YNS Christmas New Release Blog Hop!

Hello everybody! Thanks for joining us for another fun and fabulous Your Next Stamp Blog Hop! YNS just released over 25 new holiday images so the Starlets (and our awesome guest designers!) have whipped up some eye candy using many of the new images.

If you came here by way of Jenny's blog, then you're on the right track! If not, please go back and start at Crystal's blog because you won't want to miss a stop! Not only are there amazing projects for you to drool over, but there are also super prizes!! At the very end of the hop, there will be a chance to win the grand prize surprise new release package. BUT don't go directly there yet because there are also several stops on the hop with mini candy draws - you'll have to keep hopping to find them all!

By the way, there's also a 15% off sale during the duration of the hop so you'll be able to go shopping for all these new releases, and other stuff too if you'd like!

*****And now on to the show!*****

For my first project, I have a card using the adorable Merry Mouse Eve:


I stamped the image on white cardstock and colored with colored pencils and odorless mineral spirits. Next I masked off the image and airbrushed the background with Copic markers. My last marker spit big spots in areas so I decided to cover them up by sewing on seed beads everywhere to represent falling snow.

The background was embossed with a Spellbinders snowflake plate and then I attached tiny snowflake punches with sewn seed bead centers. Finally I added some white satin ribbon and some hand dyed seam binding.

For my second project, as soon as I saw the little Christmas lights in the Light up the Holidays set from our new designer Heather, I had an idea to do a fireplace strung with a garland and lights and after many hours of designing with Make the Cut, I came up with this:


It's basically a box that opens at the top so you can stick a battery powered tea light candle in to light it up. There's an insert in there so that the light stays right behind the fire even if you move the fireplace. I also designed a stencil to sponge all the bricks on and I even designed the little fire!

For the garland, I just punched out the little fern from a few different shades of green cardstock, and then hit them with a little green ink on a stencil brush so they weren't so flat green. To get them in the garland shape, I actually stamped the larger light string from the set, then just cut around the "string" to get a base to glue on my fern branches. Then I stamped the little lights twice, colored eight of them with Copics, cut them out and covered just the bulb portions with clear dimensional adhesive. Finally I glued the lights behind the garland and added 2 little bows of red baker's twine.

Here's a shot so you can get an idea of what it looks like with the tea light on:


I hope you liked my projects and thanks for hopping along with us! Your next stop is our incredibly talented October Guest Designer Tori.