The Hap-Hap-Happiest Christmas with Simon Says Stamp and Tim Holtz!

This post was sponsored by Simon Says Stamp. Thanks, Simon!

Hi friends! Well, we are in the home stretch for Christmas… are you ready? The days leading up to Christmas are my favorites: baking cookies, watching Christmas movies, shopping for just the right gifts, then wrapping them prettily. We have several holiday traditions at our house, and one that has endured from my childhood is a love of the movie National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It wouldn’t be Christmas for me without watching the travails of Clark Griswold as he pursues the “perfect” Christmas. When I saw the tree stamp in the Winter Woodlands set from Tim Holtz, I immediately heard the bells and angelic chorus from that movie when Clark makes his family tramp through the “frosty majesty of the winter landscape” to find that “most perfect Christmas symbol” and knew I needed to recreate it for a Christmas card! Let’s get started with the details.

For DieCember, Simon Says Stamp released a coordinating die to cut that perfect tree from the Tim Holtz Winter Woodlands stamp set. I started my card by stamping that tree using Sage and Pine Pawsitively Saturated inks, first stamping the entire tree using Sage, then tapping my Pine ink pad around the edges of the tree and softening the inked interior edges with my microfiber cloth to create a bit of extra shadow and depth for the tree. I die cut the finished stamped tree with the Winter Woodlands die.

For the background, I wanted to evoke the scene in which Clark stumbles upon his “perfect” tree and the tree practically glows in it’s perfection, with a light shining down on it from heaven! I started my backdrop by blending Royal and Galaxy Pawsitively Saturated ink on a white panel of A2 cardstock, keeping the center of the panel light to create that glow around the tree. I ran the blended panel through my die cutting machine with the Soft Snowfall embossing folder, then splattered it with some shimmering handmade glitter watercolors. To accent the tree and complete the Christmas Vacation vibe, I die cut the Simon Says Stamp Vintage Christmas Station Wagon from white cardstock and added color with my Copic markers, creating the “front wheel drive sleigh” from the movie!

After I popped up the tree and the car on the blended card front using foam adhesive, I used a Lacquer Pen to add Snowfall Glitter to my winter scene. I added a foiled greeting from Typed Christmas Sentiment Cards, tucking it beneath the station wagon, then finished the project off with a few sparkling white baubles! Tons of sparkle and shine on this card. It’s truly a hap-hap-happy holiday card!

Well, that’s all for my project today! We are in the holiday home stretch now, and I’m not sure if I’m ready for it. I still have so many things that I want to do and not nearly enough time in which to do them! I hope you’re doing better than I am with your time management. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!