BBTB2 Christmas in July

Happy Monday!  Our challenge at BBTB2 this week comes from across the pond from our lovely and talented DT sister Jayne.  It's a Christmas in July theme challenge, so it's pretty much "anything goes" as long as it's Christmas and cut with your Cricut.  My card is from the Cricut Circle 4th quarter cartridge Out of Character with some added stars from Simply Charmed.  I took my somewhat non traditional colors from the patterned DP I chose for the "O".

It is a fully shaped card for a change, the shadows welded in Design Studio.  Pretty easy as the it's sort of a "word jumble" cartridge so the word "Joy" and (almost all) of it's layers were done for me.  I intended this to be pretty straight forward and simple, but decided as I went that is needed a bit of sparkle and bling.  First I glittered the stars and embossed them with the Stars Cuttlebug folder.  My 5" Xyron crapped out halfway through so I removed the adhesive with one of those erasers made for that purpose and was happy I didn't have to cut them over again.  This time I used a glue marker which wasn't all that easy to tell if you've covered evenly, but it was ok.  Added some really superfine glitter and then (when I was sure it was pretty dry) ran it through my Cuttlebug. (Note to self, buy extra Xyron cartridges).  The "J" was embossed with Swiss Dots and begged for some star gems at the top and bottom.  To balance those, I added gems throught each of the holes cut in the "y".  Quite the PITA since it's popped, but I love how it looks.  After that, the "o" and stars looked a little underdressed, so they got blinged too.  (TMI?  Sorry, I'm feeling kinda chatty today.)

Even I was suprised at how FAT this thing turned out.  It looks a little bit ridiculous as a card, so I may just tear off the entire top and attach it to a plaque and make it a door hanger or something.  There are actually 2 shadow cuts for each word on this cart, the first one being slightly offset.  You can't really see it that well with my poor color choices here.  There are 2 shades of teal, one slightly darker.  It looked like more of a contrast before it was all assembled so there's an extra layer right there.  I feel strongly about each element having an entire shadow around it and each is popped.  In the design, the "o" in "Joy" had no shadow but I felt compelled to create one.  LOL  Also, when I've added several background elements in a design, I prefer them to be on different planes.  See how the top star is several layers lower than the bottom one?  I like the depth that creates, but it requires multiple cuts of the same element and really adds to the thickness. 

It looks cool (I think, anyway) but isn't so great for mailing and if you're making a card, it requires some major reinforcement to the back or it won't stand up.  This is the inside with the trimmed second shadow adding some reinforcement.  The base card was cut in the darker teal as was the top mat on the front which hides the welds.  However, I actually cut two of the top mats and glued and folded one over the back before adding the front mat to give it an extra layer.  I will also probably cut a dark shadow for the bottom star and a star itself, before adding a sentiment.  (Providing I keep it as a card, LOL)  So there you have it.  I've had a lot of requests about tutorials or videos about this so I'll call this a "baby step".  Hope y'all weren't too bored with it. Now pop on over to BBTB2 and see the fabulous eye candy from the rest of the team.  Then follow our simple rules and come join our challenge, ok? Oh, and don't forget you still have a week for our Fashion Challenge as well.  See ya there.