JAI 605: Just Add Inspiration

 Hi!

Woo Hoo! Friday once again, which means that it's Just Add Ink time! This week we have a gorgeous Inspiration Photo as the basis of our challenge, which was suggested by Kim.

Hmm, what do you see in this photo? I straight away thought of the Expressions In Ink SDSP and Waves Of The Ocean DSP. Both have now retired, but I thought that I could use the different colours and papers to make an abstract version of the scene.

I was quite please with how it turned out! I used the stitched rectangle die in the Ornate Layers dies to crop the papers - the top three are the Expressions papers, and the lower three are from the Waves pack. I tried to match up with the Inspiration Photo, but wasn't strict with placement.

The mermaid is from an Ink Road stamp set, she's Inked Girl Samantha. I quickly coloured her with Stampin' Blends in colours taken from the DSP packs. The Gold Foil 'dream' die cut is from a long-retired set, called Chase Your Dreams Framelits.

A left over strip of DSP and a sentiment from Light The Candles finished off the inside. 

I can't wait to see what you make from the Inspiration Photo. The Design team have had a lot of fun with it. You can see their cards over on the Just Add Ink blog, where you can also link up your card in our challenge. See you there!

Bye for now,

Tina

Colour Creations: 2021-22 In Colours

 Hi!

Hooray!! Time for a new year of Colour Creations! To get our timeline back in whack, we are starting with all five of the new In Colours. Have you seen them yet? Picked a favourite? Hmm, I'm still deciding! Because of that, I bucked my own system of the past year of Colour Creations and made a card that used all five colours.

I started by creating my colourful panel. I used the stitched rectangle die from the Ornate Layers Dies to crop the Whisper White, Soft Succulent, Pale Papaya, Polished Pink and Fresh Freesia cardstock. I adhered these to a piece of copy paper so that I could crop the whole lot with a Stitched Rectangle Die. Copy paper ensures that it's not too thick for the die or Big Shot to cope with.

The stamping was done to match the colours on the main panel. Have you discovered the Biggest Wish stamp set yet? It's such an awesome set! I coloured a few Rhinestones with my Dark Evening Evergreen Blend and then popped the whole lot onto an Evening Evergreen card base that I'd stamped with the little crosses from Biggest Wish. I was so enamoured with the words in the set that I hadn't even noticed the crosses until I saw them used on other card!

For my inside, I simply used the offcuts from the front of the card! I cropped another Stitched Rectangle to sit inside the border piece. Too easy!

That's all from me for tonight. You've probably noticed by now that we've switched back to a traditional Blog Hop format for this year's Colour Creations. Next in the round is my lovely friend, Christine. You won't want to miss her gorgeous card, nor anyone else's! Just keep cruising around the blogs until you get back to where you started. If you find a broken link, you can click on the links below to get back to where you were.

Bye for now,

Tina

Kate Morgan

Sharon Davern

Vicki Boucher

Caroline Manwaring

Tina Gillespie <<you are here

Christine Blain

Rachel Woollard

Theresa Gerrard

Rachel Palmeri

Michelle Taylor

Diane Furniss

Andrea Sargent

Ros Davidson

Cathy Proctor

Colour Creations: Rich Razzleberry

 Hi!

Thanks for once again joining me for the new Colour Creations Creative Showcase. This week it's Rich Razzleberry's turn. Razzleberry was one of a trio of In Colours (alongside Melon Mambo and Soft Suede) that was released mid way through a catalogue year, with the goal of bringing the South Pacific market into line with the North American market. I was thrilled when it later returned as a core colour, as it's a gorgeous, rich purple,

For this week's card I pulled out three products that I love, but haven't played with much lately - Under My Umbrella bundle, Ornate Layers Dies and my Watercolour Pencils. The focal images were stamped in Memento ink and then coloured with my Rich Razzleberry Watercolour pencil. I used my usual Wink Of Stella to blend the colour rather than water. I find I have much more control over the colour this way.

My background was stamped using the two smallest flower clusters. I popped both onto one block and away I went until the Whisper White cardstock was covered. I then embossed it with my Subtle 3DEF folder, to give the effect of fabric. I was hoping that this photo would capture the sparkly boots, etc, but it was a dull day here in Adelaide, with no sun to help show the shimmer. Oh well, you'll just have to imagine it!

I used an offcut of Rich Razzleberry card and the same Ornate Layers Die as on the front to crop a little feature piece for the bottom of the writing panel. I think that it looks quite pretty!

That's all from me for tonight, but please do pop on over to Cathy's blog, where you'll find the rest of this week's Rich Razzleberry cards. We are close to the end now, I think only about 9-10 weeks to go.

