Snooze time!

This week on the Lili's Little Fairies challenge blog we would like to know what's your favourite craft tool, along with your creation using a LOTV image of course.  It wont come as a surprise to you that I love to add embellishments made from various Marianne dies to my cards.  What might surprise you is that I use my old red Sizzix machine to cut out the small dies .. .. it means I can use up the smallest scraps of card quickly and easily, and by layering with small 3d pads or spots of glue I can keep the finished card reasonably flat and easier to post, hence easier to sell at a craft fair too when folks are looking to make savings these days.  I have the magnetic adaptor plate fitted then simply place my piece of card on the white cutting mat, place the die on top, then a small Sizzix square adaptor on top of that and slide it along, press the handle and slide out.  To emboss I have a piece of funky foam I put on top of the cutting plate, then the die with the card still in place cutting edge up, then the rubber embossing mat on top and slide through - perfectly embossed die cuts with just a few slides.  Any diecutting tends to be labour intensive, but I find using my old red Sizzix a quicker alternative to turning the handle on my Cuttlebug!

So, I've made a pastel toned Christmas card with the cute Christmas Snooze stamp by LOTV and coloured with Copics:

The beige and brown colours are from E40-E47 range, plus E81 as a shadow for the pale E40 on puppy together with the dark cool grey C7 and a touch of B99.  Using that hint of dark blue ties puppy in to the chap snoozing after Christmas dinner as I used the paler B90s for his clothing.  As I needed a green for the holly leaves on his mug I used BG93-99 for the green touches and warm greys for the shadows.  The background paper is a digi piece by Cuddly Buddly I had printed in my stash and the text is a LOTV stamp.  I've used pale blue and green card for matting and my embellishments then finished with sparkly gems - well you need a touch of bling for Christmas!

I hope you will come and join in the LLF challenge and let us know what your favourite crafty tool is.  Our sponsor for this challenge is the Ribbon Girl with a £10 voucher as a prize.