Read This If You Want To Continue To See More From Stamping With Val!!!

Hi Guys! So, the new blog went ahead, but the migration of all my subscribers hasn’t happened yet. So all the action is happening over on my new site, but many of you just aren’t seeing it. This makes me sad.

So, if you want to continue to see what I have to share, please head over to www.stampingwithval.com to see all my latest news, posts & projects. When you get there, you’ll see my new front page with quick links to all my fun offerings. You’ll also find a link to the BLOG in the toolbar across the top under the header.

You may need to resubscribe to the new blog, or update your RSS feed (eg, Feedly) with the new code or you’ll continue to miss out on what I’ve been creating! I’ve added a sign-up button on the right hand side so you can subscribe to the new blog!

 

I do hope you’ll head over to the new blog and join me there, I’ve certainly been missing you.

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

A Foxy Friend For Global Design Project!

Hi! I am popping in super quickly with my card for Global Design Project – it’s totally last minute! Mine and hubby’s plans for a new mattress and sofa took on epic proportions as we have trailed round so many stores looking at possible options, looking online for prices comparisons, beating down salesmen – you name it!

After 2 long days shopping, we have a mattress on order and the sofa is chosen, we are just waiting on fabric samples now to make a final decision on colour. Furniture is picked out, but we need to coordinate on all our deliveries so we can get time to paint the lounge before the new stuff arrives! Whew!

So, whilst I made my card, finding time to post it on the blog has been a struggle, but better late than never, right?

This week’s challenge at GDP was a theme of animals/pets! As I discussed in yesterday’s Facebook Live, this was a tricky subject for me as I’m not an animal person by nature. However, a couple of sets in my collection fitted the bill, and I went with Mr Foxy…

I incorporated a few elements from previous cards into this one – the leaf base for him to sit on, the cloud edge to the white panel using my Detailed Floral Edgelit – and I love Mr Foxy in Delightful Dijon!

I also wanted to bring you a quick public service announcement! At some point over the weekend (probably tomorrow night) the blog may go down for a short while. This is to allow for my lovely website lady to transition me from WordPress across to my new host provider. Moving to self-hosted wordpress will allow to do all kinds of things here on the blog that just haven’t been possible previously, and I can’t wait for the move! We’re not sure how long the blog will be down for it – it could be as little as 10 minutes, it could take as long as 24 hours. Please be assured though, that we’ll be back up and running as soon as possible, and sharing again as soon as.

I have no idea whether the move will affect bookmarks, RSS feeds or anything, so if you suddenly notice you haven’t had anything from me in a while, that may be why, and you’ll need to resubscribe – but hopefully all these things will stay the same.

I’ll post my Saturday Colour Inspiration on the Stamping With Val Facebook Page tomorrow instead of here, but hopefully normal service will resume on Monday.

See you on the other side,

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

Free Stampin’ Up! Paper – Last Few Days…

Hi! Ah, Wednesday! The end of the week is in sight! However, this also the point at which I realise, I haven’t got as much done as I would like!! Hubby is home this week as well as the kids, so we’ve been looking around at some jobs that need about the house. A new sofa maybe, and definitely a new mattress. Many room in our house are still painted builders magnolia, so it might be time to think about decorating some of these too! Ah, fun!

Anyway, I’m popping in with a quick reminder today about the current Stampin’ Up! Paper Promotion: Buy 3 packs, get a 4th for FREE! This deal is only available through until Monday 31st October, so don’t wait any longer if you want to take advantage of it.

It’s a great deal – especially since it includes some of the current Christmas papers too:

This promotion is available until 31st October, so don’t miss out – grab yours now!

This one above is totally my favourite paper! I used it my Candy Cane Packaging Class, which you can still enjoy – it’s all online! Over 2 hours of fun video tutorials and written instructions to create 5 fabulous bags & boxes for you festive gift giving:

I also have a tutorial for the gorgeous Star of Light Card Class available too:

Both tutorials cost just £10 each and are bursting with fun projects and techniques – and you can take part no matter where you are in the world – love that! Please note, these tutorials are sent manually by me, not automatically, so there maybe a slight delay in receiving it. I try to send them daily in a batch around 9pm my time. If you haven’t received yours within 48 hours, please email me to chase.

Thanks for stopping by today. I’ll be back tomorrow with my entry for this weeks Global Design Project challenge – the theme is about animals/pets! See you then.

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

Everything You Need For A Stampin’ Up! Halloween…

Hi! So, it’s half term here with my kids, and we’ve been to the cinema this morning to catch a movie we’d been hoping to see – The Secret Life of Pets! It was so funny! I know we’re late to see it, but at least we got there in the end. Our cinema is offering some special Children in Need screenings this half term, where the proceeds from certain showings are going to the charity, and this was one of them – so that was another great reason for seeing it now.

