The Reason for My Absence

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We are over the moon about our new addition! As you can imagine, life has changed quite a bit for us. We're sleeping a little less and working a lot harder, but we couldn't be happier. Our little guy is just as precious as can be!

In case you may have been wondering, High Notes Ink isn't going anywhere. Quite the contrary! in fact, Whitney and I just whipped out a custom invitation order this afternoon. So please keep us in mind anytime you're in need of a special card or special order.

We're Baaaaaaack!

Hello Lovely Ladies!!!!

Goodness, it has been too long since Susan and I made a post on here! But don't be fooled, it is not that we haven't been busy, but only that we haven't had the chance to post any of our wonderful creations. Our lives are both ridiculously busy, and we have some extra special news to share in the next couple posts, so be sure to check back over the weekend! The stuff we have been creating include some baby shower invites, assortment packs, the fabulous sparkle patterned sets, and so much more! We are so excited to get those posts up for you to see them! We have some new stamp sets we are breaking out too! There is so much exciting stuff going on and we are so excited to be back to sharing it with you all!

Today, I am gonna share with you a super sweet Valentine's card I made for my HunnyBun. Susan and I are momentarily locked out of our craft room, so with the latest Lawnscaping Challenge, I headed to Hobby Lobby for inspiration. With only a couple stamp sets, 2 ink pads, and a punch, I chose to focus more on patterned paper from The Paper Studio to fill the space. I absolutely LOVE :) how it turned out! I even thought up an adorable Wallet Lovin' to accompany it. You can check out our post on what Wallet Lovin' is here...it really is perfect for Valentine's Day, or any other day for that matter!

Sometimes I impress myself with what I can whip together with minimal supplies..and in a minimal space! It is almost refreshing when you can make something out of nearly nothing! I love that feeling! (Just disregard the messy desk and poor lighting!)

Well, be sure to check back for some BIG NEWS! We have a few surprises in store for you this week! so stay tuned!

Happy Thursday!
Whitney

Christmas Preview: Joy to the World

I don't know about you, but I just can't get enough of this Christmas stuff! Sure, I get just as mad as the next person about the retailers shoving Christmas down our throats before it's even Halloween. But there's something different about creating handmade items that you know will be sent to friends and neighbors far and wide and filled with love and family pride!

Today, I bring you a new design with one of my favorite Christmas stamps. And when I saw this card by Susan Raihala over at her blog Simplicity, I just knew I had to try it for myself. I loved the effect of tracing the line in the sand with the scissors to really give the effect of the wisemen shuffling through the dessert sands on their way to find the King. Couple that with the genius use of white space and you have a combination that equals perfection, IMHO. We opted to allow the scene to take center stage, but to keep the sentiment from disappearing altogether, we embossed it in gold for just a bit of dimension and sparkle.

All of our Christmas products are available for immediate order. This card is available in packs of 10 for $30, or you may purchase any design individually for $5 each (prices excluding shipping).

Keep stopping in - we have plenty more to share!

Christmas Preview: Let Earth Receive Her King

Good day, everyone! The holidays are in full swing here at HNI. Whitney and I sit around listening to Christmas music on Pandora while we work. I *heart* Christmas music, especially the classics. I really could listen to it all year. But I digress. On to today's reveal!

We've invested in some new stamp sets this year, and we absolutely fell in love with The Sounding Joy set from SU!. So many possibilities with this set. For this card, we chose to layer the beautiful star (lyrics from "Joy to the World") with the gorgeous sentiment "Let earth receive her King." And what better way to reinforce our royal theme than with a royal color scheme. To make the sentiment really pop, we chose to emboss it and then pop up the panel. The kraft base reminds me of the stable - absolutely fitting, don't you think?!

We're really loving all of the designs that we're creating this year, and we hope you do too. Remember, all of our Christmas preview items are available for order RIGHT NOW. Each card design is available in packs of 10 for $30 or you can purchase individual card designs for $5 each (shipping excluded).

We have LOTS more to share with you, so stop by tomorrow.

Christmas Preview: Twinkling Trees

Hello, everyone! I hope your week is going well. Today, I'm super-excited to bring you a preview of one of the cards in our 2011 Christmas Collection - Twinkling Trees.

