Let's Prance For JAI #761

Happy Friday and welcome!! Thankfully it is now almost the end of July and Winter is at least 2/3 of the way over - Spring is coming! It is wonderful to see the sun rising a little earlier and setting later. And here in Melbourne, the Wattle is now flowering - which signals the start of allergy season. Hopefully, we'll see the temperature rising a little soon too!

This week at Just Add Ink we have a fun challenge for you from Kerry. She has given us a Christmas in July theme to create with. The design team have all created fun and gorgeous projects to hopefully inspire you so we hope that you might be able to join us by popping over to the JAI blog and using the Linky to enter.

Christmas in July isn't something I have much experience of except for one dinner 25 years ago when I first arrived in Australia.  The other dinner guests introduced me to the "Not Happy Jan!" TV ads that were new and very popular at the time. Such a classic series of ads that have become a part of our everyday speech - especially for those of us called Jan! 😅

For my card, I looked through my past Bits and Pieces container for Christmas ideas and found the blue coloured reindeer. Instantly, I knew a pink one was needed and then came the aqua....next was the background and this card was well on it's way.

To bring it all together, and create the snowy hills, I used a retired die set called Home for Christmas. The final little touch - the Silver Glimmer Christmas tree - is actually from a pine branch from last year's Joy of Noel bundle. 

So delving into my Bits and Pieces container soon had me pulling out all sorts of Christmas sets to complete this fun card!
I hope that you are soon going through your Christmas sets, new and old and look forward to you joining us for this fun challenge at Just Add Ink this week.

'Til next week,

Jan

 

Spotlighted Christmas for JAI #675

 

Happy Friday everyone and welcome back! I hope you've had a good week? This time of year is so busy and in the midst of it all there is a lot going on in the world. I hope that you and your loved ones are safe wherever they may be.

This week at Just Add Ink, lovely Lou has suggested we Just Add the Spotlight Technique.

As always, our fabulous design team have created a number of different cards to inspire you, so we'd love for you to join us.

I created two similar cards for this challenge using a reverse Spotlight Technique. This was very fun to do.

For both cards, I started by embossing an image that was of an outline - I chose a Christmas Tree. One was embossed in white, the other in silver.

Next, the image was stamped on masking paper and cut out and applied over the image.

After this, the page was covered with ink - all except what was under the mask which remained white and clean.

When the mask was removed, the white of the inside of the image is spotlighted against all the colour of the background.

Finally, a sentiment was stamped and embossed on a strip of card stock that also was sponged with colour. The embossed sentiments resisted the colour and remain white, like the insides of the image.

Silver twine, glimmer paper and sequins complete both cards.

Thanks for stopping by this week and I hope that you can pop on over to Just Add Ink and join in the challenge. I always look forward to seeing your projects!

Card stock: Watercolor Paper, Basic White, Bedazzled Specialty Paper

Stamps: Santa's Sleigh (retired)

Ink: Versamark

Accessories: White EP, Silver EP, Silver Twine, Metallic Sequin Assortments

Non SU: Distress Inks: Salty Ocean, Twisted Citron, Bluepoint Sketch

'Til Next Time,

Jan

 

A Special Pendulum Christmas

Happy Boxing Day everyone!! I hope you all had a lovely Christmas Day full of joy and peace with lots of fun and relaxing moments too. Have you been off to the Sales today or are you waiting for the biggest sale of the year in Saleabration 😀We had a lovely day that started with Midnight Mass and then we had a long lunch with friends and a total of 6 doggies - and yes they all got along beautifully!

As most of you will know, Sally Junior arrived in August from Guide Dogs Victoria and so I wanted a special card for the staff there for Christmas. Sally was given to me as a Companion and we've undergone further training and she's now a registered Assistance Dog so comes with me everywhere I go and she's truly changed my life for the better so I am indeed very grateful.
I found this cute card by Karolyn Loncon and decided to CASE it using mainly Stampin Up products except for the cute doggy which is another gorgeous MFT creation.

It is a pendulum card and the dog's head moves from side to side. Karolyn has a link to YT video on her page that shows how to add the pendulum.

