More Snow, Less Dashing

We're still playing in the snow this week at Jingle Belles ... sledding, building snowmen, making snow ice cream ... just generally having a snowy good time. Well, most of us are, anyway!

Here are more snow-inspired creations:

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I used Hero Arts stamps with emboss resist and a combination of glimmer mists for my peaceful blue snowflake design ... layout is this week's Retro Sketch."

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "i was almost 100% inspired by basic grey this week, all of the papers, most of the embellishments, and even the (layout) sketch i used all derived from various BG collections, so this card was super-quick and easy to pull together!"

Remember, you have until 6pm EST on Wednesday, October 3rd to link-up your snowy creations; so no dashing is required!

Dashing Through the Snow

For our next prompt at Jingle Belles, we're Dashing Through the Snow ... creating projects that celebrate the white fluffy flakes of snow ... it might be snowmen, snowflakes, or just snowfall, but include some snow on your creations.

Here are our snowy cards:

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "last year our lovely fellow belle marie bingaman suggested  "suzy snowflake" (as sung by the awesome rosemary clooney) which had the distinction of not only being a fabulous inspiration for a prompt, but also being a holiday song from the 1950's which neither stef nor i-- serious xmas music aficionados-- had ever heard before! when i started sorting through supplies to make this "snowy" card, the leftover bit of sheet music was one of my first finds, and inspired (along with the current scrapbooking sketch from the basic grey blog!) my entire design!"

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I went with a homey little snowman from Simple Stories Handmade Holidays collection ... I love how the background designer paper coordinates with his scarf ... a bit of kraft & twine, and this card came together quickly using this week's Saturday Card Sketch at Two Peas in a Bucket."

So think snow ... and share your creations with us.  You have until 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, October 3rd to link-up your snowy cards; use keyword JB-12-20 in galleries and our flickr group ...  and most of all, have some creative fun.

post with the most!

as usual, we are blown away by all the christmassy creativity to be found in these parts, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! each and every one of your mail-related cards was a beauty! here are a few which we think are bound to make any postman smile this december:

tracey v. of crafty corner

stamped and colored and cut out a card's worth of adorable elements to "make a scene" in the BEST possible way!

 ros crawford of mikey's mom

made *THREE* amazingly lovely vintage-inspired collage designs, each more glittering and elegant than the last!  (the others are here and here!)

deborah frings of deborah's gems

created her gorgeous faux postage from scratch by cleverly using pinecone stamps and nestie frames for a design that *ALL* the elves are sure to approve!

and now i think we're all longing to hear to whom a little packet of christmas cardmaking goodies will be "going postal"! a consultation with the fine folks at random.org reveals that the lucky number is #18 which means that our winner is:

♥Mary Alice Bellis♥

please send your snail mail to us at jinglebellesrock @ hotmail [dot] com so we can get that right out to you ASAP!

as always, thank you to EVERYONE who played along with us, we know you will enjoy scrolling down for a cruise through the amazing "postal" gallery! of course we offer extra special thanks to our lovely guest star lela meinke, whose original idea and amazing card inspired us all this fortnight! be sure to tune back in at midnight when we'll be chilling out with another fun prompt! ♥

The Postman Always Stamps Twice

Not that ♥YOU♥ have to get inky to participate in our current challenge; just make a holiday card which features postal images (postcards, cancellations, mailboxes, etc) OR postage (real or faux) OR make a holiday postcard OR make a holiday card with a coordinating envelope! With so many fun choices, we couldn't resist showing off another round of our own creations:

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "For this week's design I created my own "vintage" postcard using three different stamp sets by Artistic Outpost & Distress inks ... I love how the sweet little reindeer is delivering a letter.  The layout is the Saturday Card Sketch from Two Peas in a Bucket & the postage-themed  designer papers are from 7Gypsies Postale Collection."

