Hi friends! I don’t know about you, but I stopped buying stamps now that I can just paint my own. This is a deinfluencing post, so if you don’t want to spend money, please continue to read for some ideas on DIY religious Christmas cards.
Why Paint Your Own Cards?
After amassing a lot of stamps in my collection, I realize one thing. You keep buying and buying every season but after using a particular set once, you have to wait a few years to do alternate versions again. And some are straight up one-use-wonders.
In addition, some specific stamps–especially religious ones–are much harder to reuse. They are too easily recognizable and not as versatile as things like cakes, flowers, etc.
Since I am not religious and only a few in my circle are, it is much easier for me to just paint a few than buy a set of stamps that I will only use once. Better yet, you can paint different ones each year!
Materials Used in DIY Religious Christmas Cards:
- Rosa Gallery Watercolour Classic Palette
- Dr. Ph. Martin’s BleedProof White
- Oat Art Studio brushes and Artegria brushes
- Grabie 100% cotton paper
- Thick cardstock paper and dark regular cardstock paper
- Glue
DIY Religious Christmas Cards Ideas
Since it takes time to paint each card, I don’t recommend anything that involves a lot of details, especially when the card is rather small. You want something that’s fairly easy to paint, but still looks great as a highly individualized card.
Silhouettes
First thing that comes to my mind is silhouettes. Silhouettes circumvent having to paint details on a small card. As long as you give enough to suggest a form, it is easy to recognize the subjects.
I painted the journey of the Three Wise Men in silhouettes in this simple watercolour painting. The camels and travellers in threes, as well as the star, give enough information to the viewer who they are and where they are going.
By the way, if you need help creating the silhouettes, you can search for them online to draw from.
Loose Watercolour Style Works Best
When it comes to hand painting more than one cards, loose watercolour style works best because you get around having to paint details. For “Almost There” above, I used some dome shapes to suggest the town without painting any details. Because of the silhouettes of the donkey, a pregnant woman and a man leading the way, it gives enough information who they are and where they are.
By the way, each of these small scenes took about 40 minutes to paint, which included natural drying time.
Turn Your Paintings Into Cards
Now it’s time to add a card base to your paintings and turn them into cards! Also, I prefer using a dark colour between the white card base and the paintings to give them a framing effect.
For the “Three Wise Men” painting, I slit the corners of the navy card base, so the painting itself is not glued down. If you think your recipient would like to keep the painting by itself, this is a great way to gift it in the form of a card.
For “Almost There”, I glued the painting to the card. I had painted something on the back of the paper and it didn’t make the cut, so I ended up gluing this piece down.
Overall, turning the paintings into cards took very little extra time. Since I only have two recipients who are very religious, I am done for the year! The rest of the recipients will be receiving my Gnome Drive Christmas cards. 🙂
DIY Religious Christmas Cards
DIY religious Christmas cards are relatively easy to make. Instead of investing in a lot of tools, stamps, dies and ink, you can paint your own. They are small and don’t take too much time to do. Most of all, they don’t cost much, and your recipients will appreciate your “art from the heart”.
For more super easy watercolour Christmas card ideas, click here.
