Festive Fridays Holiday Hybrids

Its that special Friday again -- a FESTIVE FRIDAY!
Festive Friday is a Blog Hop happening the second and fourth Friday of each month, showcasing Christmas projects. The goal is to work on a few Christmas Cards a month so your selection is bountiful by December! If you're joining me directly, you will probably not want to miss the beginning of the hop over at Terris blog. If you've joined me from Brendas blog, You're hoppin' along just fine! A full list of blogs is at the end of this post. Please enjoy your tour of the festivities this week!

Here are the cards I've been working on over our extended time this tour: Holiday Hybrids

These cards are made using My Digital Studio software, which allows you to access stamps and punches and papers (Oh My!) and digitally create masterpieces that you can then share online OR print out and share in the real world. The beauty of this is the ease of creating in large quantities. Need Calendars for your whole family? Check! Invitations for a crowd? Check! Scrapbooks for each grandparent and aunt and uncle and godparents? Check! Design once, Print a gazillion times if you so please... You can print using the very professional services through Stampin' Up! or you can send files to your favorite online printer, or you can print them off right at home! Love this program.

Another level to the program is the ability to use it to create Hybrid crafts. These crafts have digitally created elements that you then print and ADD to additional pieces from your craft stash. You can print off embellishments to add to pages or cards or home decor, you can print card bases with a particular background, you can print your scrapbook pages with photos and add embellishments to them, and so on - the Possibilities are limited only by your imagination! (and time ;-)

For this Festive Friday I reduced the Medallion stamp (the original stamp size in real life is 5"x5") and added a greeting or sentiment to the center, creating 5 different designs. I then printed them out on white card stock and trimmed them to front an A2 size card (4.25" x 5.5") and layered them onto some card bases, added some ribbon and bling, maybe ran it through a texture folder... and Voila! 5 Cards for your Friday tour. I can easily print off a dozen more and create a nice assortment of holiday cards!

The ink is Old Olive, and MDS makes it easy to match your paper - it prints pretty true to color! The sentiments I added in Real Red digitally, and then after printing, added hand colored "berries" on the "wreaths" and added my Real Red ribbon. For the ones done with the texture, I used an additional print and punched it out and layered it with dimensionals in the center (a little hard to read after texturizing :-) adds a nice dimension and effect to the card.

I think these would be great with a photo, I may hold onto the idea for a current family photo - I used one from 3 years ago (wow, where is my CD with last years pics on it?!) but it was easy to modify the photo in MDS to the right size and shape, and I even added a nice Real Red mat to it and printed it that way.

Other options would be for a company logo, or a monogram for newlyweds celebrating their first Christmas as a couple... Very easy and you still get your "hands on" crafting time in the finishing up of the cards. A time saver, and makes it easy to get a consistent look if you are having help assembling them.

Thanks for stopping by, we have new bloggers this week so visit and comment (with some festive phrases?)!
You're off to #9 - Yolonda,
but be sure to take a whirl through the entire Festive Friday blog hop - and get your notepads ready for some great ideas!