How To Add Sparkle To Your Holiday Card

Sparkle and unusual colors for Christmas are the themes for Day 20 of the Twenty-five Days of Christmas Cards. Learn how to make it.

This cool card is really versatile. For example, with just a couple of changes, you can easily change it from a card for the holidays to a birthday card or for any kind of celebration.

The inspiration for the card came from @Robin Marshall Clark who taught how to make a similar card at the Hero Holiday Stamp-Along a couple of weeks ago. I love her use of blending your own cardstock. By doing so, the only limit to your color palette for this card is the inks that you have in your stash.

Blending Custom Colored Cardstock

That said, we’re going to begin to make the card by creating the four pieces of cardstock that we’ll be using. To demonstrate, blend the pink ink onto a 4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″ piece of white cardstock until the cardstock is completely covered with ink. That is, we’ll do that by using circular motions with our blending brush.

HINT: You can alter how light or dark your cardstock is by how you hold your brush. If you want it to be dark then hold the “head” of the brush while adding the ink. If you want it lighter, or mottled then hold the brush back at the end of the “tail”.

Once we have the taffy cardstock complete, we’ll spritz it with some iridescent spray to give it some sparkle. And then, we’ll set the panel aside to dry.

HINT: Spraying ink can get very messy. To keep from having it all over everything It helps to lay the card panel down inside a box when you are spraying. I keep a shallow one that is about 12″ x 18″ x 4″ to use for this purpose. It’s the perfect size to contain splatters. The lid raises up to make the sides tall enough so that the spray can’t get out. And, it folds up into a fairly small box for storage.

Following the taffy cardstock, we’ll blend the teal, purple, and blue cardstock using the same method.

Heat Embossing for the Sparkle Holiday Card

The next step is to do a little heat embossing. And, we’re going to use this technique for the “holiday” portion of our sentiment from the Holiday Borders and Icons stamp set. And then, we’ll also use it for each of the stars.

To get started, we’ll brush the cardstock with anti-static powder. And then, we’re going to stamp the images with watermark ink.

Following the stamping, we’ll sprinkle Silver embossing powder over the stamped stars and sentiment, pour it off and give it a tap. And then, heat it until it’s smooth and melted.

Sparkle Holiday Card Die-cutting

We’ll start the cutting by die-cutting each of the stars with the coordinating dies. Following that, we’ll cut out the ornaments. We’ll cut one of the third smallest bulbs and two of the second smallest ones from vellum.

Following the ornaments, we’ll cut the word “sparkle” from silver glitter paper. And finally, we’ll cut the sparkle shadow from a scrap of white cardstock.

Finishing and Assembly

Color the ornament toppers with a silver marker. And, we’ll glue the sparkle sentiment to its shadow using liquid glue.

Next, we’ll trim the pink cardstock down to 4 x 5 1/4″ and attach it centered onto a white A2 card base with a glue runner.

I always like to create my arrangement for a card by laying out the different pieces that I am using and moving them around until I am satisfied with each of their locations. Using Press-n-Seal is helpful when you do this because it preserves your arrangement. For example, you can place a piece of it over the arrangement and lightly press on it. And the whole arrangement comes up with the Press-n-Seal so that you can add liquid glue between the pieces and on the backs of each.

HINT: Take care to only add glue behind where we colored the toppers on the ornaments so that it doesn’t show through.

You can add some foam strips to give the card some dimension. I added it behind each of the stars. And then, strategically placed it behind the sentiments in order to get the look that I wanted.

And, that is it.

Supplies

The following list may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something by following a link on this page, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for supporting my blog.

• Cardstock: Card base – Neenah Classic Crest 110lb Solar White; Card panel, Sentiments, and Stars – Neenah Classic Crest 80lb Solar White; Vellum – Hero Arts Vellum; Silver Glitter Paper – Hero Arts Glitter Paper Holiday Sparkle (this is sold out at the time this article is published, an alternative could be HERE)
• Stamp: Hero Arts Holiday Borders and Icons
• Stamp and Die Set: Hero Arts Holiday Sparkle Bundle
• Die: Hero Arts Bulb Ornament Infinity Dies (if sold out, try HERE); Hero Arts Holiday Words
• Ink: Hero Arts Reactive Ink – Taffy, Thistle, Pool Party; Hero Arts Core Cornflower; Watermark ink –Hero Arts Clear Embossing & Watermark Ink
• Blending Brushes: Gina K Designs Set of 4
• Spray: Hero Arts White Iridescent Shimmer Spray
• Stamp Positioning Tool: Sizzix Stencil and Stamp Tool
• Anti-static Powder Tool: Cottontail
• Embossing Powder: Hero Arts Silver
• Heat Gun: Sizzix Dual Speed
• Silver Marker: Decocolor from Marvy Ushida
• Adhesives: Gina K Designs Adhesive Dot Runner; liquid – Bearly Art Glue; foam strips – Scrapbook.com Double-Adhesive Foam Strips

LOOKING FOR MORE CHRISTMAS CARD IDEAS?

Check out these articles:

• Day 19
• HOW TO MAKE A SPARKLY SNOWFLAKE CARD -18
• HOW TO MAKE A STUNNING HOLIDAY CARD – 17
• HOW TO MAKE A POINSETTIA WREATH CARD – 16
• HOW TO MAKE A BLENDED ORNAMENT CARD – 15
• HOW TO MAKE A SNOWFLAKE SHAKER – DAY 14
• HOW TO MAKE A SPECIAL CHRISTMAS CARD – 13
• HOW TO ROCK A BLACK CHRISTMAS CARD – 12
• HOW TO MAKE CHRISTMAS SILHOUETTES CARD -11
• HOW TO MAKE AN ELEGANT CHRISTMAS CARD-10
• HOW TO MAKE A PURPLE CHRISTMAS CARD – 9
• LEARN HOW TO MAKE A SILENT NIGHT CARD – 8
• HOW TO MAKE MY FAV CHRISTMAS CARD – 7
• WHO DOESN’T LOVE AN ELF CARD? – DAY 6
• HOW TO MAKE A SCRAPBOOK CARD – DAY 5
• HOW TO MAKE A NOEL CHRISTMAS CARD – DAY 4
• DO YOU LOVE SANTA ON THE CHIMNEY? DAY 3
• HOW TO MAKE CHRISTMAS TREE CARD – DAY 2
• HOW TO MAKE FIRST SNOW CARD – DAY 1
• HOW TO CREATE A WINTER WONDERLAND
• HAVE YOU SEEN THE NEW NORDIC SPELLBINDERS RELEASE?
• MASS PRODUCE CARDS, WANT TO LEARN HOW?