 I did need to make two adjustments to the mechanism - instead of a penny, I used a 5c coin - but same idea. I also didn't have a slider disc so instead used two mini dimensionals on top of one another and rubbed them well with the embossing buddy so they were no longer sticky and it works well 😊
I coloured the dog to be a Golden Lab and then took liberties with the harness lol.

The harness reminded me a little of Sally's working harness so I had to make another didn't I 😀
The background inking is some distress Inks and the doggy image is coloured in a mixture of Copics and Stampin Blends.

And whilst I was on a roll....there is one last one coloured to be a chocolate Lab

for yet more doggy friends....

Such fun but quite detailed though I'm sure they will all be swinging their way through Christmas!

Card Stock: Melon Mambo, Tranquil Tide, Whisper White

Inks: Momento Tuxedo Black, Blends: Lovely Lipstick, Blackberry Bliss and Razzleberry Combos

Stamps: Hearts Come Home

Accessories: Big Shot, Layering Alphabet Edgelits, Irridescent and Metallic Sequins Assortments, Black EP

Non SU:  Deck the Howls by MFT, Copic Markers, Distress ink (Salty Ocean) TH/ Ranger, Watercolor Card stock Ranger

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you are enjoying the Christmas season!!

Happy stamping until next time.

Jan

Star of Watercolour for JAI #338

Happy Black Friday folks :-) No, It's not the 13th or related at all...but a huge world wide Sale day! I hope all those in the USA had a wonderful Thanksgiving with friends and family - such a lovely reason to have a holiday - and are all ready for the sales due to happen just in time for Christmas!

And it's also time for a new challenge at Just Add Ink. This week's photo for us all to use was suggested by me:-) The lovely colours and brushes had me excited to water colour so I hope you enjoy this challenge and can take a moment to pop over and see the fabulous cards our team have made to inspire you too.

Here's the Photo:

And here's one of two cards:

For the background, I used a technique that Shelli Gardener shared at On Stage in Sydney where she used soon to be coming Watercolor Pencils (hip hip hooray!) to colour on watercolor paper and then spritzed the paper with water til the ink ran to create a soft look. 

As I don't have the Pencils, I used Zigs. But first, I embossed the sentiment in beautiful Copper :-)

Here's the before:

I recommend taping the paper down to a board so it stays as flat as possible :-)

And after spritzing and mopping a little with a paper towel...

Water colouring always dries lighter - here's the finished card (version 2).

To finish both cards, there is a sprinkling of embossed stars and some die cuts stars from the same Bundle both in the lovely Copper Foil and some vellum. I was going for a Northern Lights kind of effect so the first one is my favourite :-)

Card stock: Bermuda Bay, Copper Foil, Vellum, Watercolor Paper

Ink: Versamark

Stamps: Star of Light

Accessories: Big Shot, Starlight Thinlit Dies, Copper EP, Brights Enamel Shapes

Non SU: Stitched Rectangle Dies (SSS)

               Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers: Red Carmine, Cornflour Blue, Turquoise Green, Light                Blue, Violet

Well, I'm taking it easy the next few days having just had surgery for a jaw bone infection in an old wisdom tooth site where they scraped the bone etc....so I look forward to seeing what you will create for this fun colour and brush themed challenge at Just Add Ink this week and I hope you get a moment to check out our talented teams's lovely designs to inspire you too as they are amazing!

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan

Peace Branches for JAI #319

Happy Friday to you and welcome! We are half way through the mid winter school holidays here in Melbourne and I have been blessed with a catch up with an aunty and cousin visiting from New York and have some lovely friends from Nelson in NZ arriving  in the next week too. Hopefully the weather might improve so they can see something other than grey skies,  rain and puddles....the dog park is looking more like a lake!

And its time for a new challenge at Just Add Ink. This week,  Di has suggested a great photo for us all to use. It gives such an instant 'Christmas" feel and so is a great opportunity to get ahead on starting towards the busiest time of any card makers year :-) Our fabulous design team have all created gorgeous cards to inspire you so I hope you can take a moment to pop on over and take a look.

