JB2502: Candy Christmas

It's a fabulous photo inspiration this fortnight at Jingle Belles, so we're asking you to create a holiday card (or cards!) inspired by this fun Candy Cane Christmas image from Turtlecreek Lane. You can use as many or as few aspects of the photo as you'd like: maybe you love the the white tree smothered in ornaments; or the red and blue stockings could be your fave; perhaps you'd just like to create a mantel with stockings and decor; or you might adore that handsome Nutcracker. Anything and everything in the pic is fair game, just make sure you let us know what part(s) of the photo inspired you.

Here's my card and then I'll tell you my inspo:

I was immediately drawn to the photo's gorgeous white tree, smothered in candy-themed, candy-colored ornaments, so luckily I remembered that I still had stickers left from Doodlebug's Candy Cane Lane collection of a few years ago. I employed one of my oldest dies (Sizzix's Christmas Tree #2) to cut a tree shape from white cardstock, then spent an enjoyable half hour adding pastel candy canes, gum drops and hearts, plus some tiny pearls, before adding lots of colorful presents under the tree. I made my background a soft blue similar to the wall in the inspo photo and added another mat of red and blue as a little salute to those bold stockings.

Visit Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's beautiful card and link up your own photo inspiration greeting. JB2502: Candy Christmas will run until 6pm (Eastern) on January 29th.

SOS539: Glitter Me Happy

All that glitters... is welcome on a card for our new challenge at Shopping Our Stash! You can use loose glitter, Stickles or Stickles Glitter Gels, glitter glue, wink of Stella pens, shimmer pens, glitter paper... the choice is yours! I've used two of the above, can you guess which ones?

I made a background using one of my all-time favorite combinations: Stickles Glitter Gel in Galaxy with Simon Hurley's Grand Greenery Stencil on deep (DEEP) Matte Black Alcohol Ink Cardstock from Ranger. You can see how very very sparkly it is, even in the photo, which has probably only captured about 60% of its glitteriness. Those thin chipboard butterfly stickers are from the big box store and super-duper stashy: the last two in the pack and I bet they are ten years old? I used a sheet of DCWV black glitter paper as a lower layer; I originally had just a black cardbase, but I realized pretty quickly that since the butterflies had a thin outline of white I had better add a bit more white; which I did in the form of the cardbase and the layer directly under the design panel. The cardstock sentiment strip is from an older pack by Paper Rose Studio, and was the perfect finishing touch to my 5x6" card. 

Check out the SOS Crew's fabulously sparkly inspiration, then start planning what you'll link up with us this time. SOS539: Glitter Me Happy runs until the evening of Monday, January 27th.

SOS537: My Precious

The new challenge at Shopping Our Stash miiiiiiight be slightly more challenging than usual. This fortnight we want you to use something on your card that you're been hoarding in your craft supplies for way too long... it might be a piece of specialty paper, some vintage lace, or a fancy embellishment. We're asking you to be strong and give it a home on a card or project.

I have had this Doodlebug Doodlepop typewriter sticker literally for YEARS... it was actually displayed in my Art Lair! But I have a friend who loves vintage typewriters as much as I do and I wanted to make her an extra-special birthday card, so I bit the bullet and actually UNWRAPPED said adorable 3D sticker and used it and I loooooove how my card came out. The only thing older than the typewriter itself is that yellow notebook paper scrap which is absolutely ancient "Love, Elsie" from American Crafts. I wasn't actually hoarding it on purpose, but not only was the color and style perfect, it was pretty much exactly the right size for my A6 card. I think the Tim Holtz "Typo" alphabet dies are out of print, but I still love my set and was happy to break them out to fashion an appropriate custom background. Those pink Eyelet Outlet Heart Brads come in a set with red and white ones in two sizes. Sadly, they're going to be going out of print, but until they sell out, they're ON SALE in the EO Store!

Check out the design team inspiration at Shopping Our Stash and then start thinking what precious item YOU can use to make a card you link up with us this time. SOS537: My Precious runs until Monday evening, December 30th.

