Hi There Crafty Friends!
Wowee, I sure am mega excited about my dear friend Barbara Anne Williams’ NEW Christmas 2010 Collection – The 12 Days of Christmas. This mega sized collection of winter goodness lavishes upon us beautiful artwork available as Rubber Stamps, Digi Stamps, 3D Decoupage, Digi Papers, Printable Pinch Boxes and Door Hangers and Coloured Clip Art. Barbara is so eloquent with her words that I’m gonna let her do the talking all the way from Utah USA, so over to you Barbara …
Guess what! It’s already tomorrow on a beautiful little Scottish island I know of, and I don’t have to wait one more moment, or count down again. . . because it’s here!!!
I’m so excited about ALL of the new products, as you’ve read in my recent blog posts – but perhaps the most exciting for me are the rubber stamps. I love how rubber stamps open up the possibility of embossing and using various colors and textures. They also lend themselves to so many interesting and ingenious artistic techniques. These are among my very favorite images, and I hope they’ll enrich your own Christmas celebrations and countdowns as well.
It’s not exactly a preview, now that they’re officially released, but I just had to share the fantastic projects that Dawn and Daniele created using the rubber stamp for Day 3:

Bits of Ivory 12 Days of Christmas Collection - Three French Hens Rubber Stamp. Hand crafted by Dawn.

Bits of Ivory 12 Days of Christmas Collection - Three French Hens Rubber Stamp. Hand crafted by Daniele.
Just as with the new digi stamps, I adore the way the same stamp can look so different in the hands of various designers! Both of these cards are so beautiful, and have such lovely little touches to make them extra special.
Bits of Ivory 12 Days of Christmas Collection - Five Gold Rings Digi 3D Decoupage. Hand crafted by Barbara.
Decoupage is not for the faint of heart. The layering of bits and pieces of an image yields a very impressive looking card- but it’s not your run-of-the-mill, slap-it-together sort of project. It takes a bit of time and effort, and it’s worth every moment of it. When you see the final project, stunningly 3-D in effect, you forget the extra time spent with the detail scissors and craft knife and sigh in contentment. It’s that wonderful.
As I was assembling these cards I remembered as a small child watching my Grandmother work on a similar project. I remember how impressive it was to see the image’s layers create the effect of a dimensional image. It was almost magical. I had forgotten all about it, and these images leave me feeling a bit nostalgic anyway, but I have to admit that now they’re even closer to my heart. I love that there are people who still take the time and effort to make a little work of art when they’re creating cards and paper crafts. I love that they’re carrying on an art form that’s generations old – and I’m so glad to be a small part of that tradition now.
Happy Christmas Creating!
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Barbara Anne Williams
Bits of Ivory
available at CuddlyBuddly









