Merry & Bright

Hello! Hostess Tami here with a card to show you; a special "Christmas in July" card...

This card combines several products and techniques to really bring on the shine and shimmer of the holidays, in a subdued yet traditional color palette.

The card base, the reindeer and the stars were all stamped and embossed in gold on kraft paper that had been spritzed with Smooch Spritz.

Then the designs on the reindeer were filled in using Smooch Accent Ink - the featured product for the blog this month - while the stars will filled in with Smooch Glitz...

Embossing your stamped image makes it much easier to fill in the designs as you'll have "rails" to keep the colors where you want them. It's SO much easier to color inside the lines that way!

The beautiful border, made using a die from Memory Box was given a light spray of Smooch Spritz to antique it and to add shimmer...

And the sentiment strip, which runs under the border, was spritzed as well before the sentiment was stamped and embossed...

Chalk Ink was used around the edges of the card base as well as lightly around the reindeer. The reindeer and a few stars were adhered to the card front with 3D squares to add some dimension.

My favorite tip for cutting out an intricate design stamp like the reindeer, is to make sure that the background paper is the same color as the paper that you stamp the image on. That way, you don't have to cut out every little itty bitty part of the design. The uncut portions will blend and look like the background paper is showing through. That tip can come in handy if you are making cards in multiples!

SUPPLIES:

Clearsnap Products:

• Smooch Spritz: Caramel Latte
• Smooch Accent Ink: Mocha, Kiwi, Snickerdoodle, Siren, Silver Fox, Green Apple and Molasses
• Smooch Glitz: Firecracker
• Top Boss: Tinted Embossing Pad and Gold Embossing Powder
• ColorBox Fluid Chalk Ink: Chestnut Roan
• Color Catcher

Other Products:

• Memory Box: Vaudeville Frame and Pearl Stickers: Berry
• Harmonie: Christmas Stamp Set
• Hero Arts: Joy To All
• Bazzill: Kraft, Red and Green Cardstocks
• Beacon Adhesives: Zip Dry
• 3D Foam Squares

Tools:

• Trimmer, Scissors, Exacto and Heat Gun 

DIRECTIONS:

1. Cut a 4 1/4 X 11 piece of kraft cardstock and fold in half to make card.
2. Cut a 5 X 5 piece of kraft cardstock.
3. Place both cardstock pieces in Color Catcher and lightly spritz with Caramel Latte Smooch Spritz; set aside to dry.
4. Distress edges of card front using Chestnut Roan Chalk Ink.
5. Die cut frame from green cardstock.
6. Cut a 1/2 X 5 piece of red cardstock.
7. Place green frame and red cardstock strip in  Color Catcher and lightly spritz with Caramel Latte Smooch Spritz; set aside to dry.
8. Stamp sentiment on center of red strip. Dovetail ends so strip measures just under 4 1/2, then adhere about 1 1/4 up from bottom of card front.
9. Adhere frame to card front.
10. Using Tinted Embossing Pad and Gold Embossing Powder, stamp and emboss reindeer and 5 stars on spritzed 5 X 5 kraft cardstock.
11. Fill in designs on reindeer using Smooch Accent Inks; set aside to dry.
12. Fill in stars using Smooch Glitz; set aside to dry.
13. Cut out stars and reindeer (see hint above and don't cut out all the tiny bits of the reindeer). Lightly distress edges using Chestnut Roan Chalk Ink.
14. Use 3D squares to adhere reindeer above sentiment strip.
15. Group and adhere stars, 2 at top and 3 at bottom, using 3D squares to adhere some.
16. Finish by adding pearls to star centers.

There are a few other Christmas in July projects coming up! So if you like to get a jump start on your holiday crafting, please check back!