by Jackie Bultje | Jan 16, 2017 | starter kit |
Hello stampers. Did you know that one of the main reasons I started my blog was to connect with you? I also wanted to grow my team across Canada. I so love what I do that I want to share this with as many people as possible. Our motto at Stampin’Up! is “inspire.create.share.” So I am inspired to share this with you. We have such beautiful products to create with and it is so hard to limit yourself to just one or two, so why not get a discount so you can truly unleash your creativity?
The beautiful thing is that you can just get the starter kit with no strings attached. There really is nothing to lose. Nothing at all. You simply copy and paste this link https://ida.stampinup.com/en-ca/?demoid=2000062 and your fun journey will begin. You get to pick out $165 of products, but before you do that you will be prompted to choose two FREE stamp sets as a bonus during sale-a-bration which lasts till March 31. Then you get to pick whatever you want. Ink pads, stamp sets, tools, it doesn’t matter. But you cannot even go over by a penny, so choose carefully. Don’t worry too much about it though, because you can place another order after your starter kit and you will not only get 20% instant income, you will also be able to earn hostess benefits (10%) and free sale-a-bration products ( a free item with every $60 you spend).
So did you guess what the best deal in the catalog is? Yes, it is the starter kit. And the value is that high (not including the catalogs you will get- 8 annual catalogs, 8 Occasions catalogs and 8 sale-a-bration catalogs plus 50 order forms) because you get to pick two free stamp sets out of any current catalog. Some of the larger wood stamp sets are $68. If you look at the index at the back of the annual catalog you can quickly see the prices of the various sets. This will help narrow your choices.
What to do with all those catalogs you will get with your kit? You may as well at least try to get your hobby to pay for itself, so hand out those catalogs and tuck in an order form. Spread the joy. Everyone needs a hobby that is meaningful to get them through the stresses of life. This hobby is extra special because it also makes other people happy when they receive your handmade cards or projects.
I am also very happy to come and teach your first class for you so that you can introduce your people to your new hobby as long as you are within a few hours driving distance from me. Otherwise I will coach you in a video chat if that is what you would like. Or you can just happily play with your new products all by yourself. That is the beauty of it, it is your kit, your way.
Are you inspired to begin your journey? Click here. I only wish that I had joined sooner, that someone would have explained that I could get the starter kit just for my own fun. The opportunities are endless. Since I have begun 11 years ago, I have met many people who have become lifelong friends, people from all over the world. People I have met in my own classes, but also fellow demonstrators I have met a conventions and on trips. My life is so much richer because of my Stampin’Up! experience. The latest blessing was being announced the number ten demonstrator in all of Canada!! Wow, what an amazing surprise that was. More on that in my next post. For now I just want to encourage you to think about investing in yourself. It is a very small investment that could change your life.
I hope that you will consider being a part of my team. We meet on the second Thursday night of each month at 7:30 to party, to create and to get to know each other better. In February I am having two team retreat days at a beautiful cottage near Rondeau Park in southern Ontario. On Saturday February 18 and Monday February 20. If you are coming from out of town we can arrange for full weekend accommodations!
That’s all for now, I hope you have a fantastic day.
Hugs, Jackie
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 13, 2017 | masculine cards |
High Tide was one of the first stamp sets on my wish list. It has the perfect combination of iconic images and beautiful sayings. I think it will be a set that I reach for again and again. I love how you can use the lighthouse image as a single stamp or layer both of them for two-step stamping. This card uses just the one image stamped in dapper denim. Both the birds and the sand are stamped in sahara sand. Now my ink pad was a little dry so the colour is bit lighter than it normally would be. In the following cards I have re-inked it and there is a considerable difference!
The next card has some layering to it, just to add a little depth. Card base is dapper denim with a mat of real red that is 3 3/4″ high by 4 1/4″ wide. Then on top of that is a piece of sahara sand cardstock measuring 4″ by 3 1/4″. I tucked in a scrap of jute ribbon behind the image. I also used the “weave” image from Best Birds as a subtle background to this card. Both of these cards were inspired by Lyssa Zwolanek.
