Dashing Through the Snow (Week 2)

It's week two of our snow-centric Jingle Belles challenge for which we've teamed up with our friends at The Double Trouble Challenge, thus giving you a chance to participate in TWO challenges with ONE card! As the title implies, for "Dashing Through the Snow" the brief at Jingle Belles is merely to make a card that features SNOW, whether it be snowflakes, snowmen or a snowy landscape.

As you may know, the "Double" in "Double Trouble" refers to the fact that there are several parts to their challenges, though the only requirement is to play along with Thing 1, which in this case is to make a window or aperture card. But the Double Trouble Gang encourage you to add some fun... try their options by participating in Twisted Sister's Thing 3 and/or Double Dare's Thing 2 to earn additional chances in their random drawing. This time, those twists are as follows:

And here's what we made this week:

Lauren's Other Card(s)

Lauren says, "I had made a few extra white-embossed panels during our Jingle Belles' "EMBOSSING" challenge, and since they happened to be snowy, when I found them again, I decided they were perfect for making an aperture card. I used an ancient set of Nestabilities' Labels 20 to cut the largest size from a panel I had inked with Wendy Vecchi's Night Sky Archival; then the next size down to cut a smaller version of the same shape from a  Sky Blue Archival Panel; then I layered both of those over a third panel inked with Violet Archival. I embossed the "Noel" from Wendy's Statements Chippies, inked it with Night Sky, added it on top, embellished with a few diecut snowflakes, et voila. Since all of my supplies were still sitting there, including the beautiful label shapes cut from the apertures of card one, I decided to build a second card with the leftovers and another Chippie from the same set."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "For this week's Double Trouble window card, I used Lawn Fawn Stitched sentiment banner to die cut the sentiment (which I attached to the inside of the card) and again on the front of the card, so the sentiment could peek through.  The sentiment & snow jar are both from Woodware Snow Jar stamp set."

Scroll down to the original Dashing Through the Snow post to find the linky tool, not to mention a photo of the fun little prize one random cardmaker will receive, just for linking up a snowy card with us here at Jingle Belles. If your card is snowy AND has a window, be sure to link up at Double Trouble Challenge #171 too, for a shot at their prize!

Dashing Through the Snow

It's the middle of July, which seems like an excellent time to team up with our friends at The Double Trouble Challenge, so that you have a chance to participate in TWO challenges with ONE card! As our post title implies, for "Dashing Through the Snow" the brief here at Jingle Belles is merely to make a card that features SNOW, whether it be snowflakes, snowmen or a snowy landscape.

As you may know, the "Double" in "Double Trouble" refers to the fact that there are several parts to their challenges, though the only requirement is to play along with Thing 1, which in this case is to make a window or aperture card. But the Double Trouble Gang encourage you to add some fun... try their options by participating in Twisted Sister's Thing 3 and/or Double Dare's Thing 2 to earn additional chances in their random drawing. This time, those twists are as follows:

Remember, you need only make a card featuring some sort of SNOW to enter here at Jingle Belles; and the only requirement at Double Trouble is to make a window or aperture card. BUT... if your card has both SNOW and a WINDOW... you can link up on both blogs for a chance at two different prizes!

Here's how we approached the challenges this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "This card started with me needing to clean & re-ink my gina k. designs white ink pad.  I had accidentally transferred some red ink onto the pad, and when I tried to use it for emboss resist last week, I kept getting ink instead of white.  I rubbed the ink pad direct to a piece of light blue cardstock until it appeared to be gone, and then re-inked.  As I went to throw the inky cardstock away, I thought - what if I embossed it with Hero Arts Iridescent Lavender Embossing Powder .. and voila.  

I decided to stencil that clean white craft ink through the gina k. designs Snowflake Mandala Stencil and emboss with white detail embossing powder.  Next I used the smallest of gina's double stitched circle die cuts to cut create the *window* in the center of the snowflake to create a shaker card (positioning the center cut portion at the back of the shaker).  The Pretty Pink Posh Winter Clay Snowflake Confetti fills the shaker and the sentiment is gina k. designs Sparkle and Shine.  With my shaker *window* and snowflake, I'm going with Double Trouble."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "Generally speaking, if I'm making a window card, I go all out and make it a shaker; so that's what I've done here. Stephanie gave me an adorable set of Doodlebug Winter Wonderland stamps and dies for my birthday, and I was excited to be able to use them so quickly. I found a few sheets of D-bug's Polar Pals patterned paper to coordinate and used an older set of Spellbinders' Nestabilities to build up that fun scalloppy frame. Inside the shaker I placed a background of pale blue snowflakes, a glittery hill, a handsome yeti and a mix of Eyelet Outlet Snowflake and Round Sequins."

♥♥♥

To make this gala Christmas in July celebration even more festive, we have a fun little prize for one randomly selected cardmaker who links a snowy card up here at Jingle Belles:

Sunny Studio 6x6 All is Bright paper pad, Inky Antics Winter Song stamp set and some gorgeous Crafter's Square gems.

Link your SNOWY masterpieces right here, by 6pm (Eastern) on Wednesday, July 31st. Keyword for galleries, etc is JB2415.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter 

The EMBOSS-able Dream

So many wonderful, clever, beautiful takes on our embossing theme this fortnight; here are a just few that especially caught our eye; but we highly recommend scrolling through the entire Readers' Gallery if you haven't done so yet!

Leslie M of LRoseCreates

...used an embossed background and an embossed sleeve, paired with traditional holiday colors and several different star motifs to make this fun and festive coffee card shine!

Chris of And Here's One I made Earlier...

...added a white embossed panel behind her beautifully framed stamped image, with bonus points awarded for her exceptional coloring and shading skills!

