Christmas card to crafty friends

Though this project didn't make it to all recipients yet, I wanted to share it before the year ends. So, sorry for the spoiling, added to late delivery.

I used to create my own custom Christmas cards for close relatives, before I became a cardmaker. It was nothing too fancy, using very basic supplies (paper, scissors and glue), but I was enjoying creating something unique for them. Over the years, the need for mass producing cards sadly reduced and I finally had to stop.

I've never been a great fan of mass production. I find the process very draining but it is also somewhat therapeutic, so I wanted to give it another try this year, for some of my crafty friends. I also thought it was the best way to create a fairly big amount of cards in less time, as I was so so late!

If you're interested in seeing some of the steps, I'm also sharing a video on YT: https://youtu.be/zWzTF8UoTWg

Before starting, I already had a rough idea of what I wanted to make but the project was fairly ambitious. I had in mind to make around 10 cards, with a little bit of masking to represent our small family in a snow globe shaker ornament. At this stage, I wasn't sure what brand I would use for the images, and I was not even sure I had that many stamps that would be a good fit. I also wanted the card to contain a small compartment for a little surprise, involving sequins and cute ephemera. A couple weeks before, I had come across a reel of a company selling annoying cards with a nerve-racking music that only stops when the battery dies and sequins falling from the card, creating a huge mess to clean up. Not wanting to go there, I mean, the annoying part. While I would love the idea of a Christmas song playing when you open the card, lithium batteries are not allowed to ship abroad, so I eliminated this idea very quickly. But the idea of a few sequins for a festive touch, I liked it! I also had some really cute and beautiful ephemera I had found the year before and restocked a couple months before, for a crafty friend, so I thought they would make a nice surprise.
I wanted the compartment to be at the back of the card with a rip strip to open it. 

On December 1st, I gathered all my supplies going through my stash to find the best images that would be representative of our small family, but also the dies I wanted to use, some of them being very early buys before 2020, so this journey started with a little speleology!

Products

Ornament:
Globe and ornament shaker card die (Honeybee stamps)
Miss Anya Amazing and 'Like' Like You (The Greeting Farm)
Gingerbread cookies (Mama Elephant)
Snow buddies (Honeybee stamps)
Shortbread shapes: Rectangle labels, Hey Honeycomb Holiday and Christmas pudding die (The Greetery)
Embellishments: Clay heart candy mix (Trinity stamps) and Chunky glitter Rock candy (Tim Holtz)
Cardstock: Metallic 3 and Metallic jewels (Idea-ology Tim Holtz), Essentials glitter cardstock Ivory (Pinkfresh Studios)

Background:
Spruce sprigs (The Stamp Market)
A5 3D embossing folder Lumber (Tim Holtz / Sizzix)
Cardstock: Peridot (Spellbinders), Noble fir and Kraft (Lawn Fawn) 

Sentiments:
Swanky Christmas sentiments (Picket Fence Studios)
Merry greetings builder stamps (Kristina Werner / Concord and 9th)
Christmas spirit (Chloe's creative)

Back compartment:
Rip strip dies (My Favorite Things)
Interactively yours (Heffy Doodle)
Ephemera L'atelier des lutins, Hiver cosy, La tribu de la forêt (Florilèges)
Simple Vintage Holly Jolly Bits and pieces and Layered bits and pieces (Simple stories)
Cute Christmas (Marianne Designs)
Acrylic embellishments: Histoire d'hiver and Enchantement (Florilèges)
Confetti: Light gold hexagons (Nuvo), Silver pine trees (The Stamp Market), Snowflake clay (Honeybee stamps), Dear Santa (Sprinkletz), Figgy Pudding (This calls for confetti) and Carnival candies (Dress my craft)

Ranger Distress Oxides: Festive berries (Joyeux Noel sentiment)
Rustic Wilderness (spray), Walnut stain, Ground espresso and Scorched timber (Wood background)

I started the creation with the ornaments and the stamping of our family. I wasn't sure if I could make enough time before and after work until December 8th, my target date to mail everything. I thought the ornament itself could be the Christmas card if time went missing. Then, if I could fit in more time, the ornaments would turn into shakers. Next, I was thinking of creating a background with textured wood and pine branches. And finally, I would create the back compartment for the goodies.

I started by die cutting the ornaments from white cardstock. I also die cut the ornament frame, to help with positioning. And I also kept the negative part of one of the ornaments, as a guide to always place the ornament die cuts the same way in my stamping press, so I could stamp each image in mass, as opposed to stamp each ornament sequentially.

I placed the guide (negative part of the ornament) in my stamping press, and an ornament die cut. I placed all the stamps over it, in their exact final location and kept only the cat Christmas hat as this is the element that is immediately in the forefront. 

