Punch Bunch Class August 19th

I've designed and made the samples for my August and September classes, mainly because we are taking off for sunny Hawaii in between these two classes. It is always challenging to manage my regular day job, my family commitments and my Stampin' Up!® business, plus time out, but organising in advance seems to be the answer. That is why I text my daughter-in-law to check months ahead, if I'm needed for babysitting!!! A full life is a happy life!

So in August I've planned that we make cards with the Stampin' Up!® punches, so you can find out how easy they are, and how much fun. There is the Fox Builder Punch, the Tree Builder Punch (that's the sweet cupcake) and the Bow Builder Punch. You will find these on page 188 of the Annual catalogue, and in Australia they retail at $31.00 each. The Fox Builder Punch can be bought with a co-ordinating stamp which comes in very handy, and is offered at 10% off if you use the special code to buy as a bundle. Check with me to find out what this is if you're unsure. I'm offering any of my customers who have already ordered this bundle through me, or those who do prior to August 19th, the opportunity to attend the class at half price, $10. Alternatively, order two Builder Punches from page 188 and the class will also be half price.

In case you've made heaps of cute kitties and foxes already, would you want to have a go at the puppy or mouse? I might even have another critter or two to share on the night. There are a couple of other 'extras' on the other two cards also. The Cupcake card has a window filled with 'sprinkles' and the Bow Builder card has a 'pleated skirt'.

If you are ordering from my Online shop, could you please add the HOSTESS CODE 9Z44PC2P You will earn a small gift in the mail from me, plus any orders reaching $90 earn a $9 voucher from Stampin' Up!® to use between 2nd-31st August. It is emailed to you, and you need to keep a record of the code, as head office will not be able to reissue it.

Gotta love a bonus, it's like another 10% discount and you just might want it next month when this sweet bundle is available. Thoughtful Branches is on offer only for the month of August, although demonstrators have been able to order it during July too. We always get to try out the products a month before our customers so we can make up wonderful samples for you. Have you seen it on PINTEREST? just search for Stampin Up Thoughtful Branches and see all the great ideas by other demos pop up. I've just begun to play with it, am loving the versatility of the set. I'll most likely share some cards using Thoughtful Branches over the next few days.

Cheers, Rachel

Favourite Holiday Bundle -CTC#56

It's Sunday evening here in Australia, time for a CASE-ing The Catty Blog Hop. Perhaps you are just starting out here with me, but do make sure you hop around all the blogs to see the creation inspiration we have for you. I spent yesterday at Stampin' Up! Onstage in Melbourne, getting the 'whisper' on what we have coming up in January. Such a fun day chatting with other demonstrators and getting inky with NEW stamps. It's all so lovely, hard not to want everything!!!

Catalogue picture

This week we are sharing our favourite bundle from the Stampin' Up!® Holiday Catalogue.
Just wait till you see the new bundles! I've chosen Snow Place Stamp Set with Snow Friends Framelits Dies as my absolute favourite, even though they're all so great. Since I've had this stamp set, I've been really enjoying playing with different combinations of the stamped pieces and the matching dies. It's a bit like playing paper dolls!!! Wouldn't it be fun if Stampin' Up!® released another stamp with more cute outfits and accessories for these guys?

I hadn't planned to buy this bundle originally, until I realised that two of my young grandchildren lug soft toy penguins every time they come here to sleepover. They've spent some of the school holidays at the beach and they loved going to see the real live 'Little Penguins' coming ashore one evening. I've also spent a few days away with them and took the stamp set with me so the children could stamp out some pictures with snowmen and penguins. Photopolymer is a bit better than my usual wood mount stamps for use by the children, they can't ruin the blocks getting ink all over them!!! The Snow Place stamp set retails at $45.00 for 22 stamps, there are 15 dies in Snow Friends Framelits Dies retailing for $45.00 also but together as a bundle, you save 15%.


This card was originally inspired by the card at top right of the catalogue picture, but this cheeky chappie has been dressed to suit our summer Christmas.





My fellow demonstrator, Petra Tailor has already done the shirt & ice cream idea, now I've put my spin on the theme. I used the die for a penguin as a guide to the shape for the shorts and shirt, and then did a few alterations with paper snips. The clouds are punched with the Cupcake Builder Punch, you could also use the Tree builder Punch. I've enjoyed the mix-&-match aspect of this set: - top hat, Santa hat, ear muffs, ties, scarf, but sadly, no sun hat for when he eats ice cream at the beach!

I've made this pair of fun Christmas cards as part of the selection for my Christmas card class next Friday 21st, with penguin and snowman wearing Santa hats with an added sprig of holly.

This stamp set doesn't have to be restricted to the yuletide season though. Because my small grand-daughter adores penguins, I decided to make her next birthday card with three lady penguins. They've dressed up for the occasion with necklaces and a bow in the hair of the youngest. It seemed a good idea to try out the Sleigh Ride Edgelit Dies, the curved landscape added interest to the scene, even in the very neutral Crumb Cake. I finally ordered the Little Numbers Thinlets, and its a great size for cards. "Look who's turning" is from Hooray It's Your Day, which was in the Occasions Catalogue back in January this year.

