I Gotta Feeling it's the InKing Royalty Blog Hop

Welcome to InKing Royalty's May Blog Hop! We are grinning from ear-to-ear with excitement over all the amazing, new products from Stampin' Up!'s 2018 Annual Catalog - and you're going to love what we are sharing today. Today's Blog Hop is filled with projects that offer sneak peeks at new products from the upcoming catalog. What fun! After you read my post, I hope you'll hop over to the next person on the list at the base of this post.

Hey Everyone!

I'm really excited about this month's blog hop theme "I Gotta Feeling" because it means I get to work with all my new goodies! I just a got a new box of fun supplies on Monday, so I knew exactly where I wanted to start...with the beautiful new color Gorgeous Grape :)

Purple is my absolute favorite color, and I love that we now have a nice, bright purple in Gorgeous Grape. I see me using this ALOT on pretty much anything I can use it on.
One of my favorite colors to pair with purple is green, and I knew the new Granny Apple Green would pair up perfectly with Gorgeous Grape. They're both bright, vibrant colors and they are a match made in heaven.
Unfortunately it's been overcast and rainy here so I had terrible indoor light that isn't doing these colors justice, but when I get a little sunshine again I'll be sure to update with better pictures.
I used a new background stamp called Handwritten. I used my stamparatus to add my versamark that I inked up only in the center, then I heat embossed it in white and did watercolor wash of Granny Apple Green over it. The sentiment is from the new set Detailed with Love. It has a beautiful font, and it coordinates with the Detailed Trio Punch which is one of my favorite new things from the new catalog.
I hope you like todays color combo, and give it a try for your next project. I'm going to try Highland Heather with Lemon Lime Twist next...I gotta feeling they're going to get along great.

Thank you for stopping by today.  I hope you'll hop along to the next stop on the blog hop, Robbye Hamilton at Miss Hammie's Crafts . There's lots of inspiration to be found in this group - and you don't want to miss it!

​Thank you for hopping along with us.  If you get stuck during the Blog Hop, please use this line-up as a guide:

Brian King at Stamp with Brian

Jackie Beers at Blue Line Stamping

Deb Cozzone at Grand Central Stamping

Candy Ford at Stamp Candy

Shawn de Oliveira at Shawn Stamps

Lynn Kolcun at Avery's Owlery

Julie DiMatteo at The Paper Pixie

Pam Morris at Tap Tap Stamp

Sue Jackson at Just Peachy Stamping

Jennifer Spiller at Westside Paper Creations

Nina King at InkPaperSequins

Robbye Hamilton at Miss Hammie's Crafts

An explosion of flowers for Mother's Day #FF0007

Hello Everyone!

Today we are going into my secret vault of retired amazingness to make a Mother's Day explosion box really shine!
What's an explosion box, you may ask?
Only one of the coolest, most over-the-top cards that is bound to wow a recipient!
I discovered these cool card/gift hybrids a couple years back while I was  #Pinteresting (I'm not sure if this is actually what it's called, but it should be- let's make it happen). From simple to mind-blowingly detailed, there is an explosion box for every occasion. They vary in size and layers, but the most common is a 4" square box.

Cute, right? Looks like a really nice gift box that could hold some sweet treats, so you remove the lid to see what's inside, and...

Ta-Da! 

I've never failed to get an appreciative gasp when I've presented one of these...they are a crowd pleaser :)

Features: This box really shines with the stunning Sweet Soiree Specialty Designer Series Paper- I have fallen in love with this gorgeous collection of paper with silver foil accents. Every page is so beautiful, I had a hard time cutting it- but I did. Because you shouldn't keep this much beauty to yourself, you should share it far and wide!  #sharingiscaringyall  #idontwannahoardnomore 

Sweet Soiree DSP may be retiring, but the leaf punch lives on, and I love how easy it is to add texture and dimension to a project with it. 

Gotta have it all : I used the Make A Difference stamp set to custom design my greeting, and it was totally worth it to individually stamp each letter. I love the font and the ability to create any sentiment you wish! I got my stamp set during the early release of the Share What You Love suite...and of course I had to have it all! The bundle included Make a Difference and Love What You Do stamp sets, Share What You Love DSP and coordinating cardstock, matching ribbon and pearls and so much more. It's everything you need to get started making your own beautiful cards right out of the box.

And a little more newness I really love: The Detailed Trio Punch is a great new punch from the upcoming catalog. It has a corner rounder, a oval hole punch, and the lovely pattern you see on the card inserts in the pockets. I used all three here : first I rounded all the corners, then I punched the pattern  on those edges, and then lined up the guide mark on the hole punch side to add the ribbon hole. So quick and easy!  This punch works best when you press down directly in the middle instead of over the area you're using. 

The Secret Vault of retired amazingness: I love all the new and fabulous products Stampin' Up! debuts every year, and it always pains me a little to see some of my favorites retire to make room for them. When I really, really love something I can't bear to see go, I send it to my secret vault of retired amazingness (also known as the big storage tub in the corner). Every once in awhile, I'll pull something from the vault when it helps my project really shine...and this time I used two retired Bigz dies. They made the big bow on the lid and the pretty flowers in the center. The flower die can cut several pages at once so it made it a little faster for me, but if you want to make similar flowers without that die you can check out my post where I made some here.

