December Roundup

Here I am (already!) with the last post of 2025.  It seems to me that the year has absolutely flown by.  We had a lovely time over the festive period, spending time with family and friends, old and new.  My sister and I had a visit to Waddesdon Manor, near Aylesbury, to see their light show and manor.  We are like Kevin from Home Alone in that we love Christmas trees and we were weren’t disappointed as the house was full of them.  There was a light show on the house and a light trail in the grounds, all of which made for a great day out.

For this last post, I’m sharing a few of the cards and crafts I’ve made during the run up to Christmas.  My friend and I went to a glass fusing workshop to make Christmas decorations and these were my collection.  I was slightly addicted to making wreaths!  Some of these were given as gifts and some adorn my various trees.

Although I try to make some Christmas cards each month, I’d not made any since early in the year and I was well short so had to get batch making.  I started with Tim Holtz Stampers Anonymous Mr Fostie.

Next was the annual outing for the Stampers Anonymous Christmas Snarky Cats.  I love these guys!

You may have seen my Instagram reel last week where I showed the making of this batch of Visible Image Christmas tree cards.

I’ve been meaning to try out free motion embroidery on card so this card for Mr L was my first attempt.  I liked this although mistletoe was possibly not the easiest subject to start with!  

I’m a member of a local art group and at the Christmas do, there was a card competition.  I’d wanted to have a go at painting a sunset over a snowy scene so that was my plan for the card.   I sketched a simple scene and watercoloured the sky and snow.  To challenge myself, I only used the three primary colours (French Ultramarine, Cadmium Yellow and Alizarin Crimson) for this and used these to mix all the others I needed.  It was a good learning experience.  I thought I’d overdone the colour as the only white part of the painting was where I lifted out the paint for the sun.  I added some salt for some frosty texture, an effect I really like.

I’d just started on the fence when Scooby decided he needed a cuddle so painting had to be suspended for 20 minutes or so!

Once painting resumed, I added the hat and scarf and increased the shadows to give the snowman dimension.   I did use some Payne’s Grey for the coals for the face and buttons and then finally spattered some Dr Ph Martin’s Bleedproof white for snow.  I was delighted to win the competition and a bottle of Prosecco!

Finally, I continued my 12 Days of Christmas ornaments that I gift to a couple of friends each year.  Ruth is on Day 7, the Swan a-swimming…

And Jane is on Day 3, the French hen.

I’ve realised that December is busy so deciding that I need to start Christmas projects then is just making life stressful so I’m planning to spread them out during the year next year.  Watch this space to see how that pans out! 

Wishing you a happy, crafty New Year.