Alphabet Artist Trading Cards (A-I)

Hello crafty people, I hope you are having a great weekend.  I was sorting through some photographs and I came across these Artist Trading Cards (ATCs) which I made for a series of swaps last year.  I thought they would make a fun blog post so here is the first batch…. from A to I.

I hope you like this selection of ATCs, it was a really fun challenge and so interesting to see how the others in the swap interpreted the challenge and how people used different techniques.  I’ll be back soon with  next batch.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

Having a whale of a time!

Hi crafty people, how are you all doing?  It’s getting colder here in Scotland although no sign of snow yet.  Today I’m back with a card entry for both the freshly made sketch and Simon Says Wednesday  challenges.  The sketch is here and the SSS challenge is to create a clean and simple card.

I had a few sales bargains arrive this week from Clearly Besotted Stamps so I chose to use the “Whale done” set to make a get well card.  I cut a square from some polka dot paper and rounded the corners as per the sketch.  The whale was stamped using the cool graphite dye ink pad and the water is bahama blue from memento.

I’m trying to do some more clean and simple cards but it’s definitely not my natural tendency, but I think this one counts as CAS!

Thanks so much to everyone who stops by the blog, it’s so lovely to know that people take time to read and even to hit like or leave a comment!

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

Fluttering by to say hi!

Happy Tuesday everyone, how’s your week going?  I’m back with another project painting with pixie powders, this time using pinks and purples.

I heat embossed this butterfly stamp in a few different colours first to see the different effects (using white, silver, clear on black ink and sparkly on black ink).  Then I used pixie powders (aubergine dream, silver dream, purple violet and scarlet mist) to give these butterflies some pretty wings before fussy cutting them out.

The background was made with the same stamp (heat embossed with clear powder) and blending distress oxide (picked raspberry) and distress ink (shaded lilac) and then lightly spritzing it with water.  I followed the sketch from the current fusion card challenge and used a stamp die for the square.

The finishing touches were some nuvo drops in black.  I added some of the background paper along the bottom of the envelope and a butterfly inside the flap of the envelope.

I’m entering this project for two challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge and

 Fusion Card Challenge.

Thanks so much stopping by and I hope you’ll pop back soon.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja! x

Waving not drowning!

Happy Monday crafty people!  I hope you had a great weekend and that your week has got off to a good start.

My first post for this week is my entry for the Freshly Made Sketches challenge and here is the sketch.

I used a stamp set that I’ve had for ages from Altenew called “You are” for the waves and I used a sentiment stamp from Letter it.  I stamped the waves and heat embossed in white.  I then added some water to pixie powder (emerald green and teal wash) and painted the waves.  They have a lovely sheen and I thought the colours complemented the blue card to make some pretty waves.

I then stamped and heat embossed the sentiment using the Wow embossing glitter in Calypso.  I made a glittery panel to mount the sentiment on by heat embossing a piece of scrap card with the same embossing powder.  I then popped it on using 3d pads to give it some dimension.  The finishing touch was to add some bubbles using nuvo crystal drops in ivory sea shell.

What do you think?  Have you used pixie powders to paint?  I think they must be my most reached for supply at the moment, do you have any other techniques using them?  Thanks so much for stopping by my blog, it’s so lovely interacting with people on here, always makes me smile!

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

SAL Sunday – 1

Happy Sunday crafty people!  Today is a new kind of blog post for me as I’ve joined a group of lovely crafty bloggers for a stitch-a-long (SAL).  As one of my goals this year was to pick up some of my cross stitch projects this has been a great encouragement to get started and so every 3 weeks I will share the progress I’ve made.  The idea is to work on one project at a time until it is finished, I’ve got a box with quite a few works in progress so I started the month by selecting one.  I chose this cat, although I had only made a small start, I was drawn to it so it made the cut!

I’ve really enjoyed working on it in the evenings when we are sitting watching television and it’s kept my hands busy to get out of the habit of having a treat or three of an evening so hopefully will help the waistline too!  So without further ado here is my progress so far….

It’s a wee bit messy and I’m fairly sure I’ve miscounted here and there but I’m just going to keep on going and not let perfectionism stop me enjoying the process.  I hope you are finding time in 2019 to do things you enjoy without the pressure for it to be perfect!

I’m looking forward to visiting all the other blogs in this SAL group, please give them a visit too, I’ve linked them here so you can easily find them.

Avis , Claire, Gun, Carole, LucyAnn, Kate, Jess, Sue, Constanze , Debbierose ,Christina, Kathy , Margaret , Cindy  , Helen ,Steph , Linda  , Heidi , Jackie , Sunny , Hayley ,Megan ,Catherine , Deborah ,Connie , Clare , Mary Margaret, and Renee.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

Bubbles for the male room challenge!

