Just around the corner..

is Christmas! and I'm having fun doing "creative" Christmas cards this year... 

I picked up some of the Library Pockets from VLVS! and got to work distressing with a walnut stain distress ink. I then cut a tag from some dictionary paper and distressed with peeled paint distress ink.

I love the cream color that manila comes.. so I seriously stock up on manila folders and use them as a regular stamping surface.. I grabbed a folder and this beautiful new stamp from VLVS!:

Jolly Ol' St. Nick 3 1/4 x 3 - $11.75

I stamped him in Memento Tuxedo and embossed with VLVS!'s Ultra High Gloss EP. 

I then did a little embellishing (I love to deconstruct decorative picks and use bits n bobs as embellishmetns) some extra inking.. ribbon snipping and tying.. and of course adhering everything down with VLVS! Miralce Tape...

and...

VIOLA!

thanks so much for checking out my VLVS! project again this week!! -DeeDee

  

12 Tags of Christmas - Day One

In case you didn't follow our 12 Tags of Christmas, here are the six Tags for Day One... each Tag had to use at least one image from our Plate #1363.



My Favorite Fruitcake Recipe!

For my Viva Las Vegastamps! design team post this time, I wanted to use this funny fruitcake recipe stamp that I have admired for a while now. I used Spellbinders dies for the mat, recipe card, and cake platter that my fruitcake is on. I used a Sizzix embossing folder to add the dot texture to my mat and then used Colored Sakura Crystal Lacquer to highlight some of the dots so that they would accent the pieces of fruit in the fruitcake.

Now here is the fun part! This month, we got to try out a product called Creative Paperclay. I used the paperclay to make my fruitcake and I was surprised at how much like regular clay it is. I expected it to be more like paper pulp, but it was very easy to use, like real clay. Here is how I made the fruitcake:

First, I drew a circle on a piece of waxed paper. Then I put red, green, yellow and orange rhinestones all over my circle. After that, I started putting small pieces of clay over the stones and I pressed the clay down until I could feel the stones. Once I covered all of the stones, I rubbed them to get the clay off the tops of them. Then I trimmed off the excess clay, while also trimming the waxed paper at the same time with a craft knife. I shaped and evened it out to my liking and then put it away to dry over night. The next day, the edges had curled up a little, but it was still a little wet. I gently pressed it flat and smoothed out any tiny cracks with a wet paintbrush. The next day, I painted it with some watered down brown acrylic paint to give it that "bake until golden brown" look. Normally I wouldn't recommend using the waxed paper, but in this project, it gave the bling something to stick to, and also added strength since my project was very thin. Other embellishments you could make this way, could be things like pizza, cookies or a wreath. You can see other projects for Creative Paperclay on their blog by clicking here.

Feel free to stop by the Create & Craft blog to see all of my Viva Las Vegastamps! posts in one place as well as projects from the rest of our team. Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to come back every Monday, Wednesday & Friday to see the newest posts!

Viva Las Vegastamps! and Creative Paperclay® Ornaments

This month the Viva Las Vegastamps! design team was challenged to use Creative Paperclay® in their post!  I usually give home make ornaments as gifts to some of the people on my Christmas list and decided to make them with Creative Paperclay® this year!  For one stop shopping Creative Paperclay® is now available online at Viva Las Vegastamps! 

Work on a flat surface, a glass surface seems to work the best. Tip: I place a transparency on the glass surface to allow easy moving. Sorry you can't see the transparency, believe me it is there! Work with small amounts of Creative Paperclay®, first roll it into a smooth ball, then between the spacers roll out the clay.   For spacers I used 3 pieces of chip board taped together with Viva Las Vegastamps! Miracle Tape, making them about a 1/4 of an inch thick. The spacers help keep my clay a consistent thickness. While working with Creative Paperclay® be sure to keep the unused portion of the clay sealed or covered in plastic so it doesn’t dry out!

After rolling out the paper clay stamp your image in the clay.  Do this before you cut the clay.  If you stamp after cutting the clay you may distort the shape of the cut image.  Note: Once you use items from the kitchen with clay the tools should be used exclusively for clay or other craft projects in the future!

For my ornaments I used Viva Las Vegastamps! Swirls Plate 1333 and Santa Holly.

After stamping your image cut your shape, press hard so that you feel the glass surface below the cutters.  Tip: Gently pull the extra clay from around the cutters while the cutter is still in the clay.  Using the end of the paint brush put a hole in each ornament.

