Here is what everyone made of it:

by Agata Pfister, a simple and elegant card

by Janet Zeppa paired with green

by Els Brigé, just in blue

by Jill Hildebrand

purple exploration by Jaine Drake

by Linda Abadie using the new Warm Tweet set and Back to the basics

by Jolene Johnston, beautiful pairing of the colours

layout and detail by Jill Hildebrand

this beautiful little chest is by Marsha Valk, the colours just pop!

… and inside! The Itty Bittys fit perfectly on the cubes.

We hope you liked our challenge!

Stay tuned for our design team call coming up later this week!

Until then, happy stamping!

Our Design Team has put together a beautiful collection of their favourite family-themed projects.

We hope you will enjoy our selection! Have a wonderful weekend scrapping your favourite family pictures.by Agata Pfister

by Jolene Johnston

by Sue Sykes

by Janet Zeppa

by Linda Abadie

by Jaine Drake

by Isolde Pyncket

by Marsha Valk

by Els Brigé

Happy stamping,

love,

Hi, I’m Isolde Pyncket and I live in a small village in the west part of Belgium.  I live together with my boyfriend and our cat Baileys.  In june 2006 I started scrapping and I’m totally hooked since then.  Scrapping is a way to express myself in a creative way.  I love to play with paper, stamps and glimmermist.  That’s why I walk around with dirty fingers most of the time, haha.  During daytime, I work as a teacher in primary school and during night time, I’m a scrapper!  I’m thrilled to be a member of this DT and hopefully you’ll be inspired by my work.

Hi, my name is Els. I life in a small town in Belgium with my husband and two children (girl – 2008, boy – 2011). Stamping and paper are truly my passion. A few years ago I started stamping and making cards again. I was instantly hooked. Not too much later, I took the plunge and made my first few layouts as well. My children are my biggest inspiration, along with all the fabulous products available in this industry. I love trying out new products and new techniques.

Again, welcome to the team, Els and Isolde!!!

Our new Design Team coordinator is Jolene Johnston. Jolene has been with the myStamp BOX design team since the very first term! Thanks for taking over Jolene! Looking forward to working with you in the coming term!

Happy Stamping!

This time around a lot of our designers will stay on, but we are sorry to see some of them go. To these three we are saying good-bye today and wish them all the best in their crafting future. May our paths cross often! It has been so much fun to work with you ladies!

You are invited to wish them well, here or on their own blogs (just click on their names which are linked to their blogs).

Allison Cope

Birgit Koopsen

Rebecca Keppel

Later this week we are sharing Fall inspired projects by our designers. Fortunately here in Toronto the weather has been great over the weekend, rather Summery than Fallish, but the leaves are bound to turn colour soon and there will be more time spend indoors on our crafts again!

Happy Stamping!

Love,

Thanks to all who applied for a DT position. It is always so hard to have to choose so few from all these wonderful applications!

Here is the long-anticipated list:

Jolene Johnston (USA) – design team coordinator

Agata Pfister (Switzerland)

Els Brigé (Belgium)

Isolde Pyncket (Belgium)

Jaine Drake (Luxembourg)

Janet Zeppa (Canada)

Jessica Griffin (USA)

Jill Hildebrand (Canada)

Linda Abadie (USA)

Marsha Valk (Netherlands)

Sue Sykes (Canada)

Wendy Morris (USA)

Sadly, our past Coordinator, Allison Cope, had to resign. She is now the proud owner of a pizza and catering business, Kapp’s Pizza in Elkford, BC. We wish her much luck with her endeavours! Ally, come visit any time And we will have to travel far for some good pizza!

We are now looking at all submissions and will be announcing our new team next Monday. Stay tuned!

I decided to fill a couple of pages in my Summer 2011 art journal.  For the first page about our National Day celebrations,  I’ve used music score paper as my background but painted it first with gesso to dull the printing. I’ve used flowers from the Funky Flowers stamp set as fireworks, giving them a sprinkling of glitter to make them shine. I’ve also used the Mini Pennants for the bunting and the border stamp from the Border Lines set to frame the page.

For my second page I’ve transfered the music score paper onto watercolour paper using gel medium to make a subtle background. I cut out some rough circles to use as masks and sprayed inks over the page using dye inks. I’ve used the Friday Night Stencil alphabet for my title, emphasising it with the brackets from the oversized set.  I wanted to stamp the film strip from the Snapshot set at the bottom of the page and ended up dropping it. I could have covered it up by stamping it a second time onto paper, cutting it out and sticking it over the top but I actually liked the messy look it gave me, so I left it there. I finished off the page using the Graphic Borders stamp printed onto book page as a frame.

