Easy DIY Christmas Card Ideas #2: Simple Shapes & Crafty Scraps

All this week I'm sharing some fun ideas for making your own crafty holiday cards.

Yesterday I posted a bunch of ideas for making simple cards decorated with lines of washi tape. Today's cards are all about geometric shapes, layering, and using up crafty scraps from your stash.

 

UPDATE: follow the links to find all DIY Christmas card ideas in this series!

1. Washi Tape.
2. Today's tutorial, Simple Shapes and Crafty Scraps.
3. Simple Lettering.
4. Christmas Trees.
5. Baubles.

This tutorial originally appeared on The Village Haberdashery's blog - visit their shop for lots of crafty goodness!

I used a range of coordinating festive craft supplies to decorate my cards which was super fun to work with, but any colouful and/or Christmassy paper will do! Mix and match holiday motifs and plain and patterned paper, embellish with stickers and tape and stamps and glitter, the possibilities are endless.

Simple shapes look great when working with patterned paper. I've included a couple of basic shapes on a template sheet to get you started - click here to download and print the PDF.

For this small card I added a strip of paper down the centre of the card, two contrasting paper circles and a line of metallic gold tape.

To add a strip of paper stretching the whole length of the card, use a ruler to cut a rectangle slightly longer than needed. Glue the paper in place so it overhangs the card at each end and leave the card face down while the glue dries. Once the glue is dry, trim away the excess paper.

For the envelope, I used a small stamp and a white ink pad to print a festive pattern – place the envelope on a piece of scrap paper so you can stamp over the edges without making a mess! You could leave the front undecorated, decorate it after you’ve written the name or address, or stamp the whole envelope then use an address label on top.

With larger cards you have much more space to play with shapes and colours and really show off a range of patterns. You could go super simple or cover the whole card with pattern for a maximalist look.

For this card I added two layers of paper, three large circles, and stamped two rows using a fir tree stamp – as with the envelope, above, I placed the card on a piece of scrap paper when stamping so I could stamp over the edges without getting ink on my desk!

This card has the same basic design but it looks very different.

 

I cut a strip of brown paper and used a stamp to decorate it. I added two lines of gold tape to the card then stuck the paper on top so the gold tape forms a lovely edging. I then added three circles cut from contrasting paper and finished the card by drawing two rows of scallops with a black pen. I then echoed the design on the envelope.

I stuck a piece of patterned paper in the centre of this card then added a line of tape in the middle and a paper star on top. I used a ruler and a black pen to highlight the central shapes (which I have to admit wasn’t entirely successful as I forgot to test if the pen would write on the tape! Oops!). To finish the card I added overlapping strips of washi tape. A couple of overlapping lines of tape look great on the envelope, too.

As well as using paper, why not make use of some of the scraps left over from your other crafty projects? Felt, fabric, ribbon, buttons, sequins, felt… they can all look great when added to Christmas cards.

I used paper and washi tape to create the background of this card, then topped it with ricrac and felt. I cut two pieces of green felt to size (trimming the lighter green felt with pinking shears), stitched them together with some metallic silver thread, stitched a piece of pink ricrac on top and stuck the whole lot in place on the card with craft glue.

Then for these two small cards I used paper and tape for the backgrounds and cut small circles from metallic gold faux leather and red wool felt. I decorated the felt circles with simple embroidery and some gold sequins then stuck all the circles in position with craft glue.

There'll be more DIY card ideas on my blog tomorrow - see you then! :)

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