the whole release here.

Don't miss the free gift! If you use the code DCMBR27, you will get a free Nutty & Bright stamp set (while supplies last!) with any purchase. The code will expire Sunday, 12/9 at 11:59 pm EST.

I made a winter panel and a spring tag, to mix up the seasons a little, and there are step photos for both. So let's start!

The background is sort of the main thing on this winter project, and It was such fun to make. The technique works for any season or theme and for lots of different types of projects. For the wall-hanging, I wanted to use a fun Christmas color-combo of turquoise, pink, red and white, which by total coincidence coordinates with the banner for the DieCember release. It's 6 x 6.3 in big.

I used these five DieCember dies on my projects: Grassy Edges, Celebrate, Nested Banners, Hooray, and Bixby Arch.

The Nested Banners set is so versatile, and you get a lot of dies, which can all be used in many different ways. When I saw the Nested Banners, I immediately thought the rectangular banners would look great for a background. Instead of separating the three dies, I kept them intact and die cut lots of nested rectangles from watercolor paper. This gives you two frames and one thinner center piece. If you have already separated the dies, you can use the Sizzix Magnetic Platform to keep them in place when die cutting.

Smear Distress Inks on a craft sheet, mist with water and press the papers into the ink.

When dry, I started applying them to a piece of mat board. You can use a sheet adhesive, such as this one by Sizzix, but I couldn't find mine, and instead used my ATG gun. Vary the colors and the placement until you are happy with the lock.

When you are done, cut the mat board at the bottom and cut off the overhanging rectangles on the sides. I almost didn't want to cover any of this background up.

Die cut snowflakes from White Diamond glimmery cardstock and from Schoolhouse Red cardstock, using the Kinley Snowflake and Stitched Flakes dies from earlier releases.

I also die cut a snowman from felt, using the Picture Book Snowman. The scarf was cut by hand, but there is a die for the scarf too.

Splatter the background with white paint for texture and sand the edges of Tim Holtz idea-ology Christmas Quote Chips.

Glue the snowflakes to the background with SSS glue, and add the snowman. I also placed dots of White Opal Liquid Pearls on some of the snowflakes. 

Use the Celebrate die to die cut a title from White Diamond glimmery cardstock. This cardstock has a lovely shine, but it was a grey day when I took these photos, and I however much I turned the panel around, there wasn't enough light to catch the glimmer.

Now to the spring tag. 

Sometimes in the midst of winter, it is nice to do a spring or summertime project and to use some bright flowers. My favorite part of this tag, was creating the overlapping hills and grass, which were all done with DieCember dies. 

Start by coating a tag with gesso.

When dry, paint the sky with Distress Paints and mist with water. 

Die cut hills, grass and flowers from heavystock paper using the Bixby Arch and Grassy Edges sets. 

Ink with shades of green by smearing the ink pad directly onto the paper. The lower parts of the larger die cuts won't show, so I didn't ink them.

Mist with water droplets.

When dry, stamp with the Good Reading background stamp and Fern Green and Leaf Green Archival inks.

Color the flowers by pressing them into the ink pads. This is such a quick coloring method and gives lovely vibrant colors. 

Stamp the sky with a sentiment from Uplifting Thoughts and smaller words from Tabbed Sentiments. Add birds and a border with a white gel pen.

Glue flowers here and there with the fabulous fine-tipped SSS Tacky Glue. I love these tiny flowers. Add a dot of White Opal Liquid Pearls to each flower. When it dries, the Liquid Pearls will take up some of the color of the ink, which is not always an effect I want, but in this case, I liked the tone-on-tone look it created. If you want to avoid it, color the flowers with acrylic paint instead.

Die cut the Hooray sentiment from White Diamond and Baby Blue glimmery cardstock and glue to the background.

There are of course prizes to be won and at each stop on the hop SSS is giving away a $25 coupon, randomly drawn from those who leave a comment. The winners will be posted post on the Simon Says Stamp store blog on Wednesday, the 12th of December.

