BLING on the Holidays!

This fortnight we're celebrating (...you may have guessed it from the title...) BLING! All you need to do is make a card featuring jewels, gems, beads, pearls, glitter, stickles, or anything sparkly and join the fun by adding it with the Linky tool at the bottom of this post.

Meanwhile, here's how we're BLING-ing it this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "Bling is the perfect way to decorate a Christmas Tree, especially this three layer Kaleidoscope Christmas Tree die cut set from Spellbinders.  I cut the bottom layer of my tree from white glitter paper for even more sparkle.  And for a bit more shine, I topped the tree & die cut the My Favorite Things PEACE Die-Namics sentiment from Concord & 9th Champagne Foil Paper.

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I've had these Bling Snowflakes from the big box store for aggggggggges, so I was determined to use them for this prompt. I found a funky gel print made (at some un-remembered time, lol) by using an ancient Darice snowflake embossing folder to remove paint from the plate. I added some older Tim Holtz metallic rub-on transfers to enhance the holiday theme. My sentiment and mat are white glitter cardstock and the finished card is an A6."

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JB2505: BLING on the Holidays runs until 6pm (Eastern) on Wednesday, March 12th. Link your beautiful BLING-centric card(s) right here:

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Clearly Awesome

Clear elements can be challenging to work with, but the Midnight Clear Readers' Gallery (clearly!) proves that the effect is worth the effort! Here are three cards that caught our eye this fortnight:

Jolanda Johnstone of The Inque Spot Studio

...layered vellum squares over her elegant trio of candle images, giving them a soft nostalgic feeling that works perfectly with her traditional red and green palette!

Beverly Sizemore aka @bevscreativepath on Instagram

...pressure embossed an alphabet folder on a piece of clear acetate (bonus points for upcycling a piece of packaging!) enhancing the sweet scene of  critters mailing letters to Santa!

Renate of Made by Renate

...made a BEARY cute shaker card that's got so much dimension, texture and charm it's practically a gift all on its own!

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Many thanks to everyone who played along, we loved seeing every card! We'll be back at Midnight with a brand new prompt we hope will BLING on your holiday creativity!

CLEAR-ly Christmas

We're still creating cards with transparent and/or translucent items (think vellum, acetate, lucite) if you can see the light through it, it works.

Here's how we were CLEAR-ly Christmas this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I love Sunny Studio's Build a Tag #2 Die Set and that's what I used to make the tags and reinforcers on this pair of A2 cards. I punched square windows into the tags, backed them with scraps of clear acetate, and made a little winter scene with Eyelet Outlet Glitter Tree Tape, Sparkle White Glitter Tape hills and Snowflake Sequins. I finished off with Snowflake Brads and Penguins or Snowy Trees; then added tag-shaped mats and panels adorned with Glitter Tall Tree Tape, sticker sentiments and a few more sequins. Gotta love an easy two-fer, right?"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I started with a Dina Wakley Pattern Play Media transparency, which I painted on the back with Dylusions Shimmer Paint.  Next I use puffy stickers to build a little scene on top (and give me places to use adhesive to attach the transparency to my card).  I finished with a die cut sentiment from Concord & 9th Jolly Holiday Greetings.

Remember, you have until 6pm EST on Wednesday, February 19th to link-up your CLEAR creations.

It Came Upon a Midnight CLEAR

This fortnight at we're asking you to make a holiday card that contains at least one see-through element. 

It can be a glass embellishment, an acrylic transparency, some vellum, acetate or "ghost" shapes, clear stickers, Lucite buttons, shrink plastic... whatever you like. If you can see through it (AND figure out how to attach it to your card) put it on there and link it up!

Here's how we were CLEAR-ly inspired this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I started my card with this weeks Sketch Saturday layout and a lovely clear piece of Hambly Screen Printed lace.  Then, as I was working through the rest of the Sketch elements, I realized I could turn the Tim Holtz Ephemera Tag Box into a shaker if I added some clear acetate, so my card for this week is a CLEAR-ly a two-fer."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I still have a fun little stash of the late great Hambly Screen Prints transparencies, which are so thick and sturdy you actually can make a card base out of them and build your entire design on top. Fair warning: however well a transparency card comes out IRL, it will be VERY hard to photograph (as you can see) but other than that, I'm pleased with this one. I used nearly an entire sheet of Hero Arts' Holiday Messages Rub-on Transfers and three out of four ancient dimensional snowman stickers from the big box store. I added a plain white diecut panel inside the card (see the pic on my blog) for writingon, but realized belatedly that the front is so transparent, I might add another panel to the back of the card and add my personal greeting that way."

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And now it's time to start planning what YOU will make, then link it up right here! JB2504: It Came Upon a Midnight CLEAR runs until 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, February 26th. 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

In Great Shape!

There are some amazing cards in the Shape Up Readers' Gallery, so if you haven't yet taken a little scroll for inspiration, we highly recommend the trip. Meanwhile, here are just a few that especially caught our eye:

Fabiola of Mon P'tit Monde

...constructed an beautiful winterscape as a clever (reverse) J-shaped side-step card; which has so much dimension and interest, this is basically a piece of decor rather than just a card!

ArtMBR

...made perhaps the most elegant (and sparkly!) round card EVER in black, white and gold; and reminded us how much we love the classic round card design!

Wendy of Cartai

...drove her perfectly pieced and shaded vintage VW Beetle car (with holiday tree on top) straight into our shaped-card loving hearts!

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A big giant heart-shaped THANK YOU to everyone who played along, we loved seeing every single card! We'll be back at midnight with a brand new challenge that we hope you'll deem to be CLEARLY inspiring! ;)

Holiday Shape Up

It's the second week of "Shaping Up for the Holidays" so we're still making SHAPED cards and you're still invited to join the fun! Here's how we got in shape this week: 

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I found a cute clipart hat online, printed a couple of copies on plain white cardstock so I could cut it into a pattern; then paper-pieced the hat, brim and bobble using two sizes of Lawn Fawn's Knit Picky papers. I had been planning to adorn the brims with brads, but stumbled upon these fun Doodlebug enamel leaves and berries and just like that, my choice was made!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I let this fun Anna Griffin layered sleigh die do all of the shaped-card work for me this week.  I cut the base from gold metallic cardstock and the sleigh from red.  I paper pieced two shades of green cardstock for the presents and then used the outline to cut my card base & the inside of the card.  The finishing touches were a chipboard sentiment and chipboard snowflake from Thickers."

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All the details (and the Linky tool) for joining our Jingle Belles Shape Up fun are on the original post, which is HERE. This challenge wraps up on Wednesday evening, February 12th.