An Old-Fashioned Christmas

This fortnight, we're asking you to create a holiday card with a vintage or retro vibe ... either by using new products that are vintage-in-style, or by incorporating actual vintage items into your design (or heck, really go for it and use both).

And we're very excited to have our prompt sponsored by Lauren's Etsy shop, Just Enough Stuff. Lauren has been collecting and crafting with vintage goodies for years, and started her shop to share some of her fun vintage supplies and creations with other crafters. So yes, that means there's going to be a prize and you'll want to make sure you join our fun! (See details below.)

Meanwhile, here's what we created:

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "It's no secret that I love vintage ingredients, especially at Christmas time! For this card I scanned and re-sized a beautiful (but much too big) piece of especially appropriate vintage sheet music, topped it with some lovely old lace, and finished off with a little floral stack that incorporates a super-funky retro button. A few embellishments and a bit of machine stitching round the whole thing off!"

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I tried to go with a vintage style for my first card incorporating soft muted tones, gauzy ribbon, fabric textured stamping and distressing.  I also threw in a touch of vintage by cutting my sentiment from a piece of vintage sheet music.  Stamps & Die Cuts are from Impression Obsession, colors are The Paper Players and layout is Retro Sketches."

So how about that prize we mentioned? 

One lucky, randomly-chosen cardmaker who links up with us this fortnight will receive a Deluxe Christmas Ephemera Pack and a $10 gift certificate to Lauren's Etsy shop, Just Enough Stuff. Why not check out her themed collage packs, eclectic decks of cards, chipboard alphabets, and holiday journal kits so you'll know just what to pick if you're our lucky winner?

Link your creations right here by 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, July 29th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:15:15.

An InLinkz Link-up

Pretty in Pixels

We were in hybrid heaven this fortnight, checking out all the fabulous ways you guys came up with to use your digital treasures! Here are a few cards that made us especially giddy:

Pauline of Crafting with Cotnob

Paired a gorgeous image and paper from a crafting cd with real life touches like skinny mats and that luscious red bow!

Eemeli of Eemeli's Home

Layered a perfectly colored pair of digi-stamped snow people over a beautiful background of text in a simple but lovely font!

Mel C aka Cards by Mel

Cleverly replicated the jingle bell image from that fab Deedee's Digis "Jingle All the Way" kit to make a garland, then layered it over a super-cute snowman digi stamp! (Be sure to check out her other cool jingle bell card, as well!) 

And now it's time to find out who's going to be having a little shopping spree later today at Deedee's Digis. The fine folks at Random.org have chosen #1 which means that...

♥EMA MARTINEZ♥

...is the lucky winner of the $15.00 gift certificate at the Deedee's Digis shop! Ema, please email Lauren at llaurenb @ hotmail (dot) com to received the codes you need to GET SHOPPING!

We hope everyone who played along will join us in thanking the lovely ladies at Deedee's Digis for their sponsorship, for sending along the fun "Jingle All the Way" kit for us all to play with and for the stellar work of their awesome design team; we really appreciate all off the above. We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt to help make your Memorial Day weekend super cool! :)

We Wish You a Digital Christmas

...and so does our lovely sponsor, Deedee's Digis, who are giving ♥YOU♥ an early holiday present by placing a brand new, super-fun, super-festive kit called "Jingle All the Way" in the very cool freebies section of their shop for the duration of this challenge! Of course you can use ANY digital element to make your own hybrid holiday card, and be sure to link it up on the Hybrid Holiday post (right below this one) before next Wednesday night for a chance at a fabulous $15.00 shopping spree at Deedee's Digis!

Here's what we made this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "One of the fun things about digital images is that you can manipulate and re-orient them.  I erased the white background and then horizontally rotated my image in PhotoShop, so I could have two Jingle Bells for my card ... I also used the scraps of my digital paper from my first card for my layout."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "My favorite trick with digital elements is to try them out on all different types of printing media. In this case I've layered the "Jingly" sentiment on top of the "Bells" paper in Photoshop, then printed the whole thing on an inkjet transparency. Apart from giving it a cool new look, I'm pretty sure this is the easiest way ever to make a shaker card! I did some machine stitching over the beautiful script of "Jingly" to make it stand out even more, and added a few flowers held with a jingle bell brad, before backing the edges of the panel with foam tape to hold the tiny heart confetti inside the shaker part of the card. 
Easy Peasy!"

