Tutorial - Chinese New Year Red Envelope

Chinese New Year is one of the biggest holidays of the Chinese calendar, and it is this coming Sunday! It coincides with Valentines Day this year.

It is Chinese tradition to give red envelopes with money to the children in the family, to bring prosperity in the coming year. Since they're paper based, I thought I'd make some this year. This is the template I used - please bear with me - I drew it by hand so its not pretty and graphic. My skills in photoshop are very limited. (I also scanned it in pdf - if you want me to email it to you please just leave me a comment or email me and I'll go ahead and send it to you). This is supposed to be a drawn image on a normal 8.5x11" sheet of paper.


Cut it out and use as a template. Trace it over red paper and cut out. I have seen it where people use all kinds of paper. My feeling is - it must be red. These are "red envelopes" - using another color is like saying let's have an easter puppy or easter bear. No no no... it must be the easter BUNNY... and in my house, red envelopes must be red paper....
Or if you don't mind the print lines, just print it directly onto the backside of your main base paper.

Cut it out and fold along the score lines.
Adhere your edges

It is the Year of the Tiger, and luckily, Tiger stamped images are not too hard to find. This one is from Inkadinadoo - Asian Characters. These are clear stamps.

I stamped directly on to orange paper, and then on the back side of the scraps of red. I am going to be piecing these and needed two colors. (**Note: the top left tiger was stamped in Memento. The image was slightly blotchy - so I restamped with versafine in the rest of the images).

Cut out and piece...
Then embellish your envelopes. The text stamps are from CTMH, and the die cuts are from Spellbinders.

Happy Chinese New Year to you!! May the Year of the Tiger bring you health, happiness and prosperity!