I'm pretty happy with how this came together, so I'm entering into #FF0007 over at the Festive Friday Challenge. I haven't been able to play along lately, so I'm glad to be able to submit for this fun challenge. 

Thanks for stopping by today :)

Have a magical day!

Nina

Saying goodbye to Hearth & Home for the Pals Blog Hop

Welcome to our Pals Blog Hop, May 2018. This month we’ll be “Stepping Up with Textures or Techniques.” What's that? Projects that are “stepped up” by using textures or fun techniques. Who knows, maybe both! Join us in the fun while we inspire you to “step up” your creations.

You may be starting the hop here or you may be coming from a previous Pal’s blog. Either way, you’ve come to the right place. You’ll find the full line-up below to help you move or “hop” along from Pal to Pal.

Hello everyone!
My card today is a happy mix of retiring products and exciting new products that fit together seamlessly. I always hate to say goodbye to our retiring goodies, some of which I've had since I first started using Stampin' Up products-like the Hearth & Home thinlits dies. I made my first real card using these sweet and simple dies, and I really hate to see them go. I figure its it's only right for me to give them a proper send off!

Who doesn't love a window box full of beautiful flowers? I kept to a white and gray color scheme for everything but the flowers because I really wanted them to "pop" and stand out. I used three new gorgeous colors from our 2018-2020 In Color collection : Grapefruit Grove, Lovely Lipstick, and Call Me Clover ( which always pops in my head as Call me, maybe - just me?) I love how they just brighten that window box right up. For the curtains, I cut a doily and adhered it to the back of the window frame, and I like how it gives it instant texture and dimension while being super easy! I used my sponge brayer and the brick mask from Pattern Party decorative masks to create the brick wall, sweet and simple.
I do have a little trick for punching out the flowers. I don't know about you, but I really like to conserve every scrap of cardstock that I can, and until recently I would waste a lot of cardstock when I used punches with multiple shapes included. I would punch the whole lot out of whatever color I needed for one little piece, and a lot of cardstock was wasted. To punch out the leaves this time, I cut a 1.5" wide strip of Call Me Clover and fed it directly to that part of the punch. I had hardly any waste at all, which is a big win for me. For the tulips I used a strip about 5/8" and it worked perfectly.

A few quick tulips on the envelope and this card is ready to go! 

Now it's time to see how the rest of the Pals are Stepping up with Textures or Techniques. Please use the Blog Hop Line-Up below to move from blog to blog. Don’t forget to show us some love by commenting on our creations.

Mark your calendars for June 13, 2018 where we feature projects for Babies, Birthdays and Brides. You’ll probably even see products from Stampin’ Up!s new 2018-2019 Annual Catalog. Don’t miss it!

1. Mary Fish at Stampin' Pretty
2. Peggy Noe at Pretty Paper Cards
3. Lisa Ann Bernard at Queen B Creations
4. Su Mohr at Aromas and Art
5. Linda Suarez at All Night Stamping
6. Debbie Mageed at Secrets to Stamping
7. Stesha Bloodhart at Stampin’ Hoot!
8. Leah O'Brien at Stamp by the Bay
9. Jackie Beers at Blue Line Stamping
10. Beth McCullough at Stamping Mom
11. Pamela Sadler at Stampin’ Pink Rose
12. Mary Hanson at Up North Stampin'
13. Nina King at Ink Paper Sequins < You are here!
14. Karen Hallam at Karen's Stamping Habit
15. Wendy Klein at Doggone Delightful Stampin'
16. Jennifer Michalski at Stamping Serenity

Thanks for stopping by!

Have a magical day!

Nina

A Sweet Card for GDP136

This week at Global Design Project,  it's a CASE the designer challenge. These are some of my favorite challenges, and this week I'm super excited to CASE the talented Allison Okamitsu. She has one of the greatest blog names ever, and she's actually one of the first demos whose work I found online when I was first discovering Stampin' Up!

Isn't that just the sweetest? I love the colors, and the sweet little strawberries :)
My card:

I started out with a sheet from the Picture Perfect Party DSP, which is retiring at the end of the month. I tend to hoard our beautiful papers, so I made a challenge to myself to really start using them up before they're retired. I love the bright patterns in this pack, and on their reverse sides are photographs incorporating the colors to match. One page has a photograph of donuts in lots of bright colors including Lemon Lime Twist, Berry Burst, Bermuda Bay, and Peekaboo Peach. So fun!

These little donuts were super easy, and super fun to make. I used my 1" circle punch to make the bases out of some Crumb Cake scraps. The tops were also made out of 1" circles that I trimmed around the edges ever so slightly. I made the "icing drizzle" with memento black ink and the stem stamp from Sunshine Wishes.  I used my fine tip glue pen to make the glaze look nice and shiny. I had some tiny little sprinkle beads in my craft stash that worked out great as teeny sprinkles for these adorable little donuts.
You may think the sentiment looks a little familiar if you're a Paper Pumpkin subscriber...it's from the May 2017 Sprinkled with Love kit. I love getting my Paper Pumpkin on my doorstep every month, and I love when I can find a new project to use those stamp sets:)

Thank you for stopping by today, and I hope you check out all the other great cards at the Global Design Project!

Have a magical day!
Nina