Hi, friends!!

It’s crazy that Christmas is just around the corner, and so is the new year! I just mailed my Christmas cards out today, and just like every year, it’s always a rush to the finish. Luckily, I had quite the head start on my cards thanks to all the design team work I’ve done, but I wanted to do some crafting for me with some of the products I’ve picked up this year (and I didn’t even get to use all of them yet 😅—but that’s a problem for after Christmas!).

One of the things I was in love with this year were the holiday-themed inlay dies that Concord & 9th came out with. They released the Ornament Inlay die, the Tree Lot Inlay die, the Christmas Lights Inlay die, and the Fa La La Inlay die, all of which I picked up, and I looooove them. Sure, it can be daunting to pick out a color palette to create with, but once you do and your die cutting is done, it’s just like doing a puzzle (though I definitely think a bit more while puzzling these together than I would with an actual puzzle!). So today’s blog post will be a shorty since there isn’t too much to know about these cards other than the color combo, which is Cranberry, Sweet Pea, Grapefruit, Lemongrass, and Juniper cardstocks from Concord & 9th. I love this palette so much!

This guy was my first card, and honestly, I hadn’t thought of making more of these cards until this one was finished. I really wanted to pull in a white background for this, so I cut some white cardstock from Sizzix and laid all my pieces in. I decided to go more realistic with the ornament topper, so I die cut that out of C9 matte silver cardstock (I used a small scrap and laid it over that part on the die so I didn’t waste a full sheet of that precious foil paper!). To finish this card off, I decided on using the Elegant Christmas 2 combo from Waffle Flower. I actually had this sentiment in my bin of spare sentiments, but I thought it felt right for this card, so I die cut a few more layers to add under it and glued it down on the card. One thing I do love about these inlay dies is it really cuts down the bulk (and the postage!!!) on these guys, so you don’t have to worry about things being too thick!

For this one, I wanted the opposite background from the last one, so I decided on Juniper for a little bit of drama. I decided at this point that I should pull in the white fall out pieces to really stretch my color combos, so I used that as my greenery. For the sentiment, I used the ‘deck the halls’ from the same stamp set from Waffle Flower.

For this guy, I was loving on Lemongrass! How fun is it as a background color?! I really love how the white ornament pops off from it. This time, I pulled a sentiment from my stash again, but it was from the Elegant Christmas Sentiments combo from Waffle Flower. Just to reiterate, the sentiment is from the first stamp set in the Elegant Christmas Sentiments line. I also thought it would be fun to put the sentiment in a different spot for this one because it was a bit longer.

How about pink Christmas?! I honestly really love this card too, it’s so playful! It almost reminds me of Whoville haha! For this one, I chose Sweet Pea as the background color, and I feel like the other colors really pop off from it (well, maybe not Grapefruit so much, but it’s still great!). The sentiment for this is also from the Elegant Christmas combo.

So, by this point, I was getting really nervous about my color combinations…I was worried I had too much Grapefruit going on with this card since the background was also Grapefruit, so I broke up the decorative teardrop colors by adding Sweet Pea into the ornament. And, since I was running low on pieces because of how I used them in previous cards, I alternated the decorative teardrops around the edges of the card in Cranberry and Sweet Pea. For the sentiment, I went back to the Elegant Christmas 2 combo.

I made it to the final stretch!! This guy feels really bold to me because of that Cranberry background, but I really love it. It feels like traditional Christmas (maybe minus the pink greenery), so it gives off a cozy vibe to me. To finish it off, I popped on a sentiment from the Elegant Christmas 2 combo. Those sentiment sets from Waffle Flower were exactly what I needed, so please remember to ‘shop your stash’, I know it can be tempting to buy new sentiments every year!

When I tell you the sense of accomplishment I felt finishing this last card off was insane, I do mean it haha! I feel like I completed a crafty marathon! I love each and every one of these cards and it’s great that the design is super cute and it’s not something you need dimension for to add a bit of ‘wow’ to your cards. These relieved so much stress for me when it came to mailing, too, so that’s always a win!

I hope you enjoyed today’s post! I should have 3 more that will hopefully make it up on the blog before Christmas, but if you don’t see a post, the photos will definitely be on my Instagram! If I don’t catch you again before the holiday, I hope you have a very Merry Christmas!

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