Sunday, August 29, 2010

Paper Players Challenge #13-Anything Goes!

**Edit**-If you are looking for last week's Inspiration winners, please click HERE.

Hi and welcome to the Paper Players Challenge Blog! This week we are sad to be saying goodbye to the wonderful and talented Marlene Peters who has been a Guest Designer with us since July! This week she has finished her 2 month run with us and is going to be a new member of the Stampin' Royalty Design Team! Congrats Marlene! We loved working with you and wish you all the best! We hope you come back and play with us again soon!!

Our challenge this week is "Anything Goes"! It is the 5th week of the month and so we encourage you to share ANY of your favourite paper projects whether they be 3D, a scrapbook page or card. As I said, "Anything Goes!". Your project does need to be something newly created during this week...and can be a project for another challenge. The Paper Players all use Stampin' Up products on this blog, but you are welcome to use any crafting products you have on hand. The main rule here is to have fun and to challenge yourself!

Here are the Paper Players inspiration samples for this week's challenge:




By: Ann


By: Jaydee


By: Nance

By: Lesley

Jaydee will be posting last week's winners soon! She has a tough choice ahead of her...we love what you did with her awesome Inspiration Challenge!

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Challenge 12 - Top Picks

Hi Everyone.

As Lesley said, it was pretty tough to chose the winners this week. I love what you all did with the inspiration challenge. I know that these are often the toughest challenges - well, they are for me, anyway! Having said that, I love the fact that you all went in different creative directions and I know that the design team had fun visiting with your creations :-)

It was really tough deciding on the ones to highlight... but here goes!

So...... on to the Headliner.... I loved the way that Laurie played with texture on this card. She used the textures from the cheese and the fruits as her inspiration, as well as the circular elements. Plus, she did a great job of tying in the sentiment to the images.


Laurie's berry day
So, congratulations Laurie. We hope that you will wear our headliner badge on your blog with pride!


Now.... on to our CUT ABOVES whose fabulous cards are displayed in alphabetical order!


I loved Jheri Lynn's ruffled and distressed lace edging and the colors she took from the inspiration photograph. The triple layer of ribbon was a wonderful touch.
Jheri Lynn's- From the heart


I love the way that Julie also picked up the textures and shapes from the inspiration photograph and produced this beautiful, clean and stunning sympathy card



Rach was inspired by the colors, the fruits and the shapes. I love this creative take on the photograph and the fact that these cards go into their own little box - priceless! Rach's Strawberry Inspiration Note Cards

Each of the submission cards had something that really caught my eye, so it made the job of choosing the winners pretty tough.

Congratulations to our winners, please grab your badge from the left siderbar for your blog! Thank you again to all of our participants for the sketch challenge!

Don't forget to join us for CHALLENGE 13 - ANYTHING GOES.

Jaydee

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Paper Players Challenge # 12 - Inspiration

**Edit**- To view last week's winners of the Sketch Challenge please click HERE.

Hi Everyone.

I'm Jaydee and it is my pleasure to host the Paper Players Challenge this week. Lesley had the honor of choosing the winners from last week's sketch challenge and she will be back tomorrow with her choices. There were so many amazing cards submitted again last week, so I know the choice will have been hard for her!

The design team is also very excited to have Nance Lempinen-Leedy on board as our guest designer. Nance will be joining as the September guest designer a couple of weeks early. Why? 'Cos our very own LeAnne is off spending some quality time with her new grand-daughter! Congrats, LeAnne and welcome Nance!

We have been awed by the creations you submit for our challenges. There is so much amazing talent out in the blogosphere, and we are so happy that you play along with us.

The challenge this week is an inspiration challenge. I chose this photograph not only because it uses some of my favorite colors, but also because I love the cheeses and fruits in the photograph.



Where to get your inspiration? In this pic you can find inspiration in the colors; in the textures; in the shapes; or even just the idea of food or fruit. As you can see from the design team fabulous creations - anything goes!

We have used Stampin' Up! products, but you are welcome to use any products.

All you need to do is create a new project (card, 3D project or scrapbook page) and load it to your blog or social site (such as splitcoaststampers) and then add your direct link to our linking tool. It's really that easy. All we ask is that you provide the direct link to your project.

Here are the cards from the design team, don't forget to pop along to their blogs and see how they made these fabulous creations.













Now... over to you - we can't wait to see what you come up with!

Jaydee

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Challenge #11-Top Picks

Hello!

Lesley here. Thank you for playing along with my sketch this past week! I was unable to post the winners on Saturday because my husband and I went to the lake to camp and fish and enjoy the last bit of summer.  We had a lovely time.  I actually caught one trout but had to toss him back as he was too little, but it was still exciting reeling him in!!

I looked through all the submissions for my sketch challenge...wow! This was a tough one for me to choose!  I loved seeing all of your wonderful work and it was great seeing how my sketch was interpreted!  In the end, I chose this Clean and Simple beauty from Linda Callahan.  Her scallop circles and the tiny pearls accenting the scallops plus the gold embossed bird, made this card a stand out!!  I really love the colours too!  Congratulations Linda.


The Three Cut Above Winners also came up with some lovely creations!  They are, in alphabetical order...



Julie E



Sandra F

Congratulations to our winners, please grab your badge from the left siderbar for your blog!  Thank you again to all of our participants for the sketch challenge! 

This week we have an Inspiration Challenge from Jaydee!  Be sure to click HERE to see her challenge. 