With just one weekend until Halloween, I thought I do a quick round up of all my recent Stampin’ Up! Halloween projects. That way, if you’re on need of some last minute inspiration, you won’t have to hunt for it – because I’ve collated all together for you! All my projects are quick and easy too, so you won’t need a lot of time to whip some of these up! Some of the projects have videos too!

You can also check out all my Halloween Posts ever by clicking HERE!

Hope you find something to inspire you there – have a spooky week!

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

Winner With Global Design Team Project!

Hi! I hope you all had an amazing weekend? We had visitors, and now my kids are grouchy! My kids always end up grouchy once visitors have left. I’m not sure if they are just tired from the visitors, or just annoyed that now they’ve gone home, the kids are just stuck with me – and I’m not as exciting! Are you kids like that? Or is it just mine?

Anyway, I did awake so pretty exciting news, and that was that my project for last week’s Global Design Project was chosen as one of their winners!! Thank you Global Design Project, you guys are so kind.

Here’t the winner badge I can now put on my blog:

And here is the project that earned it for me:

Still love this card!

Congratulations to all the other designers that were also selected as winners, or who got special mentions. All the cards for this challenge were amazing! Can’t wait to see what everyone produces for this weeks challenge! It’s a theme challenge of animals/pets! That one may have me thinking for a while – I’m not an animal person and therefore don’t have many sets including them, but I’m sure I’ll find something!

I’ll be back again this week with more, til then,

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

 

Stampin’ Up! Colour Inspiration

Welcome to the weekend! Here’s hoping for some crafting time all round! I have visitors this weekend, so not sure when I’ll get any, but I’ll keep my fingers crossed and who know when the opportunity might arise?

For a little inspiration, how about a fun colour combination?

Now, you can’t get more autumnal than an image like this, surely? So many fabulous colours – have I said that Autumn is my favourite season? Use them all, choose a selection – whatever! Let your imagination loose!

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s colour inspiration. If you’d like more inspiration, the Stamping With Val newsletter is stuffed full of it! You can join the list using the button below, or in the sidebar.

I sent out a newsletter just today with 4 more seasonal colour combinations for you to try – I’m happy to send it out again in a couple of days for all new subscribers. When you join my mailing list, you also get a free tutorial for this fabulous box:

Thanks for stopping by, I look forward to seeing you again soon.

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

 

Warmth & Cheer For Global Design Project!

Hi! Happy Friday! To all my UK mum friends – I hope you have a fabulous half term – and a well deserved rest! Or maybe you’ll rest once they’ve gone back to school – ha ha! I feel like I’ve been a busy bee this week – and still have a long list of things I was meant to do! There are never enough hours in a day/week, are there? And forgoing sleep is so not an option for me!

I said I’d probably be back with another project using the Global Design Project sketch this week, and I am! I love this sketch so much:

So, yesterday I made this card using the sketch – live on Facebook! I did my first (well, second) Facebook live yesterday – and I made lots of fun announcements. I’ll be sharing them here too, but if you can’t wait to hear what they all are, then hop on over to the Stamping With Val Facebook Page and watch the recording.

Anyway, one of the announcements I made was that I would be doing a weekly Facebook live on my page! Yay! So here was the card I made:

Pretty quick card actually. That gorgeous Cable Knit Embossing Folder does so much work on making your card, you don’t need much else!

If you live in the UK, and need any Stampin’ Up! supplies to make this, or any other project, you can get everything you need in my Online Shop. For this project, the items I used are listed below and you can click on any product image to add them to your shopping basket:

What You Need For This Project

Wrapped In Warmth Clear-Mount Stamp Set £18.00	Warmth & Cheer Designer Series Paper Stack £9.00	Cable Knit Dynamic Textured Impressions Embossing Folder £9.00	Tags & Labels Framelits Dies £24.00
Basic Gray A4 Card Stock £7.25	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock £6.50	Basic Gray Archival Stampin’ Pad £6.50	Delightful Dijon Classic Stampin’ Pad £6.00
Big Shot £99.00

Thanks for stopping by today. I’ll be back with my Saturday Colour Inspiration for you tomorrow!

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

Always Grateful For The Artisan Design Team Blog Hop

Welcome to the Artisan Design Team Blog Hop for October! The Artisan Design Team is a group of 20 demonstrators worldwide, chosen by Stampin’ Up! to share their creativity. For this hop, we are focusing on a theme of ‘grateful’.

This post’s title kind of says it all really. I will always be grateful for my time on the Artisan Design Team. It has been a total dream to work with some of the best designer demonstrators out there, and to have made new friends all over the world!

When asked what makes Stampin’ Up! for me – I always reply ‘the people’. I love the product, but for me, the people are what make this little business of mine all worthwhile. The customers, all of whom are now my friends. The staff from local and global home offices. The other demonstrators, both in the UK (can’t wait to meet up with lots in a few weeks) and all over the world as we get to know each other virtually. The people who follow the blog and leave kind comments (wink, wink!). I’m grateful for ALL OF YOU!

