Holly flourish

This was one of the last of the Christmas cards I made in August and it was based off the first element I made when I was playing around with ideas for the batches of cards.

I’d inked and stencilled a sheet of card with holly and die-cut a couple of postage-edged panels. But I didn’t manage to come up with a design that would be suitable for creating a small batch of cards with. Given enough time I would have got there, but the whole point of making a few batches of cards was to fill out my Christmas card stash fairly quickly, so I didn’t want to spend too long fighting with design ideas.

After I finished making the batches, I returned to the leftover odds and ends, including this die-cut piece. I’d previously tried layering several panels without success, so I went with a simpler option. With no other layers behind it, I needed to add a bit of interest to the background; I grabbed another of the Polkadoodles stamp sets and added some holly and stars.

I stuck the holly panel in place, then took a die-cut sentiment from the leftovers and glued it over a strip of vellum which I wrapped around the middle of the card.

It’s a simple card, but at least I managed to use up some of the spare bits. I might add a bit of sparkle to it before sending it, and I’m still pondering whether to quickly colour in the holly leaves in the background, though it is definitely good enough to send out as it is.

Supplies:

• stamps:
  Polkadoodles – holly flourish
• dies:
  Creative Expressions – merry Christmas
  Hero Arts – postage stamps infinity dies
• stencils:
  Polkadoodles – holly flourish
• inks:
  Lawn Fawn – celery stick, freshly cut grass
  Distress oxide – peeled paint, twisted citron, vintage photo
• paper and card:
  Hunkydory Adorable Scorable pearly shimmer
  Papermill Direct – pearlised – natural white
  Anita’s white vellum
  Papermill Direct – plain – Christmas red