September Birthday Bash and Release

• At Taylored Expressions we are celebrating our 3rd Birthday and you are invited to our Birthday Bash!
• Sneak peeks Monday through Wednesday – lots of fun eye candy and
  inspiration!
• All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday,
  September 1st at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.
• Every order placed Thursday – Monday will include a FREE Party Favor.
• To celebrate our 3rd Birthday, you have 3 WAYS TO WIN!

1. Help Spread the Word! Grab our Birthday Badge from Taylor's
blog and post it on your blog for the week. Then come back
and leave a comment with a link to your blog to let us know you're
spreading the word. You will be entered into a drawing for a $25 TE gift
certificate.

2. Join us on Facebook for an early reveal of all the new stamp
sets Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST. You will have until 8pm PST that night to comment to enter to win each new set.

3. Join us in our SCS Forum for a contest that will begin Thursday morning.
In the meantime you can see Baker's Dozen sneak peeks there and chat with us!

Okay…now don't freak out on me…The next two days are HALLOWEEN projects! EEEEK! It's 100 degrees today here so Halloween is not on my radar yet! Okay, So I have to switch over to Fall mode because these sets are too much fun! Today's card features the Toil and Trouble stamp set! I also made a fun Halloween treat box…more on that later in the post!

 

 

These treat boxes are free when you order the new Project Pantry Kit this month! Yay! I added a spooky fence and a sentiment. Couldn't be cuter – maybe for your work group or a child's class?  

 

I used the papers from the Project Pantry Kit for this card. They're from Echo Park's collections. Don't you just love them?? Nice creepy wallpaper I think!  

 

I used my Oval Nestabilities to creat my focal image. I added some orange rhinestones and a doilie to complete the vintage Halloween feeling. The bats are from the Moka Tabitha stamp set. You're gonna love that too!  

 

There is a new Impression Plate out this month! One side is cool spiderwebs (tomorrow's post) and the other side is a diamond pattern (see photo below). LOVE this. Harlequin, Diamonds, Argyle…Yes!  

 

 

 
Toil & Trouble is an awesome Halloween décor set. It works great for decorating the Apothecary Shelf too! Everything that would be inside a haunted house, or in a mad scientist's lab! Cool sentiments too. It was designed for the Whimsical Wishes by Nancy McKinney and is a full sized set on a 5.75" x 8.5" full color sturdy storage panel – includes 25 images/sentiments.

The Spooky Fence Border Taylored Die  is 6" long and can be used for cards, scrapbook pages, and party favors/boxes.

The Spooky Impression Plate is one metal embossing plate with 2 sides. Talk about ease of use and versatility! It's a breeze in my Cuttlebug! 

Spooky Project Pantry – Basic Recipe Kit and Spice it Up Optional Ingredients – this is really a must have for Halloween cards and projects. Taylor is doing something a little different this month with the Project Pantry.

As you know, the idea behind the Project Pantry is that when you want to bake up a yummy dessert you head to your pantry for the ingredients. When you want to create a sweet papercrafting project, you can head to our Project Pantry for all the coordinating elements. We've found that some of the best cake and cookie recipes are the ones based around a basic batter or dough recipe with lots of options to spice it up according to your tastes. This month we are offering our Basic Recipe Kit along with optional Spice It Up Ingredients that you can pick and choose from to build the kit just the way you want it.

The Spooky Project Pantry Basic Recipe Kit is $11.95 and includes: Echo Park Apothecary Emporium 6×6 pad, 10 sheets of 8.5" x 11" cardstock in coordinating colors, and 6 yards of ribbon (2 yards each of 3 different styles). This is such a great value. 

Optional Spice it Up Ingredients (choose any or all) are: Black Sparkly Fluff, Black/White Enamel Accents, Orange Rhinestones, Black Pearls, Halloween Button Assortment, Spooky Cardstock Pack, and Spooky Ribbon Bundle.  

When you go to the Spooky Project Pantry in the store you will see the optional items linked under the Basic Recipe kit, so you can pick and choose what you'd like to add to your cart. We know you'll have fun customizing your kit!

I know I just gave you a TON of information. It's just that there's so much fun stuff this month! It will all be ready for you to check out on Thursday Morning! Please take some time to see what the other "ghoulfriends" have in store for you today.  

