BLING on the Holidays

This fortnight at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ it's time to "Bling on the Holidays" so we're making cards that feature jewels, gems, beads, sequins, pearls, glitter, stickles or pretty much anything sparkly. Sound like fun? Yep, we thought so too! Here's what we made this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "This card features one of my favorite techniques I like to call *deconstructed bling".  The bling on my glittery holiday tree started as two pearl adhesive frame stickers that I've had in my stash forever (I'm pretty sure I won them in some prize package).  I started cutting the frames apart and decorating my tree with the bits and pieces until my entire tree was decked out in pearls.  I finished by scattering more pastel pearls in the snowy sky."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I've never met the sparkly embellishment I didn't love, so I've used a few different ones here: a (smallish) rhinestone frame that I cut apart to use like photo corners; a pearl brad; a glitter snowflake (you can't really tell from the pic, but it's glittery, honest!) and my all-time favorite candy-striped Glitter Thickers. It's not often you see this much bling in one place outside the Las Vegas city limits, lol! I used the current Retro Sketch (#199) for my layout."

Now it's your turn to grab your favorite shiny, sparkly or glittery thing(s) and link up your blingiest holiday creations and link them up here by 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, February 9th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:16:03.

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Christmas Tree Champions

Wow, what a gorgeous gallery of Christmas Trees.  Here are a few that caught our eyes.

SonjaK's

coloring just pops off the screen including her white-on-black sentiment. ... 

and the stitching adds such great detail.

Mimi's

library card beauty with pink glittery trees, wooden stars, 

and hand-stained ribbon made us swoon.

Marina's

combination of embossed transparency with

chevron trees is so fun and funky.

Make sure you check back at midnight for another fun holiday theme ... as we keep taking back December, one holiday card at a time.

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

We're back with more Christmas Tree fun this week ... here's what we created.

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "This week I've used scraps of watercolor paper painted with Color Burst pigment powders, teamed with a brand new (to me) Echo Park tiny tree die to make a little winter scene encased in a faux Polaroid. I've also used one of my few remaining holiday Hambly (oh how I miss them!) transparencies to make a clear card base, and the current Sketch Saturday layout (#395), which is particularly fab, imo!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I went hunting through my Christmas papers again and found this Christmas Tree background paper from BasicGrey's 25th & Pine.  I used the layout from Sunday Stamps and added a wrap of ribbon (why did I stop using ribbon).  It came together so quickly, I made a second one that you can see on my blog."

So now it's your turn to pull out the stamps, (rubber or postage, lol!) the stickers, or the pretty papers which contain a Christmas tree, use them to make a lovely new holiday card, and link up here by 6pm (EST) Wednesday,January 27th. Keyword for galleries or Flickr is JB:16:02.

Oh Christmas Tree

We know you just put your Christmas Tree away (although I heard rumors that some might still be enjoying the twinkling lights), but we're asking you to pull out a Christmas Tree from your crafty stash and make a holiday card.  It could be a die cut, a stamp, some origami, or perhaps some pretty holiday paper you've been hoarding ... just make sure your card includes a holiday tree.

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "As I was going through my stash, I realized a have quite a lot of discontinued holiday papers.  I found this trio of Christmas trees in some Kaiser Craft paper and built my card around it ... a border sticker, SRM Sticker sentiment and a few sequins make it come together quickly when your papers are pretty."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I recently acquired an envelope full of cancelled postage stamps from the 1970's, some of which are very pretty, like these red and green Santa ones, which I decided would make a really fun diecut xmas tree. I used one of my favorite (ancient!) dies (Sizzix's Tree, Christmas #2) to make that happen. I also used retro sketches #196 to guide the layout of my elements."

So now it's your turn to pull out the stamps, (rubber or postage, lol!) the stickers, or the pretty papers which contain a Christmas tree, use them to make a lovely new holiday card, and link up here by 6pm (EST) Wednesday, January 27th. Keyword for galleries or Flickr is JB:16:02.

An InLinkz Link-up

Something Awesome, Something ♥YOU♥!

Well it's official, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥: 2016 is going to be the best Christmas card-making year ever! We know this because we've had the joy of seeing all the gorgeousness you guys produced over the last two weeks for the "Something Old AND Something New" prompt! Here are a few cards which made us especially happy:

June Houck of Simply Elegant Paper Crafts

...beautifully combined some old cardstock and dies with a brand new holiday card kit to make this adorable greeting that also re-uses the final card sketch drawn by our dear friend Leslie Hanna who will be sorely missed around these parts! 

♥♥♥

Laurie of Stampin Up North

...paired an old background die with a brand new (gorgeous!) layered snowflake die and combined a few different challenges to create this striking card!

Marilyn of Crafts and Beyond

....perfectly colored a lovely new stamp and created a gorgeous background with those beautiful older dies for a dimensional winter scene that totally WOWS!

Many thanks to everyone who played along, if you haven't checked out the first gallery of the year, we highly recommend a little scroll down in search of inspirational reconnaissance! We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt we hope will have you branching out into arboreal awesomeness! ♥

May OLD Acquaintance be Forgot ...

...or, alternatively, be mixed with some crafty new goodies and incorporated into a lovely holiday card? That's right, we're still celebrating "Something Old AND Something New" so be sure to scroll down to last Friday's post for all the details and to link up your own gorgeous cards. Meanwhile, here's what we made this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "For my something(s) new I've used three papers from Kaisercraft's gorgeous "Silver Bells" 6x6 paper pad that I received for Christmas, plus their beautiful "Merry Christmas" die that I may have treated myself to after the holiday. Everything else is old, including a bit of vintage sheet music and lace, and a couple of snowflake punches that I happily re-discovered in my stash! My layout comes from Retrosketches #196."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I had fun creating this card with my new My Favorite Things Warm & Fuzzy Die-Namics (I actually wish I had a hat & mittens like that ... not to mention some hot chocolate).  I used colors from the current Christmas Card Challenges together with an older sentiment from MFT Merry Messages."

Something Old AND Something New

Happy New Year, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! If you're a brand new reader, we welcome you; if you're an old friend, we're very happy to see you again! Either way, we know you're as anxious as we are to get started making a brand new year's worth of gorgeous holiday cards, so without further ado we'll explain that the first prompt of the year is to use something BRAND NEW along with something older from your stash! Sound fun? Yeah, we thought so, too! Here's what we made this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I got this great new Avery Elle Oh What Fun Santa for Christmas ... I paired him with lots of older things in my stash including Spectrum Noir Markers, Sequins, Stitched Landscape die cut,s and two Easter Bunnies who are crashing the Christmas party."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I got soooo many cool NEW crafty things as prezzies that I had trouble choosing what to use... best "problem" EVER, lol!!! I finally settled on the beautiful red damask Hambly transparency that Miss Stephanie found for me (despite those having been OOP for a couple of years!); and some Petaloo burlap flowers that maaaaaay have been a little gift from me to me when re-ordering adhesive online. From my stash I chose an illustration from an older, falling-apart children's book from which I've rescued the pretty pictures, a scrap of October Afternoon plaid, and some ancient red velvet paper."

And now it's your turn: Go to your stash, grab "Something Old AND Something New" and use them both on your first holiday card of 2016! This link will be open until 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, January 13th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:16:01.

An InLinkz Link-up