Christmas in July Challenge

Hello fellow bloggers and welcome to another Design Team Challenge.  Today's Christmas in July challenge is brought to you by Just a Scrappin.  This week's directive was to make a Christmas project using the colors pink, black, white and one color of our choice.  As you can see I chose the color blue.

Last year I made a dozen or so of these hot chocolate holders and packaged them up (along with a candy cane stick and a little tag with a poem that hung from the 'handle') to sell at one of my local craft shows.  Boy did I underestimate the selling power of this item.  I mean they went QUICK.  So this year I'm going to make up more and thought this challenge would be a good starting point.

To make these I used:

Everyday Pop ups for the mug - lay the cuts out one the mat, weld them together and insert a little oval cut from George at the top so you have an opening in which to insert the packet of hot chocolate

Snow Day for my character cuts - the scarves were embossed using the Tim Holtz Distress embossing powders by Ranger Ink.  I love the way that these powders look after they have settled.

So now that you've seen my take on this week's challenge hop on over to Just A Scrappin to check out all the other designs our team created for you this week.  Then after you've been amply inspired create your own project, link up and play along with us. 

I look forward to seeing what you create.

Snowflake Kisses

I know, I know, but c'mon it's NEVER too early for Christmas.  LOL  Seriously though, I just recently purchased this cartridge and I finally broke it out of the box.  Even though there aren't that many cut choices on this particular cart I really like it and can envision having a lot of fun.

For this card I used only the Snow Day cart. 

My background paper is from a Recollections mat stack (Warm Wishes) that I picked up on clearance after the Christmas season.  It has some really great prints in it - some of which will be perfect for my hot chocolate mug holders.

The snow covered ground and snowflake were coated with Martha Stewart glitter in Carrara Marble.  I love this particular glitter for snow effects because it's subtle with just the right amount of bling.

And there you have my first Christmas card of the year.  Now if I keep this up I'll have more than enough cards done on time this year.