We were really late in introducing our 2010 line, so we felt that a few of our designs didn't get enough love. This lovely card is a perfect example. While the design is recognizable from last year, you may notice that we've spruced it up a bit to give it some more punch.

I love the simplicity of the design - a little sparkly embossing powder, the perfect stamps, and *voila* Sometimes you don't have to have a lot of bells and whistles to exact the perfect amount of holiday cheer! All of our designs are available for immediate order. Each set of 10 is $30 or you can purchase an individual card for $5 each (shipping not included). What a cheerful bargain!

We hope you like what you've seen so far. We have more exciting reveals on the way!

Congratulations

Good Monday to all! I hope you all enjoyed your weekend. We've been busy here at HNI. Our Holiday Sweat Shoppe is going full throttle and we couldn't be more excited.

Today, though, I have a different reason to celebrate. Recently, some dear friends of mine got married, and no gift would be complete without a handmade card to express best wishes, right?! In making this special card, I took this design a step further by incorporating the bride's colors and a portion of the wedding invitation. And I found this Viva la Verve challenge perfect for the layout - a perfect balance of all of the elements I wanted to include. I used some Glimmer Mist to mute the white flowers and to change the color of my eyelet ribbon so that both would better coordinate with the other papers I had selected.

When all was said and done, I really loved the look and I especially loved the personal touches that let the new couple know that this card was made especially for them on their special day.

Thanks for stopping in today. We have some VERY exciting holiday reveals coming up this week; so be sure you pop back in!

Sitting Next to You

Good Tuesday, everyone! I hope you enjoyed your Labor Day weekend as much as we did. The weather finally cooled off and it turned out to be the most wonderful weekend to be outside. And so I spent the majority of it out in my new outdoor kitchen/entertaining space!

Unfortunately, because I was so interested in lounging around outside, I wasn't paying very good attention to the challenge deadline calendar for this wonderful creation. But I shall give props to the inspiration challenges anyway.

Last week, Whitney told you about a client of ours who asked for pet sympathy cards. This particular client runs a boutique catering to pet owners and she hasn't been able to find "good" pet sympathy cards. In my own experience, I know exactly what she's talking about! So I've always made my own. And now we'll be providing some of our personal designs to others for those times when you need to express condolences to friends on the loss of their furry loved ones.

This card was made with cat owners in mind. I don't know if your sweet kitties are anything like mine, but they are definitely lap companions. And my furry felines always bring to mind the phrase "Sitting next to you is my favorite thing to do." I believe this sentiment goes both ways.

Our design was inspired by this Sweet Stop Sketch. It was perfect for creating our little living room scene. And what better to make the scene more realistic than a little felt! The gals over at Moxie Fab challenged us to use felt and we knew it would work perfectly in this design. We popped it up to give the scene a little more depth and dimension. The muted color scheme really draws your eye to the couch where the kitty sits.

When all finished, we really loved how this one turned out. Hope you do too!

Hellloo.

Howdy everyone!

Today I wanted to bring to you another card that is in a group of cards called Pet Sympathy cards. We had a special request to make these, and we have finally made out initial 5 designs. I don't know about y'all but I think my pup Hamlet is the best thing ever. He is about my favorite thing in the world, and I would be devastated if anything ever happened to him. I love that this set of cards we are making helps ease the sorrow that one feels when their 4 legged friend leaves them. In this process, we really had to think about what we would want to get in the mail after such a tragedy. You do not want to be too happy or too sad, you have to keep a general design that is pleasing and not too crowded, and I really think that today's design fits all of these, and it is one that I absolutely LOVE. The colors and layout mixed with the image and sentiments seems just perfect to me. I would love to get some support as sweet as this after losing the love of my life (don't tell my hunny that. lol). The layout of this card was inspired by Simon Says Stamp's Challenge here.

Since this card is all about dogs, I thought I would post a picture of my 4 legged child, Hamlet. He is almost 3 years old and is FULL of energy. He loves to run, play and go for walks. He is also the best snuggler. :) Well, I hope you have a great day and show some extra love to your pets if you have any. Have a good one! (Hamlet says "Ruff!")

