Today it's time for a new challenge over at Create With Connie and Mary and this week we have a colour combination for you:

I decided that the Smoky Slate of today's colour combo was perfect for a card using one of my favourite single stamps in the annual catalogue, Kind Koala, that is retiring at the end of May:

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

Kind Koala - This cute koala image is a great single stamp - image and sentiment all in one, with a flower that can be dressed up in so many ways. I coloured my koala in Smoky Slate and shaded in some Night of Navy on the word 'you'. For the flower, I stamped it again on Calypso Coral cardstock, fussy cut it out and paper-pieced it onto my card, adding a tiny Very Vanilla punched flower from my scraps box and finished with a navy candy dot.

A Border of Stripes - Do you recognise my patterned paper? It's one from my favourite Pretty Petal Designer Series Paper Stack. The Calypso Coral stripes were the perfect compliment to my Calypso Coral card base and koala image, which I stamped on Very Vanilla to tie in with the Very Vanilla stripes of the paper.

There's Always Room For A Bow - The clean and simple design and layout of today's card allows for a rather over-the-top double bow and button combo, to highlight more of the challenge colours. The Night of navy seam binding ribbon ties a beautiful bow - this card will definitely need a box rather than an envelope to keep it looking pristine though!

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

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

I'll be sorry to see this sweet little stamp retire - on the upside, there will be lots of great stamps to take its place!

Do visit the other Design Team members to see what they did with this week's colours; there's lots of inspiration over on their blogs too!

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

It's Sunday and time for a new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the lovely Sandy's turn to host our challenge this week and she has a great clean and simple challenge for you to play along with:

I was a little pressed for time this week in getting ready for Stampin' Up! Onstage at Telford (also the reason for a lack of blog posts over the last two days) so a clean and simple challenge couldn't have come as a better time! I used this week's sketch over at Mojo Monday for my layout and decided to go with punched rather than stamped butterflies for both impact and speed:

As you can see, today's card really is clean and simple. Here's the low down:

Pretty Petals - I reached for this paper pack to use as the starting point for my card and settled on this rather bold pattern, as I knew I needed only a small amount so wanted it to be impactful. My Pretty Petals paper set the colour combination for my card and provided the perfect backdrop to my sentiment from 'Tin of Cards'.

Can You Keep A Secret? - The DSP has a small amount of Calypso Coral around the flower heads, which I substituted with Watermelon Wonder as I wanted to use the wide satin ribbon in this colour for my banner. Sssh, don't tell - although honestly I think it's impossible to see the difference even up close. Here is the colour palette I used on my card:

A Trio of Punched Butterflies - I used a trio of solid colour butterflies to complete my card, punched using the Bitty Butterfly and Elegant Butterfly punches. I layered one of them and finished them all with pearls as a simple embellishment.

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

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

So as you can see, a clean and simple card for this week's butterfly challenge. I'm also linking up with the lovely team over at the Global Design Project where their theme this week is 'nature' and a butterfly definitely qualifies for that!

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

I look forward to seeing your clean and simple cards this week. We are off to basketball today and back to hockey today ...

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack	Mint Macaron A4 Cardstock	Watermelon Wonder A4 Cardstock	Basic Black A4 Cardstock	Very Vanilla A4 Cardstock
Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad	Bitty Butterfly Punch	Elegant Butterfly Punch	Pearl Basic Jewels	Punch Corner Project Life
Watermelon Wonder 1" Stitched Satin Ribbon

It's Wednesday and you know what that means: a new collection of Wednesday Weekly Deals! These offers are valid for one week only. As always, a new collection of deals will be announced next Wednesday.

If you want to take advantage of any of the deals on offer, you can support my business by placing your order online by clicking here or using the link to my store on the right hand side of my blog page where it says 'Shop Online' or with me in person. Don't forget to add the new Hostess Code for March XDZGYVJC if your order is under £150 and be sure to make sure that you don't check the 'no contact' box if you'd like to be kept updated with the progress of you order and receive a little thank you in the post from me. 