Lauren's Other Card... and Envelope
Lauren says, "I've been saving these adorable holiday inchies from Artchix Studios for just the right occasion, and when I saw this week's Unscripted Sketch, I knew immediately this was it. I had planned on just decorating a store-bought envelope to match, but when my card ended up being a non-standard size, I thought I would have a go at making a custom one... and found it easier than I expected! There's a little tutorial on my blog today showing what I did, step by step!"

There is still nearly an entire week to get in on the fun-- and have a chance at the prize! Scroll down to the original "POSTAL" post for full details! 

Going POSTAL!

We're always thrilled to have our fellow ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ suggest ideas for a great holiday card prompt, so please join us in welcoming our very lovely guest star, Lela Meinke!  Lela (you may know her as Serenity_Stamper) has been stamping for a verrrry long time. Back in the day, she wrote feature articles for RubberStampMadness. She’s active on Splitcoast, and she is a Stampin’ Up! Demonstrator. You can check out her ♥AMAZING♥ gallery at SCS by clicking the link for her card, and you can also check out her Stampin' Up Demonstrator Web Site; be sure to drop by one (or both!) of those fine sites and leave her some love!

Lela wrote in with a brilliant idea that we've never done before, so of course we invited her along to make a card with us! Lela suggested we build cards around postoids or real postage or even postal images; we've added in a couple twists of our own, so this fortnight you can choose from a few different-- but all MAIL-RELATED-- options:

make a card that includes faux or real postage or postal images 

(mailboxes, postcards, stamps, cancellations, etc)

OR

create a holiday postcard

OR

make a holiday card with a matching (decorated) envelope

Lela's Card

Lela says, "This card combines so many elements that I love: I love roses. I love all things postal. I love the distress technique. I love collage. And I love the holiday season! I decorate my family room with a rose theme every December. Our holiday wreath has roses too. I’ve saved that cancelled postage-stamp for a while, and it served as the perfect inspiration and focal point for this challenge. Those two red roses holding the banner are from the goody-bag prize I won from Lauren!”

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "As the wife of a postal carrier, I naturally love to collect mail-related images to use in my creations. These bright and beautiful EAD Christmas Stamp Stickerz are so very appealing that I only needed a few strips of cardstock and an EAD Christmas Sentiment Rub-On to make one of my fastest holiday cards ever!”

 Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "Amongst many other types of vintage paper, I collect postcards. I couldn't quiiiiiite bear to part with any of them, so I did the next best thing: scanned, printed and distressed both the front and back of one of my favorites (which was mailed to two young girls by their aunt, from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in 1907!) to put on this card. I used Kimber McGray's current card challenge sketch at Two Peas for the layout of my design."

We hope you'll be inspired to try one (or all!) of our fun options and that everyone will be "Going POSTAL" with us this fortnight! To inspire you further, we thought it would be appropriate for one lucky cardmaker to get a sweet little crafty package of christmas goodies in the mail. we'll randomly select a link number from the submitted cards, so you'll get another chance with every new card you make which fits this challenge!

You have until 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, September 19th to link up your mail-related creations; use keyword JB-12-19 in galleries and our flickr group, and be sure to HAVE FUN! ♥

Everybody Wins at ♥BINGO♥!

Especially us, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ when you link up as amazing array of incredibly lovely cards as you did this fortnight! Every single one is a big, biiiiiig winner in our book, and to prove it, we invite you to scroll down and check out each and every card in the links list, because we KNOW you'll be as inspired as we are. In the meantime, here are a few particularly clever takes on the BINGO challenge we'd like to show you:

Brenda B. of Brenda's Crafty Corner

We love the creative use of paper scraps for those fabulous little trees!

 Deanne of Three Trees

This beautifully non-traditional card can be summed up in two words: Simply Stunning!

Cheryl Lea of Ink Up

We're amazed by the unbelievable detail and gorgeous combination of flowers!

We've lined up a brand new challenge, a particularly lovely guest star, and there miiiiight even be a prize next fortnight, who can say??! ;) Best to stop back at midnight and find out!