• Charmaine Ikach
• Danielle Lounds
• Jami Sibley
• Jen Shults
• Jodi Collins
• Karen Giron
• Melissa Sauls
• Melody Rupple
• Regina Mangum
• Sankari Wegman
• Taylor VanBruggen
• Tori Wild
• Wanda Guess  

 

September Birthday Bash and Release

• At Taylored Expressions we are celebrating our 3rd Birthday and you are invited to our Birthday Bash!
• Sneak peeks Monday through Wednesday – lots of fun eye candy and
  inspiration!
• All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday,
  September 1st at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.
• Every order placed Thursday – Monday will include a FREE Party Favor.
• To celebrate our 3rd Birthday, you have 3 WAYS TO WIN!

1. Help Spread the Word! Grab our Birthday Badge from Taylor's 
blog and post it on your blog for the week. Then come back 
and leave a comment with a link to your blog to let us know you're 
spreading the word. You will be entered into a drawing for a $25 TE gift 
certificate.

2. Join us on Facebook for an early reveal of all the new stamp 
sets Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST. You will have until 8pm PST that night to comment to enter to win each new set.

3. Join us in our SCS Forum for a contest that will begin Thursday morning. 
In the meantime you can see Baker's Dozen sneak peeks there and chat with us!

I have TWO projects to share with you today! Let's kick the week off right! Hahaha. This month Taylor is celebrating her third year as a company! YAY! My first card is made with the uber cute Cuppie and his friends having a birthday celebration. Happy Birthday TE and Cuppie!

 

I wanted this card to have a retro 70's vibe to it and I love these colors together. The whole palette was taken from the new MME Vanity Fair 6×6 papers! MMMMM.  

 

Um, yeah, I used ALL those markers to color this image! You can see I chose my patterned paper first and then used it to pick my marker colors. Kept it right in front of me while I was coloring!  

 

So, I was trying to make my main focal image look like a Polaroid picture! What do you think? I'm not sure it totally worked out but I like the concept. Again, how yummy is that paper?  

 
 

I added some glitter accents with Stickles and a fun party banner!  

 

 

 

I hope Taylor is surrounded by sweetness on her Company's Birthday!  

 

About the stamp Set: Sweet Party is a cute petite party set that pays homage to our very first stamp set - Sweet Celebration to help celebrate TE's 3^rd birthday. Cuppie gathers his friends around to celebrate in style! It was designed by Jessie Oleson, and you get the party scene image plus 3 cute sentiments. Purchase this Petite stamp set (on a 3" x 5.5" full color sturdy storage panel) for $7.95 or get it for FREE with a purchase of $100 or more in the TE Store Thursday – Monday. WOOT!

The second card for today is made with the new borders set with ice cream and cupcakes! (Anyone else thinking of that silly Baskin Robbins commercial right now?). The Build a Treat Borders set is so versatile! I used it today and I'll have another project to share using the same set on Thursday. I actually made two versions of the same card…and I have a fun "awning" technique to share.  

 

 

 

Here's how I made that fun sweet shoppe awning! I started with the TE Medium Scallop Border Die…which is totally a necessity in my book. I cut out two pink and two white strips.  

 

I cut out the sections of pink… 

 

And glued them onto the white part… Easy peasy really.  

 

 

 

The stamp set has a border of ice cream cones (top and bottom separate) and a border of cupcakes (top and bottom separate). The matching dies make it a quick and fun project. Don't have to cut them all out by hand. I'm all for that!  

 

 

 
 
The Build A Treat Borders were concepted by Sankari Wegman. This set will provide endless opportunities for building your own treats and borders. It was illustrated for the Whimsical Wishes line by Nancy McKinney. It is a full size set on a 5.75" x 8.5" full color sturdy storage panel. Build a Treat Borders includes 5 borders – each approximately 6" long with options for both coloring and solid stamping. Build a Treat Borders Taylored Die Set is a set of 3 dies – each 6" long – to build cupcakes and ice cream cones – coordinates with Build a Treat Borders and can also be used on it's own.

Remember that TE stamps are made from top-quality deeply etched rubber in a cute shade of pink and come on EZ Mount already trimmed and ready to used with your acrylic blocks. There is a mini binder box available in the TE store to store them in!

