I recently ordered the Stampin’ Up! Berry Basket Bigz L Die, and I think it holds lots of potential for cuteness in our papercrafting! Maybe even true usefulness as it can be used to hold some of our stamping supplies! Think about cute little Easter baskets or spring baskets coming up (if it ever stops snowing in some parts of the country!). Just add a handle and some “grass” and you’ve got it. You can even use up your paper scraps along with your Fringe Scissors or Paper Trimmer to cut narrow strips of paper than can be wadded up and crinkled to look like that grass or paper shred you can buy in the store.

Use the Berry Basket Die to cut two sheets of card stock and fold on the score lines. The basket itself goes together easily, and then you can choose the straight edge trim or the scalloped edge trim. Stamp or embellish as you like! So many possibilities! The top of the basket is wider than the inside so as you can see from my top photo, the 3″ x 3″ cards fit perfectly inside, larger cards fit turned on a slight diagonal. But there are lots of possibilities for what will fit inside!

To keep this first Berry Basket simple, I just made the basket with Crumb Cake card stock and embellished it with the Bermuda Bay Sequin Trim and the Venetian Crochet Trim. Everyone seems to like using the Stampin’ Up! Handheld Stapler on the basket to attach the trim edge. It just goes well with baskets!

I know I’m going to have fun trying out various kinds of baskets!  To get your Berry Basket Die, just place your online order on my Stampin’ Up! site!  Or you can always contact me to put the order in for you! Remember, with a $50 purchase you will also earn a FREE Sale-A-Bration product!

I’ve been watching the live streaming Stampin’ Up! provided for us demonstrators at home and not in Orlando during the Stampin’ Up! Leadership Conference 2015. I have to say, it’s been ALMOST as good as being there, and I really appreciate that they did that.  There really aren’t too many things more fun than attending any Stampin’ Up! event! And getting to watch the General Sessions on my home computer has been great!!

Last night they had several different people on stage doing numerous stamping projects!  So many ideas and so many good tips! It’s always amazing! Here is the Love Is Kindness stamp from the Occasions Catalog, a single stamp. The presenter, Alisa, talking about ink, stamped this with Memento Ink and colored in with Blendabilities. She used lighter and darker shades of (perhaps) the new Pink Pirouette on the flowers, Wild Wasabi on the leaves and a little bit of Soft Sky as shading around the outside of the image. If those aren’t the correct colors she used, they certainly could be!

The photo isn’t great because I took it of my laptop screen, but you get the idea! But she didn’t make this into a card – she framed it! Isn’t that just beautiful and so simple! So we don’t always have to make a card with our stamping.  Try framing a few things as gifts or home decor for yourself!

Look through your Occasions Catalog again and see what you missed the first or second time around!  And if you need an Occasions Catalog, just send me an email at Karen@KarenStamps.com.

To order any supplies you need, either contact me or just shop at your convenience at my Stampin’ Up! Online Store!

Stampin’ Up!’s newest photopolymer stamp offering is this set, Better Than Email, which you might think is only for Demonstrators, but it is not. The main purpose of the stamp set is to provide new images for ANYONE selling items with a Stampin’ Up! copyrighted image on them. Each item must be stamped with the Stampin’ Up! copyright.  This is known as the Angel Policy. From Stampin’ Up! “Stampin’ Up!’s images are copyrighted, which means that they cannot be copied without permission. To help protect that copyright, all items for sale using our images must be marked with an official Stampin’ Up! Limited License stamp set.”  If you need more information about this policy, please let me know.

Even if you are not SELLING items you have stamped, wouldn’t any of these stamps be fun to stamp on the back of your card (like the BIG cardmaker?) or your project to let people know YOU made it yourself?! I’m still mostly using my original stamps for the Angel Policy or just for my own personal use (when I remember) to stamp on the back of cards and maybe put my initials or name and date. But this stamp set has great creative images so I think it will be very fun to use! If you want these just for personal use and really don’t want or need the brand name and copyright on it, you can cut those words off. (If you can stand to alter a stamp!) Or use a marker and only ink up the portions you want. I think stamping something like these images on the back of your cards really adds a professional and personal touch!

This stamp set is a direct result of feedback from demonstrators and customers wanting more images for the copyright and Stampin’ Up! listening and challenging department members to come up with fun and versatile ideas that would appeal to demonstrators and customers. I know it is going on my next order!

Here are some ways to use these stamps!

You can purchase this stamp set Better Than Email #140463 at my Stampin’ Up! Online Store! You’ll find it under “New Arrivals”.