Here are a couple of gorgeous pages from Birgit and some explaination on how she did them.

For “the sky is the limit” I used Colorful Companions, Bottlecaps, Repeat
after me and Backgrounds. For the background I used Gesso and TA Glimmer
Chalkboard. I stamped with Stazon and colored in the little dots of the
bottelcap stamp with Letraset markers and then I put little punched out
paper circles on top. The stars where made using sequin waste.

For “Heaven” I used Colorful Companions, Abundant blossoms, Bottlecaps,
Backgrounds and He loves me. The background was made with acrylic paint. I
also used acrylic paint to stamp the butterflies and the flowers. I used
Stazon to stamp the bottlecap stamp and the little swirl from the He loves
me set. Again I colored in the little dots of the bottlecap stamp with
Letraset markers. The little circles and the words “heaven” where cut from
bookpaper. The angel wing is a rubon from Hambly.
The little white dots on both pages where made with the back of my brush
dipped in acrylic paint.

Hope you enjoyed them.

Rebecca and Agata are here to put some color into your world! We’ve teamed up for this challenge and chose to make some layouts using a great stamp set: Colorful Companions which is all about butterflies! Here’s Rebecca’s beauty:

She took only one stamp from that set, stamped it numerous times in colors that matched her patterned papers. Then she cut out all those butterflies and pop-dotted them on her layout for some dimension. Rebecca has purposely chosen the butterfly with a simple shape as she knew she would be cutting out a lot of them!

As for me I used almost all stamps from the set to create a patterned paper of my own. I used some chalk and pigment inks which was useful since I’ve embossed two images with an iridescent embossing powder.

Depending on ink’s color this technique gives different effect. Here are some close-ups:

Hopefully those layouts will inspire you to take out this beautiful stamp set and get inky!

&

We are looking for new Designers to join our team. If you are enthusiastic about our stamps, love to stamp, are a good team player, and know a thing or two about blogging, you are the right match for us! We are interested in designers with a variety of styles who can creatively showcase myStamp BOX designs in their layouts, cards, altered art and other projects. No previous design team experience is necessary. International applicants are welcome to apply.

Our Term is 6 months from October 1st, 2011 to March 31th, 2012.

Team requirements:
* 4 projects per month
* 1 blog entry per month including good quality photos of a project and instructions/tutorial
* Upload all projects to the myStamp BOX website gallery and other online galleries
* Submit at least 2 projects per term for submission to print magazines of your choice
* Occasionally help with additional design opportunities – new stamp sets, classes, etc.
* make myStamp BOX the only stamping company you design for during this term

Team benefits:
*bio and picture on the website, with links to your blog
*a starter kit of stamp sets and additional stamp sets throughout your term
*other free scrapbooking supplies from product partners as they become available
*30% discount on purchased myStampBox stamps during your term

Please include in your application:
*personal information (your name, address)
*a short paragraph about yourself and why you think you’d be a good fit for myStamp BOX.
*link to your blog and gallery
*3-5 examples of your work showcasing your stamping ability and style

This call ends Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Send your application to bettina@mystampbox.com
myStampBOX website:  www.mystampbox.com

We can’t wait to hear from you!

Our Design Team has used this sketch made by Allison Cope and created their different takes on the theme. Enjoy!

The sketch:

Our takes:

by Marsha Valk

by Jaine Drake

by Allison Cope

by Jill Hildebrand

by Linda Abadie

by Jill Hildebrand

We hope you enjoyed our takes on the sketch and get inspired to try your own version!

Happy Stamping!

Allison Cope, our talented sketch artist, has provided us with two different sketches, one for cards and one for layouts. Today it’s all about cards and you can view some beautiful interpretations of the sketch below.

Hopefully you feel inspired to try your own version of this fun sketch!

Here are the interpretations:

by Jolene Johnston

by Janet Zeppa

by Birgit Koopsen

by Agata Pfister

by Rebecca Keppel

Rebecca rotated the sketch. This is a great idea when you have something in mind that does not quite work with a chosen sketch. Just rotate it

Come back tomorrow for our Sketch Challenge for Layouts!

