More Christmas Puzzling -

The next puzzle on my Christmas wish list was this one -  'Christmas Barn'. Another Bits & Pieces  one and by the same artist, Larry Jones, as the Happy Holiday Snowman.

The Christmas Barn was a quickie to do, but most enjoyable. So many little items to discover in the background and I enjoy the bright colours and all the details throughout the picture.

Making a start -

Coming along nicely now -

And a few details - playful cats getting up to mischief - of course!

Nice variety of quirkily shaped pieces

Another shaped 750 piece puzzle winner! I look forward to doing it again next year.

Christmas Puzzling

I'm was pretty low on Christmas puzzles so when Bits & Pieces offered some specials, I got a few. Wish I could have gotten all the ones on the wish list, but at least I did get the Happy Holiday Snowman, which has topped the list since last year.

Interesting with lots of details, and lots of red,which is a bit more difficult to do if one doesn't sort pieces before hand.

It only just fitted onto the foam core board, which makes it a nice large shaped puzzle at only 750 pieces.

Getting started :

And a few little details -nice to discover little eye candy such as this cat!

The snowman's hat looks like a snowglobe.

Some of the delightfully quirky edge pieces!

Great puzzle to do, not difficult, the picture is great, quality of the pieces great. Some pieces were lightly attached,but separated easily and there was no puzzle dust. My only observation is that the bottom part of the box is very thin and the corners very lightly closed. I would not want to store this one without bagging the pieces first!

Highly recommended.

Winter Time Cards

Did I ever have fun making these! All the stamps I used are digitals from the Lili of the Valley Shop

For the snowman trio I used patterned papers from my stash, an assortment of dies, ribbon and stamps from various sources. I pulled out whatever would work with the images. All the colouring is done with coloured pencils.

For the next 3 cards I used the same approach, pulling out whatever I thought would work with the images. The back grounds were made using the embossing folder technique where one uses wax paper in the embossing folder and then iron card stock over the wax paper. This leaves you with a beautiful resist pattern to ink blend over. I used dye inks for blending.

I also added bits of cheesecloth on these and a few hand stitches to the one with the stocking. The colours used are right up my street and the entire process was most enjoyable. The images are so precious...

You'll find :-

The single snowman is HERE

The Rabbits in the Stocking is HERE

The Girl and Robin you can find HERE


Get them from :-  Lili of the Valley Shop

Card - Sending Warm Fuzzies

We had so much snow recently that it made all the sense in the world to me to make a card with snowmen. The set is 'Build a Snowman' by Stampendous, but I've not been able to track it down on their website. Amazon here in Canada did list it at a rather crazy price, so you may be able to track it down somewhere.

I used Distress Oxide ink (Vintage Photo) for the stamping and I love how it turned out. The warmth of the brown looks delicious. Like hot chocolate. Or something like that...
Unfortunately even after leaving it to dry overnight it still reacted to the glitter glue that I added in a few places. I did the colouring with coloured pencils.

I covered the entire inside of the card with patterned paper (Forever in Time), before adding the snowbank strip, which I popped up with foam to make an edge for the easel card to push against. I added some stamped snowflakes too. These are from the snowmen set.

The sentiment is from a set by Hero Arts (with no name)  that I picked up at Michaels recently.
Just some die cut and punched snowflakes and a few more gems and I called it done.

Here's an image of the stamp set - I bought mine a few years ago at Michaels

Snowmen Snuggle

Somehow a snuggle from a snowman just doesn't sound like the best idea, does it?

Fortunately these little fellas really are very cozy as they snuggle up to a colourful pair of mittens!

I used the 'Build A Snowman' stamp set by Stampendous. The sentiment is from the 'Happy Messages' set also by Stampendous. Both sets were purchased at my local Michaels store

The papers are from the Mosaic memories Paper Pad by Recollections which I picked up at my local Michaels. I paper pieced the hats and scarves and added puffy dimensional fabric paint by 'Tulip' A bit of glitter glue and a few sequins finished it all off.

Double sided tape lifts the sentiment so the twisted easel card stays propped up nicely.

I'm sorry to see them go...but they need to travel with the mittens to carry a big hug to my friend!

For the mittens I used Red Heart 'Unforgettable' yarn (colourway 'Stained Glass') and the pattern 'Spring Is Coming' is available HERE on Ravelry