Sending some sunshine

Good morning all,

We have officially broken our streak of +100 degree weather here in North Texas after 40 days with temperatures in the 100's. We definitely are not lacking any sunshine here, but for those who might be, we have a perfect card to send your way!
This cutie is an adaptation of one I made before, but we chose to make it a little cleaner and do White on White for the current Simon Says Stamp Challenge. We love this cute little scene, and thought that it was perfect for one of our Cards Of The Month for the lovely ladies who get one of our cards in the mail each month. We love using our new PTI dies and of course, my favorite, Lawn Fawn stamps!

Well, I hope you all enjoyed your short time with us! I am gonna enjoy this 90 degree weather! Such a cool front! :)

Hoppin' Good Birthday

Good morning, everyone! I hope your week has gotten off to a great start.

Today, I have a super cute card to share with you that is a part of our new Simply Birthday pack. The entire card is based around a sketch - the Week 1 Viva la Verve sketch for August, to be precise. After admiring our creation when finished, we also realized that it works for the current Wee Memories Dare to Color challenge - after all, there are certainly more than 4 colors going on here!

Knowing that we were designing a birthday card, we wanted the colors to be bright & cheerful so we began digging through our patterned paper stash. That's when we found this adorable fish paper, which got our wheels turning ... the sketch lent itself perfect to an ocean scene! And we just happened to have some really cute ocean-themed, glittery foam ... and, well, you can see what happened from there. We used some new PTI dies to make the sun and we pulled in a strip of cork to give illusions of the sand on the beach.

When all was said and done, Whitney and I were both over the moon with how c-u-t-e, CUTE this card turned out! I would love to get this in my mailbox. Wouldn't you??

Thanks for swimming by today!

Party Hats!

Good Thursday Mornin' Y'all!

It is HOT HOT HOT here in North Texas, so Susan and I are staying cool inside while working on some more fun projects. We have lots of orders, which is great, and just got our biggest one delivered the other day, so YAY! It is nice to check things off the list, and it seems like we are on a roll. We are almost done with our new Simply Birthday Pack and this is one of the cute cards we are adding to the mix. It is CAS which is my usual style, and bright and cheery which makes me happy. We thought we would pick a plethora of colors for this one-layer wonder, going right along with Wee Memories' current challenge #63 Dare to Color.  The initial inspiration came from Chupa's recent post here. The party hats worked great as solid colors, and the sentiment just "sang" to us! :) We thought the music notes from Lawn Fawn's 'Teeny Tiny Backdrops' really brought to sentiment to life. It just makes me wanna sing the whole song...which I did....while making this card!

Well ladies, I know Susan has an ADORABLE card to share tomorrow, so we hope to see you back! Thanks for stoppin' by, and stay cool!

Mixing it Up

Happy Saturday! I hope you're all enjoying a little respite from the work week. I know I sure am. Whitney and I have been quite busy with a queue FULL of orders. Whoohoo!

Today I'm bringing you one design that we made for a client who was looking for a unique set of thank-you cards. When I saw this month's Diva Dare over at Verve, I just knew it would be perfect for this set. AND we have this pack of patterned paper that we've just been itching to use on something. And *voila* this beautiful card was born.

Do you ever have paper that you just fell in love with but then find difficulty using? That would certainly apply to the paper we used for this set. It's all cream & white patterns - a mixture of toile, stripes, filigree, and damask. Simply stunning but a bit challenging to use without losing it in the overall design of the card. With designs this gorgeous, you want them to speak for themselves, if ykwim?!

Oddly enough, we hadn't thought to let the patterns stand alone until the Verve Divas dared us to be Sentimental About Paper! All we needed was a few pop dots, a little pop of sparkly color, and a simple sentiment to make the design complete. Why a simple sentiment? Well, for this particular job, we didn't need a sentiment that said it all because the client would be using these beauties to write personal notes to her intended recipients. But you can see how this design is easily adaptable to accommodate a much larger/longer/wordier sentiment.

For me, the combination of this fantastic paper along with the beautiful turquoise accents really seals the deal. Yum!

Thanks for stopping by today. Hope you've enjoyed the visit.

Coral?? Really??

Howdy, everyone!

I hope you're staying cool. It sure is h-o-t, HOT here and I know it is in other parts of the country too. Sure, we're used to heat but not for a month straight! My poor a/c is running all. the. time. Which means that it's a great time to be inside making goodies!

Up for you this evening is a card for our new Simply Birthday pack. We want our pack to be as diverse as the people who will receive them, so we're mixing it up with images and color schemes.

