Today I have the pleasure and honor of hopping with Courtney Kreeber as part of her new online craft magazine, Create and Inkspire. There is a small group of us are talking about what originally “inkspired” us to get into cardmaking, and what our journey through the process has been like. You should have arrived here from the super sweet Maria Nyce and the next stop after me is the amazing Jennifer Hartsgrove (Don’t worry, I’ll put the links at the end too!) What about you? Was it a company whose product spoke to you? Was it a YouTuber you serendipitously found? Maybe it was a technique that sucked you in, like heat embossing. Before I get into my story, let me share the card I made for the hop.
![20200711_004359[1]](https://misplacedmojo.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/20200711_0043591.jpg?w=560)
The background is a Cover-A-Card stamp by Impression Obsession called Flower Garden, heat embossed in white embossing powder from Simon Says Stamp. The large “friend” sentiment is from MFT’s Anything But Basic Friendship sentiment set. The sub sentiment is from Pink & Main’s Happy For You set. I used makeup brushes to ink blend 3 colors of Distress Oxide inks over the embossing. The sentiment is heat embossed in white on vellum, which I then ran through my Zyron to hide the adhesive. The panel was die cut with a Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle die and popped up on fun foam for dimension. I added white strips of cardstock to finish off the edges of the vellum and added glossy white epoxy dots to finish it off. Here’s another look:
![20200711_004609[1]](https://misplacedmojo.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/20200711_0046091.jpg?w=560)
So what “inkspired” me??? My best friend. No, she wasn’t a cardmaker. She was a scrapbooker like me, but she lives 600+ miles away and sharing my projects with her via pictures wasn’t nearly as much fun as when we would scrapbook together during visits. A mutual friend suggested cardmaking since I already had all the supplies… inks, paper, embellishments… I just needed sentiments. She suggested I get a stamp set with many sentiments to choose from. I purchased a Hero Arts set called Everyday Sayings with 18 sentiments. I remember thinking… “There. This one set will have everything I could need, so I won’t have to buy any more sets.” And I stuck to that one set for a long time, until I realized it didn’t have any holiday sentiments. From there it was a very slippery slope and I won’t admit here just how many sets I currently own! Or how many are on my wish list!!!
Since that first card, my bestie has received many cards from me, but not as many as she deserves. As any good friend would do, I sucked her into the cardmaking hobby too! I mean, she already had all the supplies… except a good stamp set for sentiments. 😉
For almost a year we had a challenge group consisting of me and my bestie plus the friend who got me cardmaking, and her bestie. We took turns picking sketches or themes and marveled at the variety in our end results and how our supplies and styles impacted the design. Life happened and we disbanded. I missed it so much I searched for similar groups only to be blown away by the cardmaking community online… Splitcoast Stampers, YouTube, blogs, and online challenges. I immediately started a blog so I could participate and share! I’ve have since found even more inspiration through magazines, Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook groups like Handmade Happiness, the group founded by Courtney Kreeber.
While I miss scrapbooking, I love that I can create *and share* mini pieces of art in a relatively short period of time compared to scrapbooking. And perhaps one of those cards will “inkspire” someone else to try out cardmaking. They probably already have all the supplies they need… except for a good stamp set for sentiments!!! 😁
I hope you enjoyed my story and will continue on the hop to Jennifer Hartsgrove. If you are visiting me for the first time, I’d love if you would leave me a comment while you are here and consider subscribing to my blog or following me on IG @misplacedmojo. Be sure to check out Create & Inkspire too, cause Courtney is releasing her first monthly kit *tomorrow* and you don’t want to miss out!!!
Misplaced Mojo 
[…] Karen (Blog) […]
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It was great hearing what inkspired you, Karen, and seeing this beautiful creation done with embossing and vellum. I’m inspired just seeing it! I especially like the white border on your vellum – it’s a delightfully happy card! hugs, de
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Donna, so nice to hear from you sweetie!!! Thank you so much… it was hard trying to put much of this into words when I am literally inspired by EVERYTHING! I hope this card makes the recipient happy 😊 Crafty hugs to you!!! Hope you are doing well!
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Gorgeous card Karen. I loved your inspiration story with your friend.
