Lea's Winter Wonderland

Perfect cuts fast and easy with striking details –

I find myself reaching for die cuts and cutting

my own to match my personality and what I want to create! Although most of this layout is designed with the Winter Wonderland cartridge (The mini cartridges are perfect for other snowflakes), I found the perfect bridge when I looked at my Paper Dolls cartridge. Mix and match your cartridges! You will find more elements that can work together, EVEN, if you never thought a cartridge would have an element to match. I almost passed Paper Dolls for this layout but I’m so thrilled I didn’t.

Here are some easy techniques to enhance your die cuts:

Pastel Chalking Die Cuts: I loved how the bridge cut out with little lines so I knew where the shading would go if I wanted to enhance this image. I used Pebbles Earthtone Chalks and added gray to areas to make bricks. I did use a little white to make the highlighted areas pop out! It is really easy to do, takes moments and the results are striking. If one didn’t want to do all the shading, just take the chalks and run color around the edges using the applicator to pull color in onto the surface of the die cut. I used a little gray on the bunny’s ear and under his chin. I am totally addicted to these chalk palettes - they have so many colors and shades, and now I noticed shimmers and metallic colors! I have to HAVE them ALL!!

Ink Edging: Take your favorite pigment inks or Ranger’s Distressed inks and swipe the edge of your paper or photo mat into the ink pad. This creates a defined edge to your paper, makes it stand out against the surface it is mounted to. See photo.

Flower Soft Textures: Flower Soft isn’t just for flowers. Look at textures, of hair, or animal fur or even in this layout, the bunny’s tail!! I have a variety pack of Flower Soft ordered filled with many colors to choose from. A starter kit might be perfect to give one ideas for playing with this fabulous product.

Liquid Appliqué/EP/Glitter Snow: I wanted to make the snow look realistic without going over the top. I wanted “bling” of glitter to make the little crystals of snow stand out. The easiest way to achieve this is to use Liquid Appliqué (LA). LA comes in tubes and it is easy to squirt out with great detail. If you heat the LA right away with a heat tool, you get lots of bumpy texture. If you wait until it is dried, you get a more smooth yet bumpy texture. I let the LA dry before I heated the surface. Another way to add snow is to use Blingz! The extra thick Shimmerz that will dry with dimension if you blop it on or use a small palette knife. For the tree I used Stickles to lay down the glitter, then embossed Ranger’s Blue Pearl EP on top, then added the LA for the final dimension.

Multi-colored Glittered Snowflakes: The snowflakes started out a light blue. I used a blue

pigment ink to add dark blue to areas. I use pigment inks because I can take a sponge or my finger and spread the color the way I want to. On top of that I used a corner of Ranger’s Adirondack “Snow Cap” pad to add white. I used the corner of the pad because some of the blue will get on the pad. The color will blend so you have white, light blue, and dark blue. Lastly went over the area of the snowflakes with Stickles and spread it out and then added a dot of Stickles in the center of the snowflakes.

Note: For the tree, one tree was cut in olive green and one in light blue. I cut the tree part off of the light blue die cut and then glued it the bottom of the olive green die cut.

Supplies for Lea's Winter Wonderland Include:

• 6x6 blue decorative cardstock
• Dark blue cardstock to fit photo (Bazzill)
• Cardstock in gray, light blue, dark blue, olive, red, black, and green (Bazzill)
• Cricut Machine – cartridges: Winter Wonderland, Paper Dolls
• Zip Dry
• Flower Soft
• Earthtone Chalk Pallete (Pebbles)
• Liquid Appliqué in White
• Blue Pearl Embossing Powder (Ranger)
• Adirondack Snow Cap pigment ink (Ranger)
• Brilliance Mediterranean Blue pigment ink (Tsukineko)
• Stickles Crystal (Ranger)
• Heat Tool (Ranger)

All of these supplies can be purchased directly from Cutters Creek!