Darnell of DJ Kard Kreations

...used the same embossing folder for both the crisp white background and the elegant framed focal image, but made them look entirely different by painting the latter with translucent gold ink!

♥♥♥

And now let's see who's won that very fun Gina K Holiday Embossing Folder:

The Random Number Generator has chosen...

Lucky Number #2

which means that...

Bonnie of Stamping with Klass

 is our lucky winner!

Please send your snail mail info 

to llaurenb@hotmail.com so we can get that on its way!

♥♥♥

Many thanks to everyone who played along, we loved seeing ALL of your beautiful cards. We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt AND a special "Christmas in July" crossover challenge! 

*Mission Embossable*

Your mission this week, should you decide to accept it, is to join the Jingle Belles in creating a holiday card that features heat and/or texture embossing.

Here's how we went all EMBOSS-ible this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I stumbled upon this background panel, which, at some unremembered point in the past, I had embossed using Memory Box's Poinsettia Corner e/f, colored the raised design with Wendy Vecchi's Leaf Green Ink and Sunflower Liquid Pearls, and then set it aside. This serves as a good illustration of why I am a Setter-Aside rather than a Thrower-Out (ok apart from mild hoarding tendencies) and that is because although this did not originally meet whatever my goal or requirements might've been at the time, it was a beautiful background which seriously helped me out on a crowded and busy week. All I had to do to make the panel into a card was add Penny Black Poinsettia and Joy diecuts, plus a couple of coordinating mats et voila! Job done!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I went with the oh-so-magical Emboss Resist Technique this week using stamps from Gina K. Designs (which is also perfect for her Christmas in July #monthlymixchallenge).  I just love how the image comes to life as you blend the ink into the cardstock."

And remember, one lucky participant will win the awesome gina k. designs Holiday Flora Embossing Folder

My Sweet EMBOSS-able You

This week's EMBOSS-able theme is asking you to create holiday cards that feature embossed texture or heat embossing (or both if you're an over-achiever).

Here are our Sweet EMBOSS-able creations this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I started with the Spellbinders Forevergreen Embossing Folder on white cardstock and then I applied dark green ink to bring out the embossed texture.  Next I added spritzes of Bella Luna Gold Shimmer Spray.  I finished with a Merry & Bright CZ Design STAMPtember Merry & Bright sentiment die cut in dark green & then layered with gold cardstock.  I finished with a stamped sentiment from Simon Says Stamp Abstract Holiday."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I'm currently somewhat obsessed with the emboss/resist technique, so I chose to go with heat embossing. I stamped the gorgeous oversized Snowflake Spin background from Stampendous in Ranger's Clear Emboss It Ink, sprinkled with White e/p and once it was cool I applied a combination of Picked Raspberry, Kitsch Flamingo and Spun Sugar Oxide Inks, which I splattered lightly with a waterbrush for even more variation of shades. The "Merry" die is so old I'm actually not sure who made it, but I love how it looks cut from magenta glitter paper and mounted on some coordinating May Arts ribbon. 

And one lucky random participant will win the lovely gina k. designs Holiday Flora Embossing Folder.

This challenge runs until 6pm (Eastern) on Wednesday evening, July 17th. Keyword for galleries, etc, is JB2414.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

In Fabulous Shape!

Slightly less participation this fortnight, but literally ALL of the linked-up SHAPED cards are outstanding, so without further ado, here they are now:

Susan B of Cardmaker's Garret

...performed a spell of enchantment with the fabulous foliage and beautiful bird on her hexagonal card!

Marianne of Marianne's Cards 'n Stuff

...created a fabulous snowflake shape, with a backer that's hinged to make it open-able AND that glimmering watercolor splatter takes the whole thing over the top! 

PS: Marianne also made the most adorable Mug Shaped Card, as well!

Riet Harikini of I Need to Stamp

...proves that the holidays are the perfect time for hangin' with your GNOMIES on this adorable trio of tags!

Fabiola of Mon P'tit Monde

...didn't just design a beautiful combination of colors and papers, she also created an original template for this stunning bauble!

♥♥♥

We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt we hope will inspire you, especially if you love TEXTURE! ♥

Holiday Shape-Up Continues

We're still Shaping Up for the Holidays, and as you'll recall, that means we're making shaped cards, for which anything other than a square or rectangle will do. Though some holiday ideas might be a star, stocking, candy cane, circle, ice-skate... ok, you get the idea, right? If not, jump down to the original Shaping Up post and take a scroll through the Readers' Gallery. Meanshile, here's how we SHAPED-up this week:

Lauren's Other Card(s)

Lauren says, "A few years ago I had downloaded a photo of a beautiful mitten-shaped card, printed it out on cardstock at 4x6" size, used it as a template and raided my stash of ancient Basic Grey holiday patterned paper to make THIS CARD. Luckily, I had saved the template and still had some nice big chunks of BG, so I'm back with the same idea... times two! Basic Grey flower layers, Recollections flair, scraps of felt  trimmings, 7 Gypsies velvet holly leaves, and a couple of buttons from my stash complete this pair of mixy-matchy mitten cards."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "As a child, I loved making snowmen.  I think I had just as much fun making this paper version.  I started by die cutting two circles from white glitter paper.  I attached the circles to a card base (overlapping the fold slightly on the left) and then cut around my circles to create my snowman-shaped card base.  Next I hand-cut the hat from black cardstock with a wonderful gold shimmer.  I used the same black paper for the eyes, mouth and buttons.  I hand-cut the carrot nose from a scrap of orange designer paper.  The arms are made from a thin strip of brown woodgrain embossed paper.  I finished with some holly leaves and berry stickers and a fun little ice cold treat.

This challenge runs through Wednesday evening (6pm EST), July 3rd, 2024.