SOS584: Black Cats

The new challenge at Shopping Our Stash is Halloween-themed and called, "Black Cats" so yes, one option is to include a black cat on your card; OR you could feature any other BLACK Halloween icon: bats, spiders, a witch... you get the picture, right? I focused on the cat, but there are a couple of spiders, too, as a bonus.

As soon as you say, "Black Cat" I immediately think of the adorable version in Wendy Vecchi's Halloween Add-On Stamp and Die Set from Spellbinders (btw, it's on sale!); and yes, I realize he could be any color, but my favorite way to piece him is with black sticky-back felt, as I've done here. The background is a pink spiderweb paper from Prima's Luna Collection of a few years ago; the spiders are part of Wendy's die set; the ghost is cut from a different Prima paper; and the sentiment stamp is so old I have no idea whence it came. I did a bit of machine-stitching on some of the web, as well as around the perimeter, which is very difficult to see in the photo, but pretty cool IRL.

Hop over to SOS to see the fab and funky Crew Cards, then start planning what you'll link up with us this fortnight. SOS584: Black Cats runs until the evening of Monday, October 19th.

SOS578: Popsicle Colors

There's a new challenge at Shopping Our Stash! For "Popsicle Colors" we'd like to see cards made using this bold and beautiful Summer Color Palette; OR you can make a card inspired by the pretty popsicle photo from which we took the colors:

I did both... sort of...

I used Distress Oxide Inks in Kitsch Flamingo, Shaded Lilac and Salvaged Patina over a resist of text that I white-embossed. The ink colors are stacked, a bit like the layers of the popsicles, but I let them blend at the joins. For the focal point, I added paper flowers to which I applied the same three inks to the centers, then topped with some Eyelet Outlet Round Brads in coordinating shades. Deep, deeeeep in my stash I found a pink and blue pastel "Say it in Pearls" flourish from Prima, which needed to be trimmed and repositioned to fit on the cardfront. A teal mat and some machine stitching complete the design.

Be sure to visit SOS to the the rest of the Crew cards; then start planning what you will make using these deliciously cool Popsicle Colors. This challenge runs until the evening of Monday, July 27th.

JB2602: Something Old... Something New

You've probably guessed from the title, "Something Old... Something New" that this fortnight at Jingle Belles we'd like to see holiday cards on which you combine an item or two that you've had in your craft stash for a bit; with something new that you received for the holidays... or shopped for yourself!

My NEW things consist of: lots of stickers from the Tim Holtz/Idea-ology Christmas Sticker Book I treated myself to; a brand new pack of EO Angel Brads that I got last summer, promptly lost and just now found again (yay!); and snowflakes diecut from very cool sticky-back felt that a friend gifted me. The OLD stuff is... everything else, lol; including: papers from Prima's Pretty Pale collection; doily scraps; gold glitter cardstock; and chipboard letter diecuts made from well-patina-ed vintage sheet music. The only downside to this card is that both my mom and my auntie have seen it and if I don't make second before December, there could be some trouble! ;)

JB2602: Something Old... Something New runs until the evening of Wednesday, January 28th. Hop over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card and start planning what you'll link up with us this time!

SOS558: Hey, Ghoulfriend!

You've probably already guessed that the title, "Hey, Ghoulfriend" indicates that this fortnight's challenge at Shopping Our Stash is embracing a Halloween theme, right? So I can skip right to the part where I show off my card:

I still have some well-hoarded pink & black papers and accoutrements from Prima's Luna Collection a few years ago, and I am just going to keep on using them until they're gone! In this case I paired the "Spooky" journal card with the adorable ghosts and spiders from Lawn Fawn's Build-a-House Halloween Add-On. I popped on an Eyelet Outlet Pumpkin Brad and mounted the whole thing on Prima spider web paper adorned with (sadly out of print) EO Halloween Washi Tape. Glossy black mats and a bit of machine stitching complete the design of this 5.5" square card.

Be sure to check out the fabulous cards our talented Crew have made to inspire you, then start planning what you'll link up with us this fortnight! SOS558: Hey, Ghoulfriend runs until the evening of Monday, October 20th.

Too Cute to Spook

Halloween is just around the corner and one of the best trends of recent years is the GAL-o-ween category, which gives us a chance to make pretty, feminine Halloween cards for our girl friends! Eyelet Outlet Brads are, of course the perfect addition to any Trick-or-Treat theme; this one sports Pumpkin Brads, Spiders, a Witch Hat and some super cute Black Cat Brads peeping out here and there, not to mention a few Rose Brads and Mini Butterflies to glam things up.

Sweet and Spooky Shopping List:

Pumpkin Brads

Spider Brads

Witch Hat Brads

Black Cat Brads

Rose Brads

Mini Butterfly Brads

Eyelet Outlet has all the brads, tapes, bling and embellies you need for Halloween and beyond!

