Saturday 12 December 2015

Last minute quick and easy Christmas card


Hello dear friends! Long time no see. How have you been? I'm sorry I've been gone for so long, I didn't plan to. But this new job is squeezing every last drop out of me. Add all the usual Christmas stuff, and setting up everything for my snake-baby which has been much more work than expected (some due to circumstances beyond my control which have caused endless vexation) I haven't stepped into my craft room in ages and ages. Today I finally had a few moments, so I decided to make some last minute super quick and easy Christmas cards. I think I already have more than enough Christmas cards, but it seems wrong to make anything else at this time of year. 


I have to say I really love this design as you can use any stash you happen to own. Often you see so many wonderful cards, but they require having a specific die or stamp or whatever. There's nothing wrong with getting ideas for new stuff to buy, but also I think it's sometimes nice to just use the stash you already have sitting in your crafty den. So for this card you can use any inks or watercolours you happen to have. I love watercolouring with my Tim Holtz distress inks, they are so fun and highly reactive with water. Pick your favourite colour combo. I picked turquoise and purple. I also did another one in warm colours, although I'm not a huge fan of reds and oranges. But it's a more Christmas-y I guess. I then mixed a tiny amount of water with some Perfect Pears and used my watercolour brush to flick droplets of this glittery water all over the backgrounds, which i then left to dry. I used the Tim Holtz dies to cut the sentiments from silver and gold mirri card, and adhered them to the cards when the backgrounds were dry. To finish, I added a few adhesive gems from my stash and adhered the panels to white card. Very quick and easy. If you don't have dies, you can use stamps for the sentiments and just heat emboss them in your favourite colour. Or even stamp and heat emboss in clear powder before adding the watercolour if you want to use the emboss resist technique, that should work also.


Now I'm off to make some Finnish gingerbread, as I'm planning to make giant gingerbread snowflakes for my colleagues. I can't wait for my Christmas break to start so I can have a bit more time in the craft room. See you soon again (I hope!).

I would like to link up with the following challenges:
Happy Little Stampers - Favourite Technique (watercolour)
The Friday Mashup - Use dies
Christmas Cards All Year Long - Keep It Simple
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge - Anything Goes as long as it's Christmas
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra - Anything Goes
Sparkles Christmas Challenges - Die Cuts for Christmas
Fussy and Fancy Challenge - Happy Holidays 
ABC Challenge - W is for Wishes

Card: 300 gsm watercolour paper, 250 gsm white card, gold and silver mirri card
Inks: Tim Holtz distress inks Cracked Pistachio, Peacock Feathers, Wilted Violet, Seedless Preserves, Squeezed Lemonade, Spiced Marmalade, Abandoned Coral, Festive Berries
Dies: Tim Holtz Holiday Words, Lawn Fawn Stitched Rectangle dies
Other: Adhesive gems, Perfect Pearls

14 comments:

Loll said...

Really beautiful and artistic Christmas cards. Gorgeous mix of colours and I can see the sparkle from your pearl mist. Thanks for sharing at Happy Little Stampers.

Crafting Queen said...

Love the colours you used in the backgrounds. Thanks for joining CCAYR challenge.

Antonia said...

Love the nontraditional bright colors and the and the gold / silver sentiment is totally stunning! Thank you so much for taking the time to share with us this week at The Friday Mashup! Hugs Antonia

Unknown said...

Lovely cards, great idea thanks for joining us at ABC Challenges, cheers Carol DT

Aileen said...

beautiful cards, so simple and yet eye-catching. love the colours you chose,

Valérie said...

Love the colors of your cards and the embossing. Thanks for joining us over at The Friday Mashup.

Heidi Baks said...

Those are great cards and so cheery! The recipients are going to be so impressed with your mad artistic watercoloring skills. Thanks for joining the Friday Mashup this week.

Norma said...

Beautiful cards! Thank you for joining us over at Friday Mashup!
Hugs,
Norma

Kath said...

Fabulous cards - the turquoise and blue is my favourite colour combo. Thank you for joining us at Sparkles Christmas Challenge.
Kath - GD

Lisa said...

Fantastic cards! Love the watercolor backgrounds and the use of the die cut sentiment, very pretty!

Thanks for joining us at The Friday Mashup!

Kylie said...

Stunning results with your watercolour! Thanks so much for playing along at Happy Little Stampers xx

Theresa said...

great CAS cards. lovely colourways too. thank you for sharing it with us over at FFFC and good luck, Theresa DT xx

Helen said...

A great modern design - very stylish.

Thanks for joining us at Sparkles Christmas and Happy New Year!

Helen N x

Sharon said...

These are all so beautiful. Love the backgrounds to your sentiments.
Thank you for sharing this with us at Fussy and Fancy.
Hugs Sharon. x