Westie Greetings for JAI #776

Happy Friday everyone and welcome the last Just Add Ink challenge of 2025!
What a year it has been! We are so grateful for all those regular challenge entrants that have continued to follow us in the new almost fortnightly format and for new entrants too! 

For our last Just Add Ink challenge of the year we have a Choose Two or More of Trees, Twine, Stripes, Snow, Shimmer and Stockings. So if you are still making Christmas cards or gift packaging or tags, you have a good chance of finding a project that you can make to join with us. Our design team at Just Add Ink have created a ton of different projects to inspire you so I hope that you can pop on over and see!

Many of you know that I make a lot of Labrador related dog cards because of my friendship with Guide Dogs Victoria. But I also have friends with other dog types. Including a good friend with a gorgeous Westie that I pick up from her home and walk with Sally several times a week. Gracie and Sally have been besties since Gracie was a young puppy. So it makes sense that I would make her Mum a Westie card.

The little Westie is from the Christmas Scottie set from a few years ago and is embossed in White to create a shiny, textural Westie as it adds texture to look like fur. So that fulfils the "Shimmer " part of this week's challenge. I've also added "stripes" with the DSP  and a "Tree" using the retired Decorative Trees set.

So thank you all for following along and for all your kind comments throughout 2025. I really appreciate the effort of writing a few words when a simple "Like" on Instagram is what many people do these days.

I hope that you have a wonderful Christmas and start ot the New Year and look forward to catching up with you all in 2026 for a fun Just Add Ink Blog Hop to kick off a new year pf creativity on January 16th 2026.

Card stock: Gray Granite, Basic White, Garden Green, Highland Heather

DSP:  Christmas Tags and More (6x6)

Ink: Versamark

Stamps: Christmas Scottie, Christmas Classics

Accessories: Die Cutting Machine, Decorative Trees Dies - including the sweet bow, White EP, Basic Rhinestones.

'Til next time,

Jan

Layers On My Mind for CI #201

Happy Saturday and welcome! I was very sad to miss Colour Inkspiration's 200th Challenge recently so when I saw my favourite colour (Melon Mambo) featured as part of CI #201,  I saw it as a second chance and so here is my entry for the challenge!

Colour Inkspiration Challenges is a Facebook based challenge and you can find more information and see the design team and entries there for this, the last challenge for 2025. I hope that you are as inspired as I was to join in!

Whilst this colour combo is a fantastic one for Christmas and I may return to make a Christmas card with it yet,  but I really felt to make a card for a friend. 
Sometimes Christmas can be a difficult time for people and I have a good friend who has recently lost a significant family member and so this card is for her. 

I started by stamping the main image of the Layers of Beauty Bundle and using the masks to colour it using the Challenge colours. Then the coloured image was carefully cut apart to enable layering it at the top and bottom of the card.  This left room for the heartfelt sentiment from the now retired, Memorable Blooms in the middle. To be heat embossed using the 4th Colour of the challenge: Gold.

Then last but not least, the Mambo ribbon was layered and tied with the gold twine. And a scattering of gold jewels were added to some of the smaller flower centres to complete this card.

Thanks again for stopping by to see my entry for this beautiful Colour Inspiration challenge -their last for the year. I hope that you might be able to enter too!

Card stock: Pretty Peacock, Basic White

Inks: Momento Tuxedo Black, Melon Mambo, Pretty Peacock, Poppy Parade, Versamark

Stamps: Layers of Beauty, Memorable Blooms

Accessories: Die Cutting Machine, Layers of Beauty Masks, Layers of Beauty Dies, Melon Mambo Ribbon, Gold Twine, Gold flat adhesive jewels.

'Til next time,

Jan

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

 

A little Baby Celebration for JAI #775

 

Happy Friday and welcome!! It is hard to believe it is only a few weeks to Christmas - no I'll not do the daily count yet as it will scare me just as much as you!! I hope that you are getting there with your preparations and all is going to plan for you and your family.

This week at Just Add Ink we have a fun, wonderful and broad Challenge for you from Lou - to Just Add a Celebration. It could be a season of Celebration such as Christmas, an individual Celebration for example, a Birthday or any other time we celebrate! The whole Just Add Ink design team have come together to provide you with inspiration and we are very grateful how you, our loyal JAI followers have responded to our new format and also for the new followers that are now joining in with the extra time available to enter. It is wonderful to see you all filling the the gallery with beautiful creations!

