It's Power Poppy Friday!

Hello everyone! Well, we are in the thick of fall and if you haven't busted out the orange, rust and shades of olive yet on your cards or creations, what are you waiting for? There's a bevy of beauty outside (in most parts of the world) that's sure to inspire! I thought I'd round up a little fall inspiration for you, just to help you kick off your creative weekend.

If you want to see more of this creation, you'll have to scroll down to our Bloom Brigade Blog Roll and click on Christine's name. This is just a snippet of the amazing card she shared on her blog today using The Fox and the Moth digital stamp set. I just absolutely am awestruck by the depth Christine always brings to her colored works of art. Truly incredible.

I thought I'd share one of my favorite fall cards. I remember distinctly spending oodles of time coloring up this fall wagon full of pumpkins and gourds --taking time to "google" different gourds to see how the color variation played out in nature. The Fall Haul Digital Stamp (which is on sale right now for $2.99) is a super fun image and one that is perfect for this time of year! 

Who doesn't love a pair o' wellies when the cold, wet weather hits and this one is decked out so cutely by the lovely Katie Sims. She used Power Poppy's Fall Wellies Digital Stamp Set (this one is on sale for $2.99 as well!) I absolutely adore the plaid paper she added along with those stitched elements. So cute! 

Don't you just love the touches of teal in Ally Copes creation above using Power Poppy's Fortunes of Fall stamp set? And those painted touches on the pumpkins? Adorable! Of course, her coloring is to die for as well and the way she always ties all the colors and patterns together in every creation she makes!

I don't know about you, but just seeing these fall hues brings a peaceful easy feeling over me! I hope they inspire you!

Christine Okken

Stacy Morgan

Julie Koerber

Thanks so much for stopping by and getting our little dose of fall inspiration! You might notice that when we shared a few projects, some of those images were on sale. Have you checked out Power Poppy's Sale Page lately? There are some goodies on there just ripe for the picking! Okay, that was your enabler alert! 

Hope you have a blessed weekend and we will see you back here Monday with the fabulous Amy Shulke for another Inspire Me Monday! She's going to be previewing her latest Power Poppy Livestream Class with a beauty of an image that's perfect for Fall!


See you back here then!

~Julie 

Creative Confetti: Feeling Fall

Hello all and happiest of Tuesdays to you! Well, yesterday we ushered in the first day of Fall. So now, we can officially love all things pumpkin spice, spicy scented candles and, of course, sweater weather! In honor of this change of seasons, I thought there was no better time than now to have a kick-off celebration and use Creative Confetti to really ramp up our use of fall-themed stamps or color schemes! So, without further ado, check out this week's challenge!

HOW TO PLAY: It's just as simple as the graphic suggests, create with Fall in mind! It could be an image. It could be a color scheme. It could be using fall themed embellishments! It's just as easy as that!

On to our creations for the week!


Because this season is so beautiful, I thought I would share some fall-themed creations, not just from me but from some of the Bloomies to show you just how far you can take the challenge this week!

I absolutely love this creation from Ally Cope using Power Poppy's Fortunes of Fall  stamp set! For those digi lovers, this beautiful-for-fall stamp also comes in a digital format and it's called Maize for Days! This card is a perfect reminder to not only celebrate the season but to show some love to the shades of colored pencils that might not get a ton of use! 

Check out this masterpiece by Christine Okken, using Power Poppy's Olive and Oak digital stamp set.  I love how Christine can make any Copic creation almost have that dreamy watercolor feel. Sigh.... just too pretty!

This image above that Stacy Morgan captured so well called Fall Wellies is a heart-warming homage to autumn -- a time when we kick up our rain boots, taking a few fallen leaves with them! I adore how she not only colored up the fall leaves on the image perfectly but added a few as embellishments to boot! (pun intended).

For my creation, (which is one I actually did a while back), I chose to use just some bits of the Olive and Oak expanded stamp set.  I kept the design rather simple, letting the mix of patterns work their magic. I let the sentiment be the focal point and then adorned the die-cut and sponged panel with the cluster of leaves and acorns in this set. The Bible verse in this set is one of my absolute favorites!

