{capture the moment}

I've been tagged!

I have been "tagged" by mj weston. (Thanks for asking me to play!) 

My number one FAVORITE blogger right now is Michelle Wooderson.  I love her style, her color combinations, her studio space.  I love how she has a little "tip" at the end of each post.  I love her personality, and it really shines through her writing. 

After doing my daily blog reading routine this morning, I noticed every person in blog land had been tagged and I didn't want my post to become to repetitive in comparison to others.  So I thought I would list a few of my favorites that are a little less well known...

Posy Gets Cozy: Alicia Paulson; I love this girls whimsical/ retro style.  I really get inspired by her use of color and pattern combinations (check out this particular post for a great example of this).  She takes AMAZING photographs, really savors yummy food and has a way of writing that really draws me in.

Rachel Thomae: Her blog, named "A Writer's Life", is really unique.  Although she rarely posts photographs with her posts, I find her writing so thought-provoking.  Each of her posts end with a "Your Turn" caption.  I copy and paste these into an on-going document that I refer to when I need a  jump-start for a journal entry. Here is one of my favorites from one of her recent posts:
Your Turn: It’s my new thing. Examining things in details and writing about what I see. I’ve got freshly bloomed yellow tulips in my yard, and they are on my list. Choose something and study it for ten minutes and then write about it.

Rebecca Cooper: Love this girls stuff.  She is a regular contributer for Simple scrapbooks, and AMAZING photographer and has such a keen eye for the "simple style" that I love.  I love the way her blog makes me feel when I visit; a happy, homey place.  This blog post is a perfect example of why I love stopping by!   Check-out how she announced her recent pregnancy news to the blogging world!

A Passion for Scrapbooking, Decorating and Shopping: Jeanette is hip, trendy and stylish and is the QUEEN of internet shopping (insert me bowing graciously!!!).  I love seeing what new products, websites and projects are her new favorites with each post.  Sometimes it is a new paper crafting find, or an amazing lamp, or perhaps an organizational product, or even which brand of nail polish is THE best!  I find her sense of style so appealing and similar to mine, it is a joy each time I visit.  She takes the time to find these things that compliment me so well, all I have to do is keep tabs on her latest and greatest and my shopping is done!  Kind of like having my own personal shopper!

I hope you will take time to check out these blogs!  I find them so inspirational, and I think you will too!

Backorder Status

I have been receiving a lot of questions regarding the backorder status of our new Faux Ribbon set.  We are hoping to be back in stock by Monday, April 23rd.  Backorders will be shipped in the order in which they were received.  SO, if you didn't get your set before they sold out, place a backorder now and your order will most likely ship out around the beginning of next week!  Thanks for your patience with us!

On a side note, I have to say a HUGE thank-you to my partners, Julie & Jane!  They handle the customer service and shipping and they are doing such a FABULOUS job!  They even went into the office on Sunday so they could be sure that most packages would be shipped out first thing Monday morning!  Between the two of them, they printed labels, sorted product and taped up boxes for over 250 orders JUST on Sunday.  And continued this momentum on into Monday as well!  So I wanted to give YOU, the customers, a chance to say "THANKS" to the women behind the scenes!  The two people that help to make Papertrey such a great company (with some of the fastest shipping around, I must say!)  Be sure and share your gratitude here and let them know how all of their hard work is appreciated!

HUGE HUGS to you both!!!!

Honorable Mention

Head over to Papertrey's website if you haven't yet seen the winners of our Guest Star Stamper contest!  Heather Jackman created an amazing background by looking at Green Thumb a little differently.  And Jen Stevenson made a fun butterfly "trail" using one of the sentiments from Butterfly Kisses!  Congratulations girls!  Your FREE Faux Ribbon sets should be arriving shortly!  We got so many fantastic entries for the Guest Star Stamper contest this month, I thought I would give a few artists an "Honorable Mention".

GREEN THUMB

Michelle Giraud really caught my attention with the way she created an interactive grasshopper element.  He is mounted on wire and looks like he can be quite active when poked or prodded!  What a fun accent for a child's birthday card They would LOVE that!

Emily Gunnel created this beautiful "wisteria" card.  The detail and dimension is amazing!  And it was one of the most creative floral projects we received using this set.

Lexi Daly maximized her creativity by creating an "old-school" green berry basket for her strawberries to reside in.  Isn't that fun?!?!  And it reminds me that summer is just around the corner!

Julie Masse caught my eye with her unique use of the strawberry stamps.  The way she made it appear that they were still on the vine and climbing from the corner of the card was just so fresh!

Kirsten DuBosque made  a sweet pea card that featured a combination of  a unique color scheme and eye-catching arrangement of peas.  I love how she pulled all of the colors from the ribbon she chose.  Brilliant!

BUTTERFLY KISSES

Alli Miles made this super cute journal with matching pen.  I love how she created small butterfly "charms" from polyshrink and attached them to both the notebook spine & pen. You go girl!

Teresa Shaw made a butterfly appear as though it was flight in this clever design.  She simply folded it in half to get this really amazing effect.

Sharon Harnist's entry just took my breath away with it's beautiful color palette and detail.  I love how she inked the bottom and top of the wings using two different colors.

Adelina Starace made these beautiful transparent butterflies.  They appear as thought they are caught in mid-flight!  Beautiful detailing!

Bethany Paull came up with this really amazing technique for the solid butterfly in this set.  She heat embossed it in clear onto patterned paper.  While it was pliable, she manipulated the wings to appear as though it was in flight.  What a great concept that could be used with so many different papers for a variety of looks!

Meli Mitchell was REALLY creative and made a flower by layering butterfly wings! Now THAT is what I call thinking outside of the box!

We received over 550 submissions for this month's contest and it WAS so hard to chose a winner!  There were SO many beautiful cards!  Thank-you to everyone who submitted!   This month's contest is calling for projects created with Faux Ribbon and entries are due by May 13th.  For those of you  who did not get your set ordered before we sold out ( so sorry guys!  You overwhelmed us with your interest compared to previous releases and we weren't prepared!!!), we are hoping to have it back in stock in approx. 2 weeks.  If ordered then, you should still receive it in time to play for at least a couple days and send in your entry!  Thanks again!

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So tonight is the BIG night!  You can see the all-new Faux Ribbon set, in its entirety, TONIGHT, midnight EST at Papertrey Ink!  We also have another goodie up our sleeves!  We will also be debuting full-size Palette hybrid ink pads in 30 colors!  Many have raved about how well they work with acrylic stamps, and I have to say, their Noir pad is my FAVORITE black.  These ink pads would be a great addition to your collection, even if you just get one to try them out!

On to today's project!  One of the benefits of acrylics is the ability to bend and manipulate them to suit your vision.  Here I have used the scalloped line stamp to create a circle.  I just temporarily adhered a 1-1/4" cardstock circle to my block and applied the stamp around its edge.  You can do this with almost all of the linear stamps in the Faux Ribbon set.  You could also make ovals if you like. 

As you can see from this photo, you will end up being "a scallop short" in completing your circle, just because of the way the ends of the stamp are formed.  You could just ink up one scallop and add it as a second step to complete the circle.  Or you can take the quick and easy route (that's what I'm all about!) and cover the area with an embellishment. (see completed card below)

And here is another quick tip.  The Faux Ribbon stamps measure 4-1/2 inches wide, and work perfectly with vertical cards.  There are two things you can do if you would like to use them on a horizontal card.  You can stamp each element twice, side by side, making the ribbon longer.  When you adhere the ribbon to the card, you can cover up the "seam" with your accent.  Or you can do what I have done here, and just cut the 4-1/2" ribbon, and hide the gap with your accent!

The Faux Ribbon set also included four itty bitty flourishes!  They are perfect to add above and below your sentiment when you need to fill in the "dead space" of a circle or square.   It makes it easy to incorporate your accent color as well.

So I hope to see some of you at midnight tonight!  Don't forget, along with the new Faux Ribbon projects created by our design team, we will also be announcing the two winners of the Guest Star Stamper contest!  Hope to see you there!

ETA: Several of you have emailed me asking exactly HOW you would bend the stamp into the  shape of an oval.  I just played around a bit real quick and found that the large oval punch from SU! provides the perfect template.  The oval is not as easy to work with as the circle shape, but it definitely can be done.

After I stamped the oval, I found that the small oval punch (stamped with a sentiment) can be matted with the large oval punch, and fits in the frame perfectly.  You do have to cut the dotted frame by hand, but that is fairly simple since you can use the edge of the dots as your guide.

Guest Star Stamper Deadline

Just a reminder that today is the last day to send in your submissions for our Guest Star Stamper contest!  Don't forget, we will be choosing TWO winners this month.  One utilizing Butterfly Kisses and one demonstrating Green Thumb.  We have gotten so many amazing entries, I will be posting a few of my favorites here on my blog as well!  Good Luck!