Stampin' Creative Blog Hop - Birthday Bonanza!

Welcome to the Stampin' Creative Blog Hop!  I'm Tamara Bertram, coming to you from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.  I'm SO excited to he hopping with so many AMAZING demonstrators from around the globe as we bring you projects this month on a Birthday theme!  I don't know about you but I find birthday cards the hardest ones to design!  Honestly!  Hopefully you find some information as you hop along.  Please leave comments for us as you go.  It's always nice to see what others think of our work.  Happy hopping!

MY project came together quite quickly ... if you don't count the 7 hours of "Research & Development" (aka Pinterest *lol*).  After scrolling for HOURS (not kidding!) I decided to CASE a layout I loved ... one of MINE for about four years ago.  This seems to be my go-to method of design lately, finding an old card I loved then changing the pieces to use new papers, colours and stamp sets.

Here is my inspiration CHRISTMAS card:

 ... and here is my new , and improved BIRTHDAY card ...

I love it!  I seem to be into soft, muted colours this week.  It must be fall!  I used Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake and Petal Pink.  They look GREAT together!  Of course no card is complete without some doo-dads and some bling, so I used our adhesive backed sequins and Wink of Stella to fill those requirements!

I used my Stitched Shapes oval dies, the Piece of Cake stamp set and the banner from the new Toile Christmas set.  In order to NOT get the Christmas sentiment I just used my markers to colour the outline in Early Espresso and then stamped the happy birthday in Crumb Cake.  The sentiment is from the Piece of Cake set as well.  I ran the background ovals through my Hammered Metal embossing folder and the Scripty embossing folder to give those pieces some added interest.  The banner is popped up on dimensionals and BAM!  One pretty little birthday card ready to go!

I hope you like my project!  Now check out the projects of these other demonstrators.  Thanks for checking us out! Have a stampy day! Tam

CLEARANCE RACK UPDATE!

Happy Tuesday!

I had to pop on and let you know that the Stampin' Up! ® Clearance Rack has just been updated!

There are LOADS of great deals!!!  The full set of "new colour" markers for only $25??!!
  They were regular $64!!!  Faux Leather photo albums - regular $41 for only $16??!!

Check it out NOW and place your online order here.  Items will FLY off the shelves at these prices!

Canadian orders under $200 that use the hostess code SRV277H7 at the checkout will receive a thank you in the mail from me.

DON'T WAIT!!

(Yes, you can add other items to your order as well - any current product, including Designer Papers that are on the Buy 3 Get 1 Free promotion!)

Happy shopping .. and have a stampy day!


Tam

Beautiful Friendship - Greek Isles Achievers Blog Hop Sept 2019

Welcome to the Greek Isles Achievers Blog hop this month!  We are a group of Stampin' Up! ® Demonstrators from around the world that earned the incredible Stampin' Up! ® incentive trip that we were on in July.  It was an incredible trip!  We are hopping together to share with you some awesome inspiration using Stampin' Up! ® products.  I opted to use a set from our ANNUAL catalogue, giving it some love after ignoring it for the last month or so in favour of the fabulous new  Holiday Catalogue!  Like most demonstrators, I get caught up in the Holiday Crafting and forget about all the great products in our annual catalogue.  I rectified THAT issue this week! *lol*

Speaking Of the Holiday Catalogue ... do you live in Canada?  Do you need a physical copy?  If you don't have a designated demonstrator I would be happy to mail you one!  Leave me a message and I'll hook you up!

Right!  On with the projects!

I wanted to share several that  I made this week using the FABULOUS "Beautiful Friendship" set!

 Aren't they pretty??  The BEST part is they are so EASY!!  The epitome of #simple stamping!

The stamps do all the work!  I just love the colour combination; Rococo Rose; Merry Merlot and Pear Pizzazz.  The first project is a full sized card while the other three are notecards.  SO quick to whip up a little package for a friend's birthday or a last minute hostess gift!

Thanks so much for popping in!  There is an amazing lineup of Stampin' Up! ® demonstrators from around the world, and we know you are going to love all the amazing projects they are sharing!  Click on each of the blog links to check them all out! ... and have a stampy day!

BLOG HOP LIST

Free Skate Fun!

Happy Sunday!

I have been a working MACHINE this week!  I LOVE that it's fall, that the kids are back in school and that lazy, unstructured days are OVER!  Yes, I suppose that makes me more than a little weird, but those of you know me KNOW how I need structure in order to get ANYTHING done around here!  It's ok to say that mid-August every year I look forward to the kids going back.  It doesn't make me a bad mom and it doesn't mean I don't love my kids.  It just means  I need quite solitude to actually get s*** done!

This week was all over the map.  Alicia started Grade 9 on Tuesday at noon.  (Yes, she's only 13 years old here!  Eek!)

Rebecca started Grade 11 on Wednesday morning.

Thursday is always a half day for both of them, which results in me just being the taxi driver from 8 am until around 1:30 ... not very productive at ALL!  Despite that I managed to have a solid 3 hours a day at the computer organizing my 10-Month-Club, my Blends Club, my Paper and Ribbon shares, a few classes, LOADS of flyers and emails .... and my upcoming team meeting!  SLAYED it!