Here is the photo:

And here is my card:

With inspiration photos I find it easiest to go with what first jumps out at me from the photo - so in this case it was the wreath and how full it was with added elements, and also the elegant door it was hanging on. So I decided to use some DSP from the new Serene Scenery stack for my "door" element, and to create a wreath effect using the Flourish Thinlits which contain both the leaf and berry dies - so fabulous for Christmas :-)

"Peace" from the Christmas Greetings Thinlits is cut 3 times using white card stock and then the  top layer in gold. To create the "be with you", I masked a stamp in the Reason For the Season set and stamped directly onto the rustic looking DSP. It feels so strange to create a card using only one stamp but no more seemed to be needed :-)

Card stock: Island Indigo, Whisper White, Garden Green, Real Red, Gold Foil

Designer Series Paper: Serene Scenery Stack 

Ink: Island Indigo

Stamps: Reason For The Season

Accessories: Big Shot, Flourish Thinlits, Christmas Greetings Thinlits, Brights Enamel Shapes, White Perfect Accents (with stickers removed they are clear )previously

As previously mentioned. the dog park is looking more like a lake currently - it's only the first week of July and we already have had 3/4 of our average monthly rain....wonderful for the birds but not so great for dogs and people currently - bags not playing rugby here this weekend :-)

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you can take a moment to pop over to Just Add Ink and see what the rest of our talented team have made to inspire you and I look forward to seeing what you will create inspired by this gorgeous wreath image this week too!

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan

Merry Christmas to You

Good morning and a very merry Christmas to you! I hope that you have had a wonderful Christmas and that you are now able to relax a little for Boxing Day (or beyond that as it is here in Australia :-0 ) Here in Melbourne we had a hot Christmas - both Christmas Eve and Day were around 35 degrees and the relief of the cool change came through overnight with some much needed rain and we are still enjoying the cooler temperature :-)

This last design of card is on it's way (or hopefully arrived) to some special friends this year :-)

My Christmas was quite busy - up early Christmas Eve to do some food shopping (like many of you!) and it was good to beat the rush :-) Then lots of phone calls and some Skype with family and headed to the Church for 10:45pm where I was leading a choir to sing at Midnight Mass and Carols beforehand….it was a little tricky to hear the piano beside me over the industrial size fans (as it was about 30 degrees inside still) but I was told it was "amazing" - which is not something we've been before really :-)  We only started in time for last Christmas and with singing throughout the year we have improved some :-) It's not a formal choir - a lot more relaxed as we are just ordinary people, all of us - we sing a mix of new and old hoping that that others can join in and there were certainly a number of "new" in the pre Mass Carols this year - which was  lovely to be able to do :-)

Later versions had a red base and a different greeting :-)

Christmas Day was another early morning with some food prep and quick walk for Sally before we both headed over to see our very good friend Katerina and her lovely family who have so generously hosted us for Christmas for several years now. Sally spent a good amount of time smooching them all (before the Christmas Crackers sent her into hiding for a while!) and the decision was made - they have been too long without a "Sally" of their own!! Fantastic news my friends :-)

I have a couple more different cards to make and my Pear Pizazz ink pad needed refilling - and being a little rushed and tired I reached for the bottle and filled it up only to find as I stamped that I had added Wild Wasabi instead!!! Oh no!! But I have a solution in case you might make the same mistake - the ink washes out in water! So I put on some gloves and washed the ink pad under the tap till it was all clean.

And then put my glasses on before refilling with the right ink :-) All fixed - phew!!

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan

Upright Z Fold JAI #284

Welcome to another warm Friday - the week has really flown and we have some beautiful more like Summer days already!

We have a new fun challenge for you at Just Add Ink this week. The lovely Di  has asked us to "Just Add a Fancy Fold" So that means any card that is not the standard upright or horizontal folding one and leaves the door right open for you to create something a little different and maybe even a little bit special!! The Design Team have created truly gorgeous cards of all shapes and sizes so I hope you can pop on over and be inspired to join us :-)

For my card I decided to go with an "Upright Z Fold" Christmas Card using the lovely Decorative Ornaments dies. I just love the new Red Foil and Vellum!! 

