Pumpkins for AYSI 383

 It's Recipe Week at As You See It this week. I like a recipe challenge and it's a challenge type that's not around as much as some, so there's novelty value in it too. If you've never played with our Recipe Challenge before, it's pretty simple: take the five given ingredients, mix them in with your craft stash and see what you can cook up. Or in MasterChef terms, take the mystery box and add your chosen pantry staples and see what you can make. 😀

Having said how much I like a recipe challenge, this one did throw me a bit. It was the PUMPKIN... There are lots of pumpkins in the Stampin' Up! repertoire but just not in my Craft Library. We don't have Halloween or Thanksgiving so, apart from making soup, I don't have a lot of call for them!

Some creative thinking was called for. I made my own pumpkins out of the insides of the letter O from the Alphabet a la mode set and from stitched circles from Stylish Shapes. Then I cut some foliage from the Help Me Grow dies in what I hoped was a pumpkinesque style! I used Pumpkin Pie, Timid Tiger and Golden Glow card for the pumpkins and I blended the same coloured inks around the edges to add som depth. The foliage is cut from Old Olive and Garden Green.

The rest of the recipe was easy: Forever Plaid embossing folder for the card front to add the checked element, Linen Thread to create the crossover and Sunset Sparkle sequins for some shine.

As well as two of the pumpkins, the sentiment also uses die cuts. It's cut using the ever-useful Stylish Shapes dies. The sentiment is white embossed on Garden Green and is from Elegant Leaves.

We'd love to see what you cook up with these ingredients. You can see what the rest of the design team have done, and link up your own entry, on the As You See It Challenge 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 stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Welcome Noel for Paper Players 806

 I thought that JayDee's sketch for last week's challenge was a keeper and, judging from the beautiful entries in the gallery, so did many of you. This week at The Paper Players, our hostess is Ann. Her chosen theme is Nature's Landscapes. Anything from mountains to deserts and anything in between!

I do seem to be in Christmas card mode at present, probably because I'm planning out a number of Christmas classes. I've been doing a lot with Noel Tidings and Welcome Noel bundles and I've used Welcome Noel again for this card, along with some library items.

I started with a piece of Basic White, some torn Post-it Notes, a blending brush, Hydrangea Hue ink, Shaded Spruce ink and the small pine tree stamp from Welcome Noel to create a snowy scene.

Once the scene was created, I used the bauble die from the (retired) Ornamental Christmas from the 2025 Christmas catalogue to cut out a bauble from it. From a scrap of Gold Foil I cut the bauble topper. Using the star die from Welcome Noel, I cut the small star. 

I blended Hydrangea Hue ink around the edge of the bauble and stamped in the tiny deer in Early Espresso ink. 

To bring in more of the forest idea, I embossed the card front with the (retired) Evergreen Forest 3D embossing folder from my craft library.

After ruling in a hanging wire for the bauble, I attached it with dimensionals. 

The sentiment is one of the greetings in the Magical Christmas Hot Foil Dies, created with Gold Hot Foil. It too is popped up on dimensionals. 

Note: Hot Foiling requires the Stampin' Up! Hot Foil System and a Stampin' Up! Cut and Emboss Machine.

You can see what the rest of the team have done, and link up your entry, on The Paper Players page.

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. 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.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Christy Stanford

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.

Butterfly Flight for CAS Colours & Sketches 595

I'm always keen for a sketch challenge. To be honest, I'm also always looking for a reason not to be doing chores. Happy marriage = wet day + craft room time + sketch at CAS Colours & Sketches. 😀

So, I saw the circle shapes as butterflies. I used my Butterfly Flight Hot Foil dies and Gold Hot Foil to create a set of butterflies. Then I used the matching Butterfly Flight decorative masks to colour them with a blending brush and a mix of Daffodil Delight, Timid Tiger and Calpyso Coral before die cutting them out. Special tip: these decorative masks make beautiful butterflies even without the Hot Foil dies.

To give the butterflies something to ground them, I added in some stencilled lines using the dotted lines from the Water and Dotted Lines duo.  I used Granny Apple Green ink and a blending brush.

The sentiment used the Sweetly Sentimental Hot Foil dies, again with Gold Hot Foil. To finish off, I added a trio of Granny Apple Green shimmering dots.

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.

New Music Stuff for FMS 755

 I'm having a play around with the sketch at Freshly Made Sketches today because I have new stuff to play with. Although I've been a Stampin' Up! woman for some time now, sometimes you just have to go off piste. I'm always on the lookout for good music themed items for my collection as I have musical family members. When my Paper Players buddy JayDee used some Spellbinders musical items recently, I tracked them down within New Zealand so avoided heavy shipping costs.  They are now in my possession. 😀

The die sets and embossing folder come from Spellbinders Bibi Cameron Musical Notes Collection. All other products are Stampin' Up!.

I enjoyed creating the violin and bow from Pecan Pie, Early Espresso, Basic Black and some copper foil. I added in some adhesive sheet to give both height and strength, especially to the very delicate bow die cut. 

Since I used copper foil for the bow, I used the Sweetly Sentimental Hot Foil die with Copper Hot Foil to create the sentiment.

It was nice to get a first card done with these items - already I have ideas for other projects. 

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.

Creative Celebrations for Paper Players 805

Christy's CAS Bear challenge threw up some gorgeous bear themed cards. Thank you, if you were one of the people who took up the challenge. This week at The Paper Players, JayDee is our hostess and she has a lovely sketch for us to be inspired by. I love a sketch challenge - they're my favourite kind. 😀

Today I've played with a type of product I don't usually have in my craft room and that's items from the Quick and Easy Section of the catalogue - because I like crafting from scratch. Bit of a masochist like that! 

You might laugh at the reason why I ended up with the Season of Celebration Mix and Match Ephemera Pack and the coordinating Creative Celebrations Mix and Match 6x6 DSP pack. My husband and I recently went for a winter escape to tropical North Queensland for a couple of weeks. I couldn't face the prospect of no crafting for that long, so I got the above mentioned items, cut some coordinating card bases, pre-embossed some card fronts with the Softly Woven 3D embossing folder and took them on holiday with me.... along with some embellishments, a paper trimmer and my basic tools.

True craft minded people will understand it. My husband was rather less understanding when I pulled the items out of my suitcase. You can't spend all your time on The Great Barrier Reef or exploring the Daintree Rainforest! 😎

Anyway, I still have things left to use up so I used some of the remnants for this card. 

The wreath and the sentiment are from the ephemera pack. The Softly Woven embossed card front is well travelled, having been to Australia and back. The card base is Real Red. It too is well travelled.

The embellishments are from the adhesive backed Sparkle Sequins. 

The reason I love a sketch challenge is that I'm always fascinated at how the same starting point can lead to so many different interpretations. How will you approach this sketch? The team and I would love to see. 

You can see what the rest of the team have done, and link up your entry, on The Paper Players page.

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. 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.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Christy Stanford

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

Noel Tidings for AYSI 382

It's fill in the blank time at As You See It this week. Although I've now made more Christmas cards, this was the SECOND card I made, so that's how I'll fill in the blank. How about you?

I did rather fall in love with the Neutral Noel suite from the September-December Mini Catalogue. There was something about the richness of the DSP and the traditional nature of the greetings and imagery that won me over. In fact, it was that lovely but simple 'Merry Christmas' that did it for me. 

I started with a Mossy Meadow card base. I cut a piece of DSP - and with the gorgeous patterns in the Neutral Noel DSP collection, I was spoilt for choice. Then I used the oval die from the Noel Tidings bundle to cut out the centre.

I stamped the sentiment on a piece of Very Vanilla in Pecan Pie ink and added it behind the DSP before adhering it all to the card base. 

I cut two of the oval pine wreath dies, one in Mossy Meadow and one in Old Olive. I adhered them around the oval aperture, off-setting them slightly to give a sense of depth. I cut out some berries from scraps of Cherry Cobbler to add some colour to the wreath.

The two little pinecones were stamped in Pecan Pie on Very Vanilla and coloured with Pecan Pie Stampin' Blends before I die cut them out and added them to the top of the wreath. To finish it off, I tied a double bow from Linen Thread.

Then, I added a trio of Gold Dots around the sentiment. 

I'm so pleased with this card that we'll be making it in next month's classes. 😀

We'd love to see how you fill in the blank. You can see what the rest of the design team have done and link up your own entry on the As You See It Challenge 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 stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

 

Classic Greetings for Colour INKspiration 218

Welcome to the 218th challenge at Colour INKspiration! Today's colours offer up a rustic charm or a masculine vibe, depending how you see it. You might see something else! The colours were chosen by team member, Vicki Boucher. 

This challenge runs for nearly three weeks and will finish on Monday 12 October, 5pm 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 Sonja Zierer as our Guest Designer this time around. 

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

I originally thought I'd do something along the lines of a rustic Christmas with the colours but once I sat at my desk, other things happened!

I cut some hexagons using the smallest hexagon die from Nested Essentials and arranged them on a panel of Basic Beige. I mounted that on a panel of Basic Beige and then attached it to a Basic Black card base.

I used the Hot Foil system to create the sentiment. I used the Classic Greetings hot foil dies and Red foil on Basic Beige cardstock. Once it was die cut out, I popped it up on dimensionals then added some Neutral Matte Dots in Basic Black, Pecan Pie and Basic Beige.

So, this masculine card came together pretty quickly and would work well in lots of colour combinations. I toyed with either stamping tone on tone or embossing the hexagons but went for a cleaner look in this instance. Worth an experiment in the future though. 😀

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.

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.