Ingenious Inkling

Bringing Light to the Season

This week's Tuesday Trigger at the Moxie Fab World Blog is this picture of Thanksgiving Pumpkin Luminaries from Carolina Panache.

I spent quite a while looking through all of my stamps trying to find inspiration ... there were no pumpkins to be found other than a couple of jack-o-lanterns, so I tried thinking more broadly about what in the picture inspired med.

I loved the green-on-green tones and the subtle glow of the light.  I imagined these pumpkins decorating a peaceful farm house surrounded by beautiful trees blazing with fall colors.

The farm house serenity scene from Artistic Outpost is stamped in Olive pastel and light green cardstock.  Then I painted the entire scene with Golden Wheat Shimmerz paint for an overall glow.  The image is attached to the olive card base with foam for slight dimension  I love the fun little card size (approx 3"x4").   

I'm Dreaming of a Plum Christmas

The Plum Crazy! challenge at the Moxie Fab World Blog was to create a project that 'captures the essence of plum in its design.'  With hazel eyes and fair skin, plum has always been a favorite color of mine for make-up and clothing, so I'm thrilled to see its one of the "in" colors for the year.  I love creating plum paper crafts as well.  I decided to embrace some plum snowflakes for my design.

The Hero Arts Stunning Snowflakes backgrounder was stamped in Versamark Dazzle ink on white cardstock and clear embossed.  Next, I used a sponge to add Wisteria and Warm Violet ColorBox Chalk ink to the background.  The final step was sprays of Graphite and Pearl Glimmer Mist for an all over sparkle. 

The Clear Design Holiday Sayings sentiment was created using the same technique.  I think the thin white mat helps bring out the contrast of the white embossing.  I finished with some plum sheer ribbon from Close To My Heart.

This card also works for the Simple Holiday Card challenge at the Hero Arts blog, since it would be easy to stamp four backgrounds on one sheet of cardstock, and sponge and spray it all at once for quick assembly.

Make Mine a Tall One

This is my last challenge as a member of the Caardvarks Crew ... and it was a fun one.  The challenge is an easy one ... make a tall card.  The challenge is sponsored by Nikki Sivils Scrapbooker, and she's got lots of great prizes for the winner including a salloped chipboard album, acrylic font stamps, and lots of fabulous papers.  All you have to do is link up a *new* tall card by October 31st for a chance to win.

After receiving my fabulous birthday gift wrapped in a NY Subway map, I decided to see if I could incorporate the wrapping paper into my card design.  It turned out I had an entire stash of maps, so I decided to make a map collage.

After looking at all of the fun ruffled items on The Moxie Fab blog, I had ruffles on my mind, so I decided to add a ruffled ribbon path to follow through the mapped landscape.  I used extra-strong two sided tape and then started at the bottom folding over my ribbon into ruffles as I moved up the card.

I finished by sponging with Ranger Distress ink to help unify the background and sentiments from Stampers Anonymous (What you Seek and Just Thoughts).  I also added a tiny compass from Artistic Outpost's Geek is Chic set.
 

Gradient Elephant Friends

This week's SCS Inspiration Challenge features the wonderful website Kir DeVries.  I was inspired by this adorable Shinzi Katoh Double Deck Lunch Box called Pick.  I loved the fun little combination of elephants and flowers, as well as the pop of red.

I decided to incorporate this gradient paper from Memory Box for the Gradient is Radiant challenge at the Moxie Fab World Blog.  I sponged a bit more green along the bottom and blue along the top to accentuate the color change.

 

I realize the proportion of my flower and elephants are a bit off, but I loved the cartoon-like effect.  I stamped the elephants twice, cut out the ears, and attached them for dimension.  I put A Muse Micro Twinkle gems in the flower centers to finish the design.  Stamps are Hero Arts Playful Animals and Great Flourishes Messages.

I hope you find inspiration.

 

Relax ... it's your day

The challenge at the Moxie Fab World blog is to create a card that incorporates some kind of household item as its focal point.  As I thought about different things in our house, I realized our recliners are probably one of our favorite household items, so that's how I decided my theme (combined with the fact that this chair from Judikins is one of the few household item stamps I own).