My card is to celebrate a new baby girl arriving soon! 
I haven't had to make a baby card for a little while so I've turned to an old favourite and retired stamp bundle and teamed that with the pretty Crochet EF. Babies are such a special reason for a Celebration!

If you were wondering why there was no sentiment visible on the outside of the card, well that is because it is a little interactive. The recipient presses the bottom of the little flower to release the elephant's toe and uses the ribbon handle to open the little elephant card and view the hidden sentiment. It's a little bit cute! 

 I've used a lot of different stamp and die sets to make this card. Sometimes as crafters, use just the one stamp and die bundle and sometimes we can use quite a few depending on what we are looking to make and for whom. Being able to personalise a card for friends and family is what is so special about being able to make a card. One thing that I kept the A Litte Wild bundle for is it's versatility. The die cut animal card is one of three shaped cards that can also be used as gift cards. So I will colour up another little ele the same for the gift card. 

Thanks for stopping by today to see my card! I hope that you can pop on over to Just Add Ink to see what all the rest of the design team have created for you too. And I hope that you might feel inspired to join us and create something for a Celebration too. I can't wait to see what you will make!

Card stock: Basic White, Bubble Bath

Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers

Stamps: A Little Wild (retired), Welcome Home (retired)

Accessories: Die cutting machine, Crochet EF,  Little Loves Dies (retired) Country Flowers Dies, Stylish Shapes Dies, Gold Twine, Pink ribbon, White textured ribbon, Iridescent pearls.

'Til next time,

Jan

A North Pole Christmas for JAI #774

Happy Friday and welcome! It has been lovely to see how you all have responded so encouragingly to our longer challenge times at Just Add Ink. It has been heart warming to see, so thank you very much!

This week at Just Add Ink we have another new style of Challenge for you - to make Stencils, Dies or both the main feature of your project. These crafting tools are often used in a supporting role - for backgrounds or to cut out a stamped image. This week is the time to let the stencils and dies shine! Yes, you can use stamps as well but in a supporting role to dies and stencils. 

My card this week uses Dies and is very special to me. 
I will be holding a Christmas card making workshop at the Melbourne campus of Guide Dogs Australia for their clients and volunteers today and this is one of the cards we will be making. 
I have been a client and volunteer with Guide Dogs for the last 7 years and am very grateful for all they do for me and so many people. This workshop will be held at the Guide Dogs campus where there will be large magnifiers - including digital ones that use a camera to scan an image and bring it up on a screen - can be available to workshop attendees thanks to the so people who may not usually be able to make a card - or perhaps think they couldn't - should be able to make and enjoy these cards

Many of us remember making our first cards and that feeling of accomplishment. Now imagine if you thought your disability would make it impossible....but discovered that you actually could! How wonderful would that be?! That is what I am hoping will be the outcome of this workshop.

The Christmas Words Hybrid  EF was my inspiration as the words can felt as either a background or a main sentiments for a card. Many people with serious eye conditions don't like bright, shiny surfaces so there will be the choice of using the gold foil words like I used on this card, or coloured card that is not so painful for sensitive eyes. 

The card base is embossed with the Plaid EF which gives a deep effect that can easily be felt.

Of course the Labs are a given for this class as all guide school dogs are labradors but we will also have available the other animals and die cuts from the North Pole Delivery DSP for people to add to their projects which also include gift tags and a gift box.

Thank you for reading my story behind this card. 

Now it is your turn to create a card or scrap book page using Stencils or Dies as the main focus. We  at Just Add Ink would love to see what you can create whether for a cause like mine or to share with your loved ones.

Card stock: Coastal Cabana, Basic White, Poppy Parade, Gold Foil

DSP: North Pole Delivery

Accessories: Die Cutting machine, Plaid EF, Christmas Words EF, Stitched Rectangle Dies, Fluffy White Ribbon, Red and White Twine, Traditional Sparkling Sequins.

'Til next time,

Jan

 

 

Happiest Ribbon Birthday for JAI #773

Happy Friday to you and welcome! Thank you for your response to the changes we have made to our challenges at Just Add Ink. It has been so wonderful to see you responding by joining with us and filling our gallery with your creations and we are so grateful to you for this! It has been so encouraging for all of us on the design team to see the gallery full again! So again. thank you!

Our new challenge this week at Just Add Ink is this beautiful Sketch with a Bow at it's centre from Tristan.

When you pop on over to the blog you'll see our whole design team have created projects we hope will  inspire you. So we hope that you will join with us once again and share your creations with us. Again, you have almost 2 weeks to enter.