Lastly, you get to see a card my son made for his girlfriend's birthday last month, CASE-ing mine above. This time we have a boy and girl pair, the trees from Sleigh Ride Edgelits Dies and a handcut sun from Over The Rainbow. Aaron chose the bold birthday sentiment from Sassy Salutations. I think his card is gorgeous, and such a shame he only makes this one card a year.
Can you see why I'm loving this bundle now? Check below for product codes if this is one you'd love to play with too. I'm looking forward to seeing which bundles the other members of this design team have favoured and what they have shared.

Here's a picture of my friend from Adelaide, Kathryn Mangelsdorf with me at Stampin' Up!®

Onstage in Melbourne yesterday.It was great to catch up, so glad Kathryn was able to come over from Adelaide. You'll find her blog after Stasia's.We have so much fun at these events with lots of chatter and stamping and product give-aways. This time we were checking out the Occasions Catalogue and Sale-A-Bration catalogue, in preparation for their release in January 2016. We can order new goodies already and play with them for 6 weeks before they're released to our customers. There's a lot of beautiful stamps, thinlets, punches and paper coming your way!!!!
I'll tell you more about Onstage later.
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And in the meantime - there will be a 20% discount on selected stamp sets from Monday 16th November, but only through till Thursday 20th November, while stocks last. Click here for my online shop, open all day, every day.
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 It's time to be hopping along to Stasia now, enjoy!

Cheers
Rachel

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

It's Sneak Peek Week at CTC#32

Welcome to the CASE-ing The Catty Blog Hop. This week we are giving you a sneak peek of some of the new goodies coming in the about-to-be-released Stampin' Up!® catalogue. You may have come from my friend Kathryn's blog, or perhaps you are starting the blog here. Either way, keep on going around until you have done a complete circuit.

It's not long until the new Stampin' Up! catalogue goes 'live', Tuesday June 2nd will be a busy day, because you can purchase from all three catalogues, just for one day, but at 11.50pm Tuesday, last year's annual catalogue and the Occasions Catalogue will retire. I wonder if you have you marked your new catalogue with post-it notes, like I did? As a demo, I did get to order some select items earlier, and I'm loving playing with those, and planning my classes for the remainder of the year.

My favourite stamp set from Convention might be Sprinkles Of Life.  It could be the variety of cards you can make with these different stamps, or perhaps the Tree Builder Punch which matches it, making those clouds/ice cream super-easy to punch out. You can make cupcakes, ice creams, flower baskets, trees or clouds with just three stamps. They're all so much fun, because of the cute sentiments that go along with them. How about "Hope your day stacks up to be one good thing on top of another" on the ice cream card or "Every cloud has a silver lining - you just have to look up to see it" which is on the card with the grey clouds.

The card with the three scoops of ice cream features a couple of new In Colors:- Watermelon Wonder card and the lovely, soft, Dotted Lace Trim in Delightful Dijon. The new Paper Stack,  measuring 6" by 6" now, Cherry On Top comes in a gorgeous selection of fresh Brights and In Colors. The ice cream is Pool Party, Watermelon Wonder and Soft Saffron, the splodges behind, from Gorgeous Grunge, are stamped in the same colours. One of the new features in the catalogue which you'll love, especially if you don't have every colour in the range, is the co-ordinated packs of plain A4 cardstock which you can purchase to match the Paper Stack or 12" by 12" Designer Series Paper. They have eight sheets of  3 colours, a total of 24 sheets of card for $12.25.

You know another really good thing about Sprinkles Of Life? It's the stamp set that helps support Ronald McDonald House Charities, and $3 from the sale of each of these stamp sets is donated to RMHC in Australia (or the country in which you make your purchase). You can find this stamp on the inside of the back cover of the catalogue.

I CASE-d the Catty to make the card with clouds, just changing the colour of the striped strip down the right side of the card.

Maybe my raindrops are a bit lighter than the original too, and the Stampin' Up!® designers may have used silver embossing powder (I had none) while I have used Dazzling Diamonds. It does look like an awfully close CASE. I love the sparkle of Dazzling Diamonds. If you purchase from my Online Shop and use the Hostess Code B6VWKZMJ I will post you a 'little something' from my stash.

Folks who come to my June classes will get to make three cards with Sprinkles Of Life stamp set and the Tree Builder Punch. There are spaces on Friday 19th June at 7pm- 9.30pm, or if you and a friend would like to attend a daytime workshop in South Morang, Victoria. I am happy to run a class for 2 people, we will just have to negotiate a day and time. The third card, and some other options haven't been made yet but could feature a tree, basket of apples, flowers or something else. I keep my classes relatively small, and allow you a certain degree of creativity with your work. Email rpalmieri5@bigpond.com for more information or text 0417 500 681.

Perhaps you'd better pop along to Emma Palonek's blog now, to see which sneak peeks she is sharing with us all.
Cheers,
Rachel

If you get lost along the way, this will help you get back on track.

