A blog devoted to the cards I make in my tiny upstairs space. When my sister stays there, she calls it an "artist's garret". I'm not an artist, but am an enthusiastic cardmaker - hence the title "Cardmaker's Garret".
___________________________________________________________________________________________

Friday 27 April 2018

Upcycling for Earth Day

I love the current Jingle Belles Christmas card challenge:

The challenge is called Peace on Earth Day - create a card using recycled elements.

I always save some of the commercial Christmas cards I receive if I think there are sections I can upcycle. I have a friend who loves owls and who is very big on recycling so receiving a card with an owl on it is perfect for turning into a card for her!  I used two different commercial Christmas cards I received last year to create this card:


I fussy cut the owl in his warm sweater and hat off of one card. And I trimmed down another card to use the beautiful night sky section, using deckle scissors for the bottom edge to cut a snow bank.

I die cut a branch and smooshed it in a couple of green inks. And die cut the word "merry". I attached the night sky piece to my card base, added the branch, the owl, and the word "merry", and then stamped "Christmas" underneath it.





Supplies:
Stamps - Penny Black Christmas
Ink - Vivid Inky Blue, various green Distress inks
Paper - blue background and owl upcycled from a commercial Christmas card, white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Tim Holtz branch die, Tim Holtz merry die



7 comments:

  1. Great up-cycling and love the vibrancy colour of the background and what a wonderful owl image x

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is such a sweet Christmas card for your owl-loving friend, Susan! Great upcycling! xx

    ReplyDelete
  3. Fantastic upcycling of your commercial Christmas cards! I never think of doing that and just send it to be recycled. Love the night sky piece. Well done! xx

    ReplyDelete
  4. Love this owl all snug in his Christmas finery, Susan! What a great way to upcycle not one but two Christmas cards!

    ReplyDelete
  5. great upcycling, that owl is so cute with his winter sweater on :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Love how you were able to combine two recycled elements ... that owls is stinkin' adorable in his winter clothing ... so very glad you joined our ode to Earth Day at Jingle Belles.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Brilliant, I adore this idea of reusing commercial Christmas cards. Loving the design and the die cut/stamped sentiment. Very creative and PERFECT, xx

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for leaving me a message! I love hearing from you.