Hi crafty people!  How are you doing today?  Today I’m sharing a card I made for The Male Room Challenge which this time is “anything goes, optional twist beverages”.

I used a spotty stencil to ink and then heat emboss the white “bubbles” on the background.  Then I smooshed on some distress oxides ( cracked pistachio, blueprint sketch, salty ocean & twisted citron) and distress ink (mustard seed).  I mat and layered it on some blue card and added the sentiment from a letter it set.  The can is my interpretation of a pepsi can and it’s a die I’ve had for a little while but never had a reason to use it…. until today!

I hope that you like my fizzy card and thanks again for visiting my blog.  I love it when you pop over and say hi in the comments.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

A cocktail for dry January!

Hi crafty people, is anyone else doing a dry January?  I think I must have had it on my mind when I picked up this new stamp in the sales!  It is the Cocktail Time stamp and die set from Crafter’s Companion.

I decided to use it today to make a birthday card for my stash.  I created the bokeh background with some distress inks (twisted citron, cracked pistachio & peacock feathers) and moonlight white brilliance ink from Tsukineko.  I also added a few 3d gems that I alsp picked up in the sales and an ancient stamp that I’ve probably had for 20 plus years!

I was pretty pleased with how it turned out, I hope you like it too!

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges

Cupcake Inspiration Challenge  – Something new

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge  – Something new

Thanks for visiting the Ginger Ninja Crafts blog.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

Snow drops card

Happy Monday crafty people!  I hope your week has started well and that you had a great weekend.  Ours was really good.  We ate pizza, watched Aquaman, tidied away our Christmas decorations and I did some cross stitch and tried to learn a bit of crochet!

Today I am sharing a card which I am entering for a couple of challenges…. Firstly the Freshly Made Sketches Challenge which is currently this sketch…..

Then also the Alphabet Challenge blog which is currently on U (Use some stitching – real or faux).

It is a lovely mild day today so I decided to make a spring themed card with this snow drop die from Craft Emotions.  The background panel was cut with a stitched edge die and all the patterned paper came from a Santoro gorguss girl pack.

I finished off the card with a 3d gem and a thank you stamp from K Craft.

I hope you like my finished card and as always thanks so much for stopping by the Ginger Ninja Crafts blog.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

Art Journal beginnings

Hello crafty people!  I hope your first week of 2019 is going well.  We are back into our usual routine today and although it was lovely having time off I think I was ready to get  back into normal daily life!

In my last post I listed five goals for 2019 and one was to start an art journal to practice some mixed media techniques.  I wasn’t sure where to start but I remembered I had joined an art journal facebook group ( Nina Ribena’s Art Journal Prompts and more ) so I jumped into the latest prompt.

The challenge was to create a bokeh sky page with fireworks for New Year.  Somehow in my vast selection of craft supplies I didn’t have any fireworks so I found a flower stencil that I decided could pass as a firework burst!

It’s the first page for my art journal and the first time I’ve tried the bokeh technique.  I was quite pleased with it, although I hope I will get much better over the course of 2019.  Do any of you have an art journal?  Do you have any resources that helped you to develop mixed media pages?

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog, I’d love to hear how your year has started and if you have made a start to any crafty plans for 2019 yet.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

2019 Crafty plans

Happy new year crafty people!  I hope you had a good end to 2018 and that you are looking forward to lots of fun times in the coming year.

I’m not one for making resolutions, well that’s not strictly true!  I’ve been very good at making them and then even better at not achieving them and then feeling generally rubbish about it.  Last year I didn’t really set myself any goals but there was a few things that I wanted to try and the year flew past and I didn’t make the time.

So this year I’m not giving anything up, instead I’m focusing on some things that I want to do for fun .  I thought I would share my list here and I can post an update every now and then to see how I am getting on during 2019.

1. Learn to crochet (I even got a book for Christmas so I have no excuse!)
2. Pick up one of my unfinished cross stitch projects.
3. Start an art journal and practice using mixed media techniques.
4. Read 50 books
5. Visit a castle (or other Historic Scotland site) every month.

They aren’t all crafty but I thought I’ll keep them all in one place for accountability.

I’d love to hear if you have any crafty plans for 2019.  Are you learning anything new or picking up something you haven’t done for a while?  Thanks so much for visiting Ginger Ninja Crafts and I hope you’ll pop over again soon.

Crafty hugs

Jenny (AKA the Ginger Ninja!) x

(Photo by Ian Schneider on Unsplash )