ASI 73 Expressing Artistry in Card Making: A Conversation with Justine Hovey

Jeff: 0:08

Welcome back to Art Supply Insiders. My name is Jeff Morrow and today we're talking with Justine Hovee. Did I say that right, Hovee?

Justine: 0:17

Yes, you did.

Jeff: 0:18

Wow, I always put your name, so we're talking with Justine Hovee, and Justine is a extremely popular YouTube artist and her specialty is in card making. Did I introduce you properly?

Justine: 0:37

Yeah, absolutely so. Card making is my art stream that I work in and also make courses, and I love to teach card making. That's more my thing, not just card making, but teaching card making.

Jeff: 0:51

Well, let's go back to the beginning Now. Are you professionally trained artist, or have you so taught? How long ago did you get started? Give us a little bit of the early days.

Justine: 1:05

Sure, well, if we go back to the really early days of Justine the student, I was the kid that got straight A's and then but a C in art. I just didn't understand the whole concept of taking your time and that there was a whole concept and method behind it all. I was pretty terrible at it, but I always felt like I had a really good idea in my brain of how I wanted my art to be, and then I couldn't do it because I'm not really a fine arts type of person. I'm not a technical artist, so I'm not professionally trained in any way.

Justine: 1:44

I'm a self-taught card maker and I remember I was about, I think, 14 or 15 and I went to my cousin's house I'm half Italian, so family's a big deal new baby of the family and she had a scrapbook on her table and what is this, explain what this is? And I saw this paper and stamps and inks and all these cool things and I could do that because everything's kind of half done for you and you just got to learn how to put it together. And that's how I started expressing myself creatively in paper crafting, starting with scrapbooking and then getting onto card making.

Jeff: 2:26

So how many years have you been doing all of this?

Justine: 2:32

Well, I started, as just you know, making things for myself at about 16, so, if I do the math correctly, here 19 years and I've been on YouTube for about 12 years, so I've been and blogging long before that.

Jeff: 2:50

Long before that. I got to imagine, though, that there came a time you were making these cards and you just thought wait a minute, I should go on YouTube. What made you take that leap from what's you do in your living room or dining room to being in front of? Well, you have a little under 100,000 subscribers, right?

Justine: 3:14

Yes, yes. So I think it came out of a love for two things, so my love of travel and my love of teaching. So I became a teacher and I moved to Germany and I was bored out of my mind because I knew nobody and I was kind of lonely and I decided I just started kind of burying myself in YouTube videos and there were only maybe two or three people that were making card making videos at the time and I thought to myself I can do that and I learned so much, and so my love of teaching and then my love of traveling. But then traveling turned into a bit of a lonely journey for a little while there. And you know, the cool thing about crafting is that you can bring it because you have this amazing online community that you discover alongside with card making and paper crafting and, I'm sure, any art really stream that you're in. You know you get to bring your friends with you no matter where you move to, so that's the nice thing.

Jeff: 4:16

That's. You're right. And you know what? My business partner, dave, and I have been in the art industry for probably over 20 years and every time we think we're out of it, we just keep coming right back because of people like you and people that we see at conventions. What a wonderful industry we have right.

Justine: 4:43

It is. It is amazing, yeah, absolutely that we can come together over a paper or a hobby or a paintbrush and just geek out and you know, for our audience.

Jeff: 4:53

Our audience is half fine art, half crafters, and my wife is a card maker in transparency. She watches you all the time. So thank you so much for costing me money. So you know, it looks like it's hard to make all these great looking cards that you guys do. They look better than what you see when you go to the drugstore. Is it as hard as it looks?

Justine: 5:30

I don't personally think so, but I know everybody's got their talents and everybody has their things that they find difficult.

Justine: 5:38

So the nice thing about card making, like I said, is a lot of the things are done for you, so you can have a stamped image and it's almost like for the fine art people the drawing is done for you, you just got to know what to do with it.

Justine: 5:50

And so I think it's a lot more about coming up with an idea versus executing it, because there are a lot of really amazing tools that are out there in the art industry and in the card making industry that allow you to make beautiful things without needing those fine art skills. And yeah, so I personally don't think so, but some people you know it's very interesting they will tell me they have a really hard time lining something up straight. That's their difficulty, you know. But then you can get yourself like a little laser pointer and you're good to go. Or if you can't, you know, if you want to create a scene with inks and a landscape or something like that and you can't do it with just a brush, then you can grab yourself some layering stencils and you know you can adjust. So I always say it's as complicated as you want it to be.

