Festive lino printing

This year I am having a 'Homemade Christmas,' I am going to attempt to make everything from Christmas cards and gifts to the (hopefully delicious) feast with all the trimmings on the big day! As I mentioned in a previous post I was planning many crafty projects, one of which was lino printing.

I have a great love of Christmas, and to many people's annoyance, I may get a little bit excited too soon!  When making sure that I get all of my crafts done within good time I have got into the Christmas spirit already, and as you can see below I was printing away to a winter's favorite of mine, The Holiday!

 To create lino prints you must have all the kit: The lino, cutting tools, printing paint or ink, a paint roller, barren tool (for pressing the print onto the paper), a pencil and something to print onto.I scoured Ebay and Amazon for the cheapest price kit, as a visit to Hobbycraft showed that you can spend a fortune on just the basic set. I mainly looked at Youtube videos and online tutorials to get the technique right and got stuck in. 

I very quickly came to realize that this is quite a dangerous craft as  the cutting tool can slip quite easily off of the lino and slice into the hand that is holding the lino secure. So if you are considering giving this craft a go, be very careful and possibly buy a hand protector which I have seen  being sold.

 I am now waiting for some more lino to arrive so I can create some new designs.

You can see my mistletoe inspired design on some basic packaging tags and a cheeky Christmas pud in red on a card.