Please go check out what the rest of the team has in store for you today. There are other stamp sets that I didn't feature…and you don't want to miss anything!  Also, this month our guest designer is the amazing Jen Shults! WOWZA! Check out her blog here! I am such a fan. Welcome Jen!

• Charmaine Ikach
• Danielle Lounds
• Jami Sibley
• Jen Shults
• Jodi Collins
• Karen Giron
• Melissa Sauls
• Melody Rupple
• Regina Mangum
• Sankari Wegman
• Taylor VanBruggen
• Tori Wild
• Wanda Guess  

Hellloooooooo! It's Thursday night…practically Friday! Yeah! I can feel a weekend coming on! How was your week? Did you manage to do something creative? I sure hope so! I hope all is well with you wherever you are today. I hope the world has been kind to you this week. I have a card to share using some more of my new MME Lost and Found 2 goodies that I got a couple of weeks ago. Can I even tell you how much I love this collection? OMG. YUM. Seriously. NO Seriously.  

 

This whole card started with this one piece of paper… I cut out the three shaped elements and used two of them on this card (I'm saving the other one for later!) The stripes are on one side and the polka dots are on the reverse side. It's all spark-a-lay too!  

 

Here are my card pieces ready to be assembled! I wanted to put a bow on it…but I am kind of bow impaired. They NEVER turn out the way I want! What is that? Some people make these gorgeous perfect bows…me…not so much! ha.  My finished card is a five inch square. I edged the cream base in a dark brown distress ink.

 

That little birdie is from Webster's Pages! Chirp chirp!  

 

I just adore this vintage-y hot air balloon image!  

 

 

 

Just a reminder from me to you: You are SO special! Don't ya forget it either!  

This will probably be it for me until Monday. I'll be in the crafty cave getting ready for the Taylored Expressions September Sneak Peeks next week, which will be Monday through Thursday. We'll be celebrating Taylor's third anniversary as a stamp company! I know you're gonna love this release. There are some fun Halloween images and also some sweet treats. Thank you for coming by to see me!

 

Hello! Um, not sure where Monday went…but here it is Tuesday already! I meant to post yesterday but the day really just got away from me. But, here I am again! I have a card to share today using some pretty Memory Box stamps and a cool technique recently shared by HRR Julie E.

I wanted to take a minute to say a big THANK YOU to May Flaum for writing some very nice things about me on her blog on Sunday! I was so flattered that she likes my blog since I am a big fan of hers. I originally came to know May's work when she was on Tim Holtz's Design Team = awesome! Please take some time to go and check out her blog. And to all the new subscribers who came over – so nice to have you here!

A couple of weeks ago I read THIS great blog post from Julie Ebersole and watched her equally wonderful technique video about reverse masking. It stuck in my head and I kept trying to think of the perfect stamps to use. Then it came to me! Memory box + butterfly + leaves! Yay! Julie always reminds me to get back to stamping and how clean and beautiful that is. Mwah.

 

 

The technique is reverse masking. I cut a shape out of the center of a piece of vellum with one of my Nestabilities. I taped it down over my cream cardstock and sponged the brown ink only on the edges. Then, I left the vellum in place and stamped my branches/leaves in Crushed Olive Distress Ink. LOVE that color.

 

Voila! Here's what you get when you take the vellum off!  

 

I got out the pretty Cocoa Butterfly stamp (and matching die) from my stash, and colored it in with some pretty shades of orange and gold and yellow.  

 

 

 

I popped the butterfly up on foam tape for some dimension. I roughed up the edges to give it some more texture and then mounted the whole thing on a pretty burnt orange card base.  

 

I resisted the urge to bling, glitter, or ribbonize it… I'm happy with the result and would like to think of some more pretty ideas to use with this technique.  

 
Thank you so much for coming by today! I hope you have a fantastic week!  

 
 

Hi! Happy Weekend! Today I got scrambled! Hahaha. I was sitting around in my pajamas this morning playing Words with Friends on my iPhone and I decided to check Twitter while I was at it… I saw a tweet describing a "90 Minute Scramble" from Hero Arts. What is that?? I wondered too! It's a fun event on the Hero Arts Flickr group!

