Thinking Stamping

Wednesday, 21 January 2026

Gears & Textures for CAS Colours & Sketches 577

After last week's heat wave, this week we're having solid rain. Both are excellent reasons to inhabit the Craft Room. Today, after completing some DT work and some tidying, I've played with the sketch at CAS Colours & Sketches.

I'd actually left the craft room when I saw this sketch so had to skitter back there because it seemed to me to be made for the Gears & Textures bundle, which I've been playing with a lot.

The gloomy weather made taking a photo challenging, so you might have to read on to hear about what colours this actually is!

I used Night of Navy for the base. I used the three long stamps to create the diagonal patterning. I used Night of Navy for the solid girder stamp, Smoky Slate for the ladder and Misty Moonlight for the chains.

The cogs are cut from Silver Foil, from my stash, and the ring from Misty Moonlight (appearance in the photo not withstanding!) I popped them up on dimensionals then added the sentiment over them.

The sentiment stamp is from The Right Word and it's cut with a banner from Stylish Shapes. The embellishments are Faux Bronze Pentagons.

So, the sketch let me create a masculine CAS card very quickly. Thank you CAS team!

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 stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Sunday, 18 January 2026

Season of Chic for Paper Players 769

Players made an awesome start to 2026 with LeAnne's colour challenge last week - such pretty cards in the gallery! Let's see what you do with Joanne's Clean and Simple Challenge this week.

So it's a double challenge this week. Not only is the theme 'signs of winter' but the additional challenge is to do it in a Clean and Simple style.

By Clean and Simple, we mean minimal layers and embellishments and plenty of clean, uncluttered space.

In the Southern Hemisphere, it's the middle of a very hot summer so it was nice to focus on something cool. I had to have a hunt around my Stamp Library to find something suitable and remembered the lovely snowflake dies in Season of Chic, an old favourite set of mine. Sadly now retired, this set is a beauty, with something for every season.

So I started with a trio of snowflakes, one in a scrap of silver Glimmer Paper and two from a piece of Balmy Blue DSP from the Beautiful Bokeh stack, which I think could be another retired item.

Keeping with the colour palette, I stamped the sentiment in Balmy Blue using a sentiment from Season of Chic.

By now it was clear that this card was going to be one that made use of my Stamp Library and not the current shelf, so I also got out one of my all-time favourite embossing folders, Distressed Tile. I was originally doing an embossed rectangular standard card front but decided I wanted something a bit different so went for a jaunty angle piece instead.

The finishing touch was a trio of Basic Rhinestone Jewels.

What will you do with this double challenge: signs of winter (but not Christmas) in a CAS style?

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Eliz Stewart

Christy Stanford

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Friday, 16 January 2026

Shell Collecting for ASYI 364

Happy New Year and welcome to the start of a new crafting year at As You See It. I hope you all had a happy holiday season.

Our first challenge this year is a fill in the blank and with a period of gift giving, and a Stampin' Up! pre-order, there were plenty of things to fill in the blank with! Christmas was so busy, in a good way, that I didn't even get to open some of my preorder items until the New Year, so I'm filling in the blank with the most recent thing I opened from the box.... The Shell Collecting set.

Because the beach is my happy place, I'm a sucker for beach themed sets. And since one of the things I most like about the beach is taking a walk along the shore and seeing what serendipity brings me - most often a new shell - this set was a must have for me.

This set is a reversible one but I wanted my shells to look clean against the white, so used them without the reversible option. I chose lovely summer colours: Azure Afternoon, Coastal Cabana, Balmy Blue and Pool Party.

I started by stamping the shell to create my own DSP.

After trimming it down, I layered it onto Coastal Cabana then added some Linen Thread before attaching it to the Azure Afternoon card base.

Shell Collecting is an image only set, so I used Simply Said for the sentiment, white embossed onto Coastal Cabana and cut using a die from Nested Essentials. By itself, the sentiment got a bit lost amongst the shells, so I added in a second label shape in Azure Afternoon to create a visually calmer spot for the sentiment to rest against.

To finish off, I added the Linen Thread bow and a trio of Basic Rhinestone jewels, subtly coloured with a Pool Party Stampin' Blend. So subtle, it barely shows in the photo! Should have used Azure Afternoon instead. 😀

So what's your most recent craft room addition? Why not get it out, make something and share it with us at As You See It?

Visit the As You See It page to link up your entry and to see the rest of the team's inspirations.

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Wednesday, 14 January 2026

Nature's Symphony for Around The World on Wednesday

Welcome to the first hop of the year for Around the World on Wednesday. I hope you're all feeling rested, re-energised and ready to create!

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, we're doing something a little different. It's five years since Around the World on Wednesday started up, so we're doing some close-up looks at the team. I was surprised to discover that this month, the team is going to CASE me! And since one of things I like to do is to blend inks and tear paper, Angie has also set the theme of Paper Tearing.

One of my favourite paper tearing techniques is the Faux Torn Paper technique. I've made a lot of cards using this, like this one or this or this. So, here I am, casing myself!

I'm particularly enjoying the Nature's Symphony bundle, out of the January-April 2026 Mini Catalogue. With the foliage stamps, along with texture stamps, it's perfect for this technique.