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Doesn’t it seem like its always your friends that get you into trouble 😉 I don’t even want to calculate how much money those 2 women have cost me!!! 🤣
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What a great inspirational story. Mine was a card I made for my sister who lived over 2 hrs away. Very pretty card. TFS
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Beautiful card, Karen. I loved reading your story on how you got into cardmaking.
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Thank you so much, Amanda! Your sweet comments always mean a lot to me because I admire your cards so much 😊
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Beautiful card and I just love the colors tyfs your inspiration
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Thanks so much Maylynn, and what a pretty name!!! 😊
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Karen, I love your card. I was a member of SCS for years and still have a gallery there. I used to do all the swaps but it got overwhelming. I still use the sketches from there and was often inspired by the challenges and there were some fantastic challenges on that site. Anyway, I’m so glad to see you in this hop today. -Renee
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Glad to be here! I’m still on SCS but I was always a lurker there… unless the subject of Evernote came up. That was the only thing I felt I could really contribute on. I still love all the inspiration available there! And yes, overwhelming!!! Hugs!
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These colors are beautiful together!!!! Great card
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Thanks Keionna!!! Hugs!
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I love your card, so colorful. I love your story and so fun to have a bestie who you can share your fun projects and do together, even though it’s long distance.
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Sadly she went back to work full time and has lost her crafty mojo, but she still enjoys hearing about my crafty ventures and of course being the beneficiary of many of my creations! Thank you for the sweet comment, and I’m so thankful to have made so many crafty friends through HH and Courtney!
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The vellum is a pretty touch!
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Thanks so much!!!
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haha fun to read your story …and you only needed one stamp…haha…now your are addicted..haha..and the card is lovely.
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Oh Dawn, its even funnier than that! I also thought I was going to save a ton of money on greeting cards!!! Bwahahahahaha!!! 🤣 Glad you like the card and thanks for the sweet comment!
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LOL I know a lot of people who started doing cards that way!
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It seemed like such an innocent and naive idea now!!! LOL
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Haha – famous last words. I only need one sentiment stamp set! I love the worn lipstick and twisted citron together. Thanks for the new color combo Karen! ❤️
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Oh, I left out the other ridiculous thing I thought…. “I’m going to save so much money on greeting cards by making them myself!!!” Bwhahahahahaha!!!! 🤣
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Beautiful card! I love the soft colours of those pretty flowers. And I liked reading your story too 🙂
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Charlotte, you always leave the sweetest comments! I’m glad you liked the story. With so many of us telling about our journeys, I was afraid it would be 1 of 2 stories over and over… Stampin’ Up! parties, and transitioning from scrapbooking. I was surprised to hear the variety of things that got us all started. So what about you? What brought you in? Did you start with cardmaking or were you doing another craft first and switched? While friendship pulled me in, its the friendships that I’ve made through HH and my DT positions that really keep me. Oh, the stamps are fun, but the cardmaking community is so warm and welcoming. If it weren’t for that, I’d probably go back to scrapbooking alone in my craftroom and not sharing anything online. I’d love to hear how you ended up here, being my friend from across the pond! 😊
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I’m glad you appreciate my comments! Yes it was nice to hear/read the variety of stories.
I didn’t start with scrapbooking or Stampin’ Up or anything like that. I started cardmaking right at the beginning of 2016 (or might have been very end of 2015) after receiving a handmade Christmas card from a friend. I thought it was a nice idea, so I made our thank you cards for our Christmas presents. And then I made a 50th birthday card for my uncle. And it just evolved from there! You could argue I’d actually started a few years earlier because I did make the save the dates and invitations for our wedding, but that was basically just card and printed out information stuck together. I think I did a good job of them, but they’re nothing like what I would call card making today. The invites I made for my younger brother’s wedding last year were a lot more involved, with stamping and die cutting and all that!