At a specific time (11am PST) they post a theme/challenge. You then have 90 minutes to make your card and post a photo of it! Well…I needed something to share with you all today so I thought…why not?! I'm in. I was trying to think of how I could prepare. So I got out all my Hero Arts stamps and set them on my counter. I got my Copics ready and a big stack of scraps! And then I waited to find out what the challenge was. Here's what we were given:

"Today’s theme is “The Little Things.” I want you to create a card/project using those “little” pieces that come on a sheet of clear stamps or Clings that are kind of like a “fill-in” or are not the main image in the set. Create something with the smaller pieces. Also, the project should include at least one Hero Arts stamp."

Here is my finished project: 

 

I used ALLLL the little pieces from the Just A Note set and then used the typewritten sentiment from another cling set. I made background paper using the scissors, thumb tack and paper clips! I used the pencil for my main image accent. I kept the color scheme nice and bright. The whole back-to-school thing is everywhere right now. I think that's why it popped in my head. No time for Copic shading either!  

 

Here is the after effect of being scrambled! I had stuff everywhere! I kind of got in a panic when it came time to cut out all the tiny images…one hour had already gone by!

 

I managed to get my card assembled and photographed with about 12 minutes to spare! Yikes! I was sweatin' there for a bit. I'm happy with how it came out. It was really fun to participate and to see what everyone else came up with. If you'd like to see the post CLICK HERE. Maybe you'll want to do it next time??!! I will definitely do it again.

 

I think this would be a nice card to send your college kid or to leave in a lunch box for your special tyke. I always love red, yellow and blue together.  The Scramble has a random drawing for a prize package…but that didn't happen yet. Have to check back in and see if I won or not. {Update – Nope! Didn't win this time around}

 

And now, for something tasty and delicious! Yesterday was a particularly bad day at work. My computer crashed with a virus at around 9:30 in the morning while I was working on a giant and important spreadsheet. UGH. Black screen of death. The awesome IT guy and I tried for over two hours to fix it but couldn't. It's in surgery on his desk right now still. I had to go work in a conference room on a really old computer and try to re-create my work. NOT HAPPY. After work I stopped at the Paper Garden for a chit chat to cheer me and then I had the hubs meet me over at Starbucks for a Mocha Coconut Frappuccino. OH EM GEE. Much better.

 

 

 

 
Enjoy the rest of your weekend lovely bloggy friends! Thanks for visiting!  

 
 

Hi everyone! Well…you know I've been dying to get my hands on some of my new crafty stash from Sunday's shopping trip! Tonight I finally did! I cruised on over to The Shabby Tea Room Blog…only to discover that the theme for this week is….POLKA DOTS! Are you kidding me? Yay! Count me in. I sat down and got to work. I have been really wanting to try the whole grey/white/yellow color scheme so I started there with my paper selections. The rest just sort of flowed. I am IN LOVE with that new My Mind's Eye Collection!  Here's my card:

 
 

 

 

Here's how I got started…my design palette if you will. I really like to mix patterned papers and different textures…mmm…And there's my new border punch again… 

 

 

 

I cut out my felt flowers with PTI flower dies on my Cuttlebug. I had to bust out the crop-o-dile to go through all those layers in order to be able to put the brad through. It worked great!  

 

I used one of the MME collection embellies for the center of my flower. I crumpled it up first to give it some more height and feeling. It also worked great for the theme because of the grey polka dots!  

 

I sort of create my cards like you would a mini scrapbook page layout. I try things and move things around until I get it the way I want it. Then I glue it all down.  

 

The aftermath! The sentiment is from PTI. I use those pearls all the time. Just cut off the piece that you need. I can usually get 3-4 cards out of one package. These are so yellow and pretty… 

 

 

 

 

At the last minute I decided I had to add another flower and some butterflies! Everything is better with butterflies, right? Hee hee. At first I put some pale green leaves on my flower but it just didn't work. What do you think of yellow leaves???

 

 

Thank you so very much for coming by my blog today! If you check out my counter in my side bar, you'll see that I am about to get my 150,000th blog hit!!! Can you guys believe that? I can't! From the bottom of my heart, thank you for all the bloggy love and all the sweet comments and encouragement. Have a wonderful day!  

