Tuesday 28 May 2019

The Paper Players 443

Left over from a class I held last weekend were the necessary components to make up a silver glimmer hot air balloon backed with three colours. It seemed a shame to waste it so I made it up for the sketch at The Paper Players and built a card around it. 


Lift Me Up and the matching Up and Away dies are retiring on 3 June. They're among my favourite sets, so it was nice to give them a fond farewell in this challenge. If you've been wanting them, order them ASAP because soon they'll be gone forever.



The Swirls & Curls embossing folder gives a lovely swirly pattern that put me in mind of winds. So I cut a strip of Whisper White and embossed it with the folder for the main balloon to rest on.


To keep in theme, I stamped the sentiment into a cloud shape. I had to mask the stamp to cut off the "Congratulations" part of it but that's on the inside.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas and provide you with Stampin' Up products. Message me by visiting my Facebook page  - there's a link in the sidebar of this blog. Or you can leave a comment below. You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand by clicking on the SHOP NOW button in the sidebar or clicking on any of products below will take you to my on-line store.

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Friday 24 May 2019

As You See It 201 - Design Team Card

Thank you to everyone who entered into our 200th Challenge! It was exciting to see all the different ways people incorporated 'two' into their cards, from a literal number 2 to actually creating a pair of cards - and everything in-between. We're delighted that Heather will be invited to join us as Guest Designer for Challenge 202.

Today, it's welcome to not only a new challenge at As You See It but the start of a new way of doing things. With the retirement of Amanda, our Designer Emeritus, the crew is taking on the task of designing the weekly challenges on a rotating basis. In addition, we've decided to use a regular rotation of six styles of challenge. In future, you'll be seeing a sketch, a colour challenge, a fill-in-the-blank, a recipe (where you're given ingredients you have to use), a theme and finally a speed challenge. Then back to the beginning.

Our team leader, Heather, has started the ball rolling with this sweet sketch challenge. 


One of my favourite retiring bundles is Dear Doily, mainly because I love the spray of lavender that's part of the stamp set, all the cool bits and bobs in the die set and the fabulous medallion stamp. So this card is a bit of a farewell to it. I've used the Well Said bundle as well, which is fortunately carrying over to the 2019-20 catalogue.



The flower spray is just made for direct-to-stamp colouring. I've used Mossy Meadow, Gorgeous Grape and Highland Heather Stampin' Write markers for this. Aren't the flowers so pretty?


I've used the Subtle embossing folder to give some texture to the Highland Heather strip in behind the die-cut word. I popped the 'for everything' up in mini-dimensionals to give it a bit more prominence.

I was late to this particular party, I know, but I've only just discovered the basic pack of sequins. Oh my word - how useful are they?! They come in a pack of five colours: Mint Macaron, Pearl White, Petal Pink, Sahara Sand and Soft Sea Foam and they're lovely faceted 5 mm sequins and best of all - they're self-adhesive. They're great for the little finishing touch.

We'd love to see how you see Heather's sketch. You can join us up until Wednesday 5 June. You can see what the rest of the design team by visiting As You See It Challenge.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas and provide you with Stampin' Up products. Message me by visiting my Facebook page  - there's a link in the sidebar of this blog. Or you can leave a comment below. You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand by clicking on the SHOP NOW button in the sidebar or clicking on any of products below will take you to my on-line store.

If you have your eye on the Well Said bundle, while the components will be in the 2019-20 catalogue, you will lose the bundle discount after the end of May, so get it now to save money.

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Wednesday 22 May 2019

Colour INKspiration 56 - Crew Card


Whether you hopped here from the delightful Denita Wright-Smee or started your hop here, welcome to the latest challenge at Colour Inkspiration. If you haven't played with us before, we're a group of Australian and New Zealand Stampin' Up demonstrators. You can play with us by joining in our Facebook group here which will let you play along, comment and vote for your favourite from the top 5 selected by the crew.

Isn't this an opulent set of colours to play with? If you love Berry Burst, make sure you stock up on it before it retires on 3 June.



They shouted floral to me, so I turned to my go-to set for anything floral, Beautiful Bouquet. I was happy to see that it will be carrying over into the 2019-20 catalogue. What I love about it is the huge variety of flowers and foliage the stamp set and matching Bouquet Bunch dies offer. Honestly, you could make fifty cards with it and have every one of them different.

In this case, the furtherest back flowers are stamped on to the card base while the nearer ones are die cut and popped up on dimensionals. The tulips are stamped in mixes of Melon Mambo, Berry Burst and Blackberry Bliss by stamping in one colour and daubing on little bits of a second colour to get the variegation.


I've added in a couple of touches of silver to add to the celebratory mood but toned them down with a more rustic tie for the bouquet. I've used the linen braid trim but frayed out the ends.


This time, you've got three weeks to play with us and we'd love to see what you do with this rich set of colours. Maybe you see something other than flowers?

Next up is Rachel Palmieri who will, as always, have something inspiring for us.



If you live in New Zealand and don't have a demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas and provide you with Stampin' Up products. Message me by visiting my Facebook page  - there's a link in the sidebar of this blog. Or you can leave a comment below. You can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand by clicking on the SHOP NOW button in the sidebar or clicking on any of products below will take you to my on-line store.


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