The Blues Remain Banished...

...and you still have nearly an entire week to join our Blues-free fun! Just make a holiday card (or two... or three?!) and link them up at the post right beneath this one! Meanwhile, here's what we made this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I've used a lot of neutral tones, much like last week's card, but that's just sort of a coincidence, they weren't made at the same time or anything. This time I based my colors around that beautiful vintage illustration from Pion Design-- their holiday paper lines all have a 12x12" sheet with smaller images and sentiments that can be cut apart and used on cards, which I think is a BRILLIANT idea! This week's Sketch Saturday sketch (#413) was also very helpful in terms of where I placed each element!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I found a some holiday gift tags in my stash, and decided to build a card around this velvet Santa.  This simple design mats it on a piece of Puffs with Lotion & Vicks tissue box (the inside is a fabulous shiny silver) and adds a Hero Arts sentiment ... fun and mailable."

Stephanie says, "lalala"

Remember, you have until Wednesday to Link-up and join our fun.

Banish the Holiday Blues

This week we're kicking the Holiday Blues to the curb, which means we're making holiday cards that feature NO BLUE.  Maybe red & green is your preferred holiday palette... or neutral tones on kraft... or perhaps, like some of us, you're pretty fond of "Pink Christmas"? Use whatever color combination works for you, as long as there are no blues.

Here's what we made this week.

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "Whenever I get to a scrapbooking store, I always look for the 12x12 scrapbook papers that contain journaling cards ... they make perfect centerpieces for card creations.  I used this Santa card as the focal point for this week's Retro Sketch using striped washi tape on green polka dot designer paper.  I stuck with the traditional color palette of Red & Green (with some silver sequin sparkle) for my design."

Lauren's Hilariously Similar Card

Lauren says, "Ok, yes indeedy, I realize this is one of those times that makes it almost impossible to believe that Stephanie and I *never* confer about our cards before posting them, but truly, it's 100% coincidence that we've both used this week's awesome Retro Sketch (#215) as inspiration, both chosen a pre-made centerpiece + washi tape, and both picked a traditional palette with a few neutrals thrown in. On the other hand, there's a pretty good reason we've been crafty BFF's for nearly a decade, lol!"

♥♥♥

Now it's your turn to use any technique, theme, images and ingredients to make as many glorious holiday cards as you'd like, just remember to banish the blues! Link up here before 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, June 1st. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:16:11.

An InLinkz Link-up

Shake Stars

We loved the variety of designs this week for our Shake, Rattle & Roll prompt ... here are a few of our favorites.

Sweatpea's fun fold really makes her sentiment pop.

Margo's shaker card is filled with a sweet little scene.

June's red, white & blue color palette really pops with her fun snowy shaker.

We hope you'll join us at midnight for some *colorful* holiday fun.

Move Ye Merry Gentlemen

We're still shaking, rattling & rolling at Jingle Belles this week ... in other words, making cards that have an interactive element. Scroll down to the original post for complete details, a gorgeous readers' gallery, and a place to link up your own masterpieces!

Here's what we created for our second round:

Sybrina's Other Card

Sybrina says, "It's always fun to make cards with sweet baby animals for SAS4Kids. However, many of the hospital patients are older kids, including tweens and teens. So, I'm always looking for card ideas that older kids might appreciate. The inspiration for this card came when doing a word puzzle in our local newspaper. It was one of those Eureka moments. So, I searched online for holiday riddles and Christmas words and used the computer's word processor to come up with a word puzzle that one of the older kids might enjoy."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I went with a Pop-Up Present card this week (in part because there is both a video and photo tutorial to follow).  A few simple cuts and embellishments, and I have a card that is sure to be opened and closed again & again."

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "Yes, I made another shaker card. And yes, it's the same colors as the last one; it even has another blue burlap poinsettia on it! But this time I was in a bit of an "art journal mode" and decided to see how funky I could make this and still have it be a send-able holiday card. The answer was, 'pretty funky' lol. Definitely a different vibe, and probably a card I'll save for an arsty friend, but I had a blast playing with vintage paper, stencils, texture paste and... well... whatever else seemed fun!" 

(There are more details in my personal blog post if you're interested in the technique.)

Shake, Rattle & Roll

This week we're excited to welcome the very talented Sybrina K, who emailed us to suggest a prompt with the awesome title, "Shake, Rattle and Roll" so of course she got our attention right away! What's the assignment? We're creating cards with an interactive element ... it could be a shaker card, a pop-up, unique folds, sliders, games ... you get the picture, right? There are lots of Pinterest Boards and Tutorial Forums that are filled with possible ideas... or you can use one of ours. But first, let's meet Sybrina:

"Hi, I'm Sybrina, for me, card making is all about sending cheer, hope, and encouragement one card at a time. As a shipper for Send A Smile 4 Kids, the majority of my cards are made to send cheer, hope, and encouragement to in-patient kids at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. In addition, I'm a co-founder of the monthly words-inspired challenge blog Words 2 Craft By and a member of the Cards in Envy design team. My adventures in card making can be found at Chapter Three: Taking Life One Page at a Time"

Here's what we made this week:

 Sybrina's Card: Outside

Sybrina's Card: Inside

Sybrina says, "Thanks so much to Lauren and Stephanie for inviting me to join them today and share my passion for Send a Smile 4 Kids. When making cards for SAS4Kids, I'm always looking for new ways to include features that will appeal to children. It's hard to go wrong with interactive cards, and I've been wanting to come up with a Tic-Tac-Toe card for a while now. This fortnight's Shake, Rattle, and Roll challenge was the perfect opportunity to see what I could do with a little Velcro, paper, and adhesive."

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I won't lie, when I heard this week's theme, I was a little intimidated.  I'm not a very precise crafter (I mostly *eye-ball*) and cards with movement and interaction usually require precision to work correctly.   I found a great step-by-step and video tutorial for making a *Never-Ending Card* at SplitcoastStampers which was easy enough that even a goof-ball like me could figure it out.  I used three different blue patterned papers from the same holiday collection and added coordinating stickers and lots of snowflakes.  This picture is the four views of the card as you move through the *never-ending* fold (there are closer pictures on my blog if you want to see more."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I confess that when I heard this fortnight's title, I hardly even listened to the "Rattle and Roll" part because I was already planning my shaker card, lol. I started with the pretty winter scene --which is actually a store-bought Christmas card I was sent a few years ago. I built the shaker frame from coordinating Pebbles patterned papers; the window from a scrap of inkjet transparency; and the "snow" is composed of tiny clear microbeads. I used sketch #272 from Sketch Saturday to guide the placement of my elements."

Now it's your turn to "Shake, Rattle and Roll"! Go as wild (or as tame) as you'd like with any sort of interactive card-design that inspires you... then come back and link up here by 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, May 18th. Keyword for galleries and flickr is JB:16:10.

An InLinkz Link-up

Warm Washi Wishes

So many amazingly lovely tape-centric creations in the gallery, and every single one of them is a WINNER! You guys sure do make it hard to only choose a few to "feature", but here are some that especially warmed our washi-loving hearts:

Electra of Wishin' I Knew How To Blog

...made not one, not two, but *NINE* beautiful, unique, fabulous tape-based holiday greetings. If you haven't already seen them, you must GO... go NOW! 

Kim M of Art Keeps Me Sane

...combined a bunch of gorgeous tapes-- some holiday ones, some not-- to beautiful effect, then went for bonus points by cutting some of them into arrows to point out her stamped sentiment!

Steffi H posting on Flickr

...proved that you don't necessarily need a lot of tapes --or a lot of ANYTHING, for that matter-- if you've chosen wisely and well!

I think we're all longing to find out who'll be getting that fun prize from our wonderful friends at Eyelet Outlet, right? According to Random.org the lucky number is... *4*! Which means that

♥MISS ELECTRA♥
is our lucky winner, congrats!
(ok, yes, this is the very first time that we've ever had someone be in the shout-outs and then ALSO turn out to be the prize winner, which just goes to show you, it really *is* a RANDOM draw done by the little widget thingie at Random.org!!!)

Please email your address to Lauren at llaurenb @ hotmail.com so we can get that prize to you ASAP!

Once again we'd like to thank Eyelet Outlet for sponsoring us and providing the prize; our Eyelet Outlet Design Teammates Barry Lynn Snarr and Dawn Mercedes Barrett for being our lovely guest stars; and of course we are always grateful to have such wonderful, creative readers who share their inspiration with us each fortnight! ♥ 

We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt and another very talented "co-star" we hope will really shake up your holiday cardmaking!