Hi everyone!  We’re back to announce the winners of last week’s challenge.  We asked you to submit projects inspired by Kelly, Sarah, Kryssi, Kiara and Deborah — the winners of our second ever Win a Day on the Hero Club Blog Contest — and you all did an amazing job.  What a tough decision!  We enjoyed seeing the different styles and the unique ways you were inspired by these five talented stampers.  Thanks so much for sharing!

Our Fresh Face prize this week goes to Vera Rhuhay, who found color and design inspiration in this card of Kryssi’s. Beautifully done!  We love how she made the red screen a circular element.

Next up is our Scrapbooking winner, prospurring (Anne)!  Her take on this scrapbook page by Sarah showcases her gorgeous photos to perfection.

First Place this week goes to LysaQ!  She was inspired by the design of this card by Kelly, as well as Kelly’s use of owls.  Too cute!  We all loved it, and Sally was especially fond of the pink and orange owls (of course!)

Our Second Place winner is tomoh08, who said Sarah and Kelly inspired this gorgeous card.  It has simple appeal but with some fabulous little details.  Check out the wonderful stitching…

And Third Place goes to debstamps with this super clever owl card.  It was adapted from this unforgettable card of Deborah’s.  The blue googly eyes are so much fun!

And we couldn’t stop there. With so many terrific entries, we’d like to award some Honorable Mention prizes too!

First is this beautiful acetate card created by Lucy, England, inspired by this beauty from Kiara.  The presentation and use of stamps is wonderful!

Next is this simply sweet “hello” card by 1scrappycat, inspired by Kryssi.  We love the springlike colors with the kraft!

And finally…how pretty is this card by elana k!  It was inspired by Kiara’s design here.  The Heart Winged Butterfly looks great stamped directly onto the patterned paper…

Fantastic work everyone!  Winners and honorable mentions, please email us at the address in the blog sidebar with “Win a Day” in the subject line and include your postal address.

Thanks again to everyone for playing along last week!  We hope you’re having fun with small stamps this week.  Nancy’s “Little Things” challenge runs until Sunday, March 8 at 11:59pm PST.  You can find all the details HERE.

Happy stamping,

Happy weekend everyone!  Before we wrap up the week, we have one more Hero Arts apron winner to announce.  The apron from Friday will be going to…

#216 - Lisa Borchers (February 27th, 2009 at 8:54 pm) :

“Wow, beautiful cards! I love the Japenese dolls … it is jaw-dropping!”

Congratulations Lisa!  Please email us at the address in the blog sidebar and we’ll get your apron mailed off to you. Enjoy!

Now, here’s a look back at the inspiration provided by the Win-a-Day contest winners this week…

• Monday: Kelly Booth & Sally
• Tuesday: Sarah Moerman & Shari
• Wednesday: Krysten Ng & Lisa
• Thursday: Kiara Lee & Nancy
• Friday: Deborah Nolan & Jennifer

All of the Hero Artists would like to say thanks once again to each of the fabulous Win-A-Day winners!  We truly loved getting to know you better, and had tons of fun, too!

Would you like to win a day (plus new stamps, embellishments and more!) on the Hero Club blog?  We have another Win-a-Day contest going on right now — check here for more information.  Can’t wait to see your submissions!

We’d like to encourage everyone to enter this week’s challenge, too!  Just create something inspired by one of this week’s featured stampers and submit it to the Hero Arts Flickr Group by Sunday, March 1 at 11:59pm PST.  Have fun!

And, one last update!  We added the featured stamps from each day HERE in the Hero Arts Store!  Happy Shopping!

Thanks for joining us this week,

Hello and welcome back to our “Win-a-Day on the Hero Club Blog” week.  I am very honored to introduce you to the fabulous Deborah Nolan…

I was so happy to pick Deborah.  Her incredible talent, boundless creativity and fun personality made her an easy choice!  Here’s more from her…

Q1: What is your favorite stamping technique? (Simple stamping, embossing, collage, etc.)

Deborah: Straight-up stamping, but I love to embellish with colored pencils and Gamsol.

Q2: What is your “go-to” color combination?

Deborah: This is hard for me. Probably my favorite is to use kraft, warm chocolate brown, and then robin egg’s blue/creamy pink/sea-green.

Q3: What are your favorite Hero Arts embellishments? (Gems, pearls, buttons, etc.)

Deborah: Definitely the pearls and gems.

Q4: What inspires you?

Deborah: The HA bloggers and the stampers at the Hero Arts Flickr Group. For sheer concentration of raw talent and fresh ideas, this is THE place to visit.

Q5: What is your favorite dessert?

Deborah: I never met a cookie I didn’t like. Actually, we never have dessert, but I am quite partial to chocolate store-bought birthday cake with BUTTERCREAM icing (whipped is just plain wrong).

When I started emailing with Deborah in preparation for this day, her excitement was contagious.  She had so many fun and creative ideas!  So we decided to put a fun spin on our day and go with sketch and color palettes for our projects.  It was such fun.

Here’s the first sketch and color palette Deborah came up with.

And here is the striking card that Deborah made.  It’s one of those cards that makes your jaw drop!

(Card by Deborah Nolan)

And here is my card based on the same sketch and color palette.  I traced the greeting and stamped images with a glitter pen for added fun.

(Card by Jennifer McGuire)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Four Dolls
• Clear Design Mix and Match Elements
• Clear Design I Care Frame Messages (for butterflies)
• Clear Design Card Messages
• Dots
• Black and White Memories Ink
  
• Summer Assorted and Kraft Notecards
• Accent Pearls
• Other: cardstock, Prima Petites flowers, silk ribbon (Archiver’s), jewelry hemp (Hobby Lobby), markers (Tombow, Sharpies), Prismacolor pencils, Gamsol, chalk (Pebbles Inc.), Fiskars Scallop Punch, glitter pen

Here’s the second sketch and color palette Deborah created.

And… check this out!  What a clever use of these stamps!

(Card by Deborah Nolan)

And here is my card.  The yellow circle lifts up to reveal a message for the recipient.  To do this, I just put a small crease about 1/2″ from the top and put adhesive just on the small flap.  Easy!

(Card by Jennifer McGuire)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Hello Circles
• Clear Design Great Flourishes Messages
• Clear Design Elephants
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
• Heart Winged Butterfly
• Together Special Edition (for small butterfly)
• Design Block Scattered Flowers
• Hero Arts Memories Inks
  
• Summer Assorted Notecards
• Assorted Crystal Gemstones
• Other: cardstock, jewelry hemp (Hobby Lobby), chalk (Pebbles Inc.), heart punch, pop dots, wire, EK Success circle punches, colored pencils

And here’s the third sketch and color palette we used for inspiration.

Now - I have to say that this is the most creative card I have seen in ages.  Wow!  Check out how she used the scallop border stamps to create the decoration on the elephant.  How fabulous!

(Card by Deborah Nolan)

And here is my creation… totally inspired by Deborah! I also used one of Hero Arts’ new long notecards.

(Card by Jennifer McGuire)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Elephants
• Clear Design Scallop Borders
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
• C’est Chouette
• Soft Sand Shadow Ink (for the light birds and under the colored pencil)
• Light Kraft Long Notecards
• Hero Arts Prisma Glitter
  
• Hero Arts Gemstones
• Other: cardstock, patterned paper (My Mind’s Eye, Fancy Pants, K & Company), gems (Mark Richardson), feather (Zucker Feather Products), gingham ribbon, embroidery floss (DMC), chalk (Pebbles Inc.), Prismacolor pencils, Gamsol, pen (Zig Writer), Fiskars cutter with scallop wheel, colored pencils

Now…we have one final Hero Arts apron to give away this week!

For a chance to win, just leave a comment on this post by 11:59pm PST tonight (February 27).  The winner will be announced tomorrow morning along with the weekly wrap up.  Good luck!

Deborah - I had such fun working with you.  And I am most thankful that I can now call you a friend.  You are the best!

And Deborah said:

“Hero Arts has made three of my dreams come true. Being selected for a day on the blog was Dream #1, and it’s been a wonderful experience. Meeting Jennifer McGuire is something I’ve wanted to do since 2002, so getting paired with her put a cherry on top of Dream #2. (And she’s as nice as I had hoped, btw!) Finally, Dream #3 was to be part of a stamping community filled with loving, supportive, creative women - and this truly defines the Hero Arts Flickr Group. So, thank you, Hero Arts, for creating this blog, for providing us with fine-spirited leaders, and for giving us all the opportunity to grow and learn and cultivate relationships through stamping. You are, quite simply, the best.”  You can find more of Deborah’s work (and wit!) on her blog and in her photostream at Flickr.