CTC Blog - http://caseingthecatty.blogspot.com/2015/05/case-ing-catty-sneak-peek-week.html

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Joy Fold Class

We had a very lively workshop last Friday night despite some last-minute cancellations, or perhaps because the numbers were down, the girls really let loose! I had pre-cut Sahara Sand card for all the attendees, so they all started with this card. One made it as a wedding card, using Bermuda Bay as the accent colour, and two changed it to a birthday card with Big News providing a big sentiment.



Annette also made a second Joy-Fold card using Adventure Bound DSP Paper Stack as her starting point. The dies for Something For Baby provided the soccer top (shhh... don't tell Haris).She has made a birthday card for her soccer playing son.






Genella also had certain people in mind as she put together her three cards. We especially loved her fish card, using By The Tide and Adventure Bound DSP. Unfortunately, it is slightly out of focus at the back of the photo.
Apothecary Art, retiring June 2nd, has made a final appearance here, looking gorgeous in shades echoing the colours of the DSP.


You might notice the theme of Prue's cards was happiness in one form or another!
She was needing a wedding card immediately, hopefully the recipients realise the thoughtfulness of a handcrafted card, Bravo is where the middle sentiment comes from, and of course the Hello You Thinlets has 'happy' and yes, that set is carrying over for another 12 months.


Next month's class is pencilled in for Friday June 19th and we will be using a new stamp set, Sprinkles of Life, Tree Builder Punch and doing some heat embossing. Already two of my regulars have indicated that the date might not suit them, so if you think coming to a class in South Morang, Victoria might interest you, contact me to find out more. It is Friday night at 7pm, although I'd love to start daytime classes on a Thursday or Friday, if two or more people were interested. There's no obligation to purchase supplies from me, the $20 fee covers the class and everything you use. You're more than welcome to collect a catalogue to study at your leisure of course, and anyone in Australia can purchase from my online shop.

Have a great week
Cheers
Rachel

Sprinkles Anyone? FMS186

I've had a busy few days, mainly playing with my pre-order goodies and having some of my team come check them out too. The weather has improved markedly over the past couple of days. so there have been opportunities to enjoy the sunshine outdoors. I could handle weather like this all the time.

I'm loving the new In Colors, I like them all, but seem to be using Watermelon Wonder first. In truth I thought it would be Mint Macaron, such a soft and pretty shade. I did know for certain that I would love the new stamp set Sprinkles of Life, after seeing examples made with it at the South Pacific Stampin' Up!® Convention. It has some great little sentiments and even better, there's a Tree Builder Punch to help with cutting the cloud/tree top/ cupcake icing.

I used Tip Top Taupe as the base behind the Watermelon Wonder and used paper piercing to add a little interest. Jen Brum at Freshly Made Sketches provided the sketch for inspiration. Some paper from Cherry On Top Designer Series Paper Stack was stamped for the paper patty under the pink icing. Paper stacks have been increased in size to 6" by 6", only another 2 inches, but it just means that the paper is more useable for scrapbook pages as well as larger greeting cards.

Looking forward to another big week at work,
cheers
Rachel

South Pacific Stampin' Up!® Convention 2015 - Day Two

Friday was the second day of Convention for me and sunny Queensland wasn't quite so sunny
anymore. There were strong winds and heavy showers of rain. My weather app. wasn't totally truthful about how bad the weather was!
We were at the Convention Centre in time for the doors to open at 8.30am for General session. By now, we'd all had a look through the catalogue, I'd even started post-it marking some of the ones I considered 'must-haves'. There were a few on the pre-order list that I was going to be able to leave off. The budget was looking like it would balance!

Then Sara Douglass demonstrated Sprinkles Of Life, the new stamp set that supports Ronald McDonald House Charities. It makes it seem so much better knowing $3 of the $37 purchase price goes directly to RMHC in the country of purchase. Stampin' Up!® support this charity in other ways as well. We all contribute cards for the occupants to use, and many demos and SU staff take part in community service activities. Above,is one of the cards Sara showed, there are so many super-cute ideas, I can hardly wait to have this one as a class! (I'm thinking....July?) It has a dinky little Tree Builder Punch which co-ordinates with it too! [squeal]

Pam Jorgensen demonstrated a couple of new stamp sets too, and also included Crazy About You. The colours she used for her samples were very vibrant and I was so enthused I added Build A Birthday to my wish list.



Last item for the morning was being taken through the Make and Take before we broke up and went to another big hall to make our card, and eat our packaged lunch. There was an opportunity to play with new products again if you hadn't already, look at and photograph samples before an afternoon of business training.

Sharon and I were heading back to the hotel for a rest before the evening party. It was only raining lightly, but oh boy! were we being buffeted by the wind? This wasn't the only time our umbrellas turned inside out, but Sharon grabbed her phone and snapped me hanging on for dear life. A little later the rain began bucketing down, and we wondered if we'd go to the presentation and party in the evening. After firing a few text messages around, we'd decided that a taxi was warrented, even though it was only about 500 metres and luckily, the taxi drivers had no qualms about short distance fares.

This has turned out to be a rather long story, so I will hold over the evening event for another post.
Let me know if you enjoy hearing about our event, and if there is anything you want to know, just ask.
Rachel