Taylored Expressions @ the CHA Craft SuperShow

I'm back from the CHA Craft SuperShow and trade show and I'm still alive! I was having doubts toward the end of the 10 day trip as to whether I would make it, but after sleeping in my own bed with my own pillows and my own blankets for a few nights, I feel like myself again and I'm ready to go!

For those of you who have been to the CHA trade show you'll know what I mean when I describe it as overwhelming inspiration! So many ideas are swirling around in my head right now! It sorta feels like a drying machine...at each turn an idea pops to the front of my brain only to be replaced by a new idea seconds later... much like clothes tumbling around the dryer...they pop to the top for a few seconds only to fall back to the bottom and be replaced by new clothes at the top seconds later! No worries though...I'll make sense of the chaos soon! I am so excited to share all the amazing new goodies coming soon to the TE Store!

But first, I want to tell you about the TE booth at the Craft SuperShow! Months of planning came together perfectly for this one event...our very first experience exhibiting at a consumer event! Each of the amazing ladies (and one dashing gentleman! *wink*) pictured here played a huge part in making our booth a success. In the back row left to right... Jami Sibley, Dawn Easton, Linda Cook (my mom), Jodi Collins, *me*, Jon (my husband), Karen Motz, and Karen Giron. And in the front row left to right... Donna Baker and JulieAnn Ruiz (not pictured...Sankari Wegman, Jackie Pedro). The TE crew schlepped the booth and merchandise through pouring rain and stuck with the setup until the booth was finished! We were bound to encounter a few bumps along the way (ummm...how does this pricing gun work!? and how do we get these curtains 8 ft. in the air without a chair!?), but with some amazing TEamwork we figured it out!









Each of the girls also contributed her amazing creativity to the booth with gorgeous samples! Here's a photo of one of our card displays in the booth. The entire TE team worked so hard to make the TE booth fun and special! Thank you from the bottom of my heart for all of your hard work and support! And thank you to everyone who stopped by the booth during the SuperShow! It was so nice to see old friends and meet new friends face to face! If you weren't able to make it to the Craft SuperShow this time, perhaps we'll see you next time! :)

That's all for now, but stay tuned this week as we begin sharing some exciting news about our next release! Sneak peeks start on Wednesday and the release will be Friday, February 5th! You won't want to miss it!

Center of Attention Product Spotlight - Favors

Today the Baker's Dozen and I have another exciting Center of Attention Product Spotlight! Favors are a must-have to keep on hand for last minute gift-giving or well-planned classroom treats. We're proud to offer a wide selection of Accucut favor boxes availabe in your choice of more than 40 colors as well as specialty favors like acetate boxes, potion bottles, and clear circle party favors!

You can find all of our favors HERE. And in honor of our Center of Attention product spotlight, all favors are 15% off today and tomorrow (January 16-17). I also want to give you another reminder that all orders placed by 10pm PST on Sunday night will be shipped before we leave for CHA. We will resume shipping when we return on January 26th.


The Baker's Dozen has some amazing favor creations to show you today and I decided to do a little blast from the past of some of my favorite favors! One of the things I love most about our favor boxes is that they're quick! Most of them ship flat, but they're easy to put together to hold a quick little food gift or gift card! You can find all of the information on my blast from the past favors on these blog posts:



---Easter Basket
---Heart Handle Treat Bag
---Shop 'Til You Drop Purse
---Mini Cupcake Box



Check out the rest of the Baker's blogs to see what they've been cooking up with our favors!

Karen Motz
Sankari Wegman
Laurie Schmidlin
Alex Maldonado
Jackie Pedro

Thanks for stopping by today! Happy Saturday shopping!

Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge #98

Happy Friday! It's time to ring in another weekend with the Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge! The sketch crew will be taking a break on the 22nd and 29th as many of us will be traveling to CHA so we hope you'll join us this week! Here's the sketch:


Just create a card using the above sketch as inspiration (you're not required to use TE Stamps in your sample)! Link your creation using Mr. Linky below by Friday, January 22nd at 8am PST. I'll choose the most clever and creative cards to be included in the TESC Top Crops on my blog! And you definitely don't want to miss the Sketch Crew inspiration below...you can click on any of these cards to read more about the details of these creations!