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI 545: Just Add Shades Of Green

 Hi!

Welcome back to the new Just Add Ink Challenge. This week Lou has suggested that we use shades of green on our cards.

This one was a little tricky for me at first, as green isn't a colour I gravitate to very much. Then I remembered my pop culture stamps and an idea was born!

Who else could I choose but this big guy? He's the perfect character for this week's card. He's from a retired Kindred Stamps set, called You're Super, and I coloured him with my Shaded Spruce, Highland Heather and Basic Black Stampin' Blends. The sentiment is from another retired Kindred Stamps set, called Justice Is Served.

The background of my card was made by smooshing my Shaded Spruce ink pad onto my largest clear block, spritzing it with water and then placing my cardstock on top. I lifted it a few times and repositioned it to cover the whole piece with ink. The blotchy effect is very cool, if I do say so myself!

I used the offcut from the front of the card to matt my writing panel on the inside of my card. The icon image os from an Ink Road Stamps set, called Full Circle Vol 3: Heroes. I love it when stamps from different companies work together perfectly! The sentiment is from You're Super.

That's all from me for tonight, but please do head on over to the Just Add Ink blog, where you'll find the rest of this week's Design team cards. I hope that you'll enter our challenge too - do you like green? Which shade (or shades) will you choose to use?

Bye for now,

Tina

March Creative Showcase

 Hi!

Welcome to March's Creative Showcase. This time around, we are all basing our creations on a sketch designed by Rachel.

I quite like this sketch - how about you? I pulled out some Dandy Garden DSP to see how it would work with the layout. I think it works very well!

I started by adhering two pieces of the DSP to a card front sized piece of Whisper White card. I then cropped it with the second largest Stitched Rectangles Die and layered it on another piece of Whisper White card.

The dragonflies were punched from another sheet of the DSP, and popped up on Dimensionals. I stamped the sentiment in Misty Moonlight ink and cropped it with a die from Ornate Layers.

I used the left over piece of DSP from the front of my card to frame the writing panel on the inside. Waste not, want not! One final dragonfly and I was done!

You can find the rest of the links for this month's Showcase over on Rachel's blog.

Bye for now,

Tina

CTC #307: CASE The SAB Catalogue

 Hi!

Thanks for joining me for the new CASEing The Catty Sunday Challenge Blog Hop. Today is the very last day of Sale-A-Bration, so we are CASEing the SAB Catalogue one last time.

You can choose any card or project from the catalogue that takes your fancy. My eye was caught by this A Touch Of Ink card on page 12.

I decided to use the Berry Blessings stamp set to create my card, which is another SAB freebie choice.

I started by embossing a piece of Night Of Navy card using my Pinewood Planks 3DEF. It's such a great folder, I really should use it more! The next layer is from the Ornate Layers Dies. I cropped the shape from Whisper White card and then masked off the edge. I used a Blending Brush and Balmy Blue ink to add a layer of colour to the frame that still left the edges white. I love how this adds a visual layer without adding a physical layer.

The berries and leaves were all stamped and fussy cut before being adhered to the card.

I had a few blueberries left over, so I added them to the inside of the card, after adding a little bit of Balmy Blue ink to the panel. I'm not a big fan of the "you sweet thing" part of the Sweet Strawberry sentiment, so I masked it off before stamping it on the inside of the card.

You can join in with our challenge by CASEing any card from the SAB catalogue and adding a photo to our Facebook group. No blog, fancy camera or software required!

Next up is my lovely friend, Rachel, with what is bound to be a gorgeous card!

Bye for now,

Tina

Colour Creations: Crumb Cake

Hi!

It's that time of week again - the Colour Creations Showcase! This week we are featuring everyone's favourite Neutral, Crumb Cake. Well, It's certainly my favourite Neutral!

I've been toying with the idea of doing a sort of sepia toned card for a couple of months now, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to play.

I started by stamping the floral image from Bloom And Grow in Memento ink on Crumb Cake cardstock. I tried Crumb Cake ink, but I just couldn't get it to work. I then coloured the image with my Light and Dark Stampin' Blends. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised with how well the Crumb Cake cardstock stood up to the colouring that I did with the markers. I then used my Chalk Marker to add some highlights to the berries and to outline the image so that it popped from the page. I wish I had the confidence to add some more highlights to the flowers with the Chalk Marker. A good excuse to play with the technique some more!

The Whisper White card base was stamped with the same floral image in stamped-off Crumb Cake. I then ran it through my Big Shot twice using the Subtle 3DEF, once in each direction. The main image was cropped using a die from the Ornate Layers Dies.

The sentiments on this card are both from the Blossoms In Bloom stamp set.