For this blog hop, I kept things kind of simple – and focused on another thing I’m grateful for – cake! I am always grateful for cake! I wish I could send you all a cake!

For this project, I created a ‘tray’ for my cake using the Stampin’ Up! Paisley & Posies Designer Series Paper. I simply used my baking tin as a kind of template to draw on the back of the card, then cut out and stick together.

I always bake my cakes in liners so they don’t stick to the tin, but they also help with minimising the grease staining onto the card tray too.

I then popped my cake into one of the new Gusseted Cellophane Bags then tied it all up with ribbon from the Ribbon Trio Pack in the Stampin’ Up! Autumn/Winter catalogue.

Finally, I created a tag using a 3×4 card from the All Year Long Project Life Card Collection. I added the sentiment, cut from another PL card, and finished it off with a couple of the cute Copper Mini Pinecones.

Let me know if you’d like more detail on how I created the ‘tray’ for my cake, and I’ll see what I can do.

If you live in the UK, and need any Stampin’ Up! supplies to make this, or any other project, you can get everything you need in my Online Shop. For this project, the items I used are listed below and you can click on any product image to add them to your shopping basket:

What I Used For This Project:

Petals & Paisleys Specialty Designer Series Paper £11.75	All Year Long Project Life Card Collection £14.50	Mini Pinecones £6.75
6″ X 17″ (15.2 X 43.2 Cm) Gusseted Cellophane Bags £6.00	Ribbon 3/8″ (1 Cm) Trio Pack £10.00	Linen Thread £4.25

Many thanks for stopping by. Please hop onto the lovely Allison in Canada who I’m sure will be grateful to see you!

If you any reason, you find the blog hop breaks at some point, please bear with us and try again in a short while. We do our absolute best to have the hop correct at ‘go live’ time, but sometimes mistakes happen. We aim to fix them ASAP, but we are all at different points in our day (it’s 2am for me so I’m asleep, for example) so it might take us a little while to sort it depending on where the problem is.

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

 

Stampin’ Up! Paper Promotion – Buy 3, Get 4th FREE!

Hi! Middle of the week – nearly time for my little break! Well, I say break – but that may be debatable! The kids have a week off school, so does hubby. The in-laws are visiting for a few days. Did I say break? Hmm!

Anyway, I’m popping in with a quick reminder today about the current Stampin’ Up! Paper Promotion: Buy 3 packs, get a 4th for FREE! It’s a great deal – especially since it includes some of the current Christmas papers too:

This promotion is available until 31st October, so don’t miss out – grab yours now!

This one above is totally my favourite paper! I used it my Candy Cane Packaging Class, which you can still enjoy – it’s all online! Over 2 hours of fun video tutorials and written instructions to create 5 fabulous bags & boxes for you festive gift giving:

I also have a tutorial for the gorgeous Star of Light Card Class available too:

Both tutorials cost just £10 each and are bursting with fun projects and techniques – and you can take part no matter where you are in the world – love that!

Thanks for stopping by today. I’ll be back tomorrow with the Artisan Design Team blog hop – and our theme is all about being grateful. See you then.

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX

Stampin’ Up! Paisleys & Posies For Global Design Project

Hi! I hope you all had a fabulous weekend? I must admit that the last few weeks of our busy ‘back to school’ routine has me worn out, and by the weekends, I’m just looking for a rest. It’ll get better/easier as we go on, but for now, me and the kids are looking forward to half term next week!

Today I have a beautiful project for you, and I am so in love with it. I think it looks even better IRL! I was inspired by the current challenge offered by the Global Design Project. Run by a talented group of international designers, they always have an inspiring challenge each week. This week is a sketch, and I love sketch challenges the most!

Check out the sketch:

A classic layout (no wonky bits!) – so I’m in love! Here’s my offering:

I’m sorry to blow my own horn – but I love this card! The base is Crumb Cake, and onto it I’ve white heat embossed a background of elements from the Paisley & Posies stamp set. I’ve then added my sentiment layer – the sentiment itself is from Mixed Borders, with another Paisley element. Finally, I’ve finished it with it with Gold Shimmer Card just peeping out top and bottom of the sentiment layer.

To make this card, you can grab everything you need from my Online Shop – just click the images below to add them to your basket:

What You Need To Make This Project 

Paisleys & Posies Photopolymer Stamp Set £19.00	Mixed Borders Photopolymer Stamp Set £19.00	Crumb Cake Classic Stampin’ Pad £6.00	Early Espresso Classic Stampin’ Pad £6.00
Versamark Pad £7.75	Gold Glimmer Paper £4.50	White Stampin’ Emboss Powder £4.50	Heat Tool – Uk Plug £27.00

I’m loving this sketch – I’ll be using this one again – maybe even this week!

Many thanks GDP for a great sketch – I’ll be back!

Crafty Hugs, Val. XX