Thank You Jumpstart Kit: Vine and Dandy

Thank You Jumpstart is Paper Anthology Design's newest variation on our popular Jumpstart Card Kit series, which helps build your card stash by providing all the ingredients you need (except blendable inks and adhesive) to make FIVE copies of a single design. Vine and Dandy features Hero Arts' beautiful Victorian Greenhouse, already diecut for you from textured white cardstock, ready to be layered over blended ink panels you create using one of the five Distress Oxide ink-blend recipes (with photos) included. OR go your own way and create a blend with your own favorite colors. Then layer on the eponymous diecut vines, a canvas blossom and two-layer sentiment, before adding the whole thing to a white topfold A2 cardbase. 

This kit contains:

Five pre-diecut Victorian Greenhouse panels
Five smooth, extra-sturdy white cardstock panels for blending
Five Distress Oxide color-blend recipes (with photos)
Five dark green diecut vines
Five light green diecut vines
Five diecut canvas-paper hibiscus flowers
Five diecut patterned paper sentiments
Five diecut sentiment "shadows"
Complete step-by-step instruction sheet with large color photo
Extra page of tips and techniques for choosing and blending inks
Five white top-fold A2 cards

Visit the Paper Anthology Design Etsy Shop to get your Thank You Jumpstart: Vine and Dandy Card Kit today! While you're there, check out our other Jumpstart kits for Birthday, Holiday and Hanukkah; as well as three-card Class in a Kit options for various occasions.

SOS532: Halloween

It's time for a brand new, super-timely challenge at Shopping Our Stash. This fortnight's theme is Halloween, so you can either rock that holiday OR go your own way but use Halloween colors: orange, black, green, lime and/or purple. I went with the former, so that I could work in one of my own favorite Halloween colors: PINK!

I actually had an entirely different plan, but when I got out my Halloween stuff, I discovered a little un-remembered cache of Frank Garcia's Luna collection from Prima Marketing a few years ago, so obviously I immediately switched gears! The witchy and webby papers only needed a bit of distressing; the pumpkins, ghost and sentiments I fussy-cut from a few journal cards that were in the set. I added a Hero Arts' diecut black cat and half a dozen (sadly discontinued) Eyelet Outlet Mini Spider Brads and called it good.

This challenge (SOS532) runs until the evening of Monday, October 21st. I hope you'll hop over to SOS to see what the other Boo Crew Members have made to inspire you!

Holiday Jumpstart: Sparkle

Holiday Jumpstart: Sparkle is Paper Anthology's May holiday card kit, which features (and INCLUDES) Hero Arts’ Ornament Fancy Dies, a seven-die set that’s so useful and versatile, we predict you’ll be using it for years to come!

Paper Anthology’s Holiday Jumpstart Card Kit is our pre-packaged kit that includes everything you need (except adhesives) to complete FIVE copies of this new original holiday card design. It’s called “Sparkle” based on the sentiment AND because the ornaments feature three bold, bright shades of Non-Shed Glitter Paper, as well as silver metallic cardstock for hangers and sentiments. This kit is available for $43 in-store and online; CLICK HERE to go directly to the product page. 

While there, check out Paper Anthology's amazing selection of paper, stamps, dies, inks, tools and basically all the papercrafting supplies you could wish for!

It's Ombre, Hombre!

We're cruising into our second week of ombre-centric cards at Jingle Belles and this time I've created my own version by blending six different shades of Distress Oxide Inks from Ranger through an older Hero Arts Stencil.

There are many lovely shades of green in the Distress line, and it's totally possible to make an absolutely seamless series of tone-into-tone. But instead, I decided to work the overlapping blend to include some of my favorite shades in order of intensity rather than strictly by hue. I used Twisted Citron, Cracked Pistachio, Mowed Lawn, Evergreen Bough, Pine Needles and Rustic Wilderness. Hero Arts' Forest Scene stencil is no longer in print, but honestly, this technique would work with ANY stencil; or alternately as an emboss/resist technique using any larger background type stamp.

