Hi, crafty friends. I’m sharing another holiday card today, this time featuring Penguin Photo Strip from Lili of the Valley. It’s no secret that I’m a sucker for penguins, and these are fun and playful. I love the idea of the photo strip, but I decided to shake it up and not make it a strip.
I started by coloring the images with Copics. They each come with a frame, but I wanted this postage stamp look, so I cut my images on the inside of the frames.
I wanted some interest in the background, and the Sparkling Snow embossing folder from Simon Hurley/Spellbinders is amazing! It creates proper six pointed snowflakes and gives such a cool texture, I want to use it on everything. I used it with a panel of Blue Breeze cardstock from My Favorite Things. It’s one of my favorite light blue colors, I may need to hoard it since MFT went out of business. I trimmed my panel down, matted it with a panel of Cranberry cardstock from Concord & 9th and adhered both to a top fold white card base I covered with an A2 panel of X-Press It blending card, just so that my whites would match.
I adhered each of my colored images onto Cranberry cardstock for a nice framed look, then adhered my matted images to postage stamps I die cut with the Postage Collage die from Waffle Flower.
I mounted each of my postage stamps using foam squares, adding the first two straight before making sure the last two were wonky. I like that both the images and their placement tell a story about what happened in that photo booth, everything going perfectly at the start, followed by slight chaos. To finish off the card, I added black glaze to the eyes for some shine and a tiny bit of dimension, as well as snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Not a whole heap of colors used for these.
I stamped the 
I used my Mijello Mission Gold watercolors and brushes in varying sizes to color in my scene, cut it down and stamped a sentiment from the 
I adhered the panel to a 5 3/4 x 5 1/2″ top fold card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, before finishing off with a few Raindrops from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
I knew I had to color up this image as soon as I saw it. This is so adorable with the corgi hanging off the top of the glass. And so funny, and very typical of Pei’s illustration style. I love it!
I colored the image with Copics, fussy cut him, then added VersaMarker pen to the rim of the glass and used white puff embossing powder from Wow! to mimic a salt rim. The embossing also adds some fun texture to the glass. I also used a black glaze pen to add a little bit of shine and dimension to his eyes.
I ink blended Parsley and Starfruit inks from Concord & 9th onto a white cardstock panel for an ombré effect, then used the Geometric embossing folder from WRMK to create some subtle dimension. I added the panel to a card base I’d covered with Parsley cardstock from Concord & 9th, before mounting the image using foam tape.
In this release there are also a few sentiment sets, and this one from the 
Simple color palette for this one. This was so fun to color!!!
I actually decided to watercolor this one with my Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. I prefer using a paintbrush with water with these, but there’s also a blender that you can use. Marcel is small, but I still used three different browns and a pink for him (064 Oatmeal, 607 Milk Tea, 068 Deep Brown and 200 S. Almond Pink). For Elliot and the die cut letters I used 312 Overcast Sky only. I did use a little pink for the bow on his tail, but for the actual elephant, it was just the one blue. I love the movement you get with watercolor, it’s something you can’t really achieve with Copics.
I fussy cut my image, leaving a thin white border. Using the Impact Alphabet die set from My Favorite Things, I die cut the letters to spell out STOR (big) four times from white cardstock and once from Black cardstock from Concord & 9th. I used the Parker lowercase alphabet die set from Memory Box to die cut the letters for klem (hug), again four layers of white, this time topped by a layer of the watercolor paper.
