Simple Homemade Christmas Cards 2014

I don't have all the special tools to make those wonderful, super professional Christmas Cards that some of my friends made me this season.  I do have a rotary cutter with a blade I use for paper cutting and a cutting mat along with a sewing machine and a ton of scrap fabrics.

I found several ideas online where cards were made with triangle Christmas trees which sparked a simple idea for me.

These cards would also be the right size to use as name tags for your gifts.

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      I cute my triangles free handed from a scrap of ironed fabric.  This is actually a knit fabric that looks like a wool tweed.

           Although I'm partial to red, I found a scrap of Lamé fabric that actually came from a shirt I bought at Goodwill years ago just because I wanted the fabric to make gift bags.

            Got my serger tweezers ready to help manipulate those small pieces.

            Cut card stock in half with my rotary cutter with the aid of the ruler on the cutting mat.

             Free motion stitched around the edge of the triangle.  I found it impossible to start at the top, because the tip didn't want to stay put.  It was easier to start down the right side a bit (I'm right handed.)

               With the help of the tweezers I laid the gold pieces randomly.  Then I tried to stitch from one side to the other in a zig-zag manner as if a rope going around the tree.

TIP: If your hands and pieces become a bit static and want to "stay" with your fingers, keep a dryer sheet handy to occasionally rub on your hands.

        Before I knew it, I had made 26 of them.

                I did some free hand writing inside the card with a red marker.  You could run the card stock through the printer before you cut it in half, if you'd rather use printing from your computer. There are a lot of fonts out there. HERE are my directions on how to install fonts from the internet and how to make faux stamped Christmas tags.

          I made the envelopes. Since I didn't have to mail these cards, I didn't glue the edges, but had some foil stars leftover from teaching days.  Meanwhile, I will now keep my eye out for stickers.  Wouldn't a wax stamp on aged looking paper be nice?

         The envelope was made from a template that worked perfectly with this "half page" card. 

You'll find it @ http://houseofstirfry.com/chia/templates/A2env01.html . It will download as an image which will print on a full sheet of paper.  I used the ruler & rotary cutter to cut out 6 at a time.

              Sometimes simple things work. My Christmas this year had to be simple and quick due to the limited time.  

              Hope you enJOY making some last minute, but special cards.  

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I must show a couple of cards that were made for me this year.

First was a surprising 3D card!

      This card was from a person I met through our blogging experiences. If you are making cards, then Diane is the pro to check out.  Please take a look at her blog over @ 1CardCreator. Even though her blog is strictly cards, I find it interesting how many of her ideas inspire me & I can adapt to some of my fabric projects.

          The next card came from Theresa at church. She has to deal with a lot of pain, but somehow finds time to use her skills and tools to make reference items such as bookmarkers for our Ladies' class.

         

             Thank-you Ladies for taking the time to make my cards.  It looks like you spent a lot more time than I did making my cards.

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Sharing at several Linky Parties.

Thanks to the FREE programs:

possibly used for this post

GIMP for cropping & other digital effects

 Photoscape for downsizing & watermarking photo

PicMonkey creating collages used on this page