For the images, I'm using mainly The Greeting Farm, with one set for the girl (aka Me), the furniture and the kitty (aka Kali) and another set for the guy (aka Lois, my hubby). I then used two other stamp sets for the Christmas hats. The tiny one comes from the Gingerbread cookies set, from Mama Elephant, and the bigger ones from the Snow buddies set, from Honeybee stamps.

I stamped the hat on the ornament and on masking paper. I fussy cut the mask and reserved it for later.

I removed the first ornament, placed a new one and stamped the hat again. I repeated that process for the 10 ornament die cuts and then masked the hat on the last one. I then placed the kitty right below the hat, stamped it on the ornament and on masking paper. I removed the hat mask and placed it on the next ornament and stamped the kitty. I stamped all 10 kitties the same way. I then fussy cut the kitty mask and placed it on the last ornament.

And I basically repeated this for all stamped images, making sure to move the masks from one ornament to the next and to mask anything that would overlap with the next image. After the kitty, I stamped the girl's Christmas hat, then the girl, then the armchair, then the boy's Christmas hat and finally the boy.

During the whole process, I reused the masks as much as I could but I did have to renew the kitty and her Christmas hat masks once. Also, once I was done with stamping, I thought I would need a brand new set of masks for the ink blending. There was no way I could prevent the very dark lines, resulting from repeated stamping, from bleeding over the background. So, I stamped the images once more on masking paper and fussy cut them.

Before the ink blending, with a Copic liner, I corrected any missing line from the layers of masks (you get some sort of unstamped halo around the masks because of the thickness of the layers of masks, especially when you start layering several of them).

After ink blending the first ornament, I realized that it was totally unnecessary and I would have saved a lot of time just Copic coloring the backgrounds. But I didn't want to introduce differences, so I kept going and used Tattered rose for the wall and Scorched timber for the floor.

I then Copic colored all the images on the ornaments, coloring each item on all 10, rather than coloring each ornament sequentially. I was afraid to get tired after a couple ornaments and not find the strength to finish them all. This way, I made sure each ornament would get done.

I then die cut all the components of the shaker, including the frames from Pinkfresh Studios Essentials glitter cardstock Ivory, the ornament die from Acetate and from white cardstock, to glue at the back of the colored images. I also die cut the ornament base from folded white cardstock to create a cardbase for my inner message. I die cut the ornament caps from Idea-ology Metallic 3 cardstock from Tim Holtz, 20 times, to layer on the front and inside the cardbase, and another 10 times from white cardstock to layer at the back of the front ornament. Finally, I die cut some cute bows from Spellbinders Alabaster cardstock and from Idea-ology Metallic jewels from Tim Holtz to layer on top of the ornaments. The bows are from a The Greetery die set called Christmas pudding die.

I also wanted to create a small tab to indicate that the ornament shaker could be lifted to reveal the message, so I die cut The Greetery Shortbread shapes: Rectangle labels from white cardstock and stamped the Lift to open sentiment from The Greetery Hey Honeycomb Holiday stamp set on the right. I then folded the rectangle shape in the middle to have a clean tab inside out.

I then plan on gluing the tab at the back of the stamped ornament before gluing the white ornament shape at the back and hide the tab between the two ornaments. To make sure I would always glue the tab in the same place, I created another template with the ornament shape and the tab. I used that template as a guide to position the tab, add glue on its left (inside the ornament circle) and then place a stamped ornament over it to glue the tab at the back of it. I repeated this process for all 10 ornaments, and then glued the white cardstock ornaments at the back.

I then stamped the inner message inside the ornament cardbase, on the left, using the Christmas spirit stamp set from Chloe's creative. I then glued the cardbase at the back of the stamped ornament.

Time to assemble the shakers. I started by adding double sided adhesive at the back of the ornament frame and adhered the acetate. I added 3-mm thick foam tape at the back of the acetate and poured the shaker bits onto the stamped ornament. I used Heart candy clay embellishments from Trinity Stamps, Chunky glitter Rock candy from Tim Holtz and some cute Iridescent glitter stars probably from Trinity Stamps too, but not too sure about their name and origin. I then removed the back paper from the foam tape and adhered it over the stamped image.

I did have some second thoughts about the shakers and would I redo this card, I'd probably skip that part. The coloring was very much hidden by the glitter and it also made the card very bulky in the end. I'm not sure how well it'll travel and I'm crossing fingers the cards arrive as nicely as possible to their lovely recipients.

I adhered one Metallic 3 ornament cap over the front with double-sided adhesive. I then opened the cardbase and adhered the white one at the back and another Metallic one on the right part of the cardbase.

I then stamped the front sentiments, using the Swanky Christmas sentiments set from Picket Fence Studios which I stamped with Ranger Distress Oxide Festive berries on white cardstock and used the coordinating die to cut them out. I then stamped the second set of sentiments from the Merry greetings builder stamps from Kristina Werner and Concord & 9th with black ink on white cardstock and used the coordinating strip die to cut them out. I adhered the sentiments on the shakers with double-sided adhesive.