The last card was born by my need to use only the other stamps in the set, but not the lighthouse. I also wanted a pop of red, so I turned to our latest Valentine’s paper, Sending Love. We also have nautical paper in our annual catalog, it is called By The Shore. Super simple card, perfect for many occasions. The paper strips are all 4″- the red one is 3/4″ wide, the shells 1 1/4″ and the waves 1 3/4″. If you love quilting, you will also love card making. Paper is also cheaper than fabric, and card making is almost instant gratification! One of my favourite things to do is to combine papers from different paper packs although Stampin’Up! makes it very easy to mix and match papers with guaranteed success with their assorted designer series paper packs. The patterned paper also matches our card stock, so no time is wasted trying to get things to match and your cards and scrapbook pages always look professional. It is truly one of the things I love most about Stampin’Up.
These are the cards we will be making next week Tuesday at my weekly coffee and a card class starting at 10am. We start in the kitchen with coffee, tea and homemade baking and we chat around the fireplace or the kitchen table for about twenty minutes before we head to the stamp room (studio) to make the cards. The cost is $10 and everyone brings their own adhesive kit (tape runner, glue dots and dimensionals). This same class is offered on Saturday mornings at 10am at a beautiful store downtown called The Dutch Market. The coffee there is free and there is an amazing selection of European pastries for sale. The Dutch Market has a great selection of products from Europe, an amazing bakery and also fresh local produce. Be sure to check it out if you haven’t already done so. Here is their website. If you are not in Chatham you can also order online from them.
If you have never tried stamping, I hope you contact me and give it a try. I would love to have you come to my classes, there is such great joy in discovering your creativity and I would be honoured to help you do just that.
Hugs, Jackie
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 10, 2017 | watercolouring |
Happy winter afternoon stampers. With the weather we are having today it is hard to know what season it is. Only in Canada!! Started in the middle of the night with blowing snow, then a bit of freezing rain around lunch time and now it is just raining with big fat drops trailing down my stamp room window. If you just listened and didn’t look you would think it was spring. A perfect day for stamping and for using the new watercolour pencils.
Today I am going to show you how to use watercolour pencils. To really let them shine you have to leave room for blending. Do not give in to the temptation to colour in your entire image. Instead, just highlight a few areas and then use a blender pen to blend the colour and make it look like you painted it. It really is amazing the way these seemingly dry boring pencils come to life with the touch of a blender pen. Our whisper white card stock is perfect for colouring on. Be sure to use archival black ink to stamp your images as it will not cause the ink to bleed. For my card I used only rich razzleberry and old olive to do my colouring. The collage stamping was done in rich razzleberry, old olive and crumb cake. The set I used is Touches of Texture (141934, wood, $59.00 or 143251, clear mount, $44.00) This would be a great set to get as one of your bonus free sets in the starter kit!! If you would like to join my team just click here.
Here is a closer up picture of the card front with the set I used for the words. I added some wink of stella to the centre of the flowers and to the dragonfly.
Here is a better view of the wink of stella, not the same as in real life, but you get an idea. I love this product!!
I also used Beautiful You to demonstrate how to best use watercolour pencils. Do NOT colour in the entire image. If you do that you may as well use regular pencil crayons. The idea is to just add a few bold strokes and then use the blender pen to spread the colour around. The finished result is fabulous and it is such a satisfying technique. Discover your inner artist!
Rather than stamp the puddle image, I used the basic gray watercolour pencil to add some colour. If you look closely you can see a touch of razzleberry. I forgot to clean my blender pen from the Touches of Texture collage card!
I am having a class on Wednesday January 25 at 10am and 7pm where you can make 20 cards. The cost of the class is $95 and includes the stamp set Beautiful You, watercolour pencils, a blender pen, an archival black ink pad, soft sky ink pad and Inside the Lines designer series paper. Here are some of the cards:
Seeing is believing, so be sure to watch this video that shows you how to best use your watercolour pencils. I would love to hear how you make out, and if you do not have a demonstrator in Canada, I would love to be yours. You can order from me, or even better, join my team and get your very own discount!
Well, I hope you enjoyed this post on watercolouring. After you get a chance to play with this technique, pop me a line and let me know what your favourite stamp set is to use for this technique.
