Happy Valentine's Day

I am in Florida for the rest of the winter.  I have some stamping stuff, but by no means do I have it all.  I do not have even most of my stuff.  I do have some stamps, stamp pads, a few gelatos, my Copics, a few acrylic blocks, most colors of card stock that i use, some cutting tools, a few punches, and a few dies.    I thought I had my  heart dies because I knew I had this card in mind to make here.  But I don't. So I had to deal with punches.  So to create this card I had to use the punches creatively and trim the paper so I could even  use the punches.

The verse is found here http://techniquejunkies.com/couldnt-love-you-more/ and is a Technique Junkie stamp.

Layers and ribbon and glitter paper behind the punched out hearts complete the card.

On February 1 there will be a Blog Hop with the new releases.  Please come and join the Design Team and see the new stamps!

Have a great day -- and get inky!

Judy Jackson

Winter Has a Beauty All It's Own

 Many of us complain about winter, and the ice, and the snow.  But it does indeed have a certain beauty that no other season has -- despite its drawbacks.  If I never had to go out in winter I would enjoy watching the snow and all -- if I could stay warm.  Thus, I go to Florida in January where I can be warm.  But I have a ton of family and friends who LOVE winter, love snow, love being out in the cold weather.

I tried to capture that winter beauty in my card.   I chose to use black card stock and detail silver embossing powder.  I used Technique Junkie Retro Sparkles - http://techniquejunkies.com/retro-sparkles/ and the new Technique Junkie January Release Beauty of Winter - http://techniquejunkies.com/beauty-of-winter/.  Both were stamped on black card stock and heat embossed with detail silver embossing powder.

I used Star Dream silver text weight paper for layering.  The sentiment in punch out, and the silver punched out twice to layer behind the black piece,  A silver ribbon and bow is added.

Have a great day no matter how cold or warm your winter is!  And get inky!

Judy Jackson

A New Table for Me!

At my little home in Florida, the table I had was not all wood. It was fiber board with a Formica top. It was uneven at the center. Because I am only at this home a few months of the year, neither Ron nor I ever wanted to spend a ton of money on furniture. I knew the table would need to be replaced at some point. I would not get rid of it until I had found the "right" table to take its place. That happened by accident this year. At a mission store there an oak table and found chairs. The finish on the table was dirty in spots. But it was such a good buy, I bought it. I mean it was only $49 for the table and the four chairs. The table is solid wood. How could I go wrong? So today i washed the table and got a lot of dirt off. Then I started sanding it with 220 sand paper on a sanding block. I could tell I didn't think it was "just right" yet for staining so I called Dave France for advice. He was very helpful and even loaned me his electric sander. What a help! Just a little while ago I stained the top of the table and it looks lovely. Tomorrow I will add the polyurethane. You can see the sanded table, and the stained table. I can hardly wait to add the polyurethane! The table already looks lovely. This task is not within my normal skill set. However, at one point I stripped, stained, and polyurethaned all of our knotty pine cupboards in our kitchen. Ron helped but primarily I did all of the stripping and staining. The light spot in the foreground of the stained table is light reflection.

And now the final look.  The table top has four layers of polyurethane. I worked on this for nearly two days straight.

 

Discover Winter!

There are so many things about winter that people enjoy about winter- sledding, skating, skiing, cross country skiing, ice fishing and more.  People also seem to enjoy the beauty of snow and ice in places Neither fun to drive in.  And since I do not like cold, I prefer to spend my winter in Florida.

I used die cuts for the focal image on my card. I pressed each die cut  on my Versamark pad so I could use a sparkly embossing powder and heat set it all.   The verse is a Technique Junkie stamp called Beauty of Winter - http://techniquejunkies.com/beauty-of-winter/ .The sky was sponged in place before I added the various die cuts.  The verse was stamped with Versafine ink, covered with clear embossing powder and heat set.


It was a fun card to create!  Have a great day and get inky!

