Ingenious Inkling

Christmas Memories

Betsy Veldman issued A Challenge to do some Challenges, so I knew I wanted to get a card made for the Paper Crafts Card Style Week ~ Let's Do Shabby & Vintage.  Since several blogs are celebrating Christmas in July (Our Creative Corner & Stamp Something), so I decided to create another holiday design.  I used Jen's Sketch For You To Try & Webster's Pages Home for the Holidays & Winter's Wings (always a good company choice for Vintage designs).

I did lots of distressing and sponging and added some twill for texture.  I decided to add some vintage buttons from my stash as an embellishment (and for the Everything But The Kitchen Sink Challenge) as well as a rub-on sentiment & pounces of Crystal Ice Stickles on my Christmas tree (I squeeze it on my finger, rub it flat, and then pounce my finger over the tree, which keeps it from looking "clumpy") for an all over sparkle like tiny little holiday lights.  I tied linen thread through my buttons and then unraveled the ends after trimming.

Etsy Inspired Challenge ~ Becky Kazana

This week's shop for the Etsy Inspired Challenge is Becky Kazana.  I chose her wonderful Lulu the Lighthearted Pipette to inspire my card.

Our Challenge Sponsor is Bugaboo Stamps.  Jodie designs lots of wonderful images including lots of wonderful characters.

I chose her beautiful Flower Girl Violet for my image (love all of those great flower girls ... I see she has 50% off through July 31st, so head on over & snap up some of her fabulous designs).

I used PhotoShop Elements to create digital paper piecing for my image using Clipping Masks.  Kristina Werner has a great video explaining how to use clipping masks to combine different digital papers into a single digital card design.  I used my digital image like a template to paper piece her outfit.

I used the magic lasso tool to select all of the sections in the image that I wanted to be yellow, right clicked my mouse to create a copy.  Next I overlayed the yellow paper onto my image (positioning it directly above my copied sections), and then created a clipping mask (CTRL-G) in PhotoShop Elements to fill in the sections with the digital paper design.  

I used three digital papers to create my design {Jessica Sprague – Echoes of Asia – Red Solid, Meredith Fenwick – Hello Mini Kit – Paper 1 (yellow), Mary Ann Wise – Grungy Solid Papers 3 (green)}.

I resized my image smaller and printed it again, so I could cut out one of the flowers from her hair for an accept piece for my stamped Paper Artsy sentiment from Inkadinkado.  I added adhesive pearls to the center of the flowers and a bit of sparkle chalk "blush" on her cheeks to finish my design.  I think this bright little flower gal also works for the Sweet Sweet Summertime Challenge at the Catch the Bug Challenge Blog.

I think she also works for the Card Style Week ~ Let's do Fun & Cute Challenge. 

Here's a close-up, so you can see the variation of colors and patterns in the digital paper designs.

One winner will get a set of three beautiful cards from Becky Kazana (Waiting on You, Birthday Pachyderm, and Under the Sea)  & another will win 7 Digi-Stamps from Bugaboo Stamps.

Next week, the Etsy Inspired Challenge will be having a very special celebration for our 100th Challenge.  Each designer will be giving away a prize from sponsors that include Unity, Lawn Fawn, Limelight Papercrafts and Charleston Scrapbook Company.  The grand prize winner will get a prize package of 100 items to celebrate our 100th challenge.  Make sure you join us on August 7th for all of the fun.

And don't forget to check out the rest of the Design Team creations for even more inspiration:

Ashley

De

Emily B

Emily N

Joy

Kerry

Savannah

Virginia

Heather (July Guest Designer)

Blue Skies Ahead

This week's SCS Inspiration Challenge comes from the Etsy Store Birdhouse Blessings.  

Steve & Kate (S&K Creations) have been building birdhouses together for 20 years.  They try very hard to make sure that each birdhouse has it's own personality with a whimsical, yet usable design.  My card is inspired by the Flowery Tear Drop Trailer.

I began with a scrap of Basic Grey turquoise DP and added several layers of Washi Paper tape to the bottom for my landscape.  Next I stamped the Tear Drop Trailer from Inkadinkado's Road Trip set in the base.  I stamped the trailer three times more on white cardstock, as well as blue & yellow DP scraps and paper pieced my trailer together.

To bring in more of the yellow and orange from the birdhouse design, I added some yellow plaid clouds using my Die-Namics Cloud die cut and a paper pieced orange kite from the a muse vintage clear set.

I finished with a few touches of Silver Sharpie for the metal elements on the trailer, some red glitter pen for the tail light and kite tail, and a sentiment from the Inkadinkado set.

I hope you find inspiration. 

Season to Be Jolly

Since I had such success with my non-traditional holiday card last week at the Play Date Cafe (it made the the Fab Four), I decided to use this week's Color Splash Challenge to make another holiday-themed design.

I started with the Paper Crafts Go-To Sketch #5 for my design.  When I was at Archiver's during my recent travels, I picked up a Cookie Cutter Nesting Circle variety package (that fits some special Archiver's only Hero Arts stamps). I used the large scallop for my card base.

My main layer was stamped with the Hero Arts Holly Flourish in Memories India Ink.  The sentiment is from CatsLife Press (they have the best holiday seal stamps).

I finished with some large green adhesive gems & a tiny white pearl in the middle of my snowflake.

I'm also submitting this card for the Card Style Week ~ Clean & Graphic design challenge.

Happy Friday!