I am more used to tying twine than ribbon these days but when facing a challenge, I think it's often good to step outside of what we usually do and try something new and use that to grow.

So I have used ribbon here - white ribbon layered onto itself with glue dots and then have tied a string of sequins around the middle and gathered it to give the illusion of a bow.

Many of the elements of this card are from my leftovers box. It was getting full so it was definitely time to look to see what I could use and so this card came together rather quickly! All I needed to add was more leaves and rhinestones.

Thanks for stopping by today. I hope that you have liked seeing all the design team's cards this week and that you enjoy the longer time frame to enter our challenges at Just Add Ink. I really look forward to seeing what you will create with this sketch. 

Card Stock: Lemon Lolly, Basic White, Soft Sea Foam

Inks: Lemon Lolly, Versamark

Stamps: Memorable Blooms, Charming Sentiments

Accessories: Die Cutting Machines, Artistic Mix Masks, Country Flowers Dies, Mini corrugated EF, Silver EP, White Satin Ribbon (retired), Silver Sequin trim (retired), Basic Rhinestones

'Til next time,

Jan                    

Christmas Words for CI#198

Happy Sunday everyone and welcome!! 
It's been our hottest day in Melbourne since March and it's still quite a warm evening. We see the Christmas decorations are out in the shopping centres with signs announcing that "Santa will arrive in 6 days!" So that was all the inspiration I needed to come home and get to work on another Christmas card! 

  Colour Inkspiration is a fortnightly Facebook based Colour Challenge. I saw the current colour combination but I confess I didn't check it again until I had completed my card today. Which means that instead of Very Vanilla, I've used Basic White, my standard go-to so I hope that is ok? 

The embossed image is the lovely Christmas Words Hybrid EF. It's such a versatile product that I adore as it's so textural and I'll be using it with it's matching die a lot in an upcoming class.

I already had the ribbon on my desk. Usually I will tie a bow - but this time I wanted to give a "No Tie" method a go. So I layered the ribbon onto itself and used some silver trim around the middle to pull it tight and secured it with glue dots. I'll have to have a few more goes before I decide if its easier and speedier than tying or not.

Thanks for taking the time to come and visit and see my entry for Colour Inkspiration this week.

Do pop on over to Facebook and check out the design teams and other entrants projects and there is still time for you to join in too.

Card stock: Pool Party, Coastal Cabana, Real Red, Basic White, Silver Glimmer

Ink: Versamark

Stamps: Christmas Classics (retired)

Accessories: Die Cutting machine, Christmas Words Hybrid EF, Christmas Classics Dies, Stitched Nested Essential Dies, Brights Enamel Dots, Metallic Sequins assortment, Silver Trim, Silver EP, Pool Party Ribbon

'Til next time,

Jan

 

Healing Hugs for JAI #772

Happy Friday everyone and welcome! It was really fantastic to see the Just Add Ink gallery full with so many entries again with our refresh on challenge length and details. The design team was absolutely delighted that so many people - both regular and new were able to join us and we hope that you like the upcoming challenges just as much.

So it's time for our new Just Add Ink challenge and this week we have a Halloween inspired Colour & Inspiration Challenge for you from Kerry. You can choose to either use the Image as your inspiration OR at least 3 of the Colours for your project OR a mix of the two.  And you can also use black, white and skin tone colours and metallics if you wish. Our entire design team have created projects choosing one or the other of these options to inspire you and we would love to have you join us once again!

Halloween is not a huge deal in Australia - unless you have kids at school perhaps - so it’s not something on my radar. The Healing Hugs set arrived in my craft space recently and I thought the colours could work well for the blanket in this image. Then I used both greys and browns to colour the dog and cat. I usually tend to use 2-3 colours on a card so I surprised myself in being able to use all FIVE of these rather bold colours on one card!

The rest of the card is kept quite CAS and textural - some shiny silver ribbon and the card stock is some retired SU colours that seemed to fit the Challenge graphic colours well - Elegant Eggplant and my last piece of some very old Tangerine Tango.

Thanks for popping by and I hope that you can pop on over to Just Add Ink and check out all the design teams inspiration. And remember that you have almost two weeks now to enter - so I will look forward to seeing what you will create for this fun Colour or Inspiration challenge!

Card stock: Tangelo Tango, Smoky Slate, Elegant Eggplant, Basic White

Inks: Momento Tuxedo Black, Versamark 

Stamps: Healing Hugs

Accessories: Die Cutting Machine, Mini Corrugated EF, Stitched Rectangle Dies, Black EP (sentiment), Rhinestones, Silver Ribbon

Non SU: The image is coloured with Copics.

