A Christmas bauble

Hello there!  I am finally almost ready for Christmas;  after a hectic few weeks, the presents are bought and wrapped and I just need to pick up the turkey and the last few food items on Friday evening when I finish work.  And that will be it...  what's been forgotten or not done by then, won't be done.  

After Barbara Gray showcased my Christmas card on her blog yesterday, I thought I'd blog a little step by step in case you want to have a go.

First, I stamped the small moonfairy into place with black archival.  I found it easier to mask him off using masking fluid, rather than using a post-it.  Then, I stamped the bauble and sentiment into place.

Put the outie mask into place.

My advice would be to mask off the rest of the card with copy paper to make sure you don't get any ink anywhere else.  And how does she know this???

I brushed peacock feathers distress ink into the bauble, working round and round from the edge, building up the colour slowly.  I left the centre paler to highlight and to create the illusion of depth and dimension.

Remove the mask.

Now use the innie mask to cover up the bauble.

Next, I lightly brushed picked raspberry distress ink through the top right and bottom left corners and stamped the snowflakes into place;  allowing them to drift down from the top left to bottom right corner.  I used paradise teal and vibrant fuchsia archival inks;  as I love the clean, crisp impression you get with archival ink.  you could however just as easily use your chosen distress inks.  You can now remove the masking fluid;  it just rubs/peels away.

You can see below the Faber Castell polychromo colours I used to colour the moonfairy.

A little glitter to add sparkle to his wings, and all that's left to do is to edge with a black sharpie pen and mat onto a card blank.

So here is the finished card.  I hope you like it.  Maybe you feel inspired to mix some of your new Clarity stamps with an old favourite.

And here is the same design in a different colourway.

So there you have it;  a clean and simple design that's reasonably easy to achieve. 

And now I wish you all a truly fabulous Christmas and a Happy New Year.  With all that's going on I'm sure you'll join me in praying for peace around the world.  Till next time.  Xxx