Jeff: 6:41

So you just said a laser. What did you say? It was a laser line pointer in construction.

Justine: 6:49

Aren't they like to line up paintings? Yeah, they're just like a little thing you put on your table. Click the button, you've got a straight line and you can line up your papers with it, if you really have the difficulty of doing that.

Jeff: 7:00

Yeah, absolutely brilliant. So before we get too far along, tell us you have a website. We both know that you're on YouTube. Tell us how they can see you in all of those different social medias.

Justine: 7:15

Yeah, so you can find me pretty much anywhere at Justine Hovie H-O-V-E-Y V is in Victor, and Justine Hovie classescom is where you'll find all my courses. Justine Hovie on YouTube, justine Hovie Instagram so yeah, that's where you'll find me, just under my name.

Jeff: 7:33

So it's J-U-S-T-I-N-E-H-O-V-E-Y, classescom, if you're going to do it on the web, and I kind of asked you this question before we went live. So about how many videos do you have on YouTube?

Justine: 7:56

On YouTube itself. I'm pretty sure I'm over 800 now, and then I have more for my members and on my class site, so I've probably created well over a thousand videos at this point.

Jeff: 8:08

Oh my goodness. So people of all card making types, beginners, in the middle of their card making journey, even if they're really sophisticated, you've got a class or you've got some tips to be able to help them right.

Justine: 8:29

Yeah, so that's one of the things that one of the most difficult things I would say about being on YouTube is you always got to find a way to set yourself apart from others, right? And one of my things is that I don't like spending longer than about 20 minutes on a card, so mine are usually quick and easy techniques. And the other thing was I tried to really brainstorm what are the issues that we face as card makers. You know it sounds like the most first world problems ever. We have problems. We have them Like when you have time to craft, for example, and you sit down at your table and you're ready to go and then you have no ideas coming to your head.

Justine: 9:08

And that's where I came up with the technique resource binder, for example. It's a whole binder with little, almost like little baseball cards with over. I show you how to do over 175 techniques that are available in card making, and the cool thing is is, as you're watching the video, you would only make these baseball cards that apply to the supplies you own. So you're creating your own little custom binder, and so when you sit down at your desk you don't have an idea. You can plop open your binder and go oh, that looks really cool. I'm going to try this out, I'm going to try out heat embossing, I'm going to try out foiling, and I tried to brainstorm every possible thing that you could do with stamping, with die cutting, with foiling and all these different areas that are in card making, just to solve the problem of what do you do when you sit at your desk and you don't have an idea.

Jeff: 9:56

So, literally, this technique resource binder is a ring binder that they purchase, obviously, and you send it to them and it's tabbed and it already has stuff in it. Is that what I'm trying to paint, a visual?

Justine: 10:12

here it's all digital, so you actually create the binder yourself. Digital oh I see, Because I could create the binder for you. But the thing is is that I own supplies that you might not, and so having something like that pre-created for you doesn't necessarily make sense. But all the videos are up, all the downloads are there, so you just print out the little instruction cards you only use the ones that apply to your stash, stick them in your baseball cards and you've got your own customized technique resource binder for your craft room.

Jeff: 10:45

Absolutely brilliant. So clearly this is something that people would need to purchase, right?

Justine: 10:53

Yes, this is a paid thing.

Justine: 10:55

This one here was created out of so much love. Like I said, there's over 175 techniques in this class, so it's a huge course, and so it retails for $99, but I do have a membership program, and that was the thing for me, too, is I know what it's like to be a crafter on a budget and a crafter on a small budget, and what was important for me is community and learning, and so what I created was the Justina Jovey VIP membership, and what it is is. It's a $9 a month subscription or $95 a year, and you can get access to every single course that I've ever made on one platform. So, instead of spending $99 on it, if you're quick, you can get that class done in a month and then cancel. If you want, you can be a part of it and stay with us for years. It's completely up to you, but I like to be able to offer all of my customers and people who watch an affordable option to access all of the solutions for the crappy problems that they might have.

Jeff: 11:56

Well, to be honest with you, that sounds like it's underpriced for all of the things that they're going to be getting. But let's say that somebody's listening to me for the first time, or to us for the first time, and they just want to. They've seen you on YouTube. They want to try it. Do you have any free stuff on your website that they could just try stuff?

Justine: 12:19

Yeah, I do. I have quite a few downloads on the website that will help you with your crafting. So I mean, I have 800 tutorials on YouTube. So I feel like that's my free stuff, right, so you could go there and you could watch for years, probably if you started right at the beginning and worked your way up. And then I have downloads that will help you, like my guide to organization or my favorite ink blends and things like that that you can download. And, like I said, if you're really at that point still wanting more, sign up for one month and then check out the program, see if it's for you. And, yeah, you can make that decision from there.

