Although it seems like it’s a long way off I’m afraid to report that it really isn’t….yep, Christmas is coming and in about 9wks time eekk! For me this is the busiest time of my year and I’ve been making fused glass Christmas decorations since the heatwave back in July so on this rare weekend off I decided it was time to get my Christmas cards made.
This year I am running workshops at The Make it Room, Howe Green, Chelmsford and Craft Classes at Beautiful Things, Ingrave, Brentwood in making Christmas cards, tags and wrap with lino printing techniques. As a result of this I have fully stocked card making and print making boxes and thought that it would be a good opportunity to make my seasonal cards slightly differently this year.
I made a start by drawing a design onto a fab product called ‘easy carve lino’. It is so much easier to carve into than the old fashioned lino tiles with a hessian back. No more heating your lino on a radiator or under a hot tap to made it soft enough to carve into (I’ll bet this brings back some memories of school art lessons for a few of you!), this stuff is soft enough straight away 🙂
I’ve deliberately left the cut lines showing. It will help to create a flow within the design and adds to the character of a lino print. As I was planning on printing this onto white card I removed everything I wanted to look snowy.
As many a crafter will understand, going into Hobbycraft can be a costly experience…far too many tempting things to buy to add to an already bulging craft cupboard!!! The other week I spotted mini letter stamps and thought they’d be great for the printing workshops and thankfully they work as well as I hoped they would.
I might have got a little carried away as I printed onto the envelopes with the lino and the letter stamps too….is it possible for things to look too pretty at Christmas?! no, thought not hehe…….and Mum, before you say anything, yes there is an enveloped printed for you and Dad too, it’s just underneath some of these!
By the time I got to printing out some wrapping paper I had company…..far too curious for her own good 🙂
If you’d like to have a go at making your own designs my workshops at The Make It Room, Chelmsford are on Tues 5th Nov 10-12.30, Weds 13th Nov 6-8.30pm and Thurs 21st Nov 9-11.30 am. Booking is via http://www.themakeitroom.co.uk/epages/587985.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/587985/Categories/Workshops/Christmas
If you live closer to Brentwood the workshops there are on Thurs 14th Nov 10-1pm and booking is via http://www.clairemackaness.com/adultclasses.html
Materials will be provided and you’ll be able to take you pieces of lino home with you so if you need to print more cards/tags/paper then you’ll be able to 🙂
Hope to see some of you soon.
Helen Rose Glass |workshops |classes | commissions 