Easy Christmas Cards

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Here I am again with more cards – what can I say, I’m on a roll!

Before we get to the Christmas card design I thought you might like to see the blue card that was shown in the second photo of the previous post as it is now finished and I’m really excited – I made ‘who-would-know-they-aren’t-really-pewter’ flowers 🙂

Faux Metal Blue

What do you think – have I managed to capture it well enough in the photo?

While I was still in the playing around with embossing folders mode of a few days back I also made some Christmas cards – yay me, Christmas in hand already!

I picked up a couple of Tim Holtz Christmas themed embossing folders for a song in a sale early this year.  One is no good for me as it features snowflakes and icicles and that is not our Christmas experience – but I liked the old fashioned swirliness of this one:

Xmas1

All I did was matt up the embossed and inked cardstock and then I went over the raised letters with a water based pen.  Easy-peasy

Same process with this next one and then I filled in the centrre part with gold metallic pen:

Xmas2

The next two are created using Spellbinders ‘M-Bossibilities’ EL-014 [which gives a lovely deep emboss] on white cardstock.  I inked over the raised areas using old paper distress ink in the centre and two shades of green around the edges.  The embossed card is matted a total of three times – first to dark green cardstock.  The ribbon is attached at the back, the greeting strip is added and then the bow is attached with a brad.  When all those bits are in place the second matt was added, I used brown paper on both these cards.

The flowers are another Spellbinders die ‘Poinsettias’  the large leaves were cut from green cardstock and had a good coat of glossy accents spread over them and were left to dry overnight.  I dribbled a bit of glittery stuff over the petals when the flowers are made up and hot glued a half pearl in the centre of each one.

The greetings are stickers which are practically idiot proof.

And finally, as there are still dozens of tiny butterflies lying about all over the work table from my enthusiastic experimentation with faux metal I used three on each card as well.

Xmas3

Detail:

Xmas4

Xmas5

More detail:

Xmas6

This is all so easy to do – and makes for highly detailed cards whose only drawback is I can’t make envelopes big enough to contain them!  Drats – if you have a recipe I’d love to hear it!

The last two cards are  21 x 15 cm [81/2 x 6″].

Thanks for coming by and having a look, I love that you did 🙂

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26 thoughts on “Easy Christmas Cards”

  1. I love those blue butterflies fluttering away from the silver flowers. And the Christmas chrysanthemums are just stunning! You created precisely the perfect colour combinations.

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  3. What charming poinsettia cards. The green with white are my favorites, probably because I like the less traditional of everything around that time of year. Not sure why.

    I love the blue card with metallic features. I appear to be reading backwards so I must go investigate what I’ve missed. As always, so much attention to detail. I love your art and craft, Pauline. It’s always a pleasure to stop by.

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  4. Wow, your cards are so beautiful. I was wondering if your would put them into an envelope or a box so that the flowers etc would not be crushed.

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  5. These are wonderful creations Pauline! Little pieces of art 😀
    Your patience is admirable. Love all the little details you included in each one. Great job and thanks for sharing! : D

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  7. I’m so envious that you are working on Christmas Cards. I really must get my butt in action. You’ve really inspired me really take a look at my embossing folders and make better use of them. All your beautiful work has been photographed so well too. Love getting the
    ‘up-close-and -personal’ views. That’s a cute embossing folder you’ve used on the Green card! Alys generously sent her Cricuit Cutter home with me, I couldn’t believe it. I can cut all kinds of words and things. I’m still learning it, but hope to be an expert soon for Christmas card greetings like your stickers. Re: envelops, another trip by Alys and her sister Sharon. They use Calendar pages to make the most awesome envelopes. I’ve also seen this one on Pinterest, you just cut out a heart from a page big enough…maybe a french news paper (if you can get one there), would be cute with Xmas stamps on it or if you can buy a cheap old atlas at a book store discount tape…here’s the pin http://www.pinterest.com/pin/237916792787498525/

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    • You are such a generous and knowledgeable bloggie friend Boomdee, thanks for that pinterest tip – it is really cute! I’ve got a cricut too 🙂 Hardly ever use it except to cut out really big letters to make words on canvases. I’ve made a whole pile of calender page envelopes recently too 🙂 [Feeling really smug now 🙂 ] The problem with these cards is that they are so highly built up they really need something more like a 2cm deep box to go in …… so I should probably just make boxes …. but how do I do that? So, my Wise and Generous friend, do you have guidance on this problem? 🙂 I think it would be so great to get a French newspaper, oh, the things I would make and the places I’d go ….. but all we have here is English – and we newzillanders scarcely speak that…….

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      • Well, you’ve decorated some nice gift bags, maybe something like that but in the size you need. I liked these on pinterest…they close shut like an envelope 😀

        I saw at my local copy centre, they’ll make engineer copies, they’re very large. Maybe a Xmas Collage Page from your Journal (original art) blown up into an engineer copy and then make these bag/envelopes from it??? Sounds like too much? The engineer copies are pretty cheap. (They use them for floor plans or building plans etc)

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        • I am so impressed [underlined!] with your ability to always know what to do! Is there a course one takes – or is it a natural talent I wonder…… 🙂 Are you perhaps, secretly, the latest super-hero Super Woman??

          I have never heard of engineer copies and shall check that out next time I’m in the stationary store as that is a brilliant idea! Ah the things we can do if we only knew they existed!

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          • ??? Pauline, are you trying to make my head explode with flattery? I just have a lot of crafty and smart friends, I roll their ideas around in Boomdee goop and gobble them up…LOL. Anywho, thanks my dear.

            I saw someone talking about Engineering prints via Pinterest. They made some photo’s of their kids really big and framed them. When I inquired at our print shop, I was surprised how cheap they were. Not picture paper though, just paper….but perfect for crafts 😀

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            • Dash it – you saw right through me 🙂 Orlando is following you on pinterest now in order to keep up with all the great ideas! I’m definitely looking into those prints – stay tuned!

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  8. Good morning. Your blog randomly pulled into my “recommended posts” when I was getting ready to publish this morning so I linked to my post. What a precious cat and wonderful Christmas cards. I am a cat lover as well and have four at home. 🙂

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    • Hello Kittie, thank you for coming by today, I really appreciate it! You are certainly a most accomplished card designer – and as a fellow cat lover how could I do anything else but hit the follow button? 🙂 I look forward to seeing more of your work.

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