Stuck on Stickers

I haven't made a sticker mandala in ages, but I had so much fun with this, I predict you'll be seeing additional ones fairly soon! I used my Helix Circle Tool to draw some concentric circles and a Letter It Fineliner from Ranger for the smaller shapes that hold the puffy animal stickers. Reinforcement circles (cut in halves) and tiny triangles give the design more structure and tiny flowers have a bit of sparkle irl. In the center the sweet kitty from Dina Wakley's Pocket Circles Stamp Set is the perfect mascot!

 

SOS526: Summertime!

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we're celebrating SUMMER which means that we'd like to see cards and projects with a summer theme. That could be traveling, gardening, camping, BBQ, beach... whatever says summer to you! 

During most of my childhood, one of my favorite summer activities was going to the beach, or, as we said in the Philadelphia suburbs where I grew up, "down the shore". In my family's case, we often went to Wildwood, NJ and later to Cape May, both of which I still love today. To my knowledge, there are NO flamingoes at the Jersey Shore, nor are there tropical flowers and foliage; but there are lots of seashells. In the case of my card, the shells are from HoneyBee's Seashells Stamp Set c. 2022; the flamingo paper is from 49 and Market's Sunburst collection; the sentiment and foliage stickers are from an older Dear Lizzy line via American Crafts; and the ancient hibiscus stickers are from EK Success. I added brushed gold and pale pink mats, plus a bit of decorative machine stitching and my A7 card was complete.

Visit SOS to see what the rest of the Crew have made, then dust off one (or more!) of your older-bust-still-beloved craft items and make a card to link up with us! The SUMMER Challenge runs through Monday evening, July 29th.

SOS523: Sketchy!

It's time for a fabulous sketch challenge at Shopping Our Stash! Of course you can flip it, rotate it, stretch it or shrink it; just make sure we can see "the bones" of the sketch in your card.

Here's how I interpreted this awesome crafty road map:

I recently acquired an older sticker sheet from Echo Park's 2017 Summer Fun collection and the little scooter was soooo cute, I had to use it IMMEDIATELY!. Luckily, I had loads of scraps from various ancient Carta Bella, Echo Park, Authentique and Dare 2B Artzy patterned papers (this might be a record for how many plaids can be combined in one design, lol!) as well as some elderly October Afternoon washi tape and a border sticker of unknown origin. I've cut cloud clusters from a dwindling sheet of Simple Stories patterned paper and used a circle sentiment from the EP sticker sheet. A bit of machine stitching completes the design, not because it especially needed any, I just felt like sewing!

Head on over to Shopping Our Stash to see the Crew's awesome sketch cards and start planning how YOU will interpret this design. SOS523 runs until Monday evening, June 17th.

SOS520: Mamma Mia

Mother's Day (USA version) is just around the corner, so this fortnight at Shopping Our Stash we've got a challenge called, "Mamma Mia" for which we'd like you to create a Mother's Day greeting or a card for any other special woman in your life. Here's what I made

My mom is a keen gardener, a backyard birdwatcher. a proficient seamstress, she loves travel (especially Paris) and absolutely no form of bling has ever been made that she would not enjoy! I've gathered some ancient Pink Paislee and Photoplay stickers; leftover bits of Eyelet Outlet and Prima bling; and layered it all on top of the last few scraps of Blue Fern Studio's Bird Waltz paper; then finished off with a few pretty poppies cut from a paper that is so old I cannot even remember acquiring it!

SOS520: Mamma Mia runs through Monday evening, May 6th. I hope you'll hop over and see what the amazing Crew have made... then start planning a special card for a special lady in your life!

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!

JB2404: Text Me

This fortnight's Jingle Belles theme is called, "TEXT ME" for which we'd like you to create a holiday card that celebrates text. That might mean using letter stickers, dictionary pages, texty patterned paper, or just creating a card where the sentiment is the star... just using a small sentiment doesn't count - text of some kind should be the star of the show. Use your words, get creative and make sure you get TEXTY!

Coincidentally, a couple of weeks ago I used a Memory Box's two-layer Brilliant Joy die set to make a set of holiday card kits for Paper Anthology, and wound up with... I suppose you could say... an excess of joy! I glued them into little stacks of three, so they'd have a little more depth, then used them to create a text-y background on a piece of Photoplay plaid paper, which I augmented with (ancient!) vellum poinsettia stickers, as well as Eyelet Outlet Poinsettia, Cardinal, Cardinal Profile and Female Cardinal Brads. I trimmed a sentiment from a red texty patterned paper (Elle's Studio, I think?) and matted the whole thing on another alphabet-patterned paper from Recollections. It's definitely different from anything I've made recently, but I love how it turned out!