Be sure to check out Stephanie's beautiful card at Jingle Belles and start planning what you will make!

SOS: Extra Special

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash the challenge is called, "What a Difference You've Made in My Life" and the brief is to make a card for someone extra-special. With Mother's Day just around the corner, that might immediately spring to mind for you, as it did for me, but you can choose ANYONE in your life, just let us know who it is in your post!

Something which has slightly changed my Mother's Day cardmaking duties in the few years, is that my mom has also become an avid cardmaker! Which is really cool but... it does kind of add a little extra pressure because now she KNOWS how things are made, lol! She's also a very keen and expert gardener, so I thought a floral theme would be cool. To encompass the "Stash" requirement for SOS, I've chosen a favorite Hero Arts Tulip die from a few years ago that I haven't used in a bit. I diecut a bunch of flowers and leaves from heavy-duty watercolor paper, then used a waterbrush and a few shades of pink and green Tombow Dual Brush Pens to add layers of (sort of) realistic color.

Other ingredients, old and new: Hero Arts' super-cool Victorian Greenhouse die, which I bought in February of 2020 and somehow NEVER used until now (?!); Penny Black's "Bloom" die; an ancient Tim Holtz Movers and Shapers butterfly die; a scrap of vintage doily; some leftover Prima papers from the Pretty Pale collection; and a brand new frame element from some amazing Stamperia paper which just arrived at Paper Anthology. 

I hope you'll head over to Shopping Our Stash to see the amazing design team cards and then be inspired to make something extra-special to link up with us this time!

New Class: Awesome Blossoms!

If you're near central New Jersey, I'd love for you to join me for my newest in-person class at Paper Anthology, where we'll make three cards that  are Bloomin’ Awesome. Welcome Spring with fresh flowers, bright colors and bold patterns, using two sets of coordinated layering stencils, stamps and dies, from Hero Arts and Pinkfresh Studio. Details on the Paper Anthology Blog!

Stenciled Christmas Forest

We're still making cards featuring holiday stencils at Jingle Belles and you're still invited to join us! This week I've unearthed my sadly neglected Hero Arts "Forest Scene" stencil and some Broken China Distress Ink and made a simple but graphic background for my A7 card:

I had envisioned a more collage-style card, but after I added the oversized blue poinsettia and a sweet piece of Lawn Fawn Flair, I really liked how the whole thing looked, so I just added a couple of mats, a little machine stitching and a few Eyelet Outlet Pearls. Easy, peasy!

Be sure to check out Stephanie's card at Jingle Belles and then start thinking which of your holiday stencils needs a little love!

Thank You Very MUSH!

Winter Botanicals is the newest Paper Anthology Class in a Kit. This three-card class features soft colors, sweet doilies and plenty of woodgrain, with dies from Hero Arts, Spellbinders and Taylored Expressions plus sentiments from Wendy Vecchi’s “Merci and More” Stamp, Die and Stencil set. Don’t need that many Thank You cards? Swap the pre-stamped flags for your own sentiments and send these for practically ANY occasion. All stamping and diecutting has been done for you, just follow the written instructions and consult the full-color photos to easily assemble two A2’s and one A6 card. ♥

Snowy Banner Wishes

We're still making holiday cards inspired by the 2021 Jingle Belles Blog Banner (hop over or scroll down for a reminder!) and you're still invited to join the fun. Here's what I made this week:

I used an ancient, beautiful Darice embossing folder to add swirly snowflakes to a piece of dark green Bo Bunny Double Dot paper, then sanded the embossing to make it stand out even more. I cut Hero Arts' Snowflake Cluster from white glitter cardstock and added Eyelet Outlet Pearls in several sizes, scattered all over.

Be sure to visit Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card and the readers' gallery so far; then come back to link up your own masterpiece!

Ornamental, My Dear Watson

We're celebrating one of my all-time favorite holiday items this fortnight at Jingle Belles: we'd like to see cards that feature holiday baubles and ornaments! 

