{Special Event} STAMPlorations is FIVE! ~ A Birthday Linky Party aka CASE the STAMPgirls Challenge!

{Check out our $5 Birthday Bash Surprise Bags here!}

Hey, hey! Are you guys ready to party? We sure have tons in store because every single day this month -- all 30 days! -- the STAMPlorations girls will be out in full force celebrating our fifth birthday! Yep, STAMPlorations' fifth year.

I swear it wasn't that long ago when I was designing our first stamp set and getting it ready for production. Then a couple of months later, not really knowing anything about having or running a design team (not knowing what I was doing really), I put out a design team call on Facebook and had zilch response. To top it off, I had approached someone and asked about possibly offering my first stamps as a prize for her players. I won't bore you with the details but that experience gave me a not-so-positive impression of crafters/cardmakers and almost made me give up on STAMPlorations when I barely had gotten it off the ground. 

Then it wasn't too long after that I "met" someone who helped me get my act together and believe that my products had value (and change my initial impression about the online crafting/cardmaking community). (She'll never fully know just how much her encouragement and guidance meant to me.) Many of you are likely familiar with her because she's quite a figure in the realm of CAS cards: Nonni of Nonni's Handmade Cards. (Before that, she blogged at Runaway Cards.) Long story short, Nonni helped me set up this blog, explained to me how challenges work, and was basically STAMPlorations' first design team member.

With Nonni's help, I made another go at a design team call and this time there was a response! Some design team members have come and gone, but I am so proud to say that five of the originals (Monika, Shirley, Vicki, Maria, and Cornelia here, here, and here) and the "youngest" among the veterans (Deepti here) are still with STAMPlorations. And folks, I'll say it here and now: I am forever indebted to these ladies because without them, there would really be no STAMPlorations. And if any one of them ever decides it's time to move on, I would be heartbroken (but happy for them!) because I wouldn't just be losing a design team member, I'd be losing a huge part of the STAMPlorations family.

Okay, enough about waxing nostalgia...the point of all this is that today's post is truly a STAMPlorations superstar line-up because the STAMPvets (except for Cornelia, who'll be joining us later in the month) and Nonni have come together to share their amazing projects featuring our brand new stamps (Birthday Bash, Celebrate Big, and Happy Everything) and phrase dies (Birthday Bash, Celebrate Big, Happy Everything, Make A Wish, and Birthday Wishes).

Then starting tomorrow, each post will feature a STAMPgirl and her projects -- there's 39 of us! :o)

And we would certainly want YOU to celebrate with us throughout this month! There are 3 ways:

• Link up your wishlist here for a chance to be one of five winners of $25 worth of products in your wishlist
  
• Leave comments on this blog and on the designers' blogs throughout the month for a chance to be one of five winners of a $25 gift certificate
  
• CASE any of the STAMPgirls' projects (in this post and all the posts we'll be publishing this month) and link up below for a chance to be one of five winners of a $50 gift certificate

There'll likely be a few surprise prizes here and there as well :o)

All in all, we're giving away at least $500 worth of prizes! Winners will be announced on July 10 in the June Winners post.

So without further ado, here are today's awesome designers and their projects! Enjoy and happy fifth birthday to all of us! :o)

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DEEPTI

    

  

MARIA

  

  


MONIKA


  

  

NONNI

SHIRLEY


  




VICKI


  


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Pretty amazing line-up of designers and cards, right? Now here's your chance at a $50 gift certificate (we'll randomly pick five winners!):

• CASE any of the projects in today's post (or in all the posts we'll publish this month) -- all kinds of projects (cards, ATCs, tags, layout, art journal, etc.) in any theme (not just birthday/celebration) are welcome.
• When CASEing a project, you can CASE the layout, the color combination, a particular element, or anything that jumps at you. The key is to use the projects you see here as your springboard.
• Use whatever products/supplies you have. STAMPlorations products are not required, but it always makes us extra tingly when we see our products used! ;o)
• Link up as many projects as you want as long as they are in separate blog posts.
• Display our birthday graphic below in your post and link back to this post (not just the main blog) and mention the designer/card you CASEd.
• Link up by July 3, 11:55 p.m. Pacific time

Link back:

https://stamplorations.blogspot.com/2018/06/stamplorations-is-five.html

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An InLinkz Link-up

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When you're done visiting the STAMPgirls' blogs and linking up your project(s), check out our Wishlist Linky Party post. Create and share your wishlist for a chance to win up to $25 worth of products in your wishlist! You could be one of five lucky crafters!

See you tomorrow at 9 p.m. Pacific -- I'll be leading off the STAMPgirl feature posts that you'll be seeing for the rest of the month.