Happy Stamping

I’m here today with a challenge for you! This weeks challenge is to create your own wrapping paper using your stamps. Even if your gift is ready made bought you can add a personal touch by making your own wrapping paper.

I will share 3 examples I made using “He loves me“, “Repeat after me” “Danke fur alles“, “Seal it!” and “Wishing you sunshine”

All you have to do is take some plain colored paper, repeat a pettern, add some ribbon and tags and you’re done!

Happy stamping!

But first we would like to thank all the wonderful and talented designers that are leaving our team. A BIG thank you goes out to:

Cari Locken
Eva Pizarro
Maryfrances Fabbri
Melissa Wright
Stephanie Ackermann

Thank you for your hard and beautiful work over the last 6 months. You’ll always be a part of the myStamp BOX family. Best wishes from all of us in your upcoming creative endeavors!

Now… let’s find out more about who will be joining the myStamp BOX design team. Follow the blog hop and visit each of our returning designer blogs. Each team member will be introducing a new member of our team. At each stop, please leave a comment and when the blog hop is complete, return to the myStamp BOX blog and leave one final comment to have a chance to win a myStamp BOX stamp set of your very own! You can participate until Sunday evening 6pm EST. We will publish a winner on this blog next Monday!

mSB Blog
Agata Pfister
Jaine Drake
Jill Hildebrandt
Jolene Johnston
Allison Cope

back to mSB Blog

We hope you enjoy our little welcoming blog hop! Don’t forget to leave a comment on each one of the design team blogs and the mSB blog for your chance to win! Good luck and happy hopping!

I am very proud to introduce two of our new designers, Rebecca and Birgit! For the new team I dressed up these little spring flowers and added stamped tags as a greeting. The inks match the flowers and some of the letters are popped up. It looks quite cheerful.

Now ready for Rebecca and Birgit, who will tell us a little bit about themselves. Welcome to the team!

Hi all! I am Rebecca Keppel–former corporate attorney turned SAHM, scrapbooking, cardmaking, gift creating, momographer living with my family in the East Valley suburbs of Phoenix, Arizona. Although I have been “journaling” and taking tons of pictures my whole life, it wasn’t until I saw scrapbooking as whole that everything clicked for me and the obsession began! Besides recording memories and playing with fun product, I love to learn new techniques and learn more about photography. I love stamping on cards, layouts and altered items and I am excited beyond belief to be joining the myStampBOX design team!

Hi! My name is Birgit Koopsen. I live in a small village in the north of the Netherlands. I’m a proud mom of 3 (girl-1994, boy- 1995 and girl 2002) and happily married to Erik for 18 years. They are my biggest inspiration! I started scrapbooking in 2003 and was addicted from day one! I consider scrapbooking a way of living and can’t imagine life without it. I am so thrilled to be a member of this amazing talented myStamp BOX design team and hope to be able to inspire a lot of people with my projects!

We hope you will enjoy your time with us!

Now…. Check out the next new design team member and a fun project at Agata’s blog!

Happy Hopping,

We’re thrilled to be sharing some fun projects with you today.  We tried to think of different products to use our stamps on because normally we stamp on paper.  So we, Jaine and I (Cari) gave ourselves the challenge of stamping on anything BUT PAPER. I admit it was a bit difficult trying to come up with a variety of things to use but we did it!

First off, Jaine made this fabulous card by stamping into black polymer clay in a beige coloured chalk ink. After it baked she rubbed the chalk ink over the surface just to take the shine off the clay and make it look more like fragments of black stone.  The stamps she used were from the Funky Flowers, Repeat after Me and Wishing you Sunshine stamp sets.

For this next sample I used felt as my stamping source.  I stamped on the large turquoise flower with black pigment ink using Funky Flowers and then stamped again with turuqoise pigment ink on the small cream rectangle shape using Seal It stamp set.

This third example Jaine created another card that has been stamped using a red pigment ink and the Wishing You Sunshine stamp set onto a piece of denim.  The red card mat has also been stamped using the Repeat after Me stamp set.

Using some a transparency for my “non” paper source I stamped a sentiment using Stazon ink in black from the Oval Office-Small Box set. This would make a great Father’s Day card.

The third card that Jaine created (which she says is her favorite!) has been stamped onto shrink plastic using a black Stazon and the Border Lines stamp set.  The shrink plastic pieces were torn rather than cut and coloured with Adirondak ink before shrinking. Tearing the shrink plastic makes it look more like fragments of sea glass. (I love the tearing idea!)

