Slimline Christmas Carol Kittens Card and a Bonus Card!

Hello and welcome! I’ve got a slimline card today that features the Carol Kittens stamp set from Gerda Steiner Designs as well as one of the puppies from the Howl are You set and one of the kittens from the Christmas Kittens set. My card took a bit of a left turn along the way, and I ended up with a second bonus card for you, so you can see that card at the end of this post. 

I’ve made a video showing how I made this card, so if you would like to see the video in HD, PLEASE CLICK HERE.

I started my card by cutting a piece of Strathmore watercolour paper to be about 9 x 4”, slightly larger than my rectangular die, and I taped it down to an old cutting board. After wetting it, I dropped in some Distress Ink reinkers in Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Picked Raspberry, Wilted Violet and Dusty Concord. Once this was dry, I spattered it with some Kuretake Starry Colors paint in gold and let it dry. 

I used a Trinity Stamps die called Wonky Stitched Wilderness slimline series to cut out my background. I also embossed some of the stars that come with this die set.  I coloured all my images with Copic markers and have listed them below, and then cut them out. I applied some glossy accents to the dogs’ collar and the ornaments. I also die cut a snowbank from white cardstock using the Lawn Fawn Hillside border dies. 

When I went to assemble my card, things took a left turn.  I felt that the puppy was rather lost amongst all the kittens, but he was meant to be the singing star of the card.  So I removed the Christmas kitten in the tree (who I thought was looking very startled by the dogs’ singing), and he shows up later in the bonus card.  I die cut some trees from Sunny Studios Woodland Borders die set and covered them with Nuvo Moonstone glimmer paste.  

I embossed and heat set the words “Joy”, “The World” and the musical symbols (all from the Carol Kittens stamp set), using some Stampendous Pearlustre Moonstone embossing powder onto my snowbank border.  I also used the word stamp “To Youuuuuuuu!!!” from the Howl are You set and changed it to “Tooooooooo” by masking and rotating the stamp to only stamp and emboss the bottom of the u’s.  I then cut this out to make a speech bubble. 

To assemble my card, I foam mounted the snowbank and adhered it to the background.  I added some Nuvo shimmer pen just along the edge of the snowbank and then adhered the rest of my images. Finally, I glued the speech bubble in place to complete my card.  

And for the Bonus Card ...

So even though I had this card done, I still had that kitten in the tree image coloured and cut, so I decided to make a second card with it.  I coloured one of the other kittens in the Christmas Kittens set, as well as the tree branches.  

I die cut a panel of white cardstock with a wonky stitched rectangle die, and cut a lift the flap circle on this.  I heat embossed the “naughty or nice” sentiment around the flap in Stampendous Pearlustre Moonstone embossing powder.  I did the same for the word “Lift” on the flap.  I die cut a frame of gold foil cardstock and adhered this to my card base.  I glued the kitten in the tree in place so he would show up behind the flap, and then adhered my white rectangle panel to the card base.  I added the second kitten below the flap, and glued the tree branches over the flap itself.  I added glossy accents to all the ornaments. On the inside, I stamped the sentiment and added the broken ornament.  

Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope you’re having a great day! 

Copic Markers used:

Dog - E59, E57, E53, E51, E35, E33,  Collar - R39, R29, R35

Black cat - N6, N4, N2, N0, R20, R00,  Scarf - G99, G94, G82

Tabby cats - E34, E53, E51, YR27, R20, R00 Scarf - B66, B63

Grey cat - C3, C2, C1, C0, R20, R00, Tree/ ornaments - G67, RV13, RV04, RV02, YR16, Y38, YR21.

Hats - R39, R29, R35

Music sheets - E51, Y23

Carolling Pandas with Gerda Steiner’s Lovely Panda and Carol Kittens

Hello, it's Karen here (@karens_kardzz) and I have an interactive Carolling Panda Christmas card to share with you today.  I've used images from Gerda Steiner’s Lovely Pandas stamp set and the Carol Kittens as well. Here's a look at the card.

I love how when you pull out the tab, the panda is singing along with the kittens, but is instead singing "Beary Christmas".  And it looks like the one kitten on the left is really giving him the stink eye!

I think it’s easiest to see the construction of this card on HD video, and you can see it HERE. 

