Holiday Card Challenge - January Inspiration

I designed this 6x6 card in My Digital Studio (MDS) as this month's inspiration card for our Holiday Card Challenge.

(All the details for the challenge are in the Challenge Post, pinned to the top of this blog's main page-click the blog banner if you do not see the challenge info at the top of this page).  

I love our Christmas Cocoa DSP that was in the Holiday Mini Catalog.  Even though it is no longer available, I can still use these great papers because I purchased and downloaded our Christmas Cocoa II kit for MDS!

The snowflake is a faux version of the popular Coke can snowflakes (and other die cuts) that have been made by cutting and rolling out a Coke can, then running it through the Big Shot with one of our Sizzix dies. 

I simply added a "snowflake punch" to my card, then used our paper-fill option with the red and white flocked paper (at least the real version is flocked).  I opened the crop tool to adjust the placement of the paper a little, to get the best balance of red and white.  That's it!  No cleaning Coke cans.  No sharp edges. 

I then copied that snowflake and pasted it to the left-inside page of the card.  I wanted it to be much more subtle than the one on the front, so I reduced the opacity to about 10%.  Then, I copied and pasted the image over and over, placing the snowflakes exactly where I wanted them, including "off the page."

For the right-inside of the card, I pasted a few more snowflakes down the edge of the "paper," and added a sentiment stamp from Season of Cheer digital stamp set (in Chocolate Chip).

Other elements used on the card front were more Christmas Cocoa II DSP, Real Red "textured" card stock, Alpine "ribbon," a scallop square "punch" and a Chocolate Chip "brad." 

Don't forget to make your 5 holiday challenge cards, take a photo of the group, and email it to me No Later Than this Sunday, January 31st, to be entered into this month's drawing! 

If you complete your cards every month this year, you will also be entered into my Grand Prize Drawing for a $50 Stampin Up Gift Certificate!

Happy Stampin' and Digi-Creatin'!