Today I'm sharing a card for the current challenge over at Less Is More where it's lucky dip week and we are being asked to work with Winter Whites:

I decided to use a trio of diecut Christmas trees to showcase my winter whites - take a look:

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

I couldn't resist another outing for my Whimsy and Wonder skinny trees, but this time I did at least include one of the other diecut trees in the set so that it didn't feel left out! I find the best way to create an all-white card is to concentrate on adding different elements of texture and/or pattern. To this end, I diecut two trees from (retired) white glimmer paper and diecut the larger tree in white and popped it up on dimensionals with the glimmer paper layered beneath:

I added a silver heat-embossed sentiment that fitted with my sparkly trees to complete my card.

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 does today's card have you dreaming of a white Christmas? I read in the press yesterday that we are in for a hard Winter here in the UK, with heavy snow forecast before the end of this month. I'm hoping that's fake news - a white Christmas is one thing, but heavy snow in November - no thank you!!

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

CHRISTMAS TREES DIES (£33.00)

SNOWFLAKE WISHES PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£24.00)

METALLICS EMBOSSING POWDERS (£17.00)

BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)

VERSAMARK PAD (£8.75)

Today I'm sharing a card that uses the current sketch over at Try Stamping on Tuesday that I designed with Nancy's word prompt at Just Us Girls in mind:

I had the perfect focal point to encompass Nancy's 'merry' theme - take a look:

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

Delicate Baubles Dies - You know how much I love the Christmas tree die in this set; I thought it was time to show you one of the two dies that featured a sentiment (the other is 'Joy' - I'll share that another time). I cut out the 'Merry and Bright' detailed layer in gold foil and backed it with a piece of Evening Evergreen shimmer vellum for some subtle festive shimmer and sparkle.

Ever Eden - I added a panel of foiled green Ever Eden specialty designer series paper to my card base and bordered it with some gold foil stitched scalloped edging cut with one of the Hand Penned Dies. And since 'P is for Patterned Paper' I'm also linking today's card up with the team over at The Alphabet Challenge.

Finishing Touches - Some gold gilded gems and an in-colour gem was all that was needed to complete today's card. 

I love the soothing greens of the Eden's Garden Suite; I love how the foil and the addition of some shimmer makes them perfectively festive 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. 

I've had a full-on day today, culminating in Parents' Evening for one of the James Juniors. It's amazing how focused teachers can be when each appointment lasts only 5 minutes! Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

DELICATE BAUBLES DIES (£33.00)	PENNED FLOWERS DIES (£28.00)	GOLD FOIL SHEETS (£4.75)	EVER EDEN 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) SPECIALTY DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£14.00)	2021–2023 IN COLOR SHIMMER VELLUM (£11.25)
EVENING EVERGREEN A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	GILDED GEMS (£6.50)	2021–2023 IN COLOR JEWELS (£6.50)

It's Tuesday and time for a new challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. This week's challenge is a sketch challenge and I designed the following sketch for us to work with:

I designed the sketch to have a layer beneath a single focal point, with an overlapping sentiment. Whilst the focal point on the sketch is a circle, you can use any shape you like. Also feel free to flip or rotate the sketch when making your card.

I have been trying (and failing!) to find the time to play along with the lovely ladies over at Inspired By for several weeks, but when I saw this week's inspiration photo of that welcoming Christmas wreath, I couldn't resist! The fact that I could combine with my sketch was a bonus! Both of their inspiration photos this week feature wreaths, and having had an aborted attempt using wheatgrasses for the first one, I decided to give that up as a bad job and work with this oh-so-pretty Christmas wreath as my inspiration. I actually went on to create two cards, one being slightly less clean and simple than the other. Here's my first clean and simple one:

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

I used the leaf wreath in the Seasonal Swirls Dies set for my wreath base, snipping off the leaves to leaves just the twigs. I used the retired Pretty Pines Thinlits for my sprigs of greenery and berries, adding some sponged white ink to my Soft Succulent greenery and some large retired candy dots for berries. I finished with a gingham DSP bow and added a heat-embossed sentiment from the retired 'Arrange A Wreath' stamp set onto a little stitched rectangle of wood-effect paper which seemed to fit the photo. I backed my wreath with a scrap of white wood effect paper, reminiscent of the shiplap in the photo: 

 And that was that - card complete! I decided to make another one, identical save for one additional detail: I switched out the DSP bow for an actual one, tied with gingham ribbon that I had coloured from its original black and white to black and red with the aid of my Stampin' Blends markers:

 That showy, double-looped bow definitely crosses a CAS boundary, hence not adding it to my original card; I do love it though! Here's a close-up: 

So two cards for the price of one today! Which one gets your vote? Do leave me a comment below - I'd love to hear your thoughts.

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

SEASONAL SWIRLS DIES (£32.00)	STITCHED RECTANGLE DIES (£33.00)	DECORATIVE MATTE DOTS (£7.50)	SOFT SUCCULENT A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	VERSAMARK PAD (£8.75)
BASICS EMBOSSING POWDERS (£17.00)	BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)	BLACK & WHITE 1/4" (6.4 MM) GINGHAM RIBBON (£6.50)	POPPY PARADE STAMPIN' BLENDS COMBO PACK (£8.50)

Happy Monday everyone! An early and super-quick post from me today as I take a trip down memory lane with a clean and simple card inspired by a few challenges that caught my eye this week:

I couldn't resist that pink typewriter in the Fusion photo and delved into the retired stamp box to find my 'TapTapTap' stamp set that had the perfect image - take a look:

Do you remember this stamp set? The typewriter meant it was always going to be a keeper for me; for today's card I stamped it in Memento Black and coloured it with my Polished Pink Blends markers. Whilst I love the Fusion sketch too, I decided instead to use the sketch over at AAA Cards and stamped my alphabet of typed letters behind for the horizontal element. I'm also linking up over at CASology where the cue word is 'type' so today's card is right on point.

The eagle-eyed amongst you will notice that I used a typed 'thank you' sentiment on the paper in my typewriter and if you own(ed) this stamp set, will also know that this isn't a sentiment that it includes. Some clever masking and use of my Stamparatus made it easy to create this custom sentiment using other elements of the set - for a more complete explanation, check out this older post.

No visual summary or supplies list today - today's card is simply for your viewing pleasure. I would so love to own a pink retro typewriter just like this one! Enjoy your day; I will be getting together with a bunch of lovely ladies for a class this morning, where we will be making Christmas packaging - fun! Then more class planning and blog posts to follow before I head out on my afternoon school run  - the life of a busy Mum and part-time Stampin' Up! demonstrator is always a full one!

I'll be back tomorrow with another project - my second week hosting our challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. Until then, happy stampin'!

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous Claire to host this week and she has a timely theme challenge for you to work with:

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, Claire's theme is a timely one although it's fair to say that there is plenty to be thankful for all year round so a card that gives thanks is always a useful one to have on hand. I couldn't resist another card with Jen M's layout over at Freshly Made Sketches this week (this layout is definitely a 'go to' for me!). No wreath this time though, instead totally inspired by the current challenge photo over at The Card Concept - take a look:

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

I loved the colours and foliage and pumpkin elements in the Card Concept photo, along with the striking black and white tablescape, complete with gingham napkins and I incorporated all of these elements into my clean and layered card. I used black and white mats, layers and some gingham paper from the Pattern Paper hostess DSP pack, and layered a variety of foliage around one edge of a (retired) stitched circle onto which I heat-embossed my sentiment from the stamp set 'Banner Year'. I added some of the yellow decorative matt dots to my berry sprigs for a little extra dimension and detail which I really love:

Another trio of Evening Evergreen decorative matt dots onto my base complete my card. My foliage elements were taken from various die sets - all listed in the supplies list below. This is one of those cards that turned out exactly as I intended, first time - and I love it! I often spend ages procrastinating whilst card making, so it feels like a bonus when ideas translate exactly how you envisaged, don't you think?

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:

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; we had a busy day of sport yesterday so nothing special happening here today, but I'm not complaining. The next few weekends are super busy, so I'll take the calm before the storm! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

SEASONAL SWIRLS DIES (£32.00)	CHRISTMAS TRIMMINGS DIES (£25.00)	FOREVER FLOURISHING DIES (£33.00)	DECORATIVE MATTE DOTS (£7.50)	PATTERN PARTY 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) HOST DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£17.00)
BANNER YEAR PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£16.00)	BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)	BASIC BLACK A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	VERY VANILLA A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)	PUMPKIN PIE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)
SOFT SUCCULENT A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	EVENING EVERGREEN A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	CAJUN CRAZE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	VERSAMARK PAD (£8.75)	BASICS EMBOSSING POWDERS (£17.00)

It's Thursday and time for a new challenge over at TicTacToe! It's the turn of Team X to host this week and the lovely Felicita is our featured designer this week. This is the fun board that we are playing along with: 

I also used Jen M's great sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches this week for my layout, the colours over at Color Dare and my final entry over at Just Us Girls this week where Bobby's wild card is 'leaves'. I went across the middle of this week's Tic Tac Toe board with Autumn/Free/Wreath for my card today, but it also works for the middle column of thankful sentiment/free/any colour too. when I saw the Color Dare inspo photo of Holly Hobby this week I was taken right back to my childhood - and more recently, to my retired designer series paper pile! I had some old Comfort Cafe paper that I thought would be perfect for the challenge as it featured bluesm yellows and browns and would also provide a suitable background for my wooden, leafy wreath - take a look:

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

Seasonal Swirls - I went for a simple layered wreath of twigs and leaves today, as I didn't want to do too much to detract from the pretty background paper. I added a trio of Cajun Craze flowers, cut using my Floral Squares dies, that echo the detail on the paper, and centred each with a pearl, along with a linen thread bow and backed it with a very vanilla circle stamped with a simple sentiment from the 'Sparkle of the Season' set.

Added Texture - I love how the patterned paper has a faux-texture for added detail and interest. Having decided to add a Pool Party band to the front of my card, it looked a little too stark, so in a further nod to the paper, I added a layer of vellum over the top that I had embossed with my (retired) Subtles embossing folder. This was just enough to take the vibrancy out of the colour whilst also adding another level of detail; you can see the detail of it more closely below:

I really like this card - the paper is great for autumn and it's good to be using up more of my paper stash. If you're not a paper hoarder like me, you could easily recreate this card using the current Harvest Meadow papers, for example. A shoutout to Jen too for the perfect sketch to showcase a wreath - I think I might have to use it again this week!!

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. 

A tictactoe board offers so many creative possibilities - how does this week's board inspire you? Why not have a go? We would love to see you in the gallery and who knows - you might be selected for Designer's Choice and be eligible to be a guest designer on a future challenge. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

SPARKLE OF THE SEASON BUNDLE (ENGLISH) (£43.00)	LINEN THREAD (£4.75)	VERY VANILLA A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)	EARLY ESPRESSO A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	EARLY ESPRESSO CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)
SOFT SUEDE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	CAJUN CRAZE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	POOL PARTY A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	VELLUM A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.25)	PEARL BASIC JEWELS (£4.75)

This is the first of two posts today - I'll be back with my creative post for this week's TicTacToe challenge later. First though I have news of a rare Stampin' Up! opportunity for you:

• Are you someone who regularly restocks their craft collection, and always wants the latest and greatest Stampin’ Up! supplies?
• Would you potentially enjoy the pile of perks that come with being a demonstrator?
• Are you a former team member who may be interested in coming back to our incredible community of crafters?

If you answered “yes” to any of the questions above, the Start with Savings promotion may well be of interest to you! From 4–30 November, instead of the standard £99 Starter Kit—which is already a steal of a deal—aspiring demonstrators can snatch up a completely custom Starter Kit for only £75. What an absolutely unbeatable bargain for a box with a value of £130!

There’s no better time for you to transition from customer to demonstrator. Whether you just want to stock up on staples, or perhaps you've had your eye on the new Eden's Garden Collection pre-release , if you're considering an alternative or additional source of income or you would just like to build lasting connections with like-minded crafters, by joining in November you’ll be able to start your Stampin’ Up! business strong—and with big savings! 

You can choose any items for your kit, which comes with a free pack of useful business supplies: £130 of goodies for £75 and free P&P too and it can all be yours if you join Stampin' Up! before 30 November.

A reduced cost starter kit doesn't come along often, so if this is an offer that appeals to you, do get in touch if you'd like more information or alternative click here to sign up - I would love you to join my special team!

It's Tuesday and time for a new challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. The lovely Vicky has handed over the reins and I am your host for the month of November. Our first challenge is a colour challenge: 

This trio of colours is one of my favourite festive colour combinations and they compliment white beautifully. I am in full Christmas card making mode right now, so I am looking forward to seeing what you make with these colours. For my card today I went with two simple clusters of Christmas Season foliage to accent a central sentiment label:

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

The 'Christmas Season' stamp set is perfect for festive foliage in these colours (it also contains some lovely pinecones, although I've not used them on today's card) and I stamped a sentiment from 'Delivering Cheer' on a label cut with the Seasonal Labels dies, which includes dies that also cut out the foliage. Another sentiment on the inside of my card from the same set and a little extra corner detail complete today's card:

I love the Real Red card base for a Christmas card - I also added a trio of rhinestones for some festive sparkle:

This is one of those cards that can be easily mass produced - just stamp a bunch of foliage pieces and sentiment labels and then have fun arranging the pieces. Kind of like flower arranging without the mess!

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'm also having another entry into Just Us Girls challenge this week with their wild card theme of 'leaves' - yesterday autumn, today winter!

As a reminder, for our colour challenges, you must use all of the stated challenge colours. You may also use neutral colours; however, the challenge colours should be the most noticeable ones featured on your card. We use Stampin' Up! colour names for reference, but you are welcome to use any other companies' products as long as you match the challenge colours as closely as possible. What will you make with my colours this week? I can't wait to find out and look forward to visiting your blogs in due course.

One last reminder: the Eden's Garden Collection pre-release is now available to order! Read all about it and order yours in this post here.

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

CHRISTMAS SEASON BUNDLE (ENGLISH) (£49.50)	DELIVERING CHEER PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (£17.00)	REAL RED CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	SHADED SPRUCE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	PEAR PIZZAZZ CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)
REAL RED A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)	RHINESTONE BASIC JEWELS (£4.75)

Happy Monday everyone! I have a busy week as I am playing catch up again now that the James Juniors are back at school following their half term break, so this is a quick post from me today. I'm sharing a card that uses Jen T's great sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches, this week's Color Throwdown colours and the theme over at Just Us Girls where they are playing with leaves:

I was intrigued by Jen's sketch this week and loved the idea of three squares on a slimline card. When you look at my card you will think I made it in super-quick time - and I did, but only after an exponential amount of crafty procrastination and numerous failed attempts! Here's what I ended up with:

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

Yes - a simple trio of my favourite stitched leaves, inset into a trio of stitched squares and switched about for some mix-and-match autumn colour, with a sentiment from the 'Sparkle of the Season' stamp set. Why so difficult? Well, I couldn't decided between leaves, snowflakes, trees ... the list goes on! Then I decided I wanted to use the larger sycamore-style leaf, but try as I might I couldn't use three and create a slimline that would fit in an envelope for posting. I also fiddled with my Stitched Greenery Die - and failed to successfully adapt it for a long slimline card so gave that up as a bad job. the moral of the story? If in doubt, simple is best! Sometimes trying to complicate things just doesn't pay. Then to top it all, I struggled to get my card to lie flat for photographing - so if you're looking at it and can see a slight distortion, I'm afraid that's why. I also added a little stamping to the inside of my card:

I hope you like today's card and have enjoyed my tale of the trials of creating it! I love the finished result those - sometimes stitched dies really are all you need!

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; I'm off to grab a quick sandwich before I head back out on my second school run of today. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

SPARKLE OF THE SEASON PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£16.00)	STITCHED LEAVES DIES (£33.00)	EARLY ESPRESSO A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	EARLY ESPRESSO CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	PUMPKIN PIE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)
CRUMB CAKE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	VERY VANILLA A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)

Today it's Sunday (and I hope those of you reading this who are in the UK enjoyed a lie-in and remembered to turn your clocks back!) - 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 as it's the fifth Sunday of the month she has a fun TicTacToe challenge for you to work with:

I have a very special card to share with you today! Lots of photos and news of an exclusive product pre-release that is happening this week on 2nd November, so time to buckle up and sit tight - here we go! I went along the diagonal of the TTT grid from bottom left to top right with foil/patterned paper/diecut for my card today, which is a fancy fold birthday card featuring the new Eden's Garden suite. Here's a first look at my card when closed and then I'll tell you a little more about the products in the Eden's Garden suite:

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

Eden's Garden - The Eden's Garden bundle, comprising the Eden's garden cling stamp set and Eden Dies, will be included in the January-June 2022 Mini Catalogue, however is being released for sale this week on Tuesday 2nd November, so this is the perfect opportunity to explore it before the official release.

Pre-Release Exclusives - In addition to the bundle, for the duration of the pre-release only, you will also be able to order a number of additional exclusive products, that will be available only while supplies last. The other items in the Eden's Garden Collection pre-release include 12"x12" specialty designer paper, cotton paper and garden gems. Here's the flyer detail so that you can see it in more detail:

Eden's Garden Fancy Fold - Now you've had the detail, it's time to check out my card! As I mentioned above it's a fancy fold; the talented Elizabeth Price had made a couple of cards with a similar fold that I just loved and she coined it a 'hokey pokey' card, because the back side is in front, the right side tucks into the left and there's detail inside that could in fact be the front of the card. To explain this in more detail, here's another photo of the card closed:

When you remove the belly band that holds the folds in place, you can start to see how it opens, and you can see the embossed detail:

This is what it looks like fully open:

My card base is Soft Succulent and it measures 6" by 12" and is scored along the long edge at 1", 6" and 10 3/8". All of the papers come from the Ever Eden specialty designer series paper pack - beautiful, soft serene greens of Soft Succulent and Evening Evergreen with touches of gold foil detail. The sentiment on my belly band comes from the Eden's Garden stamp set, and I used each of the Eden's Dies in different ways on my project: the largest rectangle frame is embossed onto the front right panel of my card, with the smaller rectangle frame as the base for my belly band centrepiece, which also includes a banner piece in gold foil and some sprigs diecut from Soft Succulent shimmer vellum for added subtle sparkle and shine:

I used the edge border die to add detail to my fold out edges, cut in the beautifully soft Evening Evergreen cotton paper:

Inside my card, I used more of the paper and diecut foliage with another sentiment piece (this time from the 'Peaceful Moments' stamp set) for my pictoral panel and added some stamping of a repeating pattern using the main foliage image in the Eden's Garden stamp set:

 Here's the birthday sentiment embellishment in more detail:

The launch of the Eden's Garden pre-release coincide with my lovely Mums' birthday, so I thought this card would be perfect to send her my love and best wishes. For her version of the card, I also added another shortened banner to the outside panel, as show below:

The sentiment is from the 'A Wish For Everything' stamp set, which really does have a sentiment for every occasion:

I thought I'd share this additional detail with you as it's useful to see how you can add in a more personal greeting with this kind of card. I'm safe to blog my card today as my Mum rarely reads my blog so won't see this ahead of time; she loves greens and is a big fan of a fancy birthday card though, so I know she will love it. 

If you like the products in the Eden's Garden pre-release, do be sure to pop back Tuesday when these items will be available to order in the online store. the Eden's Garden bundle is also the focus for my online technique card class on Monday 6th December - do get in touch if you would like to join me, you would be more than welcome!

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:

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; I will be out at hockey this morning as Rebecca is umpiring at a junior tournament and am looking forward to an afternoon cosying up indoors with the family before we are back to school tomorrow. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

To be updated on 2 November when these products are available for purchase.