Thursday Link Love

Fun finds from the Internet this week:

• A step-by-step tutorial for making your own Summer Fun: Pet Collar & Leash.
• How about some fun packing tape that looks like metal hinges ... wouldn't this be fun for altered books or for cards.
• I think these Ed Emberley drawing books would be great gifts for the nieces and nephews to encourage creativity ... and here's a little taste of the drawing style from fan illustrator Nate Wragg who takes us step-by-step for drawing a Happy Sasquatch.
• Mila's Daydreams is a blog where a mother captures photos of her daughter sleeping and stages them to imagine the things her daughter might be dreaming about ... adorable pictures.
• And how about this awesome photo tour of an Anthropologie store ... so very much to inspire us.
• I love cold vegetable salads in the summer ... and this Greek Panzanella Salad combines all my favorites.
• Here are lots & lots more flower tutorials.
• Love these fabulous floral designs made with cupcake liners .. I think these flowers would be fabulous on a card too.
• Are you as filled with CHA-envy as I am?  It's painful to live so close & not be involved in all of the fun.  However, I am enjoying all of the sneak peaks like this wonderful October Afternoon & the cool new Spellbinders Grand Caliber & Grand Nestabilites.

Happy Thursday!

Candles and More Candles

Today is the Color Challenge at the Gingersnap Creations Blog and to go with the July Heat Theme, the colors are Yellow, Orange, and Red.  I'm a bit sad that this is my last week as a Guest Designer ... it's been a blast designing with such a talented group of ladies.

 

I inked this row of birthday candles stamp from DeNami with Yellow Citrus, Tangerine, and Red Lipstick Chalk inks.  To incorporate the Marker Supply Theme for July, I used a yellow spica glitter marker to color in the flames.  The sentiment is from Memory Box.

My entire card is made with papers from my scrap box.  I embossed the orange DP with the Cuttlebug Oriental Weave Folder and then inked with Tangerine Chalk Ink and Rusty Hinge Distress Ink to bring out the design.  The red ribbon is wrapped around the card base & tied with yellow twine. 

This card also works for this week's Wee Memories Challenge to incorporate stamping into your design.

Halloween in Wonderland

When I saw the new Graphic 45 Halloween in Wonderland papers, I knew they would be lots of fun to combine with the Wonderland Collage images from Artistic Outpost.  I used Laura's Sketch from 2 Sketches 4 You for my layout.

I decided to dress my White Queen in her own Halloween Costume by paper piecing her robe with the heart design paper from the collection.  I used a another paper for my background & cut the little rabbit from another paper design.

I also paper pieced Alice's dress & socks.  My original intention was to paper piece the apron with coordinating ivory paper, but after I smudged my attempt at making a blue pocket, I ended up coloring the entire apron with blue glaze pen & adding white for my pocket.  The crown is paper pieced with gold metallic paper and the rest of the colors were added using glitter pens and Prismacolor pencils.

This card also works for the Passionate for Pattern Challenge (to use at least three different patterned papers in your design ... paper piecing is one of the funnest ways to use up scraps and combine papers ... for me, it's sort of like grown-up paper dolls) at SCS as part of this month's Dare to Get Dirty Challenges ... so fun to get to play along with those fabulous designers.

Ho Ho Ho ... Dublin-Style

Since the Unscripted Sketch Blog is celebrating Christmas in July (and since I'm waaaayyy too far behind on where I should be with my holiday card stash), I decided to see if I could combine their sketch with the very elegant Dublin-Style (but not so Christmasy) colors of Black, Grey, Kraft and Ivory from this week's Play Data Cafe Challenge to make another holiday card.

I started by detail cutting an ornate frame from a Hambly Frame Wallpaper Overlay (the sanity of this decision was questioned several times during the rather tedious process ... but the end result was exactly what I was hoping for).  This also made the card work for The Res-Q Put Your Glasses on Challenge to use something that reminds you of glass.

Next, I stamped one of the holiday collage images from Tim Holtz Holiday Collections on Basic Grey Manilla paper and trimmed it slightly larger than the opening in the frame, so I could adhere without any adhesive showing.

Hero Arts Stunning Snowflakes background was stamped in Momento London Fog ink on a texty piece of Basic Grey Manilla Paper.  Next, I added several Marah Johnson Black snowflake rub-ons to pull more of that dark black color of the frame into the design.

I finished with grey bracket punched borders, three Martha Stewart punched snowflakes (with sparkly half-circle centers) and a sentiment from CatsLife Press.

Ho Ho Ho ... Dublin-Style.

And miles to go before I sleep

The Critter Sketch Challenge is celebrating Christmas in July.  I love an excuse to get another holiday card finished.  I started by stamping the Robert Frost scene from Artistic Outpost's Snowy Woods in Maroon ColorBox Chalk ink on Basic Grey Fresh Snow paper from the Blitzen Collection.  

I layered the image with light blue cardstock and woodgrain paper from Basic Grey's Eskimo Kisses & then added faux stitching around the inside edge using a Maroon Glaze pen for the BasicGrey Stitching Challenge.

I used foam tape to attach my image to a 4x6" card base covered with background paper from Basic Grey Eskimo Kisses.  I finished with three vellum snowflakes that I separated from some very old Jolee's photo corners.

Wild Wacky Women

The theme of this week's 52 Card Pick-up Challenge is Me First.  Sue talked about the importance of loving yourself first, so you can then love others ... and being comfortable in your own skin.

To celebrate the importance of being "smart, empowered and enlightened", I broke out one of the oldest stamps in my stash, some gorgeous handmade papers one of my favorite wacky women gifted me with from her last trip, and this week's Friday Sketchers Sketch.

I finished with some adhesive gold pearls and Prima flowers.