christmas card

I finally finished putting together our Christmas cards for this year. Ended up taking a lot longer than I had anticipated. But, I'm happy with how they turned out. I made about 60 with a couple of mavericks in there (you know the ones that you test something and it's not quite what you want, but still usable).

I started by stamping the music background in navy on ivory card stock. I wanted it to look old, so I stamped a part of sanded background, added a coffee stain, lots of speckles and sponged the edges. Then I added snowflakes in bashful blue. I used 5 different snowflake stamps, some stamped more than once. OK, background is done. Now for the rest.

The angel is stamped in night of navy craft ink and clear embossed. Then I embossed the saying on vellum. Did you know that because vellum is non-porous, you can use classic ink for embossing if you work quickly? I thought this would give me a cleaner image, so I pulled out a color I don't use much (so saffron), and since the gold embossing powder is opaque, any color under it doesn't show. I only wanted to use part of the stamp, so I took a piece of masking tape and stuck it on my clothes a few times to remove some of the stickiness and then put it over the part of the stamp I didn't want, inked the stamp, removed the tape and stamped. That's a lot easier than trying to just ink the part you want without getting any ink on the rest. Then the vellum was just wrapped around the ivory card stock and glued on back. The glittery snowflake is a Martha Stewart punch put through my xyron sticker maker and then smooshed in glitter and attached with a brad.

I wanted the back layer dark, but didn't want to add another layer, so I made a cheater layer. I just took my navy marker brush tip and ran the side of it along the edges of my card base - instant layer. It didn't even have to be real neat, since only 1/8" was going to show.

what's in it?
stamps: Christ is born, snow swirled, sanded (SU), music background (Judikins), coffee stain, angel (Inkadinkadoo), snowflakes (Cornish Heritage farms)

ink: night of navy (classic & craft), chocolate chip, bashful blue, close to cocoa, so saffron

paper: Wausau Exact Index ivory, vellum

other: Martha Stewart snowflake punch, Art Institute glitter, antiqu gold brad, clear and gold embossing powder

Thanks so much for stopping by today. Be blessed.