JB2515: Tic-Tac-TWO!

It's the second week of our crafty Tic-Tac-Toe game at Jingle Belles so here's a reminder of the board:

And here's what I made this week:

My stash of classic Basic Grey holiday papers is dwindling, but being a top-notch hoarder, I do still have some medium-sized pieces (from which my two background pieces hail) and lots of little scraps (from which I diecut all of the shapes to paper-piece these adorable Impression Obsession Retro Ornaments. By which you may well have already deduced that this week I chose to work the middle row of Diecuts + Paper Piercing or Piecing + Ornaments.

JB2515: Tic-Tac-Toe runs until next Wednesday evening, July 30th. Check out the original post at Jingle Belles for all the info and the Linky tool to add your own creations!

Classic Basic Grey Tribute Mandala

It's a very simple card this Mandala Monday featuring some of my well-hoarded classic basic Grey patterned papers (from Lollipop Shop, Urban Prairie and Out of Print for those who remember BG from "back in the day"!) with the petals and circles diecut using Hero Arts' Heart and Circle Infinity Dies.

SOS546: Outta This World

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we've gone absolutely universal and thus we'd like to see cards featuring Aliens (or Monsters), Stars, Moon or Planets. Here's my card:

I've raided my happily hoarded stash of classic Basic Grey papers, including Oh Baby Boy (from which I've fussycut the fab retro rockets and small stars) and Color Me Silly (used to diecut the large stars). Most of the other items in my space-themed collage card came from an equally ancient set of October Afternoon's Rocket Age ephemera and papers. The tiny blue star brads are from... ok, I have to confess those are so old I have no idea whence they came but they were perfect for this. The sentiment is computer generated in a free font called Dear Sunshine.

Be sure to check out the rest of the SOS Crew's cards, which really are "Outta This World". This challenge (Sos546) runs at Shopping Our Stash until the evening of Monday, May 5th.

Holiday Shape Up: Week 2

Cruising into the second week of our Holiday Shape Up festival at Jingle Belles for which, as you'll recall, we're making shaped cards. New Jersey is just one of the states currently under what the weather gurus are calling a heat dome, and the temps for the last 10 days have been in the mid-90's with humidity off the charts. So of course my first thought was to make MITTENS lol!

A few years ago I had downloaded a photo of a beautiful mitten-shaped card, printed it out on cardstock at 4x6" size, used it as a template and raided my stash of ancient Basic Grey holiday patterned paper to make THIS CARD. Luckily, I had saved the template and still had some nice big chunks of BG, so I'm back with the same idea... times two! Basic Grey flower layers, Recollections flair, scraps of felt  trimmings, 7 Gypsies velvet holly leaves, and a couple of buttons from my stash complete this pair of mixy-matchy mitten cards.

Stephanie's card can be seen at Jingle Belles, where, coincidentally, you can also upload your own magnificent shape-card design between now and next Wednesday evening, July 3rd.

Is it SPRING Yet?!

As Kermit the Frog once observed, "It's Not Easy Being Green" and although we've taken it as our challenge title this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash, as a matter of fact, it's not alllllll that difficult to make a card that is *mostly* green... which is what we'd like to see this time. Here's my card:

I've literally raided DECADES of fine stashular items for this one: My base is an ancient Hambly Transparency; the center panel is Prima patterned paper circa... maybe 2009? Those beautiful Dina Wakley Media Scribbly Birds from Ranger made their debut in 2014, and yet are still in print and have spawned holiday as well as mini versions. The leaves are from a Catherine Pooler die set called Perfect Foliage which I acquired at Paper Anthology during the 2020 lockdown. And finally, the scraps on the which the birds are stamped and leaves are diecut are a mixture of ancient Basic Grey and new-ish Craft Consortium. My current trusty Dymo Label Maker is only a few years old, but I have had/used one for cardmaking since at least the turn of this century!

Our SOS516: It's Not Easy Being Green challenge will run until Monday evening, March 11th; why not unearth some of your favorite older stash items and play along?

SOS495: Fold It Up!

