Color Throwdown Challenge #471 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I've had SO much fun being November's Guest Designer for the Color Throwdown Challenge! It has inspired me so much! Today's card is one that I probably would NEVER have made if it wasn't for this challenge! That's why I love it so much! It really stretches me as a designer and gets my mind working in all kinds of new ways! I'm sad to be saying goodbye!

Since I am in a Christmas card making mood, I decided to make something modern with lots of texture and shine! I had a lot of fun executing my design! This is what I had in mind as soon as I saw the colors, but decided to try something different. Well, that card is now in the bin and I decided to just stick with what my mind kept seeing! It really did turn out pretty much exactly how I had envisioned it, which is always nice!

To begin, I heat embossed the Woodgrain Background all over a 5 by 4 1/4 inch piece of Kraft cardstock using gold powder. I am almost completely out of gold powder, so I took the opportunity to order a bunch of new varieties. I can't wait to test them out when they arrive! I'm smitten with how this gold woodgrain looks! I'm pretty sure this isn't the last time this will make an appearance, so brace yourselves! LOL! 

After that was done, I die cut the Snowflake Medley snowflakes using black cardstock. I never imagined that I would be diecutting black snowflakes, but never say never! I heat embossed half in silver powder and half in gold powder. I really like how they look on the black paper! Unfortunately, the coordinating stamp set is retired, but Heather has come out with a beautiful new snowflake stamp set that would be perfect for this type of look as well!

After they were all stamped and embossed, I arranged them onto the woodgrain panel. I had some hang over, but I trimmed them off after I had them placed where I wanted them. After they were in position, I really wanted to add in some extra white so I got to work adding LOTS and LOTS of Nuvo Drops here and there where they looked good.

I added some silver and gold sequins here and there as well as a few in the centers of a couple of the snowflakes. I just love the added sparkle and shine it creates! The finishing touch is the silver embossed sentiment on a black strip of cardstock. I chose this particular sentiment because it included "Happy New Year" and this card has a "new year" type vibe to it! Thanks for fluttering by!