by Jackie Bultje | Jan 4, 2020 | Brightly Gleaming Suite, Christmas, designer series paper, Toile Christmas |
Happy Saturday stampers. As a scrapbooker and cardmaker I love patterned paper, just the way I loved fabric when I was a seamstress, Seamstress sounds better than sewer because that looks just like a much yuckier word! Pretty patterned paper is great used as a focal point, and one of the cards today will show that is true.
Happy Mail Continues
The happy mail continues so I am also continuing to blog on Saturdays to keep up. What a fantastic “problem” that is. I have to say I am overwhelmed with the response to my request for happy mail in Holland. It is such a nice role reversal for me to be inspired by my readers and I am loving it. Have you seen your card featured on my blog yet? It’s not too late to participate, I am here until January 29. The address is Bloemenlaan 6, 2691 JC s-‘Gravenzande, the Netherlands
Ann-Marie’s card
Ann Marie Paré is from the small town os Lachine just outside of Montreal, Quebec. She is such a sweet and thoughtful person. Even though she is battling cancer she still finds the time to leave encouraging comments on blog posts, videos and Instagram and Facebook posts. I met her at OnStage in Quebec City and she joined my team a few months later. We look quite funny standing beside each other. She is under 5 feet tall and I am 5’9″ so I look like a giantess!!
I love the combination of the hammered embossing folder with the copper foil paper and how you can see the copper through the little diamond openings in the label. Who can help me and tell me where that is from? The lovely sentiment is stamped in copper ink which is sadly out of stock. Ann-Marie did such a lovely job colouring the holly too. It really is a gorgeous stamp and I just happen to know that it will be returning next Christmas so we can put it to good use again. (thanks to Linda’s comment we now know that the die is from the Peaceful Boughs set in the holiday catalog)
Patterned Paper as the Focal Point
Now I am not going to tell you just yet who made the next card. I can give you a hint. The handwriting on the envelope was definitely Dutch but the card came from Canada! I love how she used both Toile Tidings paper and Brightlly Gleaming paper as focal points on her card. Simple and stunning.
Hannie’s card
Hannie Van der Zanden lives on a farm near Highgate, Ontario which is about a half an hour from Chatham where I live. Hannie and her family immigrated to Canada when her kids were teenagers, more than ten years ago. How courageous! She travels and back and forth to Holland even more than I do. Here is her beautiful card.
By punching out the paper strategically Hannie used her paper as a focal point and I love it so much. Thanks so much for your pretty card and for reminding me of this simple way of using different papers together as a focal point.
Botanical Prints Product Medley tutorial
I am so happy to be able to present to you this great tutorial. These are also the cards we will be making at my February retreat in Muskoka. Check your calendar and see if February 20-23 will work for you!
This is a picture of a skating trail in Arrowhead Provincial park which is about twenty minutes from the cottage near Huntsville. Some evenings it is lit up like this. I love the idea of skating through the snowy woods. I think the trees would block the wind, don’t you? I am not a great skater at all, but I am definitely going to give this a try. There are so many nice things to do in this area and it is also beautiful to completely relax in a cozy cabin. I really hope that you consider joining me. If you want to make a deposit to hold your spot, just click on the button below.
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 3, 2020 | Blends, Botanical Prints Product Medley, Christmas, New Year, tutorial |
Hello stampers and happy Friday to you. Today is the official start of my favourite sale of the year: saleabration!! What does it mean for you? Well, with every $60 you spend you will get a free saleabration item. The starter kit also has some great bonuses with it right now: a free mini paper trimmer, any stamp set in the annual catalog or mini catalog for free plus a free paper pack assortment. How awesome is that?
Happy Mail from Carla van der Mei
I could tell right away that this was a European card. Their cardstock is known as A4 and is longer and narrower than ours in North America. I rather like the look of it. Carla tells me that she made this card at a workshop taught by Janneke Dijkstra-deJong in Friesland which is the most northerly province of Holland. It is a little bit like the Quebec of Canada. In Friesland there language is completely different from Dutch and they are proud of their distinct heritage as well.
I really love how Carla used tiny strips of copper foil paper as the string for the ornaments. The greenery and the sentiment are from the Itty Bitty Christmas bundle which you can see here.