Happy Hybrid Holidays

We are extra excited this fortnight to have Deedee's Digis as our fabulous sponsor! 

Please join us in extending a warm welcome, and let's learn a little bit about them:

"Deedee's Digis offers wholesome digital "stamps" and printable digital papers that are the original creations of Deedee Anderson. All of our sets include both outline and pre-colored images, in both JPG and PNG formats. Our products are offered in high 300dpi resolution so that they are fully resizable to meet your crafting needs. We are a Christ-centered company, and you will find that many of our sets include KJV Scripture verses, in addition to encouraging sentiments of all sorts. We feel very blessed to be part of such a talented community of paper crafters, and thank you for allowing us to sponsor this challenge! 

One lucky, randomly-chosen cardmaker who links up a brand new "Happy Hybrid Holidays" card with us this fortnight will win a $15 shopping spree at the Deedee's Digis Shop. To be eligible, all you have to do is make a brand new holiday card that includes some sort of digital element... such as a digi-stamp, brush, paper, etc. Don't have anything fabulous? Well, Deedee has created a brand new, super-festive kit just for this occasion called "Jingle All the Way" and it will be available to our readers FOR FREE during this challenge! Just jump on over to the "Try Before You Buy" section of the shop, where it... and a bunch of other cool (free!) goodies... await you!  Here's a little preview of what's inside:

We're thrilled to have four members of the Deedee's Digis Design Team with us to help us kick off what we know will be an especially festive fortnight. Please be sure to visit their blogs and leave them some love!

Marji's Card

Features the "Mouse and Cat" and "Jingle Bell" image, as well as the "Jingly" sentiment and the grid and bell papers!

Faith's Card

Features the "Jingle Bell" image and all three papers from the kit!

Tamara's Card

Features the "Mouse and Cat" image and the "Wish" sentiment!

Donna's Card

Features the "Jingle Bell" image and the "Jingly" sentiment.

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I used the colored "Mouse and Cat" digital image, the "Jingly" digital sentiment and the plaid digital paper with this week's Retro Sketch ... all I had to do was find a few scraps of coordinating cardstock and a snip of Christmas ribbon."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I printed the grid paper and "Jingle All the Way" in the traditional way, on plain paper and sand colored cardstock, respectively. I printed the "Jingle Bell" image on plain copier paper and used it as a template to paper piece twice: once on colored cardstock and once on gold glitter paper. I used my Cropadile and a craft knife to cut out the holes in the bells and backed them with scraps of black paper. To bump up the texture factor, I swapped out the printed bow in the image for a "real life" version in red satin, embellished with dimensional florals and velvetty leaves. All of the above are popped up on textured red cardstock layered with a scrap of chunky metallic ribbon for my stash. The result is a bit lumpy-bumpy, so I'll be mailing this card with a gift in December, but I love how it turned out!"

Now it's time to see what ♥YOU♥ will create! Use your favorite digital stamp, brush or paper OR download the festive *FREE* "Jingle All the Way" kit from the "Try Before You Buy" section at Deedee's Digis and go to town! Remember, one lucky, randomly chosen cardmaker who links up a brand new holiday card with us this fortnight will win a $15 shopping spree at the Deedee's Digis Shop, so be sure to link up before 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, May 20th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:15:10.

An InLinkz Link-up

Vintage Views

This week we're celebrating all things vintage, and we'd love for ♥YOU♥ to join us by making a brand new holiday card with old-fashioned style. You can accomplish this by using actual vintage elements OR by incorporating one of the many lovely vintage-style paper crafting products that are on the market. Just in case you have nothing at all in your own stash that works, here are a couple of scans from Lauren's own (seriously enormous!) collection of vintage goodies that you may use in your fabulous card designs:

Now here's what we made this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I scanned a vintage holiday card for my base (I search for them whenever I'm at flea markets, especially ones with fun colors & illustrations like this one).  I removed *from the three of us* from the scan and added a *Let it Snow* sentiment from Christmas Magic for a clean & simple vintage design." 

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I used a slightly scaled down version of the 'Joy to the World' sheet music scan, as well as a floral bouquet cut from some vintage gift wrap, and a doily that I found in a box of garage sale goodies. I rounded out with mats and strips of patterned paper that I thought coordinated well with the gift wrap ...et voila! Another card for my 'Sane December' stack!"