Jingle Belles' Text Me challenge runs until Wednesday evening, February 28th and if you're reading this, you're officially invited to join us!

SOS511: Whatever the Weather

This fortnight at Shopping Our Stash, we're celebrating weather elements, such as snow, sun, ice and rain. Which means you can pretty much make anything you want, from holiday cards to birthday bags... just so it has something weather-centric! Here's my card:

This is one of the fastest (& stashiest!) cards I've made all year, thanks to the fact that I found both the rainbow washi tape panel AND the pre-cut-out sun and cloud element in the box where my 12x12 sticker sheets live; the latter being where I found the bird, the bee, the "wonderful" and the chipboard heart. All I had to do was find a couple of coordinating patterned papers and a 6" square Kromekote card and I was all set! 

Head on over to SOS to see what the Crew have made to inspire you, then start Shopping YOUR Stash to see what you can link up with us this time! Challenge runs until Monday evening, December 18th.

This is BIG

It's an Elegantly Elephantine Mandala Monday thanks to this gorgeous Pink Momma and Baby Elephant Sticker from my friend Gina's Redbubble Shop where there are pages and pages of stickers, stationery, tees, accessories and sooooo much more... all adorned with Gina's colorful stylized designs, which I would call Whimsical Realism. You should probably go take a look... afterall... it's Cyber Monday, right?!

This mandala was created with Black Letter It Fineliners in my (now sadly discontinued) Dina Wakley Blue Edition Journal both from Ranger Ink. The gorgeous orchids, which serendipitously match the pachyderms perfectly, were cut from a freebie calendar.

Multi-Week Mandala Mashup

After several months of remembering to post my Mandala Monday entries every week on the blog, I suddenly hit a little patch of forgetfulness and skipped two weeks in a row, so here are THREE mandalas to start your Thanksgiving week:

MM46: Distinctly Dotty

Lindy's Magicals background, Letter It and Posca Pens... with a little bit of Tombow detail

MM45: Super Sticker-centric

A little stash of ancient, rediscovered Mrs. Grossman's animal stickers

MM44: Predominantly Purple

Lindy's Magicals, Letter It Fineliners, Poscas and Tombow detail

Pink Christmas, Week 2

It's the second week of PINK CHRISTMAS festivities at Jingle Belles, so Stephanie and I are still making predominantly pink holiday cards and donating $2 a piece to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation for each pink card that you link up with us!

Here's my card:

This week I raided my stash of supercute Doodlebug Candy Cane Lane stickers and used them to make a fun little snowglobe scene. I re-used that pretty pink snowflake wrapping paper for a sky and cut into some well-hoarded Lawn Fawn Knit Picky paper to make the background. I think the sentiment sticker might be ancient Prima, but it was in the "orphaned" sticker envelope, so I'm not entirely sure.

Come on over to Jingle Belles to see what Stephanie has made this week, check out the glorious PINK CHRISTMAS Readers' Gallery and then start planning what YOU will make!

SOS502: Vacation Destination

If you've already guessed that the new challenge at Shopping Our Stash involves making a card that evokes a place you'd like to visit, well done! You can go with a geographical location (Honolulu, London) OR a type of place (beach, campground) OR even a fictional place (Narnia, Emerald City) but if your destination isn't fairly obvious, please mention it in your post. I split the difference between actual and imaginary, so my card is set in Paris... circa 1935!

This card has A LOT of layers, even for me; it also has oodles of super-stashy items, certainly there's anything on it less than four or five years old and some of the rub-ons and stickers are considerably older. Roughly, from the top down we've got: K & Co camera (Life's Journey... going back a bit lol) and postcard stickers; We R Memory Keepers embossed rose stickers; Oriental Trading pocket watch and receipt stickers; ancient Paris-themed rub-ons (that amazingly still worked perfectly); some very cool 3x3" sheer, washi-like stickers whose origin is completely unknown to me; a bit of vintage sheet music and text paper (that you can't see at all but it adds to the collage irl); and some absolutely beautiful Eyelet Outlet Eiffel Tower washi tape that has (alas) gone out of print.