Okay folks,  now it's your turn to enjoy "Feeling Fall!" Remember, after you create and play along, link up your project using the linky below so we can all see. Every entry is one more shot at a $25 gift code to the Power Poppy Shop! Woo hoo!

AND... a little teaser for you! You're going to want to check in on October 1st! Marcy will have a digital extravaganza -- releasing more fall-themed images for you to enjoy!

Also, I mentioned this last week! DO YOU HAVE AN IDEA FOR AN UPCOMING CHALLENGE? Email me at juliekoerber@gmail.com and fill me in! If your idea is used, we'll honor you on our blog for the week! Now don't be shy! I can't wait to hear your ideas! We already got a couple of emails and we can't wait to share!

Until next time,

~Julie 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Creative Confetti: Get Krafty!

EDITED TO ADD: Oh my gosh! I forgot to choose a winner for our $25 Gift Certificate for July! Check back next Tuesday for the official announcement! Sorry to keep you waiting! 

Hello all and happy Tuesday! With most of us out enjoying all that summer has to offer, I have been trying to keep our weekly challenges, well, not too challenging! I want to keep things on the simple side so that you can enjoy the process without blowing brain cells along the way! Hehe! When there's nice weather to be had, we need to be out enjoying it too as well as all our creative pursuits!

So, this week's challenge is almost as easy to play along with as last week's! Check it out sweet peeps!

What inspired my challenge was actually seeing the beautiful coloring that Amy Shulke showed off yesterday on Inspire Me Monday! If you didn't check that out, goodness, when you are done here, click on over HERE and see what I mean! She gave some really wise advice on coloring glass as well as adding texture to images as you color. It's good stuff!

So... on to my creation! 

For my challenge card, I decided to color up the floral vase grouping from Power Poppy's Fortune of Fall stamp set! It's just such a warm and inviting illustration that I think it will be great to have on hand for cards this upcoming fall.

I started by stamping on my kraft cardstock by using Versafine Black Onyx ink and then heat set it before I dove in and started to color with my Prismacolor pencils. Here is a trick that I did to start. I used my MISTI stamping tool to stamp my initial image. Then, I took time to color. You can see with the image below, some of the crispness of the image was lost. You can really see on the white petals and white vase....

That's why I love the MISTI stamping tool folks! Because, I just lined up my image again right up in the corner, inked up my stamp and stamped right on top! Look at those crisp lines emerge once again!

I will say that because I was using pigment ink, and I had a waxed base medium with my colored pencils, I did have to lay a scrap paper overtop to rub off some of the ink that was just sitting on top of my image. See?

It ended up picking up quite a bit of ink. I thought that If I didn't do this, I might actually have enough ink laying on top that it could either muddy my image or smear. Neither one is a good thing! After that, I layered everything up, keeping my layout simple. I added a little sentiment flag as well using one of the sentiments from the set and... tada! Fini! 

Here's a closeup of the coloring for you all!

And that, my friends, is it! So, let's see what you've got in this little "krafty" challenge! Simply create, post and then link up using the linky below! As we always say, if you get those fingers inky and play along, each and every link is an opportunity to win a $25 gift code to the Power Poppy Shop!

Until next time, happy stamping! 

~Julie

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

October Power & Spark: You say it's your birthday!

Is it that time again? Why yes! It's a new month, which means we are just giddy at the thought of ushering in a new challenge to help you light that design power with a creative spark! This month, our hostess with the mostess is the lovely Ms. Tosha and she has a little challenge that's really open for so many possibilities! Check it out my peeps!

HOW TO PLAY: This little challenge asks you to dig deep into your birthday month for inspiration! Instead of sharing, I am going to let Tosh give you all the deets!

It’s your birthday! For this month, I’m challenging everyone to use their birthday month as inspiration. Make a card that either celebrates the season (Fall, Winter, Spring or Summer), any holiday that might be happening during the month of your birthday, your wedding, your child's birth, whatever that month represents to you. My birthday is in November, and usually falls pretty close to Thanksgiving. So I chose to use the Pumpkins (from Fortunes of Fall), along with Fall colors since Fall is my favorite season.

So, with that in mind, let's take a gander at Ms. Tosh's creation, shall we? 

