I have another card to share with you today, this time inspired by the challenges over at Festive Friday (I chose green, thread and interactive) and the butterfly inspiration over at TGIF Challenges:

I love Memories & More cards both for scrapbooking and card making and I've used lots of them previously to make quick clean and simple cards. Today I've something a little different though; whilst my card still focuses on the Sweet Thoughts Memories & More card pack and card base and envelopes, I've paired with the Hooray For Surprises bundle to make a fun interactive card - take a look:

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

Sweet Thoughts - The Sweet Thoughts Memories & More cards and card and envelope sets are perfect for quick cards. All of the main elements I used to decorate my printed card base came from the card pack - a large butterfly and two sentiments:

All of them are stickers so have self-adhesive backs, but you can easily add with dimensionals too if you'd prefer a little lift as I've done here. The only other thing I added was a twine bow using some coordinating retired thread that I had in my stash.

Hooray For Surprises - I could have stopped there, but I thought another of the cards in the Sweet Thoughts pack would make a fun 'reveal'. I spent a little time marking my card front where I needed to place my Hooray For Surprises long pull tab. The die is longer than I wanted, given the addition of my large butterfly, but this wasn't a problem; I simply used a partial diecutting technique to diecut each one in two stages, which allowed me to shorten it without issue. I stamped the word 'pull' onto the end of each tab, and added a flower sticker from the card pack to embellish each one:

The second M&M card that I used is placed underneath the top layer, being careful to adhere around the edges and leave the tabbed area free.

The Big Reveal - So what's underneath the tabs? I created a 'false top' template using some spare card so that you can see what you'll see when those tabs are pulled:

So not only is the recipient sweet - but beautiful, amazing, fabulous, lovely and wonderful too! The hooray For Surprises Dies are such a great way to add a fun interactive element to card. One last thing - you will notice that I needed to trim the second M&M card down so that the sentiment would appear where I wanted to. Don't discard the spare edge piece though - I added mine as a little extra decoration to the inside of my card. 

So what do you think? A fun way to combine these products, right? I will be sending this card to my lovely daughter who is at university - I'm sure she will love it. This is a great opportunity to remind you that the Hooray For Surprises bundle is just one of those featured in the monthly tutorials I create with my good friend and fellow demonstrator Jan Clothier. This tutorial contains lots more ideas and ways to use this bundle and is yours for FREE when you purchase the Hooray For Surprises bundle from either Jan or myself. So why not add it to your basket now - add some Memories & More cards and you can have a go at today's card too!

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. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back on Friday with another project for our new challenge over at As You See It. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

HOORAY FOR SURPRISES BUNDLE (ENGLISH) (44.00)

SWEET THOUGHTS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (6.65)

SWEET THOUGHTS MEMORIES & MORE CARDS & ENVELOPES (6.65)

TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK PAD (6.25)

CALYPSO CORAL A4 CARDSTOCK (9.50)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous Jaydee to host this week and she has my favourite, a sketch challenge for us to work with:

I decided to use one of my Beary Christmas Memories & More cards with a pre-printed sentiment for the front layered panel of my card and the rest of the design evolved from there. Take a look at my finished card:

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

I cut down one of the large Memories & More cards and used the colours of the card to create my card base and layers. Although I used the co-ordinating envelope from the co-ordinating pack, I didn't use the card base. Instead I added a Very Vanilla layer that I added some soft stencilling to using one of the retired Butterflies and Flowers Layering Decorative Masks, adding some red rhinestones to pick out the pattern centres. I also added some Real Red baker's twine to the card and a wooden snowflake element from my stash:

These Memories & More cards are great to use for quick and easy Christmas cards; they are easy to step up too with the addition of a few additional bits and pieces. I think this card has something of a Scandinavian feel to it - what do you think? Leave me a comment below - I'd love to hear your thoughts.

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 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:

Enjoy your day; we are having a relaxing weekend as it is the start of the half-term break. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

BEARY CHRISTMAS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (9.50)	BEARY CHRISTMAS MEMORIES & MORE CARDS & ENVELOPES (9.50)	REAL RED A4 CARDSTOCK (9.50)	MISTY MOONLIGHT A4 CARDSTOCK (9.50)	NIGHT OF NAVY A4 CARDSTOCK (9.50)	MISTY MOONLIGHT CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (8.50)
BLENDING BRUSHES (13.00)	VERY VANILLA A4 CARDSTOCK (10.00)

Today I'm sharing a couple of cards - the first one is a quick clean and simple card for the current challenges over at CAS on Friday where the theme is 'SUNSHINE' and Inkspirational where they are all about clean and simple:

 The weather is decidedly autumnal here in the UK now, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to flirt with the last of the summer sun - take a look:

 I grabbed a retired What A Year Memories & More card for my base, then added a stamped and diecut sun and a couple of pink sequins to highlight my sentiment. Isn't this card just so, well, sunny?!

