Glitter embellishment on cards?

I love playing with glitter and bought some cheap Christmas cards and have tried using glitter glue as embellishment. The cards came out terrible. I tried the glue straight out of the tube and it came out too thick and the constant squeezing hurt my hand. I tried spreading it on thin using a clean make up applicator. That looked even worse and the card dried wrinkled like wet paper. Regular elmers glue and dry glitter goes on too thick for what I want. Old Christmas cards from around the 70's, or earlier, used to have a light, thin, coating of silver glitter that looked beautiful. The glitter was very fine, and you could see the card detail under it. How can I get the same effect? I would love to hear any advice on this. Thank you so much.