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!

SOS525: NBUS

In case you're wondering, NBUS stands for Never Before Used Stuff; and this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash, we're asking you to create a card that features items in your stash which are more than one year old, but haven't, for whatever reason, been used yet. Here's my card:

In the photo below you can see my Never Before Used item: a fabulous IO stamp set called "Aloha" which Stephanie gave me for my birthday last year (or possibly the year before?!) which I absolutely LOVE but somehow, despite the fact that I've gotten it out periodically and re-admired it, I had still never inked up?! I did my own variation of "spotlight stamping" by using the MISTI (also a gift from Stephanie, quite a few years ago, which I do actually use ALL the time!) to stamp a panel of tropical flowers and leaves. Then I carefully lined up my Altenew Bold Alpha dies to spell "ALOHA" and cut them from the background. I left the surrounding area plain, but used my Tombows to color the flowers and leaves of the diecuts, which I then shadowed with a second set of diecut letters in bold blue, before placing them back in the holes from which they came. I added tiny (ancient!) Prima paper flowers with Eyelet Outlet Pearl centers; added a bold blue mat and a surrounding panel of 49 and Market's Sunburst collection and called it a (sunshine-y, tropical) day!

Take a look over at SOS at what the rest of the Crew have made, then dust off one (or more!) of your Never Before Used items and make a card to link up with us! The NBUS Challenge runs through Monday evening, July 15th.

SOS522: How Does Your Garden Grow?

If you haven't already guessed that this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we're looking for things that grow in a garden, then frankly, I'm a bit surprised, but just go ahead and re-read this rather long sentence and you'll know for sure. Of course you can make a card that features vegetables, or even, I suppose weeds... but... if you're ME, of course you're going to go with flowers!

I didn't set out to make a subtle, nearly-monochromatic card, but while looking for something else entirely I stumbled upon the dwindling remains of Prima's Pretty Pale collection (c. 2019?) --including these metallic-tinted blooms which I had apparently cut out and never used-- so I immediately changed direction. I had a lot of fun tearing, sanding and distressing all of my layers, and was super-excited when I found a nice big piece of pink woodgrain paper (PINK woodgrain!!!) from Authentique's 2018(ish) Romance collection. I chose a kraft cardbase and did a bit of machine stitching mostly for the look, but also, when you have lots of layers, it never hurts to anchor them pretty well, right?  

I hope you'll visit SOS to check out the cards the rest of The Crew have made and then start dreaming up your own garden-centric masterpiece. 

SOS514: Winter Wonderland

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we've got the white stuff, and we're challenging you to make a card or project which features a winter landscape OR, alternatively, you could make an all-white card. I chose the latter, see?

Ok technically, my card is not 100% white; there's a tiny bit of tan and a little black, as well; but it's mostly shades of white: a glossy white A7 card, bright white textured cardstock, a white glitter mat, collage-style patterned paper from Prima's Pretty Pale collection (circa 2019?) which I've debossed with Taylored Expressions' Rosy Posey embossing folder (circa 2020?), part of a paper doily, some drywall tape (seriously underrated, from a design standpoint, imo!), the last little piece from a pack of Eyelet Outlet Pearl Swirl Bling, a tumble of Petaloo's Vintage Velvet Magnolia flowers (circa 2015?) from which I swapped the green centers in favor of white Pearl Brads, and finally, a bit of white machine stitching to (both literally and figuratively) hold everything together.

The Winter Wonderland challenge runs through Monday evening, February 12th. Visit SOS to see the inspiring cards from the Crew and start planning what you will make!

Too Cute to be Spooky

These sweet witches in their spooky scene are already pretty cute, but they're exponentially more adorable when Eyelet Outlet Halloween Brads join the fun. The addition of a Witch Hat, a handsome Bat Brad, a mischievous Kitten checking out a Pumpkin, a cute but creepy Spider and some pink Rose and Colored Daisy Brads make the illustration come to life; then a double mat of Glitter Black Tape and Halloween Dot Washi tie it all together.

Stay tuned to the Eyelet Outlet Blog for more Halloween and Thanksgiving projects to make your Autumn Crafting FALL into place!

SOS507: Franken-Card

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we're embracing the season and creating cards featuring something Halloween related; that could be bats, witches, monsters, costumes... whatever says Halloween to you! 

In the spirit of full disclosure, I have to admit that most of the ingredients on this card are only about a year old, but I was longing to use the leftovers from Prima's super-sweet Luna collection and I have absolutely no regrets, lol! The black Kromekote cardstock, assorted washi tapes and black gingham ribbon are all fairly ancient, however, so I feel I've redeemed myself on the Stash-Shopping front a little bit.