Here's a summary of this week's one-week only Wednesday deals - click on each item to go to the online store to purchase:

Be The Star Clear-Mount Stamp Set

Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack

Cherry On Top Cotton Paper Assortment

Silver 5/8" Satin Ribbon

Back later with today's creative project; until then, happy shopping!

Hello everyone and a happy Tuesday to you! Today I have a card for this week's challenge over at CAS(E) This Sketch and Addicted To CAS:

I saw the sketch over at CAS(E) This Sketch this week and for a minute I was wondering where to start; then I remembered one of my favourite patterns in the Pretty petals stack and I just knew where I wanted to take it. Here's my card:

This lovely pattern includes the diagonals that are so like the sketch so I knew it had to be my starting point. Whilst I'll admit it did much of the hard work, I decided that this card needed two more things: a bold sentiment - I layered three 'thanks', cut with my Greetings Thinlits, then coated in Versarmark and heat embossed clear to give a glossy finish; the second thing was a sprig of flowers just like the ones in the pattern. I fussy cut the stems, punched three Pacific Point circles and added a trio of enamel dots that I coloured black with a Sharpie and off-centred slightly, some fussy cut stems and a couple of leaves made from ... left-over pieces from the wings of a butterfly cut with my Butterfly Thinlits! I just love the bright colours and pattern of this paper - and the addition of my bloom is the perfect accompaniment!

Other news today: whilst we say goodbye to the first set of limited time Sale-A-Bration offers, we say 'hello' to some new ones: there are two new stamp sets and some rather lovely glimmer tape that have just been added to the Sale-A-Bration free product offering - here are some samples made with the new product:

Like the other items in the Sale-A-Bration catalogue, these items will be available free with each £45 spend from now until the end of the Sale-A-Bration period, 31st March. You can see full details for each of the new product on the new Sale-A-Bration flyer here.

Back tomorrow with this week's Wednesday Weekly Deals and a new project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack	Pacific Point A4 Cardstock	Old Olive A4 Cardstock	Basic Black A4 Cardstock	Greetings Thinlits Dies
White Perfect Accents	Versamark Pad	Heat Tool (Uk)	Clear Stampin' Emboss Powder	Big Shot

Happy Monday everyone! I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful Valentine's Day yesterday with your loved ones - I certainly did. I shared some of the fun of my day over on my Facebook page - be sure to follow me there for more adhoc Crafty Owl fun! As well as today's card today, I have some important reminders for you: today is your last chance to purchase the limited time Sale-A-Bration gifts: Perfectly Artistic designer series paper and the 'Sky is the Limit' and 'Hello' stamp sets. Here are a few of my projects featuring these items to remind you - all of them have been very popular free gifts so far during the Sale-A-Bration promotion:

For my card today I am using my favourite of these sets, 'Hello', once again. This is my card for this week's colour challenge over at Pals Paper Arts; I also used this week's Retrosketches sketch:

The lovely Katy McGloin chose the colour palette over at Pals Paper Arts this week and whilst this isn't a colour palette I would have put together myself, I loved the design team cards so decided I should have a go! This is what I came up with: 

I chose to feature a piece of the Pretty Petals designer series paper for my main panel, stamping the 'Hello' stamp in Lost Lagoon with a Calypso Coral border on the top panel of Very Vanilla and layering this with a piece of Venetian crochet trim across the join. I heat embossed the 'birthday girl' portion of my sentiment onto a banner of Lost Lagoon and fussy cut some co-ordinating flowers and leaves from another of the papers in the Pretty Petals DSP stack, along with a few pearls, to embellish my card. As my regular readers will know, I'm not one for vintage or shabby chic generally, but I absolutely love the softness of this card that this colour palette gives - what a great combination! This stamp set is so very versatile - I just know it will be a 'keeper' for me. 

If you want to get your hands on this set, or one of the other limited time offer items, you will need to place an order for £45 or more today. If you miss this deadline the good news is there are three new limited sets arriving tomorrow; pop back then for more information!