Hello and welcome back to our week of Win-a-Day winners here on the blog.  Today I am thrilled to introduce my pick, Kiara Lee!  I chose Kiara because I am so inspired by her use of pattern and color, and all of the special little details that she includes on her cards.  She is a talented artist and I’m so happy to have her on the blog today.

Let’s get to know Kiara a little better with a question and answer session.

Q1: What is your favorite stamping technique? (Simple stamping, embossing, collage, etc.)

Kiara: I love embossing, both the dry emboss and the heat emboss. Heat emboss gives the stamped image a crisp look and dry emboss created great textures.

Q2: What is your “go-to” color combination?

Kiara: I love to use brown/kraft and pair them with different colors.

Q3: What are your favorite Hero Arts embellishments? (Gems, pearls, buttons, etc.)

Kiara: I would have to say gems and pearls, I love the way they jazz up a card.

Q4: What inspires you?

Kiara: The inspiration is everywhere! I love to browse through home décor catalogs or fashion magazines to help me choose new color combos.

Q5: What is your favorite dessert?

Kiara: I love the Tuxedo Mousse Chocolate Cheese Cake from the Cheesecake Factory! Yummy!

Today I’m going to show you several projects Kiara created for her day on the blog, and then I’ll show some cards I created using the same stamps.

First up is this beautiful layout done in Kiara’s signature combination of kraft plus color and lots of pretty patterns. What a lovely way to document this moment.

(Layout by Kiara Lee)

Featured Supplies:

• DesignBlock Scattered Flowers
• Clear Design Hello Circles
• Clear Design Scallop Borders
• Clear Design Big Circles
• Heart Winged Butterfly
• Heart Flourish
• Light Green Accent Pearls, Hearts Accent Pearls
• Sparkle Gems Blossoms
• Other: patterned paper (Bo Bunny, Cosmo Cricket Honey Pie),  button (Stampin’Up),  flower buttons (Making Memories), American Crafts Thickers Puffy Letter Stickers

Kiara’s Tip: When deciding on a color scheme for a layout, I often like to start by choosing a patterned paper and then solid colored cardstocks to match. I also love to use the black and white photos, so I’m not limited to the colors on the photos.

Now take a look at this wonderful matching card Kiara created using the scraps from the layout above.  The butterfly looks great stamped right on top of the patterned paper…

(Card by Kiara Lee)

Featured Supplies:

• Sparkle Clear Mini Messages
• DesignBlock Line & Flower Pattern
• Heart Winged Butterfly
• Clear Design Big Circles
• Clear Design Hello Circles
• Hearts Accent Pearls
• Other: patterned paper (Bo Bunny), kraft cardstock, button (Stampin’ Up)

Kiara’s Tip: Use the DesignBlock with white ink on the kraft cardstock to create the subtle and elegant background.

Kiara’s next card is full of gorgeous layers and textures that work together perfectly. And the details are outstanding as always.

(Card by Kiara Lee)

Featured Supplies:

• Houndstooth
• Clear Design Shadow Elements
• DesignBlock Outline Flowers
• Hearts Accent Pearls, Small & Medium Accent Pearls
• Art Flowers Spring
• Other: pink flower (Prima), patterned paper (Bo Bunny), brown cardstock

Kiara’s Tip:  Try using gems and pearls on the flower center, ribbon, and button for the final touch.

I love the look of Kiara’s next card.  She really does wonders with that  kraft, brown, and pink combination.

(Card by Kiara Lee)

Featured Supplies:

• Thank You Card
• Heart Flourish
• Hearts Accent Pearls
• Medium Pearls
• Spring Felt Buttons
• Other: pink and brown cardstock, patterned paper (Bo Bunny), pom-pom trim

Kiara’s Tip: I love the look of white ink on the dark color cardstocks, it creates a lovely background.

Kiara’s final card contains a wonderful mixture of elements.  She marries the patterns and images so well and manages to make it look effortless.

