Hi everyone! Carisa back with you today with an easy to recreate Christmas / Holiday card if you are like me and still need to make some. These are incredible simple and come together really quickly. I will show you how to create two different types of backgrounds with watercolors. You can easily recreate this with ink blending if you prefer that. The best part, you can stamp several of these at once, then put on your favorite holiday movie and just paint backgrounds!
I chose one of my favorite Christmas style stamps – and that’s a manger scene. This one is perfect for slimline cards. I cut down some watercolor paper to 3.5 by 8. I tried this first with cold press watercolor paper because it’s my preferred for watercolor but when it comes to stamping and embossing they just do not play well together. So, I switched to a hot press watercolor paper which is considerably smoother. Then I stamped my image a couple times with a black pigment ink and sprinkled it with clear embossing powder. Heat set until it’s melted and I’m ready to create some fun backgrounds.
For my watercolors today, I’m using a handmade brand I found on instagram. You can use any brand you want. Just pick out a blue, purple, bright green (think neon) and teal. This is what I am using to create a galaxy style sky. You can see more in the process video below but I start by getting my entire panel wet with clean water and just start adding color. I wanted the green more around the big star so I dropped it there and then moved into teal, purples and blues. The watercolors I use separate (or granulate) into multiple colors sometimes so it looks like I have quite the variation on my card but I really just used about 4 colors.
One my second card, I wanted to create a simple gradient sky. Again, we start with a wet background of clear water and then starting from the bottom with my dark blue, I move my paintbrush side to side creating the gradient toward the middle of the page. Then I will start the purple from the very top of the panel and again move my paint brush from side to side blending the color into the blue. I want the top to be a very deep purple so I add more color again and bring it down until I’m happy. That’s honestly my entire technique with watercolors. Paint until you are happy with the result. Look for that moment and don’t overwork it beyond that.
I absolutely love how these two backgrounds turned out. To turn the into a card, I trimmed them ever so slightly on the top and bottom. Then I cut two 1″ strips from this gorgeous sparkle paper and put it on the ends of the card base. I used foam tape behind my watercolor panel and mounted it on the card base. Super simple. Since I didn’t have room for a sentiment on the front, I stamped a small Merry Christmas sentiment on the inside – just like a really Christmas card. haha I used a sentiment from this super duper cute stamp set that I really hope I can make a few cards or tags from. I just think it’s adorable!
You can also see the process video on my YouTube channel! Thanks so much for stopping by today!