Created by Taylor VanBruggen: Taylored Expressions

Created by Alice Wertz: Alice's Little Wonderland

Created by Melissa Sauls: In Stamping Mode

Created by Monika Davis: M.A.D. Stamper

Created by Lisa Hjulberg: The Craft's Meow

Created by Sherrie Siemens: Card Creme

TESC98 - American Crafts Owl

Wooohooo...it's Friday! And only 4 more days until we leave for CHA! I am so excited I can hardly stand it! I've heard from many of you that you plan to attend the Craft SuperShow and I am soooo looking forward to meeting you! If you happen to live in the Southern California area and you don't know about the SuperShow, click here to find out how to purchase tickets (you can even use the coupon code CRAFT15 for a discount)! It guarantee the ticket admission price will be so worth it! If you are planning to be there please stop by the TE Booth #734 and say Hi! I would love to meet you!

OK...was that enough exclamation points for one paragraph, or what? I'll try to calm down for the rest of my post today. This is one of those cards I made months ago that never got photographed or blogged. It's one of the "almost no stamping" cards. The only thing I stamped were the little clouds from the Branching Out Coordinates set. The little owl was cut from one of the patterns in the American Crafts Craft Fair collection. I used a Prima felt branch for the owl's perch, American Crafts foam thickers for the sentiment, and a button from my stash (dressed up with some twine). That's about it! Super simple layout!

Thanks for stopping by today! I can't wait to see what you create for the sketch challenge!

Key Ingredients Subscriber News!

Good morning! It's an exciting day at Taylored Expressions! Today we're introducing our January Key Ingredients kit and a Special Offer for new subscribers!

I've created a video for you to see all of our January kit contents and hear about our special deal! But if you prefer to read about it then keep scrolling past this video:



What is a Key Ingredients subscription?

Taylored Expressions Key Ingredients is a monthly kit club dedicated to bringing you the latest coordinating products for papercrafting! Our creative eye for color and our never-ending search for fabulous embellishments make our kits fresh and unique!

Each month you'll receive enough coordinating patterned paper, cardstock, ribbon, and embellishments to create at least 16 cards. Our kits coordinate well with Taylored Expressions stamps, but you can also use them with the many other stamp sets already in your collection. All of the elements are hand-selected to make your crafting easy, fun, and stress free!

We also strive to inspire you to create beautiful cards, scrapbook pages, and altered projects whether you're a seasoned stamper or a beginner!

Can I see the January subscription kit?

Of course! We're coming up on the 1 year anniversary of our subscription program and I can honestly say that this month's kit is among top favorites from the past year! We've paired coordinating cardstock and embellishments with the adorable Nook and Pantry Collection by Basic Grey. You'll receive 20 sheets of 6x6 patterned paper, 12 sheets of cardstock, 5 yards of ribbon, coordinating buttons, and my absolute FAVORITE part of the kit, 3 hand-crocheted flowers! These gorgeous flowers were crocheted by Jodi Collins' amazing mom! She worked tirelessly to create hundreds upon hundreds of flowers just for you! We're excited to offer you this unique, handmade embellishment. I just know you're going to love them!


What about those special offers?

I'm almost there! But first, I want to tell you about our...

Brand New Key Ingredients Website! - we're excited to introduce a website just for our subscribers! We've been hard at work on this project and we hope you'll find lots of helpful information. You'll find a gallery filled with inspiration, answers to all of your frequently asked questions, the monthly challenge, and our key ingredients video along with photos of our current kit and a list of all the coordinating accessories. We hope this website will be a great resource for you and that you'll share what you love with your friends!

www.thekeyingredients.blogspot.com

I know this is a lot of information to soak in, but I'm just getting to the good stuff! If you've considered becoming a subscriber let me tell you why now is the perfect time to do it!

-- Limited Time Subscription Special Purchase a 6 month subscription on or before January 17th and receive a FREE Key Ingredients kit upon the completion of your 6 month subscription. This kit (a $23.95 value including shipping) will be an exclusive kit that will never be available in the TE Store!

