I wanted to share my love of tunnel cards with you today since they are a fabulous way of creating cards with dimension. Sometimes I just am not in the mood for coloring and I created this Christmas tunnel card with dies and inks, no colored images in sight! This is a picture heavy tutorial but well worth it!
Picture 1: Start by trimming 2 pieces of white cardstock into 8 ½ x 5 ½, this is just taking an 8 ½ x 11 and cutting in half. Trim another piece of cardstock a little bit smaller than 5 ½ x 4 ¼. These will be the base pieces of the card.
Picture 2: You will need to score one piece of the 8 ½ x 5 ½ cardstock at 4 ¼.
Picture 3: You will take the 8 ½ x 5 ½ piece you just scored and trim ½ off of just one side. Set aside for a while.
Picture 4: Take the other 8 ½ x 5 ½ piece and score at three sections on the ½. 4 ¼, & 4 ¾.
Picture 5: Take the piece of white cardstock that is a little bit less than 5 ½ x 4 ¼ and score long ways at ¼ on both sides. The trick here is to score one side and then rotate the paper and score the other side to keep the scores even sizes.
Picture 6: You will take the 8 ½ x 5 ½ piece that you scored in three sections and place your large centered on the side with the ½ score line. Run through your die cutting machine and should look like the piece in the picture on the right.
Picture 7: Next, you will line up the little bit smaller 5 ½ x 4 ¼ under the rectangle frame you just cut out. In the center you will tape down the smaller and run through your die cutting machine. It should look like the piece in the picture on the right.
Picture 8: This is always my favorite step, die cutting lots of cute pieces that will make a magical scene! I die cut the , , & from white glitter paper and the & from white cardstock.
Picture 9: To create your background, trim watercolor paper to fit a little larger than large rectangle frame and rub with your . Next you will use a stencil, I created mine using my cameo silhouette, stamp with , and heat emboss with . Then you will ink it with oxide ink. I didn’t go all the way down since we will cover the bottom with our dies.
Picture 10: You will adhere your background inside under the large rectangle frame that opens to the right. It should be on the flat part without any scores. Then you will take the little bit less than 5 ½ x 4 ¼ and add to both sides of scored edges.
Picture 11: You will peel off one side of the and adhere to the inside of the scored center of your card as shown.
Picture 12: This is where you get to see it coming together! You will add the dies to each different layer in the card. First, add the mountains to the back of the card right over the inked background. Second, you will add the houses on top of the smaller rectangle frame in the middle of the card. Third, you will add the snow hill to the back of the large rectangle frame at the front of the card. You can now see all the depth the tunnel card makes!
Picture 13: You will now add to the shorter side of the scored 8 ½ x 5 ½ that you set aside at the beginning.
Picture 14: Next, you will peel off the adhesive and add to the back of the scene card as shown. You want the rectangle frames on the right side.
Picture 15: Peel off the from the middle, smaller rectangle frame. Flatten out and press down top piece to adhere them together. You are almost there!
Picture 16: You will now add to the scored ½ flap, peel off, and flatten and press down to put the whole card together. You have now made your first tunnel card! It is a lot of steps but will go much faster the second time around!
Picture 17: To make the front of the card, you will use the leftover from creating the large rectangle frame. I love using leftovers! Trim watercolor paper to fit in the stitched rectangle, rub with and stamp using . Heat emboss using and ink with oxide ink. For embellishments add three , , and and pop dot on front of card.
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