The last two cards that I created I stamped on canvas with pigment inks in Peony and Pink, Dark Moss and Moss Green using the Funky Flowers stamp set. I really like how the images turned out on the canvas too. The second card I used Colorful Companions and Oval office – Small Box stamp sets on the canvas.

And here’s one last card from Jaine where she stamped on the button and then embossed it. She also stamped on the ribbon as well. Fabulous! She used Funky Flowers stamp set.

WE hope that you have enjoyed our projects and have encouraged you to try different ways to use your stamps.

Thanks for stopping by!

and

Take a look at my sketch…

I used some of my favorite stamps from MyStamp Box.  Backgrounds…my new favorite.  The “Celebrate” stamp from Bits and Pieces.  The lines from Just Add Notes are awesome for journaling lines or even to create a cross-hatched pattern.  And the little dash marks from Mini Pennants add a little extra stamping to the top left of my photo.

Here is my layout…

And here is my card.

I did the card as the sketch shows but then by accident it got turned on its side when I glued the card to the base….and I liked it even more.  Turning a sketch is not against the rules and sometimes lets you see a different perspective of your layout or card.  I really love how this turned out.

Have a great one!

Please do not send us any questions or requests, if you will be part of our team. We will not be able to answer any questions and will notify everyone in the next few days.

Our new team will be announced on April 1st. As usual we will be celebrating with a Blog Hop and introduce new DT members to you. This has become a nice tradition for us.

Until then,

Happy Stamping,

Now we would like to show some projects that our team has come up with during the month of February. We did not have a chance yet to share these with you and hope you will be inspired by our many ideas.

Maryfrances Fabbri

by Agata Pfister

by Allison Cope

by Jaine Drake

by Jolene Johnston

by Cari Locken

by Jill Hildebrand

details

by Eva Pizarro

by Melissa Wright

by Stephanie Ackermann

Thanks for checking in today!

Happy Stamping!

We are looking for new Designers to join our team. If you are enthusiastic about our stamps, love to stamp, are a good team player, and know a thing or two about blogging, you are the right match for us! We are interested in designers with a variety of styles who can creatively showcase myStamp BOX designs in their layouts, cards, altered art and other projects. No previous design team experience is necessary. International applicants are welcome to apply.

Our Term is 6 months from April 1st, 2011 to September 30th, 2011.

Team requirements:
* 4 projects per month
* 1 blog entry per month including good quality photos of a project and instructions/tutorial
* Upload all projects to the myStamp BOX website gallery and other online galleries
* Submit at least 2 projects per term for submission to print magazines of your choice
* Occasionally help with additional design opportunities – new stamp sets, classes, etc.
* make myStamp BOX the only stamping company you design for during this term

Team benefits:
*bio and picture on the website, with links to your blog
*a starter kit of stamp sets and additional stamp sets throughout your term
*other free scrapbooking supplies from product partners as they become available
*30% discount on purchased myStampBox stamps during your term

Please include in your application:
*personal information (your name, address)
*a short paragraph about yourself and why you think you’d be a good fit for myStamp BOX.
*link to your blog and gallery
*3-5 examples of your work showcasing your stamping ability and style

This call ends Friday, March 4, 2011

Send your application to bettina@mystampbox.com
myStampBOX website:  www.mystampbox.com

We can’t wait to hear from you!

I love sketches. I have a sketch pad on my desk and everything I create is sketched out first. Whether it’s a card, a layout or an altered project I will draw out some ideas and work my way from there.  I often find that creating cards helps my creativity blossom especially when I’m stumped on a layout or other project.

So today I’ve created a card sketch for you to play along with. If you do play along I’d love for you to post a link so that we can see your beautiful creation.

Here’s the sketch that I created.

And here’s my card.

I wanted to keep the color combo simple & elegant so I stayed basically with white and added a bit of color.  I embossed the middle section using a Sizzix embossing folder and all cardstock is from Core’dinations.

I then used some Versamark and clear embossing powder on the top & bottom portions of the card along with a flower stamp from Funky Flowers.

I stamped the sentiment (using Everyday Lines)onto vellum a brown colored dye inkpad. Love the softness that the vellum adds to the card.

So I hope that you will have fun using the card sketch for inspiration.

Enjoy!