Jeff: 12:58

Excellent idea.

Justine: 13:00

It's cheaper than McDonald's, yeah, yeah.

Jeff: 13:04

You're involved with a lot of different events. We were talking recently with somebody that you've worked with before, laurel Beard, who, incidentally, is one of the funniest people I've ever met. And you guys do what is it called Crafters Roulette? Is that what you are a part of that?

Justine: 13:31

Yeah, we've been. I don't know if you call it contestants participants on Crafters Roulette.

Jeff: 13:36

Yeah, participants, I think.

Justine: 13:37

Very gun fun hosts Crafters, Roulette, and we've been on her show before. We have hosted retreats in the past Eat, Sleep, Crafty Retreat which is a little different than a standard retreat that you'll say put on by company or something like that. So a lot of the times companies put on retreats and then there's usually a big price tag because you're getting a ton of products and things like that. So we decided to create one where it's a nice low price but we, for example, just use what's in our stash and we try to create things that we know people have in their stash and then you can create alongside us for an entire weekend. And we host the Paper Crafters Get Organized Summit. It's called and coming up in September we are hosting the Stress Free Card Making Summit. So we got a lot of events going on.

Justine: 14:27

We love Laurel and I love bringing the crafting community together and into our crafting world and getting to know the people who actually watch our videos. That's important to us and seeing putting names to faces and just being really real about crafting and talking about the pros and the cons and what tools we love and what tools we don't love, and all of those things. We have a lot of fun together. She's the funny one, I'm more the serious one.

Justine: 14:54

But we work out well.

Jeff: 14:56

The two of you together. My goodness, OK, I've got to go backwards. You called this Eat Sleep Crafty Retreat. What the heck Eat Sleep Crafty Retreat? What does all that mean? I don't understand. I'm a guy.

Justine: 15:14

Yeah, there was, there were it was kind of a phase, I think, of t-shirts for a while where it was like Eat Sleep Craft, Eat Sleep Golf, like whatever your age was.

Justine: 15:22

Oh, I got it and that's kind of how we came up with the name of the Eat Sleep Crafty Retreat. We've hosted it three times in the past and we're debating about the future of it, but it's essentially a weekend where it's myself, laurel, and usually two to three other crafters. We've had Tiffany Solario, we've had Mary Polanco, we've had several people in the card making industry join us, and so essentially we just send out a supply list of just some basic things that we hope majority of crafters have in their house already, and then we get together on the weekend, we make cards together, we laugh, we have a ball. Then we get together afterwards and just have a freestyle crafting session and it's all done on Zoom, yeah, and we looked at doing one in person, but it was, yeah, it's just again talking about the affordability of things like that.

Justine: 16:13

Where do we host it? People got to fly in, there's hotel costs, there's this, there's that, and we thought you know what, why not make it online? And then everybody can attend, no matter there? Yeah, we don't have to worry about accessibility, you don't have to worry. Everybody can work from the comfort of their own home.

Jeff: 16:29

So if our audience wants to find out about all of these different events, do they go to your website? Is there a specific place to get the details?

Justine: 16:41

Yeah, that's a good question. So if you go to JustineHoveyclassescom, if you download anything on my site that's a free download, then you'll automatically be added to my newsletter. I do have a blog. It's older, it's JustineHoveycom. I don't really use it anymore, but if you go to that website there'll be a pop up if you want to sign up for my newsletter. So I always let everyone know through my newsletter or on social media what's going on. Yeah, you stay well informed.

Jeff: 17:12

It sounds like now we were watching. My wife and I were watching a couple of your videos last night and I saw that a number of months ago I think it was a number of months ago you brought out your own product line. I did yeah, it's about the.

Justine: 17:29

April, whether it was it's June now.

Justine: 17:34

Yeah, so I think it was. Last fall I was approached by Crafts dash and they're a company in the UK. They're kind of like the scrap of dot com of the US or or or on the time it's a stamp, whatever One stop shop type of thing, and they've been really starting to develop small lines with different youtubers and influencers and things like that May ask me if I was interested and I was like, I know I don't think so. I'm not into product design. Again, it's going back to the like fears of fine art and having to sketch and draw, and I had all these things in my head.

