As a male friend shares his birthday with Christmas day, I was planning to make him a card soon. Then the current challenge at Seize the Birthday #338-Masculine arrived and I thought ‘do it now’ and join in the challenge at the same time.

One of my stamping friends sent me a bunch of images a couple of years ago when I asked for help, but didn’t want to buy a stamp set just for a specific project. This is one of the images she sent to me and I have dressed it up to make a winter card.

I masked off the image first but because this is the only one I have left I took a photo copy and used that for my mask. Then I proceeded to add some shading with ink to give the idea of snowbanks at the bottom. I also used a stamp from a set by GKD and added my trees which I heat embossed clear. Once that was dry I added a wash of colour for the sky and sprayed some shimmer along with some spatter at the same time. When it was dry I removed the mask and added colour to the snowman using Sakura glitter pens. My friend had also included some related sentiments so I tried to adapt one but messed it up. In the end I used the idea and did it on my computer changing the last word to birthday. It came out a lot bigger than I expected so I cut it up and added it as you see at the bottom. (I forgot to put my glasses on otherwise I would have realized the font was a bit too big.)

My final step was to sponge a darker blue along the edges before I attached it to the card front. I’m not displeased with the end result in spite of some small mistakes as I went along.

Many thanks for stopping by, I appreciate you, your time and any comments you may leave.