I started my card by making masks of the kittens and the panda as well as the envelope that the panda is holding.  I also made a mask of a snowbank using Lawn Fawn's Hillside border dies.  For the evergreen trees in the background I used Newton's Nook Evergreen stencil and I made a mask of this as well.

I stamped out the kittens on the front of my card, using the masks for the center kitten.  I left room below the kittens to add my sentiment. Then I masked all the kittens and positioned the snow drift mask over the kittens.  I positioned the evergreen stencil over the snowbank and used Distress Oxide Evergreen Bough ink to fill in the trees.  I then applied Nuvo Glimmer paste in Moonstone over the trees.  Once the glimmer paste was dry, I used Copic markers to colour in the kittens.  I have listed the markers I used down below.

To create the tab, I cut a piece of 110# cardstock into a rectangle measuring 2 1/8" x 4 1/2".  I corner rounded 2 of the edges to create the pull part of the tab.  You also need a stopper at the other end, and I made this from a strip of cardstock that was 1/2" x 2 1/2".  I adhered it to the back edge of the tab with 1/8" double sided adhesive. 

Showing the tab construction

I masked off the left, rounded edge of the tab where the word pull will go, approximately 3/8".  I then placed the tab in my stamp positioner and positioned the panda holding the envelope onto the left side of the tab. I used Gina K black amalgam ink to ink up my stamp and then used a baby wipe to remove the heart and inside lines of the envelope. I lightly stamped the image onto the tab and then placed the mask of the envelope over where it should be on the image on the tab.  I then stamped the image again to get a good impression.  I used a copic multiliner pen to go over the edges of the envelope where it hadn't transferred completely.  I then used the music sheet from one of the kittens to stamp onto the "envelope" the bear is holding so it would be a music sheet.  Again, I used a baby wipe to remove any unwanted lines or ink for this.

Showing removal of unwanted lines on the music sheet

 I stamped the word "Beary" from MFT's Polar Bear Pals stamp set, and the "Christmas" from Lawn Fawn's Here We Go A-Waddling set, just to the right of the bear.  I also used this Lawn Fawn set for the sentiment on the front of the card.  The next step was to mask off the bear and position the snowdrift mask.  Once they were in place I created the trees with the Evergreen stencil the same as was done on the front, and finally covered the trees with the Nuvo Glimmer paste. I coloured in the bear with copic markers, and they are listed below.

The last step for both the front of the card and the tab was to mask everything off, including the trees and then I ink blended the sky with Distress Oxide inks in the colours Picked Raspberry, Seedless Preserves, Wilted Violet and Chipped Sapphire.  I also ink blended these colours onto a scrap piece of cardstock that was big enough for my sentiment and to die cut the "Pull" letters from.  Once the sky was inked up, I applied Nuvo Shimmer pen to the snowbanks, and the trees.

I stamped "We wish you a merry Christmas" onto the piece of cardstock I had inked in the sky colours with Versafine ink and heat embossed it in white. I fussy cut this out and added fishtail edges to it.  I die cut the word "Pull" from Lawn Fawn's Picture Changer die set and adhered it to the tab, but you could easily stamp the word or place an arrow on the tab.

To assemble the card, you need to make a channel that the pull tab will run along so I positioned the tab where I wanted it to be seen on the front ( roughly parallel to the kittens) and marked this on the back in pencil.   I placed double sided foam adhesive along the top and bottom of the back of my card front, and another strip that would butt up to the stopper end of the pull tab.  I also placed foam tape along the stopper edge of the tab so it couldn't push through to the other side.  Finally, you need to place small pieces of foam tape on the left edge of the card so the tab cannot pull out of the card completely.  The picture below shows placement of the foam tape.

Placement of the foam tape - notice the stoppers at the front and back of the tab

Finally, I removed the backing on the foam tape and keeping the tab in position, turned it over and adhered it to the card front.

So here’s that list of copic markers that I used:

Panda - N6, N4, N2, N0, C2, C0, R00
Kitten on the left - E51, E53, E33, YR27 Scarf - G99, G94, G82
Middle kitten - N8, N6, N2, N0 Scarf - B04, B02, B00
Kitten on the right - N4, N2, N1, N0 Scarf - RV 25, RV 14, RV 21
Hats - R39, R29, R35
Music sheets - Y21
Sky “fill in” - V12

Whew!  I know that's a long post, but this is a fun card and I hope you’ll give it a try.  Truly, I think it's easiest to just watch the video for the best explanation of how to make this one.