SUO Challenge #50, Buttons and Brads – Our Top 3!

8 / 6 / 12

What fun to see all the different ways that Stampin' Up! Only artists use Stampin' Up!'s Buttons and Brads! From hardware to bright accents to the stars of the show, you all really showed us some fabulous ideas to think about as we go about using them in our own projects. Thanks so much for all the great entries!

As always, we really studied all of your entries; and, as always, we had a tough time of it selecting those of you to be highlighted as our Top 3 Designers for the challenge! But once again we managed to pick out three of your projects for special mention. Congratulations to our Top 3 for Challenge #50!

Paula Sievers, with her "all boy" project, showing off how rugged Stampin' Up!'s brads AND buttons are when they become part of a fun Stampin' Up! machine! All of those buttons and brads are just perfectly placed. "Too cute!" was the operative word in our discussions this week.

Darcie Bardach, who shared a simply gorgeous boxed bouquet of wonderful paper flowers with the brads forming the centers of some of them. It's so nice to have a beautiful 3-dimensional project as a challenge entry! "Stunning" perfectly describes Darcie's project!

Jade Boteler, who got our attention immediately with her riche brayered colors. Those Daffodil Delight buttons perfectly accented that bit of card stock peeking out from behind one of the textured layers. "Eye-catching" certainly describes this beautiful card!

SUO Challenge #49, A Special Thank You – Our Top 3!

7 / 23 / 127 / 24 / 12

After so many weeks of having to struggle to decide on our Top 3 for the week, we're thinking we may have to start having a Top 10! Well, we probably won't actually do that. But your entries are just so fabulous each and every week that our job the weekend after each challenge is – yes – a challenge!

We say all this each week to let you know that, while we may not announce your name as one of our Top 3 does not in any way mean that your creation was less than wonderful. And I know that every single person who receives one of the Thank You cards that each of you shared with us this week will be thrilled to receive it!

That said, we have chosen our Top 3 for our Special Thank You challenge! UPDATE: If you'd like to read more about each of our winning posts, just click on the photo of the project!

Beth Rush. Beth's Beautiful Butterflies are definitely colored, well, beautifully! We were especially thrilled to learn how she so carefully created all of the colors and layers for her butterfly thank you card with her very well thought out tutorial.

Cathy Parlitsis. There is so much in the way of gorgeous details in this card, including that delightful rosette in the middle of the ruffled lace flower and the mat for the framelit. The Fancy Fan embossing folder is also the perfect accent for the sheet of paper from the International Bazaar set of Designer Series Paper.

Bensarmom. We had trouble counting all of the many techniques that Sue used in this stunning card showing off the latest Stampin' Up! stamp set. And all of those techniques complement each other so well that it's hard to imagine this card without all of them.

SUO Challenge #48 – Our Top 3!

7 / 9 / 12

Oh, my, you all seem to love our Stampin' Up! Birds! From chicks to chickadees and robins to roosters, you used at least 15 different Stampin' Up! Bird stamps and even a few punches! What fun it was for us at the SUO Challenges Design Team to review all of them. And, as always, it was a challenge for us to come up with a Top 3!

But we did manage to select three of the entries for our ""For the Birds" challenge as our favorites, though we really did love them all!

Diane Vander Galien. This is a perfect stamp for the spotlighting technique! And the card itself is beautiful overall, especially with the way that Diane used the Delicate Designs Embossing Folder and the Large Scallop Edgelit on the mat as well as on the stamped/embossed layer!

Vicki Parson. What an elegant card, with all those perfectly coordinated neutral colors! The understated tone and simplicity of this card is accented beautifully with that carefully designed bow.

Crystal Langton. What a gorgeous vintage-style cover for this journal! The collage is just done perfectly. I, for one, find something new and different in this project every time I look at it!

SUO Challenge #47 – Our Top 3!

6 / 25 / 12

Fun and frilly was definitely the name of the game with all of the fab projects that our entrants showed off for our Fancy Frills challenge! I read the word, "CASE," on several of our SUO Challenge Design Team voting ballots this weekend, and I've got my eye on a couple of your projects for that, too!

So, with a fancy drum roll, we are pleased to announce our Top 3 for SUO Challenge #47:

Melissa Davies. This Black and White design shows off Melissa's frills beautifully! And can't you just imagine the whole project in another single color of your own choosing? This is such a classically elegant card, with so many perfect little details – especially the new Doily Sizzlit with the black behind it showing off the details of the die.

Vicki Burdick. There are so many lovely details on this card, also! It was hard for our team to pick out any one feature – the way all the details go together in the card's layout just made us smile! If we had to pick a favorite detail, it's the way that the flowers are colored.

Diane Vander Galien. Oh so feminine! The muted colors and embossing would have been gorgeous all by themselves; but adding the ruched seam binding ribbon over the Edgelits border, and then the pleated paper underneath just sent this card over the top!