Enjoy the rest of your day; I'll be back tomorrow with another project, until then happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Hello Clear-Mount Stamp Set	Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack	Lost Lagoon Classic Stampin' Pad	Lost Lagoon A4 Cardstock	Very Vanilla A4 Cardstock
Calypso Coral Classic Stampin' Pad	Venetian Crochet Trim	Pearl Basic Jewels	Embossing Buddy	Versamark Pad
White Stampin' Emboss Powder	Heat Tool (Uk)	Hexagon Punch

It's Wednesday and you know what that means: a new collection of Wednesday Weekly Deals! These offers are valid for one week only. As always, a new collection of deals will be announced next Wednesday.

If you want to take advantage of any of the deals on offer, you can support my business by placing your order online by clicking here or using the link to my store on the right hand side of my blog page where it says 'Shop Online' or with me in person. Don't forget to add the new Hostess Code for October 9JGQEYWJ if your order is under £150 and be sure to make sure that you don't check the 'no contact' box if you'd like to be kept updated with the progress of you order and receive a little thank you in the post from me. 

Here's a summary of this week's one-week only Wednesday deals - click on each item to go to the online store to purchase:

Classy Designer Buttons	Decorative Dots Textured Impressions Embossing Folder	Fun Flower Punch
Hamburger Box Bigz Xl Die	Metal Rimmed Pearls	Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack

Loving the metal rimmed pearls this week - a bargain at £3.38 and they add such a touch of class to a project. A great deal on the Hamburger Box Bigz XL Die this week too - check out this cute little character that I made with mine a little while ago:

A great week to 'snap' up a bargain!! Back later with today's creative project; until then, happy shopping!

Today it's time for a new challenge over at Create With Connie and Mary and this week we have a great colour challenge for you:

These colours have a real ombre feel to them and I decided to go with something pretty and floral today using the 'Garden in Bloom' stamp set. Here's my card: 

I used a Very Vanilla base and a mat of Calypso Coral to set off my Pretty Petals striped DSP. I punched a 2" wide banner of Blushing Bride with my Triple Banner Punch and overlaid this with a piece of Very Vanilla satin ribbon, then for my focal panel I stamped the sentiment and flower outlines in Watermelon Wonder and 'coloured' them in with the other two challenge colours. I love this stamp set and in photopolymer, it makes light work of two-step stamping for sure!

Do visit the other Design Team members to see how they used this week's challenge colours; there's lots of inspiration over on their blogs too!

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

It's Sunday and you know what that means: time for a new challenge over at The Paper Players! This week it is the turn of my wonderful friend and talented crafter Claire, to host and she has a great colour challenge for you:

I immediately knew what stamp set I was going to use for my card this week - Sheltering Tree - and I wanted to have a go at making a swing easel card to showcase it. Here's my card:

The stamped panel is easy enough to create and uses all three of the challenge colours. I chose Old Olive as my main colour, with just a little Crumb Cake and Bermuda Bay to allow the latter to really stand out on the bicycle and border. I followed Amanda Bates tutorial here to make my swing easel card (there is a small correction required to the instructions - step 13 should say 'Line up at 5"' not 1"). She is a real whizz with fancy folds! I used two of the Old Olive patterns in the Pretty Petals DSP to decorate my card. The nice thing about this card is that it folds completely flat for mailing, so long as you keep the embellishments to a minimum as I have here:

I hope you like today's card. Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

I look forward to seeing how you use Claire's chosen challenge colours on your cards in the gallery this week. This is a birthday weekend for us: the youngest of my James juniors will be 8 on Tuesday so following yesterday's birthday sleepover, today we will be continuing our birthday celebrations. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Bermuda Bay Classic Stampin' Pad	Bermuda Bay A4 Cardstock	Sheltering Tree Photopolymer Stamp Set	Tin Of Cards Photopolymer Stamp Set	Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack
Very Vanilla A4 Cardstock	Old Olive Classic Stampin' Pad	Old Olive A4 Cardstock	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad	Crumb Cake Classic Stampin' Pad
Banner Triple Punch	Big Shot	Squares Collection Framelits Dies	Magnetic Platform

It's Sunday and you know what that means: time for a new challenge over at The Paper Players! This week it is the tun of the super-talented Sandy to host and she has my favourite kind of a challenge for you - yes, it's a sketch:

This is a great sketch and gave me the opportunity to use some of my very favourite items from the annual catalogue: another Expressions Natural Element sentiment, some Pretty Petals DSP and a butterfly cut with the Bold Butterfly Framelits - take a look at my card today:

I used a cardbase of Very Vanilla for my card today, with a border strip of Typeset DSP to compliment the diagonal lines of the Pretty Petals paper that I used to cover the rest of my cardfront. I decided to use Basic Black for my tag, punched with the Ornate Tag Topper Punch, to give a strong contrast to the vanilla elsewhere and I created a layered butterfly that echoes the design of those in the paper pattern, with a solid vanilla base then two of the Bold Butterfly thinlit butterflies - one in Calypso Coral adhered directly to the base butterfly, and one in Pacific Point that I adhered in the middle only so that the layer beneath could be seen. I did reverse the positioning of the butterfly and sentiment on my tag to the sketch - I thought the sentiment was too heavy to put above the butterfly as I didn't want to overshadow it - what do you think, smart move or should I have stuck to the sketch more literally? A few Old Olive candy dots, some satin Very Vanilla ribbon and some black and white baker's twine finish my card. No stamping on this one - not on the outside, anyway! I'm also linking up with the ladies over at Just Add Ink this week where the theme is 'Butterflies'.

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

The tag on this week's sketch is a real fun detail; I look forward to seeing how you interpret it and the rest of Sandy's sketch in the gallery this week. Time for me to return to my sunbed to top up my tan - enjoy the rest of your weekend, however you choose to spend it.

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Expressions Natural Elements	Bold Butterfly Framelits Dies	Butterflies Thinlits Dies	Big Shot	Magnetic Platform
Ornate Tag Topper Punch	Pretty Petals Designer Series Paper Stack	Typeset Specialty Designer Series Paper	Very Vanilla A4 Cardstock	Basic Black A4 Cardstock
Pacific Point A4 Cardstock	Brights Candy Dots	Calypso Coral A4 Cardstock	Very Vanilla 5/8" Satin Ribbon	Basic Black Baker's Twine

Today it's time for a new challenge over at Create With Connie and Mary and this week we have a great sketch for you:

This is such a versatile sketch with so many possibilities, in the end though I settled for something that is a little unusual for me - take a look at today's card:

I was keen to use another of the papers on the Pretty Petals DSP stack as my background layer, so matted this on a base of Old Olive and Mint Macaron. I used Calypso Coral for my banner, effortlessly punched with my Triple Banner Punch (how did I ever manage without this in my life?!) and tucking a sliver of retired Old Olive ribbon beneath it (there is not a single ribbon in this colour in the current catalogue - let's hope that the Winter seasonal brings us something here in this staple colour!) I coloured my sentiment, from the 'A Whole Lot Of Lovely' hostess set (chat to me about booking a party or joining my next hostess club if you would like to own this set too!) in Pacific Point, Mint Macaron and Calypso Coral Stampin' Write markers and stamped onto Very Vanilla cardstock, that I cut out with my Big Shot and Oval Framelits.

Then for the bit that really isn't my usual style - I covered the back of the oval with Tear and Tape (how great is this product?! No more static red peel to stick to you!)and ruched some Mint Macaron lace trim all the way around the edge before adhering to my card front. I really love this pale green colour however was finding myself not really using is much in my card making, unlike it's counterparts Watermelon Wonder and Cucumber Crush (how did I ever live without these in my stamping cupboard?!) so this card is the first that seeks to rectify that. To finish, I added an Old Olive flower punched with the Petite Petals punch as leaves for the base of my Watermelon Wonder blossom accent - whilst not Calypso Coral, it is sufficiently close to compliment the coral elsewhere on my card.

So definitely more frilly than usual and this card would work just as well without the lace trim (and be more post-service friendly) but nice for a change I think! Do visit the other Design Team members to checkout their interpretations of this week's challenge sketch; and if you didn't read my Weekly Deals post yesterday, do check it out here - it contains a special offer exclusive to my customers!

Right, I'm off to top up my tan! Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: