ICAD: The Last Round-Up

How is it possible that it's ALREADY July 31st and thus the final day of ICAD2024?! I'm pretty sure that no summer has ever flown past as quickly as this one. Many thanks to everyone who has played along, followed along, left comments, etc; it's always so much more fun to share ICAD with others. Of course, as always, the biggest and heartiest THANK YOU has to go to Tammy G aka @gypsy999 for devising, hosting, inspiring and cheering us on for another 61 days of creativity and friendship; I don't have enough words to praise a most artful and heartful friend! 

ICAD24-61: Diorama

How do you make a diorama using only index cards? Ummmm... very carefully? No srsly, I wanted to make something three dimensional but using two dimensional supplies (index cards and pens) so I decided the solution was layers. In this case the layers consist of the non-lined sides of four neon index cards, each carrying one component of a jungle scene and each popped up on a layer of foam tape for more height. Starting from the very back we have... the blue sky; then pink flowers (with orange Posca detailing); then green leaves and finally smaller yellow flowers encased in a frame around the edges to literally hold it together. This took a bit of time to construct and involved using the dreaded Xacto Knife BUT... this looks exactly like the picture that was in my head, which always feels like a win, doesn't it? Especially on the 61st and FINAL day of ICAD2024!

ICAD24-60: Planetarium

One last card featuring scraps of patterned paper, handcut shapes, doodles, and machine stitching.

ICAD24-59: Circle

Super-excited that today's prompt serendipitously coincides with my Mandala Monday strand. In my (VAST!) collection of funky vintage things to use in art, I found a few of the old-school 3.5 x 5.5 black and white postcards I'm guessing are from the 1930's or 40's, which happen to be from a collection of Bucks County, Pennsylvania images, which is where I grew up. My mandala is drawn with Posca Pens atop a pc of the northern portion of the Delaware River. I've done a few previous mandalas on postcards or photographs, but usually I feel that I've either covered the original image up too much or not enough... this time I think I hit the Goldilocks Zone (aka "just right"!)

ICAD24-28: Tessellation

I had a general idea of what "tessellation" meant... basically it's a geometric or semi-geometric regular repeating pattern; I didn't realize that technically, to be specifically designated as a tessellation, the pattern needs to have NO spaces and no overlaps! This is what is great about ICAD, you learn so much! I'd love to tell you that I came up with this funky fish pattern on my own but NOOOOOOOO; I did a Google Image Search and this one was a kid's art lesson on Faber-Cassell's website. I used a graphed index card and pre-drew every single one of the fish shapes in pencil, and it still took an embarrassingly long time and a fair amount of erasing but I DID IT! If you want to see really cool, beautiful, effortless-looking  Zentangles (both tessellating and non-tessellating) you should check out my friend and fellow Jersey Girl @Lorraine303 who has MAD SKILLZ in this (and many other) areas of art!

ICAD24-57: Garden

A simple collage consisting of a garden plan illustration and some other vintage paper that is largely hidden by the giant tulip; all atop one of the many cool library checkout cards that my friend Mary aka @millwoodstudioart shared with me. She shared some awesome catalog cards too, such as the one from last week about gardening with children... Thanks, Missus!

ICAD24-56: Playing Cards

Ok go with me on this one, it's a little tangential: doodley diamonds and hearts (or spades) in a wonkily repeating pattern. 

ICAD24-55: Off-Prompt One Staple Collage

Will this be my last #OneStapleCollage of #dyicad2024? Who can say? But it's Day 55 and we're coming down to the wire, so if not the last, probably the penultimate or the antepenultimate. From the bottom working upward, this one consists of: a yellow repro library checkout card; half a Mille Bornes scoresheet; a torn section of a European map (featuring northern Spain); an exotic belly dancer; a sepia-toned cluster of flowering dogwood, and finally a phrase from a Russian-English dictionary. All held together by the eponymous single staple.

ICAD24-54: Off-Prompt

Somewhat revisiting the #RANUNCULUS prompt from weeks and weeks ago; this time as an extra-doodley version in Macro mode. Tombow Dual Brush Pens and Ranger's Letter It Fineliners on an index card divider. Not sure what the "W" stands for... Wonky? Wednesday? Without a clue? 

ICAD24-53: Off-Prompt

Handcut clouds made of layered patterned paper scraps. With lots and lots of doodles on top. 

Trick or Treat?!

