It isn't cold here today. Actually, it's mild and a perfect day to be out raking leaves. I did that earlier. But a couple of days ago it was cold here, and the cold had me thinking about wintry things, like penguins, ice, snow, holidays....So, here's a card that I made along those lines.
The stamped images are all by Hero Arts and stamped using Memento Tuxedo Black ink. I colored the penguin with a white Inkssentials pen and the scarf with a Spica glitter pen. The blue layer is a shimmer-finish paper (from Target) that I embossed using the Snow Dots Cuttlebug embossing folder and the creative Cuttling technique. 
This is a close up view. I think you might just be able to appreciate the glitter of the paper. You also get a good look at the faux snow, or ice. :-) Kinda looks more like ice here. I'd bought it a while back from Cornish Heritage Farms. The patterned cardstock is by Me and My Big Ideas.
I have to say that when I read about these and saw the videos featuring these new inks I knew that I'd have to give them a try. Took a while to get my hands on some, but I finally did. Then of course things got busy and I had to put them on the back burner. ARGH!Today I got to use them. Woo hoo!
The bird is a Sizzix die cut that was made out of a coaster similar to the one that forms the background for the bird. Gotta like that Target dollar spot for stuff like this. Anyway, the bird isn't really supposed to have the funky head feathers, but I'd caught part of a flower while putting that die through, so I thought I'd put it to use. I applied the new Adirondack pigment inks to my die cuts. The Denim covered quite nicely. The Sunset Orange left some of the underlying design showing through, but that was fine with me. I then stamped designs on the bird with a My Favorite Things stamp, first with Sunset Orange then Sunshine Yellow. I accented some of the dots and curls with my Inkssentials opaque white pen. The sentiment is also by My Favorite Things and stamped in Denim. I used the Martha Stewart Doily Lace edge punch to embellish the layers.
I love the vivid colors and the opacity of these inks. They go one easily and smoothly. They dry quickly with a blast from the heat gun if you're the impatient sort. I'm going to like using these! The only problem that I encountered was removing that inner plastic cover from a couple of these ink pads. I think they were caught in the gluing process and it was a bit of a mess to get them off the pad. I mangled one of them quite nicely in the process, too. Other than that, hm, and because of that ;-), I'd have to give them an inky thumbs up!
The midweek "challenge" on daring cardmakers is making a card using a tutorial on doodling with patterned papers. Lythan wrote up lovely step by step instructions. I'm not a doodler, but I couldn't resist giving this a try.First off, I found out that I don't have many bold patterned papers in my stash, but I found some K & Company paper that I thought would work. Here's the pre-doodling phase.
I'd cut out some mini-scalloped circles using Spellbinders nestabilitities dies. I did the doodling on the patterns per the tutorial using a black gel pen and a Ranger Inkssentials white opaque pen. Here's how my card turned out. 
It's definitely an out-of-my-comfort-zone creation, but it was fun! The brown layer is the back of the patterned paper. The sentiment is a Posh stamp. I attached the doodled pieces with some pop dots to give them some dimension. I think this is a technique that I'll have to use again. Sure was less intimidating than free-hand doodling. :-)