Friendship is definitely a big part of it, and I really appreciate the friends I’ve made in hops and groups and DT positions along the way. I kind of lost my mojo last year in September (I started a new job which was very stressful and I didn’t enjoy, and then lost the job in a way that I felt was particularly unfair) and was just going through the motions with the minimum required for my commitments, and then this Spring I got sick and stopped creating completely. A couple of team mates were concerned and checked in on me, and seeing their care and concern really helped to get me back and creating again 🙂
This turned into a bit of a novel, sorry! But thank you for asking me to share 🙂
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I think its very cool that someone’s handmade card to you inspired you to get into the hobby!!! I hope that for others when I send them a handmade card! I totally get losing the mojo… I come by the blog name honestly. It can be a major challenge to keep it flowing with life’s demands on our time, but then add health issues to the mix and it can extremely difficult. I don’t talk about it often because I try not to dwell on it, but 17 years ago I got diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that mimics Rheumatoid Arthritis in the pain and what they call Peripheral Neuropathy, basically weird and often painful sensations in my hands and feet. I deal with weird vibrations 24/7, sometimes numbness, and occasionally needle like sharp pains. Its only been since Covid that I’ve been willing to talk about it since finding out so many other people I know have autoimmune diseases. We all tend to keep it to ourselves especially when its a condition no one can “see”. You don’t want to come across like you’re a hypochondriac. Anyway, some days crafting or even typing is literally not an option, so those days I get caught up on YT videos. I’d like to say that I make good use of the good days to craft all day, but sadly its easy to feel rusty after several days off, or just hard to get the ideas to flow. I have been known to pull an allnighter when the mojo is flowing though!!! I took almost 4 years off from crafting and blogging during a flare up when it was all I could do to keep myself functional for my son’s sake. In hindsight I learned I only made it worse for myself by not making time for me, and now I try to catch myself before it gets me down. Helps that I have crafty friends asking me what I’m working on or checking in on me if I haven’t posted in awhile. I try to keep enough obligations that it pushes me to craft when I start getting down on myself, but not so many that I get overwhelmed or over-committed and miss deadlines due to bad days. I hope your health issues were short lived! And I’m thankful you too have people who will drag you back into the hobby and community to be inspired all over again. I think we all need those people, if for no other reason that they understand the ebb and flow of mojo and the time and effort cards take. Family members don’t get that, or the emotional benefits of being creative. Now if it were only true that crafting is cheaper than therapy!!! LOL I put myself on a spending freeze before Covid and stuck to it until Courtney’s destash… then that little purchase made me fall off the wagon. I really need to put some of the new stuff to good use and soon…. before Stamptember and Diecember come along!!! Always a pleasure chatting with you and getting to know you better!!!
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That sounds really tough, but great that you have some coping methods and support network in place. I have had issues with my lungs all my life, but with no clear diagnosis. I am more susceptible to catching colds, and when I do they hang around longer and affect me a bit worse than they would most people. And I work as a nanny usually with toddlers, who tend to be germ factories! I’m actually now thinking of trying to switch fields so that I’m hopefully not getting sick as often. Maybe if I can make this crafting stuff pick up enough I can just do that!
I’ve never done a crafty spending freeze (sounds like you started well with it, at least!) but I do stick to a pretty tight budget with my crafting stuff as we don’t have a lot of spare money. The majority of the time when I get new crafty stuff it’s from winning prizes, goodies for design team things, or maybe through discount codes for DT or hops. It can be so hard trying to avoid buying things!
It’s a pleasure chatting with you, too 🙂
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I wonder, have you been tested for an autoimmune disease? I know of a couple that cause lung issues, and autoimmune is not the first thing doctors normally check for. In fact, the whole group of autoimmune are diseases no one knows the cause of! I suspect that because you are so susceptible to catching sick, there may be an autoimmune cause behind it. I do wish you the best of luck at making crafting a career! You are very talented so I know you can do it!!!
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I may have been tested for autoimmune disease when I was a child but I’m not certain. I’ll have to ask my mum about it! Thanks for the suggestion. And thanks for the luck and for saying I’m talented – I don’t usually feel like I am 😅
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You most certainly are very talented, my friend! I am in awe over your beautiful cards 😊💗
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🥰
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I love your card and your story! I love the colors you chose for your card too! Your friend is very lucky to be the receiver of your cards!
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Thank you Debbie! That was just the sweetest thing to say!!! 💗 That just made my morning!!!