Isn’t it lovely? I asked how she crafted this autumnal masterpiece and it's as sweet and simple as this! She used Power Poppy's Fortunes of Fall stamp set, stamped with embossing ink, heat embossed with silver fine detail embossing powder and then colored it all up with Zig Clean Color Waterbrush markers! I just love the dreamy look that Tosh seems to achieve -- Every. Single. Time! If you want just a little bit more in the way of details, you'll have to hit up Tosha's Blog HERE for more! 

THE OFFICIAL RULES:

Use Power Poppy stamps if you have them. If not, it is a great way to win some.

Link your creation below using our Linky (please use the exact URL from your post instead of a generic blog address.)

Please mention Power Poppy in YOUR blog or gallery post with a direct link back to this challenge

The winner will receive a $50 SHOPPING SPREE TO THE POWER POPPY SHOP

Enter as many cards as you’d like, as long as they fit the theme of the challenge

Deadline to enter is October 31 @ 8:00 PM EST. At that point, we’ll draw the winner randomly and make the announcement right here on the first Friday in November! 

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Moving on! Every first Friday we take a look back at all those ab fab entries, throw them all in a virtual hat and draw out one lucky winner for a $50 Shopping Spree to the Power Poppy Shop!  Are you ready to find out who is our lucky winner of Katie's Hit the Books Challenge? I am! Just in case you missed taking a peek at the entries from September's challenge, you really need to click HERE and see just how amazing they all are! And uber creative too!

So Random.org stirred it all up and drew....

That means our winner is....

***LINDSAY DICKASON***

Lindsay, feel free to email us at bloom@powerpoppy.com and we will go ahead and get your shopping spree code right to you so that you can get right to a little retail therapy!

And before we get to our goodbyes, we do have to share Lindsay's STUNNING creation that she crafted!

Take a look at that, will you? Lindsay used Power Poppy's Graceful Still Life stamp set.  All I have to say is... WOW! That is one breathtaking work of art with beautiful no-line coloring. Love the turquoise accents, and the roses and dogwoods look real. A wonderful sentiment, too. For more of Lindsay's creations, feel free to hop on over to her blog -- Lindsay Dickason Designs -- to see more.

Allison Cope

Christine Okken

Julie Koerber

Stacy Morgan

Tosha Leyendekker

Thanks all for stopping by! Hopefully, you'll want to honor your birthday month  and join us with this fun-filled and creative challenge! As always, after you get your fingers inky, don't forget to link up your creation below so we can all see your fabulous handiwork.

Until next time!

~Julie

An InLinkz Link-up

Bring on the (Pumpkin) Spice!

Okay, raise your hand if you can't wait until fall when Pumpkin Spice Season starts!! Yes, I know I raised my hand before I even finished asking the question. The only thing better than a pumpkin spice latte would be a calorie-free pumpkin spice latte. Can't they please invent that? Pretty please? 

Since the season is here, why not add a little bit of fall flavor to our card making? I say YES! Let's do it! That brings us to this week's Creative Confetti Challenge from yours truly, the Creative Confetti Thrower! ;-)

HOW TO PLAY: It's just as simple as choosing a pumpkin spice color scheme, or like I mentioned, a "spicy" stamp set. Want some ideas on which Power Poppy set just might be a perfect fit for this flavor of fall? How about...


Get Wool Soon -- isn't that a pumpkin spice latte in the coffee mug?
Gingerbread Family
Lavender
Soothing Sympathy
Spice it Up
Feeling Fall
Frosted Gingerbread
Apples in Season (think spiced cider, my friends!)

With so many options, I can almost see the visions of pumpkin spice dancing in your heads! Want to see my take on this challenge?

When I dreamt up this challenge, I knew I had to use Power Poppy's brand new stamp set, Fortunes of Fall! I just love the vignettes in this set and the pumpkin trio was pretty much perfect for a Pumpkin Spice Challenge! I started by stamping with Memento Rich Cocoa and then grabbed my Copic markers to color this image up. 

Here's a close up look at this colored up image....

To mat it all up, I reached for shades of olive, kraft (to bring out the nutmeg color) and orange (for my pumpkin) and ta da! It's a wrap! I added some twine, a button and some fun die cut accents and that, my friends, is it! 

