much respect to the intrepid painters!

ok, despite this prompt being a liiiiiiiiiiiiiiitle bit outside our collective crafty comfort zone, it is massively impressive how many ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ got out paints, played with them, experimented, and really got into the spirit of gina's acrylic paint UPC challenge! plus THE CARDS themselves were AWESOME!!!

here are a few especially cool techniques that gina noticed this week: these folks showed up to USE, PRACTICE, CREATE...and jingle (with acrylic paint) in particularly rockin' ways!

HAZEL

(our fellow card-making blog hostess at crafty hazelnut's christmas challenge!)

brushed blue paint to make her sky, and stamped her snowy trees in white paint; to make a card that would look completely different if rendered in ink!

LINDA

cleverly and creatively used both sponging and stamping to create a fabulous effect that resembles an impressionist painting!

BEVERLY

really took the "USE, PRACTICE, CREATE" mantra to heart: she experimented with a bunch of different paint techniques and, in her words, "loosened up" to produce a one-of-a-kind card that is charming beyond words!

to everybody who played: THANK YOU! give yourself a BIG round of applause! and if you didn't quite get there this week, hey...just because inlinkz closed it doesn't mean the creativity has to stop! make a painty card now, if you like, then come tell us!

again many thanks to gina cunningham of tyggereye art for being our lovely guest star this week! we hope you will continue to check out her "UPC play along" throughout all of 2011, since there is always MUCH inspiration to be found over there!

oh and if you haven't seen your fellow ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ work yet, i assure you that is well worth your time to scroll down, peruse the thumbnails and do a bit of blurfing!

ps: the new prompt--which is NOT messy AT ALL!!!-- goes up at midnight! :)

use, practice, create...and JINGLE!

hello, it's lauren here!

this week i'm thrilled to introduce the first of what i hope will be many, MANY guest designers* to the JINGLE BELLES blog: my dear friend, my inspiration, and my artistic mentor, ms. gina cunningham!

those of you who read gina's blog tyggereye arts will know that having hosted a year-long art journaling prompt in 2010 called HEART the ART, this year she's embarking on a medium-per-month "play along" called USE PRACTICE CREATE, about which i am very excited! i hope you'll check out her blog (full of real- and digi-art that makes me DROOL!), her etsy shop (the coolest hand-carved art stamps you can imagine), and her UPC flickr group!

but right now, let's check out her card! gina's spending the month of january using, practicing and creating with ACRYLIC PAINT, so i thought it'd be fun if we all got out our brushes and played along with her!

thus, for CARD THREE we're going to

USE, PRACTICE, CREATE...and jingle!


here's what we did with acrylic paint, and a little description from each of us:

gina's card

Thanks to Lauren and Stef for having me join them this week. With my card I took an old Basic Grey chipboard snowflake. I put all different color acrylic paints on my palette and painted them all together while wet and blended them at the edges. I then let it dry. I then stamped it with some Tim Holtz snowflake stamps in Black Stazon ink. I then added little dots of white like snow. After that dried I added the Cosmo Cricket snowman rub on.

On the background I used some white Basic Grey cardstock. I spritzed it with some Tattered angels misters. Mounted it on red cardstock and used the same Tim Holtz snowflake stamp for stamping. More white acrylic dots added. Then I added the ribbons, stamped Tim Holtz Merry Christmas sentiment and buttons.

Very exciting that many of you are enjoying making Christmas cards like I am for jingle belles challenges. the UPC group I have started makes using a different medium for the whole month on different crafts a goal. Please come check out my blog of weekly projects I've done with the medium or the UPC flickr group.

stephanie's tags

I opened A Compendium of Curiosities to page 37 and gave Dauber Resist a try. I also took a tip from several of you, and while I had things painty & inky, I went ahead made two holiday tags. The Hero Arts Fabulous Flourish was stamped in Snow Cap White ink. I used a triangle make-up sponge (cheaper than the Ranger applicators) to add varying combinations of Victorian Velvet, Fired Brick & Peeled Paint Distress Inks. I also used some hoarded little holiday owl embellishments (another great thing about these challenges ... the opportunity to use our stashes) and Hero Arts Sentiments (Holiday Cheer & Get Merry).

lauren's card

last year i started stumbled upon the idea of using the negative space from paper punches to stencil through (THIS TUTORIAL shows the step-by-step method). i love it because t's super-easy to do, makes use of what is essentially TRASH...and looks pretty good, if i do say so myself! on this card i stenciled through an oversized martha stewart snowflake with a mix of white, silver metallic, and clear glitter acrylic paint; then i built the rest of my card using an illustration from a vintage children's book, patterned papers, diecuts, and ribbon. (full product details on my blog; or email me for info!)

so now it's time to see what YOU will do! brush or brayer it, splash it, splatter it, stamp or stencil with it, dab, drip or drizzle it; make it the centerpiece of your card or merely an accent...but get hold of some acrylic paint so you can USE, PRACTICE, CREATE...and JINGLE!!! :)

link up your card by 6pm EST on wednesday, january 19th; if posting to SCS, our flickr group, or the UPC flickr group use code JB03; remember that for the january giveaway, comments count as one chance and linked cards count as TWO...so you've got a shot at three more chances when you play along this week!!! ♥

*do YOU have a great idea for a prompt, or a fabulous technique you'd like to share, or a sketch you're dying for us all to try out? we'd love to hear from you! email us using the information on the sidebar!!!