Rhonda Gump’s card
I love Rhonda’s bright and cheerful card. I don’t have an annual catalog with me here and simply don’t have the time to do the homework on this one. If any of you loyal followers want to help me out with the names of the stamp sets used here that would be great! Just when you think you know everything, you find out it isn’t so.
Rhonda coloured her bright balloons with granny apple green and mango melody. The star bursts are embossed in silver and she also added some more sparkly detail with our shimmery crystal effects. What a happy and cheerful card to start the new year. Thanks for your happy mail Rhonda. Rhonda is from Fort Wayne Indiana. I am guessing that it is about four or five hours away from me, right between the southernmost tip of Lake Michigan and Lake Erie and then a bit south. My geographical searches are proving to be most rewarding!
Saleabration Begins Today
Do you know how saleabration got started? Let me tell you. When Shelli and her sister first started the company more than 30 years ago they had humble beginnings. It all started in their kitchen when they saw a need for scrapbooking and card making supplies. Their first year went quite well and they thought their second one did too. Their accountant had a different story. After their second year he warned that they were about to go bankrupt. What to do? Have an amazing sale right after Christmas. That is how saleabration was born and it has kept going ever since. I am impressed with their tenacity. I am also very excited to share a special bonus present to you from me!
A New Freebie!
I am ever so excited to share with you that I have a very special gift for you if you place an order through me of $50 or more. Since you need to be in Canada to be able to do that, I also want to give you another way to get this free gift. If you are a fellow demonstrator I will also give you this gift if you join my Pampered Stamper Training Group. It is only $5 a month, but you pay in 6 month instalments. Message me if you are interested. My team members also get this gift. So does anyone who attends a retreat with me. My next retreat is Februrary 20-23. What is this freebie? It is a pdf from the Dream Demo Design team with 16 cards. All the cards feature brand new product from the new mini catalog.
Botanical Prints Product Medley Tutorial
So much excitement today. My second pdf is now available. I have made a pdf tutorial with ten cards all using the gorgeous Botanical Prints Product medley. Just click on the buy it now button below and I will send it to you. Here you can see all the cards that are featured in this tutorial.
Thanks!
Thanks so much for joining me today. I am about to go to the mail to check for happy mail. Yesterday I received one from Ann-Marie Paré from Quebec. Tomorrow you will get to see her card. I hope you have a super day and also a fun time placing your first saleabration order or even better yet, joining my team!! Remember, the starter kit is the very best deal in the catalog.
Product List
by Jackie Bultje | Jan 2, 2020 | Christmas, embossing, Framelits, New Year |
Hello stampers! It is January 2, 2020. This is one of the first times I am writing this new year date and it really is quite epic. Do you feel the same way? Cheers to 2020! On December 31 I think the mailman came twice, and the second time there were three more cards in the mail. I am being flooded with happy mail and that makes me so happy. It also means that I need to blog about more than one card at a time so I can feature them all.
Sharon Meyer’s card
Sharon comes from Farmington, New York. This is in upper state in the vicinity of the famous Finger Lake district. I have driven through this area twice and it is so very beautiful. Sharon used the stamp set Beautiful Baubles with gorgeous grape ink for a happy non-traditional card. I love how Sharon sponged the edges to create a distressed look. This is a great way to add contrast without having to add another mat of card stock. Thanks for your very pretty card Sharon, I love the clean and simple style you used. I didn’t get a picture of it, but Sharon also has a personalized stamp for the back of her card.
Why Holland?
Sharon asked me why I was spending time in Holland every now and then and maybe more of you are wondering. I am in a new relationship with a man from Holland. This man is quite special to me. We first met when I was 17 years old. I was visiting my cousins in Holland of which I have very many indeed. My parents are both from large families and they were one of the few who immigrated to Canada so most of my extended family was still in the Netherlands. It so happens that my cousin had a boyfriend, and his best friend was my current boyfriend Gerard. Gerard and I wrote letters for a year and then he visited me in Canada for my 18th birthday. Circumstances prevented the relationship from continuing and our lives went separate ways. Largely due to the family connection we found each other again and here we are!
Lori’s Cheers Card
The next card is from Lori Magnuson all the way from Sahuarita, Arizona. When I looked that up on the map it seems to be very close to Tucson and is surrounded by national parks and mountain ranges. So beautiful! I had the privilege of being in the area a few years ago when I attended a private retreat at Mary Fish’s house. Lori used the Cheers dies and Sip,Sip Hooray stamp set. Let’s take a look at her beautiful card.