I had a lot of fun with the sepia effect. I think it would look great with larger floral images, like Ornate Style, or the large sunflower stamp (I forgot the name!). Hopefully I get a chance to try it out.

The links to the rest of this week's Crumb Cake cards can be found at the lovely Catherine's blog. She does a wonderful job of hosting the Showcase each week.

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #511: Just Add Inspiration

Hi!

Yay, it's Friday! Time for the new Just Add Ink challenge, a gorgeous Inspiration Photo chosen by Rachael.

I have a couple of these plants - Mother-In-Law's Tongue? - but mine certainly don't look this healthy! I'm not a gardener, but I do try. I have managed to keep them alive, even if they are a little droopy.

Anyway, on to the challenge! I think Inspiration Photos are the challenges that I find hardest, and it takes a lot of thought to finally settle on a design. 

One thing I noticed about the photo was lots of long, tall lines. The plants themselves, and the candlesticks in the background. These were the inspiration for the strips on my card. They were cropped from the In Good Taste DSP using the stitched rectangle die in the Ornate Layers set. To make the middle one longer, I simply snipped in in half and hid the gap under the sentiment layers.

The second part of my card was all about the textures. I reached for my go-to embossing folder (Subtle) for the background, but as I flipped through my folders I saw my Pinewood Planks folder and thought that it suited the theme better. The retired Burlap Trim was a nod to the basket that one of the plants sits in, and the Sprig punched shapes were to add a little more of the green of the plants. Finally, the leaf from the Forever Gold SP added a touch of luxe.

I used another little strip of the wood DSP for the inside of the card. The sentiments, both front and inside, are from Itty Bitty Birthdays. 

It's time now to pop on over to the Just Add Ink blog, where you can see the rest of this week's Design Team cards. You can also link up your card for the challenge. I'd love to see what inspires you in the photo.

Bye for now,

Tina

CTC #269 Week 2: Your Favourite Retiring Bundle

Hi!

Thanks for joining me once again for the new CASEing The Catty Sunday Challenge Blog Hop! We are mid way through our current challenge, which is to CASE Your Favourite Retiring Bundle.

This week I have chosen to use the Varied Vases bundle.

I have used the stamp set a lot, but mostly for the sentiments! I love the curly script font, especially as it's a smaller size. For my card I decided to get a bit more adventurous and use the vases and flowers.

I started by blending some ink on the front of the card. I used Purple Posy and Soft Sea Foam. Thankfully the Posy ink behaved itself and blended nicely. I cropped the panel using one of the new Ornate Layers Dies.

The flower outlines were stamped in Memento ink and then filled with colour. Stamped of Rococo Rose for the top flower (an orchid? I have no idea!) and stamped off Rich Razzleberry for the other flower. The vases were just cropped from Whisper White card. I tried stamping different colours and metallics, but nothing looked quite right other than WW.

I recreated the same scene on the inside - hahaha, I just realised I did the same on last weeks card! The sentiment I used on the inside is my favourite from the set. It works so well with any floral card, and I have used it a lot.

That's all from me this week. AS I said, we are mid way through this fortnight's challenge, so you have another week to get your card made, photographed and posted into our Facebook group. I'd love to know your favourite retiring bundle!

In the meantime though, please do finish the hop. I'm near the end this week, so if you started at the top, you're nearly done! If not, just keep going until you get back to where you started. Easy! Next up is the lovely Shannon, who has made a super cute card!

Bye for now, and a very Happy Mother's Day to the mums of all sorts out there!

Tina

JAI #496: Just Add Inspiration

Hi!

Thanks for joining me again for the latest Just Add Ink challenge. This week Lou has found a beachy Inspiration photo for us to work with. It was good timing, as Adelaide has had a little burst of days over 30C, so it felt right to be playing with a summery image!

I don't have a lot of beachy themed stuff, so I decided to play more with the colours in the photo. I like the mix of the blue(ish!) water and the brown sand.

I started with a Sahara Sand card base, embossed with the Subtle folder. The DSP is from the Woven Threads pack. I love the rustic look of these papers, and thought they worked well as a water substitute.

Normally I'd use either Whisper White or Very Vanilla on a card, but this time I used both! I was hoping they looked a bit like the foamy water at the edge of the ocean, especially with the curly die cut (a sneak peek!!)

To give the card a bit more of a beachy feel I used the seahorse and shell from Seaside Notions on my card. They were stamped in Seaside Spray on Very Vanilla and fussy cut.

What do you see in the Inspiration Photo? The Design Team have taken a whole lot of different ideas and made some amazing cards! You can see the over at the Just Add Ink blog, where you can also link up your card for this week's challenge.

Bye for now,

Tina