Hero Arts Winter 2020 Release Blog Hop

Is it too early for Joy & Comfort? I think not!

I’m thrilled to be on the Hero Arts 2020 Winter Catalog Blog Hop today. This hop celebrates a beautiful holiday collection from a company that everyone loves! I think when you’ve had a chance to see all of the beautiful projects, you’ll agree that it’s time for Joy & Comfort!

I loved working with Stocking Bouquet from the new catalog. Loads of beautiful Christmas springs and florals to color and arrange. I had a car ride this week, so I packed up stamped images and my Polychromos Pencils for the long haul.

Then, I spent an afternoon mixing things up and adding them to a blended ink background for my first Joy & Comfort card.

Tip: my ink blended background is on Bristol Smooth cardstock. When I cut the scalloped white layer to frame, I also used Bristol Smooth. I do this so that the tone-on-tone of the papers is the same. Continuity in paper tones and texture gives your finished card a polished look!

I love sending Christmas cards, and usually send quite a few. So, one thing I try to keep in mind is design ideas that keep them flat for mailing to avoid the need for extra postage and/or damage in transit.

Christmas Rose Bold Prints was an instant winner in my book! Lots of beautiful, (but open!) detail for easy coloring. These panels quickly transition to full card front panels. With 6″ by 6″ of stamped space, there’s plenty of beauty to cut up for tags or smaller card elements, too!

First, I stamped the full background in Versamark on white cardstock and embossed with gold embossing powder. Then the image was colored with Polychromos Pencils and blended with Gamsol.

After trimming the colored panel down to allow for a slight mat to frame the images, I centred the panel on a white cardstock base. Finally, I added a small vellum banner with Merry Christmas embossed from Stocking Bouquet to complete the card front.

I appreciate you swinging by my blog today. It’s an honor to participate with this company and these incredibly inspiring artists. I hope you enjoy the hop, and I hope your day is full of Joy & Comfort!

See many other projects from the wonderful winter stamp collection and find lots of inspiration from the amazing artists below.  Be sure to leave as many comments along the hop as you can – Hero Arts will give away three $50 gift cards, drawn from the comments left across the hop. Enter by leaving a comment between now and Sunday, September 6th at 11:59pm Pacific, and the winner will be announced on the Hero Arts blog the following week.