Happy 5 Year Anniversary

The ever-so-sweet Kelly Kent is so excited to be celebrating her 5 year anniversary working as a Stampin' Up! demonstrator, she wanted to share the joy around by having her very own anniversary blog hop. I think she might have been just the tiniest bit surprised at how many people shouted out, "Pick me! Pick me!" It just goes to show how much we love this girl. Kelly very generously picked us all (I think) and here we are in celebration mode.

Berry Burst was my choice for this card with a little Rich Razzleberry and a bit more Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer paper. I wanted to try Embossing Paste too, as it is new to Stampin' Ups! range of products. This time I left it in the original white but I have tinted it with a few drops of re-inker to get coloured versions too. I tried it out with a mask which I used previously for painting. Happy Anniversary is from the retiring Timeless Love. Of course, you know the hot Air Balloon is from Lift Me Up. Thank goodness that is carrying over to the new catalogue!!!

The card needed to be a little bit special for Kelly, so I picked a butterfly (Garden In Bloom) and some more balloons, all things that fly high you'll note. I took a quick pic before adding this folding panel inside in case it was impossible to photograph once it was inside.

It wasn't totally impossible, just a touch difficult, so you don't really get to see the sweet verse from Special Celebrations. That is also where 'Congratulations' comes from, and 'HUGS' is from Lovely Inside & Out. My friend was very keen to take this home with her, and suggested I changed the 5 to 21, the number of years she has been married!

Wishing you a very successful career over the next 5 years, Kelly. Now you'll be heading over to Cheryl Algie, can hardly wait to see her project!

 Cheers, Rachel

Everyday Occasions AWH Blog Hop

Tonight I am participating in a blog hop along with the super talented ladies in the Art With Heart Team. We thought it would be fun to share some fabulous ideas to inspire you from our brand new 2017-2018 annual catalogue, which is available 1st June. Be sure to request your copy of the catalogue today!

I was so excited to win Special Celebrations in Prize Patrol at Onstage, I'd already marked it in the catalogue as a 'must buy'! Stampin' Up!® are a very generous company and there are some nice little sweetners like Prize Patrol that keep us coming back to these events. I think maybe it is also getting together with all the other crafty folk who go to these functions too!

 Anyway, I was mighty pleased to bring Special Celebrations home with me, and started using it as soon as possible. For my first card I've paired it with Bella & Friends, and Delightful Daisy Designer Series Paper. I ordered the paper without the stamp or punch which is part of the suite, because I thought the paper was just too gorgeous to wait for!

The sweet puppy has been stamped onto a Stitched Shape Circle, along with the Happy Birthday sentiment. Burlap ribbon has been laid behind for a little more interest.

 This accompanying verse for birthdays is lovely, don't you think?

I totally enjoy water colouring now, and used the Aqua Painter with ink from the lid of the ink pad. The new glitter enamel dots are a perfect finishing touch, with gradients of colour and speckles through them.

With this paper, also from the Delightful Daisy DSP pack, I used a flower from Garden In Bloom. It seems to go quite nicely with this paper, and I took a cue from the colours and added some Tranquil Tide to the flower. I love it! What about the Faceted Gems? This is the gold, and there is clear too. It's a great flower centre. I nearly forgot to mention this new copper trim. It is a loose weave, so you can leave it as a slim ribbon. or tease it out a little, as I have here, and it is like net.

I hope you're feeling excited about the new Stampin' Up!® catalogue, I certainly am. Every time I walk into my craft room, I have an urge to make something, and I've only a handful of new products at the moment.

I did think it was a good idea to share the inside of this card, so you can read another delightful verse from the  Special Celebrations stamp set. paired up with a flower from Garden In Bloom.


