Happy New Year

So.... here we are in another New Year!
I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year - who can believe it's 2019 already?!  This is one of those "zero" years for me... I turn the Big 6Zero in April ... so "already" really does have extra significance for me this time around!
I thought I'd share the last of my 2017 Christmas cards as I did get a few Christmas cards made this year (woops, last year, in 2018!) and those, added to the "unblogged" projects I made through the year add up nearly 60 projects still to share from my drafts -so time to get 2017 out of the equation :-)

They are mostly foiled cards as they were definitely "Flavour of the Month" for December 17.  

The first uses yet another as yet unused digital image I can't even remember getting, never mind where from, foiled with gold Deco Foil (I know, hard to see in the pic, the small pic is for foil-showing purposes, lol) The sentiment is computer generated and foiled using the laminator the same way as the image.  I love this paper, it's from Wild Rose Studio "Annabelle's Christmas" pad, it is quite lightweight but as long as you use a nice sharp blade it's nice to use.  I used MFT Stitched Circle dies to cut the image panel and mat and Paper Roses Scalloped Squares to cut the large red mat... I actually cut it as a frame, leaving a white border around the patterned paper... I used the centre cut out part as a red mat on another card.

The second card uses the same image, but this time I foiled the bauble in red and the string in gold, I foiled the sentiment in the red Deco Foil too.  No patterned paper on this one, just kraft card and gold foil matting.

Third one for the day is the simplest of all... though really quite effective in real life.  Another lovely digital image - whose pedigree I cannot recall - Foiled in green Deco Foil with red gems in various sizes representing baubles, I didn't even add a sentiment to the front of this card, only the inside.

That's it for this post... I have another post written up with the (very) last of this batch of cards... honestly... that I'll share in a day or so.   In the meantime I'd like to enter these cards in the following challenges:

Crafty Hazelnut's Patterned Paper Challenge Use Patterned Paper

Tuesday Throwdown Winter Sparkles (They're Christmas cards and sparkly gems)

Crazy 4 Challenges Tree-mendous

Christmas with the Cuties Carols or Songs (Oh Christmas Tree)

Sweet Stampin', Die Cut Divas, My Time to Craft and Simon Says Challenge, Something New (all the images are newbies to me)

Cutie Pie Challenge Add Some Sparkle… those gems again :-)

Sasayaki Glitter Happy Holidays

The Paper Shelter, Sweet Stampin' Christmas, Winter Wonderland, Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge Christmas
As You Like It,  Cute Card Thursday, Through the Craftroom Door, Digi Choosday, Crafty  Creations, Li'l Patch of Crafty Friends, Polkadoodles, Creatalicious Challenges, Crafting With Attitude, and Corrosive Challenge Anything Goes

That's it for today... I'll be back in a few days with those last few Chrissie cards.  I have to take my poor darling Rocky to the vet tomorrow, he has "done" his other knee now and has to have it reconstructed.  Of course it happened after hours and we had to take him to the Emergency Vet ($224 thanks very much!) and now nearly $2k for surgery!!  It was a tough decision to make whether to put him through it, he is not as happy a little dog as he was before he went blind and it is quite a tough recovery, but after discussing with the vet it has been decided that it is worth a try for him... he can't NOT have it done as the recovery to a reasonable state of movement without intervention would take too long (mainly because of the medication he is on for his Lupus) and he is pretty miserable being unable to see and barely able to move.  
The only option is to put him to sleep.  If he was not such a sloth of a dog anyway I don't think we would be going down this route, and euthanasia would be the only option, but he spends his time just layin' around and has for years... he's not "missing out" on a lot of activities so much as being spared them!
Of course, the alternative is so unpalatable for US... it is hard, we want to do the right thing by him and not keep him going for us, with scant regard for his well being but don't want to "end his suffering" if he's not suffering but just chilling.  My last little darling boy did the right thing by us and died after climbing onto my lap after going for his daily walk - heartbreaking but at least we weren't forced into that pet-owners Sophies Choice.  We'll see how it all goes
Until next time, Happy Crafting, Donna x