Justine: 18:13

I'm also going to the point of you know, okay, I feel like a lot of the time ever it's all been made already. You know, like, if I think of stamps, I mean there's 800 draft stamps and 900 elephants and God knows what else. So I was what am I going to add to this? Right, I'm like absolutely not, but they made things really easy for me. So the cool thing is is I pretty much just sit down with a designer and I tell them my ideas, what I seem to be missing or if I am creating something that I feel like it like I came out with a sunflower stamp, for example. That's nothing new or original, but I came up with a way of lining it up a little bit easier, how to make it look more realistic with layers and things like that.

Justine: 18:56

So yeah, that was my first release. It was a small one and then they should be rolling out every other month or so. Just a small Line, so that you know again, it stays affordable, it stays relevant. I don't want to overwhelm anybody with crazy releases every couple weeks. And it was a. It was a great launch and I'm looking forward to putting out more.

Jeff: 19:20

So they can go to your website in and see these products now and buy them through your website. Is that the best way to do it?

Justine: 19:29

The best way to do it is to go to craft stash. So craft stash has a US and an international website. So if you're in the US, there is a US website where you can shop in US dollars. And so, yeah, just going to craft stash and you can type in my name and then, or there's also, I think there's a button, if I recall that it says exclusive brands, and I'll be on there as well and, yeah, there'll be more coming out.

Jeff: 19:58

How fun is that to have your own line. I mean, wow, that's cool and very surreal. Did you ever think that you would be as popular as you are now looking back on it?

Justine: 20:16

No, I mean I the word popular freaks me out because that was not the definition of me in school. I don't think I ever thought it would get to this place. My parents are just stunned. First of all, that like 90,000 people actually card make in the world. Just what is this? What did you stumble into? So, yeah, I don't think I ever thought it would become this popular, I would be doing this long.

Justine: 20:48

But you know what? I fell in love with it and I think the thing for me is I love learning new things and so for me, it's always been a good balance of, okay, I'm learning card making, I'm learning video editing, learning photography and learning social media marketing, and so I have kind of. You know I have different focuses throughout the year and it bounces back and forth my attention span. So I, yeah, I love every aspect of it and, except for answering emails, yeah, so it's been a lot of fun experimenting over the years with courses, with classes and events and what works, what doesn't work and what do people want, and that was a big part of my journey over the last 12 years, especially on YouTube, is figuring out. You know, I started my channel and then I started getting picked up by design teams and started working for companies and designing for companies and all of that.

Justine: 21:43

And then I got lost about halfway through. It became a race to get the product first, to push the product, to figure out new and exciting ways that nobody's ever thought of before, and they kind of got stuck in this hamster wheel. And then I realized that wait a minute, I am not making videos For a company, I'm making a video for the purse, for the crafters watching me, and I completely did a whole big turn and just decided to stop all of that. And Even my own product line is a very, very small focus of what I do. I still like to use All sorts of products. I love to mix and match. I love to just show the average crafter because that's what I am is an average crafter. I had a graph.

Jeff: 22:28

You can literally Is do card making on a budget right. It doesn't really take a huge investment because you can just kind of take stuff that you have around the house and Figure out ways to make cards right.

Justine: 22:44

I have so many videos where you literally need some masking tape, an ink pad and a stamp and you can make so many different types of cards with just those supplies. And of course it can be the most affordable hobby and it could both be the craziest expensive hobby you've ever had. I'm sure your wife could tell you that, or you probably already know.

Jeff: 23:07

I know Gosh between the Gemini II and the Cricut machine and all the stamps and all the dies and all the tools. And, yeah, she listens to you, so she's subscribed and so whenever a new video comes up, I get to see you once or twice a week. You're very welcome in our home because you're very engaging. But thanks to all of you, I will continue working for another 20 years to support her habit.

Justine: 23:42

I think we all will.

Jeff: 23:46

So what do you see for the future for you? How do you see yourself evolving? Do you see it keeping it simple? What else do you want to do?

Justine: 23:59

I think I will always have my VIP group is my pride and joy. I have so much fun creating courses and doing live classes in there and creating YouTube videos. Well, hopefully always be something I do. It might not be something I do as often as I do now, but I don't know. I kind of have this like if I were to dream big, I'd have my own organization line. I think I would have like the like a hoarders TV show on Netflix for crafters, where I go and clean up people's craft rooms. That would be amazing. Oh, that's great. But the other thing I've toyed with is because I live in Europe now and traveling is definitely a big or an easy thing to do. To get from place to place is maybe taking people on the road with me, crafting in different cities and countries and visiting different art stores and things like that and being inspired by what you're seeing around you and that kind of stuff. But yeah, you know you've got to find the hours.

