Funky Festive Christmas Card by Bobbi Smith

Hi everyone, Bobbi here. I’m so happy to be with you on the Ranger blog today! I thought I would share a fun dimensional Christmas card tutorial with you, featuring Distress Crayons.

Instructions

Step 1: To start with, cut 6 pieces of Tim Holtz Mixed Media Heavystock 4 1/4 x 5 1/2. Paint a thin layer of Dina Wakley Media White Gesso onto all 6 Heavystock pieces. Then dry with the Heat It Tool. Squeeze a couple drops of Mowed Lawn Distress Paint onto a Non-Stick Craft Sheet, and lightly mist the paint with a Distress Sprayer using water. Press the gessoed side of the Distress Heavystock into the paint mixture until covered. Dry with a Heat it Tool. To add more distress, pick up droplets of color off the Non-Stick Craft Sheet with heavystock, blotting to pick up the color (not swiping), then drying with Heat Tool.

Step 2: Repeat these steps with 4 more of the gessoed pieces of Distress Heavystock using the following Distress Paints: 1 Peeled Paint, 1 Candied Apple, 1 Frayed Burlap/Gathered Twigs combo and 1 Pumice Stone. Then seal all pieces of Heavystock with a thin coat of Distress Collage Medium Matte and Collage Brush and let dry.

Step 3: Use a small piece of the plain gessoed Heavystock and cut out the Tim Holtz Sizzix 3-D Impresslits Embossing Folder Mini Provincial border. Paint a thin layer of Pumice Stone Distress Paint onto the cutout border. While paint is still wet wipe away the top portion of paint with dry cloth, so that color is only left in recessed areas of the border. Dry with Heat Tool.

Step 4: Repeat these steps with a couple of darker colors like Frayed Burlap and Walnut Stain. Drying with Heat Tool between colors.

Step 5: Mount the music Stampers Anonymous background stamp onto a grid block. Turn the stamp over and apply the Hickory Smoke ink from the Distress Permanent Mixed Media Ink Palette using a Brayer. Now lightly stamp onto a scrap piece of paper, just to take away some of the ink.

Step 6: Lay stamp back on Non-Stick Craft Sheet for second generation stamping. Gently lay the pumice stone colored Heavystock on top of the inked stamp and apply very little pressure sporadically over the surface of the stamp. Very carefully lift the Heavystock off of the stamp and dry with Heat Tool. Not all of the stamped image will transfer to the Heavystock and it gives it a lovely vintage distressed appearance. Add a little shading to stamped image with Walnut Stain Distress Crayon and a baby wipe, then dry with Heat Tool.

Step 7: Die cut various blooms, leaves and twig shapes from the Tim Holtz Sizzix Funky Festive Thinlits Set using colorized heavystock. Gather several Tim Holtz Distress Crayons. The colors I choose were Mowed Lawn, Peeled Paint, Forest Moss and Pine Needles for all things green. Apply some Mowed Lawn to the Non Stick Craft Sheet. Pick up color with your finger and smudge onto desired area of cutout. To intensify color, apply directly to image and smudge with finger.

Step 8: Repeat these steps with several other Distress Crayon colors for twigs and blooms. To add shading smudge a little Walnut Stain Distress Crayon onto cutouts.

Step 9: Even more shading, try a little Black Soot Distress Crayon (a little goes a long way). Now for a little shimmer. Swipe some Brushed Pewter Distress Crayon onto the Non-Stick Craft Sheet and smudge with finger onto cutouts. It’s hard to see in the photos, but in person it creates a beautiful shimmer.

Step 10: Assemble the various twigs, leaves and blooms using Distress Collage Medium Matte. If you slightly bend the leaves, twigs and blooms it will give more of a 3-D look. Tweezers come in pretty handy with this step.

Step 11: Cover Non-Stick Craft Sheet with a scrap piece of paper, to protect from sand paper. Use sanding grip on Tim Holtz Gold Metallic Kraft Stock card panel to expose underlying kraft. Attach gold and stamped panels to Ranger Kraft cardstock cardbase. Then attach mini provincial border and a sliver of the gold kraft to the stamped panel, using Collage Medium Matte. Now it’s time to assemble all those great blooms, leaves and twigs.

Step 12: Now for a little hardware. I chose a Tim Holtz idea-ology Christmas Token. Fill in the wording with a little Picket Fence Distress Crayon to make it stand out a bit. Just wipe away the excess crayon with finger to clean it up. Tie off a little silver metallic ribbon and attach the token with Ranger Letter It Black Adhesive Foam in a double layer for some lift. To finish it off, splatter some watered down Dina Wakley White Gesso with Distress Splatter Brush and dry with Heat Tool.

I love the combination of the traditional Christmas colors along with the shimmer of brushed pewter, it’ll dress anything up. Thank you so much for joining me today, I hope you give it a try!

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