Beth's Paper Cuts: Chirstmas in July

Sunday, July 24, 2016

Chirstmas in July

Hi everyone! This week we had temperatures reach 94!! So what a perfect day to make Christmas projects, right? Looking at some of my favorite blogs it seems that 'Christmas in July' has really been in full swing.
I love a handmade Christmas card. It's little touches of homemade cookies and handmade gifts that make the season special. It shows the love that Christmas time brings.

I decided to make two versions of Christmas, one for the grown ups and one for the kids!
For the more grownup projects I focused on my all time favorite stamp set, Lovely as a Tree. Do you have that one? I think we all do!! It is the longest running stamp set in the Stampin' Up! catalog! I have used it countless times. It is my oldest stamp set. Look how used it is!! And still going strong!

I started by stamping the tree image with Garden Green and Early Espresso markers. I stamped onto Watercolor paper, which is a bit bumpy and hard to get a really crisp image but that was OK in this case because I watercolored over the image with my Aqua Painter. I did not add any more ink with the Aqua Painter, I just lightly tapped over the image to blend and soften it, and give it that beautiful watercolor look.

For the smaller name place cards I only inked up the top of the tree, to make a smaller tree, and then used my Aqua Painter on these as well.
All of the cards have a wash of Pool Party to the background to add to the serene winter scene.

I used the Brushwork Alphabet for the names. I love that these alphabet stamps are photopolymer, it was so easy to line up the letters with my clear block!

What's hard to photograph is the sparkle! I added some Dazzling Details to the tree branches and along the ground. This has some glitter in the glue, but to add even more shine and a bit more coverage, I added Dazzling Diamonds Glitter on top of that. These trees look dusted with new snow, and the snow has texture because of the puffy nature of the Dazzling Details glue.

Here you can get a little better view of the snow and the Pool Party background.

The place cards where mounted onto Real Red cardstock, cut 5 by 3 3/4, folded at 2 1/2 so that it will stand up.

The gift tag is made the same way. I love the large "Joy" die cut from the Wonderful Wreath framelits set.

For a card with a flare for fun I went with this cute reindeer made from the Foxy Friends stamp set. I LOVE this stamp set. It is so much fun and makes several cute animals. To make it even better there is a coordinating paper punch! A must have in my opinion!! I added a fun little red nose with some enamel dots.

I made the place cards for the kids table in the same way, folding the base short so that the white circle goes over the fold. I made the names with the new Labeler alphabet! This is another awesome photopolymer set, so you can easily line up the letters to spell out anything!

The tags are super cute 3 by 3 cards. Cut the base 3 by 6 and fold in half. A hole punch was used to add the ribbon.

One of the so many great things about Stampin' Up! products is the coordination. The Gumball Green paper used for the card base matches the Gumball Green patterned paper which matches the Gumball Green ribbon. Love it! You get a really nice end result and your projects look great!