Stamp-a-Stack

I loved Christmas break!  I loved not running my kids to all of their classes, not teaching piano, and not doing all of the other things I generally need to do.  Now, of course, I had some silly notions that I was going to work hard on de-junking various places in the house, organizing the kids closets/drawers, spiffing up the office, etc.  Um....who am I kidding?!  Christmas break=Stamping marathon!  Last year I went on a little vacation over Christmas break.  This year I stayed home and gave myself a "play-cation." It was awesome!

My first project was to stamp a stack of "Get Well Soon" cards and "Thank You" cards as I was running very low on those.  I had given my hubby's godmother the Tin of Cards for Christmas, and she was very excited about it, but mentioned she needed some "Get Well Soon" cards too (oops, not in the kit).  My mother-in-law also needed thank you cards so this inspired me to whip up a batch of both so so I could give some to them and have some for myself.

Sometimes I spend a lot of time on one card, at other times, I mass produce a simple card pattern as shown in the polka-dot cards above.  I like doing both things!

I guess I hadn't gotten my fill of making Christmas cards, so my next move was to make Christmas themed thank you cards (for all of the lovely gifts I received). I did NOT whip these cards up.  It took me forever to figure out how I wanted to make these!  Ha, ha, that's what happens when I'm not making a direct copy from Pinterest!  I have been wanting to use the bird builder punch to make a Cardinal for a long time and I finally got around to it.  This punch art stuff is a bit tedious and time-consuming, but I like the results.  Of course I had to add glitter to every snowflake on my embossed background!

In spite of the tediousness, I made eights of those beauties and I also made a giant mess on my stamping desk! Ha, ha!

My next project was to try and re-create a cute store-bought card given to me by one of my piano students.  My initial plan was to punch out three circles and piece together Mr. Snowman but that was taking far too long.  I ended up using a snowman from a retired set to make the card.  It didn't turn out quite the way I was hoping, but I still like it. 

Store-bought card

My homemade version

My next design was much more simple as I was trying to find an easier card to mass produce (all of my cute piano students gave me gifts so I needed a stack of thank you cards).  This is what I came up with:

I also made this snowy scene card with the cardinal on the fence.  I saw something similar to this on Pinterest and have been itching to make it.  It was my hubby's favorite.  If only the glitter on these cards would show up on pictures!  Just imagine how pretty they are with dazzling diamond glitter shimmering everywhere! :)

I almost forgot to mention the stamping I did the day before Christmas.  I needed some tags to go with some gold wrapping paper so I made some tags using the Holly Jolly Greetings bundle and the Winter Wonderland Designer Washi Tape (on clearance right now!):

All in all, I stamped quite a few stacks over Christmas break and loved every minute of it.  I only wish it wasn't over.  It will be hard to return to all of my responsibilities Monday morning!

P.S. Sale-A-Bration is right around the corner!  Beginning January 5th, you can pick free Sale-A-Bration products with every $50 order.  More details to come!