HOW TO PLAY:

• Create a card or project with a pumpkin spice color scheme or... use a Power Poppy stamp set with a "spicy" theme. (See the links above for ideas!)
• Use Power Poppy stamps if you have them, if not, you might win some if you're randomly chosen. Each month, we'll round up all those that play in any of the month’s Creative Confetti challenges, and draw a name from the entries to win a $25 GIFT CARD for the Power Poppy Shop!
• To enter, link up your creation below, sharing the direct link to your card from your blog, Instagram, or card gallery. 
• Our link will be open all month for you to play along with us! Try one Creative Confetti Challenge or partake in them all for extra chances to win!

So let's capture all the Pumpkin Spice "feels" as we head to our crafting spaces. Since this is my favorite time of year -- who doesn't love sweater weather, the changing leaves and the savory comfort food that brings families to the table together? Let's capture a little bit of all this as we create and then... once you do ... don't forget to link your project below so that we can all see. You'll also be in the running for a $25 gift code to the Power Poppy Shop, and that, my friends, is a fun prize!


Until next time!

~Julie 

a.k.a The Creative Confetti Thrower

An InLinkz Link-up

Natural Wonders clear collection: Day 3

Day 3 rolling along here... and this one should really get you in the fall spirit if you aren’t already. Gotta say, though... each of the stamp sets in this collection can really be used year-round. I’ve tried to make the imagery versatile enough to not get stuck in a pile of fall stamps in the corner of your craft room. These babies can be used in spring, summer, AND fall — you’ll soon see how even today’s set has a cross-over vibe.

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Comment on the Bloom Brigade’s blog posts during ANY of this week’s Natural Wonders release (including the Power Poppy blog). We will select FOUR blog commenters to win the stamp of their choice.
Winners will be announced by 5pm central time on September 15 on the Power Poppy blog. The more comments you leave, the better chance you have to win. Hop to it, loves!

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Let me get you in the mood for today’s peeks...

When you come upon a scene this enchanting, you gotta stop and take some pumpkin pix! Like the hops vine I shared yesterday, this antiques shop is also in one of the picturesque towns in Brown County, Indiana. I loved how they made fun displays throughout their shop featuring pumpkins mixed with country-quaint antiques. It got me to thinking....

Introducing Fortunes of Fall

First, take a minute and soak in that adorable card in our graphic up there!! Isn’t Ally Cope’s card OFF-THE-CHARTS CUTE? Be sure to visit Ally’s blog to see the whole thing, there are details covered up in the graphic that you gotta see in her post.

We’ve got the sweet lil’ pumpkin vignette, and two more scenes for you to stamp and color. What do you think about Zinnias?

I thought you’d like those!! What delicious shades of these marvelous varieties, I could hardly capture them all in one shot. This is the bounty from visiting the most darling booth (Flower Hill Farm) at the Schlafly Farmer’s Market the other day — a couple selling herbs, interesting fruits and vegetables, AND flowers by the stem while their toddlers toddled about underfoot. What a heartwarming spot to visit! 

Fortunes of Fall features a whimsical scene of vintage bottles and vases, each with a perky Zinnia popped inside. The inspiration for the illustration came directly from my kitchen, where earlier this year, I grouped a bunch of random vessels together to hold Oriental Lily sprigs, which had broken off their larger stalks. Our Bloomie Stacy Morgan said, “That would be a great idea for a stamp! A mix of vases, but all with the same kind of flower in them!” I had to agree and set to work drawing it. When it comes to Zinnias, though, there is so much variety to the flower forms, I had to mix them up a bit. I snapped photos of Zinnias in my own garden, and in those of my neighbors’ who had some awesome selections. It takes a village to design a stamp set! 

One last hint at the images in today’s peeks... 

Might look familiar from a certain digital stamp in our line up! And now it’s coming out in clear, streamlined a bit, and ready to be colored up in a harvest rainbow!

Allison Cope

Christine Okken

Cindy Lawrence

Katie Sims

Stacy Morgan

Tosha Leyendekker

Quick reminder: 
Place your order on release day, September 15, and get a discount on your new stamps with a code we’ll announce tomorrow. We’ll have sale prices on summer and fall stamps and a new digital image to boot! Saturday is going to ROCK. 

xoxoxo,