Friday, August 29, 2014

Baby, It's GOLD Outside!

This fortnight we're pleased and proud to have as our lovely guest star and prompt-setter the very talented Lisa Hausmann of Recklinghausen Musings! Lisa's come up with a gloriously glimmering theme, she wants to see GOLD! But we'll let her tell you herself:

"I love following scrapbook trends and incorporating them into my own style. The rush to use lashings of gold on our layouts totally had my name on it and hardly a page goes by without a little (or a lot of) gold finding its way on there! So it was only a matter of time before I'd be overloading my cards with gold too. I love how luscious and rich it looks and am thrilled to be sharing my love of gold with the Belles this week."

Since we Belles love anything shiny and sparkly, OF COURSE we were happy to oblige, and we hope you will be, too! Here's what we did:

Lisa's Card

Lisa Says, "I brought together as many gold elements as I could find in my stash to see how many shades and textures I could incorporate onto my card. Sequins, a doily, glitter paper, foil card die-cuts as well as gold letters are a beautiful contrast to the simpler background. I just let the gold do all the work. "

Lauren says, "I've got quite a few golden items on my card: the diecut tree is made from doily scraps I've layered with bits of Doodlebug's awesome glitter-encrusted cardstock; the sentiment is one of those super-shiny foil peel-offs; the little velvet flowers have a touch of gold glitter; and finally the background paper in which I've framed the whole thing is a gold filigree print. I've used  Sketchbook Saturday #127 to guide the placement of all my yummy embellishments!"


Stephanie says, "I pretty much went all-out-gold as well ... stamping done with Delicata Golden Glitz Ink ... gold DCWV glitter background paper ... gold sequins ... and snowflakes punched from gold foil paper.   Unfortunately there was no gold ribbon in my stash (seriously, that must be remedied), so I used blue glitter ribbon instead ... layout is from Tuesday Morning Sketches.

So grab your foil papers, your shiniest embossing powder, your golden glitter and sequins or whatever glamorously gilded ingredients make you happy! Link up before 6pm (EST) on Wednesday, September 10th. Keyword for galleries and flickr is JB:14:18.


Thursday, August 28, 2014

Celebrating Winter in Style!

We were spoiled for choice when it came to selecting awesome cards made to this fortnight's non-Christmassy specifications!

...proves that you don't need many elements at all, provided each one is absolutely perfect!

IMG_0221
...combined silver and gold diecuts to make a winter scene that's glamorous  enough to give to ANYONE, but tempting to keep for oneself!

...absolutely ALWAYS does her own whimsically delightful creative thing, and we wouldn't have it any other way!!! :) 

We'll be back at midnight with a brand new prompt from an especially lovely guest star, we hope it will prove to be a gilt-y pleasure! :)

Friday, August 22, 2014

The Hanukkah Song, Verse Two!

We're still having fun creating cards for our friends and relations who celebrate the other winter holidays other than Christmas, and we're even making some general winter-themed cards.

We'd love for you to scroll down to the link up post and join us in that endeavor! 

Meanwhile, here's what we made this week:


Lauren says, "I went hybrid again this week, creating a collage in photoshop that I printed on an inkjet transparency, then adorned with chunky glitter chipboard letters and lots of machine stitching to add texture and interest. You may notice that there really aren't any specifically Hanukkah-themed products here, I've let the colors and the sentiment do the work for me!"


Stephanie says,"My go-to theme for non-Christmas cards to send in December is Peace.  I combined the bold Peace sentiment from SRM Stickers with a gorgeous Penny Black Starry Night Sticker using this week's Retro Sketch."


Friday, August 15, 2014

The Hanukkah Song

Something that's pretty important to us here at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ is to make sure our card-making festivities include EVERYONE who is special to us, whatever occasion or holiday in which they partake!

So this fortnight we're making cards for our friends who don't necessarily celebrate Christmas. Hanukkah is the most famous of the other winter holidays, and it (plus our favorite Adam Sandler song!) inspired our title, but you could choose Kwanzaa, New Year, Hogmanay or Solstice; or you could go totally non-denominational with a general winter-themed card.

Here's what we made:

Stephanie says, "I went quick, clean & simple for my card by covering a card base with SRM Hanukkah stickers."



Lauren's Card
Lauren says, "I chose a general winter theme, for which i used my own layery digital collage as background. Punched border strips and a small silvery flower accent the large sentiment. For the latter I combined my all-time favorite alphabet stickers (Basic Grey's old-school letters) with some chunky glitter chipboard. A bit of machine stitching adds texture whilst ensuring that everything stays firmly attached! "


Link up your own lovely non-Christmas winter holiday cards by 6pm (EDT) on Wednesday, August 27th. Keyword for galleries and our flickr group is JB:14:17.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Shape Up Super Stars

Thanks so much for getting in *shape* with us at Jingle Belles.

Here are a few of our favorite shaped creations:


created an amazing box card with all sorts of fun snowflakes ... what a treat for the eyes.


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paper-pieced an adorable stocking card that even has some subtle patterns on the inside (don't you love the ruler pattern).



repeated her *shape* with her focal image, which really ties the design together ... not to mention her lovely trio of snowflakes and perfectly colored image.

We hope you'll check back at midnight for another fun holiday card prompt.


Friday, August 1, 2014

Shape Up For the Holidays

I don't know about you, but for me the easiest time to *shape-up* is during beautiful summer weather when I get get outside to walk all over town.  So this week, we're also going to Shape-Up for the Holidays ... which means we're making *shaped cards* ... any shape but a square or rectangle is fair game.

Stephanie says, "As I was searching through my stash for a shape-up idea, I saw this neglected Christmas Tree embossing folder.  I originally tried embossing on patterned metallic paper, but the embossed texture got lost in the pattern ... however when I turned over the image, I realized there was a gorgeous metallic cream on the back, so I used the de-bossed side for my Christmas Tree shaped card.  I hand cut around the tree, and then hand-cut my card base to form a border.  The final step was decorating my tree with multi-colored *lights* and adding a glittery star on top."



Lauren says, "A few years ago, I started sending individual cards to all of our nieces and nephews, both actual and honorary. Since this includes several groups of siblings, it's important that each card be different... but that they're all recognizably equal! This year I decided to make ornaments, in four basic shapes. I used a range of older papers by Basic Grey because I love the way their collections coordinate perfectly, and added a selection of flower and snowflake embellishments attached with decorative brads. My goal was to produce a mailable set that resembled a box of fancy vintage ornaments, and I'm pretty pleased with the results!"


We can't wait to see what creative shapes you create.

Link up your shapely masterpieces before 6pm (EDT) on Wednesday, August 13th. Keyword for galleries and Flickr is JB:14:16.