An adorable Eyelet Outlet Chicken Brad is the star of this EGG-stra special (and EGG-stra silly) card. Set atop a pile of Egg Brads (they're on sale!) she is justifiably proud of her achievement. Super-cute Chicken Washi Tape makes the perfect background for this MATHEMACHICKEN to strut her stuff!
It's a Perfect Pearls Mandala Monday with extra shimmer and shine in my large Dina Wakley Journal from Ranger, which has the thickest and sturdiest cotton rag watercolor paper I've ever used; it's seriously dreamy and will stand up to any amount of paint, water, ink, sprays, gesso... pretty much ANYTHING you can think of.
Now that January is o-FISH-ally FIN-ished and dusk is taking place after 5pm (yay!!!) in the northeast, let's celebrate with a couple of collage cards featuring the amazing mixed media digital art of my friend Gina, who has a variety of very cool products available in her Redbubble. Zazzle and Teepublic stores, all of which can be accessed via the bolded text above OR from the linktree in her IG profile @ginaisarty ♥ My "favorite" design is usually whatever she's just done, but I confess that her whimsical animals and her fish are always at the top of my list. Shout-outs to my Aunt Judie, who often does a stack of fussy-cutting when she visits; and to my friend Heather @hchampag who recently came over for a Collage Playdate which also encompassed an outstanding home-baked chocolate cake and a feast of takeaway Chinese. Hard to beat an occasion which combines friends, food and creativity all in the same place, am I right?! ♥♥♥
Since January is the time for healthy resolutions at Jingle Belles we figured it was a good time to start Shaping Up for the Holidays, which means we're making shaped cards … anything other than a square or rectangle will do.
Here's my card:
I confess to not being the most adventurous shaped-card-maker, I tend to do the same shapes-- for which I've made handcut templates-- over and over. This bauble is a fave, as you can see, lol. But then, the combination of a classic ornament shape with well-hoarded Basic Grey holiday papers is too good to resist, imo! This time I added a Scrapaholics laser-cut wooded pine cone sprig tinted with Distress Oxides, a few ancient Imaginisce velvet flowers and a tassel. job done!
Here's my number one tip for choosing where to place and trace when using a template: cut one copy of your shape out of plain paper, leaving a nice border around all the sides. Now you have a window to see exactly what you'll get. Trace the negative space, cut it out and VOILA!
Be sure to head over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card, then start planning what you'll link up with us this time. JB2503: Shape Up for the Holidays runs until 6pm EST on Wednesday, February 12th.
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.
It's an extra-fun challenge this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash, as we'd like to see you take something that is already out on your desk or workable, and use it on your card. I am nearly always spoiled for choice on these occasions, and this time was no exception. There was actually a bit of a pile on my worktable, but these are the remnants I decided to use:
At Jingle Belles, Stephanie and I are still taking our inspiration for our holiday cards this week from the fun Candy Christmas inspiration from Turtlecreek Lane:
Here's what I made this week:
I remain fixated on the tree and the candy, lol. This week I approached it in a more abstract way, with a subtle peppermint(ish) background and LOTS of bauble(ish) shapes. I used the soft blue wall coloring to make my chunky sentiment stand out, giving them a white drop-shadow for more emphasis.
Remember, you have until 6pm EST on Wednesday, January 29th to link-up your photo-inspiration card.
I love the GAL-entine's Day and GAL-oween trends; they're the perfect excuse to celebrate our closest friends! I also love Ranger's Perfect Pearls, because they are indeed the PERFECT way to add color and shimmer to light or dark cardstock. I'm on the Ranger Project Tutorials Page today with the step-by-step process for using them both wet (like watercolors) or dry (by stamping or stenciling over Perfect Medium) to make a GAL-entine's card that really shines.
It's a Wavy Gravy Macro Mandala Monday in which we focus on the detail of the patterns rather than an overall design.
Tombow Dual Brush Pens, White Posca and Letter It Fineliners in my Dina Wakley 6x6 Kraft Journal from Ranger.
It's a fabulous photo inspiration this fortnight at Jingle Belles, so we're asking you to create a holiday card (or cards!) inspired by this fun Candy Cane Christmas image from Turtlecreek Lane. You can use as many or as few aspects of the photo as you'd like: maybe you love the the white tree smothered in ornaments; or the red and blue stockings could be your fave; perhaps you'd just like to create a mantel with stockings and decor; or you might adore that handsome Nutcracker. Anything and everything in the pic is fair game, just make sure you let us know what part(s) of the photo inspired you.