I'm also linking up with The Daring Cardmakers' latest challenge: Bon Voyage! 

What is your favorite Vacation Destination? Why not make a card which features it and link up with us at SOS this fortnight!

Week 8: ICAD Round-Up

We're getting to the end of the Index Card a Day challenge soooooo much quicker than I could have imagined, but here are my cards from this week:

Day 47: Mandala Monday

Today's mandala was 100% inspired by this beautiful bloom, which I cut out of an older piece of Vicki Boutin patterned paper.* Then I drew the outer layers of the mandala in a similar style, on a vintage library catalog card for a book about Gaugin. The flower is probably just a teeny bit too orange to strictly qualify for ICAD2023's Day 47 prompt of Vermillion, but let's just roll with it, k? 

(*The paper is called "Picked for You" and is from American Crafts' "All the Good Things" line.)

Day 48: Raindrops

An absolutely literal interpretation of today’s prompt!

Day 49: Focus

I actually had an index card nearly finished that was just concentric circles of patterned paper; and then I saw the off-cuts... circle slivers of various size, looking like funky broken piecharts and I immediately peeled everything off and changed direction!!! 

(& that is what ICAD is all about, imo!)

Day 50: Off-Prompt

Today's prompt was "Note to Self" and since mine was to clear my worktable off enough that the precarious piles were not threatened every time I got up to get something, I made a Clean-Up Collage from some of the many and various discarded bits thereon.

Day 51: Off-Prompt

Commemorating, in ICAD form, the amazing layered rainbow fruit salad we had last night. I did not include the yummy vanilla yogurt sauce, but feel free to imagine it!

Day 52: Weathervane

This eclectic collage has stickers, ancient rub-ons (that surprisingly still worked perfectly?!) part of a sewing pattern, wide washi tape and an American Eagle handsome enough to be (one suspects) a bit of a Weather VAIN...

Day 53: Museum

I *LOVE* museums! Big or small ones; wide-ranging or super-specific; traditional or modern; art museums, historical societies, botanic gardens... I'm there. My friend Barbara and I have built entire vacations around attending a specific exhibition in a far-flung city; @smilynstef and I devote a significant portion of every NYC trip to seeing what's on in our favorite museums. None of this has ANYTHING to do with my card, which features flower stickers on vintage paper, set off with washi tape frames; though the super-dense arrangement does bring to mind the Barnes Collection in Philadelphia.

♥♥♥

ICAD, Week 7

The NJ weather is pretty warm, but the Index Card inspiration on Instagram (aka #dyicad2023 hashtag) is red hot! Here are my cards from the past week:

Day 40: Mandala Monday

It's an Ink-Over-Collage Mandala Monday, featuring some of my favorite, extra-vivid Simon Hurley create inks, including Clear Skies, Later Gator, Shooting Star, Remember Me, Prom Dress and Roar!

Day 41: Off-Prompt

A surprising proportion of my collages are composed based on color; in this case cerulean blue and sunshine yellow. On a vintage library catalog card.

Day 42: Off-Prompt

Freeform funky flower doodles on a smooshed background of  Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks.

Day 43: Patina

Quite a loose take on today’s prompt of #PATINA because usually rust isn’t blue… 

(Ok yes, busted: this is basically just an excuse to sequentially smoosh some of my favorite Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks, including Night Sky, Prickly Pear, Sky Blue, Leaf Green and Morning Glory; and doodle with Ranger's Letter It Metallic Markers.)

Day 44: Wabi Sabi

Several years ago, during ICAD, was the first time I had ever heard of Wabi Sabi (the Japanese ethos of embracing the inevitable decay and perfect imperfection of the physical world) and the first image that I consciously recognized as being Wabi Sabi happened to be a crumbling brick wall with some vines growing randomly out of the mortar. Since then, I think I've made a Wabi Sabi Brick Wall card every year; and here's the 2023 version: handcut patterned paper bricks, pink index card mortar and stapled on wonky leaves. Not gonna lie... I really love this one! 

Day 45: Repeat

Pretty sure the "REPEAT" prompt was not intended as an invitation to repeat my favorite technique of a random collage featuring a historical lady, a sewing pattern layout, S & H Greenstamps, sheetmusic and found text (topped off with a few sticker butterflies) but... that's how I chose to interpret it!

