WLS Nov #1 - Christmas Critters

Good Morning Everyone

Its the first sunday of November (scary!) and time for a new challenge over at We Love Stamping where the theme this month is 

CHRISTMAS CRITTERS

So time to get those last Christmas cards made.  Ive used a reindeer stamp which is within an arch so it made sense that i used my very old and much loved crealies Arch dies with it.  I also decided i needed to use some of the pile of backgrounds ive made over the years.

I first dug through my box of inky offcuts for pieces for the reindeers which has given us a rainbow of reindeer - but then these are magic reindeer with their wings ready to lead Father Christmas through the night sky🎅

Approx size 5x7" Card base die cut using Crealies XL arch dies.  

I stamped the image with dark blue ink onto the background and the piece for the reindeer.  The background i die cut into an arch, i added white posca pen to the stamped details and a grey alcohol marker for some shading.  Then put the panel through a dotty embossing folder for some falling snow. 

I fussy cut the deer from the 2nd stamped image and gave it some vellum wings by stamping just the wings onto white vellum, cutting them out and adhering behind the body.  I then adhered the reindeer flat onto the base image leaving the wings unstuck to add a bit of movement. 

I raided my luxury card stash and found this beautiful gold holographic went perfectly with my golden deer for a mat layer.  Woodware sentiment stamped onto white using the same blue ink used to stamp the image and added across the front. 

 I used a hole punch to punch to circles from the offcut from the blue background and adhered these to the sentiment strip, they give a faux gem look but match the colours perfectly and are totally flat for posting.  In the past i have done this and added glitter or glossy accents to them but in this case as my background is very blingy i left them plain. 

Just a close up, sadly as usual the photos don't show the beautiful shimmer of the mica powders in the background and the reindeer, well or the holographic either.  When the light hits the card it really does dance and sparkle.

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I made a batch of these for Christmas making a good dent in my pile of backgrounds and inky offcuts.

The reindeer is a scrap of paper I'd marbled years ago using the shaving foam technique - fun but oh so messy! As the marbling has pink in it i matched it with a blue brusho background which has flecks of pink pixie powder in it.  Matted onto ombre glitter card which went really well with the reindeer. 

Another marbled scrap for the deer, this one had flecks of green so picked a brusho and pixie powder background with touches of green

This is more traditional deer colour, the brusho background had this lovely section of pattern so i stamped the reindeer to encase it, giving it a mane like appearance which reindeer do get.  It also has a soft orange hue so i used orange satin card for my mat layer, which is beautiful but looks rubbish on the photos.  You would think with all the amazing technology these days we could get cameras that actually pick up on sparkle, shimmer and shine😁 

Items Used:

 Stampendous Laurel Birch 'Reindeer Spirit' #LBCP006

Crealies XL arch dies

Woodware Sentiment stamp

Sizzix swiss dot embossing folder

Brusho powders

Cosmic Shimmer pixie powders

VersafineClair Ink 'Medieval Blue'

White posca pen

Grey Alcohol marker

Various holographic, glitter & satin cardstock

CraftUK white hammered card

Papermania vellum

We have this amazing two red robins prize this month so hop over to We Love Stamping to join in with your stamped projects

Id love to enter the first card into:

https://jinglebellesrock.blogspot.com/2026/10/while-shepherds-watched-their-flocks.html

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https://addictedtostamps-challenge.blogspot.com/2026/10/challenge-529-any-occasion.html

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