Hello Holly

This little fairy is Holly Starshine, yet another of the Sweet November digis that has been on review over at the All That Scraps Blog... there's even more coming next week too!  

I've coloured Miss Starshine with Copics, and breaking with tradition, didn't add any sparkle whatsoever!  It was an oversight, but the silver mat (cut with Marianne Designs die) is pretty shiny and probably doesn't need the competition, lol.  Holly is cut out then glued to the silver board.  It took forever to cut the image out... lesson learned; pay attention to how many fiddly bits are on the edges, and if necessary leave a bit of a border :-)  One Stop Craft Challenge has Christmas Fairies as its challenge, so I'm entering my little Christmas fairy there.

I used the sketch from Pink Inks last challenge, I didn't get this post up in time but thought it worth showing the sketch anyway as it's very "usable".  In the meantime Pink Ink has changed its name to "the Sketchy Challenge" so don't be confused :-)  They have an interesting sketch this time too.  For a change I haven't used Kaisercraft papers; I've used Basic Greys Jovial collection.  I love the rich dark tones of this paper, and it's nice to mix it up every now and again.

The flowers are cut using a Nellie Snellen floral punch, which comes with a die to emboss the petals... I have found if you dampen the paper before embossing it is more effective (running a ball stylus down the back of the petals at the end helps too).  The centres of the flowers are Pebbles, from the Boo collection, they're actually all the same colour, but the one at the top looks lighter because the glue hadn't dried behind it when I took the photo (I was, as usual, in a hurry!)  Sweet Stampin' has Punches and/or dies for its challenge this time, too easy!
I used my new Scalloped Circles Nestabilities die to cut the polka dot circle; I usually have a plain mat on top of a fancy edged one, but in this case I used the largest Scalloped circle and so had to resort to my old Fiskars system to cut the larger circle... it's certainly not as easy as a Nestie, but I was glad not to have to cut freehand! Bizzy Becs has Circles for its challenge, so I'm entering there.

The ribbon is from my stash, it looks quite plain in the pic, but is really nice and lush IRL.  Only the image mat and the triangle piece are foam dotted this time, so NOT like me :-) but it gave me the chance to stick the ribbon flat. 

The inside of the card echoes the sketch and uses papers from the front.  The sentiment is from Tickled Pink Stamps, as is the sentiment border, the whole thing cut using the matching die.

Paper Crafting Journey,  

Fab'n'funky Challenges, The Paper Shelter and Divas by Design all have Anything Goes challenges running, so I'll be entering there.  Pollycraft has Christmas Fun, Copic Oz has Christmas and Craft Your Passion has Tis the Season, so I'll be entering there too.
That's it from Holly and I, don't forget to pop over to the ATS blog and check out some of the other digis in review... there's lots of rubber available for the "old school" too ;-)  You can get them all here.  I'll be back in a day or so.  Until then, Happy Crafting, Donna