“From our home to yours” is a sentiment that is often seen during the winter holidays. House cards are one of my favorite types of cards to make. The cards shown in today’s blog were made using new Creative Expressions Craft Dies by Sue Wilson.
To die cut a large solid die like the house front, it is best to angle it so that it goes through the die cutting machine at a diagonal rather than straight across. (See picture below.)
For the red brick house, I used leftover stenciled cardstock that was stenciled with Distress Ink in Fired Red Brick, a brick stencil and a small make-up brush (I find these inexpensive contour make-up brushes from Dollar Tree work as well as the expensive ink brushes.)
For the brown brick house, I used a digital image of a brick wall to create a tiled pattern to print on an 8 ½ x 11 sheet of white cardstock using a computer and ink jet printer.
The windows, door and roofs were all cut from lightweight white cardstock and then fussy cut. The roof and door were colored with watercolor pencils and a water brush and allowed to dry under the dies’ plastic packaging so they would be flat. Once the door was dry, I added a drop of a gold Nuvo drop for the door knob and set it aside to dry overnight.
Solid colored scraps of red and green papers were used for the bows and wreath. The topiary trees were cut from white cardstock and colored with watercolor pencils. Their pots are cut from scrap patterned paper.
To glaze the windows, I used shiny organza ribbon glued to the back of the house die-cut. (I had ¼ inch wide ribbon so had to use two stripes for each window. You could use wider ribbon.) After the ribbon has set, the decorated house front was glued to a solid house frame cut with the largest die in the set. The top of the this die has a non-cutting edge which has to be hand-cut.
The tiny decorations can be attached at this stage in the assembly.
While the die set is designed to cut a tent fold card, I decided to make it an easel card using a 5 ¼ inch by 11-inch sheet of heavy white cardstock to score and fold along the long edge at 3 inches and at 3/8 inches. I then die-cut the base, folded at the 3 inches scoring with the non-cutting top of the house die at the fold. (See photo below for how the easel base looks opened up after being cut.)
Next, I used a stamping platform, clear VersaMark watermark ink to stamp the inside greeting after rubbing clean the cardbase with an anti-static powder pad. (I like to use the round stamping tool Stampendable with my stamping platform for uniform pressure on my stamps. I also use scrap copier paper under my items being stamped to add more pressure and to keep the platform clean.) The greeting from Lou Collins’ Text{ures} Seasonal Sentiments set was heat embossed with my favorite gold detail embossing powder from Cosmic Shimmer.
To adhere the house to the easel base, fold the short roof piece closed and add glue to the 3/8 inch tab. Position the house front to match-up with folded base and press at the tab area to adhere to glued tab. Open card up to see if positioned correctly, before attaching welcome mat (stamped and heat embossed from a retired Stampin’ Up front door stamp set) with foam tape.
I used two more stamps from the Text{ures} Seasonal Sentiments set on the envelope flap with Stampin’ Up’s Crumb Cake ink, which looks very much like gold embossing on the cream-colored envelope.
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See the more of Houses of Christmas
Keeping the Home Fires Burning
Supplies
Dies
- Creative Expressions Craft Dies by Sue Wilson – Finishing Touches – House Front Accessories – CED1539
- Creative Expressions Craft Dies by Sue Wilson – Shaped Card – House Front – CED2151
Stamps
- Text{ures} by Lou Collins – Seasonal Sentiments from Creative Stamping, issue 101, November 2021
- Stampin’ Up – At Home with You – stamps & die set 143681 (Retired)
Ink & Embossing Powder
- Stampin’ Up – Classic Stampin’ Pad – Crumb Cake
- VersaMark – Watermark Stamp Pad
- Cosmic Shimmer – Detail Embossing Powder – Bright Gold
- Ranger -Embossing Powder – Black Sparkle
- Ranger – Distress Ink – Antique Linen
- Ranger – Distress Ink – Fired Brick
- Brown Fine-Tipped Pen
- Nuvo Watercolour Pencils
Paper
- Lightweight White cardstock 8 ½ x 11 inches
- Heavy White Cardstock 110# weight 8 ½ x 11 inches
- Neenah Social – A7 (7 ¼ x 5 ¼ inches) Bare White TechWeave 32 lb/120g/m2 Envelope
Miscellaneous
- Nuvo Crystal Drops – Bright Gold
- Cosmic Shimmer – Specialist Acrylic Glue – 125ml
- Sizzix – Big Shot PLUS die cutting Machine
- Fineline 20 Gauge Applicator & Bottle
- LDRS Creative – Stampendable Stamping Tool
- Foam Tape
- Organza Ribbon
- Computer & Printer
- Scissors
- Digital Image of Brick Wall
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