 We've been celebrating the new Eyelet Outlet July 2024 Brads which arrived just in time for Christmas in July; I'm not sure "Halloween in July" is a thing (yet!) but we've also got Halloween-friendly Candy Corn and Black Cat brads, featured in this fun Trick or Treat card along with an adorable Bat Brad.

The background is framed with bold orange and black Halloween Dot Washi Tape.

In addition to Candy Corn and Black Cat brads, the brand new July Release also includes colorful Retro Holiday Trees, and gorgeous vintage-inspired Angel Brads. See them all (and lots more!) in the Eyelet Outlet Online Store. 

SOS527: Up, Up and Away

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we're celebrating BALLOONS! They could be of the hot air variety or the kind you buy for birthdays, new babies and graduations, just feature one or more balloons on your project.

I've had Lawn Fawn's adorable Party Balloons set for probably two years and I think this might be the second time I've used them; which is NUTS, obviously. I've had the LF Giant Happy Birthday die even longer and have neglected it even more shockingly. The dinosaur is from Spellbinders' Monster Birthday collection and I've only had it for a few months and have used it more often. This particular paper piecing was part of the rough draft for one of the cards in my Here Be Monsters Class in a Kit and I thought he was adorable, but then I realized for that card, the stripey Lily Bee patterned paper would work better as grass on which the dino was standing, so he became a "leftover". Since I was diecutting fairly small items, I was able to use up quite a few scraps; since I needed a card for a young boy, the scraps I chose were all in blues and greens.

Check out all of the awesome cards the Crew have made to inspire you, then start planning what you'll link up with us. SOS527:Up, Up and Away runs until the evening of Monday, August 11th.

Liquid Pearls + Archival Inks + Stencils = Colorful Joy

Ranger's Liquid Pearls are super-versatile and add extra shimmer and dimension to any project and (as my title implies) they work really well in conjunction with stencils... a bunch of which I've used to make a trio of colorful encouragement cards. Follow along, via my step-by-step tutorial, on the Ranger Project Page.

Here Be Monsters

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: A monster, a panda and a dinosaur walk into a card kit… resulting in one of the cuuuuuuutest Paper Anthology Class-in-a-Kit selections ever: Here Be Monsters!

The monster, panda, dinosaur and sentiments are all from Spellbinders' Monster Birthday collection, but since it's a kit, all of the diecutting, stamping and pattern-combining has already been done; you can jump right to the assembling and sending. Each critter is adorably paper pieced and framed in his or her own little scene, with just the right embellishments, including various sizes of Googley eyes.  

This kit includes everything you need to make all three cards as pictured, just add adhesive! Easy to follow, step-by-step instructions are included, as well as a nice big color photograph to guide placement.

♥♥♥

Also new in our Etsy Shop, Cardmakers' Vintage and Found Paper Assortments; mini collections of curated backgrounds, perfectly sized for A2 cards.

The Here Be Monsters Class in a Kit and Cardmakers' Vintage and Found Paper Assortments are both available now in the Paper Anthology Etsy Shop, Paper Anthology Design; where you'll also find other Class in a Kit selections, Holiday Jumpstart kits and Birthday Jumpstarts, too!

Dashing Through the Snow (Week 2)

It's week two of our snow-centric Jingle Belles challenge for which we've teamed up with our friends at The Double Trouble Challenge. Thus giving you a chance to participate in TWO challenges with ONE card! As the title implies, for "Dashing Through the Snow" the brief at Jingle Belles is merely to make a card that features SNOW, whether it be snowflakes, snowmen or a snowy landscape.

As you may know, the "Double" in "Double Trouble" refers to the fact that there are several parts to their challenges, though the only requirement is to play along with Thing 1, which in this case is to make a window or aperture card. But the Double Trouble Gang encourage you to add some fun... try their options by participating in Twisted Sister's Thing 3 and/or Double Dare's Thing 2 to earn additional chances in their random drawing. This time, those twists are as follows:

Here's what I made this week:

I had made a few extra white-embossed panels during our Jingle Belles' "EMBOSSING" challenge, and since they happened to be snowy, when I found them again, I decided they were perfect for making an aperture card. I used an ancient set of Nestabilities' Labels 20 to cut the largest size from a panel I had inked with Wendy Vecchi's Night Sky Archival; then the next size down to cut a smaller version of the same shape from a  Sky Blue Archival Panel; then I layered both of those over a third panel inked with Violet Archival. I embossed the "Noel" from Wendy's Statements Chippies, inked it with Night Sky, added it on top, embellished with a few diecut snowflakes, et voila. Since all of my supplies were still sitting there, including the beautiful label shapes cut from the apertures of card one, I decided to build a second card with the leftovers and another Chippie from the same set.

