Black Lantern with Poinsettias and Pinecones

Christmas In July!   Susan's new Christmas die set release, by Spellbinders, will be available next week so you can add these wonderful dies to your Susan's Garden collection.  As soon as the new release is available in the US, I will include links to all the new die sets below. 

 Today I am giving you a preview of a card I created with this new release.   Susan's flowers always are so realistic, but wait until you create pinecones with her new Pinecone die set! Susan has instructions on how to create the pinecone on her Susan's Garden Facebook Live and will also have instructions on YouTube soon. 

Here is how I created this card.  To create the lantern, use the Garden Lantern die set and die cut one lantern out of black glossy card stock.  For lantern details,  die cut the lantern again using gold metallic card stock and cut out the lantern details using scissors, which are included in Susan's Flower Tool Kit. I cut out the band for both the top and bottom of the lantern.   Glue these pieces to the black lantern. To decorate the windows, I used a quatrefoil die and die cut it out of black glossy card stock, cut it down, and attached behind the windows.   Gold Self Adhesive accents, from Spellbinders, were added to the top and on the handle for dimension.  To make the lantern dimensional, use the Leaf Tool from Susan's Tool Kit and scored down the center of the lantern, between the windows and slightly bend it to give it dimension.  Double sided tape was added along the sides and attached over the candles, being sure the center is raised up for dimension.  I did not attach the top, nor the bottom of the lantern to the card.

Included in the Garden Lantern die set, is a die for a candle.  I die cut the candle twice, using red card stock.  The flame was die cut using silver metallic card stock and colored with Copic markers.  Around the top ridge edge of the candles, I added clear glossy accents to resemble dripping candle wax.  I wanted to include two candles so I cut down both sides of each candle to make them narrower.  They were attached to the card at different heights.

Using the Poinsettia die set two red poinsettias were created. I used Susan's white Speciualty Card Stock from Spellbinders and brushed them with red ink.  I placed them on the Waffle Flower Media Mat to put the die cut pieces on, then used brushes to color. These media mats come in two sizes.  They were shaped using the Flower Tool Kit and glued together using Bearly Art Glue.  

Two pinecones were created using the  Pinecone die set.  Don't they look like real pinecones!!!  These were so fun to create.  They were die cut using brown card stock then once they were assembled, I used a sponge and white pigment ink to brush along the tips of each petal.  This helped accentuate the tips of each petal.   

Here is a picture of the same card that I added Snow Paste to the pine needles and pinecones, for a snowy effect.

For the foliage, the Pinecone & Evergreen Bough die set was used.  Each of the tips were split, using scissors from the flower tool kit, to give them a realistic pine needle appearance.  A brown thin line marker was used to draw a brown line down the center and out toward the tips.  Using my fingers, I fluffed out the tips on each pine branch.  Using the new Winterberry Holly Branch die set, five branches were die cut, using green card stock and shaped with the Flower Tool Kit.  For the berries, I used tiny white bean bag Styrofoam balls.  They were put in a small plastic Ziploc bag, along with red acrylic paint and rolled around until they were all colored.  They were then scrapped out of the bag, with a chop stick, onto a piece of waxed paper and spread out to dry.  Once dry, they were individually glued on the Winterberry berry branch.  Once dried on the branch, a fine tip black pen was used to push down on each berry to accentuate the end of the berry.  This makes it look more realistic.

I used one of Susan's quotes from her Winter Quotes Stamp set.  It was stamped on black card stock with VersaMark ink and gold embossed, then die cut with an oval die.  It was added with dimensional foam tape.   For finishing details, I added a gold bow created with thin gold cording and added Spellbinders gold self adhesive embellishments on the corners.   

This is an exciting new release and I will be sharing many more cards to give you inspiration.  Thanks for visiting my blog.  I will be adding links for the new release to the list below just as soon as they are available.