To make an Upright Z Fold  just start with a standard card folding horizontally and then fold the front in half on itself and you have the base for the Z fold. The decorated piece is cut to the same size as if it would fit on a normal card front. The idea is that it is attached only at the bottom and the top of it tucks underneath an element on the base (or back)  to help hold it upright. Here that job is done by the holly and berries.

And because it still is able to lie flat, it is easily posted too - although it might need some "operating instructions"sent with it so people know it sits up by itself as it can look a little lack lustre otherwise:-) 

Here the greeting was set lower than usual so that it doesn't get covered over by the holly. And the Red Fancy Vellum was added to some white card stock first to bring out the contrast of the red and white stripes.

Card stock: Real Red, Whisper White, Red Foil, Gold Foil

Designer Series Paper: Holidays Fancy Foil Vellum

Ink: Real Red, Garden Green

Stamps: Embellished Ornaments

Accessories: Big Shot, Decorative Ornaments Framelits, Softly Falling EF, Gold Cording Trim,  Home For Christmas Enamel Dots, Blender Pen, Owl Builder Punch ( for berries on Holly)

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you can take a moment to pop on over to Just Add Ink and see the fabulous cards that the Team have made to inspire you this week and I look forward to seeing what type of "Fancy Fold" you decided to add to your card this week!

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan

Christmas Tree for JAI

Today is the first Tuesday in November and so is Melbourne Cup Day! The day when one horse race "stops a nation" as they say. And so it is a Public Holiday here in Victoria and the race is due to run at 3pm (I think? ). I can't say it interests me really - I did go to Flemington Race Track once some years ago with a group of girlfriends and while it was lovely to have a reason to get dressed up, there were a few too many drinks had by some….and at least one ended up being spilled over me…. so never again!! So today is a beautiful 29 degrees now although the wind is picking up a bit and has been a lovely day! After taking Sally the Lab for a walk and a trip to the garden shop for some more veggie plants…it's time to get back to some cards :-)

Yes, I'm sorry, the blog has taken a back seat the last couple of weeks as life has gotten in the way but hopefully we are back on track now. Yesterday I had 5 cards on the table that I was sending off in the mail but sadly none could be shared yet….

And so today I finally have a new card for you - and for the great sketch challenge at Just Add Ink. I have so missed taking part in their challenges of late! This week they have a great sketch:

And here is my card:

Yes, it's a shaker card :-) I couldn't resist the idea of trying to find the smallest circle the Tree Punch would fit into and this is compliments of the 21/2' Circle Punch rather than Framelits as their intervals were too large for what I wanted here.

The card base is Lost Lagoon and there is a layer of white card under the beautiful DSP as I wanted to add the DSP on Dimensionals so as the Circle shaker window doesn't stand out too high above the rest of the card and I find that DSP doesn't sit up on dimensionals on its own so well - it tends to sag in between them! The beautiful DSP is all from the All is Calm pack - so gorgeous and is the real star of this card:-) and so I added some of the Frosted Sequins on top of the snowflakes on the DSP as well as the top of the tree.

To create the Tree circle shaker I first punched a Tree from scrap paper and then traced the outline onto the white circle for the top of the shaker as a guide to where to punch the tree. Then I also punched a circle of White card for the bottom under the DSP and of course some Window Sheet. I use the Shaker Frame adhesive and cut the individual circles and this means I can easily mould them into the shapes I need. I find it is quick and easy to join up the ends where you need them so the filling is secure inside.And for the filling here I used the Confetti Star punch with some Silver Glimmer and Lost Lagoon card and added a few silver sequins for a bit of added bling :-) The greeting is from the Good Greetings stamp set and is cut using the Itty Bitty Banner framelits and then the front end cut to fit in with the circle theme.