(Card by Kiara Lee)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Hugs and Hearts
• Clear Design Trees, Birds & Messages
• Small & Medium Accent Pearls, Hearts Accent Pearls
• Assorted Clear Circles
• Other: patterned paper (Making Memories Paperie Rouge & Mocha), twine

Kiara’s Tip: I love to use the 6×6 paper pad when I use the patterned papers to create a card. In the pad, the patterned papers are all nicely coordinated with each other; it saves me a lot of time trying to pick the right papers. The Making Memories and Basic Grey paper pads are my favorites.

Most of you know I like “simple stamping” but Kiara inspired me to spread my wings and try using pattern and color…I love it. Thank you Kiara, for making me take a deep breath and try something new and challenging to me.

Speaking of challenges…for my first card I chose a bold striped paper.  I pulled the color for the stamped butterfly and sentiment directly from the paper and stamped a coordinating envelope to tie it all together.

(Card by Nancy Taylor)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Hugs and Hearts
• Heart Winged Butterfly
• Raindrop Background
• Citron Gemstones
• Chocolate Notecard, Lagoon Envelope
• Other: striped patterned paper

Nancy’s Tip:  Cutting out the tiny antenna on a butterfly is challenging at best…so I like to stamp the image directly on the patterned paper then stamp the image again in the same color of ink and cut out the body and wings. After glueing on top of the butterfly, the antenna show from the image underneath.

On this next card I took a cue from the colors Kiara enjoys using…

Does stamping on multiple layers frustrate you because of the unstamped area along the edge? I love the look of stamping on multiple layers so here is how I solved the problem. After glueing the pieces together I use a really small paintbrush and dip the brush into the ink pad I used and hand paint the rest of the image. I left some of the areas unfinished on this sample so you can see the difference.

(Card by Nancy Taylor)

Featured Supplies:

• Heart Flourish
• Clear Design Hugs and Hearts
• Light Kraft Long Notecards
• Neutral Art Flowers
• Assorted Clear Circles
• Hearts Accent Pearls
• Other: patterned paper

If you work in an office sometimes you want to give a card that can sit on a desk, without disclosing the personal message inside…this last card is perfect for that.  It is a single layer with a cardboard easel glued on the back.

The top of the cutout heart holds the “hugs” card closed, so the message is hidden.  Here is how it looks when the “hugs” flap is open…

(Card by Nancy Taylor)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Hugs and Hearts
• Houndstooth
• Neutral Art Flowers
• Citron Gemstones
• Other: pattterned paper, easel back

Now it’s giveaway time and you guessed it — we are giving away another exclusive Hero Arts Apron!

All you need to do to enter the drawing is leave a comment on this post by 11:59pm PST tonight (February 26).  Then check back tomorrow morning when I announce the winner.  Good luck!

Kiara, I had so much fun stamping the cards inspired by you.  Thank you for pushing me to try something new — I will definately try it again!  You are such a sweet, wonderful person to stamp with.  Keep on stamping in your special style, and enjoy your day!

A note from Kiara:

 “Winning a day on the Hero Arts blog has been an awesome experience! Thank you, Nancy and Hero Arts for giving me this incredible opportunity. Working with Nancy was so much fun; I really admire her fabulous style! I’m truly honored and lucky to be chosen among so many talented artists. Thank you Hero Arts for this amazing blog!!”  You can view more of Kiara’s work on her blog or in the Hero Arts Flickr Group.

Thanks for joining us today,

PS.  The winners of last week’s Friendship Challenge have been announced — click HERE to see them! There are some truly amazing entries.

Hi and welcome back to “Win-a-Day on the Hero Club Blog” week.  It’s Lisa here, along with my pick for the contest — the super talented Kryssi Ng — aka Sugarbuffet!  We have a bunch of fun projects to share with you, plus a video, so let’s get started!

First off, meet Kryssi!

I chose Kryssi because she has such a fun stamping style — she always adds clever little twists to her projects.  And she has a great sense of style + color.  Love it!   I asked her five questions so that you can get to know her a little better:

Q1: What is your favorite stamping technique? (Simple stamping, embossing, collage, etc.)

Kryssi: I love clean and simple and I think it’s harder to achieve than a card full of embellishments. You have to pay more attention to the entire composition.

Q2: What is your “go-to” color combination?

Kryssi: Red, soft aqua blue, and brown.

