I am behind on getting Christmas cards done monthly this year. These are technically my March cards!!
I started with some handmade paper triangles which I created a long while back when I was regularly making handmade paper. I created them on a spare screen sitting on my mould and used a baster to add the paper pulp which allowed me to include a lot of texture. I chose to let them dry naturally which preserved all the details I had created instead of couching them. They were needing a bit of touch up in colour so I colourwashed them with green acrylic paint and I dried them with my heat gun. Worked very well!!
I added a garland using various fibers and stitching and used sequins to simulate ornaments. They are all different but I generally used the same sketch which worked well with the size of the "tree".
For this one I used red rick rack which I positioned with glue dots and a few dots of white glue in strategic locations. I added large gold sequins using glue dots and overlapped them over the rick rack garlans. I adhered the tree to the background paper and added the gold star brad. I adhered this large element to a red card front and added a laser printed layered punchie greeting on the top right hand corner.
For the one on the left I added white fiber for the garland gluing the ends to the back. I added iridescent white sequins with glue dots. I glued my tree to a white shimmery embossed background then added a white snowflake brad at the top. I tucked a laser printed greeting just behind the tree and embellished a clear iridescent sequin which I applied with a partial glue dot. This large element was mounted to a deep plum card front.
For this one I used shiny thread and some copper blending filament in my sewing machine. I cut a length of each and wound them onto an empty spool so I could feed them into my needle at the same time. It worked well though I was going very slow because I was incorporating the sequins as I went. I started at the lower right hand of the tree and started my stitching. Next, I positioned a sequin and manually adjusted the machine to stitch just before the sequin, in the middle of the sequin and just past the sequin. I continued to stitch in a zig zag pattern up the tree adding sequins (large blue, gold and copper) in the same manner. I returned to the bottom in the same manner but did not add any sequins on the way down. I really like the look of the blending filament and the shiny thread!! I glued the tree to my decorative paper and added a gold brad at the top. This one was coloured with a gold paint marker to coordinate. I added a laser printed layered punchie greeting to finish off my layer and glued this large element to a rust card.
For this one, I stitched a garland with white shiny thread using a long zig zag stitch. The tension was off a bit with the top thread being a bit tight so the zigzag is not as apparent as I was expecting. I added four small fiber snowflakes using iridescent glitter glue then added dots along the garland as well. While they were drying I layered my decorative paper over a snowflake punched border and glued this layer to a dark green card front. I glued my tree to the decorative paper and added an iridescent snowflake charm to the top of the tree using a glue dot. I added a simple laser printed punchie greeting to the top left. It still needed a bit of something so I added a dot of iridescent glitter glue to the centers of each snowflake in the border and I like that much better.
For this one, I added a garland using silver cording gluing the ends to the back. I added tiny silver and blue sequins using partial glue dots in a bit of a random pattern. I glued the tree to my soft blue floral background then added a silver star sequin using a silver brad. I glued this large element to a blue card front. I layered a laser printed oval greeting which I had sponged with a bit of green ink over a scalloped oval of blue cardstock.
It was great to use up these little trees and get some Christmas cards made!! I have a few more ideas so hopefully this month I will get caught up.
Therese
