School broke up really early this year due to the exams but I didn't want to abandon my yearly tradition of giving out Christmas cards and a little extra gift to go with it. As per usual of me I left it to the last minute but I did have some idea of what I wanted to do. I wanted the cards to be eco friendly and made out of recycled newspaper. I realised though I couldn't just make them out of newspaper otherwise they'd be much too flimsy. So instead I mounted pictures from a festival guide on the back of cardboard shoeboxes and cut out a bauble shape in the corners of the card, to detract slightly from the text/images on the newspaper.
The cards were still a bit plain and not hugely Christmas-y so a bit of gold and white paint sparingly swiped along the edges made them more to my liking.
Then to finish them off I wrote the greeting and inner message in some calligraphy-style felt pens that I nabbed off my mother(which was NOT easy can I tell you).
My cards weren't largely Christmas themed but since I handed them out so early, not even in December I think that suited well plus my friends enjoyed the quirkiness of them(I hope!). I'm attempting to make this an eco Christmas and I'd say it's going well so far; handmade cards out of newspaper and cardboard and may I add that I even picked out all of the tiny little paper scraps from the mess I produced and put them in the recycling bin.
The little gift I added were these handmade friendship bracelets/anklets that I found in this new little boutique in my local shopping centre, Tree Of Life. I'd previously seen their products advertised in magazines so it's great to be able to finally buy them. They sell all these beautiful home wares made in India. They also sell all these beautiful handmade dresses in to-die-for fabrics. I'll show you a picture later of the one I bought. I'm really glad they're adding great little shops like it to shopping centres, I am so sick of all these rubbishy chain stores that essentially sell the same things year and year out. I shall hopefully have a tutorial for the cards posted up closer to Christmas on the Cut Out & Keep crafting site.
