Planners Gonna Plan

I'm so excited that Close To My Heart has come out with its very own planner! The special for the month of December is a Planner bundle which gives you all you need to set up your very own planner binder. During December, you can get your hands on the new, gorgeous Everyday Life™ album from Close To My Heart, the accompanying Everyday Life 2016 planner pages, and the coordinating Everyday Life Perfect Plan roller stamp in an exclusive product bundle for only $29.95. 

There are other products which coordinate with the Everyday Life binder too. You can mix and match or just use one type of product in your binder. Click here to check out the whole line. The binder rings are not huge, which I think is good because who wants to carry around a bulky planner? But, I just want to let you know that because I don't think one binder could comfortably accommodate every single item that was made for it. I do think you can add bits of the other items.

I've started putting my binder together as mostly a planner so I have the planner pages but I have also included 12- 4" x 3" Memory Protectors (pocket pages). I've slipped a variety of Picture My Life™ cards in the Memory Protectors and included some quotes on some of them. So far I have one Memory Protector in front of each month. I think I may include one or two pictures from the month and/or written memories in some of these pockets later on as well. I think it is a good size with just these two products in there and doubt that I will add more to this particular binder. I tend to use the monthly calendar more than the weekly calendar, so there's a chance that as the weeks go on, I may remove the weeks that have passed, in which case I may see if I want to add some of the My Crush® Everyday Life Pages or more Memory Protectors.

Here's what January looks like so far. This is the front of the Memory Protector located right before January's calendar pages.

This is the flip side of the Memory Protector. You can see that I left the cards blank so that I could add to it later. You can also see the beautiful "cover" page on the left side which comes before the January monthly calendar.

Here is my embellished January monthly calendar. I used the stickers and the stamp which came with the Planners Gonna Plan bundle but, like many of you, I already have a lot of stuff! I used rub-ons from both CTMH, which have since retired, and from other brands. You may also notice some stickers from older Base and Bling Style Sheets. Of course I used washi tapes...my favorite is CTMH's Gold Polka-Dot Washi Tape which is on clearance right now. 

Here's a picture of an unembellished January monthly calendar just so you can see the difference.

Here's a snapshot of the weekly spread along with the "Today" bookmark that come with the planner pages.

The last page is a pocket file which holds the stickers which are included in the planner pages pack. I really like these stickers. While I had trouble with smearing when I wrote on the washi tape, I didn't have any problems writing on these stickers.

Finally, I want to show you both the outside and inside covers. I used rub-ons to include my initials to differentiate my planner from my daughter's since we now have the same planner!

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ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Marker Chart

This is awesome! If you've been using the ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ markers and have been wondering how to match the Close To My Heart Colors, now there is a handy dandy little chart you can use to help you! Check out Jeanette Lynton's blog to see how it's done and to download your very own marker chart to color!Pin It

Wavy Blooms Notecards

Over the past few weeks, I made a bunch of card sets to give out to various teachers at my daughter's school as well as to some colleagues and friends for the end of the school year. Wavy Blooms is such a great set to color with the Shin Han Touch Twin markers and the images look so striking! Although it took me quite a while to color in all the flowers for all of the various sets of cards I made, it was a no-brainer for me to use this wonderful stamp set to make my cards! Here's just a sample of some of the cards I made.

Since I had so many to make, you can see that even though I changed up the colors, I kept my design fairly simple. I made approximately 30 cards with some sort of variation of this design. Phew! I'm hoping to make some more so I can have some cards on hand if I need them!

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The Many Uses of Studio J - Use Your Reprints to Make Mini Albums!

My good friend, Heather, documented her recent trip to London and Paris using Studio J, Close to My Heart's digital scrapbooking program. As soon as she finished designing her layouts, she decided to purchase and print her 12" x 12" layouts through Close To My Heart, and she automatically received the JPG files for her layouts. She then thought that it would be fun to use these JPG's and print them out in smaller sizes. So she sent them to Persnickety Prints and had them printed in 8" x 8," to put in an album for her friend, and also in 4" x 4," for a  mini album. This past weekend, when we got together for our monthly scrapbooking/crafting time, she worked on this adorable album and kindly gave me permission to photograph and post her pictures!