Eyelet Outlet Gnome Brads and Girl Gnome Brads are celebrating Valentine's Day in their Sunny Studio Home Sweet Gnome. EO's extra-wide Sky Washi and Grass Tape are perfect for making a little scene that also features Heart Brad, a Mini Ladybug, Mini Leaves, a Sunflower Brad and a Mini Bee.
Love is in the air, so the Eyelet Outlet Store has all the brads, tape, bling and sequins you need for Valentine's Day and the rest of the year, as well; and adorable Sunny Studio Stamps are the perfect size and scale to use with your brads!
All that glitters... is welcome on a card for our new challenge at Shopping Our Stash! You can use loose glitter, Stickles or Stickles Glitter Gels, glitter glue, wink of Stella pens, shimmer pens, glitter paper... the choice is yours! I've used two of the above, can you guess which ones?
I made a background using one of my all-time favorite combinations: Stickles Glitter Gel in Galaxy with Simon Hurley's Grand Greenery Stencil on deep (DEEP) Matte Black Alcohol Ink Cardstock from Ranger. You can see how very very sparkly it is, even in the photo, which has probably only captured about 60% of its glitteriness. Those thin chipboard butterfly stickers are from the big box store and super-duper stashy: the last two in the pack and I bet they are ten years old? I used a sheet of DCWV black glitter paper as a lower layer; I originally had just a black cardbase, but I realized pretty quickly that since the butterflies had a thin outline of white I had better add a bit more white; which I did in the form of the cardbase and the layer directly under the design panel. The cardstock sentiment strip is from an older pack by Paper Rose Studio, and was the perfect finishing touch to my 5x6" card.
Check out the SOS Crew's fabulously sparkly inspiration, then start planning what you'll link up with us this time. SOS539: Glitter Me Happy runs until the evening of Monday, January 27th.
It's the second Mandala Monday of 2025 so here's not one, but TWO, snowy watercolor mandalas to start off a week that I hope will be equally bright and colorful but not feature any actual snow...
...Unless you're longing for actual snow, and then, I hope you will see some this week; unless you live in Central New Jersey where I will be voting for its absence.
It's the second week of our first Jingle Belles challenge of 2025, so we are still making cards that feature Something OLD from our craft stash as well as Something NEW from Santa or the post-xmas sales, etc. Here's what I made and then I'll tell you which is which:
Kicking off the New Year with a fun and colorful card featuring Eyelet Outlet Unicorn and Rainbow Brads with a background of diagonal stripes of Chevron Washi and a mat of super-shiny Pink Foil Tape. BTW, all off these items are currently ON SALE!
The Eyelet Outlet Store has all the vibrant and beautiful tapes, brads, and bling to brighten up your January!
A New Year's toast to all the makers: May 2025 be our most creative year yet! Follow along as I kick off January with a super-sparkly card tutorial thanks to Stickles Glitter Glue, Stickles Glitter Gel and Tinsel Embossing Powder. It's on the Ranger Project Page, where there is literally always something new and wonderful to inspire YOU! ♥
It's a Magnificent Monarch Mandala Monday thanks to this beautiful glossy butterfly photo snipped from the back cover of a magazine last year and saved, "to do something with"; in this case, the "something" turned out to be a mostly symmetrical mandala in coordinating colors in my large Dina Wakley Media Journal from Ranger.
I hope your first full week of 2025 is off to a warm(ish) and wonderful start! ♥
I've said it before and no doubt I'll say it again, but here it is now: Papercrafting supplies are AWESOME for wrapping gifts! Washi tape, journal cards, scraps of patterned paper or wrapping paper, ribbon, florals, chipboard shapes... they are all outstanding items to make your gifts truly unique!
Wishing you a very Happy New Year with hopes that 2025 will be your happiest and most creative year yet! It seems appropriate to start the year with a toast... and Eyelet Outlet definitely has a fine selection of beverage brads, including, from left to right: Lemonade, Beer Brads, Cocktails, Liquor Brads, champagne flutes from the Wedding Set and Wine Brads. With Party Hats and Balloon Brads to decorate the numeral balloons, each diecut from a different shade of Glitter Tape. All on a background of extra wide Calendar Washi.
