Who does not love to read??

Hello everyone
Welcome and good to see you here!. Hope you are all well ahead with your Christmas preparations! Can you believe it is now less than 2 weeks away (scary.....)
I love making gifts and have a friend who is an avid reader, so what better gift than a homemade book mark? To make it look a bit more special, I created a book-shaped holder to tug the bookmark into.

These were the stamps and other products I used:
Stamps: 
Traveling Words
Christmas plate 3
Mini Christmas
Calligraphic Mat 12
Other products:
Ideaology Kraft Resist Seasonal
 Claudine Helmuth Multi Medium Matte
Ranger Distress Stains in Pewter, Bundled Sage and Picket Fence
Distress Inks in Bundled Sage, Brushed Corduroy, Peacock Feather, Festive Berries
Adirondac Color Wash Cranberry
Archival Ink in Jet Black and Cobalt
From My Stash:
Various dies, Treasure Gold, corner rounder punch, smooth stamping card, foam tape, gold embossing powder, small piece of scrapbook paper, crinkled seam binding, script embossing folder, various small embellishments.
1. I started by cutting a piece of the Kraft Resist Seasonal paper to & 3/4 by 7 1/2 inches and scored and then folded along the long side at 3 3/4 and 4". I rounded the corners, inked around the edges with Brushed Corduroy Distress Ink and then Treasure Gold White Fire, to give it an aged antique look. This is the cover of the booklet.

2. I cut a piece of smooth white card to the same size and scored in exactly the same way. I spread the distress stains on my craft mat, swiped my card through it several times, spritzt it with water and dried it with my heat gun. I then inked it further with my chosen Distress Inks until I was happy with the result. Next I gold embossed the Calligraphic Mat stamp all over it and inked around the edges, and finally glued it onto the cover using Multi Matte Medium

3. To embellish the outside I stamped the Santa stamp from the Christmas Plate twice with Jet Black Archival ink, coloured with Distress inks and  die cut and layered as shown in the picture. I fastened a piece of seam binding, died with Cranberry Color Wash underneath my ornament first.I then mounted it onto the cover with foam tape. Those of you who are observant will see that the die cut is a Spellbinders die and the great news is that in the new year the Artistic Stamper will start to stock Spellbinder dies, so keep your eyes peeled!!

4. The inside was done in a similar way, creating a pocket with one of the die-cuts that I ran through an embossing folder first.

Here you can see some more detail:

5. For the bookmark I cut a a piece of strong card to 2 by 6" and covered it on two sides with scrapbook paper. I stamped one of the stamps of the Traveling Words set in Jet Black archival ink, cut, inked and mounted it as shown and finished it with some ribbon and small embellishments.

Here you can see the bookmark inside its pocket:

Here finally you can see the back of the booklet, again I first cut a bit of seam binding and then glued a small die cut ornament over it

Well |I hope you enjoyed this little project and feel inspired to make some of your own last minute gifts still.
I wish you all the most wonderful, peaceful and happy Christmas. I will be back on Boxing Day with another project.
Until then, stay happy and crafty!

Let it Snow...

Hello everyone, Astrid here with my second project for November.

I seem to have fallen in love with the colours blue and brown, not exactly traditional for Christmas projects, but for some reason I can't seem to get away from them.....
For my second project this month  I decided to make a piece of Christmas wall art.
I used the following stamps for my project:
Mini Christmas 1
Christmas Greetings 1 and
Music# 011
I started by taking a piece of 5.5 by 4" smooth white card and coloured it by putting some Distress Stains in Tarnished Brass, Bundles Sage and Picket Fence on my craft sheet and swiping my card stock through it several times. I then coloured it further  with some  Distress Inks in Chipped Sapphire, Vintage Photo and Scattered Straw. I  crumpled it all up, roughly flattened it again and then dried it with my heatgun. I then ran it through an embossing folder from my stash and darkened the embossed bits some more.

The next step was to colour a small canvas board with Pains Grey acrylic paint, it's called grey but is actually blue. I'm pretty sure you would get a very similar effect with Sapphire Blue Distress Stains, but I don't have that one. Before it had dried I dabbed it with a piece of kitchen towel to get a textured effect and when it was dry I  stamped some of the little snowflakes from the Christmas Greetings 1 plate in white by using the Picket Fence Distress Marker. Love how they slowly start to appear against the dark background. I embellished the background with a strip of canvas tape, stamped with the music stamp and some lace.

The final steps were to stamp some of the Christmas stamps from the two plates I used on smooth card, cutting them out and colouring them with the same colours of Distress Inks. Next I cut theTim Holtz Decorative Snowflake Rosette Die, slightly inked and glittered with some Diamond Stickles. I ran the topper through a little snowflake embossing folder in my stash to give it some more texture and then I put it all together as you can see on the photo.

Thank you for dropping by, - I hope you liked my project and feel inspired to use some of the wonderful Artistic Stamper Christmas stamps for your own Christmas projects.