Blog Hoppin' with Poster Tidings in September!

Hello! Welcome to our Close To My Heart 'stamp of the month' Blog Hop! Hopefully you've had smooth sailing so far and have arrived here from Nancy Womersley's Blog...if this is your first stop, no worries as this is a circular hop and you will end up back here again once you've hopped on around to everyone's sites!

This month's stamp set is great! I've used the Fall themed one but am looking forward to creating with the Christmas one next...

This certainly was a basic layout design...I wanted to play with the 'Happy Autumn' stamp set and the Huntington papers... I love the rich Autumn tones in the papers and the inks...the sentiment was stamped in Autumn Terracotta, of course, and I've rocked some Red barn from the bottom up to add a little depth to the stamped sentiment. The Huntington assortment with these fantastic wooden buttons and canvas images were the perfect accessory to this page...now just need to take some new family fall photos to fill this page!!!

 Now head on over to Jean McNulty's Blog to see what she's done with this month's stamp, Poster Tidings!

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch#12

Sizzlin' Summer sketches are still coming your way...when I get a chance to actually get them done! I hope you are visiting Scrapbook Challenges to see all the sketches and examples from our Design Team and members in the gallery!

This sketch started one way and ended another, which is fine because I like how it all turned out!

I'm playing with our new 'Frosted' paper collection from Close To My Heart which will work great for Winter or Christmas  themed projects...check out some cards I created at the end of this post using one of our fantastic card kits! 

These glittery sparkles are discontinued now but I'm glad I bought lots when we had them in our catalog! I've just used an assortment of punches for the snowflakes that were in my stamp drawer at home...fast and easy when you are punching it outta card stock! Which is 'Colonial White' by the way :)

I have been featuring CTMH's new 'Artbooking' cartridge from Cricut in the previous few weeks...this project's title and fancy doily on the left side were both cut out of our cartridges...our glitter paper is so fantastic that it cuts like butter on the Cricut machine too! Which makes for some fun embellishments and titles in glitter!

Isn't this great, what an awesome doily huh?!!! Anyways, my goal was to keep this layout simple with simple embellishments and stay within the colours of this paper line...the photos are from 7 years ago when our family stayed at Leavenworth in Washington over the Thanksgiving weekend...this town is so interesting at that time of the year!

Our card kits come with enough product to create 15 cards! We also include an exclusive stamp set and envelopes!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Enjoy your weekend wherever you may be!!!

Sizzlin' Summer sketch #10

Hello again! 

Yes, I have missed a few posts' haven't I? Busy working and organizing some upcoming classes...getting sidetracked to say the least! But I'm back today with another Scrapbook Challenges sketch! 

I was trying to keep this one simple...I kept grabbing items to add to this layout and then I just decided it was finished...I am going to add a Project Life sleeve for the right hand side of the album and add the handful of other pics we took of Marissa's Birthday dinner...

I've used the Close To My Heart Sarita paper collection and embellishments...both the sticker sheet and the assortment of wooden bits. I also cut the doily in the background from the new Artbooking Cartridge...looks even better when it's not covered up!

I also stitched with my sewing machine to add a bit of dimension to these layers...I raised a couple of the card stock sticker flowers as well to make the layering of embellishments easier :)

Here's the sketch:

Thanks for stoppin' in today, I hope you enjoy the sketches this week!

you ready for another one?

Ok well here we are already with our Sizzlin' Summer sketch #7 from Scrapbook Challenges! Have you been playing along? I'd love to hear from you if you have been!

I knew I wanted to use some baseball photos for this sketch...after trimming them to 3½" X 5" I sanded the edges...laid the photos on some black cardstock and then thought...now what?!!!

So I sat and thought about a title...the sketch has a big one along the left hand side...I don't always care to follow the sketch exactly but in this case I thought I'd like to play with my Silhouette! It's been ages since I used it and the #1 reason I bought it was so that I could cut really cool downloaded images and words and...you get the idea!

So I played with the phrase 'take me out to the ball game'...used my 'too much paper!' font, 'ariel black' font and 'huntson' font that were on my computer, fiddled with various sizes and welded the letters together so that it would print nicely! I am still learning the Silhouette machine but it's been easy enough to figure out so far :)

The only patterned paper I've used on this layout is to cut the title! I am amazed that I was able to just leave it alone...simple enough in theory but hard for me to just let it be plain'ish...if you know me at all you would be amazed with me too!!! I have several stickers left over from my Simple Stories 24/seven collection so they made adding little finishing touches to this layout crazy fast! Of course the best part of this layout is the story...I LOVE baseball...just sayin'

Enjoy the sketch and I hope you have some luck getting a little scrappy time for yourself this month! Thanks so much for stoppin' in here and checkin' me out ;)

PS. Do you sense a little cheeky'ness? not sure whats come over me...must be this late night scrapbooking!

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch #6

Oh Yeah! I'm back...missed a couple sketches...did you notice? I hope you clicked on over to Scrapbook Challenges and got a look at them even though I've missed them here! 

Gah, my weekend and week are just speeding by and as life tends to interrupt our creative intentions...such was the case for me!!!

I seem to be doing some really late night scrappin' but at least I'm getting a chance to play along with all these fun sketches...this one started with an idea in my head around the sketch and then kinda went a little North East from there!!! LOL

Isn't she cute?!!! It's pretty much just me in this household that thinks so...she is when she's taking one of her many daily naps...when she's awake she's not quite as cute and friendly...her teeny tiny size, a whopping 2.5 lbs, means she is quite nervous around short people (AKA. kids!) and so she tends to growl and snap at them! Ooops!

Ok so do you totally love these papers? This is the new Babycakes collection from Close To My Heart and the Babycakes Asst. which are these lovely canvas adhesive backed embellishments! So fun! The tiny type I've used for 'Lucy' is included in our My Crush Besties Asst. pack...a great little package of goodies that you can use with our new My Crush albums for fast/on the go scrapbooking...or to incorporate into your layouts, mini-albums or Project Life pages!

It just so happened that there was a great title already on my Babycakes Asst. sheet...which happened to fit in with this photo of Lucy having her nap :)

These great arrows were cut using the Sizzix 'Note to Self' Thinlits which coordinate with the Echo Park paper 'Note to Self'...it was super fast running these arrows through my Big Shot.

Here's the sketch!

 

Thanks for stoppin' in today! I hope you have some fun with these sketches...stay tuned for tomorrow sketch#7 and perhaps I'll even have a chance to get caught up with the last couple I missed! Fingers crossed ;)

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch #4

OK, so don't let this design freak you out! It was a little intimidating I will admit but after working with it, I really love how it looks!

I've used some 'Hey You' Basic Grey paper and some stickers and bits from the My Mind's Eye 'find your wings and fly' once again...I'm really liking using this paper right now...great colours!

Now you'll have to excuse my photos...it's super late or super early depending on what you consider 1:00AM and I've used my iPhone to take these photos in my workshop...so lighting, not so great!!!

My new favourite CTMH stamp set is our E size 'Framework Alphabet'...I love it actually and I'm so glad that CTMH has made their E size sets the same 6x6 size as all the other stamp set packaging!

I've used our new Alcohol Markers to colour in the letters (Honey)...they are so fantastic...I never knew Alcohol ink markers were so awesome!!!

These fun arrow shapes and stamps are in our new Artbooking Cricut bundle! Love this stamp set and it was super easy to cut these shapes out and stamp (in Ruby) my own custom, colour coordinating embellishment! I LOVE Close To My Heart when it comes to matching things up!

Thanks for checking in today! I hope you are enjoying all these great sketches!

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch #3

Hello Again!

I was busy working on a couple more of these fantastic Sizzlin' Summer sketches over at Scrapbook Challenges! I even dug into my stash for this journalling page...I think this pad of journalling bits has got to be at least 6 yrs old! 

Glad to have the colours work so well with these new papers!

I had this photo from three years ago, sitting there waiting to be scrapped...super simple design and I just stuck it down...rather proud of myself that I actually kept it simple this time around :) I wanted to use the Kraft CS base as the other layouts in my daughter's travel album have similar colours and I wanted to have it all work well enough together...and I love Kraft too!!!

Popped up the title and a couple of circles, dropped some Dylusions Ink spray here and there and that was it!

Have fun with this new sketch everyone and thanks so much for stoppin' by!

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch #2

Welcome back! It's Scrapbook Challenges' Sizzlin' Summer sketch#2 today and I like this one...well I've liked all of the sketches so far this summer but this one got me thinking of all the 3x4 journalling and Project Life style cards that I have and so I wanted to try to incorporate one in the layout...as it turned out I used two!

