Country Birdhouse for Creativity Abounds

Exciting times at Creativity Abounds as our next stamp camp draws near! This time, we're featuring the Country Birdhouse bundle. Each of the thirteen members of the team have put together one project for the tutorial bundle you'll get with purchase. We've all done a second project too to teach you during Stamp Camp. 

Usually on our monthly hops we give you a sneak peek at the tutorial project (that will still happen) and then we go on to give you a bonus project and tutorial on the same theme. This time we'll  be giving you a look at what the Stamp Camp Live project is going to be. You'll learn how to make it during the Camp.

So my project for Stamp Camp is a simple photo album. It's great for special events like a graduation, a special place or special occasion gathering. It would also work as a way for people to leave messages and memories for someone leaving a workplace or retiring, or even as a special recipe book. It holds about a dozen or so pictures, depending on how large they are and how you arrange them. 

I'll be showing you how to create the actual book and give you some ideas on how you might go about filling it.

Here's the cover. As you see, the album has a pretty ribbon closure.

This is an example from one of the inside pages. Of course, my granddaughter really does have a face! I just felt better obscuring it a little before popping her online. 😀

How you use and fill the album is up to you but I'll share some ideas and things I've learned along the way with you. 

Here's a look at the project I've contributed to the tutorial bundle. You'll receive the tutorial project PDF and kits before Stamp Camp and there'll be a video tutorial for each of them as well. 

Here's all the details about the camp and how you can get your invitation.

As you follow the hop, you'll see all the 26 projects you'll get to make!

Creativity Abounds Virtual Stamp Camp

The next international virtual Creativity Abounds Stamp Camp is being held the weekend of June 15-16. The featured products for the camp are the Country Birdhouse Bundle, Country Woods DSP, Eyelet 3D embossing folder, Petal Pink and White 1/4" ribbon pack and the Basic Gray and Smoky Slate pearls.

To get your invitation to Stamp Camp, simply purchase the featured products from me by the 25 May.

If you are a demonstrator and already own these products, simply order goods of equivalent value from me, message me to let me know you want to come to camp and you will still receive your invitation and kits.

What do you get from the Creativity Abounds Stamp Camp?

• PDF and Video tutorials for 13 projects using the products
• Make and Take kits for the projects (excluding the items you've purchased)
• Access to the exclusive Stamp Camp Facebook Group where you can interact with the team and other participants from around the world, join in the challenges and chats and share your projects.
• View the Facebook Lives for an additional 13 projects made using the products -that's a total of 26 projects for your purchased products. The Lives are recorded so you can access them at any time.

If you do not live in New Zealand but would like to participate, there are team members in all Stampin' Up! markets I can refer you to. 

Here's the team and where they're from.

Follow the hop to see all the 26 projects you'll get instructions for at Stamp Camp.

Layers of Beauty for CAS CCS 536

 I thought it was a bit of a tough challenge at CAS Colours and Sketches this week. 

However, since I kept thinking about the combination I decided to have a go and see what happened.

Since I quite liked the result, I'm sharing it after all. 😀

I had my new Layers of Beauty stamps, along with the coordinating Layers of Beauty masks on my desk from their first play out of the box yesterday. I had a different idea in my head but somehow I couldn't go past using them again.

I used Pool Party and Lost Lagoon for the flowers, then soft Pebbled Path and a second layer of the same for the leaves. 

The sentiment, stamped in Pebbled Path, is from the new Unbounded Love stamp set. 

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page.

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand here.

Layering Beauty for Freshly Made Sketches 635

Today is Mother's Day, so I treated myself to some free time in my craft room - not doing Design Team or Class related things, but just playing. Along the way, I realised I have very little self-control as I did buy myself a new set in my last order, despite telling myself I didn't need anything else. It just looked so pretty! And that was the Layering Beauty bundle which includes a set of coordinating masks. So more like things plural, really. 😀

Anyway, I was looking for something to try it out on and turned to one of my favourite challenges, Freshly Made Sketches.

Since this was an all-round try out of new things, I added in some of the new 2024-2026 In Colors as well for good measure. 

Although the stamps and stencils can be used separately, I went the whole hog and used the stamps, dies and all five layers of stencils.

I stamped the large floral spray stamp in Tuxedo Black and used the first three layers of stencils to colour the flowers: Pretty in Pink for layer 1, Flirty Flamingo for layer 2 and Melon Mambo for layer 3. The notch and number for each stencil made layering very easy to do. 

I used Summer Splash and Shy Shamrock for the last two leaf layers, then die cut out the whole thing.

It was at that point that I ran into a slight problem, which is that the stamped image fits perfectly on a whole card front. Of course, with the sketch, I was working with a narrower front than usual to accommodate the size strip. What to do?

Option 1: Place the spray on the front and let it cover both the white and DSP panel

Option 2: Cut up the spray and rearrange it into a narrower zone.

As you see, I went for Option 2. It also helped that one of the dies in the set cuts out the largest rose and its leaves. In the end, this worked well as it let me pop up some sections of the spray on dimensionals.

The sentiment is from Country Birdhouse and is cut with Stylish Shapes dies.

On the back of this, I also made another card using the same colours. It's such an easy suite of products, I can see I'll be coming back to this one repeatedly. 😀

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page.

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand here.

 

Latte Love for As You See It 323

 Welcome to a new challenge at As You See It. This time, it's our Recipe Challenge: just take the five ingredients and see what happens. 

I quite like the idea of keeping the colour to black, white and one other colour - although it did turn out to be a little trickier than I thought at first. 😉

The colour I chose was one of the new In Colours - Petunia Pop.

I stamped the mug from Latte Love onto scraps of Petunia Pop DSP from the new Colour Family stack, then die cut them out. I did shade the edges with a light Petunia Pop Stampin' Blend - still not sure whether that was a good idea or not! On the whole, I think so. I certainly would have done it if I'd been colouring the whole mug in.

I used the Painted Texture 3D Embossing folder for the background. I like this one for the coffee because it reminds me of the crema on top of a flat white.

I white embossed the sentiment on to Basic Black card. While the sentiment is from the Latte Love set, the label is from the new Unbounded Love die set.

So, five ingredients:

• Black ✓
• White ✓
• One other colour - Petunia Pop ✓
• Embossing folder - Painted Texture ✓
• Die Cut - Latte Love for the mug and Unbounded Love for the sentiment label ✓

I'm excited to see what you do with these five ingredients!

Make sure you visit the As You See It page to see what the rest of the Design Team have done with them - and to link up your own entry.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page.

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand here.

Magnolia Mood for Around the World on Wednesday

 

Welcome to a new hop with the crew at Around the World on Wednesday. On the second Wednesday of each month, the team put together a thematic hop to give you some inspiration for your own crafting. We love it when you try out something new or CAS(E) one of our projects. The team is truly international, with members from each time zone of the world that Stampin' Up! operates. You're with me, in New Zealand - the first place in the Stampin' Up! world to change the date. 😀

This month, our inspiration is a sketch challenge. I love a sketch - they're my favourite kind of challenge because I find a sketch really gets me thinking and the ideas flowing.

I'm really enjoying the Magnolia Mood bundle, which is one of the Online Exclusive products. Online Exclusives exist outside of any catalogue. You'll only find them in the Online Exclusive section of the online store. It's worth a look as you'll not only find new products but also a few things you thought had retired too. 😀

For the three vertical strips of the sketch, I used three narrow strips of DSP from the new Country Woods range. I used the Timber 3D Embossing Folder to carry on the wood theme. I used Petal Pink Stampin' Blends to colour the flowers and Old Olive for the leaves. I added in some die cut leaves in Old Olive to fill out the focal point.

My favourite ribbon is Linen Thread. With its warm, natural look it was perfect for the rustic feel of this card.

Next up on the hop is the wonderful Leonie Stuart, where you'll see another interpretation of the sketch.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand here.

If you get lost around the hop, or want to revisit someone, here's a blog roll for you.

Jan Clothier - NZ - You are here

Leonie Stuart - AU

Rochelle Laird-Smith - AU

Cheryll Miller - AU

Aurélie Fabre - FR

Mikaela Titheridge - US

Angie McKenzie - US

Kelly Taranto - US

Shel Anderson - CA

Sharon Hashimoto Burkert - US

Chris Smith - US

Tricia Butts - US

Theresa McEntee - US

Bree Renwick - US

Lori Willcox - CA

Teri West - US

Lifetime of Love for Colour INKspiration 165

 

Welcome to the 165th challenge at Colour INKspiration. It's that time of the year when welcome the newest set of In-Colors, so this challenge uses two of them: Peach Pie and Shy Shamrock. Of course, if you don't have them yet you can substitute the nearest colour you have. I'm excited to see what you do with this, since the graphic was my choice this time around. 😀

If you haven't played with us before, we are a group of Stampin' Up Demonstrators from the South Pacific. Challenges are shown and entered via our Facebook Group page. If you don't belong, and would like to, click here. Don't forget to answer the three easy questions you'll be asked when you ask to join the group.

Each challenge, Top Picks and a winner are chosen by the crew and the winner offered a chance to Guest Design with us for a future challenge. We're very pleased to welcome Yvon Doensen as our Guest Designer for this challenge. This challenge is open for two weeks and closes Monday 20 May, 7pm AEST.

If you don't have an exact challenge colour, feel free to replace it with whatever you have that's closest, for example Pale Papaya for Peach Pie. Black, White, Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake, Basic Beige and metallics are free colours, as are flesh toned Stampin' Blends.

I wanted to do something floral with these colours. I purchased the Lifetime of Love bundle, which is a great wedding set, last month before it stopped being a bundle but had yet to open it up. So this is my first play with it.

You can see what the rest of the Design Team have done with these colours in the Crew Inspiration Album on the Colour INKspiration Challenge Facebook page.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand by clicking here. 

Creativity Abounds Virtual Stamp Camp

The next international virtual Creativity Abounds Stamp Camp is being held the weekend of June 15-16. The featured products for the camp are the Country Birdhouse Bundle, Country Woods DSP, Eyelet 3D embossing folder, Petal Pink and White 1/4" ribbon pack and the Basic Gray and Smoky Slate pearls.

To get your invitation to Stamp Camp, simply purchase the featured products from me by the 25 May.

If you are a demonstrator and already own these products, simply order goods of equivalent value from me, message me to let me know you want to come to camp and you will still receive your invitation and kits.

What do you get from the Creativity Abounds Stamp Camp?

• PDF and Video tutorials for 13 projects using the products
• Make and Take kits for the projects (excluding the items you've purchased)
• Access to the exclusive Stamp Camp Facebook Group where you can interact with the team and other participants from around the world, join in the challenges and chats and share your projects.
• View the Facebook Lives for an additional 13 projects made using the products -that's a total of 26 projects for your purchased products. The Lives are recorded so you can access them at any time.

If you do not live in New Zealand but would like to participate, there are team members in all Stampin' Up! markets I can refer you to. 

Thoughtful Wishes for AYSI 322

 Welcome to a new challenge at As You See It Challenge. After the colour challenge, it's always a 'fill in the blank' and with those, you never quite know what you're going to get. This time is was a challenging one - what is my least used colour? And what's yours?

There's a few colours that would have completed the sentence but they all come from the same group of colours. For some reason, I shy away from orangey colours. I never got friendly with Grapefruit Grove or Pale Papaya. Peach Pie might be a challenge. I can use Calypso Coral at a pinch. But really, if I didn't own Pumpkin Pie, it really wouldn't bother me at all. So that's it - PUMPKIN PIE is officially my least used colour. 

I thought it didn't look too bad with Pebbled Path, so that's what I used for this card. 

I started by white embossing the leaf stem from Thoughtful Wishes on to Fluid 100 Watercolor paper. 

Then I blended Pumpkin Pie ink over it, making sure to have it heaviest at the bottom and getting lighter as it went up the page. 

Then I added some splashes of water to lift the colour slightly in places and gave it a light spritz with water.

Once it was dry, I stamped some more of the stems in Pumpkin Pie over the top, making sure to have a variety of heights.

Before mounting it onto a piece of Pebbled Path card, I added three strands of Pebbled Path jute twine around it. I got the three strands by cutting a length of twine and pulling out the individual strands of twine.

The matted piece is attached to a Pumpkin Pie card base. I used another strand of the twine to tie a bow around the three horizontal strands. 

The sentiment is white embossed on Pebbled Path and is cut with one of the dies from the new Unbounded Love dies.

Both Unbounded Love and Thoughtful Wishes are in the 2024-25 Annual Catalogue, coming live on May 1.

Make sure you visit the As You See It page to see what the rest of the Design Team have with this sketch - and to link up your own entry.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page.

You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand here.