The brand new 2020-2021 Stampin' Up! Annual Catalogue started today and it's time for a new journey through the beautiful Stampin' Up! colour families. 

Every week the Art With Heart Stampin' Up! team will explore another colour from the Stampin' Up! range. This week's Colour Creation Showcase is Balmy Blue!

Stampin' Up! Classic Color Combo

Basic Black

Balmy Blue

Whisper White

www.katlodesigns.com

I've selected one of my favourite colour combinations and teamed it with some new products to show you how fresh and lovely Balmy Blue is with just black and white.

Using the ORNATE LAYERS DIES from the Ornate Garden Suite I have cut several layers in each of the three colours, keeping the smallest layer white to be the main front panel. Base cards are Basic Black and Balmy Blue, so make sure you cut extra Ornate Layers Dies in Whisper White for the inside of the cards.

Because the dies are so detailed, I want the rest of my card to be just understated elegance. I selected two new stamp sets - Comfort and Hope along with Tasteful Touches to provide some soft background stamping in Balmy Blue and Black.

 I stamped the leaves from Comfort and Hope onto vellum with Balmy Blue ink and set it aside to dry, and I cut some leaf outline shapes using the sprig die from the Wild Rose Dies and also a vine like die from Detailed Bands Dies in Basic Black card for some extra layering detail.

It's amazing how much depth is created with a little layered stamping of elements and some die cut pieces.

The sentiment stamp is from Butterfly Gala stamp set. With the change over to a new catalogue I will now be looking for some new greeting stamp sets, as I seem to chosen in the past lots that are now retired!

The stamped greeting is cut with a simple shape from the Ornate Frames Dies. I was going to also do the ornate frame that matches perfectly to layer with this piece, cutting it out in vellum - but it was going to become too fussy. Sometimes you've just got to know when to stop, right?

Don't forget to make the inside of your card just as pretty as the outside!

Thanks for stopping by to visit Katlo Designs blog. I would love it if you scroll right down to the bottom and leave me some feedback - either about my cards, or about what you are most looking forward to getting from the new catalogue!

To see the other Balmy Blue creations by my Stampin' Up! demonstrator friends, visit Catherine's blog to see the full list of participants sharing Balmy Blue projects tonight : click here.

See you soon with ink on your fingers!!

Kathryn Ruddick (Croydon North VIC)

Product List

Balmy Blue Classic Stampin' Pad [147105] $13.00	Balmy Blue A4 Cardstock [147007] $15.25	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad [132708] $10.00
Whisper White A4 Card Stock [106549] $17.00	Basic Black A4 Card Stock [121688] $15.25	White Vellum A4 Card Stock [106584] $17.50
Ornate Layers Dies [152726] $64.00	Ornate Frames Dies [150664] $59.00	Wild Rose Dies [149547] $59.00
Tasteful Touches Cling Stamp Set (English) [152562] $40.00	Comfort & Hope Cling Stamp Set (En) [152509] $37.00	Butterfly Gala Photopolymer Stamp Set [148580] $37.00

Just a really quick post today, to share a rebuild of an old favourite!

When the latest Stampin' Up! annual catalogue came out in June, I think just about every demonstrator pre-ordered Swirly Bird Stamp Set and Thinlets.

I've seen a few variations of this card now, and this is the 4th or 5th one I have made, but it never ceases to be a fun card to make, and to get a great reaction from the recipient.

Welcome Swirly Bird Minnie!

Featuring Flirty Flamingo Designer Series Paper and Ruched Ribbon, Petite Pansy Punch and Bow Builder Punch, this is a fun card to make, and easy to do with the 8-12 year old girls who would probably most love it!

Give it a try today!

Buy Swirly Bird Online Here.

As I was preparing to go to Stampin' Up!s On Stage Live event last week - a three day convention packed full of product demonstrations, make and take projects, gifts from the new catalogue coming in January, fun, friendship, leadership training, business ideas, recognition and rewards . . .  word came through that one of my lovely Tasmanian team members had advanced in title from Bronze Elite to Silver demonstrator.

I didn't have time to complete a silver card for her before I went away, but when I returned, I was very excited to bring back a divine new stamp set with me, called "Beautiful You" which I won in Prize Patrol (similar to door prizes).

Straight away this gorgeous elegant set was screaming out to me to create a Silver Congratulations card for me team member who promoted.

Don't you just love the simple elegant lines of the stamped image, and the subtle Smoky Slate watercolouring?

I adore the whole stamp set, and will definitely be making lots of cards with it! I feel so lucky to have received it at On Stage!

How and when can you get your hands on it?

The new catalogue starts on January 4th 2017. You may order it then.

