Ingenious Inkling

Thursday Link Love

Another week of blogland discoveries:

• mmm ... birthday cakes
• love her beautiful floral wedding dress ... and the idea of a bowling reception
• How to Gamify Your Life
• I won't lie ... I love Cool Whip (and am so grateful for sugar-free) ... I think my team would like the Chocolate Peanut Butter Lasagna (shown)
• How to Stay Happier
• Slow Cooker Mongolian Chicken
• Book to Film Adaptations in 2025
• DQ Blizzard Hack
• Peanut Butter Popcorn
• Every Day Paper Mache Art
• Crack Chicken Casserole
• love this colorful kitchen
• DIY Upcycle Locket
• Black & White Cookies
• Apple Crisp

Have a tremendous Thursday!

Vintage inspired Collage

I've been thinking a lot about collage lately.  I'm taking a free Collage Joy Taster Class, which has inspired me to make new collage papers.  Today in the online class, we finally start assembling some collages.

Here's a collage I made with the intent of it being a card.

 

 

I started with an Archival Ink embossed panel using brown ink.  Next I painted on a watercolor frame before attaching it to a dark kraft card base.  Next I used the same watercolor paint on an ATC sized pieced of watercolor paper and I added some washi tape bits and some embellishments made from dried Nuvo drops.  I finished that little bit with one of Tim Holtz Paper Doll.

I added a bit of dry wall tape to my embossed panel and then attached my watercolored panel.  I finished with a Dina Wakley Typed Ledger Sentiment.

Just Because Flowers

I'm the Guest Designer the current Color Hues Challenge.

 

Here's another card I made using the colors of Red & Kraft with Kristina Werner's Cheerful Flowers Background Stamp.

 

 

The sentiment is from Kristina Werner Checking In Stamp Set and coordinating Die Cut (love this set).  

And I'm joining the Simon Says Something New Challenge with my new Stencil, sentiment stamp & coordinating die cut.

January Art

It's time for #gelprintJanuary again ... so there's been a lot of paper making going on in the studio.

 

 

For the Day 1 Letter prompt, I started with a Joggles Three Circle foamie stamp that reminded me of the Letter "O".

 

 

For Day 2, Shape, I stuck with circles using a Carabelle Points stencil and some paints from my Arteza Advent Calendar.

 

 

For Day 3 Celestial, I used the stars from the Punchinella Stencil by The Crafter's Workshop.

 

 

Day 4 Sentimental had me getting sentiment as I went wandering down memory lane where I got sentiment over this Mr. Huey's Circle Graph Stencil by Studio Calico.  I think it was one of the first stencils I added to my collection when I started using Mr. Huey's spray ink.

 

 

 

Here's a card I made in 2013 that incorporated the design ... I think it has stood the test of time.

 

 

Day 5 was Mesh ... I went shopping in my gelliprinting inventory and found several meshes to try ... it's funny the things I save now when I think about using them for printing.

 

 

Here is another.

 

 

Always have so much fun printing my own papers.

Let It Snow

When I saw this week's Freshly Made Sketch, I knew it was the perfect opportunity to ink-up my new Colorado Craft Company Big & Bold ~ Warm Wishes Snowflake.

 

 

I stamped the sentiment from the same set directly in black ink on top of the snowflake.  Next I pulled out my trust Martha Stewart Snowflake punches and a scrap of pearly white paper.  I topped them with some fuzzy white snowballs to finish.

 

 

With my slightly snarky sentiment (although I would actually like a little snow ... just not a lot of snow) and my brand new stamps, I'm also linking-up at the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers NBUS (Never Been Used Stuff) Challenge.

 

And I'm joining the Anything Goes Challenge at the Give a Crafter a Cookie Challenge.

 

 

Tropical Retirement

The January Gina K. Designs Monthly Mix Challenge is Take Me to the Beach ... to make a card inspired by your favorite beach.

My favorite beach has to be the ones in Florida I have visited with my Sister.  Those memories are just the best.  

 

 

Since I'm in Iowa, I'm not usually drawn to beach stamps, so I had to shop my Gina K. Designs stash to find images that would work, and I found them in The Good Life.  I stamped 5 images and colored them using primarily oranges and yellow hues.

 

 

I cut the images into 1 1/2" squares and then added a thin black mat.  I originally had the images in two rows of three, and then when I was trying to decide on some background paper, they overlapped slightly, and I started playing around with positioning. 