I stacked my layers, and sandwiched the image between the white and black letters for the large word. I created a black mat on the card front, covered that with a piece of green patterned paper from the Watercolor Wash 6×6″ paper pad from My Favorite Things and mounted the letters and image in the center. I adhered the klem letters directly on top of the larger letters and added a sub sentiment sticker strip from Kort & Godt below it. I popped it up a bit to level it with the black letters, before finishing off with a few dew drops from the Spring Leaves embellishment mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
I colored the penguins with my Copics, making sure to add blue for their hats and scarves. Nothing beats blue for Christmas, right? I left plenty of space between the penguins for a greeting, which is from the 
I used a die in the Slim card basics die set from Mama Elephant to die cut the frame with openings from Harbor cardstock from Concord & 9th. I also cut two from white to add behind it for dimension. I stamped the Paint Splatter background stamp from My Favorite Things onto the blue using VersaMark ink, then sprinkled on White Satin Pearl embossing powder from Hero Arts and heat set.
I added pearls from the Glossy Porcelain mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards here and there around the openings and also three Coral Heart Droplets, also from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Limited color palette for these two penguins.
I colored these cuties with my Copics and did the same with 
I used the Additional A2 Layers die set from Waffle Flower to cut my panel down slightly, then adhered it to a card base I created from Autumn Rose cardstock from Papertrey Ink, before I added a few snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Lots of Copics for this one. I even created a new combo for the fox which requires less markers than the one I used to use.
I added some tufts of grass to my coloring. The markers make it super easy because of their actual brush.
Once all my coloring was dry, I stamped a sentiment from the 
In addition to Polly and the stone wall, I also used 
Once my coloring was complete I stamped a sentiment from the Journey sentiment set from Purple Onion Designs using Altenew Obsidian ink.
I stacked cardstock scraps behind each of the postage stamps for dimension and adhered everything to a card base I created from Rustic Cream cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I love this cardstock, I need to break it out more!!
To finish off the card I embellished with iridescent flowers from the Spring Leaves mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Lots of Copics for this one.
For this card, I really tried. I chose a color combo of Pebble, Ballet Slipper, Brickyard, Cranberry, Cobblestone and Tidepool from C9. I wanted to focus on Ballet Slipper, Cranberry and Tidepool for the Gummiapan diecut houses, but Tidepool and Ballet Slipper created mud when they mixed, while ink smooshed Cranberry looked like an episode of Dexter. I switched gears and ink smooshed Ballet Slipper on its own on watercolor paper. When it dried it looked like Grapefruit. So much for not using peach tones. I watercolored a background using Tidepool reinker and did the same with Pebble reinker on a separate piece of watercolor paper. Once dry, I die cut the Pebble piece with a curved landscape die from the Slim Card Basics die set from Mama Elephant, then layered the two pieces together and die cut them using the largest die in the Watercolor Rectangle STAX die set from My Favorite Things.
I sprinkled on Chunky white embossing enamel from Stampendous onto the background, heat set it so the granules melted to look like snow, adhered the slope with 1 mm foam squares and mounted the entire panel onto a card base that I covered with a piece of Nectar cardstock from Concord & 9th. I tried Grapefruit first, but felt it was too dark against the background. I mounted the houses using foam tape, die cut and stacked four layers of Happy Holidays from the Jolly Holidays Greetings die set from Concord & 9th and adhered the greeting at an angle above the houses, before finishing off with Snowdrift Sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
When I printed my image, I printed 
Once my coloring was complete, I used the Notebook Edge die from My Favorite Things to cut from the edge of the panel for a little bit of interest. I mounted my little scene using foam tape onto a card base I created from Cornflower cardstock from My Favorite Things.
I stamped a sentiment from the Birthday messages stamp set from Mama Elephant using VersaMark ink onto a scrap of Cornflower cardstock, added super fine detail embossing powder from Ranger and heat embossed. I always heat emboss from the back of the back of the cardstock only, it gives a much better result than heat embossing from the front.
I cut my sentiment down to a strip, added a couple of layers of cardstock behind it for dimension and adhered it near the top left of the card, before finishing off with a few gems and confetti stars from the Starry Night mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards. The stars made me think of “When you wish upon a star”, which goes perfectly with the sentiment and the “Once upon a time” theme for the Coloring Club Challenge.
I used a fairly limited color palette for this one, I feel.
Papirmølla 