Halfway through the drying time turn your ornaments over.  Sand the rough edges gently with an emery board or fine sand paper.  For a sealed surface paint ornaments with a matte medium or gesso,  set aside to dry.

Paint your charms with acrylic paints or any other craft paint you may have around, set aside to dry.

With gold paint cover the ornament and then wipe the paint leaving the gold in the impression made by the stamps.

Set aside to dry. 

Add a bow to each ornament and 

a set is ready to give as a gift!

Close up of Holly Santa!

Supplies:

Viva Las Vegastamps! Holly Santa

Viva Las Vegastamps! Swirls Plate # 1333

Creative Paperclay®

Cookie cutters, 

Cutting surface-Glass cutting board 

Transparencies

Roller 

Spacers made from Chipboard

Paint brush

Emery-board

Gesso or Matt medium

Acrylic Paints

Ribbon

REMEMBER to join the monthly Viva Las Vegastamps!

 the Theme for December  

is CHRISTMAS! 

One winner’s card will be featured on our Blog and the receive a $25.00 Gift Certificate to shop at Viva Las Vegastamps! 

Find out more HERE... 

The 12 Tags of Christmas Blog Hop is in its 7th day plenty of time to hop along with us and win some BLOG CANDY... 

Start the Hop on Terri Sproul's Blog.  CLICK HERE!

Season's Greetings Side Step Card

I participate in a card swap at Red Letter Journals. On the first Sunday of every month, about two dozen card makers get together to learn a new technique and trade cards using the technique they learned the previous month. It’s a great way to learn new things, have fun and get some great cards!

Today at the card swap our friend Nancy shared a “side step card” that really impressed me. As soon as I got home, I put the project I had ready to post on the back burner and created this card using two stamps from Viva Las Vegastamps! ; Waving Santa 2 ¾ x 2 ¾ #4820 and Seasons Greetings Square 1 ¾ x 2 ¼ #10110.

The stamps were stamped on white cardstock using black dye ink and then colored using Copic markers. To highlight the images, glitter was applied using Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer as an adhesive. The fine tip made it easy to get in to the tiniest parts of the stamped image. Since the Crystal Lacquer dries completely clear, you can still see the stamped image under the glitter.

I created the “HO! HO! HO!” banner on the computer, punched out a gift box using the Martha Stewart present punch and cut out a Christmas tree using Sure Cuts A Lot (SCAL).

I cut out the card base using a side step card pattern I found at Carson’s Creations.

Check out the 12 Tags of Christmas Blog Hop that's going on at Viva Las Vegastamps! The tags look fantastic!

You can see my other projects on my blog on Create & Craft.

Happy Crafting!

Joe Rotella

WINNER! Nov Monthly Challange winner

I am loving all the entries for the Monthly Blog Challenge you all are posting on our facebook wall. 
This month theme was "Thanks" - I know all of us here at Viva Las Vegastamps are very THANKFUL for all of you. 

And the Winner is.........

Jocelyn Susie Micke Cazier

Now please contact us at Terri@ultimatescrapbookretreat.com - with WINNER in the regard to claim your $25 gift certificate to our on-line store. 

a Few other amazing thing are going on with Viva Las Vegastamps

We are doing a "12 Tags of Christmas Blog Hop with our Design Team.  CLICK HERE to start

December Theme is

Christmas

Thanks for all the support each of you give to us and our Design Team

Terri Sproul

Ho...Ho...WHOA!!!

Happy Saturday and welcome to December!!! It's Susan (again) with my regularly scheduled Saturday top of the month project. Today's project also features a fun product called Creative Paperclay® now available for sale over at Viva Las Vegastamps! This is my first time working with this and I'm so happy with the results.

Can't believe Christmas is just a couple weeks away. Have you seen our 12 Tags of Christmas Bloghop? This project will certainly get you in the Christmas spirit!

A sneek peek!

This piece begins with this Santa Foot through Ceiling #5395 and the unmounted Christmas alphabet #7560 from Viva Las Vegastamps! As soon as I saw this stamp I knew what I wanted to make.

For the background wall, I rolled out some Creative Paperclay and sandwiched it in my T!m Holtz distressed brick embossing folder. This took a little over a day to dry. I made sure that I could get it out of the folder before I let it dry completely. **Make sure to dust embossing folder with powder or rub with versamark or something similar to help clay release - I forgot to do that.**

Creative Paperclay® after pressed and dried in embossing folder.