Judy Jackson

Love -- Lacy Gatefold Card

This is a more fussy Valentine's Day card than some you might see, but it was worth it.  I found this die on line and could see how this would work as a "gate fold." It was really rather simple in it's final  creation but I had to figure it out.  It is a larger card than an A-2 regular sized card.These are the steps I did to create the card:
1. Cut 2 of the lacy rose panels. They are made to be used in this way.
2/ I measure how long the part was for the fold under of the lacy rose die cuts.
3. I folded back a corner of the lacy panel die cut.
4. I measure how  wide I needed the red panel underneath would need to be and cut that out.
5. I attached the sections that fold under to the back side of the red panel.
6. I cut out a white panel 1/4 inch large on all sides of the red panel and adhered the red panel with the die cuts to the white panel.
7. I used a white heart shaped doily  and die cut a red heart to out behind it.
8.  I used the Technique Junkie Love Heart - http://techniquejunkies.com/love-heart/ - and inked it with Versamark.  Then I added a red embossing powder that had a lot of red sparkle to it and heat set it. I die cut out a heart from that stamped and embossed image.
9. I die cut another red heart that was slightly larger than the other heart.
10. I adhered the smaller heart to the larger heart.
11. I thought that the red heart lacked something so i used my Versamark pen  and ran it around the red border, dipped in the sparkly red embossing powder, and heat set it. So pretty!
12.  I adhered ONLY the left half of the Love Heart piece to the folded back section of the two lacy panels of the gate fold.
13. Then I realized I needed a ribbon to keep the gate fold closed.  I wish I had thought of this earlier and I would have attached the ribbon before attaching the  lacy panel to the white card stock, but I didn't.


Do you send Valentin'es?  I do to my grandchildren.  So I need to (just like you need to) get inky!
Judy Jackson

Happy Valentine's Day!

This is a pretty and fun Valentine's card.    I used 3 Technique Junkie stamps:  Love Heart - http://techniquejunkies.com/love-heart/, Love Overlay - http://techniquejunkies.com/love-overlay/, and Happy Valentine's Day - http://techniquejunkies.com/happy-valentines-day/.  and on the Happy Valentine's Day stamp I only inked the words and a small section of the flourish from the "H."

The Love Overlay stamp was inked in red and then I  used a die to cut the half-circle swirl for a spinner card.  The Love Heart stamp was inked with Versamark, and  then  the image was heat embossed with detail gold embossing powder. The punched out heart with Love Heart stamp is raised up and attached to penny to make it spin in the die cut track. ``

The entire card is mounted on red card stock for the base card.

Have you created your Valentine cards yet?   Remember all of the Technique Junkie January release stamps  are on sale for 15% off through January 9, 2017!   You can see all of the new releases here: http://techniquejunkies.com/january-2017-release/. 

Have a great day, and get inky!

Judy Jackson

Explore - Dream - Discover!

This focal image stamp is another January Release of Technique Junkie stamps paired with Technique Junkie stamp French Bicycle Collage - http://techniquejunkies.com/french-bicycle-collage/ .

I used a light green ink, stamped it off once and then stamped it again on white card stock.  The Technique Junkie Amsterdam Winter - http://techniquejunkies.com/amsterdam-winter/ - was stamped with black Memento ink on white card stock.  It was colored with Copic markers and shows the winter leaving and Spring is coming.

The brick background is Brick Wall Background - http://techniquejunkies.com/brick-wall-background/. And the verse is from the set Road Trip - http://techniquejunkies.com/road-trip-set-of-6/. It was heat embossed with detail black powder. Layers add to the visual interest of the card.

Have a great day and get inky!

Judy Jackson

New Year, New Stamps, New Sale, New FUN!!