-- Exclusive to Subscribers The kits we offer to subscribers will no longer be available for individual purchase in the TE Store. We will continue offering Key Ingredients during our stamp releases, however, subscriber kits will be exclusive to subscribers beginning in January. So if you LOVE the kit shown above featuring Basic Grey Nook & Pantry, then you need to subscriber today!

-- Beat the price increase Increased shipping costs on both our shipments to you and the products we receive from manufacturers have forced us to increase the cost of our subscription. Prices will increase as of January 18th, to $23.95 a month for a 6 month subscription and $25.95 a month for 3 month subscriptions. However, if you subscribe on or before January 17th, you'll receive the current pricing of $21.95 a month for a 6 month subscription or $22.95 a month for a 3 month subscription. However, please note the the free exclusive kit is only available when you purchase a 6 month subscription.

-- There are many more benefits that you receive as a TE Key Ingredients subscriber. You can read more FAQ's and subscriber benefits here!

What about kit samples and inspiration?

The Baker's Dozen and I create several samples each month to jump-start your creativity with the kit. You can always find samples from past and present kits in the Gallery!

And today we're excited to welcome some of our current subscribers to our blog hop! Not only are they sharing their creative talents, but they're going to share what they love about being a Key Ingredients subscriber. So you don't have to take my word for it...check 'em out:

Laura Leonard
Lisa Hjulberg
Lynn Mercurio
Randi Barrett
Sunghee Chon
Candace Mitchell
Kathie Bailey

And, as always, inspiring samples from the Baker's Dozen:

Jodi Collins
Karen Giron
Melissa Sauls
Donna Baker
Charmaine Ikach
Jeanie Witmer

Ready to subscribe!? Click Here!

TESC96 Top Crops

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I feel a bit like a hibernating bear as I stayed inside all cuddled in a blanket for most of the weekend. It has been unbearably cold lately, but we're supposed to have a heat wave this week with temperatures possibly reaching 30 degrees. I'll do a cheer for that! :)

Today it's time for the TESC96 Top Crops! There were 72 amazing submissions last week! It was such a tough choice, but here are your Top Five Top Crops!

Just click on each individual picture below and you'll be taken to the blog of the talented gal who created the card. A picture of the full card along with all of the card details will be posted there! Don't forget to give 'em a big congrats on being featured in the Top Crops!

There's still time to participate in this week's TESC97 Sketch Challenge (just scroll down one more post!) and maybe you'll find your card among the next Top Crops!

Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge #97

Welcome to this week's sketch challenge! Did you catch our latest stamp release!? We're so excited about these new stamps and accessories...personally, I can't put them down! Scroll down to yesterday's post to check out all the details, but first here's the sketch:


Just create a card using the above sketch as inspiration (you're not required to use TE Stamps in your sample)! Link your creation using Mr. Linky below by Friday, January 15th at 8am PST. I'll choose the most clever and creative cards to be included in the TESC Top Crops on my blog! And you definitely don't want to miss the Sketch Crew inspiration below...you can click on any of these cards to read more about the details of these creations!

Created by Alice Wertz: Alice's Little Wonderland

Created by Taylor VanBruggen - Taylored Expressions

Created by Rachel Sztonyk: The Gingerbread Gallery

Created by Sherrie Siemens: Card Creme

Created by Monika Davis: M.A.D. Stamper

Created by Melissa Sauls: In Stamping Mode

Created by Jami Sibley: More is More

Created by Lynn Mercurio: Stamperosity

TESC97 - This Way to Love

I must admit that I was just grinning from ear to ear as I created this card! You all know how much I LOVE cupcakes so I started with the cupcake image from our new Sprinkled with Love set. As this card started to take shape with the "this way to love" sentiment and the chipboard arrow pointing at the cupcake it just made me smile. There's something about Valentine embellishments that makes me happy! I used elements from the Valentine Key Ingredients including the glittered chipboard heart and chipboard arrow, ribbon, patterned paper, and cardstock. I also incorporated my Martha Stewart heart scallop border punch.