It just so happens that I had a fair bit of champagne on New Year’s Eve. Gerard’s dad had four bottles of champagne that he was starting to gather up and he had no use for them so I was more than willing to take the risk of opening bottles of unknown vintage. They were all good, and yes, we did share with ten other people! I simply love the layout of this card. Clean and simple lines with exquisite attention to details.
Lori embossed the glasses in gold and added gold bows. The champagne bubbles are also embossed in gold on the card base. What a brilliant idea.
Yes, the envelope has already been torn open. Gerard was even more excited to open the happy mail than I was. I had to remind him that I needed to take pictures of the envelopes as well, so please open them carefully!! Lori used the free bee paper from saleabration to decorate the flap of the envelope. So pretty with the gold and white paper. I am also very intrigued with the gold cheers. It looks to me like Lori used wink of stella on top of the gold foil paper. I would never have thought of that!! It looks so pretty, even my photo captured the shimmer.
The Power of Happy Mail
When I saw the clever design of the postage stamps I just had to share a picture of that as well. Can you see how much joy happy mail can bring? Even though I may sound like a broken record, it bears repeating. Happy mail is just so very much nicer than an email or a text. I encourage you to send some happy mail today. People aren’t expecting happy mail in January and that makes it even more special. We can all agree that there is not enough joy in the world, and if by sending a card we can increase the joy factor, I say go for it!! Let’s change the world one card at a time, together we can make a powerful difference with happy mail.
It was so nice to read the inside of Lori’s card. It appears that we have a lot in common: our love of stamping, our love of cooking and our faith. Lori even has a little Dutch blood. This made me smile.
Saleabration Starts Tomorrow
Yay!! Cheers to the fact that saleabration starts tomorrow. In case you are new to Stampin’Up! I will explain how this works. If you live in Canada you get to choose a free saleabration item (stamp set, paper, ribbon) with every $60 you spend before tax and shipping. You can also get a free stamp set called Little Ladybug if you host a workshop with $375 in total sales. Believe me when I tell you that it is very easy to reach that sales goal during saleabration. Please let me know if you want to host an online workshop. I can get it started for you and then you can share the host code with your friends and they can all order online. Easy and fun and everyone gets bonus free things.
This is also the very best time of year to join my Beyond Pampered team. You an buy the starter kit for only $135. There is no shipping or tax. You get to choose $165 worth of products, anything you want from either the annual catalog, the mini catalog and even the clearance rack! During saleabration only you also get to choose ONE bonus stamp set of your choice, any value for FREE. It cannot be a host set or a saleabration free set. You also get a free super cute mini paper trimmer and a free designer series paper sampler which includes 48 sheets of 6″ by 6″ paper with six different paper packs represented. Did you know there is also a free past Paper Pumpkin in your kit?
Your kit also comes with 8 annual catalogs, 8 mini catalogs and 50 order forms to make it easy to share with your friends. There is also a 20% discount for everything you buy or 20% income for everything you sell. You will keep this discount for a minimum of four months and a maximum of 6 months without any obligation. If you want to keep your discount for longer than that you need to buy or sell $400 every three months. If that doesn’t happen, no worries, there are no penalties. There is no pressure either from me or from Stampin’Up! to do anything more than what you want to do with this opportunity. How absolutely awesome is that?
Diva Day
I get very excited when new people join my team and I have a special day just for my new team members. I call it Diva Day because it is catchy and because I want to spoil you. This year Diva Day is on Friday March 27 at 5pm until 9pm. We will have a lovely meal together, we will stamp some fun things and of course there will be amazing goodie bags for you so you have more stamping options for yourself or to share at possible classes. This is a great opportunity for us to get to know each other better and for you to have your questions answered. For long distance team members I am going to offer a Zoom meeting with door prizes.
Thanks!
Thanks so much for joining me today. Isn’t it fun to see what happy mail has arrived? It just goes to show the importance of a stamping tribe! I am so happy that you are a part of my tribe too. I hope you have a super day. Hugs from Holland.
edited to add: if you place a $50 order either online or in person you will get a FREE pdf from the new Demo Design Dream Team with 16 projects. How wonderful is that?