Head on over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's card and a picture of the prize and all the links to Double Trouble's half of this special Crossover Challenge!

Calling All Angels

 The lovely and cherubic new Eyelet Outlet Angel Brads have arrived just in time for Christmas in July festivities! This card features both shapes from the set, hovering near the sentiment, which is backed by two strips of gorgeously glimmering Glittery Tape in Copper. Below are a few golden diecut baubles, decorated with a Pearl Brad and a Snowflake Brad.

Shopping List:

Eyelet Outlet Angel Brads

Copper Glitter Tape

6mm White Pearl Brad 

Snowflake Brad

In addition to these beautiful Angel Brads, the brand new July Release also includes colorful Retro Trees, yummy Candy Corn and mischievous Black Cats. Check them all out in the EO Store.

Yet Another ICAD Round-up

Another week has passed and thus seven new index card artworks have transpired:

ICAD24-22: Mandala Monday 

I'm off-prompt in favor of Mandala Monday, for which I've drawn a bunch of nested/clustered mandalas on a neon orange index card.

ICAD24-21: Off-Prompt

Definitely not the best hibiscus I've ever drawn, but I quite like my stripey leaves and I'm awarding myself bonus points because the whole thing takes place on a library catalog card for a book called, "A Backyard Flower Garden for Kids"!

ICAD24-20: Off-Prompt

Freeform curves made out of layered neon index cards. With plenty of machine-stitching on top!

ICAD24-19: Off-Prompt

Best Fishes on Day 49 of ICAD2024; for which I've made a super-random collage from some of the bits that were sitting on my worktable.

ICAD24-18: Off-Prompt

 A random collage in (mostly) pink and white. Vintage ticket background, washi strips, rub-on transfers and fussy-cut butterfly, horoscope wheel and rose... the latter from a book about Cath Kidston fabrics.

ICAD24-17: Plum

Flashing back to a prompt from earlier this week, for which I've doodled with black Letter It Fineliners and white Posca paint pens on a glossy plum/purple color swatch.

ICAD24-16: Calm

At first glance, this might look like a seriously tangential take on the prompt, but, as any oceanographer will tell you, there's literally NOTHING calmer than a squid playing solitaire in a mushroom garden. Obviously!

Dashing Through the Snow

It's the middle of July, which seems like an excellent time for Jingle Belles to team up with our friends at The Double Trouble Challenge, so that you have a chance to participate in TWO challenges with ONE card! As the post title implies, for "Dashing Through the Snow" the brief at Jingle Belles is merely to make a card that features SNOW, whether it be snowflakes, snowmen or a snowy landscape.

As you may know, the "Double" in "Double Trouble" refers to the fact that there are several parts to their challenges, though the only requirement is to play along with Thing 1, which in this case is to make a window or aperture card. But the Double Trouble Gang encourage you to add some fun... try their options by participating in Twisted Sister's Thing 3 and/or Double Dare's Thing 2 to earn additional chances in their random drawing. This time, those twists are as follows:

Remember, you need only make a card featuring some sort of SNOW to enter at Jingle Belles; and the only requirement at Double Trouble is to make a window or aperture card. BUT... if your card has both SNOW and a WINDOW... you can link up on both blogs for a chance at two different prizes!

Here's how I approached both of the challenges this week:

Generally speaking, when I set out to make a window card, I go all out and make it a shaker; so that's what I've done here. Stephanie gave me the adorable Doodlebug Winter Wonderland stamps and dies for my birthday, and I was excited to be able to use them so quickly. I found a few sheets of D-bug's Polar Pals patterned paper to coordinate and used an older set of Spellbinders' Nestabilities to build up that fun scalloppy frame. Inside the shaker I placed a background of pale blue snowflakes, a glittery hill, a handsome yeti and a mix of Eyelet Outlet Snowflake and Round Sequins.

To make this gala Christmas in July celebration even more festive, we have a fun little prize for one randomly selected cardmaker who links a snowy card up at Jingle Belles:

Sunny Studio 6x6 All is Bright paper pad, Inky Antics Winter Song stamp set 

and some gorgeous Crafter's Square gems.

"Dashing Through the Snow" runs at Jingle Belles until 6pm (Eastern) on Wednesday, July 31st. Hop over to see Stephanie's card and link up your own snowy masterpiece.

