Hello, friends! Nicole checking back in with an out of the box way to create some holiday/Christmas cards this year. (Plus, a couple extra ideas as well!) Can you believe we’re just a couple of days away from December first? This year has cruised by! Wasn’t I just creating last year’s cards?
I really enjoy making cards to send for holidays and coming up with a new idea for each year. Back in October, I created some fun fall décor using the Autumn Leaves stencil. As I was cutting out all the leaves, I realized how perfect the shapes were for Christmas trees! I just had to use this stencil again, but instead of the “as-designed” leaves, I’m making trees!
Like my last tutorial, I knew I wanted to stencil on vintage papers. Thankfully, I already had a pile leftover, so I didn’t need to make more. I also had a sheet music page leftover from another project that I thought would add a festive feel to the trees.
If you’ve never lightly gessoed vintage papers before, it’s really easy. Simply add watered-down gesso to some old book and ledger pages. This does a couple things. It adds some integrity to the sometimes-brittle pages and allows for a better surface to paint on. Since I don’t want to cover up the text and I don’t need a thick layer of gesso, I water it down. You can also use clear gesso. Since I didn't create any this time, here are couple pictures from my wildflower greeting cards post:
To make the trees, I grabbed shades of green paint, an applicator and began to play. This is a fun, simple process but does require some patience. The Autumn Leaves stencil is a bit more delicate, so sometimes you have to hold down parts of it while you stencil.
For my first trees, I created an ombre design using white. First by adding a green, then using the white and blending back with the green and even white again if needed.
I thought I’d use a different green and design in each tree (leaf) style, but as I began to play, I decided to keep the same greens in each tree. Don’t worry, I’ll use these first leaves in a different way.
For all the trees, I simply blended a different green or three.
Tree One:
I filled the entire shape with a lighter green and then went back and added some dark green in spots to give the tree some dimension.
Tree Two:
I stenciled with the lighter green on the top and darker on the bottom.
Tree Three:
I used one color in the center and the other color on top and bottom.
After they dried, I cut them out of the vintage paper and grabbed some green card stock to give them a border. I chose a different green for each design and stuck them down with matte medium, front and back, and then also added another layer on top for extra protection.
When the matte medium was dry, I grabbed some brown paint and went over the leaf stems to make them into brown tree trunks.
I also I added some red berries to one design with the end of my paint brush.
Then, once they dried, I had to cut them out again.
Look at all those trees! Now, let’s turn them into cards! I used a ruler to make sure the middle tree was centered and then used some dimensional adhesive to pop it up from the card. For the other two trees, I just used a tape runner to stick them down.
After all the trees were added to the fronts, I spattered watered-down gesso to the fronts for some snow.
I also added it to both sides of the envelopes.
There are so many other fun things you could add to the front of these trees! A star on top, pinecones, different colored dots for lights, ornaments or even a little bird. I decided to keep mine simple. I might add a sentiment on the front closer to sending them out. Last year I typed “Merry Christmas” on my typewriter.
After all those cards, I have a few leftover trees including the first ones I stenciled. Here are a few more ideas to use up any extra trees or have an excuse to make more!
Make Gift Tags
Punch a hole in the tree and grab some bakers twine or ribbon to loop inside for a tie. You can tie it on a package or gift bag. All you have to do is write your to and from on the back, and you’re ready for gifting season.
Ornaments
Created just like the gift tags above, but hang them on a tree, evergreen garland or wreath.
Similar to the garland, string some to dangle from a branch, old paint brush, vintage wooden spoon, or anything you can think of! You could add some beads or other winter/holiday-themed items. I made one back in October with the leaves that still hangs in my husband’s office!
Hello! Nicole here back for my last blog post of 2023! What? This year has flown by, hasn’t it? If you’re anything like me, it’s the middle of December and you either ran out of time or completely forgot about sending some holiday cards. I always like to have a few on hand for neighbor gifts and friend get-togethers plus some for mailing.
Ever since I began making my own cards, I just can’t purchase them. I think that also adds a bit of pressure to create a work of art on a card.
Recently, when I was playing with some StencilGirl® stencils, I applied paint through the Butterfly Rouen Tile stencil and thought it looked like snow and/or the pattern on one of those ugly Christmas sweaters. I immediately wanted to spray paint white through it and brainstormed how I could make that work for a card design. Then, it hit me. Trees!
I could add some trees and make a snowy winter sky background. So, for this year’s card I had the idea to gel print some papers and turn them into trees with the spray-painted background of course!
My first step was to gel print a variety of papers in all shades of green. I wanted to layer different patterns, colors and sizes of trees in the foreground.
I printed on white and kraft colored card stock to add to the variety and for a tiny bit of pop and thickness to the trees.
The gel print process was simple. First layer down some green(s) on the plate and brayer them to a thin coat.
Place a stencil down and pull a first print on top the stencil.
This print isn’t always a great one, depending on the stencil style, but it makes a great first layer!
Then, remove the stencil and pull a second print.
I repeated this process several times with different shades of greens and stencils. Once in a while I pulled a third print to layer on one that just didn’t look right or flipped the stencil over to use the paint again on that side. I let the paint, stencil, and results determine my next steps each time. There are no rules, and you can watch my simple process in the video tutorial.
Sometimes when I was unsure of how the pattern would look for a tree, I isolated it with a piece of paper that I had cut a triangle out of. It’s amazing how different just a slice of the print looks and makes the perfect little tree.
While I waited for the prints to dry, I cut my base cards and spray painted through the Butterfly Rouen Tile stencil.
And, while those dried, I added some white splatters to the envelopes. I just simply sprayed some of the paint in a small cup and added some water to it. I repeated this process on both sides of the envelopes and also the back of the cards.
Finally, it was time to cut out the trees! I cut out some small tree patterns to make this process easier. Using the patterns, I was able to ensure that the trees would layer ok on the card fronts.
Once I had millions (ok, maybe just a hundred) trees cut out, I placed a large one on each card and then picked out all the little ones to go with it. I originally planned to put three trees on a card, but I couldn’t resist changing that to five trees.
When the trees were perfectly placed, I quick snapped a photo just in case. Then I carefully piled the cards up and began the process to stick them down.
Looking back, I wish I had printed a few more trees that were a little more solid in color with small pattern. I like how they anchored some of the card fronts.
To finish the cards, I knew I wanted to add a “Merry Christmas” sentiment with my typewriter, but I also decided to add some red berry garland to one tree on each card. If you don’t have a typewriter, you can print words from your computer or find some stickers.
I added the simple berry dots with the end of a paintbrush.
I really enjoyed how these came together, even if my husband calls them mountains instead of trees. Maybe that’s one reason I decided to add the berry garland!
The best part? Besides the fact that I have a bunch of cards to send, I have a lot of leftovers. So, I think I’m going to also make some small tags for packages as well.
Check out the entire process in the video below!
I hope you have a wonderful holiday season, and maybe I just helped remove a little of the holiday stress by not only giving you a card idea, but some moments to just sit down and create.
