Free Christmas card classes

Just signed up for the free videos. Thanks!

Bought the VIP access since I want to spend some time this summer working on cards, looks like fun!

Thanks for sharing. I don't make that many Christmas cards to want to provide my email to yet another site.

So far I haven't had any spam from them. I opted out of email offers when I signed up and for a change it looks like they're respecting that.

I've watched a few of the classes already with my VIP pass, mostly the people I'm familiar with. The quality seems pretty much on par with their free YT offerings, so the quality of the presentations varies, but is generally good so far.

Each class has an intro from Brandi from Stamp Me Some Love, a short promo from a sponsor, a short face to face intro from the teacher, and then about 20 mins of content. All of the classes have a written transcript as well as a step by step guide/worksheet so you can reproduce the cards if you want to without re-watching the video.

I've gotten a few ideas, but it's also made me want to do some shopping! I'm trying to reign that in by brainstorming what I have and what I could do with what I have, rather than starting from what I could do and what I need to buy to do it. I went through my stamps and dies while watching one video and realized I need a metal shim to make a couple of dies work the way they should, and I could probably give away a couple of stamp sets - they only have one stamp I use, so I can probably do without them.

Can you see the classes without Facebook?

joblackford, in your opinion, from what you have watched, what would you say the skill level is needed to make the cards. Your work is much more advanced than mine. I’m a simple card maker and don’t have the skill or supplies for anything too advanced.

Your thoughts, please!

I will take a better look around this afternoon and try to review. I think for people who spend a lot with the sponsors the discounts might make it more worthwhile. I haven't looked at the svgs yet. I paid $39 so I could watch it now when I have more time, but I hesitated - not sure it's worth even that much for me. I'm not looking to "save money" on shopping discounts because I'm trying not to spend money! 

Restless Spirit I'll take more of a look around and answer your question properly later but I think most of the classes focus on basics and then offer a few more advanced options, but I'll have to think about supplies as well - it will probably make you want to buy more... I think they're expecting people to have a fairly decent stash.

OK, so far... I'll try to summarize the supplies and skill level of the videos I've watched since everyone has a different idea of what a limited stash looks like. 

Daniel West shared a style of coloring that would work well with a limited palette of markers. He used copics, but because there was no blending I think any markers would work well with this technique. The stamps he used were quite a specific loose illustration style. I'm not sure yet if I have anything like that in my stash. It's not really my style although I really like what he did. He made 3 coordinating cards. Skill level, definitely beginner friendly. 

Justine Hovey shared ink blending. She used distress oxides with brushes, but the ideas are the same with different inks and applicators. She also used some kind of paste I don't have and don't want. She used a couple of stamps sets and stencil I think. Her freebie (if you sign up for her marketing list) is favorite Christmas ink blend combos. Made 2 cards. Beginner friendly. 

Laurie Willison did masking, but it wasn't what I expected. It didn't use washi tape like Daniel did, and it wasn't stamp masking either. She used masking stencils to color in her image. I don't own any masking stencils but I could figure out a simple DIY plan for some aspects, not so much for others. She has a freebie with some more info on masking but I think it's all stencil based. The techniques were beginner friendly and were a good shortcut for coloring without using markers or having skills, but you would need stamps with matching masking stencils or a way to make your own. Made 1 card.

Carrie Rhoades made 2 coordinating stamped slimline shaker cards. She has a nice freebie sentiment file. She shows one way to make shakers, some stamping and ink blending, and some copic coloring. Shaker cards are probably a little bit beyond beginner - she had a few good tips and a way to make it a little easier to contain the confetti bits. 

Jess Francisco did ink blending. They were definitely on the beginner end of things, a couple of blends with a stencil design over the top, or a fussy-cut stamped focal point. 2 cards. I think you could get much better tips on ink blending from YT than from either Jess or Justine's videos to be honest. 

Tiffany Solorio did a mixed media background with distress sprays but she mentioned you could do the same thing with ink pads and smooshing (but didn't actually show that option). She used a handful of blue shades and has a freebie if you sign up for her mailing list to get her favorite ink color combos. She did some heat embossing but most of the class was showing ink and water smooshed on paper and watching it dry into pretty colors. One sheet of background turned into 4 matching cards. Her VIP bonus is a mini class on ways to turn backgrounds you've made into finished projects.

