Pinflair Snow Dust – The Art of Cobwebs

I’ve missed blogging my Card-io Christmas Cards over the past two days, so I’m blogging three of them today to catch up. (As you view each photograph, you can click on it to make it bigger – but don’t forget to click ‘back’ in your browser window so that you can come back to reading here!)

If you’ve missed the last few blog posts you won’t know that I normally don’t make Christmas cards for neighbours, or friends and family whose cards I have to post, simply because you can buy a box of Christmas Cards for so little that it would cost me more to make and send my own handmade ones than to buy some, – so have always gone with the more ‘frugal’ ready made boxed cards – as those were cheaper not just to buy but also to post.

A 'group photograph' of the cards I've blogged about over the last few days. — A ‘group photograph’ of the cards I’ve blogged about over the last few days, and the three I’m blogging today.

However, this year I had such a stash of cardstock, I thought I’d challenge myself to make cards which wouldn’t cost me the earth to make or post, so I got out some of my favourite stamps, Card-io Stamps, and decided that I’d try to use just those stamps, some ink pads and some cardstock – (and try not to put any expensive or BIG adornments or embellishments on them, so that I didn’t have to make specially sized envelopes or boxes), – so that they wouldn’t cost the earth to post!

But, today I’m blogging three cards: Starting with … a Christmas warning to our feathered friends . . .

Don’t stop here lads – apparently – they’re eating BIRDS for Christmas!

The little bird down on the ground there, has been earwigging (a British term – means eavesdropping) at the open kitchen window and keeps hearing: “What time will that bird be ready to take out of the oven?” – and . . . “Is that bird cooked yet?” – and even . . . “The bird looks so lovely. I can’t wait to eat it!” . . . Eeeek! No wonder he’s fretting! 😮

A simple to make card. I began by making a mask to ‘frame’ off a square in the centre of the card. Using a spare bit of thicker paper, I measured out the size I needed to cut, then once ready, I took it outside and sprayed the back with some Stick and Spray from Crafters Companion and carefully stuck it to the card front.

I then ripped a bit of copy paper and put the ‘frilly’ torn edge on an angle across the card and made the winter sun you see in the background, using three colours of Versa Color ink pads. I stamped the bare winter trees you see in the distance, just over the top of the hill, and the one standing on top of the hill.

Wanting to add some Pine Trees, I angled the torn paper again on the card, but a little further down the page, so that the Pines looked closer. Once the torn paper was in place, I stamped the Pines using the 2nd generation stamping method I talked about in previous posts over the last few days.

Finally, I wanted to add the little bird, stood all alone on a snow drift. Then came the fun stuff. SNOW!

The ‘snow’ you see on the card is a simple effect to achieve. I use Pinflair glitter glue, and Pinflair Snow Dust. That’s it. It takes a short while to dry, but once dry it’s a lovely addition to a card.

Time for Card 2.

Oy! You’ve Forgotten my Christmas Dinner!

The family have eaten their Christmas Dinner and are now out for a walk to give the children some fresh air, and hopefully wear them out so that they’ll go to bed! But oh! Look! They’ve forgotten to fill up the bird feeder and that little chap on the floor is having a grumpy moment about it!

This card was made basically the same way as the previous card, only this time: I made a mask with 4 equally sized sections in it, so that it looked like you were looking through a window. Once the mask was in place it meant that I could ink up the sky, the winter sun, and stamp the trees, the church, the family, the bird etc, and even draw in the fence. Once everything was in its place, I removed the mask and added the snow.

Card 3.

Who Buried Dinner?

I don’t actually really know what the conversation is which is going on here, ↑ – but I do kind of feel that the little bird in the centre of the card is either ‘getting it in the neck’, or he’s letting the bird on the right let off steam and voice his complaint so that the digging, scratching and searching can begin to find all the seeds, nuts and mealworms which have obviously been blown off the bird feeder, and are now hidden under a layer of snow.

