Six Christmas Cards

     I’m back with more cards made from Tim Holtz dies - this one is from a few years ago. I love moose. Once summer we drove all through Algonquin Park in Northern Ontario that has a lot of moose - and saw none. We drove through the East Coast Provinces a few years ago - and saw none. My granddaughter now lives in New Brunswick and she sees them all the time on their property and even crossing the roads....I need a visit to see her.

     So, I made all my immediate family moose cards. It was quite the process and I’ll quickly walk you through how I design my cards. Sorry, not a follow a sketch person but if you just want to see the finished cards, scroll on past to the end. Sorry for the poor photos. These were taken in the basement (aka the lower studio) with my cell phone and the lighting is terrible.

    The first thing I had to do was assemble the moose with his accessories which you can see in the finished cards. Very tiny pieces once again. 

And then I die cut the trees.

                       

A couple of the trees were cut from brown cardstock; some white cardstock and dipped in brown ink. There was not enough difference that made dipping them in brown ink worthwhile so next time I make them, brown cardstock it is. The green branches are cut separately and glued on in various branches. I have seen some cards on Pinterest that die cut them from white and used them as snow. I did mine different.

Adding snow.

                      
    To add snow to mine, I used Cosmic Shimmer (shown in picture) which I bought last year from Stamp Art in London, ON. Great store, great, helpful staff and I can order on-line. This product reminds me of the old Liquid Embroidery product which I haven’t seen around in years. So, you squirt on the Cosmic Shimmer and then hit with the heat gun, and it puffs up. I was going for the grunge organic look and that is exactly what I got.  

Next, I wanted to work on the sky. 

The first thing I tried was running a snowflake embossing folder through blue cardstock and then going over the embossed snowflakes with a roller that was inked with white ink. The blue was too bright for what I wanted so that one was set aside for another project.

 Next:

 Next was this background using the same embossing folder but inking the flat side with some blue ink the background was a nice colour but then I realized that the snowflakes were way too large for the scene I was creating. Another one in the stash to be used later, likely much later but it won’t go bad in the stash.

 Next failure...

... was the good old Swiss Dot embossing folder. I think one of the first ones I ever bought so many years ago. The background was okay and the dots were okay but not very snowflake looking. (Terrible photo I know)

 And then I remembered……          

I remembered I had the snowflake falling embossing folder from Stampin’ Up. It’s larger than the other ones so I have it, and other larger ones, sit off to one side and I have a tendency to forget about them.

 

 It’s a little hard to see in the photo but the dots are heavier at the top and then thin out on the way down. Perfect on a light blue sky.

 Next: I wanted some hills, so I used the curved hill dies from another die set; die cut them and inked the edges in Distress Speckled Egg - love this colour.

                         
     And then it was assembly time. I seldom make cards the same but once in a while I do. Before adding the elements, the sentiment was stamped on the bottom left corner. I used my Tim Holtz stamping platform and it was very quick to do.

     So, here are the cards all assembled but with a few different designs. I added some die cut trees from other die sets. Double click to enlarge the photo.

 

That is all for a very cold Thursday, December 1, 2022. I didn’t leave the house at all today, but Joe had to take the recycle bins out, and he told me it was very cold. I took his word for it.

  Cheers

Violet

Ps: To save a card to your Pinterest account, simply over over the image until the “Pin It” symbol appears and then click …. be patient, it sometimes takes a few seconds.This will take you to your own Pinterest account to save the card.