This weekend I'm hell-bent on sorting out my craft cave.  This Saturday Dale Hampshire, Demonstrator Development Manager for CANADA is coming to my team Stampin' Social.  Eek!  Nothing like Stampin' Up! Royalty attending to motivate me to find the floor in my cave!  lol.

Now ... amidst all THAT chaos last week I DID manage to make a card.  Check THIS one out ...

I showed my Facebook followers how to make it on my "Check It Out Tuesday" weekly live video.  You can see it here.

As I mentioned in the video, the layout is one I CASEd from a card I made years ago ... this one ...

You can see my blog post about that card here

When you find a layout you like use it over and over, just switch out the colours and/or elements!  Quick and easy!

For my newest version, I used the new "Free Skate" bundle of product from the new 2019 Holiday catalogue.  I used the beautiful Feels Like Frost DSP for the 1" strips along the bottom and Seaside Spray ink, marker and paper for the accents.  On THIS version I used our new Silver Delicata ink for the snowflakes but in a second attempt I used the Seaside Spray ink and I like it much better.  I used my rectangle stitched framelits for the stitched layer on the front.  Check out my FB video for a tip on how to cut that out effortlessly!

This card really is quite quick to put together.  I'm going to get a lot of use out of this bundle!

If you're in Canada you can shop my online store 24-7 here.  If you place an order that is under $200 and use the hostess code H23ZKW97 at the checkout I'll mail you a thank you!  If your order is OVER $200 you DON'T use the hostess code ... you scoop the 10% in free product instead!!

That's it for today - I'll leave you with a few pictures of my favourite Doodle Dog, Koda.  I think he misses me being layed up and playing with him - he's constantly begging me to play!  Hee hee ...

 I'm off to give him his walk and then I'm hitting the Craft Cave.  Whatever YOU get up to today, I hope you have a stampy day!


Tam

Stampin' Up! 2019 Holiday Catalogue is HERE!!

Happy Wednesday!

No time to chat ... there's shopping to do!

Click on the holiday catalogue image on the right hand side to see the catalogue.

In Canada?  Click here to place your online order.  All orders under $200 that use the hostess code H23ZKW97 at the checkout will receive a thank you in the mail from me.

Off you go!  Happy shopping!!


Tam

Toile Christmas Two Ways

Happy Sunday!

MAN it feels like LATE fall this weekend, rather than EARLY fall!  We had to turn the heat on last night!!  Am I complaining?  HECK NO!  I LOVE this weather!  It's my absolute FAVE!  The ONLY downside for me is it is WAY too short and it is quickly followed by 6-8 months of snow, ice and cold.  I'm going to enjoy every cool fall day I can get!  PERFECT crafting weather!

I only managed to spend about half an hour crafting this week.  The rest of my "spare" time has been spent playing game with the girls, back to school shopping and getting those 3 years worth of photographs in my albums!  I'm down to just two little boxes.  I think I started with 9!  The goal back in June was to get it done by the end of summer.  I'm cutting it close, with only 3 days left before school starts but I think I'll get there!  Go me!

It has been a process for SURE!  I've already gone through 15 PACKS of our pocket pages and am on album #4!  It will feel SO good to get this project off my "one-day" list!

So!  What crafting did I do this week?  Well, if you follow me on Facebook (Tamara's Paper Trail) you have already seen today's project.  It's a re-make of the Blog Hop card I created for the "Stampin' Creative Blog Hop" I posted Thursday.  For THAT card I CASEd a card right from the upcoming Holiday Catalogue, using the Toile Christmas bundle.  This is the card I shared:

Isn't it pretty?  For full details on how to make that card click here.

After I made THAT card I had a few leftover pieces on my desk.  With those I made THIS card:

This one uses Cherry Cobbler (4" x 3 3/4") and Old Olive "4 plus 2 ticks x 3 3/4" plus 2 ticks).  I coloured the branch with my markers and added some Ice Glitter to them.  The Cherry Cobbler layer was run through the Scripty 3-D embossing folder.  Quick, easy card!

Thursday I wanted to play with the Toile Christmas bundle some more and I wanted to see if the Cardinal would work as a Bluejay so ...

 I would say it does!  Now the face is a little creepy to me.  I used my whisper white watercolour crayons first (that worked well on the tummy) but it didn't give great coverage on the face, so I used our Chalk Marker on top of that.  It worked well enough but I think I'd like to try it again, stamping the face on Blueberry Bushel card stock in White Craft ink, then cut it out and adhere it down.  I think that may be less creepy.  If I try it I'll let you know how it turns out!

Here are the two versions together.  For the Bluejay card I used the Itty Bitty Birthdays set for the sentiment.  I like it!  Which do YOU like better?

That's it for today.  I'm off to start some laundry, walk Doodle Dog and then crack off another box of pictures.  What ever YOU get up to today, I hope you have a stampy one!


Tam