Day 46: Millefleur

Millefleur is French for a thousand flowers, and has its origins in Medieval tapestries, where the foreground would have figures, animals or structures and the background would be filled in with lots of tiny plants and flowers, usually surrounded by green. Nowadays a millefleur pattern can be taken more loosely to be any allover pattern with smallish plants and/or flowers. In Italian, Millefiori also means a thousand flowers and generally refers to millefiori glasswork which comprises a bunch of glass canes all fused together and then sliced to resemble a sort of mosaic, vaguely floral, pattern. My card has very loose fleurs painted in some of my favorite Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks (Orange Blossom, Cornflower, Violet, Night Sky and Carnation) then outlined and detailed with Letter It Fineliners.

Week Six: Index Card a Day

Summer always seems to fly by at record speed, especially in June and July when we ICAD-ians are knee-deep in index cards and inspiration! Here's what I made this week:

Day 33: Mandala Monday

This weekend, Tammy G reminded me how much I love One Staple Collages, so I decided to celebrate Mandala Monday with a One Staple Mandala! My mandala layers are constructed of a library catalog card painted by my friend Mary and gelprints made by Gina and Linda (which they used to wrap some pretty fab birthday presents) enhanced with the newest set of Dina Wakley Collage Papers, Jumbled Letters, from Ranger and the dragonfly is from the biggest and coolest sticker book that Stephanie gave me. 

(Of which more later...) 

Day 34: Summer

Fresh strawberries are one of my very favorite summertime treats; I don't think I could even count how many of them I ate during the month of June. So when I found this cool pattern for adding an appliqued berry to knitwear, I couldn't resist a strawberrycentric collage.

Day 35: Astronomy

Inspired by today's prompt, I was randomly blending some of my new Simon Hurley create. Inks from Ranger, going for a sort of Aurora Borealis effect... and then... it turned into an abstract doodle. 'Cause that's the way I roll! 

Day 36: Imaginary

I'm taking an #IMAGINARY trip to Oahu, thanks to this fun hibiscus doodle, painted with some of my favorite Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks... Peachy Keen and Rosey Posey; with a little Viridian added in on the foliage. Did you know that the official State Flower of Hawaii is specifically the yellow hibiscus? So these are just "backup blossoms" then, but they were fun to paint and doodle! 

Day 37: Off-Prompt

Would you believe I had already made this torn paper collage background BEFORE Stephanie gave me the Botanists Sticker Anthology, the amazing book I referred to on Mandala Monday, which has hundreds and hundreds of gorgeous realistic plant and flower stickers.  

Day 38: Zodiac

My western Zodiac sign is Cancer and it's not that I have anything against crabs, but I confess I prefer my Chinese Zodiac sign, the dragon! This one came from the amazing Pearl River Emporium in NYC's Chinatown, he... (or she? it's hard to tell with dragons!) ...is perched atop a repro library card, adorned with a page from a Chinese zodiac calendar, and a little postage on the side.

Day 39: Levels

Funky (dotty!) flower doodles, made with my Zig Clean Color Dot Markers, from that late great bastion of NYC crafting... The Ink Pad! I like that the gridded card makes them sort of look like the coolest bar graph EVER!

Did You Say, "SOS500"?!

Yes! Yes, we did! It's time for our 500th challenge at Shopping Our Stash and we hope you'll come along and help us "Celebrate by the Numbers!" To mark an occasion featuring such a big number, we'd like to see projects with at least one numeral. Here's what I made:

Ok, yes, my card really does have only a single numeral, but what I really needed right now was a girly birthday card, so that's what I made. There is *SIGNIFICANT* use of older stash here; I don't think there's a single item that's less than 5 or 6 years old. I used up that sheet of cute chipboard critters; the oversized alphas were from the big box store yeaaaaarrrrs ago; the texty patterned paper was (I think) 7 Gypsies. This measures just over 6x6 and I confess it has exactly the vibe I was going for, which is always such a great feeling, isn't it?

Coincidentally, Seize the Birthday also has a (birthday-centric!) numerical theme this time, as well, though their challenge ends later this morning, so you'll need to be a bit quick. Still, they post a NEW theme every other Thursday and you can always choose their option of "Anything BIRTHDAY Goes" so you'll definitely want to check them out!