Q3: What are your favorite Hero Arts embellishments? (Gems, pearls, buttons, etc.)

Kryssi: Buttons, most definitely buttons!

Q4: What inspires you?

Kryssi: I draw my inspiration from the stamp images. It’s a lot of experimenting around the image until I find a layout that I like. Unfortunately, that also means a lot of wasted paper… and my desk is a perpetual mess.

Q5: What is your favorite dessert?

Kryssi: Lemon ice-cream pie from a local restaurant!

Now, for the first set of cards that Kryssi made using one of my favorite stamp sets –  Clear Design Four Dolls! Love how she used her “go-to” color combination of red, pool and brown:

(Cards by Kryssi Ng)

Love how she pulled a bit of soft purple from the wooden doll’s dress into the mix, too!

(Card by Kryssi Ng)

And, check out the slatted screen background on this one — told you she has clever little details!

(Card by Kryssi Ng)

When Kryssi showed me these photos I fell in love with the wooden doll she used as a prop and I HAD to have one!  (Search on momiji dolls if you want to find one for yourself.)  I decided to use the new Kanji Poem to make my background + Kryssi’s color combo and also try to recreate the flowers on the momiji doll’s dress…

(Card by Lisa Spangler) 

To make the red flower, I cut off two petals from a red Felt Flower.  For the white flower, I just used a white Neutral Felt Button.  And here’s a tip I learned from a friend — you can make the Clear Design Dolls seem even more “doll-like” by curving the paper around your finger.

(Card by Lisa Spangler) 

Curving the paper reminded me of a fun papercraft that goes perfectly with the dolls — fortune cookies!

(Cards by Lisa Spangler) 

Here’s a closeup of the fortune cookie

These are so simple to make — and fun, too, because you can customize the message to be whatever you want!  Perfect for lunchboxes or romantic dinners with takeout (no cooking!) + candlelight  :)  Here’s a video to show you how it’s done:

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Four Dolls
• Clear Design Mix and Match Elements
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
• NEW Kanji Poem
• Smooth Gemstones, Small Blossom Gemstones, Accent Pearls
• Summer Felt Flowers, Neutral Felt Buttons, Summer Buttons
• Pool, Crimson, Kraft, Hyacinth Notecards
• Soft Pool Shadow Ink
• Other: Prismacolor pencils, scallop border punch (Stampin’ Up), scallop border punch with holes (Martha Stewart Crafts), Baby Blue Liquid Pearls (Ranger), 2 3/4″ circle punch for the fortune cookie (EK Success), red permanent marker to color the smooth gems (Bic)

Next, feast your eyes on this creative card design by Kryssi! I just love how the circle frames the image, her color scheme, and of course the cute owl:

(Card by Kryssi Ng)

Here’s my take — I used paper flowers instead of the buttons, and swapped the pink and green, too:

(Card by Lisa Spangler) 

Featured Supplies:

• Four Stylish Owls
• Clear Design Whoo Loves You?
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
• Clear Design Card Messages
• DesignBlock Flourish
• Small Accent Pearls
• Spring Art Flowers, Meadow Art Flowers
• Shabby Shutters Distress Ink
• Chocolates & Blueberries Chalk Ink Queue
• Kraft & Garden Notecards
• Other:  patterned paper on Kryssi’s card (K&Company), buttons (Foof-a-La), Prismacolor pencils, wiggle eyes (craft store), paper edge distressor (Tonic by Tim Holtz)

Next up is this adorable mailbox that Kryssi created.  She said, “I want to use this box to store little trinkets for my daughter. I made little note cards that daddy and I can write little messages on special occasions. They are held together with a ring so we’re going to use this box to hold her little jewelry as well.”

(Project by Kryssi Ng)

Isn’t it super sweet?  I bet her daughter loves it. And, what a special keepsake it’s sure to become!

I was inspired by Kryssi’s blue + brown color scheme, and her use of the “little things” message reminded me of the clouds in the Clear Design Sky’s the Limit set – I thought they would be perfect to build a little scene with a polka dot elephant:

(Card by Lisa Spangler)

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Elephants
• Clear Design Sky’s the Limit
• Special Edition Artistic Windows
• Design Block Raindrop Background
• Art Flowers White and Cream
• Other: patterned paper on the mailbox (K&Company Wild Saffron),  mailbox (Target), buttons (Foof-a-La), paper crimper (Fiskars), scallop border punch (Fiskars)

Now it’s time for another Hero Arts apron giveaway!