That's it for my card, but on a personal note, Jon and I had to dig our car out of the driveway TWICE yesterday! I think we've learned our lesson...our Hybrid just doesn't have what it takes to make it through 3 ft. drifts of snow. Oh, and I wanted to give a public thank you to the state of Iowa for welcoming us with the worst winter in years! ;) Although even the best winter probably would have seemed like the worst winter to us!

Thanks for stopping by today! Hope you all have a wonderful day!

It's Release Day + Cuppie Love Sneak Peek

It's release day! All of the products and accessories we've been sneaking peeks at for the past few days are now available for purchase at the TE Store! Here's a little more about our new products:

We're excited to introduce three new stamp sets: Sprinkled with Love, Love Everywhere, and Cuppie Love Scenes! In addition, we have our Valentine Key Ingredients kit and the Valentine Sweets Sampler. The Valentine Sweets Sampler is perfect for those of you who want to try a little bit of everything while barely making a dent in your wallet! Just click on the pictures below for the nitty gritty on these products!

I'm super stoked about the new Frameabellies and polymer clay buttons to coordinate with our Valentine Key Ingredients. I know how much I love having everything perfectly coordinated so we're also offering the Valentine Copic Kit to coordinate with the Key Ingredients:









And while you're at the store, you'll want to check out our Fresh Out of the Oven category where you can find everything NEW in one place! Don't miss our new silk ribbon, May Arts crochet trim, October Afternoon Cherry Hill patterned paper, and more!

Today the Baker's Dozen and I are sharing projects we created with Cuppie Love Scenes, our latest set in the Stamp A Sweet Impression collection featuring the illustrations of Jessie Oleson. Several months ago I received an email from Baker's Dozen member, Donna Baker, presenting several "date" ideas for cuppie. "Wouldn't it be cute to have Cuppie at the movies and a Lady & the Tramp inspired spaghetti dinner!?" she wrote. Well, of course it would and so Cuppie Love Scenes was born! Thank you, Donna, for the inspiration for this adorable set! The first project that came to mind when I saw Cuppie Love Scenes was a coupon book! I've created several coupon books for Jon over the years. If any of you have read The Five Love Languages, then you'll know what I'm talking about when I tell you that Quality Time is one of Jon's love languages. Dates out on the town, home-cooked meals, or a movie on the couch go a long way in showing him how much I love him. I do these things even without being presented with a coupon, but a coupon book is so much more fun especially this time of year! Usually I sit down and create a super simple Word document for the "coupon". But this time I decided to create some new coupon book templates that I can use over and over again! The coupon templates are now available as a downloadable item in the TE Store for you to enjoy as well! There are three different coupon templates that will print onto one 8.5" x 11" sheet. They were designed to coordinate perfectly with the Spellbinders Long Classic and Scalloped Rectangles (Large) for easy cutting and layering. I printed the coupons onto Choice Buttercream cardstock and colored them with Copic markers. I decorated the cover with elements from the Valentine Key Ingredients and added a large brad in the corner so all of the coupons can be easily fanned out.

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I hope you enjoy our new releases! Happy Shopping and Hopping! You don't want to miss the rest of the inspiration using Cuppie Love Scenes:

Alex Maldonado, Charmaine Ikach, Donna Baker, Jackie Pedro, Jamie Pyles, Jeanie Witmer, Jodi Collins, Karen Giron, Karen Motz, Laurie Schmidlin, Melissa Sauls, Sankari Wegman

Psssstt...don't forget the TE Gallery...filled to the brim with sweet samples!

Sprinkled with Love Sneak Peeks

The Baker's Dozen and I have more sneak peeks to show you today! This time we're using a new set called Sprinkled with Love, illustrated by Nancy McKinney. The inspiration for this set was taken straight from this card that Nancy designed for her youngest son...you don't want to miss this sweet story. But first, I have some cards and another announcement to share with you today!

