Speaking of empowering, it was my local library that showed me I could do it. I’ve dabbled in card making over the years, even progressing to some pretty advanced levels of cutting and sticking, but at some point it fell off my radar. I no longer considered it to be something I did. That was until the library ran some card making sessions for adults.
For a £2 donation, participants received:
- Two blank cards, plus envelopes
- Access to the library's not-insignificant stash of crafty bits and pieces
- Tea and biscuits (posh ones!)
This was in the later part of 2019, meaning the sessions were Christmas-themed and the cards followed suit. I could have written about them when I made them, but that would have spoiled the surprise for the recipients. Writing about them in the run up to Christmas 2020 would have been equally sensible, but I didn’t manage it. (I have no idea why. It’s not like I had anywhere to be. I was probably just busy managing my umpteenth existential crisis.) I thought about waiting until Christmas 2021 but that’s a little too much procrastination, even for me. I contemplated skipping my Christmas cards altogether and describing the birthday cards I’ve made in more recent weeks, but I felt the need to start at the beginning. Given the slackening of festive timescales this year, I thought February was as good a time as any.
As such, please enjoy this account of my festive adventures in card-making.
This first design was for my Mum’s friends. Their initials were “E” and “R” and they always liked to receive a Christmas card of a postbox bearing the royal cypher. Bonus points if you could get a robin on there too. Having struggled to find a suitable shop-bought candidate, I thought the card-making session would be a good opportunity to create my own.
Here’s what I came up with:
I wish the lettering looked less like that of a serial killer but they say you can’t have everything in life. I could blame the font or the inkpad but I suspect it was my technique.
The card was a preform. I have set it against an old envelope here, just so you can see the scalloped edge.
I drew the postbox myself and cut it out of some bits of coloured card and shiny paper. Quite effective, I feel.
The robin is a real postage stamp. The library had a little stash of these, of all different kinds. I’d never thought of using them for card-making before but it sparked an idea.
This brings me onto my next design:
As you’ll see, I decided to address the card to absolutely everyone. I made jokes about efficiency but was actually overcome with rare feelings of goodwill to all earthlings. I even had to brush away a little tear. Yup. Right there in the library.
This sentimentality didn’t last long when I realised I could cover the too-clever-for-its-own-good angle as well. The addressee goes on the front of the parcel, right? And the sender goes on the back, like so:
This next design is probably the simplest of them all, but it still has a nice bit of impact.
The reindeer outline was drawn using a stencil, cut out and stuck onto the front of the card. His antlers got a bit mangled as I was using children’s scissors which, while appropriate for minors, were not the most precise instruments I have ever used.
The next bit is really quite exciting. The library has a few of those funky hole punch things. They don’t punch little circles so you can clip sheets of paper into a binder. They punch STARS! I punched three stars into the front of the card and then placed a strip of the patterned paper on the inside. I can’t tell you how happy this simple but stunning “peep through” technique makes me.
I stuck with stencilling for this next design, but switched from fauna to flora. I give you, The Holly:
Perhaps the most interesting thing about this card is that I cut the leaves and stem using a craft knife. It took forever but it meant I was left with a perfectly intact negative. I might use it for a design in about 5 years’ time, then write about it after another 10.
Last but not least we have this delightful chap:
The template took all the design effort off my hands and the machine took care of the cutting. From this point of view, my snowman feels like a bit of a cheat. However, once you start counting up all the tiny little pieces you have to arrange, lose, find, arrange again and then stick down, you realise there is quite a bit of effort required to make him into a real boy.
He went off to the friend that loaned the die cutter to the library. Full circle, innit?
As I’ve hinted at, the above images are scans. I also took photos. Not wanting to overload your eyeballs, I only included the scans above, but if you’d like to see the cards relaxing on sofas, reclining in my garden, etc., then you should totally check out the gallery I made for them.
So there you have it. My 2019 handmade Christmas card collection. I’ve enjoyed showing it to you. I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing it and that, despite the unseasonal timing, you’ve felt a little inspired for some festive designs of your own. In that respect, perhaps this post is early, rather than late.
I will show you my non-Christmas card collection sometime, but I wanted you to know where it all began. Life has often felt shapeless, these past few months, and colourless too. Immersing myself in actual shapes and colours gave me a little bit of the boost that so many of us desperately need, and I have my library to thank for it.
I just want to make it clear that I made these cards over the course of several sessions and that I did make the recommended donation for each one. I also tried not to obliterate my donation by eating all the chocolate biscuits.
I also want to make it clear, if I haven't already, that libraries are awesome. Use them. When you can, go in. When you can't, use their online resources. They will thank you for it and you will get back so much more than you ever imagined.