Bricks colored with distress inks and mounted to patterned paper
backing with miracle tape.

Stamped image colored in on cardstock.

Santa foot stamped on clear acetate.

CLOSE UP of finished boot mounted in box.

Here's the details: The box is the base of a box of blank cards with envelopes. I try to upcyle things into art pieces whenever possible. I stamped the Santa Foot with Stazon onto white cardstock and also onto clear acetate. I painted in broken pieces with white gesso on transparency and cut out. I left about 1" above image to use as a glue flap when mounting in shadow box. The foot stamped on paper I colored in and then embossed the boot with clear embossing powder. The white fuzzy part is embossed with a Ranger white puff powder. This really didn't puff up how I expected. I cleaned up all the edges with a black zig pen. I mounted all of the pieces in the box and I stamped my sentiment in red ink with the candy cane letters. I love these letters! I finished off scene with some tinsel trim and a Jolee's Christmas tree embellishment. 

Santa might want to lay off the cookies...

It's December which means there is a new VLVS Theme Challenge. Submit your "CHRISTMAS" theme creations using Viva Las Vegastamps! for a chance to win a $25 gift certificate at the VLVS online store. CLICK HERE for info on submissions. Also check out the Viva Las Vegastamps! store - there is something for every occasion and more! December's Theme is "Christmas" and we will be celebrating with a Twelve Tags of Christmas Bloghop December 1st thru December 12th CLICK HERE to check it out!

Thanks so much for visiting & if you would like to see more of my creations please visit my blog, sbartist : painting in the dark HERE. Have a great weekend! : )

Merry Chrisdog To You

Happy Holiday Season!  VLVS has the best selection of words and quotes that can be used with any image, although, like above, there are matched words to fit select images.  There are a vast amount of dog images, so choose the breed you love!!

This ornament is in memory of our beagle Woodstock, she passed away this past April.  She was our beloved doggie of 13 years and my 18 year old son grew up with her.  It was difficult to say goodbye to her.  

VLVS Stamp Images:

12650 Beagle, 5425 words Fleas Navidog, 8762 bone, 8046 paw

Use a chipboard shape or cut your own ornament from cardboard (which I did).  Stamp the bone and paw image randomly on a white sheet of copy paper with black, permanent ink.  Turn the stamped paper over and trace the circle part of the ornmanent with a pencil.  Turn the paper back to the front and color in the images only where the traced circle is (Hold up paper to see the tracing). 

Color with colored pencils, Copics, watercolor markers, etc.  Cut the circle out and use Miracle Tape to adhere the bone/paw background to the ornament.

Stamp the beagle on white cardstock with black permanent ink and add coloring realistic to the breed dog.  I colored the beagle according to how our Woodstock looked.  Cut out and set aside.

When I received my Pound 'o Rubber, I found this little shape that could be a star or just a decorative image.  On another piece of decorative paper, I cut it first to fit the stem of the ornament and then used Brilliance Copper ink and stamped the decorative image around the area.  Then I wrapped below the area with wire to add extra dimension and texture to the ornament.  An eyelet was added as well.

Lastly, adhere beagle to the front of the ornament, add ribbon with a knot in the back and pulling the ribbon through to the front forming loops.  Hold your black ink pad on its side and go over the edges of the ornament to create a black outline.

GMTA - Great Minds Think Alike!  Recently Sakura Hobby Craft showcased the VLVS Lady Holding Globe, using 3-D Crystal Lacquer to make the globe look like real glass.  I had already completed my design for this blog, but I did my design a little bit different.  I blinged up my lady and added glitter, etc.  The trees in the globe was colored with metallic green pen, and I added white, blue, and brown to finish the scene.  When I added the 3-D Crystal Lacquer, it magnified the colors like a real globe!  I also sprinkled a tiny bit of glitter into the lacquer to make the globe look like it was shaken. 

Be sure to place your design on a FLAT SURFACE so that the 3-D Crystal Lacquer doesn't migrate from the area you want it to stay at.

The TAG Blog Hop has started!!!!  The beginning of the blog starts with Terri Sproul, and goes on.  Check my blog out and follow along.  To win the plate of stamps the DT used to create these awesome stamps, comment on each blog and you have a chance of winning!!!

Plate 1363

The ideas keep coming...more to come!!  Check back every Monday-Wednesday-Friday for designs so it is fast and easy to create your holiday cards. 

Holiday Thoughts to you - Lea