 
 

Hello! Welcome to my stop on the Taylored Expressions August Blast from the Past Blog Hop! The theme this month is "Collectors Anonymous" as in crafty collecting! Well, I am a paper hoarder as good as the rest of them! I was inspired to create a craft card using some of my favorite stamps from TE! I based my color scheme on the plaid background paper and actually assembled my entire card before coloring my main image. That helped me get the colors right with my pencils! I hope you're having fun going around to everyone's blogs today. The complete list of blogs is at the bottom of this post.

 

 

This was the sketch for this month…designed by the super talented Sankari. I had to modify it a bit since my main image was too big. That's okay, right?  

 

Check out all of these fun crafty-related stamp sets!!!  

 

I used my Prismacolor pencils for this one since the images are so tiny. I added some pops of glitter glue to jazz it up some!  

 

I'm not really sure, after 17 years of buying craft stuff, if it is cheaper than therapy! Hahahaha. I know it's more fun!  

 

 

 

I added some glitter glue to my buttons also…  

  

 

Knit Wit? Knit Happens? Close Knit? Ar Ar Ar…I'm totally cracking myself up. And, I'm probably the only one I'm cracking up! Today's Saturday, which means I am spending the day with some old friends and stamping and laughing and eating alllll day! Yay!

One of my friends has left the corporate cube farm behind her and is following her dream of opening a knitting store! Can you imagine? I find this move so totally inspiring and amazing! I will see her today and so I wanted to bring her a card to celebrate this next step in her life!

Last week I stumbled upon the cutest set of stamps at Joann's that was all knitting related! I snatched it up and then used one of the stamps to make this card! (I cleaned it really good afterwards!) The stamps are a little present for her too.  I hope that whatever you're doing today that it makes you happy!

 

 

 

I matched everything to this super cool paper from Memory Box. I love love love the retro color palette! That is my new edger punch in action again too. I colored the yarn in with my Copics and then put on some clear glaze to make the needles shiny.

 

I used my blo-pens to add some speckles to the white background and a sentiment from PTI. Simple and clean.

 

 

 

Happy Happy Saturday!

 
 

Hi! I couldn't for the life of me think of what to share today. I thought I could make this or I could make that…but nothing was coming out right. Ya know? I have one card I want to share, but I didn't give it to the person yet, so that's out. I finished a MAJOR project at work today so I'm sort of brain dead too. That doesn't help.

So, I sat here in my craft room just mulling things over. Waiting for something to come at me and inspire me. Waiting. Hello? Bueller? Is this thing on? (I'm in a weird mood, too). I looked through some crafty magazines and surfed the web. Then I just got out some paper I love (MME Penny Lane Collection) and then a card happened! A card! And then another one! Imagine that! Don't mind me – hope you like the cards though, and I hope you are having a fabulous week. Thanks for stopping in.

 

 

I've been seeing this cool technique around a lot lately – where you cut out shapes and then pop up the top layer of your card to let another paper show through. I've seen all kinds of beautiful cards. I thought I would try it with some of my fav PTI flower dies. The cute pink and white check is actually the back side of the flower paper. LOVE. Couldn't be easier. I added some pearls and a birthday saying banner. It's so cheery and happy with those papers.  

 

 

 

 

 

I used the flower shapes that were left as a pretty decoration for the inside of the card!

 

Soooo…inspired by this cool paper collection…another card came out! I don't know where I got the notion to make one of those foldy rosette things. Haven't made one in a long time. I thought it would make a cute prize ribbon. I just kept adding stuff…

 

 

 

I cut the edges of the strips of paper first to make a nice edge. The strips of paper are 12 inches by 1.5 inches. Scored the entire length each 1/4 inch.  

 

 

 

 

 
 

  

 
 

The sentiment is from PTI and the edger is a new one I just got at Joann's. I like it already!  

 

There ya have it! A couple of clean and simple and colorful cards for today! 🙂

 

Have you guys checked out Pinterest yet? It's this cooooool website that lets you create your own design and inspiration boards…then you "pin" things to them! It's the neatest thing. You can follow your friends and share your boards with people. It took me a little bit to get the hang of it but now I'm sort of addicted! Click HERE to go to see my profile and my boards! Let me know what you think!

This weekend we are finally seeing Adele in concert at the Berkeley Greek Theater! The show was postponed from back in June when she got sick and had to cancel. I am BEYOND excited to go and have a date night under the stars with the DH! Is it the weekend yet? Talk to you soon everyone!