Welcome to this month’s Fancy Friday Blog Hop!  Our team is a group of demonstrators who love to make beautiful things.  Sometimes they are clean, sometimes they are layered but the one thing I can say for sure is that our projects will be fancy!  If you hopped over from the super talented Kaitlyn, welcome to the next stop.  For April, we are creating anything but a card!

Before I sat down to create, I had to take care of the yearly task of assessing the Retirement List from Stampin’ Up.  I went through and started pulling some of the items and it is always a bit bittersweet.  This year, the accessory list is pretty long (as you can see from the link) and there are some “must haves” on it for sure.  Some of them are simply workhorse items that need to be in your stamp room.  Since we are making 3-d items this month, I knew I needed to show you the Fry Box Bigz Die again.  Something about this die is just so adorable!  It is so perfect for creating treat boxes FAST!  All the DSP that you have lying around (yes, you….and me, haha!), the Fry Box is a great way to use it and create party favors or dress up a little gift.  The die does all the work!  I use Fast Fuse Adhesive to secure the sides….easy and, well, fast!  For the inside, I used a 4×6″ Cellophane Bag (also on the list…..just stock up…you need to have these on hand!) and filled it with buttons and twine.  All of the color family buttons are retiring this year and if you love having buttons to match your inks I strongly recommend you stock up!!  The 1/4″ White Cotton Ribbon that I used to tie up the bag?  Yep, also retiring!  Another staple for sure.  The little clip is an already retired item and I added a banner using a Paper Pumpkin sentiment.  I use these Paper Pumpkin stamps all the time.  I hope to show you my storage tips for them soon…..helps me find exactly what I am looking for with those fun sets.  One more retired item that is shown but yet not shown is the Banner Punch….GASP!!!!  Ok, breathe!  That little banner punch that is so perfect for cutting perfect little ends.  It is still in stock but I’m guessing not for long.  Stampin’ Up is keeping the list current but really, just go order it if you love it.  Whew…that is a lot of retiring stuff in one project.  Funny enough, I didn’t really sit down with a plan to do that but it just shows how versatile many of these items are.  Many of you know that I’m not much of a 3-d stamper.  Oh, I love the idea of them but my practical side takes over and I often ask “But what will I do with that?”.  This is the kind of project I can see plenty of uses for…maybe not totally “fancy” but definitely fun!

So we have some great news for you in this month’s hop.  We have added a new Fancy stamper to our group!!  The oh-so-fabulous Joyce Fowler is joining us.  Yep….she is totally fancy!

We hope you love our “not cards” this month!  Tons of inspiration for sure.  I get the honor of linking to our new team member so off you go to see what Joyce has created!

And you can click our logo above to get to the Fancy Friday Pinterest page!

Click HERE to purchase these wonderful Stampin’ Up products!

Stamp:  Paper Pumpkin; Paper:  It’s My Party DSP, Thick Whisper White;  Ink:  Tempting Turquoise; Accessories:  Big Shot, Fry Box Bigz Die, Fast Fuse Adhesive, Banner Punch, Brights Buttons, 4×6″ Cellophane Bag, 1/4″ White Cotton Ribbon, Star clip (ret),