I also glued the Metallic red bow over the white one with liquid adhesive and then adhered the bows on the ornament with glue dots.

Our shakers are complete. Time to create the backgrounds. As I said, I wanted something woodsy and textured, so I used the A5 3D embossing folder Lumber from Tim Holtz and Sizzix on Lawn Fawn Kraft cardstock. I cut 5.5 by 5.5 panels which I dabbed with Ranger Distress Oxides Walnut stain and Ground espresso, leaving untouched spots of Kraft paper, to create 3 shades of wood. I inserted the panel inside the embossing folder and ran it through my die cutting machine. Once done, I dabbed Distress oxide Scorched timber on the raised parts to add more contrast.

After drying, the background turned a little dull and too chalky to my taste, so I waxed it with Ranger Distress Glaze, avoiding the center part as it will be hidden and the glaze tends to reduce adhesives efficiency.

I then die cut the Spruces from Peridot cardstock from Spellbinders and Noble fir cardstock from Lawn Fawn. I die cut 20 of each, so I could layer 4 spruces on each card. I used the Spruce sprigs die set from The Stamp Market.

I then watercolored the Peridot spruces with a mix of Ranger Distress Rustic wilderness spray and Lawn Fawn Liquid stardust to give them a bit of interest and reduce the contrast against the Noble fir spruces. I had to use my heat gun to speed up the dyring. I probably should have used a different technique with dry inks, but I was not sure a sticky mat would have been quicker and safer way of doing it. I probably would have picked less contrasting colors if I had had them in my stash, but I would totally anticipate next time!

I then decided I wanted them to have a bit of frost or snow over them and splattered White gesso over the 40 spruces. Another lesson learnt. I think given the lack of time, I should have skipped that step or chosen a different medium. I had to layered them while splattering to save a bit of time, but acrylic tends to act like a glue when drying, so I had a really hard time separating the spruces after they had dried. I think it looked messier than I wanted in the end, but still brought that additional interest that I was looking for.

Before working on the back compartments or pockets, I actually adhered a white panel of cardstock at the back of the wood panel, for a clean finish. This was before I started the actual pockets and I realized this wasn't a smart approach. If I were to redo this, I would create the back pockets as stand-alone pockets and only then adhere the pocket at the back of the wood panel. What happened is I went for a size slightly smaller than 5.5 by 5.5 so the pocket would not stick out of the wood panel, but it made things a lot more complicated to adhere the back pockets and I can't say the finish look was totally perfect with this technique.

For the back pockets, I started by cutting panels from white cardstock 6.25 by 6.25 in size and then scored the tabs on the 4 sides at about 0.37 inches. You can just make it 0.5 inches if you want (I was actually working in centimeters). But consider the size of your die cutting machine too! I was happy to not have to pull my A4 big Shot Plus. I then die cut the rip strip, using a die of the same name from My Favorite Things.

I then stamped the I have a surprise inside sentiment, from the Interactively yours stamp set from Heffy Doodle. I finally adhered the pocket at the back of the wood panel with double-sided adhesive, removing the back papers only on the sides and bottom but leaving the top one unattached, so I could add the goodies after finishing the front.

I then adhered the Spruces on the wood panel, layering a light one over a dark one, adhering a total of 4 on the top left corner. I used liquid adhesive between the layers and on the wood panel.

I then pulled my ornament frame guide again to see where to put the foam tape for the ornament. The foam has to be thick enough to allow the cardbase to open completely. So I decided to use a super thick foam tape (4 mm) and added another layer of super thin foam tape (2 mm). Two layers of thick foam tape would give the same result, but I was happy to use extra large foam tapes for this too.

I also realized the spruces were getting a little bit stuck in the cardbase, when closing it, so I taped them on the panel before adhering the foam tape.

I then removed the frame guide and adhered the ornaments on the wood panels.

For the goodies in the surprise pocket, I used various brands and products: 

Ephemera L'atelier des lutins, Hiver cosy, La tribu de la forêt (Florilèges)
Simple Vintage Holly Jolly Bits and pieces and Layered bits and pieces (Simple stories)
Cute Christmas (Marianne Designs)
Acrylic embellishments: Histoire d'hiver and Enchantement (Florilèges)
Confetti: Light gold hexagons (Nuvo), Silver pine trees (The Stamp Market), Snowflake clay (Honeybee stamps), Dear Santa (Sprinkletz), Figgy Pudding (This calls for confetti) and Carnival candies (Dress my craft)

I poured the confettis first at the bottom, as I wanted them to pop out as soon as the recipient ripped the strip and then placed the ephemera before removing the back paper on the top adhesive and closing the pocket. As I was doing so, I realized the confettis were escaping from the rip strip starter, so I secured it with a post-it note. I think it totally gave the surprise away for the recipients, at least partially, but I could not let them escape in the envelope either. Once again, I would consider not adding those tiny bits next time, especially as I'm sure some recipients will hate having to clean the mess afterwards!