TREE-Mendous!

The TREE-Mendous new Eyelet Outlet Retro Tree Brads have arrived just in time to celebrate Christmas in July!

 This card features a cluster of said Retro Trees layered over Snowy Trees for a feeling of depth, creating a little forest glade in which the vintage-inspired deer from our Santa and Deer set feels right at home. The background consists of neatly aligned strips of Holly Jolly Washi in traditional red and green.

In addition to these fabulous Retro Trees, the brand new July Release also includes vintage-inspired Angel Brads, Candy Corn and Black Cats. Check them out in the EO Store.

SOS526: Summertime!

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we're celebrating SUMMER which means that we'd like to see cards and projects with a summer theme. That could be traveling, gardening, camping, BBQ, beach... whatever says summer to you! 

During most of my childhood, one of my favorite summer activities was going to the beach, or, as we said in the Philadelphia suburbs where I grew up, "down the shore". In my family's case, we often went to Wildwood, NJ and later to Cape May, both of which I still love today. To my knowledge, there are NO flamingoes at the Jersey Shore, nor are there tropical flowers and foliage; but there are lots of seashells. In the case of my card, the shells are from HoneyBee's Seashells Stamp Set c. 2022; the flamingo paper is from 49 and Market's Sunburst collection; the sentiment and foliage stickers are from an older Dear Lizzy line via American Crafts; and the ancient hibiscus stickers are from EK Success. I added brushed gold and pale pink mats, plus a bit of decorative machine stitching and my A7 card was complete.

Visit SOS to see what the rest of the Crew have made, then dust off one (or more!) of your older-bust-still-beloved craft items and make a card to link up with us! The SUMMER Challenge runs through Monday evening, July 29th.

Index Card a Day (Week 7)

We're rounding the corner into the second half of July (already?!) and here's my own output of Index Card Art from this past week:

ICAD24-45: Mandala Monday

Wouldja believe... It's a Marvin Mandel Mandala Monday?! In perhaps the most stunning case of vintage-paper-related serendipity EVER, I found this business card stuck into one book, and the illustration of this (completely unrelated) gentleman in another book about ten minutes later. I went looking for the name "Mandel" in an old telephone book I rescued to use in collages and did NOT find a Marvin, but there were half a dozen others which are partially obscured by the mandala petals. I used a combination of Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks, a white Posca pen and Prismacolor Pencils to add color; and Ranger's Letter It Fineliners for all the shapes. As always, my Helix Circle Maker Tool was invaluable.

ICAD24-44: Seashell

Super-literal take on the prompt: I white-embossed a set of HoneyBee Seashell stamps; blended some of my favorite Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks on top; then splattered and outlined and played with the results.

ICAD24-43: Fragile

 My collage admittedly has a #FRAGILE connection to both the prompt and to reality. But… you know… in a good way! I am especially proud of the way most of the design is built around a similar color palette; AND, especially the fact that the banana, the ballet dancer and the Chinese character for banana all have a similar shape to them. 

ICAD24-42: Off Prompt OSC

And here we have world’s most random One Staple Collage! FYI, One Staple Collage is an ICAD tradition; the brief is to create a collage which is held together with… wait for it… one staple! Slightly trickier than it sounds but a lot of fun!

ICAD24-41: Forest Green

I set out with the intention of working on today’s prompt of #FORESTGREEN and thus handcut some beautiful wonky leafy shapes from every green EXCEPT forest green… then branched off into altered/doodled patterned paper scraps in various shades of blue. But that’s why they’re called “prompts” rather than assignments… they’re meant to get you started and you can go in any direction from there! 

ICAD24-40: Off-Prompt

Today's is actually not my favorite card, although I love the funky ink-splotch colors; and stand by my decision to cut around the flower edge on the right hand side. Plus… to enjoy and learn from the process rather than focusing purely on outcome is (to me!) the true spirit of ICAD, so woohoo!

ICAD24-39: Off-Prompt

Yes, I do tend to save my scraps of patterned paper, even quite small ones that I probably shouldn't bother with, but they're excellent for stamping and paper-piecing, not to mention for those nights when I just feel like cutting out random shapes, stacking them, and arranging the result into a funky pattern. 

Mission: EMBOSS-able!

