May 5, 2019 | cards, Retired List, rubber stamping, Stampin' Up!
OK I’m a little tired, so that’s my excuse for the corny title, but it’s true – Lovely as a Tree is Retiring! This stamp set has been part of the Stampin’ Up! Catalogue for slightly longer than I’ve been a demonstrator – but it’s retiring June 3rd. (Don’t worry, I’m NOT retiring though!).
For Swap Sunday I thought I’d pull out this card that I made for a card swap from a few years ago featuring this classic stamp set.
I stamped this onto Shimmery White cardstock and then used my Aquapainter to add a wash to the sky to create a winter sunset sky. Still one of my favourite techniques because it’s so easy and still impressive.
If you want to get the Lovely as a Tree stamp set before it’s gone forever, you can visit the YamStamps Stampin’ Up! Online store (by clicking on the link), or remembering the shortcut address yamstamps.com/shop . Lovely as a Tree is available in red rubber wood mount or red rubber clear mount.
The other reason I pulled out this card to share is that I originally made it when I was going to attend a Business Conference that was run by Stampin’ Up! Canada (and a group of leading demonstrators that were helping organize it). This past weekend I attended another training session put on by Stampin’ Up! Canada (and a group of different leading demonstrators that were helping organize it!). It was a great chance to get together with other demonstrators and get some great business ideas and inspiration. A few members of my demonstrator group were also able to attend so it was great being able to catch up with them at lunch beforehand. Oh, and technically at dinner afterward as well LOL.
(love this quote that Dale Hampshire, Stampin’ Up! Canada Demonstrator Development Manager, shared with us at the event).
I recently celebrated 16 years as a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator and looking forward to many more years of running my creative business! Part of my business is helping others start and run their own businesses. If you’d like to find out more about becoming part of my group of demonstrators and having your own business, you can check out the FAQs here, or contact me for more information. I also have scheduled Information Evenings, so you can attend in person and find out more – the next one is actually booked for this Wednesday, May 8th. Please RSVP if you’d like to join us (and for directions).
Otherwise – happy May! Hope it’s looking more spring-like where you are these days – it was gorgeous in Burlington today for a change!
Apr 15, 2019 | Announcements, Retired List
***UPDATED 16 APRIL – LISTS NOW HIGHLIGHT WHICH STAMP SETS WILL BE RETURNING IN CLING FORMAT***
OK – here are the Stampin’ Up! Canada retiring lists
CARRY-OVER STAMP SETS NOW IN CLING
Pop of Petals
Label Me Pretty
Special Celebrations
Itty Bitty Greetings
Botanical Bliss
This Little Piggy
Flourishing Phrases
Stitched All Around
Hold on to Hope
Heartland
Peaceful Place
Barn Door
Accented Blooms
Birthday Backgrounds
Perennial Birthday
Dashing Deer
Winter Woods
Kindness & Compassion
Dandelion Wishes
Healing Hugs
Sorry for Everything
Love You to Pieces
Tropical Chic
Bee Thankful
Animal Outing
Little Elephant
Beautiful You
Painted Glass
Little Twinkle
Beautiful Day
Magical Mermaid
First Frost
Rooted in Nature
Country Road
Lilypad Lake
Sea of Textures
Artisan Textures
Gallery Grunge
Bokeh Dots
Crafting Forever
All retiring items are available while supplies last OR until June 3, 2019, whichever occurs first.
I highly recommend that you place your order online at yamstamps.com/shop – because then you can get it placed right away and reduce the risk of being disappointed because an item sells out. I am always happy to assist with placing an order, or can place it for you, but be aware that by the time we get an order finalized, something may sell out. Just warning you! You can contact me if you have any questions or need assistance.
Apr 9, 2019 | Announcements, Big Shot, die cutting, Information, Retired List, Stampin' Up!
Stampin’ Up! Retiring Product News! While the full retiring list won’t be released for a few days yet, we do know of a few items that will be retiring – notably the Big Shot Die Cutting Machine and the Stampin’ Trimmer!
What to know:
- Stampin’ Up! will still continue to offer dies and embossing folders, and moving forward these items will be made by a different supplier, so you will notice some difference in them. Exciting – the dies will have an inner edge or lip so that they will line up right against the stamped image – making them easier to align perfectly, rather than having to judge the amount of space you’re leaving around the stamped image. In the meantime, carry over dies and embossing folders may be the “old style” when ordered, until current stock is depleted.