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So beautiful card, Karen! I love that floral background and the colors you chose! So fun reading your story and it’s so nice that you started with your friends (partners in crime :D). Seeing how friendly and supportive crafting community is is kinda what got me more into card making…not just making Christmas cards for all the relatives with my daughter since she was 2 years old 🙂
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If it hadn’t been my friend’s suggestion to make cards, I’d still be scrapbooking by myself… especially since my bestie has returned to work full time and hasn’t crafted in years. She’s just lost her mojo and already doesn’t have enough time to get done the things that need to be done, much less anything for fun. She’s one of those people who can’t relax if there are things to be done. I’m just thankful she enjoys hearing about my projects and this new season in my crafting of posting to FB & IG, potentially being in Courtney’s magazine, and DT positions. This is all stuff we never dreamed of when scrapbooking or starting out with cards. The best part of it all is the friendships I have made just since Courtney started HH. Who would have thought I’d have a friend in Finland!!! 💗 😊
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It’s just so amazing to find friends all over the world and I am so happy to have you 💗!! I’m so grateful that Courtney brought us together. Before that I had no one (in real life too).
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I”m so grateful too Bory!!! I may have friends IRL that craft, but I never see them, and they don’t craft like I do. I have 2 scrapbooking friends, but 1 is totally the Creative Memories style with just pictures and stickers and a title, no embellishments or inking. The other scraps like I do but she hasn’t in years since her youngest kid graduated. She doesn’t get into cards AT ALL. And while my bestie can appreciate my cards and the techniques, she gets lost when I talk to her about my new social media and hop ventures. She has no interest in that side of crafting. So its wonderful to have friends in HH who actually GET IT. I don’t expect to get craft famous, and I’m appreciative for any expose I get through Courtney’s ventures, but I am MOST appreciative that I found a group of supportive crafters and met some of my closest friends in this group! It amazes me that I get to chat with such sweet friends in Finland and the Philippines each day! So thankful to have met you 💗
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Great card, Karen! I kind of miss scrapbooking! I’ve been so focused on cards, I need to do a few pages. I love your use of velum and you’ve inspired me to grab out a sheet and use it soon! Thanks so much for the lovely introduction!
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Maybe we should challenge each other to do a layout! Or make it a collab so we get some pages in plastic. I have to admit I haven’t done a layout in about 10 years so I am really rusty, but I’m dying to scrapbook my son’s high school marching band years. I may not have scrapbooked in a decade but I sure didn’t stop buying supplies!!! 😆 The instant gratification of cards is hard to beat… even if a card takes hours. That’s still a fraction of the time I spent on layouts. I have another vellum idea kicking around my head that I hope to pull off before my end of the month DT and hop obligations, so stay tuned! I found some forgotten pearlescent vellum I bought from a stationary store and my brain hasn’t been able to let the idea go, I just need time to pull it off. And if you do bust out the vellum soon, I’d love to see what you do with it! Of course I will automatically since I stalk you everywhere on social media!!! I truly love your cards, and your sweet comments, so much!!! 💗
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I love reading about your card making story! It’s wonderful to have friends that share the same interests that you can trust and bounce ideas off of & can encourage each other! Thanks for sharing! Hugs!!!
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Friends make everything better!!! I’m so thankful for the new crafty friends I have made in HH!!! 💗
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What pretty card. Lovevthe colors. Great job.!
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Thanks so much, Lisa! I appreciate the comment!!!
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beautiful card. I realky like the vellum on the background.
I started cardmaking/papercrafting as a way of staying busy when I could no longer hike. It’s a long story – I started by making my own stamps and books. Now I too have an embarrassment of riches.
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Embarrassment of riches! LOL! I love that expression, CIndyellen! Crafting is definitely therapy for many of us… shame the old expression “Cheaper than therapy” is not even close to true!!! On that note, I have some “therapy” arriving next week from Jane’s Doodles that I can’t wait to play with and I of course got the first ever Create & Inspire kit. Need to get my butt in gear and bust out some cards! My dragon’s hoard of riches are getting dusty! I love hiking on the days I can do it. Because of some health issues I don’t vacation like normal people but we have found balance with camping in an RV and hiking on my good days. Its also nice cause I can bring along crafty supplies to pass the evenings or any rainy days of the trip. I would love to see some of the stamps you made! Thank you for the sweet comment!!!
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Your story is fantastic! I love the softness of your card and the bright white sentiment just makes it pop that much more!!
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Thanks so much, Terra!!! I enjoy writing almost as much as crafting!!!
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I love both the card and the story! I’m so glad you started down this path!
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I am too, otherwise I would not have met my beloved Squirrel Sisters!!! Love you girls!!! ❤❤❤
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