Hi friends! Today I am sharing something I made just for fun. Meaning this is NOT an assignment, is NOT a paid advertisement (haha) and is NOT trying to sell you something - whoopee! I wanted to make a slimline card as I keep seeing them on Instagram and think they are so cute. I love that they allow you to use more of your stamps and create a longer scene than a standard card does. I researched a bit and found THIS BLOG post by Nicky that discussed slimline card sizes and how she came to the conclusion that if she makes them 8.5 x 3.5" they will fit perfectly into a standard slimline size envelope.
So instead of experimenting myself, I went with Nicky's advice and cut my cardstock to be 8.5" x 7" which basically meant just leave the one side and cut the other to 7". I then used my bone folder to fold the 7" side in half. Then I cut another piece to be 8.5" x 3.5" to use as my card front (which you can cut from the leftover so you are just using a full piece of cardstock). With that bit of instruction, now I'm ready to show you my two cards and tell you the details about how I made them using my new Christmas stamps by Mama Elephant.
There is NOTHING cuter than this Mama Elephant set of Cool Penguin stamps. I love how the set includes not only penguins, but also lots of gift wrapping supplies and gifts. I stamped all of the images on white cardstock with MFT Natural Ink and colored them in with colored pencils. I resisted my urge to outline them once they were done and left them a softer gray color.
You can see on these guys that I added a lighter gray shadow on the white portions of the penguins. I also added the Christmas sign from the Santa's Sleigh stamp set as I wanted a couple taller images to add to my scene.
To create the background, I used my card front piece I had talked about cutting in the intro part. I rubbed Spun Sugar Distress Oxide Ink over it getting lighter as I went down to the bottom. I used some Worn Lipstick Distress Oxide Ink on the edges of the piece. I splattered some water on it to get bleached spots.I used the Falling Snow Stencil and Texture Paste to add snow to the piece and let it dry. I die-cut some snow banks from white cardstock using the Lawn Fawn Stitched Hillside Border dies (you can use any of the ones I linked in the supply list or the ones by Mama Elephant called Landscape Trio). I also used some hills from the Hello Bluebird snowy hills dies, but I can't find them at SSS, so I've linked you to the Mama Elephant Snow Capped Mountain Dies instead. I layered all of these pieces to create a scene for the penguins to play on!
Last I attached all of my colored images to the background including lots of gifts (I stamped some twice to get more and used some from the Santa's Sleigh set as well. I then stamped a sentiment from the Santa's Sleigh set on the bottom with SSS Intense Black Ink. Last, I added some more snow on my scene on top of the white areas with Glossy White Nuvo Drops.
When I was deciding white Mama Elephant Christmas stamp sets to buy, I picked this one called Little Agenda Trains because it had so many cute little images in it and I couldn't wait to color them and create a cute scene with them. But to utilize them all, I definitely needed to go with a slimline card shape. I accidentally cut this one to be 8" long instead of 8.5" long, so it is a little shorter than the last one. Still learning here!
I created the background by spraying Distress Resist Spray on the background and letting it dry. I like this spray as if you use pure white paper for the background, it leaves the spots pure white (unlike Texture Paste which are slightly cream). I used Distress Oxide Ink in Tumbled Glass over it once it was dry (takes about 30 minutes to dry). I used the SSS Drifting Stitches die for the back hills and then some of the other basic hill dies for the front ones. I attached the hills over the background in two layers.
I stamped all of my images on white cardstock with MFT Natural Ink and colored them with colored pencils. I then outlined them with a black fine tip marker. Being so small, I felt like they needed outlines to make them stand out enough so I could have just used black ink.
I arranged all of the images over the background. I stamped the sentiment using the Santa's Sleigh stamp set and Black Intense Ink. I added some Glossy White Nuvo Drops as snow on the white snow areas again to finish it.
I hope you enjoyed these slimline cards today and they inspired you to try them as well. I might start making them way more often since they let you use so many of the stamps in a stamp set to create a scene. I love making Christmas cards and I'm going to be so sad when this pre-season is over and I have to move on to something else. They are just so fun to make and give away (if I can part with any of mine! haha). Thanks for visiting and have a very good Thanksgiving friends! xoxox Suzy
Comments