Just in case you need a little *EXTRA* incentive, there's a prize on offer, from a fabulous Etsy shop called "Just Enough Stuff" which specializes in vintage ephemera for all occasions! Oh yes, and did we mention this shop just happens to belong to Lauren?! :) Here's what she has to say about the shop and the prize:

"Hi ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! You probably already know how much I looooooove to collect vintage paper goodies, from sheet music to postcards, to funky magazines, books and sewing patterns... if it's old and made of paper, chances are I have at least a little bit! My Etsy shop, Just Enough Stuff evolved out of the realization, a couple of years ago, that whereas *I* have far too many lovely bits and bobs, other folks might not have any! Thus I decided to try to even the balance by making the extras into fun ephemera packs... so we could ALL have Just Enough Stuff! One randomly selected card-maker who links up with us this fortnight will win one of my special Christmas Ephemera Assortments (like the one pictured above) and also a $10 gift certificate to spend at Just Enough Stuff! Good luck and have fun!"

So now it just remains for you to put on your vintage-style thinking cap, make a holiday card, and link up below between now and 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, September 25, 2013. Keyword for galleries and our flickr group is JB:13:19. We can't wait to see what you will do! ♥

Happy to be *Stuck* with You

So many fun sticker cards in the gallery ... here are a few that caught our eye:

Cathy G

of Paper Princess

Love those fun little holiday elves ... so perfect with that round little Santa ... and the red wood grain trim is the perfect finishing touch.

Kim

of Art Keeps Me Sane

She totally rocked the letter stickers combining four different patterns, but tying them all together with her cool blue hues ... love how the snowmen are peeking through that glittery snow-scape too.

Lisa H.

of Recklinghausen Musings

She turned this big bold ampersand into a gorgeous design element ... and love those perfect tiny letter stickers for the perfect holiday sentiment.

And ... the winner of the sticker prize package from our generous sponsor SRM Stickers is ...

#19 - Brenda Becknell 

of Brenda's Scrappy Blog

with this gorgeous card.

Brenda sent us your mailing address to jinglebellesrock at hotmail dot com so we can get your SRM Stickers on their way.

Join us at midnight for another fun holiday card prompt ... with a very talented lovely guest star.

Let's *Stick* Together

We're still celebrating STICKERS this week with SRM Stickers ... remember, there's an awesome prize package up for grabs for one lucky participant.

Here is our second round of sticker-ful designs:

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I used lots of stickers from the SRM Stickers' Fancy Sticker Sentiments (including border stickers on my paper flags) for my design together with Carta Bella Winter Fun papers and a sketch from Sunday Stamps (I stamped some tiny little vintage Stampin' Up Snowflakes in the corners ... because stickers and stamps are the perfect playmates)."

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I had a completely different plan for this week, but every time I saw the sheets of SRM's awesome Labels By the Dozen sitting on my work table, they kept screaming, "ORNAMENTS!" to me, so eventually I gave in and made that card, instead! :) I layered the three pink circle shapes with various snowflake diecuts, punches, and brads to fancy them up, cut little "necks" for the tops, and then placed a couple of "We've Got Your Border" stickers on the background paper to act as hangers. One of the white sentiments from the "We've Got Your Stick-Merry" sheet made the perfect finishing touch!"

Remember, you have until Wednesday, March 13th at 6pm EST to link-up your card featuring at least one STICKER.

Stick-y & Sweet

We're thrilled to have the fine folks from SRM Stickers joining us for our current holiday card prompt we're calling ... Stick-y & Sweet ... create a holiday card or project featuring at least one sticker.

SRM Stickers is a leading sticker and container manufacturer. SRM Stickers are crystal clear and melt into your patterned paper or cardstock for a seamless sentiment, embellishment, title, or journaling feature. SRM also carries fun-to-decorate containers such as tubes, pillow boxes, and glassine bags! SRM Stickers has assembled a dream team of Designers offering amazing samples every weekday at their blog. SRM products can be purchased through their online retail store. 

And ... one lucky participant will win this amazing SRM Sticker prize package that includes stickers for almost every occasion as well as some of those cool glassine bags.

