Tuesday 3 December 2013

Christmas cards....

...DIY 


This week I am busy getting ready for Little Miss Moo's school Christmas fayre this coming Saturday...It is the first time I have ever set up a craft stall to try and sell my makes, and I am a little bit nervous...I am trying to stay calm by eating Christmas cookies and listening to some Otis Redding(for me it is still a bit early for Christmas tunes...) whilst crafting away in the kitchen... 
Today I have been making some Christmas cards...


...Nothing too complicated.
My approach has been much the same as with my scrap wrapping advent calendar:
I have used what I've got :I have been collecting glossy decoupage images for years (You can find similar in TIGER), so some of those and some vintage music sheets and some Christmassy tissue paper and some heart-shaped paper doilies.


I bought some plain cards, ready to decorate and some Happy Christmas stickers from Hobbycraft.... 



 First I played around with my supplies to see what would work together...
I made a plan for each card, and organised my supplies accordingly...


...I decided to use the green bird-print tissue paper(came with some candles I bought in TIGER) and the vintage music sheets as my "background" on the cards, and cut them to fit...


I decided to use a spray glue for this project, as it has the most even application...
I laid down  some brown parcel paper to protect my surface, opened the window for ventilation, before spraying the back of my "back-grounds", one at the time, and gluing them onto my cards.


TIP: When using spray glue, the surface under your bits(you want to spray) will become very sticky, so in between I dusted the surface with talcum powder to prevent my images from getting sticky on the front when placed face down...


With all my backgrounds stuck onto my cards, above , I decided which decoupage image to put on each card before spraying with glue and sticking down...


Working as organised as possible...


...I explored the combinations...



Before committing to the finished look of each card...


And sticking down the finished look...
  


Then I placed and stuck down the "Happy Christmas" stickers...


And my "collection" of Christmas cards were ready... 

Some I used the Paper doilies for a background on..


Some got the vintage music sheets...


 And some got both the bird-print tissue and a paper doily...
 
 I love the look of these cards...the vintage glossy decoupage images gives them such an old fashioned and nostalgic look...
I hope they sell at The school fayre on Saturday, but if not, at least I've got Christmas cards to send out to all my friends and family this year!!

Now I'm off to make some gift-tags, by gluing some decoupage images onto some cardboard, cutting out and treading with ribbons...

I will be back in a few days with a post about a tasty home-made Christmas gift idea!!
For next week I am working on some gift guides...including some DIY gift ideas!!

xxx
June
"