Today's color scheme comes from this week's ColourQ challenge - early espresso, calypso coral, pool party, island indigo, and white. I'll be honest, I loved it all until I saw the coral. And you wanna know what I groaned to Whitney? "Do you think we can substitute an orange without anyone noticing? Orange is so much more ... I don't know, birthdayish." *snicker* Needless to say, I found this color scheme pretty challenging!

But once we started pulling papers and possible stamp sets to use, it all kinda came together. We saw this card by Mariana Grigsby in our browsing this week and decided the layout was just perfect for our card. We knew that our blue hues would serve as the anchors, while the key to making it all work would be to make the most challenging color - coral - the "color pop." What can be coral-colored? *insert Jeopardy theme* Of course...flowers! And that pared down our stamp choices considerably. We used the brown, along with pop dots, to make our sentiment panel stand out against the busy background and the scalloped grossgrain ribbon added a nice touch to finish it all out.

When all was said and done, I was surprised to find that I liked the card so much ... coral and all! So thanks, ColourQ, for making me spread my wings and break outside my very boring color box!!

Critters in the cake!

Heelllloooo Everyone!

We are so happy to bring to you an amazingly cute card we put together this week. We got some new Lawn Fawn stamps in, and after seeing Kelly Marie's you tube video using Bake Me A Cake here, we decided that paper piecing this cute card would be perfect! We also have some recent animal inspiration and thought we would go with that to bring extra cuteness to this birthday card! The polka-dot papers worked great for this fun cake...or stack of presents, whichever you see it as, and the orange, yellow, and blue accents seemed like good bold accents between the multitude of colors this card has going on! A simple layout inspired by the sketch over at Sweet Stop proved perfect for this cute little scene! A touch of color on the animals, a few pink noses, and it turned out better that we could have hoped!

Thanks so much for stopping by! We have more cute stuff coming over the weekend! So see you back here soon!

08/03/11: Thanks to the ladies over at the Lawnscaping Challenge who spotted this card on their patrol this week and gave us a shout-out on their blog!!

HELLLLOOOO!

Hi Everyone!!!

Susan and I have taken a little hiatus over the past couple weeks due to our ridiculously crazy lives, but we are back in full force and have TONS of projects to share with you. We have been busy, we just haven't snagged the time to post all of them right away. With that being said, we wanted to share with you all today another addition to our recently requested pack of cards titled "Difficult Anniversary". These cards are meant to be sent to someone on a difficult anniversary, be it a wedding or birthday of someone who has passed away. This card is one of my favorites and could be used for so many different occasions, but we chose an inside sentiment specifically for this pack. I never thought the color scheme would be so perfect, but it has really become a combo I am very fond of! It is amazing what 1 accent color can do for the whole card!!

Well, I hope you all love it as much as I do!

See you back tomorrow!!

Sending Some Sunshine

Good Afternoon All,
I am excited to share with you today a new card for our Simply Sunshine pack. It is fun, bright, cheery, and CAS of course! Susan and I got in some new dies and we are having fun using them! Today's card uses a few new ones, and also some cute critters from Lawn Fawn's Critters In The Burbs. The dog and cat go so well together, that I just HAD to use them together. I usually like mixing sets up, but this one just seemed right. I chose to enter this one in Lawnscaping Challenge #11 which is clean and simple, ad right up my alley. Now, I am no pro, but I also was able to work on my watercoloring skills for this beauty, and I really think I am coming along nicely. Well I hope you enjoy the post for today! We will see you back here soon!

Feel Better Soon Flowers

Good Morning!

I hope everyone is waking up as refreshed as I am. I have a fun post to bring you all this morning, one that I really love. This Get Well card is from the most recent Assortment Pack we are putting together here at HNInk! It is bright and cheery enough to make anyone's day, but seems perfectly perky for that friend who might be feeling under the weather. There is nothing a few flowers can't fix, and it helps that the colors are so vibrant! I love that there is lots of white space, something I am quickly swooning for. I am always thinking about white space when brainstorming now! We thought this would be a perfect example of our style here at HNI and that is why we wanted to enter it in Wee Memories Challenge 59 Free For All! I usually don't enter these very often because I am a super sucker for getting inspiration from something and going from there, but I really love how this card turned out. It is based on this card by Latisha Yost. 

