Good Morning Crafters! Have you had a good week? Are you making Christmas Cards this year? Today’s card uses a bit of ink blending. I don’t use this technique very often, but every time I do use it I always think I should use it more because I love the effect! The Stampin’ Up inks are perfect for this technique as they’re water based and so mix together really well.
I like the Lovely as a Tree stamp set because it’s appropriate for all seasons. I do love the pine for Christmas cards though.
Tutorial – Lovely as A Tree Christmas Card
First create a card base by scoring and folding a 5 1/2″ x 11″ piece of Thick Whisper White cardstock in half.
Add a piece of Basic Black cardstock measuring 5 1/4″ square to your card front.
Take a piece of 5″ square Whisper White cardstock to be your main panel. Use a circle die to cut a piece of masking sheet (You could use a post-it note if you don’t have any). Take another piece of Masking sheet, a little wider than your piece of card, and cut a hill shape from it. Stick your hill and your circle (for the moon) onto your white cardstock to mask these areas from the ink that you’ll put on.
To do your inking, take one of your Stampin’ Sponges. I find it easiest to cut them into quarters and use a quarter for each colour. This will also make your sponges go a lot further. Start with your lightest colour – Sky Blue – and use circular motions to cover your cardstock. Take your mid colour – Marina Mist next, and using the same circular motions, come in from the sides. Don’t come all the way in to the moon this time as that creates the effect of the moon giving off light. Finally, come in with your Night of Navy and come in from the outer edges until you’re happy with the result.
Give your background a light spritz with water from your spritz bottle. This will give a bit of a snowy effect. Take your masking sheet off your card to reveal your “moon” and “snow”
To add the trees, use the fir tree from the Lovely as a Tree stamp set and stamp onto your card front with Basic Black ink. Stamp when the ink is fully loaded, but then overlap with the 2nd and 3rd generation inks to create lighter trees that look as though they’re in the background. Repeat this across the card.
Using a fine tip glue pen, put small dots of glue all over the background of your card and sprinkle over some Dazzling Diamonds glitter to enhance the snow effect. Adhere this image panel to your card.
Stamp the Merry Christmas sentiment from the Flurry of Wishes stamp set onto a 5″ strip of Whisper White Cardstock. Back this with a strip of Basic Black cardstock and add it to your card with Stampin’ Dimensionals.
I hope you enjoyed this project. Click the links below to shop the products used to make it.
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Sarah Phelan, Independent UK Stampin’ Up Demonstrator