Your next stop on the hop is Gayatri Murali, and I hope you won't miss the inspiration she has in store for you. If you get lost along the way, this is the hop list:

Simon Says Stamp Blog 

Debby Hughes

Amanda Korotkova

Yoonsun Hur

Amy Rysavy

Vicky Papaioannou

Karin Åkesdotter

Marge Yoon

Anna-Karin Evaldsson (you are here)

Gayatri Murali

Elena Salo

Emma Williams

Ankita Gupta

Olga Direktorenko

For more DieCember inspiration, remember to check out the DieCember gallery at SSS, and if you make something with products from the range, it is fun if you post it in in the gallery too. There are galleries for all releases, and for the card kits, full of inspiration. There was also a part one of this blog hop last week, with even more wonderful projects.

Tomorrow we are going to do bake gingerbread cookies and make Christmas sweets with some friends. It is going to be fun and I bet the kids will eat a lot of cookie dough.

Thank you so much for visiting today and I hope you will have a lovely weekend!

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

Glow In The Dark Space Panel Tutorial

Hi friends! I hope your weekend was a great one! We went to a Christmas market yesterday and I was happy to find a ceramic Santa/gnome. Last year, at the same market, I bought one of the Santas, which were made maybe 50 years ago by a female artist and forgotten in a box in an attic. This year, they had only one Santa/gnome left, and now it is living in our living room with its friend. I love Christmas ornaments with a good story. I wrote Santa/gnome, because Swedish Santas are both of the more traditional Santa Claus kind, but sometimes even more what you might call gnomes. These were small santas, living especially in barns, and helping out at the farm, but they could be naughty too if you didn't treat them well. You can read more about them here. 

This week at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog we have a 'B is for' theme. Since it is the first Monday of a new month, the team is showcasing a specific designer/company and this week it is Brutus Monroe, which has a wide range of very cool stamps, embossing powders, and other interesting products. You can find them all here. You don't have to use Brutus Monroe products to join, but it is always fun if you do.

Our guest designer for December is the very creative Ann Barnes, with her blog Aksbarchitect Creates. Don't miss her project!

I made a space wall-hanger for the boys, on the theme of being brave. This was such a fun project to make and it shines and glitters, and even glows in the dark. How cool is that!? It is the first time ever, I make a project which glows in the dark, something that always fascinated me as a child, and it will be a winner with many children. The finished wall-hanger is 8 x 9.5 in.

These are the Brutus Monroe products that I used: Flat Back Acrylic Bubbles, Glitter Flat Back Acrylic Bubbles, Abstract Art stamp set, Monster Party stamps, Milky Way Embossing Powder, and Glow in the Dark Seaglass. Unfortunately, the Abstract Art set is no longer in stock, and I didn't discover that until the project was done, but it isn't essential to completing the project.

I started with a left-over watercolor paper from my Misted Galaxy project, which had been misted with the Distress Resist Spray. It was misted with Distress Spray Stains. The Resist Spray resists the ink, forming stars and galaxies.

Mist with Brushed Pewter Mica Spray.

Apply Embossing Dabber Ink around the edges and emboss with the Milky Way powder. I used a chunky powder, but could only find a fine powder in the shop now. It will still work almost the same, you just need to add two layers if you want it to look thick. Remember to be careful when using a heat gun so that you don't burn yourself.

Stamp the fun monsters on watercolor paper. I thought they made perfect aliens. I always stamp more than I need, in case I mess up coloring. And as you can see, I dropped a stamp on the paper.

Watercolor them with Distress Inks, by smearing the inks on a craft sheet, misting once with water and picking it up with a paint brush.

Die cut three circles using the Sizzix Circle Framelits set. My paper was already inked with Antique Linen. Smear the ink on a craft sheet, mist with water and press the papers into the ink.

Continue using Frayed Burlap and Hickory Smoke, aiming for a splotchy and textured look.

Stamp with Abstract Art shapes. You can skip this step, if you don't have the stamp set. I even thought the planets might have looked better without the extra stamping. 

The title letters were die cut from white mat board using Tim Holtz's Letterboard die. Inked with Lucky Clover and covered with sparkly Crystal Stickles. I used the same stickles here and there on the background, it glows almost in a green shade.

Now for the really fun part, glue Glow In The Dark Seaglass to the background, so that they look like asteroids. Add Flat Back Acrylic Bubbles here and there. They actually do glow in the dark and the panel looks really cool with the glowing asteroids. I can't wait to hear what the boys say when they get the panel.