If you've considered joining the Stampin' Up! family, you could join now, then as a member, you can participate in the pre-order period which starts on December 1st. All demonstrators get to order from the new catalogue more than a month before everyone else! You could put this stamp set on your Christmas list!

You could join in December and get this stamp set along with other pre-order items as part of your starter kit. There are definite savings - you get $235 of product for only $169.00!!

My team is really wanting to welcome new stampers to our lovely creative family, we are very social, sharing and caring so ask us about the benefits today!

Last year I particpated in a 12 month Mystery Box Swap where we worked on a set range of projects, to our own theme, over the whole year and at the end of the year, exchanged them with another stamper.

My theme was Black and White, and one of the projects towards the end of the year was gift tags. I never did get around to showing off my tags, because by the time the projects were exchanged, the 2014 Holiday Catalogue had finished and the gorgeous stamp set Festival of Trees and co-ordinating Tree Punch were no longer available to purchase.

But, NEW Annual Catalogue, and which lovely bundle of products has re-appeared?

Yes, that's right! The Festival of Trees Stamp Set and matching Tree Punch!

And yes, these are the three tags I completed for the Mystery Box Swap.

When I was planning for my team's Christmas in July event last month, I remembered that some of my lovely stamp club ladies had asked if we could do tags like these, so with the new catalogue in hand, and a list of replacement product options for the Designer Series Paper and the fabulous Banner Bigz L Die which were no longer available to purchase through Stampin' Up!, I sat down and created three more tags that the ladies could create as a Make & Take project at our fantastic event.

Without the Banners Die, the shape was going to be different, and I decided to go with the awesome Tag Topper punches, the Scallop Tag Topper and Ornate Tag Topper which meant the tags were also much smaller. I wanted to keep the overall design simpler because there were so many projects for the ladies to create at the Christmas in July event, that these needed to be easy to make.

So I eliminated the extra banner shape layer and also the stamped greeting. I love how striking they are with the Cherry Cobbler, Black and silver colour combo.

Shortly after this (before I had finished packing away all the equipment and materials from that event), I promised to put in an entry for a colour challenge on one of our demonstrator forums. The colours were Island Indigo, Old Olive and Silver and the sample card was Christmas themed.

Right away I thought of recreating these tags again, but with a new colour combo. This was fun, and I just love how they came up.

Did you know that the Festival of Trees Stamp Set and the Tree Punch are still available as a "Bundle and Save 15%" item in the Annual Catalogue? In fact there are 35 stamp sets available in 65 Bundle options in the Annual catalogue, where you save 15% by purchasing the coordinating items together. That is totally awesome!

I will be featuring lots of these bundles during August, so click on the subscibe button at the top of my blog page to enter your email address to make sure you don't miss out on seeing any of these bundles in action!

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Hey again!

How's your week been?

Did you manage to get in any creative time? I hope you had a chance to drop in on our blog hop yesterday? If not, scroll down to my next post and follow the links.

Today I've got more of the Black and White Mystery Box contents to show you. And since we are on the Easter theme already - this actually was last year's challenge for April - hence the retired Designer Series Paper - Modern Medley, and the retired stamp set Blessed Easter.

The challenge was to make a gift box and matching card - and when we sent the Mystery Box out at the end of the year, the idea was, the Easter gift box should be full of goodies. Given we had some very hot days around Dec / January when the Mystery Boxes were in the post, I hope they all made it safely with no melted chocolate accidents.

Over the weekend I've got something totally different to show you - a wedding card that took me close to seven hours to make! Yep, very special family wedding this weekend, so be sure to check back in and have a look at the card I slaved over - oh the hassles of being a perfectionist!

Are you tired of the Black and White cards yet?

I hope not! Because I've still got heaps of them to show you!

Starting with a "Mother's Day" (or women) inspired card.

Have you met the gorgeous peacock yet? The stamp set is called Perfect Peacock and it's in our current annual catalogue. Everyone just seems to love it, and I've seen some gorgeous creations with it.

I've stamped in Stazon Jet Black ink and applied a really light touch of Smokey Slate ink over the stamped image to pop it out a bit, then added lots of Pearl jewels to the tail feathers.

Would you like to do some peacock cards in a class?

I've scheduled Peacock Card Classes for Thursday 26th and Saturday 28th of March. It will be the same class both days, just different time slots so hopefully you can make one or the other.

We will be making 3 different peacock cards, and class fee is $20.00 for two hours.

To R.S.V.P, please click on the link for your preferred time-slot.

