Artsy handmade christmas cards

Last year I worked on making Christmas cards, but they never made it to the mailbox. I thought I'd show how they were made, as they look "arty" but are super easy and anyone with some decorative paper, some rubber stamps, and embossing powder can make them.

First, I made "serendipity paper". I don't know who came up this this term and technique. Basically, I took some papers that look good together (patterned, solid, holiday, metallic candy wrappers). I ripped them into various size pieces, at least 1" big, but many were bigger. Using a 12" x 12" piece of card stock as my base, I glued the pieces down, making sure they overlapped a little, in a very random way.  (Any glue will do, as long is it stays glued down, I think I used glue stick).  Once dry, I rubber stamped and used different embossing powders until I liked how it looked. I made sure to leave areas without any embossing.

Here are the papers (I didn't use all of it for the cards).

This is mainly red, I used gold, black and verdigris embossing powders.

 Here is a close-up.

This one is mainly green. I used black, gold, red, and glitter embossing powders.

 And a close-up.

Here are my some of my finished card fronts. I did embellish them with some gold 3D stickers to look like ornaments.

It's a fun "play" type project as there is not a lot of planning or thought. Just dive and have a good time!
They could be cut into round ornament shapes instead of trees as well.The serendipity paper is a great technique for collage or ATC backgrounds, it's a great jumping off point.


12/3/13 Here are some more pictures with star tree toppers and trunks added: