Aloha, all!
If you’ve been following along with me this week, you know that I sneaked in a Christmas card for my Throwback Thursday blog post this week. But today is Saturday, and I’ve promised that every Saturday in September will feature a Christmas card. So this week is a two-fer!
A Stamp Set Perfect for Slimline Cards!
I bought the Joyful Holly Stamp Set for just one reason – to make a slimline card. Oh, I knew it would be good for other types of cards, too. But I could just see those two long sprigs of holly stretching out to fill an 8-1/2″ long card.
And do they ever fill out this card nicely.
CASE-ing a Catalog
The layout of the card itself was in a weekly Facebook group challenge I check out each Tuesday. The group is called CASE-in Tuesday, and is opened to all card-makers. The focus of the CASE-ing (Copy And Share Everything*) is one of the Stampin’ Up! catalogs. The “original” for this card is a somewhat slim card on page 8 of the Stampin’ Up! 2020 August – December Mini Catalog. What I CASEd were the main layer colors – a Crumb Cake Cardstock card base and a large banner made with printed paper from the Heartwarming Hugs Designer Series Paper set. The other main color in the original was Pear Pizzazz. But there’s where I diverged a bit.
A Side Note on the Original Design
When you see a sample card or other design in a catalog, it’s usually there to show off the product that’s being sold on one or two pages associated with the sample. This sample shows off 6 products from the Heartwarming Hugs Suite of products. Besides the printed paper, there’s also the Warm Hugs Stamp Set, the Real Red Linen Trim, Glitter Star Ornaments, the Warm Wraps Dies, and the Wrapped In Texture Embossing Folders. I really do like that Stampin’ Up! now arranges for us to be able to buy an entire suite of products with just one item number (see the carousel below for the item number for this Suite). But I am just not into 3D projects much this year as there’s not much of a social life (yet) in which to share them. So I didn’t want any of the coffee cup-related products, and didn’t buy the suite.
Back to My Design
Unlike what is needed for a catalog, I – and you! – can use products from other suites and bundles to make our cards just as we want them. That’s what CASE-ing is all about. What I had that I am loving is another set of papers from the Mini Catalog, the Tis the Season Designer Series Paper set. There is a luscious red and green plaid print in that set that I was sure would complement this design perfectly. And I think I was right! I may not want to mix stripes and plaids when I’m dressing. But I think it looks great on a card!
Back to the red, I went back to the original and pulled out some of the fun Real Red 3/16″ Braided Linen Trim. I went REALLY far back for the sentiment element. That beautiful ornate frame and the sentiment layer both come from what was promoted in last year’s Holiday Catalog as a Halloween die set. It was aptly named, Ornate Frames. The sentiment itself is from another Christmas set from last year’s catalog, Christmas Gleaming.
About the Joyful Holly Stamp Set
I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk a bit about the may stamp set for this project, Joyful Holly. This is what Stampin’ Up! used to label a “2-Step Stamp.” There stamps for the outline of the two holly springs and separate stamps for the inside color. No hand coloring these beauties! I arranged the outline stamps on one side of my Stamparatus plate and the fill stamps on the other side. I already have a stack of these boughs of holly! The stamping goes so quickly that I have already decided that this is going to be my main Christmas card for the 2020 season. Those of you who follow me regularly know that I am the proud owner of a Brother Scan n Cut machine. And that machine cuts those boughs out like a champ. I’m already set up for mass production, with another pack of the Heartwarming Hugs Designer Series Paper on order. There are plenty of reds and greens in that set to get me through my project.
A Tip for 6″ x 6″ Papers
If you want to make a slimline card with this design, but only have the 6″ x 6″ papers, no worries. Just cut your 6″ papers in half to make two 3″ x 6″ strips. Then cut across the paper to make a 3″ x 4″ and a 3″ x 2″ piece. Adhere the ends to the top and bottom of the middle strip (on the back, of course).
I hope by now you have a good stack of holiday cards! If not, there’ll definitely be a suggestion for another card next Saturday. And I’m sure I’ll be working some more Christmas cards into my schedule in October and November!
Happy stamping, whatever you’re making!
*There are two different ideas about what “CASE” stands for. Stampin’ Up! is promoting the phrase that I used in the post above. But I personally prefer, “Copy And Share with Everyone.”