A couple of well-chosen embellishments are enough to elevate this CAS card without spoiling the clean feel. This card will be winging its way to my very own ray of sunshine, by daughter, who is very much enjoying her new university life. My second card, much more in keeping with the weather outside my window, was inspired by the nature photo over at Time Out:

So many interesting things in this photo; I took my inspiration from the tall trees with their autumn leaves reflecting the low autumn sun and decided to feature one of the beautiful photographic papers from the All About Autumn designer series paper pack:

I really wanted the trees to take centre stage, so added little more than a simple border (this is actually the reverse of the photographic image) and a little copper foil, along with one of my favourite sentiments for this kind of card, which is from the retired stamp set 'Lighthearted Leaves'. The sentiment is square but I stamped it on a diecut rectangle from the Nested Essentials Dies so that I could recreate the border detail from my main panel:

I think this adds to the cohesiveness of the design. And that's all there is to it!

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on my second card 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. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project, featuring another of the designs in the All About Autumn pack, so stay tuned! Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

ALL ABOUT AUTUMN 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 CM) SPECIALTY DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (14.00)

NESTED ESSENTIALS DIES (32.00)

VERY VANILLA A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (8.50)

EARLY ESPRESSO CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (8.50)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's my turn to host this week and I have a fun theme challenge for us to work with:

I feel like I need to start today's post with a confession! I am hosting this week - and for a variety of reasons I have been super busy with family commitments and not had a moment to craft all week! So when it came to making my card with limited time to spare, I remembered I had the cutest family of four-legged friends that would enable me to make a super-quick card - take a look:

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

Yes - the Beary Christmas Memories & More Cards to the rescue! For this week's card, I used not only one of the printed cards but also a pre-printed card base with co-ordinating envelope; all I needed was to add a little ribbon loop detail and pop the card up on dimensionals and I was done. By using the pre-printed bases, this card was even quicker to pull together than last week. And isn't this cute family of polar bears just the cutest?

The Memories & More cards are perfect for crafting when time is of the essence - and this set of four legged friends is just adorable! They are making me sleepy just looking at them - so contented.

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 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:

Enjoy your day; I'll be back soon with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

I had a little extra crafty time yesterday so thought I'd pop by to share an extra card that I made with the current Fusion sketch:

When I had my Santa Express Memories and More Cards out on my desk to make this card that I shared with you on Sunday, it occurred to me that one of the large cards would be a great jumping-off point for the Fusion sketch and with just a few extra bits and pieces I could make another quick Christmas card to add to my stash - take a look:

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

This is another of those cards where the Memories and More cards take the strain - you can see the 'undressed' card in the corner of the photo at the bottom of this post - I added a simple banner and a wreath cut in Shaded Spruce cardstock using the Country Wreaths Dies, decorated with a bow cut from white velvet paper for a little added texture and some glittery (retired) enamel dot berries (the sequins listed below would make a good current substitute):

I didn't need to do any stamping, as the card had a sentiment already printed onto it - I simply picked out some key colours and shapes (the wreath detail echoes the berry detail on the M&M card) and used those for my banner detail. This is a great way to dress up a simple card base - perfect for a quick card.

Also - did you know that Stampin' Up! sells Basic White Assorted Memories and More Cards and Envelopes in packs of 20, that are sized perfectly to fit memories and More cards? You don't even need to cut anything down to size; bonus! You can find them on page 136 of the Annual Catalogue and they are the perfect addition to your Christmas craft supplies for quick and easy cardmaking. 

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. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with more news. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

SANTA EXPRESS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (£11.25)	BASIC WHITE ASSORTED MEMORIES & MORE CARDS & ENVELOPES (£10.00)	COUNTRY WREATHS DIES (£37.00)	PETAL PINK A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.75)	SHADED SPRUCE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.75)	ADHESIVE BACKED SEASONAL SEQUINS (£6.75)
SNOWY WHITE 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) VELVET SHEETS (£4.75)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous Ann to host this week and she has my favourite, a sketch challenge for us to work with:

I saw Ann's sketch and immediately knew what I wanted to do with it - I love it when that happens! I mirror-flipped the sketch on the vertical and this is what I came up with - take a look:

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

A Christmas Shaker - Who can resist a shaker, let alone one that is this colourful and festive?! I thought that central frame would be perfect for a feature shaker, filled with red, white and silver sequins. I made a frame using my Rectangle Stitched Framelits and used one of the patterned acetates from the Santa Express Memories and More Cards for my shaker front: 

I chose some complimentary papers from the Santa Express designer series paper pack in Poppy Parade and a colourful 'ho, ho, ho' design for my frame and central border element to tie in with my shaker frame.

