Season’s greetings

Create pretty lino-print cards

You Will Need

• Tracing paper, pencil and ruler • Hand guard, soft lino and lino carving tool set (we used Essdee Lino Cutting and Printing Kit,

£29, Hobbycraft)

• Scissors

• Coloured inks

• Blank cards and envelopes • Rubber alphabet stamps (we used ones from Hobbycraft) IMPORTANT: The blades used in this project are very sharp. Always push the blade away from you, wear protective gloves or use a hand guard.

MAKE IT

❶ Fold a piece of tracing paper in half. Next to the folded edge, draw on half of a triangle-shaped tree with a pencil and ruler. Turn tracing paper over; trace over to complete tree. Transfer on to a piece of soft lino.

➋ Position the hand guard in the corner of the lino and hold in place. Use the thinnest blade (Number 1 if you are using the Essdee kit) to carefully follow the triangle line, remembering to always direct the blade away from you.

➌ Cut the central and diagonal lines into the tree. Rotate the lino as you go, so you are cutting away from you.

❹ Change to a scraper blade (number 4) and scrape away some of the excess lino around the edge of the tree. You don’t need to go too deep, just gentle strokes over the top.

Cut out the tree with scissors.

❺ With the tree facing down, dab on ink pad until covered. Position on to front of card and press down. Peel back to reveal your printed tree.

❻ You can make a small pot stamp, too, to go at the base of your tree, but this can be fiddly so you may just want to add a trunk on to the bottom of your tree stamp.

❼ Continue stamping trees, using different shades of green ink. Then use an alphabet stamp to spell out a festive message. You can decorate the envelopes, too, if you like. ➺