- Stampin’ Up!’s Trimmer and all associated tools will be retiring – which means the replacement blades and mats. There is currently a 3 item limit on replacement blades, but after April 15th, it will move up to a 6 item limit. This means that you can stock up on the blades and they should last you a long time still.
While neither of these items will be in the 2019-2020 Annual Catalogue, Stampin’ Up! is moving forward with coming up with new offerings in these categories (and will let us know when they’re ready to be released!).
I know that this Stampin’ Up! Retiring Product News may be a bit of a surprise – I personally LOVE my Big Shot – but I know that Stampin’ Up! is working toward offering their own product that will fill the paper crafter’s needs, and I’m looking forward to see what they will be offering.
In the meantime, as always – if you have any questions, you can either leave a comment below or message me. If you need to grab these items (or associated accessories) – please visit yamstamps.com/shop (or click on the images above to see them in the YamStamps Online Stampin’ Up! Canada Store).
May 3, 2018 | birthday, cards, Retired List, Stampin' Up!
Isn’t this a fun card? This is one of the cards you can make with the Perennial Birthday Project Kit and the Perennial Birthday Stamp Set (available in wood mount or clear mount). The kit will be retiring at the end of the month (or when supplies are exhausted), but the stamp set will be around for another year. This kit makes 4 each of 4 different cards quickly and easily! The most time consuming thing on this card? Might be a tie – poking out the little die cut slats on the background piece….or tying the bow around the strings! haha
This is what the kit itself looks like – the box that holds all the project items then doubles as a card box with dividers so that you can be prepared for upcoming birthdays! If you’re interested in grabbing this kit, you’ll want to place your order sooner rather than later. If you want to complete the cards exactly as shown in the kit, you’ll also want the Dapper Denim, Flirty Flamingo and Old Olive ink pads and the stamp set, though you could easily substitute other ink colours or greeting sets.
Stampin’ Up! is going to do a Colour Revamp with the new catalogue – so we’ll say goodbye to some colours that have been in the catalogue, and make room for some new ones! Plus, there’s a new design to the ink pads – and they’re stackable!
As you can see – there’s some old favourites coming back as core colours – many demonstrators were excited to see Mint Macaron and Blackberry Bliss on the list! And Flirty Flamingo leaves as an In Colour, but comes right back as a Core Colour. There’s also a new “Basics” Group that consists of Basic Black, Very Vanilla and Whisper White.
Last but not least….the In Colours
So while we are sad to see some of our favourites leave, there’s lots to look forward to in the new catalogue! Demonstrators are able to order selected items from the upcoming catalogue this month so we can be prepared to share all sorts of new projects and ideas right away come June 1st! If you can’t wait for June 1st, you can join my demonstrator team NOW and select some of the new catalogue product in your starter kit! Details on being part of my demonstrator group here – or contact me for more information and the new catalogue preorder list! Otherwise – if yu’re local to Burlington ON, June 2nd is my New Catalogue Open House – rsvp to make sure there’s a copy of the catalogue waiting for you!
Apr 25, 2018 | cards, Retired List, Stampin' Up!
This is a quick ombré thank you card – and it’s easy to recreate! The graded shading (ombré) look is created by using a sponge brayer. For this card, the quick part is that the background patterned paper is the Stampin’ Up! Petal Passion Designer Series Paper (“DSP”) – which is a set of black and white patterned papers. I brayered two retiring colours onto this paper – Wisteria Wonder and Pink Pirouette. I started with just the Wisteria Wonder, inking up my brayer by rolling it on the ink pad repeatedly in one direction – roll across the ink pad, lift, then roll again across the ink pad, continuing in the same direction. Inking by rolling back & forth will give you a hard line of colour on your brayer, which will transfer to your project. Then I rolled the brayer on the paper. For this, you can roll back & forth, but you’ll want to change directions when you’re off the paper itself. So, working on scrap paper, start off the paper, roll across right off the other side, then come back across the paper off onto your scrap paper again before changing directions. Hmm. Maybe I’ll post a quick video on the YamStamps Facebook page later today LOL!! Anyway, I rolled the Wisteria Wonder starting at the top of my DSP, continuing down. The colour naturally fades out, and then I reinked my brayer and did the same thing again, starting at the top. When I finished, I wanted the difference in shading to stand out a bit more, so I added some Pirouette Pink, brayering from the bottom upwards. I used a new brayer roller for this to make the colour lighter and more pure (otherwise it would still look mostly purple).