I had a scrap of Basic Grey Marrakech, so I used that for my chair upholstery.  The background paper is from DCWV Downtown Loft Collection and reminds me of the stone walls that were in my great-grandparents' sunken family room when I was growing up. 

I think the sentiment from A Muse works perfectly for a masculine birthday card design ... because for my husband, one of the best gifts would be a day in his recliner to relax, watch baseball, and nap.

Clean & Graphic Christmas

Another style featured at the Moxie Fab Blog is Clean & Graphic ... white space, clean lines, and simple treatment of text. 

 

The card base is stamped with Hero Arts Stunning Snowflakes in Versamark Dazzle ink for a subtle design in the white space.  The Hero Arts Large Christmas Circle was stamped in Warm Red and embossed with Polysparkle embossing powder, clear embossing powder with holographic purple/silver ultrafine glitter for a subtle opalescent shimmer.  I repeated the scallops in the border and layering to finish the design.

Got Snow?

I love challenges that help me build my Christmas Card stash ... this card is for the Moxie Fab World blog challenge to make a holiday card using a Fun & Cute style.

I pulled out my all-time favorite snowman stamp Frosty by Penny Black and stamped it on Cosmo Cricket Audry DP from the Dutch Girl Collection.  I used the reverse side of the paper for the card base.  Next I stamped Frostya second time on white cardstock and paper-pieced the body.  I added some additional falling snowflakes with a Stampin' Up Itty Bitty Background stamp.

 

I finished with a sentiment in white foam Thickers and a couple of strokes of Opal Shimmerz paint on the ground for a bit of sparkle.  Feels like cute & fun to me.

Vintage Moxie Fab Christmas

This card is for a Vintage/Shabby Chic Holiday Card Challenge at the Moxie Fab World blog.  Every time I sit down to make a vintage/shabby chic card, I always think to myself ... this is so not "my" style.   I think I probably feel that way because there isn't much "vintage" in my home design ... I tend to gravitate to bold bright colors with a funky graphic style. 

However, it seems that every time I complete a vintage project, I love it.  Some of the vintage holiday projects I have done were with images I won in some blog candy ... I think it may be time to add more vintage images to my design stash.

 

I love the vintage wallpaper look of the Wassail papers from Basic Grey.  I distressed the edges of the center panel and added some Ranger Distress Tea Dye ink.  A friend gifted me with a bag of vintage lace, trims, and doiliess saying "I know you'll find something to make with these."  I love how the vintage doilie frames Santa Claus.  I finished with an typewriter font rub-on (Marah Johnson's Christmas Design Swtach Book) at the bottom and two sizes of champagne pearls to accent the corners.

Coneflower Pastiche

The Moxie Fab World Bag Lady challenge was the perfect opportunity to tryout some of the new stamps I found on our Rubber Stamp Road Trip. 

I chose this Poppy Pastiche Bag from Anthropologie as my inspiration.  I loved the contrast of the bright colors, flowers, and the blocked design, so those are the elements I incorporated into my card.

For my main panel, I stamped the Coneflowers by Serendipity Stamps in PTI Fresh Snow ink on white cardstock and clear embossed.  Next, I used colored pencils to color in the petals, leaves and butterfly.  To finish I sponged the entire panel with Charcoal and Blackbird chalk ink and then wiped away the embossed areas.

 

The Sunflower from Paper Source was stamped in Warm Red ColorBox Chalk on Red cardstock and clear embossed.  I colored it with colored pencils and added Stickles to the center.  The other two blocks are the Olive Branch from Paper Source and Fuchsia Vine by Magenta.

I finished with a sentiment from Hero Arts Anytime Messages and four different sizes of pink bling.  

Green Peace

The current challenge at the Moxie Fab World blog is to create a paper-crafted project that treats eco-friendly sayings/symbols/words in a clever way.

To find some inspiration, I searched Google images for the word recycle.  My card was inspired by this cool Arlo Guthrie recycled garbage bag from Rising Son records.  I love the concept of recycling peace.

My finished card is a 6" circle.  I cut a thin circle out of green and then cut it into thirds for my recycle symbol.  For the peace theme, it seemed appropriate to replace the arrows in the universal recycling symbol with hearts.

 

The Wordsworth Peace on Earth stamp was highlighted with sparkle pen.  The remainder of the sentiment was printed in blue ink.