'Til next time,

Jan

 

Yappy Birthday for JAI #771

Happy Friday everyone and welcome!!

I have some exciting news for Just Add Ink fans. This is the first week of a new format here at JAI. I hope that you can embrace these changes and have a lot of fun creating your projects.

For Challenge #771 we have a Choose Two or More. You can use as many of the 6 listed options as you'd like as long as you use at least 2 of them. Please remember to tell us which ones you use! And you'll have longer to create your projects too as we are now moving to a fortnightly challenge schedule. Our whole design team will create to inspire you each challenge too so you'll also have more inspiration. We all hope that you will enjoy these changes and, as always, we look forward to seeing and celebrating your creations!

So without further ado, here is this week's Challenge and the Six options to choose at least 2 of to use in your project. This week's challenge was also suggested by ME - so I especially hope that you that you can enjoy this and have fun with it!

For my card....it is rather obvious, (hopefully!)  that I've gone for Pets, Plaid and some Patterned Paper...and a few Pretties too!!
This card was created for a friend but  was made to be from my Labrador, Sally. so the retired Happy Tails stamp set and punch were perfect for this. I am also looking to design cards for a Dog themed Christmas for Guide Dogs Victoria clients, so this design is also suitable, with its plaid and die cut textures to potentially be used for this too.

The Lab from Happy Tails is coloured using Copics to resemble my dog Sally, a black Labrador. And her collar is stamped in Berry Burst and fussy cut.

For the base layers, the Plaid EF is used on some Berry Burst card stock and the "Patterned Paper "or DSP is from the Full of Life suite. 

And then there is the large, bold, die cut "friend"which is also from the Friends for Life Bundle. 

The other sentiment is from my stash. Sometimes, keeping the design simple so the individual elements can shine is for the best.

Thank you for stopping by. I hope that you are excited by the changes happening here at Just Add Ink which are designed to give you more freedom, inspiration and opportunity to share your wonderful creativity with us and with each other as entrants. I look forward to seeing what you create for this challenge!!

Card stock: Basic Black, Berry Burst, Basic White

Inks: Momento Tuxedo Black

DSP: Full Of Life 6x6

Stamps: Happy Tails (retired), Dog Sayings (Stampendous),

Accessories: Die Cutting Machine, Plaid EF, Dog Punch, Friends for Life Dies, White EP, Jewels, Copic Markers

'Til next time,

Jan

 

Inspired Just For You for CI #197

Happy Thursday everyone and a very warm welcome to you!! I am very honoured and was indeed a little nervous to be invited to be a Guest Designer for the fabulous Colour Inkspiration Challenges. It is very special indeed and I am very grateful!

This week's Colour Inkspiration Challenge is with these elegant colours - Misty Moonlight, Night of Navy and Crumb Cake. You can also use, Black, white, Vanilla and metallics if you would like. You can find the Challenge on Facebook  (follow the link above) and I encourage you to check out all the designers cards and see what other entrants have created there too.

I thought this was a beautiful and elegant colour combination and so chose the Inspired Imperfections bundle to use for this challenge. 

The vase image is stamped on Misty Moonlight card stock with the same colour ink. Whilst all the other blues used are Night of Navy.

The white layer is embossed using the Joined Together EF and the EF was also used on some Gold Foil which was then cut out and added to it. 

To create the flowers, I used some white card stock and the Country Flower Dies. Then alternating flowers were coloured with Night Of Navy Blends. It is a quick and easy way of creating the card stock colour you want which is especially good when just needing small pieces like these. 

Crumb Cake was used for the frame and sentiment strip and the flower branches and that is the last Challenge Colour to be included. 

Thank you for stopping by today and I hope that you check out this week's  Colour Inkspiration Challenge and consider joining in too! There is plenty of time for you to join us as the challenge lasts for two weeks!

Card stock: Night Of Navy, Misty Moonlight, Crumb Cake, Gold Foil, Basic White

Inks: Misty Moonlight, Versamark

Blends: Night of Navy

Stamps: Inspiring Imperfections, Charming Sentiments (Retired)

Accessories: Die Cutting Machine, Inspiring Imperfections Dies, Joined together EF, Country Flowers Dies, Crumb Cake Twine ( Essentials Pack), Night of Navy Ribbon, Gold Faceted Gems

'Til next time,

Jan