Smiles,
Lesley :)

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Meet our Guest Designers for August: Ann Schach and Marlene Peters

Hello!  If you are looking for this week's current Challenge please click HERE.

This month at the Paper Players we are pleased to have two fabulous Guest Designers with us!  Ann Schach and Marlene Peters.  Both have been a wonderful addition to our team for the month of August!  Here is a little information about each of these wonderful ladies, in alphabetical order!!  If you click on their names below their photo, you can go visit their beautiful blogs!!


Recently retired after teaching high school science for 34 years, Ann resides with her husband and son in southeast Iowa. Originally a scrapbooker, she began stamping a year-and-a-half ago when she became a Stampin' Up! demonstrator. Since that time she has developed a passion for cardmaking...a passion which she shares with family and friends through her classes, clubs and workshops. When not stamping, Ann can be found reading mysteries and listening to either baroque music or classic rock. An avid dog lover, Ann will soon be welcoming the newest member to the Schach family, Muffy the Boxer. Ann is currently a member of the Splitcoast Dirty Dozen and the Pals Paper Arts design teams.



Marlene is a piano teacher of almost 20 years, starting her career as a young teenager. Marlene started crafting shortly after finishing high school, mostly working with wood, acrylic paints and fabric. She discovered rubber stamps and shortly after getting married added card making and scrapbooking to her list of hobbies. She came upon Stampin' Up! and fell in love with the products and after having 3 girls decided it was time to start demonstrating. Marlene has been demonstrating for a little over a year and loves sharing her crafting with friends and family. She will be taking on her first position as part of a design team for Stampin' Royalty in September. For Marlene, everything she loves involves her hands (hence the title of her blog "Hands on") and can always be caught doing something crafty or musical with her free time.

We are thrilled to have you on board ladies, we have enjoyed getting to know you and playing with paper with you! 

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Challenge #11-A Sketch

Hi everyone! If you are looking for last week's Colour Challenge Top Picks, please click HERE. This week I have the pleasure of hosting a sketch for you to try!! If you do not have a circle shape, please feel free to substitute with your own shape...it does not need to be a circle...it is all up to you!! We have also made this card a square card but any sized card will work.


We have some simple rules to follow and they are located in the left sidebar. The main rule is to have fun! The Paper Players have created some cute samples, I think we all had Christmas on the brain!!


By: LeAnne

By: Ann

By: Lesley

By: Jaydee




P.S. Edit by Jaydee.... team... were we all channeling each other this week? What a fabulous bunch of Christmas cards and yet none of us knew that anyone else was doing a Christmas theme! Love this sketch, Lesley. :-) hugs

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Challenge #10 Top Picks

Hi everyone! LeAnne here.....thanks for playing along with us this week and using my yummy challenge colors! You all did an awesome job and it was quite difficult to pick just one that was the cream of the crop! But my vintage heart won out, and I chose this card of Lori's as the Headliner for this week. This is one of my favorite sets in the new catalog, and the coloring, the ribbon treatment, the sentiment and her shading, just made me smile:



And the three Cut Aboves, in no particular order are:



Jennifer



and Julie



Congratulations, stampers! Feel free to copy the badge on the sidebar to show off on your own blog!

All the samples were really very pretty--I think this is a color combo I'll be using often, and I hope you do too! Be sure to stop back tomorrow for a NEW challenge!

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Challenge #10-A Colour Challenge

LeAnne has chosen a yummy combo of colours for us to use this week! She has challenged us to make a paper project using the colours Cherry Cobbler, Early Espresso, Crumb Cake and Very Vanilla. I found the perfect inspiration photo to go with this challenge! I hope it gets your creative juices flowing!!


Here are the Paper Players fabulous samples to inspire you...


By: LeAnne

By: Marlene


We also would like to announce last week's winners for the"Vintage" Themed Challenge. All of the submissions were divinely vintage and we loved seeing them all!!

The Headliner for the Vintage Challenge is:

Our Three Cut Aboves for the Vintage Challenge are:
(in no particular order)




Congratulations ladies! Please feel free to copy your badge from the left sidebar of our blog. Please leave a comment for us if you have any problems.

Please remember:
1. The rules for our challenges are located in the left sidebar.
2. The main rule is to have fun and to be sure to link up your creation by Saturday, Aug. 14th at 6pm (PST)
3. If you are interested in being a Guest Paper Player at some point, please let us know in your post.

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Welcome to the Paper Players

Hi, welcome to the new Paper Players Challenge Blog.  We had been holding our weekly challenges every Sunday at my blog "Always Playing with Paper" but we decided to expand and become a single challenge blog for all our stampin' friends to enjoy!

Over the past two months, we have appreciated all the "Players" who have played along with our challenges.

Here are some things you may not know about us ...

1.  We are all Stampin' Up Demonstrators...from across North America.  I asked some of my dear blogging gal pals to help me set up my own challenge blog...and here we are!

2.  We encourage everyone to play...so please feel free to use non-Stampin' Up items as well.  Our rules are located in the left sidebar.

3.  Every month we look for a Guest Designer.  We try to choose that person from our participants.  So be sure to play along, maybe even let us know in your post that you would like to be considered for the Guest Designer spot!

4.  We post a new challenge every Sunday and it ends on the following Saturday at 12pm (PST).  We will post the winners for last week's challenge on Saturday evenings.

5.  We have different types of challenges each week...please have a look at our schedule below.


Hope this makes sense!  We look forward to seeing your creations.  Please have fun and be sure to leave us a comment if you have any questions. 

Thanks for stopping by!
Smiles,
Lesley