Jo Herbert showed heat embossing ideas, from basic to slightly more advanced (mixing two colors or two types of powder). Some ink blending and some coloring. She put together 5 different cards, all different styles of stamps.  

Mary Polanco made 5 different cards using one background stamp. She showed how you could take one scene stamp (snowy village and Santa flying over) and color and embellish it in totally different ways. She used ink blending, smooshing, markers, die cutting, and made a shaker card. I don't have a stamp like that but the principles were good - I like ideas for using the same supply different ways. Nothing particularly advanced or complex that I recall. 

Ardyth Percy-Robb is one of my favorite YTers because she gets right to the point and keeps things really tight. She makes 24 cards in about 2 hours using strips of colored cardstock and dies. I don't have many dies that work for this (maybe 1) but the principles are really good. She shows how she uses her LIMES idea to take inspiration from an image and she includes a guide for how to plan out a mass production session. Definitely great for beginners. 

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That's what I've watched so far. I'm interested to watch the watercoloring ones, and there are a couple of die cutting ones that might be good. There are several that sound pretty specific like the pop up bird house one. Not really something I care to do. 

I think they're pitching them a bit above beginner but they're not so basic that they explain every detail. They're also not terribly new or challenging for people who are more experienced. Could you learn just as much and be triggered into buying all new supplies just as much from watching YT? Absolutely. But the worksheet guides might be really helpful for a lot of people who like to follow along. 

I'm not sure that this is really worth $39. It's definitely not worth $139 (the full price) to me. The free weekend crafting with Q&A chat might be fun, but I don't think anyone will be missing out on much by just tracking these folks down on YT and watching their other videos. 

I'm trying to watch as much as possible before I run out of motivation so I'll drop some more comments here later. Hope this helps!

I don’t send many Christmas cards, so if they included more holidays - Thanksgiving, Christmas, Chanukah, New Years - it might be worth it. But I keep taking classes and watching videos on youtube and blogs, so do far more watching than creating, so at some point I have to Just Stop. And I’m happy with the autumn and Christmas cards/stamps I have, with lots of techniques to use...

But I like and follow a lot of the instructors and can see this being really fun and appealing for people too.

Thanks so much, joblackford! That synopsis was very helpful. I'm really glad I didn't buy access to it now. I'll watch what I can when I can and be happy with that. That was my plan anyway, but it's good to know what to look for and what I can probably skip.

I watched a few more videos:

Therese Calvird is new to me, an Australian with a really laid back voiceover, relaxing but almost too laid back for me! She showed some die cutting, embossing with dies, painting your own cardstock to die cut, and she made 2 cards with the same poinsettia layering dies with different color schemes, one slower to make, one faster.

Gerry van der Velden showed easy mixed media using gesso, ink blending, and stencils. Her card was less Christmasy and could be for any occasion.

Laurel Beard did a paint along with me easy watercolored snowman card. She had freebies for making watercolor mixing charts.

Sarah Edwards made a layered svg dog for her card using a cricut machine. She has free svg files included, two of which are here on her site for anyone: www.craftwithsarah.com/free-svgs/ The one she uses on the card comes free with the class and she has 4 more Christmas ones for VIPs. Her files can be used with other machines too, if you know how to handle the file formats and run your machine already.

I'm going to skip some videos because I don't even want to be tempted to buy supplies that aren't my style. There's a LOT to watch!

Oh, and be forewarned, you're going to see the same 3 sponsor messages many, many times...

This is very true. There are literally THREE sponsors and one of them is the host/store who introduces every video... so it gets old very quickly, especially because I did pay for the VIP pass. I started fast forwarding through all of that after the first dozen videos. I am quite patient and used to watching YT ads to help my favorite creators make money. I should've stopped watching the ads much faster!

As I expected I had completely lost interest by this weekend. I never joined their Fbk group so I pretty much forgot there was stuff happening this weekend tbh. I already watched most of the videos that might be interesting, I think. Maybe a couple more might be worth my time. I'm glad I didn't have to watch this weekend or I would've missed everything, so I don't really regret paying for the VIP pass. I guess I should check what discounts codes there are, if there's anything that will actually save me money (on stuff I was already planning to buy).