Christmas Already?

Time sure flies.

The flurry of post-wedding sorting, tidying, organising and documenting has only just started to calm down, and I find myself half-buried under an avalanche of card-making materials.

But it's the life I signed up for, I guess! Actually, this year, without a wedding looming in the near distance I feel very relaxed about Christmas preparations. Good thing, too, since I have nearly 100 cards to make for customers! The first batch has already gone, and I'm working on the second next week.

rolled paper scraps make a great Christmas tree

and give such interesting dimension to a card

the brief was traditional, but I like to add my own twist

again, great dimension from these baubles

and reusing last year's gift tags? genius!

 How about you? Have you started with Christmas yet? 

Just My Type

Very often I really struggle to express through spoken word the feelings and thoughts that are in my head. And on rare occasions I struggle to express through written word what I want to say. Today is one of these, so I'm going to let my photos do the talking. This is a little set of cards I made at a friend's request, just in time for their valentine to receive them tomorrow.

My First Customer

I put together the final card designs for my first paying customer, a good friend who, like me, strives to stave off all things Hallmark. While I combat the greetings card giant with a burning hot glue gun, blinding embossing powder, and scything pinking shears, my friend uses her extreme powers of investigation to find the almost-invisible independent craftspeople who can help her build up a forcefield of handmade stuff. The final two sets of cards I made were a female birthday set and a male blank set:

Once the collection was complete, I had great fun indulging my stationery-loving side by packaging all the sets in a Rather Agreeable Manner:

And because I'm such a nice, kind craftsperson and want to pledge my allegiance against the greetings card giant, I included a freebie for my friend:

I loved all that packaging up! And she loved all the unwrapping and finding delights! I think it's safe to say I have One Happy Customer, so that's a good 100% record for me so far.