Thinking Stamping: 2026

Jan Clothier - You are here

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

Friday, 3 July 2026

Garden Gatherings for As You See It 376

Welcome to a new challenge at As You See It. It's our Fill in the Blank challenge and we're asking you to tell us about your favourite Embossing Folder.

This is a tricky thing for me because I love embossing folders. I use them all the time. I choose to use them over patterned paper almost always. So asking me for my favourite embossing folder is a bit like asking me which is my favourite child... I love them all! Over the years, my favourites have been the Subtle folder, Exposed Brick and Softly Falling.

Of current folders, my favourite changes pretty much daily. The new Floral Spray is awesome but the one I keep coming back to is Lazy Daisy, so that's what I've used today.

To add a bit of interest, I embossed a piece of Basic White, then tore one edge of it before attaching it to the card front.

I've used my latest acquisition, Garden Gatherings for the flowers. I cut two vases from scraps of Beautiful Ordinary Life DSP. The squat one, I ran through the Lazy Daisy folder to give it some patterning.

The flower stems were stamped in Pretty Peacock. The flowers were stamped in Flirty Flamingo, daubed with touches of Melon Mambo. The front vase and flowers are popped up on dimensionals.

The sentiment is from the same set and is cut using a banner die from Stylish Shapes. I finished off with a trio of dots from Array of Dots.

The team and I would love to see what you do with your favourite embossing folder for this challenge.

You can see what the rest of the Design Team have done, and link up your entry, on the As You See It page. The team and I are all keen to see how you see it!

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

Fern & Flora for CAS Colours & Sketches 588

I thought I'd play along with the colour challenge at CAS Colours & Sketches.

I was aiming to stay very clean and very simple with this card. So I stamped a simple floral spray, from Fern & Flora, in Blackberry Bliss and coloured it with Garden Green and Gorgeous Grape coloured pencils. Then I added in the sentiment in Blackberry Bliss.

Then I used my paper trimmer to score a rectangle by scoring a line 1cm in all around.

The final touch was to add a trio of Purple Fine Shimmer Gems.

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

Sunday, 28 June 2026

Help Me Grow for Paper Players 792

Many thanks to those of you who played along with my CAS Weather theme last week at The Paper Players. This week, JoAnne is our hostess and she has a sketch for us. I love a sketch challenge and I really enjoy seeing how one starting point can end up with such different projects.

I thought I'd pay some attention to the 2026-2028 In Colors this week so I did something I seldom do when I'm making cards... I reached for DSP! In this case, the 2026-2028 In Color Painted Patterns. There's a pack of this DSP in each of the colour families, but I only have this one. I chose a striped background in Peaceful Pine as the base, and a contrasting Crisp Cantaloupe dotted piece for the horizontal element.

I embossed the white panel with the retired (but much loved) Subtle embossing folder.

Then I went to work on creating the pot plant. I used the Help Me Grow dies for this, cutting a pot and saucer from Golden Glow. I added some splatter stamping in the same colour to give the pot a sense of both depth and age.

I cut the foliage from Peaceful Pine (2 sprigs) and arranged them in the pot. The flowers were cut from Crisp Cantaloupe, some with adhesive foam backing so they'd be able to pop up easily. I used a blending brush to apply a little Crisp Cantaloupe ink on some of the flowers to add variation of colour.

The sentiment is from Rolling Waves, stamped in Peaceful Pine. I trimmed the card down and angled the end. I debated about popping is up on dimensionals but didn't - some regret on that point!

The final touch was a trio of Crisp Cantaloupe dots.

The team and I would love to see what you do with JoAnne's sketch. You can see what the rest of the team have done, and link up your entry, at The Paper Players.

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)

Jan Clothier - You are here

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

Wednesday, 24 June 2026

Fern & Flora for Colour Inkspiration 212

Welcome to the 212th challenge at Colour INKspiration! Today's colours offer up a retro mid-century design graphic and a chance to play with some of the new In-Colors, along with a favourite classic.

This challenge runs for nearly two weeks and will finish on Monday 6 July, 5pm AEST.

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.

If you don't have an exact challenge colour, feel free to replace it with whatever you have that's closest, for example Petal Pink or Pretty in Pink for Barely Blush. Black, White, Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake, Basic Beige and metallics are free colours, as are flesh-toned Stampin' Blends.

I thought these colours worked charmingly together and I was taken by the circular elements of the graphic. So I got out my circle stencils, created by punching out different sized circles on some scraps of window sheet. Using a blending brush, I created some overlapping circles with Golden Glow, Barely Brush and Crisp Canteloupe.

