Monday, March 18, 2024

NEW Ranger Archival Colors!

Today at Ranger we're celebrating the debut of SIX gorgeous new Archival Ink Colors: Wine Cellar  (a deep rich red); Cayenne (a medium-hued red with orange undertones); Beach Cruiser and Mountain Lake (two lovely medium blues that go with everything); Aubergine (a gorgeous purple that perfectly splits the difference between red- and blue-toned); and Graphite (perhaps the most beautiful and useful shade of grey EVER?!) Oh and did I mention that not only are there Ranger Archival Reinkers for all of the above, there are coordinating Stickles for each shade, as well!

I'm up on the Ranger Project Page with my first make to feature these fantastic new shades; it's a card on which I've white-embossed Simon Hurley's Bitty Botanicals background, then used Simon's The Loo! stencil on top, to make a very detailed multi-color ombre tile effect... with accents of glittery Stickles, of course! I'd love for you to jump over there and read all about it.

MM12: Distress Watercolor Pencils

It's the twelfth Mandala Monday of 2024 and I've gone a bit grungy playing with my Distress Watercolor Pencils from Ranger. For this one I drew all the outlines first (using three sizes of Letter It Fineliners, which are impressively water-proof!) and then went crazy coloring, shading, flickling, brushing and blotting all of the blue and green Distress Watercolor Pencils from sets 1-3. At the very end, when the piece was thoroughly dry, I added a few details with a white paint pen, then made it into a 5.5" square card.

Friday, March 15, 2024

BLING On the Holidays!

This fortnight at Jingle Belles we're BLING-ing on the Holidays by making cards that incorporate jewels, gems, beads, pearls, glitter, stickles or anything sparkly. Here's what I made:

This card has a lot of elements (and A LOT of sparkle!) but it came together quickly because nearly everything on it was a leftover! The background was stamped with Simon Hurley's Bold Holiday Blooms and embossed with Ranger's Green Tinsel and Lime Tinsel Embossing Powders. It was one of several panels I made while playing around with said glittery e/p's to create this post on the Ranger Project Page; (the Emerald Green Archival-Inked mat was made at the same time). The strip featuring two offcuts of green patterned paper and some Eyelet Outlet Fancy Long Bling I found in my EO box when retrieving the tiny Pearls and the Jewel Brad that's holding the silk poinsettias (I took apart an ancient poinsettia garland from the big box store a few years ago and am still enjoying the fruits of that labor) and pre-diecut glitter paper snowflakes. I have no idea where that giant pale green holly leaf came from, but it was the perfect size, shape and color so on it went!

Our Jingle Belles BLING It On challenge runs until the evening of Wednesday, March 27th. Be sure to hop over and see Stephanie's amazingly gorgeous (PINK!) Bling Tree card and start planning what you'll link up with us this time! 

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Bunny Kisses

Eyelet Outlet Rabbit Brads are adorable at any time of year, but obviously they're excited to be the stars of the show just before Easter! Here they've hopped onto a supercute word-art journal card, which is also adorned with White Daisy Brads, a few bright green Leaf Brads, and matted on fabulous EO Carrot Washi Tape! Large and small scallop dies from Wendy Vecchi Heartfelt Thanks and Scallops die set by Spellbinders. 

Whatever holidays you celebrate, Eyelet Outlet has the perfect Brads, Tapes, Bling and embellies to adorn your cards. Don't forget: it's officially Tradeshow season... check our Tradeshow Schedule to see when the EO Booth will be coming to your town!

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

SOS517: Round and Round

If you've already guessed that this fortnight's challenge at Shopping Our Stash involves making a card or other project with a strong theme of circles or dots... well done! That means I can get right to my (super stashy!) card:


I started with the beautiful aqua-blue Hambly patterned paper with the rows of circles; stumbled upon a large circle frame I had diecut from some fab dark woodgrain paper but then (apparently) never used; filled the frame with a fun cloudy sky (MME I think, from 4 or 5 years ago?) then loaded on lots of fabulously dimensional tropical-themed stickers from Paper House Creations that somebody gifted me a while back... long enough for me to have forgotten who and when, but if you're reading this and recognize them, THANK YOU! In the last month or so, I have become completely re-smitten with my various corner rounders and punches and apologize if you're getting tired of seeing them, lol.

Our SOS517: Round and Round challenge runs until Monday evening, March 25th. Why not unearth some older goodies from your own stash and join the fun!

Monday, March 11, 2024

Mappy Mandala Monday

I'm celebrating this Mandala Monday by parking my tiny car collage in the tiny car garage! I stumbled upon this fun library catalog card on which I had apparently, at some point, started drawing some mandala shapes... but then, for reasons which now elude me... stopped and abandoned said card. So it seemed like a good idea to finish the mandala, add some color, a scrap of map, a peachy rose and a tiny vintage car. Hope your week has started off well!



Friday, March 8, 2024

Prepare to DIE(cut!) (Again!)

It's week two of our celebration of diecutting at Jingle Belles and this week I've used three dies to make two versions of one card. See?


Penny Black's Glorious Poinsettia is my focal image and I cut it several times from green and from red to make it more substantial and to emphasize the petals and leaves. I also used two of the three dies in Tim Holtz's Sizzix Mixed Media Christmas set to create background patterns using negative space, then layered the pierced backgrounds onto contrasting colors. As you can see, I have no problem at all with combining multiple patterned papers; and NO, for the record, I've never met a Christmas plaid I didn't love!

Jingle Belles' diecutting challenge runs until next Wednesday evening, March 13th. Hop over and see Stephanie's card, take a look at the Readers' Gallery and start planning what you'll link up with us!