4 Desing tips for making a Christmas Shaker Card and what not to do!

I had a truly magical afternoon making these cute shaker Christmas tree cards for some pretty awesome kids, (mine) for Christmas Day!




While taking a class at Taylored Expression's studio (totally amazing people and company.) I realized what had been holding me back from ever doing shakers, and that is I could wrap my mind around the foam aspect of shaker cards, once I understood that to make a good shaker card is to use foam adhesive sheets, I was set to make more! So off I went!















To make a Shaker Card I found this tutorial to be very helpful!

 I have a couple design tips when creating the Christmas tree card.

1. Using Taylor Expression's Foam double-sided adhesive sheets were perfect for this die, a must if you want a shaped shaker card! You use the foam sheet with the tree die and run it through the sizzix, as if you were making a frame. Then you do it again with your pattern paper that you want to put over the foam.

2. Keep it simple. I learned with Taylor's class to keep the shaker element simple the focal point is the shaker element. The more "stuff" you have the less the shaker card is going to shine. use minimal embellishments. (although you do need a good amount of sequence.)

3.Keep with a color combo, and use coordinating paper if at all possible! My Shaker cards have at least two colors, not a ton. This card is meant to use colors as a design element, use them wisely!

4. Don't have the sequence blend into the background, the red and white works together because of the contrast. The blue and white works well with the white background because it's semi monochromatic.

While designing these shakers cards, I did use a build a scene sequence from Taylor Expression for the blue and white card, which I love, for the other cards, I used sequence in the kid and craft aisle at the local craft store. I got three different sizes of red, and then to add to the texture of the sequence, I added some gold stars. For a good shaker card, you want a variety of sizes and colors that coordinate with the paper! 

For this card, I had printed out the Merry Christmas sentiment on cardstock that I was going to use with Washi Tape, but doesn't this work well with the sentiment? This card is a great example of choosing a sequence that blends into the background, it's not my favorite one, but I wanted to show you that if you chose a red background with red sequence, it doesn't pop as well. (lessoned learned.) In hindsight, I should have added just one more layer on top of the red, to make the Green Tree stand out with the red sequence. Again, learn from my mistake!

See this card, much better right? I pulled in the red, and the green with some pink that makes it all work! ahh, my eyes are better!

When you think of Shaker cards, think of color as the most important element, then the shaker and your card will look great!

Here are the links to the Christmas Tree Die, while your at TE's site, order your foam adhesive sheets and the clear window acetate for the shaker cards.
I also used TE's Christmas Rejoice sentiments for cards that were stamped.