Ho Ho Santa - I accented my shaker frame with a jolly santa that I fussy cut from one of the Santa Express Memories and More cards, to which I added one of the flat jingle bell trinkets using some co-ordinating (retired) festive baker's twine.

Don't Forget The Inside - I finished the inside of my card with another offcut of designer paper and a sentiment from the Sweet Candy Canes stamp set - I also used a narrow one from the same set on the front of my card:

I just love this card - so fun!! The Santa Express Memories & More cards are just fantastic - so useful for cards and scrapbooking alike! This is the first one of the included acetates that I've used; I also love the wood word diecuts too. An all-round, super useful set!

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 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:

Enjoy your day; we are taking it easy following our early start; I think ironing and an afternoon movie might be required! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

SANTA EXPRESS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (£11.25)	SANTA EXPRESS 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£11.25)	SWEET CANDY CANES CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£21.00)	POPPY PARADE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.75)	STITCHED RECTANGLE DIES (£33.00)	SPARKLE & SHINE SEQUINS ASSORTMENT (£6.75)
FLAT JINGLE BELL TRINKETS (£7.00)	FOAM ADHESIVE STRIPS (£7.50)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous LeAnne to host this week and she has a fun clean and simple challenge for us to work with:

I used Judy's great sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches this week for my layout and found some wheels on Santa's Express train for my no-stamping clean and simple card - take a look:

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

Today's card really is so simple! I used a pair of Santa Express Memories & More cards to create my fun scene: I trimmed one down for the background then fussy cut my santa express train from another to create my snowy scene. I added a couple of borders, some (retired) Petal Pink ribbon to the bottom border and a few (retired) adhesive snowflakes to complete my scene:

I didn't even have to stamp a sentiment as there was already one printed onto the Memories & More card! These are great for quick cards and the acetates and wooden diecut words that are also included in the pack make this set great value for Christmas crafting. 

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 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:

Enjoy your day; we will be catching up on homework following another university open day visit yesterday for one of the James Juniors, whilst the other will be recovering from an army cadet sleepout under an improvised shelter and looking forward to a few home comforts! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

SANTA EXPRESS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (£11.25)

PENNED FLOWERS DIES (£28.00)

BASIC WHITE A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.75)

PETAL PINK A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.75)

It's Tuesday and time for a new challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. This week's challenge is a sketch challenge and Patricia has asked that we incorporate an angled element overlaid with a sentiment. Feel free to flip or rotate the sketch when making your card.

This is an interesting sketch with so many possibilities for that angled section. For my card today I decided to use it to highlight some new speciality paper and create a clean and simple Christmas card - take a look:

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

Snowflake Vellum - I cut a strip of one of the patterns of the new Snowflake Speciality Vellum and tucked it behind the triangle 'v' shape that I cut out of my top white card layer. The vellums in this pack are gorgeous - a variety of snow patterns, some of which are fuzzy white velvet and some of which are silver holographic foil, one of which I used here. They are so pretty - difficult to photograph, but so shiny in real life! I used the remainder of the vellum strip to decorate the flap of my envelope - you can see that on the photo at the bottom of the post.

A Hidden Gem - I love a good word diecut and was disappointed to not find any new ones in the new seasonal catalogue. But wait - there is a hidden gem! In the Santa Express Memories and More card pack, there are two - yes two! - sheets of wooden diecut sentiments - score! These are great for adding dimension and detail to all kinds of projects. They are naturally the colour of whitewashed wood, but I coloured mine silver with a retired silver encore ink pad before adding to my card:

The Santa Express Memories and More pack has some great cards for both both memory keeping and card making, but I have to say I think the pack is worth it for the diecut sentiments alone - such a great way to create an impact!

Sparkle and Shine - I finished my card with a sprinkle of Sparkle and Shine Sequins to highlight my sentiment and bring out the sparkle of the vellum. Not too many - today is clean and simple day, after all! 

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. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

SNOWFLAKE 12 X 12 (30.5 X 30.5 CM) SPECIALTY VELLUM (£9.50)

SANTA EXPRESS MEMORIES & MORE CARD PACK (£11.25)

BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£8.25)

SPARKLE & SHINE SEQUINS ASSORTMENT (£6.75)

BASIC GRAY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.50)

I hope you are all enjoying the start of a long bank holiday weekend. We have already enjoyed a morning of fresh air, followed by an afternoon of chocolate and a movie to avoid the return of the rain here in the UK. I am so done with winter now!