The starting point was to tear a piece of photocopy paper to make the mask. I attached the card front to my grid paper with a post-it note to hold it in place, then used others to hold the mask in place while I blended the inks: Lemon-Lime Twist, Granny Apple Green and a touch of Shaded Spruce at the outer edges. Blending Brushes make the job easy but it is very important the mask does not move, so hold it with your hand for extra support while you're blending at the torn paper edge,

With the mask still in place, I stamped in some foliage in Shaded Spruce and some wood texture in Granny Apple Green. I was keeping things simple, so left it at that. After removing the mask, I attached the card front to the Early Espresso card base.

I stamped the sentiment in Early Espresso and cut it with one of the Textured Notes dies. To accent it, I cut some foliage from Nature's Symphony in Granny Apple Green and Shaded Spruce and tucked them uncer the popped up sentiment. The finishing touch was a trio of Faux Brass Pentagons.

This is such a lovely technique and not at all difficult, so I hope you'll give it a go sometime.

Next up on the hop is the lovely Leonie Stuart.

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Here's a blog roll in case you get lost or want to revisit someone:

Jan Clothier - NZ - You are here

Leonie Stuart - AU

Rochelle Laird-Smith - AU

Cheryll Miller - AU

Aurélie Fabre - FR

Danielle Kassing - NL

Layers of Beauty for Colour INKspiration 202

Welcome to the 202nd challenge at Colour INKspiration! And welcome back for a whole new year of crafting. I hope you're refreshed and ready to create!

We're starting off the year with this gorgeous colour combination, chosen for us by Crew Member Lou Kitzelman. Isn't it just so pretty?

This challenge runs for nearly four weeks and will finish on Monday 9 February, 7pm AEST.

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 welcome Sandra Stoebel as our Guest Designer for this challenge.

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

Some pretty colours and a green and I'm going to be thinking floral. Usually, I try to steer away from the obvious choice but sometimes, it's just too good to pass up on. The Layers of Beauty bundle has been around for a little while now but I never tire of playing with it. I've played it very simple today, with the large floral image stamped, stencilled and die cut.

Well, perhaps not totally simple. I did cut up the image and rearrange it a little and I did stamp and colour a second image and cut out some of the images from that to add in. And I did die cut come extra bit of foliage in white to add in as well. 😀

The floral bouquet was popped up on dimensionals over a background embossed with the Beautiful Pattern embossing folder on a Strawberry Slush card base.

The sentiment is from Sweet Jar and is cut using the ever-faithful Stylish Shapes dies. Honestly, if dies could wear out, this one would! The embellishments are Strawberry Slush Flat Pearls.

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.

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Tuesday, 13 January 2026

Nature's Symphony for Atlantic Hearts 664

I couldn't resist having a play with the sketch at Atlantic Hearts Challenge.

I was probably influenced by the absolutely gorgeous foliage die in the new Nature's Symphony bundle. It seemed to be perfect for this sketch and I also had a hankering to make a starry evening sky which I thought would work well with the semi-circular shape in the sketch.

I cut a mask using the retired Deckled Circles then went to work with blending brushes, a spritzer, some white ink with a water painter and some Wink of Stella to create the sky. The ink colours were Pretty in Pink, Flirty Flamingo, Fresh Freesia, Highland Heather and Blueberry Bushel graded and blended. Next time, I'll try less pinks and more blues for more of an evening sky rather than a sunset sky.

I cut the panel down using one of the Textured Notes dies and created a mat piece in Gorgeous Grape with the largest of those dies. The foliage is stamped in Highland Heather while the die cut foliage is in Blueberry Bushel.

The sentiment is stamped in Blueberry Bushel, the foliage is in Highland Heather and it is cut with another of the dies from Textured Notes.

The finishing touch is a trio of Pearlised Faceted Circles in the palest colour -which is nicely opalescent.

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Sunday, 11 January 2026

Nature's Symphony for Paper Players 768

Welcome to the first challenge of 2026 at The Paper Players! I hope you're all feeling refreshed, with full buckets, after the holiday season and are ready to start crafting again.

LeAnne has an intriguing colour challenge for us to play with this week. I do like blues, so the mix of Misty Moonlight and Night of Navy with Silver was very appealing to me - as I hope it is for you.

I was keen to play with one of my pre-order goodies, the Nature's Symphony bundle, which I'd not had time to get to over Christmas. The coordinating Nature Walk DSP is lovely, in shades of green but I thought the images would work well with LeAnne's palette too.

The card base is Night of Navy, which peeks through the Basic White card base because I used one of the texture dies to punch in some lines of dots. I really like this die but there are other textures I could have used too.

I stamped the large foliage with Misty Moonlight and added diecuts in Silver foil and Night of Navy. The die cuts were layered over the stamped image and the die cut lines of dots.

The sentiment, from the set, is stamped in Night of Navy and cut using one of the Textured Notes dies.

A trio of silvery Rhinestone Jewels completed the card.

What will you do with LeAnne's colours?

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Eliz Stewart

Christy Stanford

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.