I decided to use the Basic Grey Sugar Rush patterned paper and accessories for my set of sprinkle cards. I thought it was fitting! Each of the papers in this collection is named after a candy and the bright color palette just screams FUN! My favorite thing about the images in the Sprinkled with Love set is that they're perfect for paper piecing! I started by stamping the images in Memento Rich Cocoa ink and paper piecing the coffee cup. I colored the foam and sprinkles with Copics and added the little Sugar Rush Woolie heart to the front of the cup. Every good coffee cup needs a little embellishing! I added the sentiment as a 'slide' onto a red twill bow and finished it off with with a heart trinket pin. Another great feature of this set is that the group of sprinkles is a separate image! So you get to decide if you want to 'hold the sprinkles' or pile 'em on! I decided to pile 'em onto the ice cream cone in my next card. I colored the image with Copic markers and highlighted the ice cream with a bit of Taffy & Pumpkin Smooch and a touch of Stardust Stickles on the sprinkles. I cut the image out with Spellbinders Labels 9 and popped it up on foam tape. I further embellished with the Martha Stewart loop punch, saddle stitch ribbon, and another heart trinket pin. And last but not least, I have another ice cream card to share with you...this time it's a sundae! I paper pieced the dish with Basic Grey Sugar Rush patterned paper and colored the rest of the image with Copic markers. Of course, I couldn't leave the cherry 'as is' so I added a red candy dot. The buttons are from my never-ending stash and as you can see I'm on a bit of a corner rounding spree! My Corner Chomper makes it so easy...I swear it talks to me from my tool caddy. "Your card is not complete...you must round the corners!" LOL! The 'You're such a Sweetie' sentiment along the bottom finished this one off!



Now have you noticed the amazing embossed frames on my cards!? Well, that's part of today's fun announcement! Taylored Expressions is thrilled to be partnering with Jamie Pyles, polymer clay artist and creator of Frameabellies (the frame-embellishment you see on my cards)!

What is polymer clay? It's a sculpting material that can be formed into various shapes, baked to harden, and sealed to create beads, pendants, buttons, and now Frameabellies! These frames were designed to coordinate perfectly with Spellbinders dies. Just cut out your cardstock panel and adhere the frame directly over the cardstock. In my case, I used the oval Spellbinders to cut out the image panel from cardstock and then I adhered the Frameabellies directly to the cardstock (using Tombow Mono Multi liquid glue). The clay has been baked so it is no longer malleable and these embellishments are sealed with acid and lignin free material making them completely safe for your photo projects as well!

Jamie's designs are just too clever and cute to stop with the Frameabellies! We're also excited to share the set of buttons she created exclusively for Taylored Expressions! These buttons were designed to coordinate with the cardstock and patterned paper in our Valentine Key Ingredients (releasing tomorrow)! Aren't they adorable? You'll see much more of these buttons in the Baker's Dozen release posts tomorrow!

I hope you're as excited about these new products as we are! They are fun and unique and will go a long way in spicing up your creations! All of Jamie's new products along with our latest stamp releases will be available for purchase at the TE Store Thursday, January 7th at 8am PST (that's tomorrow!). Don't forget to stop by the rest of the Baker's blogs to see more Sprinkled with Love inspiration!

Alex Maldonado
Charmaine Ikach
Donna Baker
Jackie Pedro
Jodi Collins
Karen Giron
Karen Motz
Laurie Schmidlin
Melissa Sauls
Sankari Wegman
Nancy McKinney

Love Everywhere Sneak Peeks

It's that time of year again....Love is Everywhere! Department stores barely have the Christmas decor out the door before the Valentine merchandise hits the shelves. But don't get me wrong...I'm not complaining! I love Valentine's Day! In fact, I've already perused and purchased decor from the Valentine displays at Target! :)

And now it's time to get started on those Valentine cards and treats! The stamp set we're taking a peek at today called Love Everywhere is definitely up to the task! Our illustrator, Nancy McKinney, really brought this concept to life! So....where will you find love this Valentine's Day?

