What is it about Christmas and the holidays that makes us want to connect and share with others. Sharing a homemade card or gift is the highest compliment you can give someone because you are sharing your time and passion. I love sending unique cards to others and I am starting this series to share with you some card ideas. I hope you are inspired to make these cards yourself.

Hello and thank you for joining me on this blog hop to celebrate The Altenew Educator Program and Love & Friendship. If you are following along on the hop, you have come from the talented Nandini Karmarkar of Paint, Paper, Scissors. Your next stop on the blog is the amazing Christine Pennington. If you get lost along the way, see the full list on the Altenew Card Blog.
I am excited and honored to be a part of a very selective group of such talented people. The Altenew Educator Program really helped me to gain confidence in my card making and helped set me on a path to teach others about the joy in making and sending cards. Each amazing Altenew Academy class taught me how to improve my skills and introduced me to new ways of looking at my crafting supplies. The support from the Altenew Educator Program Coordinators really helps boost your confidence, improve your card designs, as well as your photography and blogging skills. Watercoloring is a medium I struggled with but the Altenew Academy has three great watercolor classes that helped me to improve my skills: Watercolor Basics and Beyond, Watercolor Creative Media and Stunningly Simple Watercolor Techniques. I took all three of these classes and they were wonderful. 

Today I will be featuring the Altenew watercolor pan set which is a 36 half pan watercolor set that coordinates perfectly with the Altenew Inks. I made three cards for this blog hop that feature three ways to watercolor: with black pigment ink, white heat embossing and no line. Thank you for joining me on this hop to celebrate the Altenew Educator Program.

Hello and thank you for visiting my blog. For this card I played around with Nuvo Embellishment Mousse, Hero Arts sand embossing powder and layering die cuts to create some texture on this scene card. This card was relatively easy to put together once each of the components was built. For the colored die cuts, I actually colored those over a year ago and pulled them out of my stash for this card. Please read on for how I built each of the card components and put them together for a fun summer thank you card. Some items used to make this card are listed at the end of the post. If you would like to build this card and purchase items through these links, I may receive a small commission. Thank you for your support.

I recently met a crafty friend on line and we met up to craft together. She introduced me to a great Birch Press Layered die, Adora. I’ve loved Birch Press dies but just hadn't ever used them so I quickly grabbed three colors of paper out of my scrap stash and die cut them. The Adora die has a repeating heart pattern and after I cut out the patterns, I was left with all these colorful hearts. I didn't want to waste them so I decided to make some cards but needed white as a neutral to go with my color palette. I grabbed the Altenew Radial Hearts cover die which has a repeating heart pattern and cut out a piece of Neenah solar white. I saved all these heart pieces and decided to use them on a card. Well I ended up making 5 cards and would like to explain how I made them using dies and leftovers. Please read on and note that affiliate links are used in this post. If you decide to purchase the items through these links, I get a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for your support.

Hero Arts has a great product that came out in November 2018 but I only recently discovered it. The Peek-a-Boo Die works with three different background stamps to cut out an A2 sized card front and score tons of doors where you can stamp or include little messages. This post is about the die and using it with the Mail Jumble background stamp to make a Thank you card. Please continue reading to find out more about this great product.

Tim Holtz and Ranger recently released new alcohol inks in a pearlized formulation. Some of these inks were included in the May Simon Says Stamp kit. Using these new inks and some inspiration from Michelle Short on the Hero Arts blog as well as Jenn Shurkus, I made some alcohol ink panels. I then used these ink panels to complete some cards I needed to celebrate the coming of babies. Please read on for how I put together these cards. 

In November of 2018, I embarked on a journey where I was not sure was going to lead; I became a participant in the Altenew Educator Certification Program. For the past 5 months I have been steadily working towards certification under the guidance and tutelage of Virginia Lu and Erum Tasneem who have been so gracious with their time and positive feedback. Throughout this journey, I have taken 25 classes at Altenew Academy, made 44 cards, one tag, four framed pieces of art and now taught one class. I feel proud of my accomplishments and happy to be able to share a love of crafty techniques to my friends and get them excited to try something new. Please read on for how the class went, the fun we had and what the students learned in the class. If you would like to read about how I prepared for the class, click here. Affiliate links are used in this post. If you choose to purchase through these links, I may receive a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for your support.

Hello friends. I am participating in my first ever hop! On Instagram! I regularly post on Instagram and I’d love it if you join me there @sevenscrafts. The hop today has a $50 gift certificate to Scrapbook.com where I do regularly shop for my card making supplies because I like their prices, selection and fast shipping. If you are hopping along, you came from Anna Komenda @moriony and your next stop is Nicole Watt @pixelmavensretreat. For today I am sharing an adorable love you card made with the Monster Love stamp set from Concord & 9th along with other supplies that are all available at Scrapbook.com. Please read on for how I put together this cute card.

For the final challenge of the Altenew Educator Certification Program, I will be teaching a 2 hour card class full of techniques to 4-10 people. After the class, I will be blogging about how it went but I wanted to do a post before the class to discuss building an idea, setting up for a class and figuring how to break down ideas and make them accessible to others. Please read on for how I plan on teaching this class.

My kids do karate and are in black belt training which means they have extra equipment with which they train. I wanted their stuff to stand out from all the other kids so I got crafty and made some tags, bags and labels using my crafty supplies and some ingenuity. Read along to hear about what I made.