 Your next stop on this blog hop is Alisha Watson

If you find a broken link or have come to this blog hop from a different entry point, you can view the participants below:

1. Tina Gillespie
2. Ros Davidson
3. Kathryn Mangelsdorf
4. Kate Morgan
5. Andrea Roberts
6. Rachel Palmieri
7. Alisha Watson
8. Kimberly Hern
9. Monika O'Neill
10. Claire Daly
11. Sharon Davern
12. Rachel Woollard
13. Caroline Manwaring
14. Judy May 

15. Catherine Proctor

16. Rebecca Jacovou

Happy crafting, 

Rachel

Colour INKspiration CI #04

Another delightful colour combination from Colour Inkspiration for challenge #04. We are a group of Aussie and NZ Stampin' Up!® demonstrators, creating samples based on Pinterest inspired colour swatches. There is a Facebook group for Stampin' Up!® enthusiasts who would like to share their paper craft projects using the colour combinations. You don't need a blog, and you don't need to be a demonstrator. This colour swatch with the four different pictures and strong shades of purple and yellow was almost too inspiring, I had trouble deciding where to go with it, and was very tempted to use Beautiful You.

Eventually, I decided on Garden In Bloom, a photopolymer stamp from page 146 in the Annual Catalogue. This stamp set has lovely flowers, leaves, butterfly and bee, all perfect for stamping in two-step stamping to fill with colour, or just stamp the outline, like I did for my card, and use ink and aquapainter to fill it in. Timeless Textures, and in particular the small splatter stamp, are out on my table a great deal of the time these days, and it has made another appearance here. The colours are Delightful Dijon, Elegant Eggplant, Crushed Curry and Whisper White.

On the inside the card has been lined with Elegant Eggplant and another bloom stamped with Archival Basic Grey Ink. This ink is waterproof, easy to clean from your stamps, and the grey is softer than Basic Black. This 'friends' sentiment belongs to Garden In Bloom, while the sentiment on the outside is from Suite Sentiments. Suite Sentiments is at the very back of the Occasions Catalogue, and it contains sentiments for Easter, Graduation, birthdays and guys. What's more, they're in fonts that match sets in the Occasions Catalogue and it shows you which. Although it's not particularly supposed to be paired with this stamp set, don't you think the two sentiments fit together just like a hand in a glove?

When I coloured this card, I squeezed my closed inkpad to get a pool of ink in the lid. I was able to use it fairly concentrated to get the strong purple shade on some petals, or watered right down to put a wash of Crushed Curry onto the background. It is such a relaxing thing to do.

It would be fun to see what you decide to craft using these colours and Stampin' Up!® products,don't forget to share at our spot on Facebook.

You are now heading to Nikki Spencer

Cheers

Rachel

Happy Haunting in the Garden - CTC#53

Hello again, another Sunday and I'm back with CASE-ing The Catty. You may have just arrived from Rebecca Benson's blog, or perhaps you are starting here with me. This week we are CASE-ing the Happy Haunting section of the Holiday Catalogue. Halloween is barely celebrated in Australia, although a few children dress-up and go about to see what treats they can collect. There's definitely no decorating of houses, exchanging of cards or anything. That fact isn't going to stop me CASE-ing The Catty though, because I really like this card sketch.

For my first card, I used the Elegant Dots Textured Impressions Embossing Folder on a piece of Pool Party card and substituted the large Maple leaf for the Halloween doily. Garden In Bloom provides a varied selection of blossoms for two-step stamping and the cute as a button bumble bee.My tag is punched with the Ornate Tag Topper Punch, and some Delightful Dijon Dotted Lace Trim has been threaded through and tied with some gold Cording Trim.

For the second card, I decided to use a DSP(Designer Series Paper) instead of the Textured Embossing as a background. I'm a big hoarder collector of patterned paper, therefore, I need to force myself to cut into its gorgeousness while the papers are still available. This piece of prettiness is English Garden and it co-ordinates officially with eight colours from the Stampin' Up!® range, It also matches the Garden In Bloom stamp set, so by selecting some of the colours listed on the back of the DSP pack, everything matches up beautifully. This is one of the great things about Stampin' Up!®, co-ordination of colour suites, stamp sets, papers and dies is carefully thought out, so you just need to start creating.

This time the sentiment was simply stamped onto a rectangle, and a few loops of the Gold Corded Trim was placed behind the corner overlapping the large leaf. It's not a complicated design to make, and very easy to change it up a bit.Which one do you prefer?

Now you can continue along your CASE-ing The Catty Blog Hop journey by heading over to visit Julia Quinn.

Cheers, Rachel

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog