Good morning & Happy Thursday! Today I’m excited to introduce a new challenge at Taylored Expressions to kick off 2012! But before I get into the details of our new challenge I want to give you an update on our other challenges. First, the Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge will be back at the end of the month! We have some exciting changes in the works to make it bigger and better than ever so mark your calendar for January 27th! Second, we are replacing the Blast From the Past Blog Hop with a brand new monthly Calendar Challenge (starting today!). Not only will this challenge help keep us organized, but perhaps at the end of the year you’ll have a completed calendar (or two or three) to give as a gift! There’s a lot of freedom in this challenge and I hope you’ll all play along! Here are the deets:

Each month the Baker’s Dozen will supply inspiration using Taylored Expressions Calendar Products and showcasing designs for the current month. To play along you simply need to choose a TE Calendar Product to use with any stamps or papercrafting supplies you’d like. Create a calendar page using the month in the title of my post (start with January this month), post it on your blog or online gallery, and come back here to add your link to the Mr. Linky at the end of the post.

And what would a challenge be without a prize!? Everyone who participates in 10 out of 12 months of the calendar challenge will be entered into a random drawing for a prize package of TE stamps, dies, and other supplies worth over $150! Now that’s an incentive to play along, right!?

I love to have pretty things sitting out on my stamp desk, propped in the windowsills of my stamp room, and all over the shelves! It gives me inspiration and it’s a daily reminder of what I love so much about this hobby! So I decided to create a calendar just for me to enjoy in my stamp room. I’ll probably duplicate these for gifts once the 2013 calendars are available (in March), but for now this is just for me! I wanted to start the year off with a quote from the New Beginnings stamp set “A New Year is unfolding like a rose with petals curled tightly concealing the beauty within.” Love that! And it goes perfectly with the new roses from the Rosy Posey stamp set. I stamped the sentiment with Memento Tuxedo Black ink and cut it out with a circle Spellbinders die. Then I trimmed off the bottom part of the circle and stamped the roses in Berrylicious and Pink Pastel inks. The patterned paper is from the MME Vanity Fair collection and I used the Large Scallop Border die to cut out a houndstooth piece for underneath the sentiment. I layered the patterned paper onto cardstock and slipped the insert into the magnetic acrylic frame. Then I just adhered the 2012 Mini Calendar to the outside of the frame with sticky tape so that I can rip off the month of January and continue on with new inserts each month.

Here’s a quick re-cap of the TE Calendar Challenge:

• The challenge for the current month will go up at 8 am PST on the 2nd Thursday of each month and you can play along any time after that.
• Use any TE calendar product and any stamps or papercrafting supplies to decorate the current month (not required to use TE Stamps).
• Post your creation to your blog or on-line gallery. If you post your creation on SCS or other on-line gallery please use KEYWORD: TECALCHAL
• Add your direct link to the Mr. Linky list below.  The linky list will remain open all year, so you have the opportunity to go back and catch up should you start late or miss a month.
• Show your spirit for the calendar challenge and grab our blog badge HERE. 
• ENTER TO WIN!  Everyone who plays in 10 or more of our monthly Calendar Challenges in 2012 will automatically be entered to win a Taylored Expressions Prize Package valued at over $150!!!!  The winner will announced on New Year’s Day 2013.

Now before you get started on your calendar project, you’ll want to take a look at the fabulous calendar inspiration from the Baker’s Dozen gals:

• Charmaine Ikach
• Jodi Collins
• Melissa Sauls
• Sankari Wegman
• Taylor VanBruggen
• Wanda Guess

document.write(‘