It's a fun and creative challenge this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash. For "Fold It Up" we'd like you to create a card that features a non-standard Fun Fold design (easel card, gatefold, stair step, side step, trifold, etc) OR a card with interactive elements (shaker, mechanical, spinner... you get the idea...) If you need inspiration or tutorials to get you started, check out This Pinterest Page! Being emphatically NOT an engineer myself, I usually make a shaker card on these occasions; but when I clicked the link in the last sentence I stumbled upon something called an Angled Gatefold and it's funky design called to me. Ok, yeah... and the fact that I realized I could basically wing it and not do lots of measuring and things helped too. So here's what I made:

Two of my favorite kiddos who happen to be siblings both have birthdays in April, so I generally mail their presents and cards at the same time. It's not like they HAVE TO coordinate, but if I can swing it, I always think it's a bit more fun. I broke out some of my all-time favorite, well-hoarded, classic Basic Grey papers (from Skate Shoppe, Lollipop Shoppe and Out of Print) to make the cards, then a bellyband for each in a coordinating pattern, and finally a fussy-cut motif to be the focal point. Often I'm fairly lazy about decorating the insides of cards, but having used double-sided cardstock for the bases, they were kind of half done already, so I printed appropriately punny sentiments and called it a day.

I'm joining Inspire.Create.Challenges #141: Fancy Folds, you should check it out because the DT cards are very inspiring! Then, head over to Shopping Our Stash to see what the rest of the Crew have made and start thinking what YOU will link up with us this time!

Flowers, Flowers, Everywhere!

You may well have already guessed that Challenge #491 at Shopping Our Stash has a floral theme, which is handy because it saves me explaining and thus I can get right to my cards:

Not only is nearly everything on both of these cards about ten years old, I have cut into my LAST piece of Basic Grey "Marzipan" paper (with the roses) which I have hoarded with Golem-like intensity for about a decade, lol. It kind of helps that I have pretty much used it one flower at a time... it's not that I didn't like the soft purple background, I just always think the roses look cool in a collage, so that's what I made.

The first card features three roses that were at the edges of the page, so I went with that. I've put them at the edge of a collage of torn vintage paper topped with Pavilio's gorgeous White Lace Tape (a leftover from The Ink Pad) with a little bit of Spun Sugar Distress Oxide added on using the tape as a resist. The background mat is from BG's Out of Print collection (now even more aptly named, alas). The sequins are from Fun Stamper's Journey and leftover from a class at Paper Anthology.

The second card has just one freestanding rose, layered over another vintage collage. This one's topped with super-cool translucent postage stickers that my craft bestie, Stephanie, gifted me; they're Matchbox Stickers from an asian company called Candy Poetry and I adore them. The round white sequins are from Eyelet Outlet and probably the only thing on either card that you could still purchase, lol!

Be sure to visit SOS to see what the rest of the Crew have come up with, then start planning your own card for, "Flowers, Flowers, Everywhere"!

Stars OR Stripes?

We're still celebrating Stars OR Stripes at Jingle Belles, or if you're really into it, you can make a holiday card that has BOTH... like I did:

I've circle-punched some vintage-inspired holiday illustrations from an older Authentique patterned paper, dusted off a leftover piece of classic Basic Grey Stripey paper, added a Simple Stories sentiment, and then bumped up the star power with washi tape, a paper strip and some ancient anodized brads. Not the fanciest card I've ever made but it's sweet; plus... it's flat and mailable, which becomes a more desirable thing to me every time they raise the postage rates!

Venture over to Jingle Belles to link up your own starry or stripey creation, and while you're there be sure to check out Stephanie's beautiful card!

SOS468: Sketch Challenge

Do you love sketch challenges as much as I do? I hope so, because we've got a fabulous one this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash and it looks a bit like this:

Ok, technically, it looks EXACTLY like that, lol! And I found it so inspiring, I made not one, but two sketch cards:

Back in the day, my favorite paper company was Basic Grey; and I have to confess that I still LOVE them! My well-hoarded collection of papers is dwindling, but I really enjoy using them, so I've raided my stash of Skate Shoppe and Lollipop Shoppe for this pair of fun and colorful cards.

These are made specially for a brother and sister whose birthdays happen to both be in April, to whom I generally mail small gifts, so I quite like it that the cards are unique but similar. I also like that I had some of the circle-patterned paper left in both colorways, since those circles echo the circles of the sketch so well.

Be sure to visit SOS to see all the design team cards and then start planning what older and much-beloved items you will re-discover to use on your own sketchy masterpiece!