Made in the same way as the two previous cards.

Well, . . . I’m pretty sure you’re probably fed up with Christmas Cards by now, so rest assured, I’m not going to bore you forever. But … I have just two other Christmas cards which I want to share – only this time they’re totally different from any of the ones you’ve seen over the past week. Still made using Card-io Stamps – but different. These one’s have some of those things which I said I wanted to avoid (embellishments) – but, they’ll still post in a regular envelope, and they’ll still cost the same as the cards above. (Have I piqued your interest?) ;D

I’ll share those two with you next time.

In the meantime – thank you SO much for coming and sharing a few minutes with me here. Your company, honestly, really is very much appreciated. So thank you for coming and sharing your time with me.

May you have a truly blessed Thursday. ~ love ~

Continuing with my easy and ‘low-cost to make and on postage costs’ Christmas Cards, – made using Card-io Stamps, stamp ink pads and a bit of imagination. Today we’re feeding the birds their Christmas Dinner.

2 day 5 Christmas Dinner — All the photographs can be enlarged by clicking on them – but don’t forget to click ‘back’ to come back to this page to carry on reading!

I love this card as it has some humour built into it somehow. It makes me smile when I look at it.

To make: I began stamping the garland towards the top of the card, using a twiggy stamp, and a berry stamp – to which I added a little red by colouring over the berries with a fine tipped red Staedtler pen.

Then I ripped a sheet of cheap copy paper in a wiggly but straight(ish) line and angled it on top of the card in the place where I wanted a snow-covered hillside in the background to be. Using three colours of Versa Color ink pads I ‘made’ the sunset by blending first the lightest yellow colour, using a cheap cosmetic sponge – over the edge of the torn paper. I then added a soft shade of yellowy orange to the centre – blending it outwards so that the colour began to graduate. Finally I added a tiny touch of a deep warm shade of orange, again blending outwards so that there were no ‘edges’ to the three colours, but a warm glow. Voila! A sunset.

To make the blue sky over to the left hand side of the card, I did the exact same thing as making the sunset – simply blending (this time) two colours of blue.

Next came the sentiment closely followed by stamping the bird houses/feeders. I added the trees in the background, and birds on the bird boxes, individually.

I ‘framed’ the whole scene by hand drawing a pair of wiggly, barbed, lines around the edge of the card.

Then came the fun stuff … the Snow!

I took this photo at an ‘odd’ angle so that I could capture the snow to show you where it was. I used Pinflair glue, and added Pinflair Snow Dust to make the snow on the hillside, and on the tops of the bird houses/feeders; around the bottom of the post on the one bird house/feeder and along the ledges.

I also added more ‘snow’ by using a Graph It marker in white. Using it as ‘snow falling from the sky’ by dotting carefully and gently over the scene, and also adding little strokes to the garland so that it looked like snow had collected on some of the twigs.

And that, as they say, is all there is to it!

I really enjoyed the making of this card, it came together so quickly and was such fun. (I was watching Judge Judy at the time – so I’m astounded it turned out well at all. Judge Judy is SO acerbic and caustic, she has me hooting with laughter. I’m quite sure that I’d get it in the neck from her for doing that – so please don’t anyone tell her or she’ll ground me for a week! LOL)

Whilst I’ve got your attention: those of you who were waiting for my ‘Craft Product I Recommend’ blog post about Card-io Stamps – it is in the pipeline, and there is a reason that it’s not on the blog here yet, which you’ll find out about when I actually post it.

Thank you so much for visiting and staying with me for a while. I SO enjoy your company. I always feel like you’ve come and joined me at my kitchen table, and shared a coffee with me while we’ve had a good ol’ chat and a few giggles about crafting. Perfick! (lovers of Pop Larkin; author H.E. Bates; Darling Buds of May, will ‘get’ that word: → but for those who haven’t got the foggiest notion of what I’m talking about – replace ‘perfick’ with ‘perfect’). 😀