SUO Challenge #64 – It’s Sale-A-Bration Time!

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This post of the Stampin' Up! Only Challenges blog finds us right in the middle of Stampin' Up!'s annual Sale-a-bration festival. It's a time of the year when those of us who purchase Stampin' Up! products can get something free as well. Of course, not everything that's free as part of Sale-a-bration is brand new – there are quite a few products that are in the main Stampin' Up! catalogs that are available – even including the "Getting Started Card Stock Pack"!

Our challenge this time around is to use something that's included in this year's Sale-a-bration catalog in a card or other project. If you've already taken advantage of this special sale time and have something new from this year's Sale-a-bration Catalog, bring it on – we'd love to see what you do with it! But if you haven't, you can do something as simple as featuring a color that's in that Card Stock Pack. There are 12 colors in that pack, from Basic Black to Whisper White and all kinds of colors in between!

I hope that our Design Team samples will inspire you to get out your paper and ink and stamps and enter this week's challenge! As always, the instructions are at the bottom of this post:

To participate in our challenge, make a card or other paper-crafted project and post a photo of it to your blog or a gallery on the internet. Then come back here and use our link tool at the bottom of this post to share the photo with us. We're looking for cards posted to the internet after February 11, 2013, and (of course!) made with Stampin' Up! products only. The products may be those that are in current catalogs, or they may be retired products. But (as our blog title says) SUO – Stampin' Up! Only! This means that products from other papercrafting, rubber stamp, die-making or other companies may not be included in your project or in any other project included in your blog post if Stampin' Up! sells a like product. For example, Stampin' Up! does not sell sewing thread. So use of sewing thread from another company is just fine. Stampin' Up! does sell the Sizzix Big Shot, so use of die-cuts, texture plates or other such products from another company is not fine. If you have a question, please send an e-mail to our Coordinator, Robin Messenheimer, and she'll be glad to answer it!

Challenge Dates: February 12, 2013 (3 am USA Eastern Time) –

February 23, 2013 (9 am USA Eastern Time)

SUO Challenge #63, CAS Valentines – Our Top 3!

2 / 11 / 13

Oh, my, what a wonderful collection of easy to make Clean and Simple Valentines you showed off during our last challenge! Of course, some were more "clean and simple" than others. But there is a wide variety of opinions on what constitutes CAS. All these different ideas is what makes looking at all these wonderful project samples so much fun!

Thank you to everyone who contributed a gorgeous project for this challenge – and they were ALL gorgeous! We have selected a "Top 3," though, and they are:

Karren J. made a card that we all agreed was the epitome of "Clean and Simple." What a beautiful splash of red in the one corner of the card and the rhinestone accented it perfectly!

Gail Wheeler. The Naturals Composition envelope and the distressed background complement each other so well – and provide the perfect background layout for the hearts and greeting. Lovely card!

Kristine Giampietro. We loved the party favor, and especially the pearl heart on the tag. The texture on the pillow box accented the two pieces of pink with their pearl accents beautifully. What a fun project!

If you wish to learn more about any of these projects, just click on the picture and you'll be taken to the artist's blog!

SUO Challenge #63 – Clean and Simple Valentines

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With so many new – and not so new – Stampin' Up! products to use for Valentine Cards, it's a wonder that they're not all just covered with layers of papers and dozens of embellishments! It's so easy to put lots of Stampin' Up! products together to create elegant cards, especially for such special card-giving times as Valentine's Day!

But some of the most elegant cards that we've seen here at Stampin' Up! Only Challenges are elegant because of the Clean and Simple (or CAS) way that elements have been put together on the cards. Sometimes it takes a bit more thought and planning than for a more complicated card. But the results can be absolutely stunning.

So that's your challenge this time – to make a Clean and Simple Valentire's Day Card! There's a wide variety in what different stampers consider CAS, as you'll see in our Design Team entries for this week. And we're looking forward to what YOU have to offer with your own take on the CAS Valentines!

(Update – the link to Jennifer's blog has been fixed)

Mary Brown

Robin Messenheimer

Pam Staples

To participate in our challenge, make a card or other paper-crafted project and post a photo of it to your blog or a gallery on the internet. Then come back here and use our link tool at the bottom of this post to share the photo with us. We're looking for cards posted to the internet after January 28, 2013, and (of course!) made with Stampin' Up! products only. The products may be those that are in current catalogs, or they may be retired products. But (as our blog title says) SUO – Stampin' Up! Only! This means that products from other papercrafting, rubber stamp, die-making or other companies may not be included in your project or in any other project included in your blog post if Stampin' Up! sells a like product. For example, Stampin' Up! does not sell sewing thread. So use of sewing thread from another company is just fine. Stampin' Up! does sell the Sizzix Big Shot, so use of die-cuts, texture plates or other such products from another company is not fine. If you have a question, please send an e-mail to our Coordinator, Robin Messenheimer, and she'll be glad to answer it!

Challenge Dates: January 29, 2013 (3 am USA Eastern Time) –

February 9, 2013 (9 am USA Eastern Time)

SUO Challenge #62, New Toys – Our Top 3!

1 / 28 / 13

What an outpouring of entries we had this time around – our most ever! You must really like showing off your "New Toys" when it comes to Stampin' Up! And we enjoyed looking at each and every entry – lots of new ideas for those new toys, and we love new ideas as much as the next stamper!

As you can imagine, we had as much difficulty picking our Top 3 as we had fun going through all the entries. But the Design Team came through, and here are our Top 3 picks for the challenge:

Sharnee Torrents. Some of us have had some difficulty making the new Summer Starfruit color work well for us. But Sharnee made this color SING with the way she put it together with all the lacy elements from the new Spring Catalog (not yet out in Australia, but soon to be!). A beautiful card!

Allison Ohran. What an elegantly simple style in this lovely monochromatic classic card! All of the elements seem so perfectly placed.

Kristin Moore. Again here is a card that is so elegant in its simplicity. The grays are beautifully put together – we loved the progressive colors on the butterflies!