New stamps are always fun. New stamps in a new year are exciting too.  So we have a bunch of new stamps to show you to begin this New Year..  And remember every stamp on the cards I am showcasing is a Technique Junkie stamp and all of the stamps in the January release are on sale for 15% off through January 9, 2017!   You can see all of the new releases here: http://techniquejunkies.com/january-2017-release/.

Now a disclaimer -- if I take the same links and put them in an email -- they become "hotlinks." But when I put them in my blog, they don't. I don't know why, and I don't know how to fix it. So there are times the links are "hot" and some times they aren't.  Some you may need to copy and paste the link. And I am sorry.

You should have come from the blog of Pam DeChellis: http://journeyawakensthesoul.blogspot.com/. If not you might want to go through the entire  blog hop stating at the Design Team blog - http://techniquejunkies.blogspot.com.

The Technique Junkie stamps I used for this first card are: Funky Kitties - http://techniquejunkies.com/funky-kitties/  (not a January release) and Cat Crazy - www.techniquejunkies.com/cat-crazy/.  I used my MISTI - http://techniquejunkies.com/misti-most-incredible-stamping-tool-invented/-  to create this card.  I placed the white card stock in one corner.  I then laid down the cat stamps die face down on the white card stock. so I was sure of the placement.  I closed the lid and pressed. The cling back of the stamps put them all on the lid.  I applied the mustard color to the cats and put the lid down stamping those images on the outside edges of the white card stock.  I used my black dye based marker to apply black ink here and there on the died of the cats. I closed the lid, and hurrah - the ink went right where it was supposed to be. The letters and the eyes were colored with Copic markers. I layered the cat on card stock and layered him again on the base card followed by lots of layers.  A mustard ribbon finishes the card.

Isn't this just a fun, fun stamp! One  of my husband's sister would be one of these ladies!  The stamp I used is By Us - www.techniquejunkies.com/by-us/.  The image is colored in with Copic Markers. Both the focal image and the saying are mounted on card  stock and adhered to the DSP on the base card.  Vellum is die cut out and adhered to a piece card stock cut with the same die. I love the purple hat on the first lady.

My last card is a Valentine. I will have a few more Valentine's later this month.   I used Love Heart - www.techniquejunkies.com/by-us/ and Love Overlay - www.techniquejunkies.com/love-overlay/. I stamped the first layer with red ink on white card stock. I ran this piece through my Xyron machine to put adhesive all other the top.  Then I stamped the same image again in red ink on vellum but this time I covered the ink with sparkly red embossing powder and heat embossed the powder.  Now I flipped the vellum so the images do not line up.  I stamped the Love Heart image - www.techniquejunkies.com/love-you/ - on white card stock and and used the same red sparkly embossing powder and heat set it.  I cut out the heart and adhered to a piece of red stock and used my scissors to cut a border around the heart. It is adhered to the white heart doily.  A pretty ribbon was tied around the vellum and card stock layer and adhered to the base card.  I had stamped the Love  Heart image in red around the edges of the card stock.

Here is the entire Blog Hop list.    I hope you are able to find many cards you like, and stamps you want to own.  Don't forget  that all of the stamps in the January release are on sale for 15% off through January 9, 2017!   You can see all of the new releases here: http://techniquejunkies.com/january-2017-release/.

Design Team Blog: http://techniquejunkies.blogspot.com
Lanette Erickson: http://stacksofscraps.blogspot.com 

Cheri Weston: http://stampnboomer.blogspot.com
Kathy Stacy: https://craftynurse4u.wordpress.com

Ro Donner: http://rodonner.blogspot.com/
Beth Norman: http://www.sunflowers-dragonflies.ca
Pam DeChellis: http://journeyawakensthesoul.blogspot.com/
Judy Jackson: http://judysstampart.blogspot.com - you are here!
Pat Huntoon: http://patstamps.blogspot.com - the last stop is with the incomparable Pat Huntoon!!

So now you can hop along the Blog Hop.  Have a great time and get some deals as well.  Get inky!

Judy Jackson