Heather used CTMH's Artbooking Cricut cartridge to cut pages out of cardboard and pages out of the Wanderful paper packet (which she had used the digital form of in her Studio J layouts). She simply layered the Wanderful papers over the cardboard and then added her 4" x 4" prints of her layouts to each page -- except for the cover. The cover is a section of a patterned paper from Wanderful, plus a sticker from the Wanderful Complements, and a bit of journaling! Simple, elegant, and beautiful!

She put her album together with binder rings and ended up with this cute and sturdy mini album!

 I added my scissors to this picture to give you an idea of the scale. The scissors is about 6" long.

Imagine a few of these types of albums on your bookshelf or in a little basket on your coffee table! It'd be such a fun way to display your travel layouts or event layouts...or any photos you like!

If you haven't ever tried Studio J, I urge you to play around with it. It is free to try out and it is fun! You do not have to purchase any software. You just need an internet connection and digital pictures. The program does all the enlarging and re-sizing of photos according to the layouts you choose. You can sart with a blank canvas or use some premade layouts and add or subtract according to your tastes. The really nice thing is that you can work on a layout, save it, and then go back to it when you have time, without having to clean up! 

If you decide you like your layouts and want to purchase them, they are 6.95 per two-page layout and they include the JPG files. You need to purchase a minimum of 4 double layouts in an order. If you just want to buy the JPG files, they are 2.95 per two-page layout.

Click here to try out Studio J!

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A Little Treat Card - Heart 2 Heart Challenge

Here's my entry for Heart 2 Heart Challenge - Warm vs. Cool Challenge.

Since I wanted it to be a to go cup with tea, I stuck a gold sequin over the stamped coffee bean on my cup. I'll have to make another card with a coffee cup though! That little bean is so cute! I'm just loving the Treats of Friendship stamp set! I used the Paper Fundamentals Basics Assortment and the Jackson paper packet on this card. The orange chevron paper is from a piece I hoarded from Treats of Summer, the special from last month. The tea bag string is retired Colonial White Waxy Flax...remember that?

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retro sketches #165 with Treats of Friendship

I love tea and anything tea themed. In fact, I'm drinking some tea right now! So when I saw retro sketches #165 and the teacups were in the sketch, I was inspired to make a card. Of course, I knew I didn't have to use teacups but I just wanted to! So glad the deadline was extended! Here's the sketch:

Here's my card:

I paper pieced the teacups from Treats of Friendship with some leftover Taste of Summer papers and used the Blossom paper pack for the rest. Pacifica is the stamp pad I used for the sentiment and the black is Memento Tuxedo black. If you're looking for some great scissors for paper piecing or any fussy cutting, I highly recommend CTMH's Non-stick Micro-tip Scissors. They are wonderful!

It's been so long since I participated in a card or scrapbook challenge. I'm hoping now that school and work are winding down, I may have more time for them.

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Wavy Blooms Birthday Card

I totally understand the current popularity of adult coloring books. It's a great way to de-stress! Wavy Blooms is a wonderful stamp set for coloring. I used our ShinHan  markers and the Taste of Summer paper pack to make this card. I also added some Pear cardstock, Gold Sequins, 3-D Foam Tape, and used one of the stamp sets from the Artfully Sent Cricut Collection for the Happy Birthday sentiment.

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Graduation Cap Card

My niece is graduating from college this year and I wanted to make her a special card. I've been seeing this type of Graduation Cap Card on the internet and decided to try it out. I used the tutorial found here: http://dostamping.typepad.com/dostamping_with_dawn/2010/06/grads-dads-grad-hat-fun-fold-card.html (there's also a video).  I used the Diploma Day stamp set to embellish my card and retired Cranberry grosgrain ribbon to make my tassel (the video has a great description about making tassels out of grosgrain ribbon). I also used the Cranberry sheet from the Paper Fundamentals Adventure Assortment. The Paper Fundamentals have one side with a colored and white pattern and one side with a subtle glossy pattern. I used the glossy side in my previous post with the Mother's
Day card but it may be difficult to see the pattern in those pictures.

Here is how the card looks when it is open. I used 3-D Foam Tape to pop up the white portion, which is also where I stamped. This gave me a little pocket so that I could include a gift card, money or a check with my card.

I added another white panel to the back of my card so that we could have room to write a message.

 I have a good friend who went back to school after being in the work force for many years and she will be graduating from Law School(!) this year. I thought it would be fun to make her a similar card and try to make a purple tassel to match what she will actually have. So I am looking for purple grosgrain ribbon...but I may end up making her tassel out of embroidery thread.

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Taste of Summer Mother's Day Tri-Fold Card

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there! 

I'm sharing the card I made for my mom using the Taste of Summer paper pack and stamp set, only available during the month of May in honor of National Scrapbooking month. I love Tri-Fold Shutter cards because you can really embellish and make them pop!

Here's how it looks closed. I cut out the "m's" and circles using my CTMH Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge. I used Juniper and Cranberry inks to stamp my strawberries and sentiments.

When you open it, you can see all the panels. I used the CTMH Artiste Cricut Cartridge to cut my little label where I stamped "Happy Mother's Day" (from the Just To Say Cricut Collection stamp set).

You can see some more of the dimension in this view.

And here's one more open view as it's standing up. The red ribbon is our retired grosgrain Cranberry ribbon and the red cardstock is the Cranberry from the Paper Fundamentals Adventure Assortment. The base of my card is a sheet of Smoothie cardstock.

You can do a Google search for a Tri-fold Shutter card but the measurements I used for my card base are 12" x 5.5" and I scored lines using my scoring blade in my paper trimmer at 2", 4", 8", and 10" as I held the paper horizontally. I cut from 1.5" measuring down from the top edge and up from the bottom edge going from the 2" mark to the 10" mark. I liked this video on YouTube to get a better idea of how to make this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeaG4wvdZbw

Here's another video I looked at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWrnqMoaCnQ

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My Creations Mini Mix Album and Mini Folio

These little albums are adorable! I think I will use the accordion one as a Mother's Day card/gift.

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New York Visit Studio J Layouts

Have I told you how much I love Studio J, Close to My Heart's digital scrapbooking program? I know I have...but it bears repeating! You can probably tell that it's been a busy time for me from my lack of blog posts. Not much time to be creative (which I really miss--it makes me cranky when I can't be creative). But I really wanted to do some scrapbooking so I went to my stalwart friend, Studio J, to help me out.

Aside from being something that I can work on in little bits of time and save without worrying that my layouts will get ruined or moved around before I finish them, Studio J is incredibly flexible. I had a lot of photos that I wanted to scrapbook from a recent visit to NY. I started with preset layouts and then I added pictures to each of my layouts. So even though a layout may be listed as having enough photo wells for twelve pictures, you can add additional photo wells to suit your needs.

If you count how many photos I included in my last layout pictured here, you'll see that it comes to twenty-three! That would have taken me quite a while to scrapbook, let alone to print, enlarge, and shrink down all the pictures I needed! I finished these layout in less than two hours working in short little intervals of time over the course of two days -- I even worked on them a little in the morning between getting my son off to school and getting ready to drop off my daughter at her school. The majority of my time was spent on deciding which pictures I should include.

I used the Wanderful paper packet, which is still currently available to purchase. But I also love how some of my favorite papers which have been retired, are still available in digital format. Anyway, take a look and let me know what you think! You can click on the thumbnails to get a larger view.

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Snowhaven Layout

Now that we have some beautiful binder albums, it's easier than before for me to add my layouts directly to my album and move my layouts around. I've always liked including different types of layouts (divided page protectors along with the 12 x 12 page protectors) in my album and now I can see how it will look right away. I worked on a double layout today which has a regular undivided page protector on the left and a divided page protector on the right. Sorry for the quality of the last two photos. They have a glare from light reflecting off of the page protectors but I wanted to show you how they looked in the album.

 Right side  

 Left side (divided)

The layouts side by side

I decided to use the divided page protector on the right as opposed to doing a large layout because I had photos from two different events. While I wanted to include the second event in my album, my pictures were not of great quality (took them from far away with my phone in a poorly lit room and then enlarged them) and I only ended up with two okay photos. Including them along with the other photos just seemed to make more sense than focusing on them in a whole other layout. I still wanted my layouts to look a little cohesive so I used the same paper pack, Snowhaven, one of my favorites and tried to repeat some elements, such as they way I did my journaling in a list format and in strips. The pocket card was cut from the Artfully Sent Cricut cartridge and the snowflakes were cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge. I also repeated using some Oceanside Sequins (these will be available starting April 1st) as bullets for my journaling list and as the centers of some of the snowflakes.

