It's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's my fabulous friend LeAnne's turn to host this week and she has a clean and simple challenge for you to work with:

This week's challenge was indeed 'sew' much fun and I have not one but two super clean-and-simple cards to share with you this week! This is also something of a 'something old, something new' post for me and perfect for the current challenge over at As You See It where they are asking us to remember the first tool or stamp set we bought or the one that made us fall in love with stamping, so I have a story for you today! First things first though - here is card number one:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Take A Hoop - I've been wanting to use these cute little mini embroidery hoops in the seasonal catalogue and today gave me the perfect opportunity. Perfect for framing miniature works of art, they are just like the real thing. 

Cross Stitch With Hoop La La - The stamp set I've used today is an old set called 'Hoop La La'. It isn't the first stamp set I ever bought (that was called 'Sweetheart' I think and you could make treat cup cards with it - I still have it somewhere but couldn't find it anywhere when I looked this week!) but this was one of the first. I chose it because it combined two of my favourite hobbies: my love of cross stitch and my new passion for card making - I just had to have it and haven't been able to part with it since. On this card I used the house, coloured with my Stampin' Write markers in Pool Party and Bermuda Bay and added a red enamel heart. Another 'new home' card - I seem to be needing a lot of these lately! The stamp set includes a stamp of an embroidery hoop, but I love the dimension that the little wooden hoops give to the card.

Get Stitching - To continue the stitching theme, I used my stitched circle framelits to cut out my circle to sit inside the hoop (I popped it up on dimensionals). I also added a diecut needle from last season's Quilt Builder Framelits and threaded it with some Pool Party baker's twine. I also added a twine bow to the top of my hoop for decoration. 

Here's the second of my cards, this time using the smaller size embroidery hoop and adhering my stitched circle to the top of the frame for an alternative mount:

This one shows up a little better with the darker purple colour against the white - here is a close up of the hoop so that you can see the alternative mount on the smaller embroidery hoop:

I like this mix of old and new so much I think I'm going to have to get another pack of hoops and make up some more of these cards! 

Here is the visual summaries of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my Product and 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

Don't forget the theme is clean and simple this week - so minimal layers and embellishments and lots of white space. I can't wait to see what you create and look forward to visiting your blogs this week! Enjoy the rest of your weekend as it will be over all too quickly. I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

Mini Embroidery Hoops	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock	Brights Enamel Shapes	Pool Party Solid Baker’S Twine	Silver Foil Sheets
Bermuda Bay Classic Stampin' Pad	Pool Party Classic Stampin' Pad	Stitched Shapes Framelits Dies

Good evening lovely blog readers! I hope you have all had enjoyable weekends; mine has been pretty good, with the final finishing touches to Ben's Lego bedroom, a little crafting and even a bike ride in between the showers today. More on the bedroom later, but for now today's card is my entry for this week's Colour Me Card Challenge, where there is lovely colour palette of blues on the menu:

For today's card, I also took my inspiration from the picture of the cotton reels and went with a sewing-themed card - here it is:

The Six-Sided Sampler set has always reminded me of quilts - the hexagon pattern has to be one of the most popular quilting shapes, or at least one of the most iconic to me. I decided the colour palette would lend itself to a quilt, so set about laying out mine. I stamped from top and bottom opposing corners - my stamp-a-ma-jig was invaluable in getting them all aligned - and stamped my sentiment in the centre in Pacific Point. For fun, I also added a needle threaded with Pacific Point stamped from a retired set called 'Hoop La', just to add to the 'stitched' effect.

Just before I go, I wanted to share with you some of the photos of Ben's Lego-themed bedroom, featuring Lego City Firemen (of course!) - he chose a three colour wall combination, but the most fun was in customising the decoration, all of which were inspired by various photos on Pinterest:

The letter 'B' is my favourite - the windmill rotates, the wheels turn and the firemen and surface bricks can all be changed out as desired. Working wall art - how cool is that?!

