Christmas cards featuring embellished scrapbook paper, chipboard ornament (reuse) and gold JOY die cut

Having committed to making Christmas cards monthly I have begun.  These cards are the ones I have made for January.  I cut circles (Nestibilities - Classic rounds) for the ornaments and managed to get twelve from the scraps of the Christmas crackers our daughter gave us for Christmas.  I decided to die cut JOY (Sizzix) from gold decorative paper to embellish my ornaments which echos the gold in them.  I created my ornament hangers from the same paper.  I cut a half inch strip from the gold paper, trimmed the bottom edge using my Fiskars Scallop decorative scissors and then trimmed the strip on every second scallop which gives each hanger a nice scalloped edge.  I used the same scissors to trim both corners just a bit to give the corners a soft rounded look.  Once I laid my ornaments on my decorative paper I found that having it outlined in brown would be beneficial but the next Nestillibities gave too much of a border so I cut the backers from brown cardstock with my circle cutter instead which allows me much more flexibility in size.  I glued my decorative chipboard circles to the brown ones and then added my JOY and hangers with double sided tape because of how slick the surface was.  In the process I decided to add some gold to my backgrounds as well.  I could have spattered them but having not perfected that skill I decided to use my stipple stamp (SU) with gold pigment ink and gold embossing powder instead.  Worked well and really helped create unity in my cards.  I still needed a string to hang my ornaments so I dug through my stash of crochet thread and found a length of brown that would work perfectly.  Considering it was just a length it is possible that I dyed it at some point in time for another project.  I added a length to my background securing one end on the back and the other to the front in the area that would be covered by the ornament with double sided tape.  I tied on another piece and tied a bow in it leaving it at the top.  I adhered my backgrounds to coordinating brown card fronts.  I added 3D foam tape to my ornaments and added them to cards pressing my hangers down a bit to touch the thread I had attached.  Next, I slid the bows down to be just above the hangers.  I like that the bows add texture and interest to my cards without too much bulk.    You can check out all my cards below.  You can see that the middle two have gold embossing on the ornaments.  I did this to cover up the bit of shadow that was remaining when I removed the writing using alcohol.  On hindsight, it might have been better to use brown ink instead as the gold embossing distracts from the gold JOY.  I did audition a brown JOY and it was not better than the gold one so on went the gold ones!!  I am very happy to have my first Christmas cards made.  I need to print inserts and add envelopes before I consider them all done but I will get that done this morning and into the box they will go.    I keep a running tally on a sticky note on the box so I always know how many I have on hand.    It is encouraging to have these made but I am usually pretty good at the beginning and sort of fall off as summer comes.  No matter, the more I do earlier the better off I am in the fall at crunch time.    Therese