Just leave a comment here on this post by 11:59 pm PST tonight (February 25) and you’ll be entered into the random drawing.  I’ll announce the lucky winner tomorrow morning.

Kryssi, I just wanted to let you know how much FUN I had stamping with you and getting to know you better — you are so sweet!  I truly love your sense of style and color, plus all the clever little details you add to your projects. I’m definitely going to be using your “go to” color combo more often.  And, thanks again for telling me about the momiji dolls!  Mine is sitting right here on my desk — next to a felt mushroom — do those two go together?  Hope you enjoy your day on the blog!  BIG hugs!

And here’s a note from Kryssi:

“I’d like to say ‘thank you’ to Lisa and Hero Arts for giving me this opportunity! This was such a fantastic experience in every aspect! Lisa has been an absolute sunshine to work with - not only is she super friendly and funny, but she is talented beyond belief! And I can’t say enough about what a big fan I am of Hero Arts stamps and products! Hero Arts is just an amazing community that I have learned so much from and the reason why I continue to challenge myself daily. So thank you - for this honor, for the friendships, and for making me a better artist in the process.”  You can check out even more of Kryssi’s work on her blog or in the Hero Arts Flickr Group.

Hello and welcome back to “Win-a-Day on the Hero Club Blog” week. Allow me to introduce you to the incredibly talented Sarah Moerman.

Sarah is my choice to share this day together. I have always admired Sarah because of her outstanding design skills and use of color…she’s got great style and is a sweetheart to boot. I had a great time working with Sarah on these projects, she is so nice.

To get to know her a little better, we asked her a few questions and this is what she said:

Q1: What is your favorite stamping technique? (Simple stamping, embossing, collage, etc.)

Sarah: I’d have to say my favorite stamping technique would have to be heat embossing, especially with Versamark and white embossing powder. I love how it makes the white pop on dark colored paper.

Q2: What is your “go-to” color combination?

Sarah: I really don’t think I have a “go-to” color combination though I do tend to use either white or kraft for my background.

Q3: What are your favorite Hero Arts embellishments? (Gems, pearls, buttons, etc.)

Sarah: My favorite Hero Arts embellishments are the pearls. I love how rich they look.

Q4: What inspires you?

Sarah: Most of my scrapping inspiration comes from my kids. I start with either the pictures of them or some trait or quirk I want to remember and go from there, usually drawing my colors from the pictures. Beyond that, my inspiration comes from magazines and blogs, especially the Hero Arts blog and flickr group. So much talent here.

Q5: What is your favorite dessert?

Sarah: Definitely cheesecake!! Fortunately for my waistline my husband doesn’t share my passion for it.

We’ve got so much to show you today so let’s get started.

Sarah made this card and flower arrangement that is to die for.   I love the multi-layers of the flowers and the vibrant colors, they are just so pretty! Great idea with the wire stems and buttons in a jar.  Wow!

(Projects by Sarah Moerman)

Supplies:

• Clear Design Printed Flowers
• Clear Design Scattered Leaves
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
  
• Clear Design Scallop Borders
• DesignBlock Scattered Flowers
• Memories Ink - Black and White
• Colorbox Chalk Queue Misty Meadow
• Hero Arts Shadow Ink Soft Blossom
• Black Staz-On (on ribbon)
• Other: kraft paper, white cardstock, Basic Grey “Urban Prairie” and buttons, thread, green wire, ribbon

I was inspired by Sarah’s layered flowers and decided to use the same set.  I’ve been wanting to spiff up my apron that I wear for classes.  I used a little Grungeboard and Distress Inks.

Supplies:

• Clear Design Printed Flowers
• Broken China Distress Ink
• Walnut Stain Distress Ink
• Peeled Paint Distress Ink
• Tea Dye Distress Ink
• Other: Grungeboard, Fired Brick Distress Ink, buttons and heavy thread

Next Sarah made these ADORABLE bib cards.  I love how she curved the scallop borders around the edges.  These cards could be used for baby shower cards, announcements, or even congratulations.  What a fantastic design.  So cute!

