Hello Honey Bee friends!! Today, as I did last week, I pulled out one of my most favorite previously released Honey Bee holiday sets. Some of the older set are still my most favorite and I’ll never get rid of them! So I pulled out the beautiful Country Christmas Wreath and paired it with the new favorite Lovely Layers: Winter Birds!! My inspiration for this came from the raucous, but beautiful, Blue Jays we have here in Texas. They have a crest and a similar body shape to the Cardinal this is intended to be. I think it works!!

For ease of reading, I’ll list the steps for each component of my card starting with the wreath.

• From the Country Christmas Wreath Honey Cuts, I die cut the wreath from 80# Neenah.
• Then I chose two shades of green cardstock from my stash and a piece of white 80# Neenah. Then I used the Fresh Balsam Distress Mica Stain to lightly spray the pieces.
• WOW! I ordered these recently and this is the first time I’ve used them. These sprays give such a beautiful shimmer and shine that a photo just cannot capture! (P.S.: I need them all–LOL!)
• Once the pieces were dry, I chose a few of the greenery dies in the Country Christmas Wreath and die cut them from the mica panels.
• I tried to keep count and think I die cut about 34 of the pine sprigs and maybe a dozen of the leafy branches. I die cut the small leafy sprigs from white cardstock.
• Then I put dots of glue on the small leafy sprigs and dipped them into Clear Rock Candy Distress Glitter and set them aside to dry.

• I used glue and my reverse tweezers to arrange the pine branches and leafy sprigs around the die cut wreath.
• Lastly I added in the glittered small leafy sprigs around the wreath.
• I used a piece of paper from the Make It Merry paper pad and die cut it with the largest Deckle Edge A2 Honey Cut. Then I adhered it to an A2 card base.
• I used Bee Creative glue to adhere the wreath to my card base.

Next I created my “Blue Jay” inspired bird:

• I die cut the layers for the bird in the Lovely Layers: Winter Birds Honey Cuts from 80# Neenah. The feet, beak and eye is black cardstock. Did you know that there is a downloadable layering guide? The link to it is just under the product description in the Honey Bee shop.
• Then I used a couple of the little bitty Detail Blender brushes to color each layer. I used Prize Ribbon and Tumbled Glass Distress ink.
• To get the lighter shade in the middle of the birds belly, I lightly inked on some Brilliant White pigment ink with a detail blender brush.

• I always begin with inking/coloring the bottom layer of all of the Lovely Layers sets. Even though you don’t need to color the entire layer, I added some ink around all of the edges as I usually like to pop up the layers and didn’t want the white cardstock to show.
• I added thin foam squares for dimension between the bird’s body layers and used glue to adhere the rest.
• Since the bird is sitting over the wreath, I added a few pieces of foam tape to the back (on the lower tail and upper body) to adhere it.
• I stamped the sentiment from the Let Nature Sing stamp set with Rustic Wilderness Distress Oxide ink. I cut it out with the coordinating Honey Cut.
• As if there’s not enough shimmer and shine, (Haha!) I added a few gem stickers from the Winter Wonder set onto some of the green leafy sprigs.

I hope you can see some of the beautiful shine in the photos. It’s so amazing in real life! I sure appreciate you stopping by today! Have a wonderful, crafty day!