Meanwhile, head over to Shopping Our Stash to see what the crew have made to inspire you, then start thinking what you'll make to help us celebrate! ♥

Christmas in July with Double Trouble

Christmas in July is upon us and at Jingle Belles once again we've teamed up with the gang at Double Trouble Challenge which means you'll have twice as many opportunities to link up AND to win prizes!

You can link up ANY Christmas themed project with Double Trouble. At Jingle Belles, we're excited to be celebrating the USA's Independence Day next week, so we're asking you to incorporate either stars or stripes into your card design (it needn't be red, white or blue) … just stars or stripes (or both) in any medium you choose.

Here's my Stars and/or Stripes card:

It's no secret that I love stickers, generally; Doodlebug stickers, especially; and D-bug Xmas stickers particularly! So I was pretty psyched to find a whole sheet of little houses and cars from their Candy Cane lane collection a year or two ago, which I built my card around. My stars and stripes are, as you can see, subtle... just one starry and one stripey patterned paper, plus some really fun glitter foam star stickers... but it just goes to show that the "Stars and/or Stripes" theme is pretty flexible!

Head over to Jingle Belles to see Stephanie's card and the fun little prize that one random cardmaker is going to score this time. Then visit the Double Trouble Challenge for even more Christmas in July inspiration!

Index Card Round Up: Week 3

Still loving the freedom of making a completely random piece of art on an index card each day, with no pressure to end up with a perfect finished piece... just playing and trying different ideas!

Day 12: Glyph (sorta)

A somewhat tangential take on yesterday's "GLYPH" which has several meanings in various contexts, but "a hieroglyphic character or symbol; a pictograph" probably sums up the general idea best. I got an entire little booklet of safety icon stickers for less than a dollar on a mega-thrifting excursion with my friend Heather last year, and ever since I've been meaning to use them in a sticker mandala. And now I have! :)

Day 13: Superstition

Tuesday the 13th isn't (as far as I know) a source of superstition anywhere, but I still love that Tammy G elected to imbue this prompt with a bit of numerical significance. My handcut and paperpieced rendition of a black cat is placed against a full moon, thus also giving a tangential nod to the MOONLIGHT prompt from yesterday.

Day14: Typewriter

I am lucky enough to own a few vintage typewriters and I love using them to add text to cards and collages; also... they're pretty cool for staging. The typewriter on the index card is a Remington clipped from a slightly grainy 1940's magazine advertisement, it's surrounded by random lines from a typing textbook and the word "daisy" stamped in a typewriter font. I typed "daisy" repeatedly over an illustration of daisies, then fussycut and added them to the index card. The typewriter in the photo is my 1952(ish) Smith Corona portable, with beautiful two-toned green keys.

Day 15: Sea Glass

I wasn't entirely sure where I was going when I started painting random shapes in blues and greens. When I was done painting, I wondered if I should outline them? When they were outlined, I wondered if I should add doodles? I try not so succumb to, "What if I wreck it?" anxiety, but let's face it, we ALL feel that way sometimes, so here's my top secret strategy: Each time you get to a place where you fear you might "wreck it"... take a photo! Then fearlessly take the next step! 

(All of my favorite blue and green shades of Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks, painted using a waterbrush full of isopropyl alcohol. Outlined and doodled upon with Ranger Letter It Fineliner Pens.)

Day 16: Alphabet

Here's an example where I loved the idea... but not necessarily the finished card. My concept for #ALPHABET was to handletter a (repro) library card, then add found text to each letter. There's not particularly anything WRONG with the result, it's just somehow *not* quite what I was hoping for. If and when I figure out why not, you'll probably see another version. In the meantime, Day 16 was a triumph of process if not outcome, which is what ICAD is all about!

Day 17: Sunflower

About as literal as you can possibly get, just layers and layers of handcut patterned paper petals around a brown center, with a little machine stitching to hold it all together.

  

Day 18: Off Prompt

Every year of ICAD there are a couple of prompts I need to Google, and in 2015 or so, one of those was "OGEE" which turned out to be a style of pattern that I knew and liked, but never realized it had a specific name, lol. Since then, I've drawn or paper-pieced an index card version each summer, and here's the latest version, handcut from patterned paper scraps and machine-stitched for extra texture and durability!