(Cards by Sarah Moerman) 

Supplies:

• Clear Design Scallop Borders
• Clear Design Precious Baby Boy
• Clear Design Adorable Baby Girl
• Pale Pink Accent Pearls
• Pool and Blossom Notecards
• Hero Arts Shadow Inks in Soft Pool and Soft Blossom
• Other: white cardstock, thread

I was pleased that Sarah had chosen the Clear Design Boy set, this gave me a chance to make a congratulations card for another one of my nieces. I made Jennifer’s design of a pop-up slide card.

(Card by Shari Carroll)

Supplies:

• Clear Design Precious Baby Boy
• Walnut Stain Distress Ink
• Faded Jeans Distress Ink
• White StazOn
• Clear Circle Tags
• White Notecards
• Other: Making Memories cardstock and brad, Bo Bunny cardstock, color pencils, ribbon and string

And finally Sarah made this wonderful card where she meticulously created small cut outs of the stars.  I love her color scheme.  Amazing talent, I tell you!

(Card by Sarah Moerman)  

 Supplies:

• DesignBlock Reach for the Stars
• Clear Design Galaxy of Stars
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
  
• Lemon Notecard
• Accent Pearls
• VersaMark
• Colorbox Chalk Queue Pumpkin Patch
• Other: Bazzill cardstock, clear embossing powder, twine

I hadn’t used this set so what a treat it was for me to break in some new rubber.  I was completely inspired by Sarah’s design but added my own twist to it.

(Card by Shari Carroll) 

Supplies:

• DesignBlock Reach for the Stars
• Clear Design Galaxy of Stars
• Clear Design All Occasion Messages
• Faded Jeans Distress Ink
• Walnut Stain Distress Ink
• Kraft Notecards
• Other: Basic Grey “Ambrosia” paper and brad, blue cardstock, string

And I can’t just let today go without a quick GIVEAWAY.  Leave us a comment (by 11:59pm PST tonight) and I’ll randomly choose one lucky person to receive an exclusive Hero Arts apron.

I’ll announce the winner tomorrow morning.  Good luck!

Working with Sarah as my blog buddy has been such a pleasure.  She inspired me to work with stamps that I hadn’t used yet and to step outside of my box.  She is such a sweetheart and it’s been so fun to get to know her on a more personal level.  Thanks Sarah for stepping up to the plate and joining me for a fantastic play date!

Sarah:  “Big thanks to Shari and Hero Arts for this wonderful opportunity! It’s definitely been a dream come true to work with the super talented Shari and to create projects for the Hero Arts blog. Thank you Shari for making this experience so wonderful, for answering my questions and being so supportive. You’re the BEST!! Hugs, Sarah”

Thanks for joining us today. Enjoy!

Welcome to day one of our “Win-a-Day on the Hero Club Blog” week.  This promises to be a fun-filled week, as we feature the five talented stampers who were selected by the Hero Artists as contest winners.

Today I would like to introduce my “blog buddy” for the day (and fellow Californian)…Kelly Booth.  I found several of her flickr cards intriguing, so she was my pick for this week. Kelly’s cards captured my attention with their whimsical, lighthearted look. Loved all her PINK too!

Let’s get to know Kelly with a little question and answer session.

Q1: What is your favorite stamping technique? (Simple stamping, embossing, collage, etc.)

Kelly: My very favorite thing to do is to color. I can’t remember a time not having a crayon in my hand from the time I was very young. Whether it is using prismacolor pencils, markers or water coloring. I love to paint and color!

Q2: What is your “go-to” color combination?

Kelly: Lavender has always been my favorite color. But I never stamp purple and lavender…I would have to say my go to color combo is anything with PINK! Usually pink and brown, although I do love aqua or blue with brown too!

Q3: What are your favorite Hero Arts embellishments? (Gems, pearls, buttons, etc.)

Kelly: Definitely pearls and gems…I do love the new felt buttons as well but am addicted to the gems! (You should see my stash it is SICK.)

Q4: What inspires you?

Kelly: I am inspired by colors and paper. I usually look at papers and start playing from there.

Q5: What is your favorite dessert?

Kelly: Hmmm. I love chocolate but my favorite would have to be banana cream pie!!

