I'll be *HOME* for Christmas

We're still celebrating holiday architecture, and you've still got lots of time to make a card with any type of building on it and link up at the "Little Town of Bethlehem" post right beneath this one! Meanwhile, here's what we made this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "This sparkly little house and the uber-cute reindeer couple were just a few of the stickers on a sheet of adorable Doodlebug Icons I bought recently. I've dipped into some of the brand new Eyelet Outlet brads to dress these sweeties up even more: the boy reindeer has donned some Antler Brads, while the girl reindeer is wearing a hat that comes in the Elf Brads set. i've also added some Heart Enamels, plus a bit of Skinny Washi, and Holiday Dots Washi. I'd love to take credit for thinking up that super-fun diagonal swathe of tape, but actually, I just followed the current Sketch Saturday (week #429) layout."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I played with fun papers again this week ... a die cut sentiment and this one came together quickly."

O' Little TOWN of Bethlehem

This week's prompt is called, "O' Little TOWN of Bethlehem" and if you're wondering why we emphasized the "TOWN", it's because we want to see holiday cards with at least one building on them. We confess that at first the assignment seemed kind of tough, but when we started looking through our stash of holiday ingredients, we found patterned paper with cozy christmas cottages, stamps of gingerbread houses, stickers with Santa's magical castle at the North Pole; not to mention cityscapes, eskimo igloos, lovely snow-covered churches and yes, even a stable with a manger in it! So there's a lot of ways to go with this, and we hope you'll have fun discovering at least one you'd like to pursue.

Here's what we made this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "My buildings are courtesy of this pretty Christmas Magic holiday paper by Shimelle.  I used a sketch from The Challenge at a sticker sentiment to finish the design."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "Something I didn't realize until I started looking for "ingredients" for my card is that another great source of Christmas building images is snowglobes... and I had a bunch of them! This one --and its attendant embellishments and sentiment-- came from a pack of My Mind's Eye cardstock elements. I combined papers from a few different manufacturers' Christmas collections that just happened to match, and used this week's Sketch Saturday layout (#428) to help me arrange everything." 

Link your cards right here by 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, September 21st. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:16:19.

An InLinkz Link-up

Musical Masterpieces

We loved the awesome variety of ways our Musical prompt inspired you to create.  Here are a few of the musical masterpieces.

Asha

of

Sunny Summer Crafts

created a card inspired by a Christmas Carol - Joy to the World.  

The silhouettes and text are fantastic against her awesome inky background.

Marina

of

My Perfect Life

totally rocked -paper-piecing for her adorable chorus of animals.

The musical background and musical sentiment were the icing on the cake.

CreaMaria

of

Made by CreaMaria

showed that just a little music goes a long way in a perfect design.

Her embossing really adds elegance to this gorgeous holiday card.

Make sure you join us at midnight where we'll be taking you HOME for Christmas.

The Christmas Waltz

We're still celebrating all things musical at Jingle Belles ... so tune-up your instruments, warm-up your voices, and come join the fun.

Here's how we were inspired this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "I was inspired by this warm grey toned sheet music from Crate Paper's "Sleigh Ride" collection. I really like how it looks with the soft pink and white of the various other papers I found in my holiday stash. I placed all of my elements using this week's Sketch Saturday (#427) layout, which I think you'll agree is rather fab!"

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "I found this cute little musical journaling card in my holiday stash and built my card around it using a great sketch from The Paper Players.  No stamping on this one ... just great papers and a sticker sentiment."

Hark the Herald Angels Sing

This week's holiday card prompt is all about MUSIC ... you might incorporate sheet music, musical instruments, music-themed stamps ... or even make a card inspired by your favorite Christmas Carol. Just make sure you let us know what your MUSICAL elements are.

Here's how the music moved us this week:

Stephanie's Card

Stephanie says, "I scanned in a piece of vintage Christmas Music from my collection and sized it down to fit on my card front.  I combined it with velvet ribbon, some holiday flair, Eyelet Outlet Champagne Bling and Authentique papers with this week's Retro Sketch."

Lauren's Card

Lauren says, "I chose this lovely older 6x6 patterned paper by My Mind's Eye because its pre-made collage had a bit of sheet music in it. Then I added some chipboard letters made by fusing vintage sheet music to thin chipboard (with my Xyron) and diecutting with Provocraft's "Tag Sale" alphabet. The poinsettia diecuts were leftover from a 'Christmas In July and August' class I taught at my LSS... all I had to do was choose a few different patterns which went well together and load the whole deal onto a couple of mats. Easy, peasy!

And now it's your turn to select your favorite MUSICAL elements, use them to create a brand new holiday card, and link it up here by 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, September 7th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:16:18.

An InLinkz Link-up

Red Letter Day

It's always a happy occasion when our readers' gallery is chock full of gorgeous cards, and the "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" link-up is very nice indeed, so be sure to scroll down and check it out! Meanwhile here are three crimson creations that made us feel especially well red this fortnight!

Diane W of All I Need is Paper and Ink...

...reminds us all that the guy who rocks the red best of all is --and always will be-- Santa!

Robyn Oliver of Waterlily Cards

...not only impressed us with her purely monochromatic aesthetic, she did it in one gloriously elegant layer!

Julene of Julene by Design

...made this sonnet in scarlet as part of a THIRTY CARD MARATHON at a recent crop!!! (Our minds *boggle* at this... but in a very very good way!)

Many thanks to everyone who played along, we ALWAYS love to see what you will make! We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt we hope will put a song in your heart! ♥

Even Stop Lights Blink a Bright RED

And although a "red card" is a penalty in some sporting events, here at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ the red cards in the current readers' gallery are definitely cause for celebration, so we hope you'll scroll down to the original post (just below this one) for inspiration before you link up your own gorgeous RED creation!

Here's what we made this week:

Lauren's Other Card

Lauren says, "The last couple of years many online crafting stores have had a "Christmas in July" event, so it's now a bit of a tradition for me to do a bit of summertime shopping. This card mixes a few of my new (RED!) goodies with a bit of older (RED!) stash, I love a good "all ages" fusion design, lol. I've used the current --very excellent-- Sketch Saturday sketch to guide my layout."

Stephanie's Other Card

Stephanie says, "No one wears RED better than the jolly old man himself ... Santa Claus (this Avery Elle Santa always makes me smile).  I paired him with three different red papers and some sequin snow using this week's Sketch Saturday Layout too ... Lauren & I must have been on the same paper sketchy wavelength this week."