This little character is such fun, and got a whole planet for himself. I planned to add white circles to the background, but forgot to do it before having glued the seaglass, which made it hard to trace the circles with a plate. Instead, I just scribbled faint uneven circles with a white gel pen.

The aliens are a lot of fun to color. I added Glossy Accents to their eyes and a little Stickles here and there.

The combination of the clear Flat Back Acrylic Bubbles and the Glitter ones is very cool. The glitter ones are very sparkly. Anton has been using some of both of these to craft with, and will enjoy seeing them on this project too.

Two aliens are peeking out from behind the planet.

The seaglass pieces are dimensional and I love their uneven shapes. So cool. Brutus Monroe also has a glow in the dark embossing powder, which I am going to get in my next order.

I hope you will join us this week in our B is for.. challenge. As always, you have a chance to win a $50 gift voucher to do some fun shopping at Simon Says Stamp. You have until next Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in.

Don't forget to follow Simon Says Stamp on Instagram, they post great stuff daily. 

Do you use Instagram? If so please add #sssmchallenge so we can see your entries there too.

Thank you so much for taking the time to visit my blog today!  

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

December Countdown Calendar

Hello friends! It is the last day of November and I have done the finishing touches to the journaling tags for my December Countdown Calendar. This is a Sizzix tutorial showing you how to do the tags.

I made the wall-hanging for my countdown calendar three years ago, with the plan of reusing it for my countdown tags. It hangs on a wall in the living room, and every day I take one of the tags off the hook. The tag then goes into my December Daily journal, with memories and stories from that particular day written on the tag. I used dies and stamps by Tim Holtz for this project.

I like the way my December Daily journal and countdown calendar coordinate, with the latter doubling as journaling cards. I also have an ATC advent calendar, which I made years ago, and I always enjoy taking it out on the first of December.

 

Start by die cutting tags from watercolor paper, or another paper, using the largest die in the Stacked Tags set. Use the small dies in the set to die cut the holes and the reinforcers. Glue the reinforcers to the tag. I die cut everything with the Sizzix Foldaway Big Shot.

On my first December journal, I die cut the number of the day, but after that I have mainly stamped it. This year, I decided to die cut the numbers, since it adds such a nice touch, and I like that you can glimpse the next tag through the negative die cut. Use the Cutout Script Thinlits set, together with the Sizzix Magnetic Platform to die cut numbers out of each tag. My tags go to the 26th of December, to also include Boxing Day.

Smear Distress Inks on a craft sheet, mist with water and press each tag into the ink. Repeat on the back.

I like to use the ledger stamp from Tim Holtz's School Desk set on my journaling tags. It was stamped with Forget-Me-Not ink on both the front and the back of the tags.

Now comes the super fun part. Sit down surrounded by Christmas stamps and stamp away. I use a lot of the Christmas stamps I have at home on this project. Most of them are from Tim Holtz and you can find them in the supply list below. Mix image, word and background stamps. I used quite a lot of the designs from the Winter Watercolor set, to add branches and flowers.

Here's a look at some of the tags. They are all different, and both sides are stamped, since when they are in the journal, you see both sides.

More tags. I really have such fun just stamping like this, without much of a plan, and if you make a mistake, it doesn't matter.

Some of the tags have images that were a little more planned, such as the 24th always having a Santa stamp, since that is the day when Santa comes to visit here.

In my December Daily journal, I have Tim's Tag Pockets, ready to be filled. I just add journaling and some times a small photo, but the focus in my December journal is on the words. I normally scrapbook my Christmas photos instead, mainly since I don't print photos at home. The bird stamp is from the Festive Overlay set, and is the same stamp that I used on my Christmas Bird Frame tutorial earlier this week.

At the back of the journal, I add extra unnumbered tags, in case I need more space. They are also used to write down the gifts everyone received each year. I started writing down my birthday and Christmas gifts when I learned how to write, and those lists are a lot of fun to have and bring back many memories.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and that it inspired you to maybe make your own version. You can find my December Daily Winter Birch Forest tutorial here. For more inspiration:

The original Countdown Calendar tutorial.
Countdown tags 2016, with a video
Advent Calendar with boxes
ATC Advent Calendar

Tomorrow, I am planning to take out our electric chandeliers and stars. They always give such a cozy Christmas feeling.

Have a lovely weekend! Thank you for the visit!

Happy Christmas crafting!

Anna-Karin

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.