Jeff: 25:03

You know, almost you're right, you have to find the hours. But I just was envisioning, you know, card making techniques from different parts of the world and from different countries and what's important to them, and looking at other people's styles and troubles and tribulations and that sounds like a blast.

Justine: 25:24

Yeah, yeah, definitely it's, it's, it's in the planning. Works right now.

Jeff: 25:29

Well, I actually hope you do it, because that I think you'd have a huge audience for that. And the other thing that I saw is you're a bit of an expert on getting craft rooms organized.

Justine: 25:44

Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of the funny thing is, in my regular, my regular life I'm not the most tidy person, but my craft room is, and I think, while my craft space and I think it always had to do with the fact that, being in Europe, you have a little bit more limited space than I did have when I was living in North America and generally have your space always in a public area, whether it's a hallway or a living room or, you know wherever, a corner somewhere, and so you just kind of needed to keep on top of it because there's other people living in the house too. And so, yeah, organizations kind of a passion of mine, and trying to figure out why I'm a messy person has been a passion of mine. So I took a professional organizing course and, like I said, laurel Beard and I host the paper craft is get organized summit, and you know, just trying to.

Justine: 26:37

It has nothing to do with having a picture, perfect, mark the Stuart magazine ready craft room. Not at all. It's about having something that works for you, which could be very much a messy and tidy space. But the thing is, all of us crafters have the same goal we want to be able to be creative, and we want to be able to be creative with the supplies we know we have somewhere. So the goal is, of course, to be able to find what you're looking for essentially in your craft room, so having some sort of system set up that works for you.

Jeff: 27:06

The last thing. Gosh, we're almost out of time here, but one thing that I saw on your YouTube videos was you have a very cool dog.

Justine: 27:17

Oh, Lone the.

Jeff: 27:18

Lancer, what's the dog's? What kind of dog is that? It looks like a big one.

Justine: 27:25

Yeah, so her name's Lone.

Jeff: 27:27

She's a Lancer, I think that's how you say it in English A what A Lancer.

Justine: 27:31

Yeah, L-A-N-D-S-E-E-R. They're part of the New Fee family and so there she's a big girl. She's about 140 pounds and she's a gentle giant and, yeah, she's definitely a conversation piece. I mean, I'm from Thunder Bay, Ontario, northern Canada, and you know everybody has a dog and everybody's got a big dog Maybe not so big, but everybody's got a big dog. But here she is like a celebrity because nobody's ever seen anything like it.

Jeff: 28:04

So who walks? Who? Do you walk, her or him, or does he or her walk you?

Justine: 28:11

It depends on her mood really. I mean, she's off the leash quite a bit, but yeah, I mean, if she wants to, she can walk me.

Jeff: 28:21

Well, justine, the time has gone by really fast. For me it has. Is there anything else that we missed, that you'd like for us to touch on, that you'd like the audience to know?

Justine: 28:35

That's a good question? I don't think so. I mean, like I said, take a look at YouTube. Like I said, everything there is free. There's 800 videos to watch. You can watch me for years and then, if you want more, come on and see me in the VIP group. We have a blast every month together, meeting a few times and crafting together and live classes and all that stuff and get to know each other a little bit better.

Jeff: 28:58

Well, I'm not a card maker. My audience knows that I've done some oil painting in the past. My wife is the card maker but I was absolutely enthralled by your YouTube videos and you were just so easy to watch and easy to understand. That's your particular brilliance. I think you could be selling shoelaces and I think I'd probably watch it.

Justine: 29:29

Well, thank you. I'm a teacher by day, the full-time teacher, and then I do YouTube in the evening, so I kind of incorporate both, so yeah. I'm the final teacher, though I'm not that boring teacher like Bueller.

Jeff: 29:43

Bueller, I know Okay, so again, your website is.

Justine: 29:50

Justine Hobeclassescom.

Jeff: 29:53

Justine, thank you. This is really a breath of fresh air and so much fun and as you grow and as you become more popular, we would love to say I knew her when she was younger and she probably doesn't remember me, but I knew her when. I hope you can come back and join us again sometime in the future.

Justine: 30:18

Absolutely I'd love to.

Jeff: 30:20

Thank you so much. You've been listening to the Art Supply Insiders. Check back with us often as we talk about the world of art and craft supplies. If you'd like to hear more of these podcasts, please hit the subscribe button on your preferred podcast platform and we'd really appreciate it if you tell a friend. If you'd like to show your support, please consider going to our website and hitting the support button at artsupplyinsiderscom. Now go out and create something.