Sixth Street Sundries

Emily Midgett

christmas card

PTI blog hop for Dawn McVey

Good morning! So, I’ve had a very long obsession with Papertrey Ink stamps. It honestly was the second company from which I purchased any stamps, and after I received my first order, I was absolutely hooked. The super high quality stamps, the coordinating ink and card stock…. I was smitten. Though I don’t have as much time to play with my PTI products as I used to (hasn’t stopped me from purchasing, ahem), I still follow along with each release and glean SO much inspiration from their crazy talented designers. One of those designers, Dawn McVey, has been having a series of very serious health troubles for the last few years, and finally was able to receive a small intestine transplant that will hopefully give her some relief, at long last! (To read all of her story and/or to donate money to her recovery, click here.) To celebrate this auspicious occasion, the cardmakers who adore Dawn’s style and trendy products from Papertrey Ink are taking part in a blog hop using Dawn’s products!

Dawn is known for her florals and use of color, as well as the vintage flair that she adds to all of her projects and products. I personally love her holiday sets; she has so many, and they are all so unique and so lovely. For my project for today’s blog hop, I chose to work with Deck the Halls. I die cut and stamped the wreath and bow from PTI’s white card stock (the only white card stock I use. So sturdy and economical!), then stamped it with Tropical Teal and Pure Poppy inks.

I have had this card in my head for awhile, since the Garden Gate Make It Market kit came out. I die cut the gate from plain white card stock and added the sentiment from Deck the Halls in black ink down in the corner. For the background, I blended some Spring Rain ink at the top of the card base, gradually tapering it off down towards the bottom of the card. I used a snowfall stencil to add some snowflakes with pearlescent embossing paste. I adhered the gate with the wreath to the card front using dimensional adhesive.

Well, that’s all for me today! I am so happy for Dawn, even though she has a long road to recovery…. hopefully this transplant will be the answer for which she’s been searching for so long! Sending big hugs and lots of healing thoughts to you!

Christmas is officially in season!

Hi there! I hope you had a happy Halloween and have recovered from your sugar intake! My kiddos are at that age where Halloween is cute AND fun…. not nearly as much work to get a reaction from them like last year! An almost 3 year old doesn’t really “get” Halloween, but an almost 4 year old definitely does haha! Batman and Mademoiselle Ballerina received lots of oohs and aahs in our neighborhood, as well as plenty of candy. It should last us til… oh, next week. Ha! I feel no shame in posting holiday cards after Halloween, so be prepared! 😉

Today, I have another holiday card using the Concord and 9th Ornamental stamp and die set (C9|SSS|EH). I started by die cutting the main ornament image using the largest die in the set from watercolor paper. I then used silver detail embossing powder to stamp the lovely florals from the Ornamental stamp set, then added the coordinating “merry and bright” greeting using silver sparkle embossing powder, stamped and heat embossed twice to get extra thick coverage.

I used my Zig markers (SSS|EH|AZ) and damp paintbrush to color the image in lovely jewel tones. I cut a piece of silver glitter paper slightly smaller than A2 size, then matted it on some wine colored card stock.

I popped up the ornament with dimensional adhesive, then added a white velvet bow. I love how ornate this ornament is, but the card construction itself is fairly simple. Gorgeous stamp design.

That’s all for me today! Have a marvelous Wednesday!

Jump Start the Holidays with Hero Arts!

Good morning! Today, the team at A Blog Named Hero are participating in a wonderful blog hop celebrating the crafty comeback of Lea Lawson. If you don’t know Lea’s story, click here. We are so excited to join Hero Arts in celebrating her return to the crafty world! The entire A Blog Named Hero team is here to provide you with some inspiration to help jump start your holiday crafting! You should have arrived here from Donna’s blog and your next stop is Kelly’s blog.

There’s something about a pretty bird surrounded by snowflakes and pine boughs that screams winter to me. To create this wintry project, I started by blending Hero Arts Stonewash, Pool, and Soft Pool ink on an A2 panel. I then stamped snowflakes from an older mini set by Lia Griffith using white pigment ink and blended some more white pigment ink around the edge of the panel to really give it a frosty look. I also added a few dots here and there with my white gel pen.

After I had created the background panel, I began stamping the focal point of the card. I stamped the beautiful cardinal (female cardinals are brown, which is a cousin of gray, just go with it haha!) from Color Layering Cardinal using Shades of Gray cubes and the pine boughs were stamped using both Antiqua and Emerald Green inks. I fussy cut them all, adding in a few loose pine boughs. I adhered the main branch and cardinal with dimensional adhesive, then added in some loose boughs using regular adhesive to add lots of dimension.

To create the greeting, I die cut the peace from the Peace Stamp ‘n Cut using silver foil, then stamped the rest of the greeting onto some thin strips of card stock and mounted them with foam tape. The last step was to add a few sequins from my stash.

We will be giving away a $25 gift certificate, randomly chosen from all of the comments left at every stop along the blog hop. To enter, leave a comment on any of the blogs by Friday, November 10th at 11:59pst, and the winner will be announced on Lea Lawson’s blog on Sunday, November 12th.

Have fun, and good luck! 🙂

Christmas In July!

Good morning! Christmas in July has been eeeeeeverywhere lately. I really need to start working on holiday cards, but we’ve been so busy that it hasn’t even crossed my mind until I saw the Christmas in July sale from Ellen Hutson and thought maybe I should take a look at the (many) holiday stamp sets I purchased during the after Christmas sales last year haha! I had forgotten about this absolutely gorgeous ornament set from Birch Press Designs, and I knew that I needed to make a card with it to celebrate Christmas in July!

I started by die cutting the pretty Classic Ornament set from plain white card stock, then heat embossed the pretty decorative ornament stamps from the coordinating Beaded Ornament stamp set using silver embossing powder. I then used my foam blending tools to blend Caribbean Sky, Puffy Heart, and Lavender Fields ink on the edges of the ornaments. (For some reason, my holiday cards before October always are in pastel shades. My brain can’t seem to leave summer behind until then!)

I then cut the beautiful Winter Floral cover plate die from Papertrey Ink using some hunter green card stock. I trimmed off the solid edge and smaller floral cluster, leaving just the larger floral cluster intact. I arranged the ornaments beneath the floral cluster to create the illusion that they were hanging on the branches of a Christmas tree, then blended the same ink colors (Caribbean Sky, Puffy Heart, and Lavender Fields) lightly on the corner of the card base. I was trying to give the impression of lights in the Christmas tree bouncing off of the shimmery glass ornaments… I hope that came across!

For the greeting, I used the lovely Believe die from Ellen Hutson’s holiday release last year. I die cut it first from some pink glitter paper, then twice more from regular white card stock and adhered them all together to create a dimensional die cut. The final step was to add some sequins here and there and under the foliage of the Christmas tree branches to add some sparkle.

I hope you enjoyed this project! I have far too many holiday stamp sets that have been untouched… I think I should try to set a goal of one holiday card a week for awhile. What do you think? Have you started on your holiday cards yet?

Hope you have a marvelous day, friends!