Product List
by Jackie Bultje | Dec 31, 2019 | Christmas, Happy Mail in Holland, Night in Bethlehem, Uncategorized |
Hello stampers. I am writing this Happy New Year blog post while my oliebollen dough is rising. My heart is once again happy with the arrival of more happy mail. It really makes me feel so close to all of you and it is a joy to share your work with everyone. Today I am sharing a card from Prince George, British Columbia which is half way up the coast to Alaska. Thanks Sandy Allman for this stunning card! Tomorrow or the next day I will share the second card. I’m going to keep you in suspense!
Happy Mail
I love the story that the outside of the envelope tells as well, don’t you? #itsinthedetails The handwriting, the return address, the postmark, the stamps, they all tell a story and I love that. You don’t get those vibes from an email or a text, that is for sure! Take a look:
Do you see how the one post office has a special Christmas postmark with a wreath and Happy Holidays?
Sandy Allman’s card
If lots of layers means lots of love, then I am definitely feeling the love with this card. I had also forgotten that we had copper glimmer paper! There was one detail that also almost evaded me. Sandy even decorated the back of the card. Oh. My. Goodness. Sandy used the NIght of Bethlehem framelits which I just love. They just happen to be on the clearance rack right now in case you missed out when they first became available.
Here is the inside:
Finally the surprise detail on the back!
The Little Details
The last thing I love about Sandy’s card is that she signed the back of it and included the year. That can really mean a lot when you discover this card in your box of Christmas cards years later. It was a lot of fun showcasing Sandy’s card. Thanks for participating in the happy mail contest Sandy.
I hope that all of you are having a fantastic last day of the year. It is hard to believe that tomorrow it will be 2020. As a teenager in the 80’s the year 2020 sounded futuristic. Now it is our reality. It is time for me to begin baking oliebollen. This blog post was supposed to be done hours ago but I was having technical difficulties on the home computer. Picmonkey was only allowing me to edit one photo and then it balked. No fun!!
Thanks so much for stopping by. I may do a little live video of everyone enjoying oliebollen. We have a perfect day for it. Sunny and 8C. Blessed beyond measure.
by Jackie Bultje | Dec 30, 2019 | Happy Mail in Holland, Nature's Beauty |
Hello stampers! Happy Monday to you. I am sure feeling the love over here in the Netherlands. It would appear that I may have to start blogging about more than one card at a time. I still have two to feature and then two more arrived in the mail on Saturday. What a wonderful problem to have!
A Card from Shelley Merkin
Not only is Shelley’s card lovely, there is also a heartwarming story inside. Sometimes as stampers we would like more sayings for the inside of our cards but I always tell my people that the best thing you can put inside a card is your own writing. I am a huge proponent of writing more than just your name and a quick sentiment inside your card. Make it personal!! That will add so much more meaning and value to your beautiful hand made card. Your recipient will definitely feel the love!
Shelley shared about her responsibilities caring for elderly parents with declining health and also commisserated with me about living further away from her own parents than she would like. It is hard to not be able to spend as much time with your loved ones as you would like, especially when they need more care and attention. What really shone through with this card is how we can touch each other’s lives without even knowing it and that social media and the internet can truly be a powerful tool for connection and blessings.
Shelley used a technique called triple layer stamping for her card and if I remember correctly the stamp set used is one from saleabration last year. It is a DistINKtive stamp which I just love. I will do a video this week showing that technique. Shelley lives in Lawrenceburg, Indiana in the United States.
Karen Silvester’s Card
Karen chose to use the beautiful stamp set Nature’s Beauty since it is a stamp set that is being used to raise money for mental health awareness around the world. Her card is soft and pretty in balmy blue and whisper white. I love the touch of glitter. It really is amazing what a simple little extra will do for a card! Karen comes from Chaplin, Saskatchewan. Some day Gerard and I want to do a cross Canada tour in a camper, then I can see Saskatchewan and maybe even meet Karen. I really would love to meet all of you in person!
Thanks So Much
I am so enjoying sharing the cards that I am receiving. Tomorrow I will share two more. I just realized that tomorrow is New Year’s Eve and I am hosting a party and I will be busy making oliebollen, so there will be NO Facebook live video this week. Well, there might be an unscheduled one but not the regular weekly one. I know you understand and that you will most likely also be busy with festivities. Thanks for joining me today, I hope you have a super day!!
If you want to join in on the happy mail contest, my mailing address here is Jackie Bultje c/o Gerard van der Sar Bloemenlaan 6 2691 JC s’Gravenzande The Netherlands I will be here until January 29.,
