Sometimes an ornament can be a fun Christmas card.  A traditional nativity scene makes for a special greeting and gift.

Memory Box dies and Distress Inks make for a quick make with brown kraft cardstock and white card stock scraps. While you can purchase a bundle of the Memory Box dies from Craftstash, I purchased my dies from several stores and skipped using the House Frame base die.

Cutting Pieces:

Cut from brown kraft cardstock:

• 3 of the Nativity house frame
• 2 of K-shaped crossbars
• 2 sets of palm trees
• 1 of the house frame background
• 1 strip 3/8 inch x 2 3/8 inches

Cut from green paper:

• 2 sets of palm leaves

Cut from white cardstock:

• 2 of human figures

Cut from gold glitter cardstock:

• 1 of star

Cut a 9-inch piece of linen twine

Creating Sturdy Pieces:

Glue the palm trees together to form a study pair of trees with green leaves on the front and back of trees.

Glue one of the K-shaped crossbars to the back side of a house frame. Cut the tab off another of the house frames. Glue the trimmed frame to the back of the first frame sandwiching the crossbar between the two frames.

Glue the two human figures together.

Creating Middle Frame:

Trim 1/8 inch of the remaining house frame’s tab.

Glue human figures onto strip positioning them to fit inside the frame opening.

Inking House Pieces:

Using Walnut Stain Distress Ink, cover the front and middle frames. 

Ink just the roof of the House background.

Inking with Lighter Brown:

Ink the palm tree trunks with Vintage Photo ink. Lightly tap some brown on the green leaves.

Ink around the sides, floor and eaves of house background.

Using washi tape or low tack tape mask the human figures off and ink the white ground to blend into the brown strip.

Inking with Yellow Ink:

Using Fossilized Amber Distress Ink, Blend the center of the house background into the darker edges.

Mask off all but the halo, baby’s head and straw and solidly color it yellow.

Inking with Green Ink:

Mask the hands and face. Using Mowed Lawn Distress Ink, color the male figure.

Inking with Blue Ink:

Mask the hands of female figure and manger/crib. Ink with Mermaid Lagoon ink.

Painting Flesh:

Tap a small amount of Abandoned Coral or other flesh toned ink on to a craft mat. Using a waterbrush pick-up some ink and experiment on scrap paper to get the desired flesh tone before painting the human figures.

Inking Manger/Crib:

Using both brown inks, color the crib to be darker than the ground.

Inked Details:

Using a fine-tipped brown pen, draw in man’s beard and add woodgrain to crib.

Golden Sparkle Detail:

Color the halo and baby’s head with a gold gel pen.

Attaching Figures to Middle Frame:

Add glue to back of middle frame and glue brown strip with human figures to house frame.

Attaching Middle Frame to House Background:

Fold back 1/8-inch tab on middle frame and glue to folded tab of house background. (A fine-tipped glue bottle makes this so much easier.)

Attaching Front Frame to House Background:

Fold back front house frame tab. Place glue on inside of tab and adhere to the bottom of house background tab.

Adding Twine Hanger:

Thread twine through all three holes in top of the roofs.

Knotting Twine:

Fold out the house frames flat to create slack in the twine before double knotting the twine at the roof pinicale.

Finishing Hanger:

Loop twine ends into a solid knot and trim ends to be even.

Glue star tips to house frame and twine.

Mailing Ornament:

The ornament fits into an A2 envelope. (I plan to seal mine into small plastic bags to go through the mail safely. You could also seal the entire piece with a spray acrylic sealer to stop the inks from running with if exposed to moisture.)

Thank you for reading. If you enjoyed this blog post, please like it and follow the blog. 😊

Dies

• Memory Box – Dies – House Frame Background
• Memory Box – Dies – Nativity House Frame

Inks

• Ranger – Tim Holtz’s Distress Ink – Mowed Lawn, Mermaid Lagoon, Walnut Stain, Vintage Photo, Fossilized Amber, Abandoned Coral
• Brown fine-tipped pen
• Gold gel pen

Papers

• Brown Kraft cardstock
• White cardstock scrap
• Recollections – 8.5 x 11 glitter card stock – Cashmere Glitter
• A2 envelope

Additional Supplies:

• Sizzix – Big Shot PLUS die cutting Machine
• Cosmic Shimmer – Specialist Acrylic Glue – 125ml
• Fineline 20 Gauge Applicator & Bottle
• Waterbrush
• Sticky notes
• Low tack tape or Washi tape
• Linen twine