Here's a card from one of the the SRM Stickers designers:

SRM Design Team Member Melanie's Card

Sweet & Simple Blog

Melanie says, "First, I cut out the tree shape and then layered the We've Got Your Border Christmas Stickers on top of it. Then I matted it with gold glitter paper. I adhered the tree with foam adhesive to a journaling card and finished off the card with Gold Shimmer Twine and sequins."

And here are our sticker creations:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "One of my favorites are the fun We've Got Your Border Stickers from SRM.  I used the Christmas Borders & white cardstock to create this fun holiday design.  I finished with some layered felt snowflakes and some green Christmas bling (sketch is from the talented Lucy)."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I am absolutely in love with SRM's glassine bags and clear pillow boxes, and since the SRM stickers really do go on completely clear, you can just go to town decorating them... so i did, lol! there are more photos of this little gift set, as well as a complete product list on my personal blog, but you can see right off I've used a Large Glassine Bag, a Medium Pillow Box, We've Got Your (Merry) Stickers, a bunch of We've Got Your Border Stickers tons of Sticker Stitches and some Labels By the Dozen; I was also inspired by this week's Unscripted Sketch for my card!"

So pull out those stickers (FYI they don't need to be from SRM to join the fun!) and make some holiday magic ... we can't wait to see what you create.  Link up here between now & Wednesday, March 13th at 6pm (EST) for a chance to win the wonderful SRM Sticker Prize Package.  Keyword for galleries & our Flickr Group is JB:13:05  and make sure you add them to the SRM Stickers Flickr Group too if you use their products.

Vintage Valedictorians

We had such fun having the talented Linda Brun join us for a vintage celebration at Jingle Belles.

These vintage creations were at the top of their class this week:

Barbara of The Knackered Grouse

Barbara claims that vintage style is a challenge for her, but you could never tell it from this amazing 3-D vintage masterpiece ... simply stunning.

Karen McAlpine from Dreaming and Creating

Karen combined vibrant hues with her black & white vintage image ...

and the sentiment is just toooo cute.

Aisling of Aisling's Hobby Blog

This peaceful monochromatic palette with subtle sparkles of gold is perfect for this adorable vintage image ... such a wonderful combination of stamped patterns too.

And, our random number generator says our grand prize winner is:

(drum roll please)

#18 - Lela Meinke

and here's her wonderful vintage creation:

Lela - e-mail us your mailing address, so we can get your wonderful prize from

Just Enough Stuff 

sent your way.

And join us at midnight (or whenever you crawl out of bed) for our next Jingle Belles prompt with another lovely guest star joining our fun.

hybrid hijinks

what could be more digitally delightful than saving time and money by making lovely hybrid holiday cards? well, seeing the ones made by our amazing ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ of course! here are a few which rocked our pixel-based world this week:

Kirsty Vittetoe of Handmade Little Things

printed this adorable reindeer digi onto brown paper and added lots of luscious red glitter to make him literally "shine" as the star of this bold and graphic holiday greeting!

Ros Crawford of Mikey's Mom

layered a digital stamp onto a digital paper, printed and colored the result, and then combined it with gorgeous textural elements for even more interest and appeal!

Meg of Bits and Pieces

made *TWO* completely different, but equally lovely cards, so we were spoilt for choice since both used adorable digi-stamps AND the perfect combination of "real world" supplies!

and now i'm sure we're all pretty excited to find out which lucky BELLE will be choosing *FIVE* fabulous digital stamps from our lovely sponsor Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps and More, so without further ado let's consult the fine folks at random.org:

:

LUCKY NUMBER #24

which means that

♥Marie Bingaman♥

is our winner!

marie, please email us at

jinglebellesrock @ hotmail [dot] com

and we'll tell you how to claim that awesome prize!!!

once again we'd ask you to join us in thanking our wonderful friends at Robyn's Fetish for providing that cool prize and the images stef and i used in our cards. and of course if you've not yet seen your fellow BELLES' take on hybrid holiday, do scroll downwards for a peek at the gallery! we'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt and a lovely guest star who's bound to delight you! ♥

Happy Hybrid Holiday, 2012!

Hello, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! If you played along with us last year, you'll remember that we were lucky enough to be sponsored by Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps and More to make holiday cards which incorporated a digital stamp or element in our design. We called it "Happy Hybrid Holidays" and it was so much fun that one of the first things we did this year was ask to do it again... and of course we're thrilled that Robyn's Fetish said, "YES!" Here's a little more info for you about that fine company:

Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps And More is proud to sponsor this challenge. 

 Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps And More, a division of I Did It Creations, was created and is owned by Robyn Weinrib. Robyn offers a wonderful variety of digital stamps and digital papers, designed to meet the needs of all digital paper crafting addicts for every occasion. 

 Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps And More is happy to award the winner her choice of 5 digital stamps.

Yes, that's right, one lucky random cardmaker who links their newly made, hybrid (or completely digital) holiday card with us this time will get to *CHOOSE* five stamps from the Robyn's Fetish shop! But what if you don't *have* a digital image to use on your card, you ask?! Not to worry, Robyn's Fetish have got you covered--they're providing A Bell for Christmas absolutely free to any ♥JINGLE BELLE♥ who'd like to use it! Just email lovely design team coordinator Susan Paulson at susan_paulson@verizon.net and request your free Jingle Belles Digital Image. We're thrilled they're offering another opportunity for everyone to try a digital stamp, so please join us in heartily thanking them!

And now I'm sure you're itching to get going on your own cards, but first, let's have a quick look at what we did:

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "One of my favorite looks for digital stamps is to old-school paper piece them... but with a techie twist: I print several duplicates of my image--in this case the very elegant Christmas Lamp Post from Robyn's Fetish--on clear ink-jet labels from the office supply store, and then stick them to the papers i'd like to use for each bit of my image. In this way I can use quite teeny scraps of lots of different patterned papers in my design! For this card, I also used the March sketch from The Craft's Meow as a road map, and I love how it came out!"

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I had fun using digital paper piecing with 

Robyn's Fetish Prissy Poinsettia. 
I used two shades of red together with green & gold grungy papers from my digital stash. 
I added a wrap of gold ribbon and an 

EAD Designs rub-on sentiment to complete my card."

So now it's time to see what you will do to make your very own Happy Hybrid Holiday, 2012! Email Susan P. for that lovely "Jingle Bell" image... or pull something out of your own digi-stash and get creative! You've got until 6pm (EST) on Wednesday April 4th to link up below for a shot at that great prize! Keyword for galleries or our flickr group is JB12-07. Have fun!!! ♥

Let's Stick Together!

It's hard to believe we're into the month of March, ♥JINGLE BELLES♥, but having all of our lovely friends from EAD Designs with us the last two weeks, and making so many wonderful sticker- and rub-on festooned cards with their generous sponsorship, has totally made the time fly by for us!

Here are a few of *YOUR* gorgeous creations that really STUCK in our minds:

Raquel of My Creations

made her own beautiful swirly christmas tree sticker by die-cutting self-adhesive vinyl, then used it as the centerpiece of this stunningly soft and elegant holiday card!

Kristin of Mrs. Pink's Hobby

used a dramatic red angel rub-on that coordinates magnificently with several bold but understated patterns on this marvellously monochromatic masterpiece!

Marianne of Marianne's Cards 'n Stuff

made five (FIVE!) totally diffferent, but equally lovely, cards for this prompt! For this one, multiple layers of red and green patterned paper frame a lovely--and tiny--christmas tree sticker to perfection!

 

Of course we're all very anxious to find out which of you lovely ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ will be enjoying that very generous $25 EAD gift card, so without further ado let's consult the fine folks at Random.org... 

and the winner is...

LUCKY NUMBER 45
which means that

CYNDIE

is the fortunate lady in question!
(HOORAY!)

Miss Cyndie,
please contact us at

jinglebellesrock @ hotmail [dot] com 

to claim your prize!!!

Once again we'd ask you to join us in thanking Emily Nelson, owner and illustrator of EAD Designs, and her very special design team members who came along with their gorgeous holiday cards:  ~Amy~ of Tsuruta Designs, Jessica of Chick-n-Scrap, Julie Ranae of Julie's Open Window, Liz at Liz's Paper Loft, Rose of Rose's Happy Place (who honored us with *two* cards!) and Shellye McDaniel of The Papered Cottage. this would not have been nearly as fun... or as inspirational... without their considerable talents! And now, since you've still got 24 hours until the new prompt debuts, why not scroll down and check out your fellow belles' gorgeous work in the "Stuck on You" gallery?! ♥