A Wintery Altenew Collaboration

Hi friends! I’m so excited to be collaborating with the amazing company, Altenew, for a couple of holiday projects. My first project is a rustic, wintery card featuring the Winter Cardinal Bundle. I used the beautiful cardinal image as my focal point and gave him a frosty backdrop using a stamp from the Poinsettia and Berries Set and finished with a rustic, textured border using the Herringbone Tiles 3D embossing folder. For even more details, follow along below as I walk you through the steps to creating this beautiful holiday card showcasing some of the incredible products from Altenew.

Altenew products featured in this project:

Winter Cardinal Bundle
Poinsettia and Berries Bundle
Herringbone Tiles 3D Embossing Folder
Joyful Greetings Bundle
Mix and Match Frames Die Set

My first step was to create the background panels. I started with two kraft cardstock panels, trimmed to 4 1/4 x 5 1/2″, and used the Herringbone Tiles embossing folder to emboss one of them. The other panel, I die cut with one of the Mix and Match Frames. Then, I lightly rubbed a white pigment ink pad over the embossed panel, catching just the raised areas, creating a frosted look. On the other panel, I repeatedly stamped the berry branch image from the Poinsettia and Berries set, also with white pigment ink, before spattering each panel with thinned white gouache paint. Before attaching the stamped panel to the embossed panel with foam tape, I stamped a sentiment from the Joyful Greetings set with black ink.

Next, I stamped the body of the cardinal using four shades of red ink and black for the face and then used the coordinating die to die cut him before spattering him with a little of the thinned white gouache paint. The berry, legs, and branch dies are solid, so for the berries, I die cut them first from inked cardstock; I used an ivory color, and then stamped the details with a beige ink color. I did the same for the branches using brown ink and the legs using black ink.
Then, I stamped the holly leaves from the Poinsettia and Berries set, blending two shades of green directly on the stamp, and for the berries with the large holly leaf, I used the same ivory and beige ink colors as the other berries. Finally, I used the coordinating dies to die cut them.
To give the holly leaves and the branches a frosted look, I dabbed white pigment ink on them with a sea sponge.

With the remaining elements now completed, I attached them to my background panel with liquid adhesive and foam strips or tape where the image overhung the panel. The final detail was to add the cardinal’s eye with a black glaze pen and a small white gel pen highlight.

Thanks so much for stopping by to see this wintery collaboration with Altenew. The project-specific supplies I used are listed in the description above, and my everyday supplies can be found here. Happy crafting!