Kelly and the rest of the winners selected stamps from the current catalog to use on their blog day.  We also sent them some extra goodies like notecards and embellishments and then asked each of them to work their card magic.

So, let’s get to today’s cards!

People are always craving cards for MEN. So, here is a great card from Kelly using the “boy” owl. The houndstooth and newsprint really MAN him up. The DesignBlock birthday stamp really adds style to this card.

(Card by Kelly Booth)

I took basically the same stamps and gave it MY twist. I thought this printed paper scrap really looked like a man’s shirt. Dang, I could have rolled up some newsprint under his wing so he looked like he was reading the paper! Always after thoughts!!

(Card by Sally Traidman)

Featured Supplies:

• Boy Owl
• DesignBlock Birthday
• Houndstooth Background
• Screen Shadow
• Clear Card Buttons
• Black Gemstones
• Hero Arts Notecards
• Other: newspaper, cardstock, colored pencils (Prismacolor), Gamsol, sewing machine, scalloped circle die (Nestabilities), Dotted Swiss cardstock (Bazzill), patterned paper (Basic Grey), string, twine

Now it’s time for the GIRLS. And we all love shoes!  We both created shoe cards and used the same color for our houndstooth, but in different ways. And Kelly colored her shoes in. Love her scalloped cards!

(Cards by Kelly Booth) 

I stamped the houndstooth down the inside edge and put a strip of black along the front to tie it all together. My bright shoe colors stand out against white - my go to color everyday for basic stamping! I love stamping black on solid note colors and cutting the items out. And then the BLING…gotta have it!

(Card by Sally Traidman) 

Featured Supplies:

• Houndstooth Background
• Clear Design High Heels
• Hero Arts Notecards
• Hero Arts Gemstones and Pearls
• Other: scalloped circle and scalloped rectangle dies (Nestabilities), Memento black ink, Copic markers

Kelly knows I love flowers and the pink and orange color combo. Look how she put it all together to capture my attention! (It worked!!!) Love her stitching around the edge. I could use my machine on every card, but I am too lazy to change the thread!

(Card by Kelly Booth) 

On this card, I turned a pink card “inside out” and had the white outside, so the pink edge you see is really the stamped “inside”. I love creating tone on tone patterns with our DesignBlock stamps as shown here. And as you see, I used almost every stamp in the set!

(Card by Sally Traidman) 

Featured Supplies:

• Clear Design Printed Flowers
• Woodgrain Pattern
• Clear Design Thoughtful Messages
• DesignBlock Wavy Leaf Pattern
• Art & Life Background
• DesignBlock Four Leaf Grid
• Vintage Collage Art Flowers
• Neutral Card Buttons
• Hero Arts Notecards
• Other: Copic markers, StazOn brown ink, Memento black ink, stitched ribbon (Papertrey), patterned paper (Basic Grey), sewing machine

And now…it’s time for the weekly challenge!  It will work the same as our last Win-a-Day back in November.  Using at least one Hero Arts stamp, create a card inspired by one of this week’s Win-a-Day contest winners.  Upload it to the Hero Arts Flickr Group by 11:59pm PST on Sunday, March 1st, then tag it with the code word “winaday“.  Please let us know in your description which winner inspired you and how.  So that you can get started early on the contests, here are links to each of the winner’s photostreams:

• Kelly Booth
• Sarah Moerman
• Krysten Ng
• Kiara Lee
• Deborah Nolan

In addition to the challenge this week, we’ll be having lots of giveaways!  Each day you’ll have a chance to win an exclusive Hero Arts apron.  Picture yourself super-stylin’ in one of these…!

For a chance to win, just leave a comment on this post by 11:59pm PST tonight, February 23.  We’ll announce the lucky apron winner tomorrow morning.

It’s been wonderful working with Kelly. Our virtual blog buddy projects were lots of FUN! Thanks for stamping with us and being part of the Hero Arts Blog.

And here’s a note from Kelly:

“Winning this day on the Hero Arts Blog has been the most wonderful experience. It has been so much fun to get to work with Sally and get to know her a little bit… I just love her style. I am truly honored to have been chosen and want to thank Sally and Hero Arts for everything…you all rock!”  You can see more of Kelly’s work on her blog or in the Hero Arts Flickr Group.

Thanks for joining us today.  Be sure to stop back tomorrow to see the next contest winner!