Card stock: Lost Lagoon, Whisper White

Designer Series Paper: All Is Calm

Inks: Lost Lagoon

Stamps: Good Greetings

Accessories: Big Shot, Stars EF, Bitty Banners Framelits, 2 1/2 Circle Punch, Tree Punch, Window Sheets, Frosted Sequins, Silver Twine

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you have time to check out the great cards by the Team at Just Add Ink and maybe you too might be inspired to join in too :-)

And do come back later if you can as I will be sharing some of the the lovely cards I received for my birthday and they are all very special too!!

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan

Joy Case

Good evening! Well it has been a cold and wet day today for the first day of Spring! I have the odd new plant in the garden so am not that unhappy about the rain but poor Sally has spent the afternoon hiding in the bathroom from the rain and hail! Of course she came out for food - ever the food loving Labrador :-) - but quickly returned there. At least she is happy!

So I decided to break out some new stamps - the Wondrous Wreath bundle and for my first card I wanted to CASE the card in the Holiday Catalogue :-)

For the card base I used some Pear Pizazz and for the background used the berry image in Pear Pizazz ink. The long tartan banner is cut from DSP in the beautiful Trim the Tree DSP Stack - it's perfectly sized for cards so easy to use!

And the white banner is also run through the Big Shot using the Woodgrain EF for some added texture.

To stamp the actual wreath, I kept close to the original colour mix - Pear Pizazz, Mossy Meadow and Versamark ink and Cherry Cobbler embossing powder.

The beautiful Joy is cut from gold foil card stock and is so shiny and adds a beautiful texture.

And the gold ribbon is literally two bows folded and affixed to the sides of the card.

Card stock: Pear Pizazz, Whisper White, Gold Foil Specialty

Designer Series Paper: Trim the Tree Stack

Ink: Pear Pizzazz, Meadow Moss, Versamark

Stamps: Wondrous Wreath

Accessories: Big Shot, Wondrous Wreath Framelits, Cherry Cobbler Embossing Powder, Woodgrain EF, Gold Ribbon

Thanks so much for stopping by today,

Jan 

12 Days to Christmas!

With only 12 days to go it is of course the busiest time of the year for most people but especially the card makers! When I finally went through my list it came to nearly 60 cards!! So it has been a busy month and now am finally winding down as am nearly there and have a few other Christmas projects to share soon too. Its also time to think about Wish Lists of stamping "needs" - yes we all "want" certain things but when they become "needs" you know its something serious LOL! Saleabration starts January 28 and the thought of some lovely freebies to compliment purchases is always exciting!

But for now, its back to Christmas cards :-)

The design here  is the same as the card box and card set you can see here and I decided to just experiment with a few different colour schemes. This was the first though not my favourite :-)

Card stock: Smoky Slate, Bermuda Bay

Designer Series Paper: Winter Frost Specialty

Ink: Versamark

Stamps: Joyful Christmas

Accessories: Big Shot, Expressions Thinlits (Merry), Silver Embossing Powder, Frosted Finishes Embellishment

This next card is one of my favourites and I've since made quite a few of them - glad now that I splashed out earlier on the Frosted Finishes!!

Poinsettias are such classic Christmas symbols and this time is silver embossed onto Whisper White card stock. The banner is again using the Winter Frost DSP - am getting so much use out of my one pack its wonderful!! The Expression thinlits are used again for the Merry - so all in all there is very little  stamping involved, just the poinsettia! I have had a sneak peek of the coming Occasions Catalog that has some banner framelits so soon there will be no more uneven banner layers:-)

Card Stock: Pool Party, Whisper White

Designer Series Paper: Winter Frost Specialty

Ink: Versamark

Accessories: Big Shot, Petals a Plenty EF, Expressions Thinlits, Silver EP, Frosted finishes Embellishments

Sally has been visiting her friend Monty regularly this week and they always love a play. Here is a common sequence of events….

Monty on his back, begging for attention and Sally pretending to ignore him - just teasing him until he gives a little bark as well :-)

Get ready Monty…she's coming to get you!

A reminder to be careful what you wish for!

But he obviously loves it, look at that tongue hanging out :-)

And a little kiss as they really do love each other :-)

Happy stamping until next time,

Jan