SPREADING PEACE AND JOY

This holiday season is a good reminder to me to make the best of what we have and know that we will look back on this year and say, "Remember...."

This season is a good chance to receive a personal letter or postcard in the mail. I have creative friends who use a cutting machine such as Cricut to make beautiful designs.

I am always amazed to open an envelope to find one of their cards inside. Their designs are often intricate and always carefully done. I haven't purchased a Cricut yet. For now, I still make do with hand cut or hand punched designs when I make cards and decorations as part of this holiday season. I find I always need an extra card or two, so I am sharing some quick and easy cards to make. All of them feature a Christmas tree. They would be much easier to make using one of the cutting machines!

SUPPLIES NEEDED

Postcard-weight paper

Paper tape

Green Copy paper

Decorative paper (last year's wrapping paper or washi paper) cut into strips

Rice paper

Circle hole punches

Glue & Matte Medium with an old brush for spreading these

Embellishments such as stars

Watercolors & small round brush

Tombow dual brush pen or whatever marking pen you have on hand

Envelopes

TIPS FOR LETTERING

Practice lettering with the Tombow brush. I used the stiff end to practice letters, but you might like the brush instead. Good examples of lettering styles can be found at Pinterest and check YouTube for demos. Write slowly on your finished postcard when you are ready.

SIMPLE HOLE-PUNCH TREE

Punch out a dozen half-inch green circles. Arrange them in a tree shape on the postcard paper. Add a trunk cut from your decorative paper or washi. Add either smaller punched circles or embellishments to decorate the tree. Add hand lettering at the bottom of the card.

WATERCOLOR TREE

Using paper tape, create a triangle on the postcard paper. Make sure edges are pressed down or the watercolor will leak. I used a light and dark green wash over the triangle. While still damp, I dotted several places with gold paint. When the tree was completely dry, I removed the tape and placed red ornaments on the tree and a red triangle for the base. Because watercolor will warp the paper, be sure to press your postcards under a couple of books for a day.

WASHI TREE

I cut thin strips of washi paper (wrapping paper works well too). I coated a piece of rice paper with matte medium and placed the strips one after the other until I covered a six by seven inch segment. I coated the washi with matte medium and hung the paper to dry.

Washi strips glued to rice paper

I drew a six by seven inch rectangle on a piece of copy paper and divided it into four sections. I drew lines from each mark to make three tree-shaped triangles and two halves. I punched a hole in each of the points of the triangle so that I could mark the triangles on the washi paper. I used a cutting blade to cut out the triangles from the washi paper leaving my copy paper pattern intact. I trimmed the bottom of each triangle so that it would fit on the postcard. I had lots of trimmings left over. I glued the tree-shaped triangles to each postcards and added a star on top.

Pattern for triangle trees

With the washi paper that I trimmed from the original triangles, I made two more cards using the strips that I shaped on the copy paper pattern. I glued the strips to the postcard paper.

Use pattern to cut strips to fit inside tree shape

On all the trees, I added hand-lettered words. These trees are a quick way to add some personal touches to your holiday. I use them as gift tags, thank you cards, and ornaments. Have fun!

Be sure to use an envelope to mail any of these cards. 

Check out the YouTube tutorial for hand lettering: 

HowTo: Calligraphy & Hand Lettering for Beginners  https://youtu.be/sBoVGqiSzr4

Pinterest is a great source for examples of fonts: https://www.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=contemporary%20hand%20lettering&rs=typed&term_meta[]=contemporary%7Ctyped&term_meta[]=hand%7Ctyped&term_meta[]=lettering%7Ctyped