I ended-up using foam tape on three of the images for some dimension and swapped out one of the images for a sentiment square using two sentiments from the same set with some orange/yellow ombre inking.

Gold Splatter Big Rainbow

The January Taylored Expressions #TEMakerChallenge is all about Splatter.

 

 

I started with the Taylored Expression Big Rainbow & Clouds inking with Taylored Expressions Confetti Cake, Key Lime, Pineapple, Peaches & Cream and Fruit Punch inks.

 

 

Next I used gold metallic watercolor to splatter blue cardstock (because of course there's gold at the end of the rainbow).  When the paint splatter had dried, I used the Taylored Expressions Stitched rectangle Stacklets to die cut the background.  

I positioned the rainbow & clouds and finished with a sentiment from Simple Strips Stamp - Friendship.

 

 

With all of the die cuts on my card, I'm linking-up at Just Us Girls Die Week.

Thursday Link Love

Another week of blogland finds:

• Morning Cookies for the Backpack
• NPR's Top 124 Songs of 2024
• Cream Cheese Pound Cake (reminds me of the late nights sharing a slice of Sara Lee Pound Cake with my grandma at her kitchen table while we solved all of the world's problems)
• New Yorker's Best Books of 2024
• Sausage Gravy Stuffed Biscuit Bombs
• Rotten Tomatoes Movie Awards Leaderboard for 2024
• School Lunch Pizza from the 80's ... I never skipped pizza day
• I love her Off the Wall Art
• Marshmallow Frosting
• Winter Little Pleasures (I actually love all of the seasons)
• Chai Spiced Hot Chocolate - combining my two favorites (shown)
• 7 Ways to Reduce Inflammation
• Chicken Pot Pie Soup
• Ten Deepest Peanuts Comics
• Declutter & Cleaning Challenge
• Sheet Pan Shrimp Fajitas

Have a tremendous Thursday!

New + Old + Jingle Belles Year 15

Lauren and I are back for our 15th Year of Christmas Mayhem at Jingle Belles where we take back our December one card at a time.  If you're unfamiliar with our quest, 15 years ago we decided it would be easier to get enough unique Christmas cards made if we did them all year long, then when December arrives, we'll be all ready to put them in the mail.  It has worked so well, we have continued that quest every year thereafter.

 

So if you'd like to join us, our first prompt is Something Old and Something New.  We're asking you to make a holiday card that features something OLD and something NEW. 

For example, combine an item (or two) that you've had in your stash for some time with some of the new goodies that Santa brought you for Christmas (or maybe you were your own Santa and you shopped those Black Friday sales and bought it yourself). We're pretty sure Santa was good to all of the lovely ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ and we know you've got lots of goodies in your stash. Be sure to tell us what your OLD and NEW items are in your blog or social media post!

I started organizing my rather large paper stash and discovered this *old* but never used Vicki Boutin Wrapped in Ribbons paper pad, so that rectangle with the tree & holly leaves was my starting point.  Next I added lots of new products from Pretty Little Studio that Santa Stephanie got for me (the large circle sentiment, racoon and my favorite stitching stickers). 

 

Then I added a few things from my Spellbinders Crafty Advent Calendar (the bird on the tree and the holiday cheer banner).  Before I attached the pieces to my black card base, I added a red strip from one of my *old* Gelliarts prints, and then I finished with a Merry & Bright stamp from the *old* but again, never used, stamps set Wordfetti Holly Jolly from scrapbook.com.  I had so much fun putting this all together.

I'm also linking-up at the Something New Challenge at Simon Says.  With the Circle Die Cut I used for my stamped sentiment, I'm also linking-up at the Divas that Die Cut Something New Challenge.

We sure hope you'll join us every week for another card ... or whenever it works for you ... and we'll enjoy having holiday fun with you.

Color Hues Cutie

I'm thrilled to be Guest Designing for the newest Color Hues Challenge - Red & Kraft.

 

 

I tried several combinations, but finally settled on a classic ... red hearts.  I created my own red papers using my GelliArts Press, and then I die cut the Lawn Fawn Candy Hearts Lawn Cuts.

 

 

I used the same Gelliarts print to die cut the Kristina Werner A2 Thin Frames die and then again for my larger mat.  For the center solid heart, I stamped a sentiment from Lawn Fawn How You Bean? Conversation Heart Add-on in red ink on kraft and punched it out with one of the heart punches in my stash.

I finished with a few Doodlebug Design tiny heart stickers from the Sugarplum Street Doodle-Pop Stickers.

I hope you'll come join me for this fun Color Hues combination.