As you may remember, your mission, this fortnight, should you decide to accept it, is to join the Jingle Belles in creating a holiday card that features heat and/or texture embossing. Hop over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's gorgeous card, and in the meantime here's how I went all EMBOSS-ible this week: 

I stumbled upon this background panel, which, at some unremembered point in the past year or so, I had (apparently) embossed using Memory Box's Poinsettia Corner e/f, colored the raised design with Wendy Vecchi's Leaf Green Ink and Sunflower Liquid Pearls and then set it aside. But this is a very good illustration of why I am a Setter-Aside rather than a Thrower-Out (ok apart from mild hoarding tendencies) and that is because although this did not originally meet whatever my goal or requirements might've been at the time, it was a beautiful background which seriously helped me out on a crowded and busy week. All I had to do to make the panel into a card was add Penny Black Poinsettia and Joy diecuts, plus a couple of coordinating mats et voila! Job done!

Beach, Please!

Life IS better at the beach and summery cards ARE better with Eyelet Outlet Summer Vacation beachy brads! Both of these beachy keen cards feature our Shell Corner Brads and have twine accents strung through a trio of colorful old school 1/8" Round Eyelets; with mats of Shell Washi and extra wide Sky Tape.

The first card also features both shapes from our Seagull Brad Set as well as both Sun and Cloud from that set. 

The second card has a pair of Flip Flops, a Sandcastle and a white Anchor Brad... the latter is masquerading as postage.

Did you know that in addition to the regular search feature, the lefthand side of the Eyelet Outlet Homepage has lots of handy categories like Vacation/Summer; Birds, Bugs and Critters; Food, Drink and Cooking; Animals and lots more; super useful for those times when you'd like to see a lot of options at once!

Week 6: ICAD Roundup

Since the Index Card a Day project runs from June 1st to July 31st, we're now more than halfway through! Here are the cards I've made in the last seven days: 

ICAD24-38: Mandala Monday

It's a Mahalo Mandala Monday, celebrating the fact that I stumbled, almost simultaneously, upon both a library catalog card for a book about Hawaii AND some pre-stamped and already-colored yellow hibiscus... the state flower of Hawaii. You just cannot argue with that kind of serendipity, am I right?!

ICAD24-37: Dashboard

A tangential collage for #DASHBOARD; an antique car on a library card with trading stamps and vintage paper and some abstract rub-on transfers that kinda/sorta look like dashboard gauges...

ICAD24-36: Splash

Flashing back to yesterday’s #SPLASH prompt with a doodled version of one of those Lazy River pools they have at resorts; in this case some of the splashes are neon index cards glued on top

ICAD24-35: Castle

It’s a One Staple Collage featuring vintage paper and illustrations; flashing back to a prompt from a few days ago. Staged on my newest (and also oldest) vintage typewriter; a 1920ish Underwood of surpassing beauty.

ICAD24-34: Panorama

According to Vague Magazine, Panoramic Argyle might be the next big fashion trend... or possibly not; it's hard to tell. Ok, so... SUPER-loose take on today's optional #dyicad2024 prompt of #PANORAMA which is also (unintentionally!) a slightly tangential picture puzzle referencing a Beatles song; whilst also indulging my obsession with argyle. 

ICAD24-33: Off-Prompt

Apparently "Stripes with Doodles" is going to be my default mode this summer when I don't have another idea. And hey... I'm cool with that...

ICAD24-32: Off-Prompt

Not just off-prompt, but without any plan at all! I started out paper piecing… added pattern-enhancing doodles to my scraps of designer paper… and finally built out a weird sort semi-mandala in the leftover space. Not the best thing I've ever made but having started late in the evening of a tiring day with literally NO IDEA what I was going to do, I feel ok with just having made SOMETHING!

My Sweet EMBOSS-able You

This fortnight at Jingle Belles we're asking you to create holiday cards that feature EMBOSSING... either pressure embossing OR heat embossing... or BOTH if you're an over-achiever! 

I am currently somewhat re-obsessed with the emboss/resist technique, so I chose to go with heat embossing. I stamped the gorgeous oversized Snowflake Spin background from Stampendous in Ranger's Clear Emboss It Ink, sprinkled with White e/p and once it was cool I applied a combination of Picked Raspberry, Kitsch Flamingo and Spun Sugar Oxide Inks, which I splattered lightly with a waterbrush for even more variation of shades. The "Merry" die is so old I'm actually not sure who made it, but I love how it looks cut from magenta glitter paper and mounted on some coordinating May Arts ribbon. 

This challenge runs until Wednesday evening, July 17th. Hop over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card and start thinking about how you'll approach this Emboss-able Mission!