This set is filled with love in all the ordinary places of life. For my card I started by stamping the branches of the tree onto Kraft cardstock and masking it with a post-it note. The branches and the hearts are two separate stamps for easy 2-step stamping. Then I stamped the picket fence in Cloud White pigment ink in the background. I stamped the heart 'leaves' in Memento Rhubarb Stalk ink. I stamped them again, cut some out, and popped a few up with foam tape. I also stamped the dog in Memento Rich Cocoa ink, cut him out, and popped him up in front of the fence. Doesn't he look like he's having fun digging one of those dreaded holes!? ;) The patterned paper, cardstock, ric rac, and Stardust Stickles on this card are part of the Valentine Key Ingredients kit also releasing this month! I used the Small Classic and Small Scalloped squares and the Ribbon Tag Trio dies from Spellbinders. For my special Valentine treat I filled a Stampendous mini pail with M&M's. I used the Martha Stewart picket fence border punch and adhered it around the pail with 1/4" Sticky Tape. I stamped the sentiment and mailbox in Memento Rich Cocoa. I cut out the mailbox and adhered it to the pail with Sticky Tape. The sentiment was punched with the Word Window punch.

We're also excited to announce a new shipping policy at Taylored Expressions! All orders of $75.00 or more (in the U.S. only) will receive Free Shipping! Click here to read our shipping policy for international orders and those totaling less than $75.00.

Thanks so much for stopping by for our first day of sneak peeks! All of our new stamps and accessories will be available for purchase on Thursday, January 7th at 8am PST! You don't want to miss the rest of the Love Everywhere inspiration from the Baker's Dozen:

Alex Maldonado
Charmaine Ikach
Donna Baker
Jackie Pedro
Jodi Collins
Karen Giron
Karen Motz
Laurie Schmidlin
Melissa Sauls
Sankari Wegman

Taylored Expressions Announcements

Good morning! We at Taylored Expressions are excited to wish you a Happy New Year! We are humbled and grateful that so many of you have chosen to spend your stamping time with Taylored Expressions in 2009! And if you’re new to the crew in 2010, WELCOME! We’re excited about the future and we hope you’ll join us on the journey!

Today I have some announcements to share before we get started with sneak peeks for our upcoming release!

With a new year comes a new look at TE Store! Check out the homepage of our website where you’ll find easy to navigate sidebar buttons and links to your favorite places (SASI Blog, TE Gallery). You can also subscribe to our newsletter and sign up to follow us on Facebook! And now as a registered member at Taylored Expressions you’ll be able to track your order status directly on our website giving you the most up to date and accurate information available in order to follow your purchase right to your doorstep. All order history and download purchases will be archived for 6 months. We hope you find these new features helpful!

We've also created the a blog badge for you to show your support of Taylored Expressions on your personal blog! Just click on the code in the sidebar and upload it to your blog! ---------->

You may recall that we’ve recently bid farewell to some of your favorite Baker’s Dozen members. While we’re always sad to see part of our family leave, it also gives us an opportunity to showcase the beautiful work of more talented designers. So it is with great pleasure that I introduce our two newest members of the Baker’s Dozen:

Introducing Alex Maldonado!

I've been a long-time fan of Alex's beautiful work! If you haven't stopped by her blog, Fairy Blossoms & Life, then you're in for treat with the yummy eye candy she shares there! Her signature style always includes the most fantastic details and I can guarantee she'll 'WOW' you with her amazing TE creations! Stop by her blog today and welcome her to the team!





Introducing Melissa Sauls!

Melissa initially caught my eye with her gorgeous creations using our most recent Christmas stamp set, Wings of Joy. She always adds the most amazing touches to her cards, beautiful trims and other shabby chic embellishments! You can check out her amazing work on her blog: In Stamping Mode and give her a warm welcome while you're there!






In addition, we’re excited to introduce a brand new Guest Designer opportunity at Taylored Expressions! We love seeing so many different styles using our images so we’ll be introducing a new Guest Designer every two months! I will be hand-picking each Guest Designer... more details coming soon on how you can be considered for the spot! Today, I’m thrilled to introduce our first guest designer:

Introducing Jeanie Witmer!

Jeanie originally caught my attention with her eye for color, her big and beautiful bows, and her amazing coloring skills! Plain and simple...her creations make me smile! Stop by her blog, The Spotted Chick, and you'll be smiling too!


Thanks for stopping by for these announcements! You’ll definitely want to tune in tomorrow as we begin sharing sneak peeks for our release on Thursday!