This Hero Arts Poinsettia and Ornament Die is one of my favorites because there are so many ways to use it. Often I cut it out of watercolor paper and paint the flowers, but this time I left the ornament plain and layered it over a watercolored background; then mounted the whole thing on an ancient scrap of Prima paper. White dimensional florals and tiny Eyelet Outlet pearls add extra texture and interest.

Be sure to go and see Stephanie's card at Jingle Belles and start planning what YOU will make!

Bring on the Flowers

Happy Mother's Day to everyone who is celebrating! Since this seemed like an especially good day for a beautiful female image... or flowers... (or both!) I've used Hero Arts Flower Power Layering Stamps and Die Bundle to make two fun and colorful cards. The results are on The Ink Pad Blog.

 (PS: Flower Power is also available without the die, as a stand-alone stamp set!)

Something for Everyone

Travelers Notebooks are so much more than just calendars. In fact, many of the refills have no connection to time, like Lined Refills for notetaking and listmaking; Watercolor and Sketchbook Paper for drawing anywhere; Dot Grids for lettering practice, Blank Pages that can hold collages, poetry, haiku, photos or anything else you can figure out how to attach! Your TN or Planner can be whatever you want it to; especially a fun place to spark your creativity... I know mine is! Here's a look back on the first three and a half months of 2021 in my Traveler's Company Notebook from The Ink Pad. I've been using the Regular Sized TN (there's a Passport Size too) in a Binder (as opposed to a leather cover) to record my completed creative assignments Monthly; and a Weekly Diary to do some super casual memory-keeping (family milestones, the election, etc); and a little bit of list-making (tv shows we've binged, audiobooks I've devoured); but honestly, as much as anything, it's a great place to keep pretty papers, stickers and tapes that I'm not quite ready to part with. Here's a page that illustrates what I mean:

In the past few weeks, I've blogged about Hero Arts US Mailbox and Envelope Accessories Die Sets, and thus wound up with a bunch of extra postal-related diecuts in random colors. Time permitting, I could have made additional cards... but in this case, I just sort of collected them all into the "Cleanup Collage" you see above; which also makes use of an abandoned label I typed for National Card and Letter Writing Month, the MT for Pack Letters tape that was sitting on my worktable, and some of my fave Pepin Vintage Fashion Stickers.

This year I was lucky enough to grab a 2021 Monthly Diary before they sold out; but in some ways I miss the (undated) Free Monthly Diary I used last year, since the calendar pages had a little more room for embellishing. The other plus-side of the Free Monthly is that you can start and end with whatever months you choose! Rather than planning events forward, I use mine to make a little visual record of what I've done for each of my creative posts throughout the month. I always enjoy these in a nostalgic sense; but it's also practical, as it helps me see, at a glance, what products, colors and themes I've done recently. 

Technically I don't need to add the name of the months to my dated pages, but I have some excellent StencilGirl Alphabet Stencils that I love using and it lets me add another splash of color. "March" is done using Carolyn Dube's Vintage Typewriter Lowercase Stencil and February capitalized on the fact that the Emotions and Feelings Alphabet has both full-sized and tiny letters.

And of course I love to use my Karin Brushmarkers to do some handlettering. In January I paired them with some Pepin Art Forms in Nature Stickers and Tapes as well as some of the stamps, dies and stickers I used throughout the month; my MTA licensed Tape and Stickers being particular faves, but as you can see, there's a little bit of EVERYTHING! 

I hope you'll be inspired to start (or re-start!) a journaling habit and to tailor it to suit your life and creativity!!!

Envelope Envy

It can sometimes be slightly challenging to use dies that do not have a coordinating stamp set, but with Hero Arts' Envelope Accessories set, that's definitely not the case! This card is made using only the dies in the set, and apart from inking the edges I haven't even enhanced or embellished them. I have, however, made half-a-dozen additional, colorful, diecut envelopes; to which I've added Sealing Wax and Dried Flowers. You can see those on The Ink Pad Blog!

Did You Know?

