Santa Baby

This week at Jingle Belles we're celebrating Santa Baby ... we're asking you to create a card featuring Santa, Mrs. Claus, Elves, Reindeer ... any denizen you might find at Santa's North Pole abode.

Here's what we created this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I went with an elegant reindeer prancing in the snowflakes.  After the more traditional holiday colors of last week, I chose a coral-brown-tan color combination from this week's CR84FN with a sketch from The Paper Players.  The button is from Paper Trey Ink with a little chocolate twine."


Lauren's Card


Lauren says, "believe it or not, stef and i don't confer before we make and post our cards, we just somehow usually manage to go in completely different directions, it's one of the things i love most about our blogging partnership! i guess i was missing the idea of red AND green together, so i made up for it this week; plus, i just ALWAYS love me some pink, especially in holiday cards! :) this month at merry mondays one can choose ANY past sketch, so i went with challenge #6 from back in february" 

Whether you feature Santa himself, or one of his North Pole buddies... whether your colors are traditional or unique... whether your style is elegant simplicity or funky-n-festive... we do hope you'll link up your own "Santa Baby" card between now and 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, August 8th. Keyword for galleries and our flickr group is JB:12:16.

it's a red (or green!) letter day

we reached a record level of participation, and bold new heights of creativity this fortnight, for which we thank you, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! we're very grateful for the participation of our lovely-- and talented-- guest star, june houck; and she, in turn, would like to thank you, too!  here's june:

Wowza! Nearly 60 entries, I am soooooo pleased. I was tickled that quite a few people made green and red versions and linked each card up. Quite a few people mentioned in their posts that this was a challenge for them, and yet they rose to the challenge! Thank you to all who were able to participate. I enjoyed seeing familiar faces and some new ones too.  There are a plethora of GREAT cards linked (if you haven't had time to peruse them, check them out!) Less than 5 months until Christmas… 

 Hugs, 

June 

here are a few red *OR* green creations which especially amazed and impressed us all:

 leanne pugliese of wee inklings

june says, "A jaw dropping and stylish CAS card. I love that paper piercing! I want to CASE this card!"

noelle mcadams of paper and ice

june says, "INSPIRED! The tumbled snowman is brilliant! Fantastic card idea."

wendi r of scrappy day in paradise

june says, "Fabulous and fun elements: the felt tree and the distressed stars background make a truly unique and beautiful card."

once again we thank everyone who participated, and add our own extra-special shout out to the very talented june houck for joining us! we hope you'll come on back at midnight when our brand new prompt goes live! ♥

green *OR* red (but still... not BOTH!)

this week, quite by coincidence, our additional design team inspiration is all "in the red", but ♥YOU♥ can still "go green" if you want to! remember, your card must contain one or the other of these super-traditional holiday colors, but it cannot have BOTH! yes, we know, it's trickier than it sounds... which is what makes it fun! :)

we're thrilled to have lovely guest star* june houck back with us again this week, and excited that she's willing to share a little bit of her creative process with us:

"I began making cards using greeting card computer software back in the 1990s. Oh my, how far I have come! A few years later, I was introduced to rubber stamping, and I began to make all of my holiday cards. My very first stamped card looked like this one, that I revamped a little:" 

"In the beginning all of my cards were stamped in black ink and were the focal point of the card…not that there is anything wrong with that! I slowly started buying other colored ink pads, then a few years later using patterned paper. No more stamped backgrounds! That was time-saving and fun. When I started blogging five years ago, I was amazed at the talent that was out there. I still follow those same fabulous paper crafting ladies, and a couple hundred more :) Many of those uber-talented ladies did not stamp AT ALL. I thought, "that is cheating!" I am eating those words now. I won a Cricut Expression and I have become addicted. Often times I use my Cricut and stamp only my sentiment. But when I sit down to create, I do not consciously think about using the Cricut OR stamping unless there is a specific stamp I want to use or a specific image I want to cut. I have an idea and go with it."

"I have been wanting to cut these presents, and that was where my inspiration came from. I also love red/aqua Christmas cards, so I went in search of aqua papers. And I stamped my sentiment" :)

thank you, june, for sharing both of those gorgeous cards with us! ♥

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "this week my inspiration came from a blogger and paper artist i have just discovered called tara anderson; i ♥LOVE♥ the way she combines layer after layer of both brand-new papercrafting product AND unique vintage elements! i don't think i've even come close to approaching her amazing style, but i sure had fun making this card!!!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I stamped a favorite image from Artistic Outpost's Snowy Woods in Versamark on Ivory cardstock and clear embossed.  Next I sponged on lots of Fired Brick Distress Ink for a great emboss resist effect & trimmed leaving an inky frame around the image.  I use a baby wipe to clean the extra ink of the embossed surfaces, to really make it pop.  I added a few frames of paper to finish the design."

there's still nearly a whole week to link up your own red *OR* green creations, scroll down to last week's post for the linky tool and full details! 