Be sure to head over to SOS to see the creepy, kooky, mysterious and spooky cards the rest of our awesome crew have dreamt up to inspire you, then start planning your own Franken-Card masterpiece. Link up by 7pm on Monday, October 23rd.

Belles and Bells

This fortnight we're ringing in the new year and putting the accent on BELLS at Jingle Belles, so we'd like to see cards with sleigh bells, church bells, jingle bells or... well, whatever kind of bell you can think of. I went with an older die* that my fellow Jersey Girl and cardmaker Lorraine (of Paper Vernissage) gave me in the first or second year of Jingle Belles, and which I still find very useful and beautiful!

For this card, I cut the bells out twice: once from a scrap of velvetty-textured cardstock in a bold cerise and a second time from metallic gold, which I've used as a sort of drop shadow behind the pink. The sweet deer and most of his coordinating pink papers are from Prima's Candy Cane Lane collection; there's also some older Prima and a few anonymous scraps. I was in a shabby chic kind of mood, so I did a bunch of distressing, sanding, inking and stitching; though this A7 card is quite nicely flat and mailable.

A small (exciting!) side note: more than HALF of my 2022 holiday cards were mailable using ordinary postage! Admittedly many of them needed either an extra ounce or a second full-price stamp but still... it's a personal best that made me quite happy. I'm definitely going to attempt a similar feat this year!

Meanwhile, Stephanie's card is waiting to inspire you at Jingle Belles; you should probably hop over and check that out.

*It's Memory Box's Jingle Bell Border and seems to have been discontinued for a while; apologies if that is a bummer. I assume there are similar dies available from somewhere.

What's Pink & Vintage & Sweet All Over?

It's Prima Marketing's new holiday line, Candy Cane Lane by Frank Garcia, which is coming soon to Paper Anthology. Luckily, I was allowed to sneak a few of the gorgeous papers a teeny bit early, so I could use them for week two of PINK CHRISTMAS at Jingle Belles!

This Santa's face miiiiiight be my favorite image in the line, though the whole collection is so adorable, it's hard to just pick one. I did some tearing, some fussycutting, some distressing and layered on flowers, ribbon and White Lace Tape for extra interest. Would it be wrong to send this one to myself in December??! (Ok, yeah, it would... but luckily I get to enjoy it for the next six weeks or so!)

I hope you'll visit Jingle Belles to see the already awesome PINK CHRISTMAS gallery, and we'd love for you to link up a card or two to help us raise a little money for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation!

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!

Five Gooooooo-ollllllld Riiiiiiiiiiiings!!!

This week at Jingle Belles, we're still celebrating the fun categories from that old holiday favorite, "The Twelve Days of Christmas" OR you can choose to make an extra-special holiday card for your True Love OR you can make a holiday card that features hearts. Lots of choices, we hope you'll find something to inspire you! I went with the ever popular Five Gold Rings... see?

Admittedly, it's a bit of a tangential version of "Five Gold Rings" in that I used my classic Nestie Circle Dies to cut five round frames from gold Idea-Ology cardstock  then I cut circles of red patterned papers to frame up, and arranged them in a design that also incorporates some Prima poinsettias as well as an Echo Park sentiment, and still fits nicely inside my 6" square card.

Visit Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's card and start planning which of the current options will inspire your next holiday card!

Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice

If you've guessed that this fortnight's challenge at Shopping Our Stash is a celebration of all things autumnal, then well done! You don't need to include a literal pumpkin (though of course you can!) just channel thoughts of Fall, Halloween or Thanksgiving and that should point you in the right direction. Here's what I made:

A couple of years ago, I made this card that featured a chevron-patterned background made from LOTS of leftover patterned paper scraps, cut into skinny strips. A couple of weeks ago, I saw that card again and was inspired to make more of those backgrounds. I couldn't decide whether to go darker or lighter, so I made one of each!

Both cards feature ColorBursted, collaged and diecut leaves (an ancient set of Provocraft dies from Cuttlebug days that I still use a lot!); machine stitching, tiny paper flowers, Prima Pretty Pale leftovers, and the perfect orange mats from Simply Stories' (older) We Are Family collection, which I may have liberated from the Paper Anthology scrap bag!

Wend your way over to SOS to see what the rest of the design team darlings have created, and start planning your own awesome autumnal masterpiece!

Weekend Round Up

In addition to hostessing some of the challenges during Paper Anthology's WCD Crop Weekend, I also participated in a few that my friends Elisabeth Ostrowski, Shari Morris and Linda Duke were responsible for, and this seems like a good time and place to post those.