Today I thought I would share with you the first of the projects that I made with the ladies that attended my recent luxury craft weekend earlier this month. I won't be sharing any instructions on how they were made - these are reserved for those that attended - however I am sharing lots of photos of the projects that I designed as it is a great way for my readers to get a flavour of what a residential crafting retreat with me is like and the kinds of projects included. With 4 classes spread over 2 days, it's a great opportunity to tackle a variety of projects and also some that are a little more time-consuming than can be completed in a class that is of a shorter duration.

Today I'm sharing one of my favourite projects: a mini album I made featuring the Sweet Soiree Memories and More cards that are one of the current Sale-A-Bration gifts that can be yours free with a purchase of £45 or more, for just over another 24 hours:

Berry Burst cardstock forms the base of this expandable album and in addition to the Sweet Soiree Memories and More card pack, the Sweet Soiree Embellishment Kit has been used to decorate the cover and inside. 

This is what album looks when you first open it:

Fully extended, the album is four panels wide:

Each side then expands further to include additional flaps and pockets on both sides:

The album includes lots of areas to add photographs and capture memories, including this neat waterfall feature:

This album was certainly the most challenging of the projects we tackled during the retreat and was not for the fainthearted! The feedback was really positive though and everyone was so pleased with their creations; some ladies reported feeling truly amazed and thrilled to have tackled something like this, which they would not have ever contemplated on their own. I was personally thrilled with how positively this was received, as I've never led a class quite like this before. I'm already taking the learns from this project to create another version that is equally 'wow' yet a little easier to recreate.

If you would like to make projects like this one at a future retreat, please sign up to my newsletter by clicking on the icon in the right-hand column to ensure you receive the information for future retreats as soon as it is released or click here for more information - details for my next retreat will be announced in the coming weeks!

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. 

Enjoy your evening and I'll be back tomorrow with one last project featuring Sale-A-Bration item. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Sweet Soirée Memories & More Card Pack (£0.00)

Sweet Soirée Embellishment Kit (£10.00)

Berry Burst A4 Cardstock (£7.25)

I have had a busier than usual schedule this week which has necessitated a few blog-free days - I hope you will all bear with me, whilst I like to think I'm organised clearly I'm not organised enough! So much to share and so little time really is my motto at the moment.

Anyway, today I am back with it and I have something a little different for you - this week the team over at Global Design Project have a family theme and CAS-ual Fridays are challenging us to make anything but a card - so I thought I would share one of my recent scrapbooking layouts:

Here is my layout featuring the Color Theory Memories and More card pack:

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

A Traditional Layout - Whilst I don't often share my layouts with you here on my blog, I'm a real fan of the pocket-style memory keeping that we introduced with the Project Life range and subsequently with Memories and More. The pocket cards make it so easy to put pages together quickly and I love that I can organise my pages with minimal supplies and 'pretty' them up as I go or add extra detail later. Here I've used the Memories and More cards in a traditional 12" x 12" scrapbook layout as I wanted to show how these cards can be used in a variety of different ways. The pre-printed sentiment cards mean that whatever type of layout you use, Memories and More cards make it easy to create a colourful layout with no stamping required.

Color Theory For All Seasons - This layout is one of four that I created using the Color Theory Memories and More card pack, as I created one for each season. I will share the other layouts in a future blog post; as you can see this page is my Winter layout featuring the rest of the James family on our annual ice skating trip. This is something we love to do every year and make a point of doing together, just the four of us - it has become a tradition and is generally accompanied by different novelty hats each year - in the photo above Rebecca is sporting a Christmas tree whilst Ben's has elf ears! In addition to the Memories and More cards, I used some coloured embossing paste with my Pattern Party Decorative Masks to add some texture and interest to my background, along with some diecut snowflakes courtesy of the Seasonal Layers Thinlits, a little glimmer paper and some glitter enamel dots to add some festive sparkle. I added stickers from the Color theory card pack for additional sentiments and accents.

Hidden Thoughts - My layout features space for journaling on the card above my photograph, but it also features a 'hidden journaling' card concealed beneath the photograph and revealed by pulling the tab on the left hand side attached to the card that says 'Details'. The circle tab punch is great for adding tabs to your journaling cards in this way.

I'll be back tomorrow with another project for this week's challenge over at The Paper Players; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Color Theory Card Pack	Whisper White 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Cardstock	Embossing Paste	Pattern Party Decorative Masks	Palette Knives
Dapper Denim Classic Stampin' Ink Refill	Circle Tab Punch	Dapper Denim A4 Cardstock	Glitter Enamel Dots	Marina Mist A4 Cardstock
Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer Paper	Seasonal Layers Thinlits Dies	Silver 1/8" (3.2 Mm) Ribbon