♥♥♥♥♥
*do ♥YOU♥ have a great suggestion for a prompt? have you always wanted to try your hand at making a card sketch? or maybe you'd just like to come along, make an early card, and be "featured" one friday on the jingle belles blog? we ALWAYS enjoy having a "lovely guest star" so if you'd like to be one, just email us at jinglebellesrock @ hotmail.com!

♥ either red *OR* green (...but NOT both!) ♥

happy friday the 13th, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥, we hope, like us, you'll feel this is your lucky day, when we tell you that we have one of our favorite belles, the lovely june houck, jingling along with us for the next fortnight! you'll probably recognize that name from seeing it in the link list on many of our past prompts; she's also got a wonderful blog, simply elegant papercrafts, and is on the design teams at my pink stamper and pumpkin spice.


june has devised (in our opinion!) one of the cleverest prompts of the year so far. we call it red OR green and the "OR" is capitalized on purpose, because june's got a fun little twist for us: the assignment is to create a holiday card that incorporates either red OR green... but not BOTH!!! so, for example, you can have red and aqua, or green and silver, or all red, or all green; you can throw in any neutral shades you'd like; you can choose whatever brights, neons or pastels you want; but if you've got RED, you have to leave out the GREEN... and vice versa! 


here's what we came up with this week:

June's Card

June says, "When I started crafting I ALWAYS stamped in black ink, my cards were symmetrical and/or perpendicular, and all holiday cards were in traditional red and green OR blue and silver. I still tend to create cards with elements that are perfectly straight, but I have learned to enjoy placing items on at an angle on occasion and I particularly like making holiday cards that are not both red and green. Red is my favorite color, but I also like pink and aqua Christmas cards (Lauren's influence!)"

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I decided to go monochromatic for this week's card combining deep green with a subtle sparkly gold cardstock.  Stamps are from Artistic Outpost and sketch is from 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown.  The background is embossed with a brick embossing folder (to feel like the wall of the house). I stamped the wreath a second time & attached it (and the sentiment) with foam tape for dimension."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "i used unscripted sketch #166, and color-wise... as you can plainly see... i went with green and blue. i've got lots of shades of each, with plenty of white for good measure and just the teeeeeeeeeeeeniest accent of black to give everything definition. i have used a few specifically christmassy papers, but most of this card is made up of scraps of "regular" non-holiday stash. i love when my supplies can "multi-task" that way!"

and now it's time to see what glorious holiday creations ♥YOU♥ will make, using either red OR green! link them up right here between now and 6pm (est) on wednesday, july 25th. the keyword for galleries and our flickr group is JB:12:15.


updated sunday, 7-15-12: due to a few mix-ups regarding this week's prompt, we've expanded and clarified the title of this post to better reflect the assignment. in order to prevent confusion and be fair to all players, we’re going to have to delete cards that blatantly use BOTH red AND green this week!!! thanks very much for understanding!!! ♥♥♥

Vintage Valedictorians

We had such fun having the talented Linda Brun join us for a vintage celebration at Jingle Belles.

These vintage creations were at the top of their class this week:

Barbara of The Knackered Grouse

Barbara claims that vintage style is a challenge for her, but you could never tell it from this amazing 3-D vintage masterpiece ... simply stunning.

Karen McAlpine from Dreaming and Creating

Karen combined vibrant hues with her black & white vintage image ...

and the sentiment is just toooo cute.

Aisling of Aisling's Hobby Blog

This peaceful monochromatic palette with subtle sparkles of gold is perfect for this adorable vintage image ... such a wonderful combination of stamped patterns too.

And, our random number generator says our grand prize winner is:

(drum roll please)

#18 - Lela Meinke

and here's her wonderful vintage creation:

Lela - e-mail us your mailing address, so we can get your wonderful prize from

Just Enough Stuff 

sent your way.

And join us at midnight (or whenever you crawl out of bed) for our next Jingle Belles prompt with another lovely guest star joining our fun.

Walking in a Vintage Wonderland

We can never get enough Vintage Style... especially at Christmas time... so here are a few more cards to inspire you:

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I recycled another vintage holiday card from my stash using this week's sketch from CardPatterns.  The vintage papers can be very delicate when cutting, so a fingernail file is perfect for sanding any rough edges.  I also added a vintage button from my button bowl."

Lauren's Other Card


Lauren says, "most of the time i use my ACTUAL one-of-a-kind vintage bits on my cards, but sometimes i find an image that's too big, too small, or just too precious to use... so i'll scan it, and use the copy instead. that's what i've done here with this fabulous early 1960's illustration from "the night before christmas", which came from one of my personal copies of the book (i collect them!) and was also just slightly too large, even for me! the little oval with text is from the same copied page which i printed on photo paper; the diecut panel with the snowy trees is clipped from an old christmas ideals magazine. everything else is regular old scrapbooking product from my stash, following this week's awesome mojo monday sketch!" 

Remember you still have until Wednesday, July 11th to link up your own Vintage Style holiday card! Scroll down to the main post to see the work of our lovely guest star Linda Brun, snag one of her beautiful vintage images to use if you'd like to, and read about this week's fabulous vintage-style prize!