Acorns and/or Pinecones Challenge

Elisabeth made an utterly luscious card for this one, featuring vellum leaves to die for! My card has text diecut leaves on which I've smooshed autumnal colors of Tombow Dualbrush Pens, dimensional Prima flowers from various older collections and Eyelet Outlet Pinecone Brads... all set atop a piece of absolutely gorgeous patterned paper from 49 and Market's Vintage Artistry collection.

Clean and Simple Christmas

CAS cards are a true challenge for me, but this time I think I've acquitted myself pretty well. That Lawn Fawn Yeti never fails to make me smile, and he doesn't really need much embellishment to make a card work. I stacked some snowy washi tapes, added a couple of punched trees and finished off with a trio of EO Snowflake Brads.

Black and Orange Challenge

I gave myself a bit of an extra challenge on this one, I wanted to use these colors but NOT make a Halloween card! I'm happy that this is seasonless but still interesting and entirely orange and black!

 (Well ok, there's some white too...)

 

SOS Sketchfest

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we invite you to choose from one of four excellent and inspiring sketches by Craft with Sarah and make a card based on the sketch you choose. I went with sketch 001, which I will show you in a minute, but first, here's my card:

For once in my life, I've done a very straight-up, literal version of the sketch, though admittedly my pennants are different lengths, but that's what happens when you're using up scraps. They're scraps from some of my favorite Prima collections of the last few years though, so they're mostly pink and floral because that's the way I roll! My left hand strip is White Lace Tape from The Ink Pad which has gone out of stock, but that doesn't mean I love it any less.

I swapped out the three small circles around the large circle in favor of a fussy-cut butterfly and two ancient, tiny, Prima flowers. I added lots and lots of Eyelet Outlet Pearls because those are ALWAYS a good idea, imo!

Hop over to SOS to see the other designers cards, then visit Craft with Sarah to see the four sketches you can choose from!

It's Paper Anthology's 9th Anniversary!

In other years, we've celebrated this festive occasion over the course of a riotously fun weekend, in-person, at Paper Anthology in Kenvil, NJ. Obviously a party with loads of people jammed into one place with self-service food is not on the cards for 2020. But... we've come up with an alternative that features four days of fun, challenges and prizes on the Paper Anthology FaceBook page (which means our friends from all over the world are invited to play along!); plus four awesome Take and Makes for anyone who shops in-store or online during the party, and there might just be a few surprises as well.

There will be twelve awesome cardmaking challenges revealed over the next few days on the Paper Anthology FaceBook Page. I'll be hosting three of them, and the first is called Put a Doily On It. If you've already guessed that the brief is to create a card, layout or journal page with a DOILY ON IT... you are definitely on the right track, lol. Here's what I made:

My card is a bit like a Greatest Hits collection... it has all my favorite elements: Prima and Blue Fern Studios papers, dimensional florals, distressed edges, machine stitching and of course, the inspiration for the whole thing: a lovely 3" paper doily. Of course your card needn't be shabby chic, your doily doesn't have to be white and for that matter, you might make something besides a card! I can't wait to see what it will be.

I hope you'll join us at Paper Anthology's 9th Anniversary Party, the fun continues through Sunday night! ♥

Happy Fall, Y'all

The gang at Shopping Our Stash are always up for a celebration, especially when it can be translated into papercrafting form. So this fortnight we'd like to see... (as you've no doubt guessed!) ...cards and projects with an autumnal vibe of some sort: either the fall holidays of Halloween and Thanksgiving, or the occasion of your choice, featuring fall colors, leaves, etc. There's lots of ways to go, so we hope you'll be inspired to join the fun. Here's my card:

Lots of stash-centric goodness here: The leaves were all pre-diecut, with their edges inked and little highlights of gold stickles on them; clearly I made more than I needed for some distant fall project, stuck the extras in an envelope, and forgot all about them. I had intended to mix in more traditional reds and orange shades, but then I found the patterned paper panel with the deep denim blue flowers and changed course, lol. It's last year's Eclectic Charm collection from Blue Fern Studios, though I think there might be one or two sheets left at Paper Anthology; and despite the blue, it feels very autumnal to me. I did lots of distressing and a bit of sewing around the edges, then loaded up lots of miscellaneous Prima flowers; the cluster was from Pretty Pale, I believe, and the tiny flowers with the wooden bead centers were Georgia Blue. The only new item here is the dark blue mat that's peeking through the torn places. Two varieties of Bo Bunny's Double Dot collection (Vintage and Lace) arrived at Paper Anthology about a month ago, and I grabbed every color because they have one patterned side and one not-quite-solid side, which makes them great for cards and also as backgrounds for photographing cards! (That's a shade called "Chiffon" you can see behind my card in these photos.)

If you're feeling at all Fall... do come and join us at Shopping Our Stash! If you're not feeling it, I suggest hopping over to see the super-inspiring DT cards! ♥