I needed to move some of the design elements around a bit to work with this photo but I'd like to try this sketch again another day with a different photo as I really like the layout of it. 

My girlfriend and I were at a 'Use Your Own Product' workshop where we powered through making 20 layouts over 10 hours...we got a lunch and dinner break and I was almost able to complete all of them! I'm getting so much better at Jennifer's UYOP classes...this is my 4th time taking it!

I've grabbed some more of My Mind's Eye 'find your wings and fly' papers and stickers...this time I've trimmed a handful of the tickets from a 12x12 piece of paper from this collection...I thought it made a good embellishment and you know I'm all about using what I have!

I just picked up another Tim Holtz stamp set...was planning on using it with my Art Journal but pulled a couple thread spool stamps and added it to this layout...I think I'm going to get a lot of use out of that set!

The title was cut from my new CTMH Cricut cartridge 'Artbooking' which is exclusive to Close To My Heart and order-able through me if you LOVE it like I do! Only took a minute and I had a title ready to go...lovin' this new cartridge for scrapbooking, card making and mini-albums...just sayin'

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop in today!

Sizzlin' Summer Sketch#1

Well I warned you that we've got some great sketches coming your way this month...

five {5} a week as a matter of fact! 

So here's our Sizzlin' Summer sketch#1

Fun huh? Now I do promise to show photos other that Hawaii this month too...but this ones of my daughter at the Luau we went to on Christmas Eve...I'll end up adding this layout to her personal album as I am trying to finish up our holiday album I'm discovering that I have a lot of photos...who'da thunk that huh? Anyways, seeing as I have lots of photos to put into the family holiday album, I've decided to put some of the solo layouts of my kids into their own albums.

I just recently picked up some of the new My Mind's Eye 'Find Your Wings and Fly' paper collection, brad assortment and sticker sheet...love these soft colours! I've dug into my stash of Washi tape as well and added it along the top.

Thanks so much for stopping by and make sure you head on over to Scrapbook Challenges and upload your creation from this sketch to the gallery! More to come tomorrow!

I {HEART} sketches

Greetings Scrappers!!!

It's Monday and that means I've got another great sketch for you. Scrapbook Challenges always has some of the best sketches and I'm enjoying my time on the Design Team there very much! 

I'm not sure if I've mentioned our Sizzlin' Summer of sketches to you all yet?!! If not, let me tell you there are many more sketches coming your way...a total of TWENTY (20) sketches coming everyday starting today until the end of August! Yeah, you read right...TWENTY sketches!!! Phew...that means a lot of layouts from me and hopefully it'll mean a lot of layouts for you too!!! 

Now I REALLY, REALLY want you to try to get at least one done this month and when I say one sketch I mean for those of you double-pagers...you know who you are...I want to see you try to do a single! Yup! a single page layout ladies...come on, you can do it ;)

This sketch is super easy in design, but if you click on over to Scrapbook Challenges and see what some of my fellow Design Team members have done, perhaps it'll spark your creativity...which, after all, is why we are here at Scrapbook Challenges !!!

Here's my take on this sketch using yet another surf photo but this time it's of my eldest daughter and I'm playing with the new Carta Bella papers 'Beach Boardwalk'...I picked up a handful of papers and a sticker sheet which has alphas, images and phrases...perfect for some summertime photos!

This sticker sheet has two different sized alphas and ready to go stickers, which when you want to get your layouts done quick...come in very handy!

Now if you've seen my layouts before, you know I LOVE wood veneer...I will buy it from any manufacturer...I'm not picky! The heart and arrow in this layout are from the 'trinkets wooden shapes' from Close To My Heart! LOVE them...

...57 mini stamp-able, laser cut wood shapes for $6.95...seriously awesome...the circle and bracket shapes are from Maya Road I believe...not 100% sure though as I tend to open the packages and put the bits into my embroidery floss container...

One of my all time pet peeves is getting the true colour of the papers and layouts right before posting here...I almost have it on these papers, but not quite...taking your photos outside during daylight hours out of the direct sun is best but no guarantee that the photos will show the colours perfectly ;( just your best bet in getting the best photos possible.

Thanks so much for stopping by today !