Christmas preparations ....

... I think it's time I started mine.  I've seen some wonderful Christmas cards on Splitcoaststampers and Docrafts Gallery - there are so many talented people about.  And I'm only just starting to think about my cards. 

Our family and friends are spread about the UK, consequently, I have to make quite a lot of cards - normally in excess of 150!!  I usually end up helping the children too.  I also try to make some to sell at the school and/or Scout fete.  So I think I'd better get started.  To be fair, I do have some lovely Nutcracker stamps that will be perfect for a series of 10 cards.  And I know that I'm going to be using some Christmas tree and holly stamps.  I hope to get some new sets from Stampin' Up! after my party on Saturday - so I may be using some baubles too.  Below are some of the cards I made in 2008 featuring the Elusive Images Christmas Trees and Holly spray.

I did a series of eight black and white cards featuring various Christmas trees.   I did half of them with black trees on a white background and the other half with white trees on a black background.  I was very pleased with the way these turned out.  And they were popular at the school fair too - I sold most of them and had to make some more. 

For this series of eight cards, I did red,black and white.  I used the same stamps, with half the set stamped red trees on a white background and the other half red trees on a black background.  While the red trees on a black background looked great in reallife, they didn't photograph very well.  But below is one of the red trees on white - which worked really well and looked really luxurious.

I find that holly leaves tend to feature heavily on my Christmas cards - and in the Christmas trees set from Elusive Images was a beautiful holly spray which worked really well.

So these are cards from Christmas Past.  Now I need to concentrate on Christmas Future.  At craft class this morning I was playing with my Nutcracker stamps and working out different colour schemes - hopefully, I'll post some pictures later this week.  To be honest, I didn't get much done this morning as it was our first meeting since July and we all had so much catching up to do.  Swapping stories of summer holidays and showing off our new goodies :))

I'll say good night now, as I must get back to my astronomy course.  I find that making cards is a great way to avoid working on my assignment - but it's due in on 28th October so I really must get down to some serious work.  See you tomorrow.