April is National Card and Letter Writing Month! At The Ink Pad, we always want to do the WRITE thing; especially when it involves our favorite type of correspondence... snail mail! We'll be celebrating throughout the month of April, by showing off some of our favorite postal-centric products, starting with this super-fun Hero Arts US Mailbox die set! Hop over to The Ink Pad Blog for all the details!

Wishing You a Beautiful Day

As well as a very Happy Easter if you're celebrating today or a belated Happy Passover if you've just finished celebrating! Here's a pretty card featuring one of Anna's favorite flowers, the exotic and hearty Protea, courtesy of Hero Arts' Protea Flowers Clear Stamp Set. All of the product details and a bit about the process are on The Ink Pad Blog today.

 

Happy Easter, Everybunny

Even if you have LOTS of patterned paper... (and I do!) ...sometimes you still don't have exactly what you want for a particular card. In this case, I wanted a text paper that said "Happy Easter" so I typed it myself! It's the perfect home for my Eyelet Outlet Rabbit Brads, whom I've given a little landscape to inhabit, by adding a Sun and Cloud Brad and a Mini Butterfly, as well as some punched grass and an oversized Hero Arts diecut tulip to frame up the whole thing.

This week I wish you a Happy Passover or Happy Easter, if you are celebrating; or just an extra nice second week of Spring! 

Holiday Cards to Die For!

We're embracing the joys of diecutting this fortnight at Jingle Belles, so break out your nested label shapes, your stamp-and-die combos, your beautiful background dies or all of the above! For those who have not embraced the format, we'll also accept cards that use old school paper punches as well as electronic systems like Cricut, Silhouette, etc, so there's no excuse not to join the fun!

I absolutely love this Hero Arts Holly Confetti Cover Die, so it's a bit of a mystery why I don't use it more? That's what I love about card challenges... it spurs me on to use items I've been neglecting. I made a funky smooshed background using Lime, Pthalo Green and Turquoise ColorBurst, and layered the diecut panel over some ancient dark green velvet paper. I made a flower and snowflake stack using pre-packaged diecut snowflakes as well as some Tim Holtz Tattered Snowflakes, sandwiched between layers of fabric flowers. The brad at the center is so old I'm not sure where it's from, but it actually has tiny holly leaves so I could not resist!

Hop over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card and start planning what you will link up!

It's the 14th of February!

I hope you'll receive your fair share love and treats today, whether they be from a Valentine, a GAL-entine, or something special from you to you! Here's a "HEART-y" shaker card featuring Avery Elle's Oval Burst Elle-ments Die which I talk more about on The Ink Pad Blog today.

A Butterfly, Who Flutters By

Lots of color is ALWAYS a good idea, imo; but in January it's even more than usually necessary to cheer up the darker days with lots of bold and brilliant hues! Luckily, The Ink Pad is here for you with The Bright Stuff! Read all about this Picket Fence Studios Swallowtail Beauty card and super-saturated background made with Hero Arts Liquid Watercolors on The Ink Pad Blog.

Have a Stashy New Year!

A bit of a change-up for our first challenge of 2021 at Shopping Our Stash. This time we'd like to see projects which use something NEW you got over the holidays! Of course you can pair your new stuff with older goodies, if you'd like. Here's what I made:

I have two little girl birthdays coming up, so my project is a "double header" lol. Stephanie gave me the awesome Hero Arts T-Shirt Infinity Dies for Xmas and I happened to have an Avery Elle stamp set I got at Paper Anthology over the summer and somehow valiantly managed not to use at all? So I based my cards around the combination of those two items. 

I added in an older die that I love, Lawn Fawn's Happy Birthday Border, as a background; I would blanch at adding this many super skinny diecuts if I didn't have Nuvo Deluxe Adhesive, which has an excellent fine-tipped applicator and dries completely clear. I couldn't decide between yellow and blue backgrounds, so I made one of each. The yellow matches really nicely with the pink... but the white text pops more against the blue...

Hop over to SOS to see what the design team darlings have created to inspire you, then break out your NEW STUFF and join the fun! ♥