What next, I wondered? Well, what happened was that the Fern & Flora bundle was on my desk, since it's a current favourite and before I knew it, that fern image had just inked itself up and stamped itself over the circles. 😁

So I die cut a large fern from Lost Lagoon and added that. The sentiment was cut using a die from Textured Notes (recently retired but too good to part with). I popped it up on dimensionals and gave it a Golden Glow shadow.

I added a pair of moths, stamped in Lost Lagoon and coloured with Lost Lagoon and Golden Glow Stampin' Blends. They were die cut, then popped up on dimensionals.

To finish off, I added a trio of Golden Glow dots.

Originally I'd intended to have a Thick Basic White card base - and I still do have - but I decided at the last minute to add a Lost Lagoon mat. Funny how cards sometimes evolve and sometimes there's an actual plan... this one was more an evolution than a plan!

You can see what the rest of the Design Team have done with the 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.

Sunday, 21 June 2026

Using the Stash for Paper Players 791

Welcome stampers to the latest challenge at The Paper Players. I'm hostess this week and I have a double challenge for you. It's both and theme and a style challenge: create something that uses the weather and is in a Clean and Simple style.

At The Paper Players, we think of CAS being uncluttered with lots of white space, with minimal embellishment.

Despite having set the challenge, I did have a few problems finding something weather related that I wanted to work with, so I actually borrowed a bundle from my daughter: the retired Rainbow of Happiness stamps and Brilliant Rainbow dies.

These dies made creating a rainbow so easy! I cut rainbows in Real Red, Daffodil Delight, Pumpkin Pie and Blueberry Bushel then assembled it roughly in ROYGBIV order - allowing for missing colours.

Then I used the cloud dies and arranged them under the rainbow. To add a bit more interest, the centre ones are popped up on dimensionals.

The sentiment is stamped in Blueberry Bushel to go with the card base. Then a trio of Basic Rhinestones finished it off.

A bright, simple card just right for cheering up someone's day. 😀

The team and I would love to see what you do with this thematic CAS challenge. Visit The Paper Players to see what the rest of the team have done and to link up your entry.

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)

Jan Clothier - You are here

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

Friday, 19 June 2026

Fern & Flora for As You See It 375

It was Joanne's choice for colour week at As You See It and she's chosen a bright and breezy, summery colour palette that I'm sure you'll enjoy working with.

It was kind of hard to go past florals, although I didn't come at it head on with florals - more a sideways approach using the Fern & Flora bundle.

I stamped two of the small stems of flowers in Tuxedo Black, then coloured them with Melon Mambo, Berry Burst and Lemon-Lime Twist Stampin' Blends. Then I die cut the pair of them out.

On the card front, I stamped the small tally lines in Coastal Cabana and a fern in Lemon Lime Twist as a background. Then I arrange the two die cut stems over it, with the top one popped up on dimensionals.

I stamped the sentiment in Tuxedo Black then die cut it with a stitched rectangle from Notes of Texture (retired) and shadowed it with some Coastal Cabana.

I stamped one of each of the moths in Tuxedo Black, then coloured it with a Coastal Cabana Stampin' Write marker (retired) and Berry Burst Stampin' Blends. Then I added some highlights with a white gel pen before die cutting them and adding them to the mix popped up on dimensionals.

The finishing touch was a trio of Basic Rhinestones coloured with a dark Melon Mambo Stampin' Blend.

You can see what the rest of the Design Team have done, and link up your entry, on the As You See It page. The team and I are all keen to see how you see it!

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

Sunday, 14 June 2026

Summer Happiness for The Paper Players 790

I do like a beach theme, so I picked up the Summer Happiness bundle from the July online exclusives pre-order. Preorder opportunity is one of the best perks of being a Demonstrator. 😀

It seemed a perfect chance to try it out, with Christy's beautiful summer colour palette this week at The Paper Players. There were lots of super entries in Stef's Masculine theme challenge last week, so if you entered - thank you!

I started with a Coastal Cabana base. I blended Coastal Cabana ink through the new Water mask with a blending brush to create a light-on-the-water effect.

Then I used some of the dies and stamps from the bundle to create some jandals, a camera, a pair of sunglasses and two flowers with Lemon-Lime Twist centres and clustered them over the water. I particularly liked the stamped glasses and camera, worked tone-on-tone.

The sentiments in the set lent themselves more to scrapbooking, so I used a sentiment from Rolling Waves then completed the card with a trio of Strawberry Slush flat pearls. What a marriage Summer Happiness and Rolling Waves will be!

The team and I would love to see what you do with Christy's bright colours. Visit The Paper Players to see what the rest of the team have done and to link up your entry.

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)

Jan Clothier - You are here