Hugs, Jackie
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 5, 2017 | Uncategorized |
Hello stampers. I think I just made up a new word here. “Splooshing”. What I mean is scrunching up a wet baby wipe (actually, half a baby wipe), dabbing it into an ink pad and then pressing it onto paper to make a background. So, to make this very striking card, I used sahara sand and smoky slate to make the background on a 3 3/4 by 5″ piece of whisper white cardstock. Then you ink up your Lovely as a Tree “treeline” image with Versamark and emboss with copper embossing powder. Repeat slightly lower and to the left with silver embossing powder. After that you can choose to add a ribbon or not. I used 1/8″ silver ribbon (132137)on one and vanilla 1/4″ satin ribbon (142794) on the other. I also did one without ribbon after getting lots of feedback on Facebook. Which one is your favourite?
There is a story behind this card. I received a beautiful Christmas card from one of my team members, Karen Gardner. This technique was used on her card and I immediately knew I would be using it to make my swap card for the Canadian Business Conference in Toronto. This is the first event of its kind for Canadian Stampin’Up! demonstrators and I am super excited about it. We used to have a Leadership Convention each year in January but it was discontinued, so Dale Hampshire decided to create this event. I signed up for two swaps, one with Lovely as a Tree and one with Touches of Texture. The other swap will be the focus of my next blog post. Here is the card without the ribbon:
The sentiment is stamped in black archival ink and comes from Rose Wonder. When I made these cards I was nervous about using so much copper foil! The stuff is not cheap. And it is beautiful. Those two facts usually lead to hoarding. Then I decided I could cut images from the part that wouldn’t show. Genius. Now I have a ton of dragonflies and bees. Large dragonflies, medium dragonflies and groups of dragonflies, all waiting to be incorporated into beautiful cards. Check it out:
I did create a video showing how to do this technique. It really is so very simple and the results are truly beautiful. Have fun with it.
Don’t forget to keep your Versamark pads juicy by reinking now and then, it is the secret to successful embossing. Secret number two is not swinging your heat gun back and forth but focusing on one spot at a time and slowly moving as the powder melts. Today this card is in honour of my team member Janis Taylor’s mom who died and went to heaven today at the beautiful age of 92.
Hugs, Jackie
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 4, 2017 | Uncategorized |
Hello stampers. It feels so good to be back here. It is already January 4 and I have not yet wished you a very happy new year. It doesn’t seem so long ago that 2017 had a futuristic feel to it. Now it is our reality. My key word this year is “focus”. I tend to easily go off on rabbit trails, so I am going to really try to focus this year. To focus on each day instead of always looking forward to or planning the next day. That is harder than it seems. In today’s world, and also in my job as a Stampin’Up! demonstrator it is very important to plan ahead so you stay on track with your classes, your clubs and your ordering. It is also very easy to get excited about the new incentive trip. I will still do those things of course, but now I plan to focus on each task, each class, each customer, each conversation. Less multi-tasking and more simplicity. Now, on to today’s post, end of sermon.
I have already shared with you how much I love the new stamp set Beautiful You. Today I am going to show how great this set is with a technique called paper piecing. With paper piecing you stamp your image twice- once on your card base or layer and once on patterned paper. Then you cut out the part you stamped on patterned paper and adhere it to your stamped image. Wow. You really have to try it to see how amazing this simple technique is. Pictures don’t do it justice but of course I will try.
I also used this technique with the new set Moon Baby #143085. This set really called to me because of two things. Number one, we are expecting our first grandchild!! April 7 is the due date and we are thrilled. Number two, I love the song Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. I guess there is a third reason. It will be great to use with our new watercolour pencils. Did you know that you get a set of 13 for only $21 (#141709)
I made a short video on how to paper piece so I will share it here. Let me know if you have any success and which stamp set you used to do this technique!!Don’t forget, today is also the beginning of sale-a-bration. Here in Canada you get to choose a free item from the sale-a-bration catalog with every $60 you spend before shipping and tax. Also, there is a great deal on the starter kit, and I would love to have you join my team, Beyond Pampered. You do NOT have to sell or do parties to get the kit. You can get the starter kit just to get your own discount. What you do after that is entirely up to you. Did you know that most demonstrators joined simply to get the 20% discount? Just go to www.thepamperedstamper.stampinup.net and click on join now. The kit is only $135 but you get to choose $165 worth of products AND you pay no shipping and tax. You also get to choose a bonus TWO stamp sets out of either the Occasions catalogue or the annual catalog.
Happy stamping and don’t forget to focus on this day, this gift you have been given to enjoy.
Hugs, Jackie
