HeARTful Stamper: Power Poppy digital stamp

Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Very Merry Holly Berries

I really like challenges because they give me ideas to focus on when there are so many choices in my stamp arsenal. I made another Christmas card inspired by two previous challenges I saw, one to include holly and another to include candy canes. I knew holly was symbolic at Christmas. Here's what it means: Legend states that holly berries were originally white, but that the blood Christ shed for the sins of humankind stained the berries forever red. A holly's pointed leaves symbolize the crown of thorns placed on Jesus' head before he died on the cross. Candy canes are symbolic, too. The 'J' can mean Jesus. The white of the cane stands for the purity of Jesus Christ and the red stripes are for the blood he shed when he died on the cross.

I selected a digital stamp I've had from Power Poppy that had both holly and a candy cane. I colored the image with Copics. The sentiment is from a retired CTMH stamp set, Joy to You and Me. The Ruby colored paper from long-retired Sparkle and Shine had a pattern resembling the pattern on the embossing folder I used. I chose to use this sketch from The Paper Players Challenge:

I'm sharing this card with the following challenges:

A Snowflake's Promise Challenge #51 - anything goes

Christmas at Sweet Stampin' May Challenge - anything Christmas goes

The Holly and the Ivy Challenge #30 - anything goes

The Merry Christmas Challenge #22 - anything Christmas goes

The Paper Players Challenge #395 - sketch

Thank you for visiting! May you be blessed as you create cards to bless others!

Philippians 1:6 (WEB)
being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you
will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.

Sunday, May 20, 2018

Poinsettia Peace and Joy

We live in a world in desperate need of peace as well as joy. This Christmas card sentiment has a much deeper meaning than a trite or overused expression during the holidays. I saw another school shooting this week that was violent and senseless. When I was in school, one of our teachers taught us The Golden Rule at the beginning of the year and had it posted in front of the room all year: ³¹Do to others as you would have them do to you. (NRSV) Luke 6:31. In high school a student would always read a scripture and another would lead in prayer before assemblies. Both schools were public schools.

Teachers and schools can't do that now. Taking the influence of the Bible and prayer out of school may have kept some from being offended, but it also removed the positive influence of Christian values that had been present in our society for generations. Now we must pray for the Prince of Peace to heal troubled minds and hearts in the parts of our world where violence has destroyed peace and joy.

I made two versions of this Christmas card. Hubby likes the first and I like the second. They were made from DCWV paper, a gold embossed sentiment, gold sequins, and a ribbed gold ribbon.

To make these cards I played with the Power Poppy digital image in Photoshop to change it from a black and gray to an rgb image so I could change the color balance to red and magenta instead of black.