Xmas card: Santa and sleigh

What:

My first “commission”. My mum has a hard time finding appropriate “brother” cards so I offered to make a Christmas card for her. Any excuse to use this adorable Santa again.

The Idea:

I wanted to create a card with a traditional feel and a foiled sentiment. And a cute Santa Claus.

How:

I coloured the Santa and sleigh with Copic markers and fussy cut them out, using a scalpel for the more fiddly bits around the sleigh runner.

The sentiment was created on the computer and printed out using a laser printer. I trimmed it down to size and foiled it with the Minc machine.

The snow line was created by embossing the card panel with a landscape die. I used the same die to cut a mask to cover the bottom of the panel so that I could blend a Distress ink sky up to the sentiment.

I found a pine branch stamp lurking in my collection in a stamp set that was a magazine freebie. I used it, with three colours of pigment ink, to build up a frame around the edge of the panel.

This is the point at which I should have stopped working on the background. However, when I placed the Santa and sleigh in position, the sky looked a bit empty and I decided to add some snowflakes. Horrible idea. Realised it was a bad idea as soon as I started, but I carried on to see if I could rescue it. I couldn’t. Not for this card at least — I have an idea of how to use it for another card. So I started again and recreated the panel.

I cut and scored a card base from pearlised card and cut a red mat for the panel. The mat was flush mounted to the card base and the panel was glued on top. I attached the Santa and sleigh using different thicknesses of foam tape and linked them together using a small piece of silver thread.

As this card is for a man, I resisted adding any sequins or other bling.

Lessons Learned:

Stop. Think twice, at least, before adding that last element.

Supplies:

• stamps:
  Create A Smile – snow dance kit
  Get Stamping magazine – cosy Christmas
• font:
  Signpainter
• dies:
  Lawn Fawn – stitched hillside borders
• inks:
  Memento – tuxedo black
  Distress – ink pad – tumbled glass, shaded lilac
  Avery Elle – pigment ink – bamboo, celery, jungle
• foil:
  Wow! – fab foil – red
• pens:
  Uni-ball – Signo UM-153 – silver
• Copic markers:
  Santa
  skin: E000, YR000, E21, R20
  beard: W00, W1, W2
  hat/coat: R35, R46, R59
  trim: C0, C2, C4
  boots/gloves: W5, W8
  Sleigh
  body: R35, R46, R59
  runner/trim: E30, E31, E35
  present 1: YG01, YG05, YG07
  present 2: V04, V05, V09
  present 3: BG02, BG05, BG07
• paper and card:
  Neenah – solar white – 216gsm
  Bazzill Basics – ladybug trio
  Papermill Direct – pearlised – ultra white
• tools:
  Brother – laser printer – HL-L2365D
  Heidi Swapp – minc mini
  Sizzix – big shot
  Sizzix – texturz silicon rubber embossing mat