Day 320: Charlotte Workshops Your Way Layout 1

Now were are down to the meat of this Charlotte kit - the scrapbook layouts.

Please excuse my crooked photography. My new Shotbox has shipped and you should see a marked improvement around here soon! In real life this lines up perfectly across the break, and how adorable are the new Charlotte Complements stickers and chipboard pieces? That Happy oval bit is a shiny gold foil - adoooorable! I need to get my pics printed and on here, but since I'm traveling in Portland right now, you get empty pages today. Wish me luck on our house search!

Day 195: Love This Life Card

I'm taking a little break from the Pocket Scrapbooking shares tonight to show you another September SOTM watercolor card.

I just did a quick wash of purple from the bottom to the top of a panel of watercolor paper. It was so easy to get this ombre using the fattest brush and watercolor paints! I stamped a floral spray from the Sept SOTM in Memento Tuxedo Black. I added a strip of Nevermore (Halloween) paper along the edge - can't even tell it's supposed to be a spider print, eh?

I added my sentiment images from two of the Hello, Life stamp sets available through the National Stamping Month promo. I love these sets so much! The font mixes are so fresh, and the little images included are very sweet and trendy. I've been doing a lot of mixing and matching with these sets.  The glitter hearts are from the new black Fundamentals assortment. 

You can find all the details on these three fabulous sets right here. Happy National Stamping Month!

Day 119: You Make Me Smile Card

Today is the 17th anniversary of the day I married my sweet hubby John. We have three, well, let's just say energetic young boys and we live about a two to three day drive to our closest relatives. So we chose to celebrate by putting our dear ones in the Drop In and Play center at the local mall and having the most expensive lunch of our lives (normal cost for a nice gluten free lunch plus 8 bazillion dollars for drop in care for three children = wowza!). It was worth every penny. 

I was thinking about him as I put this card together from more of the My crush for Her scraps. It's pink, and girly, and full of glitter sparkles, so it's not exactly his taste in cards. His taste in cards is basically none at all, because he's an engineer and he doesn't care about the foofala that is my bread and butter. He does appreciate what I do though - today he and the boys sat down and looked through our wedding and honeymoon albums while he patiently explained all the who's whos and what's thats to three squirmy little boys. 

Sometimes the hustle and bustle of caring for three small ones, all the cooking and planning for our gluten free/real food from scratch diet, plus my dedication to the daily blogging commitment I've made this year (plus my super secret project for Convention) leave me feeling a little stretched thin lately. I love crafting. I love my boys. I love cooking (no, really, I do). I am a very lucky lady. I know that I am blessed...but it felt so fun and decadent to say whatevs to the endless to-do list and just go hang out with the dude who makes me smile, and has been making me smile since we accidentally met in the hallway at school waaaay back in 1992. That day he played my violin in the hallway. Today we bought him a couple pairs of shorts for summer and some new sandals. It wasn't anything super special...except it was, because we did it together.  

Day 9: Heartstrings Scrapbook Kit

While I was updating my page kits buttons last night I realized that I'd never actually posted the Heartstrings pages on the blog - just sent them to my sweet Club members. I love the pink and Lagoon colors in these pretty papers!

And here's the full pages from the Heartstrings Kit.

I printed these pics all on Studio J using the new Express Collection for drop and drag photos. It was great for all my weird square instagrams! You could totally do four 4x6 vertical photos instead. 

The paper wasn't too girly for my sweet Max tuxedo pics. I added a little flip out album (tied with the bow there) to fit in more pics of my little fancy ham.

I refuse to shy away from "girly" papers when scrapping my boy adventures. We were in a sweet cupcake shop, and the boys were so well behaved (for once). Ok, except when Ben licked his crumbs off the table. Doh!

Find this kit and many more over on my no commitment Monthly Memories Club page.

SOTM Love Hip Pics Pages

A few weeks ago I shared this little Album cover for the January SOTM Blog Hop.

Today I'm finally sharing all the inside goodies. 

This is a mini album of the Instagram pics I took of my kiddo during his first month of obsessive tuxedo wearing. He wore it everywhere. He did everything in it. If I'd let he he would've slept in it. He still wears it a couple times a week. Best $20 I ever spent on eBay!

Super fun, right? I just love these little pics, but now I'm gonna have to make an extra one of these for my little fashion plate. He constantly wants to see his Tuxedo book!

I'm linking up to the Paper Issues Prints Charming party with this book of fab photos of my little Prince Fancy Pants.

January SOTM Blog Hop

Welcome to the first SOTM blog hop of 2015! This month we are featuring This Moment, a LOVE-ly set of 12 heart themed stamps. If you've arrived here from JEAN'S BLOG, you're on the right track!

Today I'm sharing the front cover of this cute Hip Pics album all done up with the January SOTM. Throughout January I'll be sharing interior pages, all stamped with this adorable set.

I really loved this week's RetroSketches sketch, so I used that cuteness for the basis of my album cover. I sketched out a square using red Shimmer Trim, then added a line of rhinestone mesh ribbon I got for a sewing project. I just trim off rows and bits of the ribbon as needed and it lines up beautifully. I adhere it with Liquid Glass, A bit of stardust gel pen outlines the main focal point and the album cover with just a hint of shimmer.

I'll be sharing more pages throughout January, but that's all for today! Now hop on over to see more January SOTM goodness on STEFANI'S BLOG!

Here's another January SOTM project I've made:
Be Amazing Quick Card

Monday Listicles

Stasha over at the Good Life is at it again - another Monday Listicle with a fascinating topic. This week we are spending (a pretend) $1000 on 10 things.... Since I'm off to Dallas in 22 days (!!) my mind is overwhelmed with the possibilities of what new awesome swag CTMH is gonna hook us up with. So here's what I'm dreaming about spending my $1000 on...

1. New Markers! Our old markers are retiring, and some colors are already gone. My markers got left in an unfound box in the garage for 6 months after one of our moves, so the fact that they still function at all is a miracle. Something new is coming down the pike...the anticipating is delicious! Replacing all 60 colors in one blow... $250 bucks...or if we're REALLY wishing some new form of alcohol ink marker... can't wait to see!! So maybe $300...

2. New Paper! I am a paper er...um...hound! I love paper. I sniff it as I open a new package (come on, you know you do that too...right?). I spread it out across my table to admire the colors. I save scraps just in case. 8 new packets are coming to me in a month!! I'm so excited I can hardly see straight...oh wait, that's probably the allergies right now, but still! 8 new WOTG kits of paper (with stamps = $250). Maybe I'm blowing my new $1000 stash too fast...

3. New Alphabet Fonts! I love stamps in general, but it's the Alphabet fonts that I collect obsessively. I have every font I've ever bought. I clear out the flowers and borders to make room for new designs, but the Alphabet Fonts...those are priceless. Could I even hope for 5 new fonts? $100

A rainbow of buttons...and brads...and eyelets...and there are 20 of those bins of embellies underneath.
I like to see what I've got!

4. More Buttons. New Buttons. More kinds of buttons. Shiny glitter buttons. Buttons with flowers stamped into them. Is it wrong that I already have a rainbow of buttons (see pic above) and I want more? If it is wrong, I don't want to be right! I mean, I already HAVE all the ones we already carry...plus some contraband...so I need you to change out the buttons so I can buy some more, ok, CTMH? Thanks! $30

5. . More Ribbon! Says the girl with an entire Shoe Organizer of ribbon...I mean one of those lovely sturdy wooden modular shoe organizers with 18 shoebox sized holes. Each one is filled with spools of ribbon stored in the back and a clear jar with smaller ribbons and scraps in the fronts...also sorted by color. What can I say - I like a rainbow of choices when I sit down to craft. It's how I roll. Bring on some more fancy ribbon please! $40

6. More Cricut Cartridges please! I love my Art Philosophy Cartridge dearly and it almost never leaves my Cricut. So I need CTMH to produce a new Cricut Cartridge I can't live without, because I need me some Hexagons, and if CTMh can't provide them, I'm gonna go and get me this...if it should ever come back into stock! Never mind - I just want the PTI hexagon die...more $$ for other swag! $16


7. More Bitty Sparkles in a huge spectrum of colors. I've been coloring my clear sparkles with sharpies and Reinker/Liquid Glass Combos...but deep down i'm a lazy crafter. I want to have many, many, way too many  sheets of tiny sparkly colored rhinestones all ready to just stick on with no liquid adhesive hassle. I can SEE them fanned out in a rainbow on my table top. $30


8. Lace. And crochet trim. And fabric flowers. And Baker's Twine in lots of individual colors. $30+


9. Gluten free food and no...issues. I am very worried about eating at Convention this year. I know this isn't a craft thing, but, hello, even a hard core crafter's gotta eat something besides chocolate! We almost never eat out at home anymore, and when we do it's almost always Chipotle (or Five Guys) because we know that they won't gluten us up and are affordable. I'm busily storing away homemade snacks to bring (pineapple is drying on my counter in the dehydrator as I type - yum!) and we're planning to make a grocery store run when we get there...  but as a bona fide food-freak-even -though-I-swore-I'd-never-be-THAT-mom...I don't know HOW to eat out any more, and even with a full bottle of Gluten-Ease tucked away for my trip I am just so NERVOUS about it...I can't even have coffee anymore... though that'll just save us a bazillion dollars while we are traveling... I can't put a dollar amount here...just something that takes up way too much of my pondering time, every day, even without travel...can I survive for a week on dried pineapple and homemade beef jerky? I guess if I add in enough chocolate and Earl Grey...


10. New Stamps! I'll spend the rest and anything I can scrounge up from the couch cushions on new stamps! Christmas stamps, new background stamps, frames and tags - I can't even imagine what new gotta-have-that-right-now-give-it-to-me designs we'll see in just a few short weeks, but I'm already practically drooling over the idea. I haven't bought a single buy 2 get 1 free stamp deal this month for myself because I am saving all my pennies for this. You can see the shine of my halo right? 


Oops-  I guess I'd have a halo if I choose to spend my imaginary $1000 on something good and altruistic instead of more papercrafting supplies...or something for my three little boys...or pedicures for me and all my girldfriends - wouldn't THAT be a hoot!  I've never spent anywhere close to $1000 on stamp stuff for me...at one time...ahem...so it's nice to imagine getting all the new stuff all at once instead of picking and choosing and being all reasonable. 


So there ya go - my 10 things for $1000...unless someone knows a good doctor who can make you NOT be allergic to gluten and/or coffee...then I'd blow it all on that! Now get out to Stasha's Blog and check out all the much deeper than mine lists - maybe make one of your own!


What's on YOUR list?

I'm falling for you!

Here's my third Stamping Royalty Submission - a pretty pink moving card! I got a huge pack of this beautiful Basic Grey paper collection called Out of Print - don't faint, it was part of my class kit, lol. It's so pretty and yet super distressed - love it!

I cut the channel with my craft knife, and backed it with the reverse side of that Pink dotty print. I built the spinner base with two pennies and some 3-D foam tape, so I needed my channel to be skinnier than the pennies. You put the first penny under your channel, top it with some foam tape (I needed two layers to make it freely spin), then top it off with another penny. Now your pennies will roll back and forth in the channel without popping out! Those big fat Foam circles we used to sell were brilliant for this...but I used those up a long time ago.

Then I built my hearts, using Cricut Art Philosophy hearts for the base. I filled in the smaller heart with everything sparkly Rhinestone Designer Brads, Clear Sparkles,  Bitty Sparkles, and Bitty Pearls. It was like a tiny Sparkly puzzle - so much fun! I adhered this to the top penny with Liquid Glass (and impatiently let it dry completely) before trying out my new spinning creation. The sentiment is form the retired Dreaming WOTG stamp set, which I loved.

In case there wasn't enough bling on this card already, I finished it off with a large Rhinestone Designer Brad on the sentiment (also acts as a stopper for the heart to hopefully end upright at the end of it's fall) and a double row of Bitty Sparkles across the bottom of the card.

Time for me to spin off to pick up Gabe from School - thanks for dropping by!

March SOTM Blog Hop!

Welcome to our CTMH Stamp of the Month Blog Hop! We will be featuring February's SOTM, which is called Thoughtful Tidings, a stylish set of 11 sentiment stamps! 

If you have come here from MICHELLE'S BLOG, you are on the right path! This month we have over 50 Close To My Heart Consultants sharing their creations using this month's elegant SOTM and other great CTMH products on their blogs. Hopping is simple to do - just click on the link at the end of the post on each blog to move to the next one! Here we go!

This month I added another square to my collection of scrappy wall hanging that will someday be hanging in my home. I bought a ton of these 10 x 10 silver frames at Target years ago, and have slowly been building a collection of single page layouts to frame using special pictures or super big events. I love a nice one-off project - gives me an excuse to go hog wild on the embellishing without worrying about how to write instructions or project cost! In this case, we had the boys pictures taken for Valentine's Day (since we completely missed the holiday photo thing last year). At the end of the session she took a couple of goofy shots of the boys eating some of the mustache lollipops we had made for the boys' Valentine's parties. I love this silly shot where Max can't figure out what to do with a lollipop that has a mustache attached!

Here's a close up of the crafty cluster down the side of my layout. I cut all the pieces on my Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge (which you can get along with $350 worth of fabulous CTMH goodness this month for just $99 when you join CTMH!) I mostly used Bamboo Cardstock plus a smidgen of the red B&T from the new Stella Paper PAck. Then I stamped the banners and circles using pieces of the SOTM circles and swirls. I put a pic of the SOTM at the bottom of this post, because it may be hard to recognize here, even though almost every piece is stamped with it in Tulip or Black ink! I also added one of the original lollipop mustache cutouts made with the adorable "A Paisley" stamp set. I applied a liberal sprinkling of buttons from the Red assortment, bitty sparkles , and lots of the yummy new Twine....plus a two of piercing with my beloved CTMH Piercing Ruler all around the photo to finish off the page!  

I know I've said this before, but Bitty Sparkles are the best. thing. ever!! I love that the packets are so inexpensive and allow me to sprinkle on the sparkle wherever I feel a page needs a little love...or I accidentally dropped a fine tipped marker and left a teensy tiny dot where no dot should be...just saying...

Now I MUSTACHE you to  "Hop" on over to TAMYTHA'S BLOG to see what wonderful craftiness she's got up her sleeve! Be sure to visit all of the Consultants at their Blogs to get some great SOTM  and other fun ideas!

Remember, the SOTM is only available for one month, so contact your consultant (or click here) to see how you can get this stamp set for just $5!

Here are some other projects I have made using the March Stamp of the Month...

We're In This Together Card
Monday Motivations Team Card

And I'm linking this to the Heart 2 Heart 3-D Challenge too!

Magnifique!

I am so loving the new papers from the Fall catalog, going live tomorrow!! I was up late last night snuggled up with my Magnifique papers (instead of the baby, who staying asleep in his own bed until 2 am - woo hoo!). With Max sleeping more, I feel like I can get back to my first love - paper!

I love the rich browns and deep blues in this Magnifique packet! These are the first two pages of our club kit for September. I added a liberal sprinkling of the new BLUE and GREEN Sparkles and Mocha Pearl Opaques! I finished and journaled 3 more double page layouts last night, so check back throughout the week for more. Magnifique!