Note: Tutorial written with screenshots from PSCS2 on a Mac.

Valerie Randall has a fantastic brush set called Christmas Ornaments. I decided it would be fun to design a Christmas card using these. I used my ScrapSimple Card Templates: Square Biggie to help me layout my card. It was as easy as creating a digital scrapbooking layout.

I started with a background paper from Angie's Beloved Collection (gray with white polka dots). I layered this with a background paper from Syndee's Shall We Dance Collection set on a Blend Mode of "Multiply" (swirly black frame). I then reduced the size of the nine circles (from the card template) a bit, so they would fit within the swirly frame. I cut these circles out of a white background from Ann's 727 Collection.

Next, I added the ornaments! I had a neutral base, so I wanted to add some vibrant color so the ornaments would really pop off the card. I used Erica's digital scrapbooking Cherish Papers.

Get an idea for what size your ornament brushes need to be. I used a brush size of 400.

Open a background paper of your choice. Create a new layer and in black, brush an ornament onto the new layer.

With the Ctrl key held down, click on the ornament thumbnail in the Layers Palette. This will let you select your entire ornament layer with marching ants.

But we don't want the entire ornament cut out of this background paper. We don't want the topper, just the base of the ornament.

To deselect just the top of the ornament, click on the Marquee Tool, hold down Alt and drag the Marquee Tool (you'll notice there is a little negative sign beside the Marquee cursor, telling you it's subtracting a selection) across the part you want to deselect. Or, instead of pressing Alt you can choose "Subtract" from the Selection Toolbar as seen above.

Now with your background layer selected in your Layers Palette, choose Edit> Copy. Go to your card document and choose Edit> Paste.

Now, I needed to add the topper. I repeated steps 2-5. But instead of deselecting the topper, this time I deselected the ornament, leaving just the topper to copy and paste out of the background paper.

The ornament looks a little bland to me. You can add some drop shadows and you can outline the ornament in black. To do this, I flattened the two layers of the ornament into one layer. Then I chose "Stroke" from the layer's Style menu (click on cursive "f" on the bottom of the Layers Palette to get to the layer's Style menu). Color black, Stroke size 3.

Continue steps 2-7 to add additional ornaments to your card. Tweak placement of ornaments, as you like. Add additional digital scrapbooking embellishments if desired. Print, fold and send to friends and family. Don't forget to decorate an envelope as well. An envelope template comes with the card set!

Card by Mandy Steward

	Note: Commercial license versions of Christmas Ornaments Brush Set, ScrapSimple Tools - Shapes: Embellishments 1801 Biggie and ScrapSimple Tools - Styles: Embed 1801 are also available.

Tutorial written by Mandy Steward