Thursday 26th 10am - 12 noon

OR

Saturday 28th 2pm - 4pm

I'll be back on Thursday with something completely different for you - some Easter cards, that I have made for a blog hop with some of my fellow demonstrators. Be sure to check back for some inspiration!

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Do you have trouble coming up with Masculine Cards?

I do - and I know my stamp club girls do too, so it was great that one of the months in our Mystery Box challenge we had to make three masculine cards!

I love the Traveler Stamp Set, and I knew some of my stamp club ladies had already purchased it and were keen for some more ideas of how to use it, so I did some googling to get some more inspiration. These are the three cards I created - heavily inspired by those I found on Pinterest.

So along with Traveler Stamp Set, I have used World Map Stamp set, and That's the Ticket, a bit of Gorgeous Grunge and the birthday stamp from Perfectly Penned.

Here's a closer up image of the two with World Map as the background.

Don't you love all the layers, and so easy with the co-ordinating punches and stamp sets.

Did you know I hold classes in Croydon North - weekdays and occasionally on weekends - I do more parties on weekends so it's a bit harder to schedule classes then. If you'd like to learn how to do these cards, please let me know and we'll schedule them into the class list.

You can email me [email protected], or leave a comment below, or post a message on my Facebook page. Either way, I'd love to hear from you.

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Oh! You came back again?

Thank you!!! Hope you're well, and enjoying my wrap up of my 2014 Mystery Box Project.

What else did we have to make as part of our monthly contributions to the box of goodies?

One of the things I found most challenging was to make a packet of Card Candy.  I'm so used to making full card fronts, I really didn't know where to start with just making some embellishments that go on the front of cards - had to do lots of googling and searching on Pinterest!

In the end, I was ecstatic with the results though.

I feel so lucky that we have so many co-ordinating stamps, punches and framelits in our Stampin' Up! range, and that the ink colours, card and accessories just work so well together! These were so easy to make but even so, I wish I could have kept them for myself instead of posting them off to my lovely recipient (hope she loves them too!!).

What would you do with a packet of gorgeous card candy like this?

Leave a comment below and let me know if you'd just keep them to admire or what you would do with them?

See you again soon with more Black & White.

Kathryn

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Black & White Card Projects

Back with Part 3 of the 2014 Mystery Box Swap

OR Part 2 of the Non-Standard cards - if you prefer!

I interpreted "Non-Standard cards" to mean something with fancy folds or a different shape to you average fold in half A5 card.

Easel cards fit into this category and what could be more elegant than black and white in an easel card? So lucky to have such a gorgeous range of stamps and papers that lend themselves beautifully to such!

If you follow my blog (if you don't - there's a subscribe button up the top left so whenever I post, it will come to your email inbox) you may remember from last year I did quite a few cards using Stippled Blossoms stamp set - I'm guessing it probably was my most used set last year.

Couldn't resist getting it out again to compliment Ex Libris Stamp Set (now retired) in this elegant easel card.

Quite a few different layers happening here - but nothing too difficult - just following the lines of the stamped image. Yummy!

My third card in the "non-standard" category was a gate fold with extra folds - so I used the full (long) width of the A4 card stock.

The Modern Medley Designer Series Paper (DSP) really comes into it's own on this card - so beautiful to work with! I've teamed it with Bordering Blooms Stamp set.

And it just has a minimal amount of colouring with the Blender Pens and Crumb Cake Ink.

Are you enjoying the Black and White projects? I loved making them - the Very Vanilla and Basic Black combo is just too elegant and it's such fun to see what little touch of other colour really works with the.

Stacks more projects to show you - so I'll be back again soon!

Kathryn

Back again to show you some more of my Black & White Projects that I made for the 2014 Mystery Box Swap.

We had to make three cards that were Non-Standard. I interpreted this to mean they weren't just an A5 card folded in half - in other words use a bit of fancy folding or some different shapes.

Love the challenge of this - and to bring in the elegance of Black and White - nice!!

The first card I settled on for this was a step-fold card.

Lucky me! - I hold team nights once a month for those ladies who have joined my team, and often one of two of the girls bring along some Show & Tell or even a project for everyone to make. Lovely Heidi Bell shared step fold cards AND curling petal flowers with us one night - so I did mine in Modern Medley Designer Series Paper with a black base so I could include it in my Mystery Box.

I also used the (now retired) Houndstooth Embossing Folder, The Bird Builder Punch (for the leaves) and the Petite Petals stamp set for some embellishments.

Pretty special card I reckon - and it couldn't go in a normal envelope so I packed it in an empty Clearmount stamp set case (DVD case) for posting.

I'll be back in a day or two with the other two "Non-Standard" cards I created for the Mystery Box Swap.

See you then!

Kathryn