Back tomorrow with something very exciting that you are not going to want to miss!! Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Six-Sided Sampler	Whisper White A4 Card Stock	Card Stock A4 Coastal Cabana	Coastal Cabana Classic Stampin' Pad	Pacific Point A4 Card Stock
Pacific Point Classic Stampin' Pad	Bermuda Bay Classic Stampin' Pad	Tempting Turquoise Classic Stampin' Pad	Smoky Slate Stampin' Write Marker

The changeover in annual catalogues brings with it mixed feelings; excitement at the thought of lots of new stamp sets and accessories to play with, but it's also a time to say goodbye to some old ones. Today I'm sharing a 'Welcome to your new home' card that I made recently for my fellow crafty friend Issy recently when she moved house. The card uses the Hoop La La stamp set and the Comfort Café designer series papers:

This set appeals to me because it reminds me of my other hobby, cross stitch, and there are some lovely little images in this set, including a needle and embroidery hoop. I coloured the house image with markers in colours that coordinated with the Comfort Café paper, using my Stamp-a-ma-jig to get them perfectly aligned, then created a focal point by making a feature of the final house placing on a raised circle and adding a cute little heart from my trusty owl punch for good measure. This time I even remembered to decorate the envelope too - something I often intend to do, but often forget when I'm busy focusing on the card itself.

Back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Hoop La La

Cardstock: Very Vanilla, Midnight Muse, Summer Starfruit, Cajun Craze, Comfort Café DSP

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Midnight Muse, Pool Party, Cajun Craze, Summer Starfruit

Tools: Stamp-a-ma-jig, 1 3/4" circle punch, Circles #2 Originals Die, Owl Punch

We are back to the LOVE theme today, with a cute set of four notelets with a coordinating box. I have designed them with Valentine's Day in mind, but these little 3" notelets are perfect for tucking into a lunchbox or loved one's pocket for a surprise love note.

I've used a selection of stamp sets to create this set:

From the left, do you recognise the stamp used on the first card? I created the patchwork heart design by using my marker pens to colour the central section of the 'recover rapidly' Band-Aid stamp from the Sale-A-Bration Patterned Occasions stamp set, aligning each one with my trusty stamp-a-ma-jig to align them into a neat patchwork pattern. The second stamp is from a now retired set called 'Sprinkled Expressions' and the third uses the cross stitch heart from the Hoop La La set in the main catalogue. Lastly, the heart/flower stamp is one of 24 available in the set 'Spring Sampler' available in the new Spring Summer seasonal catalogue that goes live TODAY! There are lots and lots of lovely new items, some of which I've already featured and many of which you will see on my blog during the coming weeks and months. There is a link to the catalogue on the right hand side of my page; if you would like your own copy of the catalogue or would like to place an order, do get in touch with me at joanne@thecraftyowl and I will be happy to help.

I also whipped up a lovely two-tone box to keep them all in out of melon mambo cardstock with a co-ordinating regal rose flap shaped using one of the small Labels Collection framelits. To finish off, I stamped and cut a pair of hearts using the Hearts a Flutter set to tuck the box flap into and hold it in place.

My little girl has had her eye on these ever since she saw me putting them together, so I'm thinking I might slip the first one of mine into her school bag for a little surprise. The second might go into my husband's lunch box - assuming I stop crafting for long enough to make him a sandwich of course! I hope you are inspired to have a go and make something similar - do leave me a comment and let me know who you are sending yours to. Off to create now - until next time, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Patterned Occasions, Sprinkled Expressions (retired), Hearts A Flutter, Hoop La La, Spring Sampler, Tiny Tags, Hearts a Flutter

Paper: Whisper White, Melon Mambo, Regal Rose

Stampin' Write Markers: Real Red, Melon Mambo, Regal Rose

Tools: Stamp-a-ma-jig, Hearts a Flutter Framelits, Labels Collection Framelits, Simply Scored