Here's a close up of the journaling block on the right with the snowflake and sequin detail.

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Heartstrings Layout

Did you know that the Heartstrings and Hopscotch papers will no longer be available after March? We will have a new Seasonal Expressions catalog which you can order from beginning on April 1st with new papers and other amazing products but this month will be your last chance to purchase these two wonderful paper packs. I have to say, Heartstrings has become one of my favorites! Here's a layout I made with the Heartstrings paper pack,  Heartstrings Complements, the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge and the Artbooking Cricut cartridge.

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Ford's Theater Layout

Here's a simple double layout that I made documented a visit to Ford's Theater. I had a lot of photos and I wanted to include a pamphlet so while I did omit some photos, I also used a handy dandy Flip Flap to fit a couple more onto my layout. You can see it lifted in the second photo. This is a pretty photo heavy layout and there wasn't a ton of room to add too many decorative elements but I used the Art Philosophy cartridge to cut out some stars and banners. What do you think? Should I add anything else? A few more stars? Or just leave it as is?

You can kind of see the edge of my new Ruby Floral D-Ring album, which I love! If you were thinking of getting any with the special, it ends at the end of this month and the Teal D-ring has already sold out!Pin It

Seaside Tea House Scrapbook Layouts

I've been using my Cricut cartridges so much lately that I thought I'd experiment with them a bit on some layouts. The sorbet colored backings for the journaling blocks on the upper left and upper right of these layouts are actually cards from the Artfully Sent cartridge (they are on the letter i key, Sentiment function). But the tea themed cutouts go well with the theme of my layout so I cut them smaller than I would for a card and trimmed them a bit in order to make them fit. The one with the teapot actually has a sentiment cut out below it but I covered that up with a slim scrap of juniper paper. 

I also like how the Seaside paper worked so well with these photos even though it's not a beach themed layout. I sponged the edges of all the papers in the layouts with Chocolate Distressing ink. A long while back, CTMH sold a CD with different exclusive fonts. I still have those fonts on my computer and I used one of them for my journaling - this font is called CTMH Heritage. If you do any digital scrapbooking on Studio J, you've probably seen it.

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Cricut Artfully Sent: Scene Function

I'm loving the Artfully Sent Cartridge. It makes it so easy to create cards!

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Another Valentine's Day Card using Artiste and Art Philosophy

I actually made the front of this card and send it out today! That never happens with me. It should arrive on time. Woohoo! I even included some cute heart shaped sugar cookies. I hope my friend likes her package. Cricut made it easy once again. I just cut out a bunch of banner shapes and used what seemed to look good together. The inside is the same pop up heart I used earlier here.

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Floral Condolence Card

Here's a condolence card I made with my latest favorite go to overlay card design from the Artfully Sent Cricut cartridge (shift, sleeve, key e) cut in Colonial White. The flowers are different sizes of one design from the Art Philosophy Cricrut cartridge. I wanted the flowers to be relatively flat so I could mail the card but I still wanted them to have a bit of dimension, so I just adhered them in the middles and bent up the petals a bit. The Background and Texture paper is from the Seaside paper pack. The inside sentiment is also from the Artfully Sent Cricut cartridge (same key as the overlay card).  

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Valentine's Pop-Up with Artfully Sent

My mom is so timely about sending cards out for every occasion. Unfortunately, I didn't inherit that gene! Now that I make cards you'd think I would be better...but I stress over whether or not the intended receiver will like a certain design or color or whatever and I get stuck. I am working towards having more fun with the process of creating. That's what it's about, right? I'm also trying to keep cards on hand instead of making them right when I need them. Well, I'm trying and I actually started on some Valentine's today. Of course the first one will go to my mom! I have to say, the Cricut cartridges make it so much easier and faster for me. I used Artiste and Artfully Sent...and most importantly, I had fun! I felt the same way I used to as when I was a kid making cards for my mom.

A closer view of the front of the card (I like that little envelope)...

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