The sentiment from Petal Palette (available in Clear Mount or Wood Mount) is stamped in Tuxedo Black Memento Ink, and I just used the Circle Punches – 1-3/4″, 2″ and 2-1/4″ – because sometimes I don’t feel like hauling out my Big Shot and dies. (Shocking, I know, but true). (OK well, slight exaggeration, since my Big Shot is always out anyway…haha!) Thought I’d add a bit more “wow” by adding some Rhinestone Basic Jewels. Might have gone a bit overboard….I blame the grey, wet day today – I needed some flash to compensate for the dull weather! So – tada – my quick ombré thank you card. Honestly, I think it took more time to write this blog post than it did to actually make this card! I’m still doing a bit of catch up on Thank You cards – so I think this might be my Thank You for March orders….if you ordered from me during March, you’ll have to find out if this is the design I end up using or not!!
If you want to recreate this quick ombré thank you card yourself, you’ll want to place your order for supplies sooner rather than later, since some of the items are on the retiring list. While retiring stamp sets have guaranteed availability until May 25th, individual ink pads and refills are only guaranteed until May 7th. Ink Pad Collections and everything else are “while supplies last” only. You can shop online 24/7 in the YamStamps Stampin’ Up! Canada store, which is the recommended way to go during the Retiring LIst season – you can enter it when you’re ready and you’ll know right away if everything you want is still available or not. If you live in Quebec or would like assistance placing your order, you can always email me directly. I’ll do my best to help you as quickly as I can – though extra steps always mean a bit of time, and a bigger risk that items will be sold out if you’re waiting until the last minute to grab retiring product.
Last reminders – if you’d like a copy of the upcoming Stampin’ Up! Canada Annual Catalogue, please complete this form and I’ll be in touch to organize getting you one. Tomorrow brings the last North American Events Council Member Blog Hop, sharing our class project ideas using the upcoming Share What You Love Product suite, so please come back to the YamStamps Blog to check it out!
Apr 22, 2018 | cards, Events, Retired List, Stampin' Up!
This is a fun butterfly card made easy by using Stampin’ Up! Designer Series Paper and die cuts – but if you want some of these products, you’ll have to move fast as they are on the Retiring List and fluttering away! Stampin’ Up! retiring stamp sets are available until May 25th – guaranteed, but after that, and all other retiring Stampin’ Up! products are only while supplies last.
It’s not a colour combination that I would have though of, but I took it from the Desginer Series Paper…. The Painted With Love Specialty Designer Series Paper has been one of my favourites, and it will be retiring at the end of the month. It’s used on the solid butterfly behind the detailed die cut black butterfly. One of the Stampers Club members used the side of the DSP that featured some metallic gold splashes and it was really striking. The solid butterfly die cut is from the Bold Butterfly Framelits, and the detailed butterfly die cut is from the Butterflies Thinlits dies. Both of these die sets are retiring, and (I just checked) only the Bold Butterfly framelits are still available. The Peekaboo Peach Cardstock featured in the foreground of the card is retiring, as it’s a 2016-2018 In Colour – making room for new in colours. It’s embossed with the (already sold out) retiring Fluttering Embossing Folder. The Rich Razzleberry cardstock is still available, since it’s not a retiring/revamped colour, and the sentiment is from the Bunch of Blossoms stamp set, which is NOT retiring so no worries about that availability! The slot on the front of the card (the butterfly pops through it) is created by punching the Classic Label Punch twice in a row to make a longer slot that will comfortably fit the butterfly. It’s also NOT retiring so will be available into next year. A fellow demonstrator, Ronda, shared the construction of this card – it’s fun and different. There are two Very Vanilla solid die cut butterflies underneath the solid butterfly of DSP. Each vanilla butterfly is folded in half, and one half is attached to the inside of the card, while the other half is attached to the back of the DSP butterfly which helps the DSP butterfly fold upwards as well as anchoring it to the inside of the card. See the detail of the butterfly card in the photo below:
For my butterfly card, the detailed die cut black butterfly is adhered on top of the DSP, but if you don’t have that detailed die cut, you could easily just leave the plain DSP butterfly exposed, or you could stamp the butterfly body from Watercolour Wings onto the die cut butterfly to give it more definition.
While I’m sad that the butterflies are fluttering away, I can’t wait to get my hands on more new product from the next Annual Catalogue! If you are in Canada and don’t already have a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator, please complete this form before April 29th and I will see about getting you your own hard copy! If you are local to Burlington ON, please mark SATURDAY, JUNE 2nd 9am til noon on your calendar – that will be my New Catalogue Open House and Retired Product sale! Please RSVP to ensure I have a copy of the catalogue waiting for you!