 Thanks for stopping in today! See you all back here tomorrow!!

Dad...My Guide, My Compass

Hey there! Thanks for joining us for our second reveal of our 2011 Father's Day card designs. When designing our line, we gave serious thought to what we wanted each card design to represent. We wanted each of them to be more than just a card that goes in a drawer. We wanted each one to speak to its recipient and convey a special message from each cardgiver.

Today's card speaks to the stalwart. Not only is this dad dependable and steadfast but he is an ever-present compass and moral guide on his child's journey of life. We felt like the Viva la Verve sketch from Week 3 really reinforced this simple yet effective message. We took a few liberties with the sketch, but if you study the card, you will see that each element is firmly in place - just not in the form that you may have expected. Simple but oh-so effective! Wouldn't you say? The color scheme is one of our tried and true masculine favorites. What better way to reinforce dependable and steadfast than with a favorite color scheme? I love the effect of the white craft ink on the chocolate - aged, worn, like dad's favorite shirt.

What do you think? Have we achieved what we set out to convey in our design?

Thanks for stopping by!

Steadfast and True...Dad

Well, yesterday's little soap elicited some responses from you, dear readers. And honestly, I'm quite glad for that. Sometimes one wonders if there's any validity to the ideas that go floating across the ol' noggin. So it's nice to get some commentary.

As I mentioned, when Whitney and I designed this year's line of Father's Day cards, we really gave each some serious thought. We wanted them to speak, not only to the cardgiver, but also to each intended recipient.

Today's card design speaks to all of those dads we see as the mighty oaks of the family. They are steadfast, true, strong, an ever-present shelter in both fair and foul weather. This week's Color Splash Challenge over at The Playdate Cafe was absolutely perfect for this card, particularly since we were able to use a neutral, like kraft. The splash of green is perfect for our sheltering tree. The sketch is straight from Saturday's Sweet Stop Sketch. Turn it on its side and *voila* the perfect design!

Thanks for dropping by today. We hope that you've enjoyed the second of three Father's Day card designs!

Faithful, Dependable, Comfortable ... Dad

Hey, everyone! Are you enjoying your holiday weekend? I heard an interesting observation about Memorial Day that really made me stop and think. So often we take the true meaning of the holiday for granted and merely view it as a means to a long weekend when instead we should be both remembering and celebrating those who have believed that "some things really are worth fighting for." So thank you to the fathers, grandfathers, brothers, uncles, cousins, and friends who have believed and still believe that this great nation and its ideals are worth fighting for!

Oddly enough, this same notion made me reflect upon Father's Day. I know you may be thinking: Susan, you've rocked OUT of your rocker! But follow me for a second. So often we become desensitized to the meaning behind a holiday and merely focus on the celebration itself. Don't get me wrong, celebrating is important. But I think that consumerism has led us away from true intent. So in designing our Father's Day cards, we asked ourselves: what does Father's Day really mean; what messages do we want our cards to convey?

Today's card is for those fathers who we view as great protectors with soft hearts and comfy hugs. They're much like their favorite chair - faithful, dependable, trustworthy, comfortable, comforting, safe. That's why we chose a stamp from On My Couch (Papertrey Ink) as our focal image. It truly wrapped up this message in one convenient package. Our masculine color scheme and eye-catching addition of text is from this week's Embellish Color Trends Challenge. I really loved how the soft color palette reinforced the feelings of calm, comfort, and serenity that so many of us think of when describing our dads. The CAS layout is straight from the Viva La Verve Sketch May Week 1. The sketch was ideal in its simplicity, which really allows the image and imagery to take center stage.

When all was said and done, both Whitney and I stood back and gave ourselves big ol' pats on the back for how well this design was formed and executed. I'd like to tell you it's my favorite design of all of our 2011 Father's Day card designs, but let me tell you, when you see some of the others, you'll see why I'm not so quick to commit! But this one ranks right at the top for sure!

Thanks for dropping in today - I hope my little step up on the holiday soap box doesn't scare you away from the other terrific designs we have to share with you!

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A big THANK YOU to Paige for choosing this card as 1 of 26 featured in the Create: Blog! Father's Day Challenge. If you've come here from the Create: Blog, welcome! And thanks for stopping by.