Winter Themed Cards

Here's a picture of some cards I've been working on. I'm really enjoying using the Thin Cuts. I used the Cozy Christmas Thin Cuts Bundle for the snowman card and the Snowflakes Thin Cuts for the top two cards. And, of course, I'm still playing with the CTMH Cricut Flower Market cartridge (wreath card).

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Flower Market Sunflowers

I had some fun playing with my CTMH Flower Market Cricut cartridge. I cut out a variety of sunflowers and middles, not to mention letters. I LOVE the font on this cartridge! It all worked perfectly for my layout which was about a trip this past summer to a sunflower field at a local farm. The Rustic Home Fundamentals paper pack added the perfect weathered counter balance to the cheery and bright sunflowers.

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Keep Calm and Love Autumn PL

 I used the new CTMH Woodland Critters stamp set on a PL I sent to Portugal. The theme was "Keep Calm and Love Autumn!" 

I also used a bunch of older CTMH supplies (felt pieces, leaves, journaling spots) and some Target Dollar Spot items (wooden tags, wooden leaves and pumpkins).

Here's the reverse side with all the treats!

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Fall Prima Doll Pocket Letter Swap

I am brand new to the world of Julie Nutting Prima Dolls. Yes, I know I'm late to the game! I actually only bought some to participate in this swap (Fall Prima Doll themed swap) and now I am hooked! It is so much fun to create and customize each doll. Unlike my first two pocket letters,in which I've used each pocket as a mini canvas, I decided to change it up this time and made a scene which I then cut up. I used mini velcro dots - Hook and Loop Dots - to attach the Prima Doll to the outside of my pocket letter since I really wasn't comfortable cutting it up!

Here's a view of the back of the pocket letter and all of the goodies I put in it. I just love that gold washi!

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"Pretty Things" Pocket Letter

The pocket letter fun continues! This was made for a "Pretty Things," themed event so we could use anything. Here's the front.

 I included my letter inside of this envelope which I made with the Cricut CTMH Artbooking cartridge and teeny tiny Velcro dots.

 And here's the back!

Doing these pocket letters has helped me to explore more of the cuts on my Cricut cartridges ad there are a LOT on the CTMH ones. I get to use my extra supplies in a creative way and I've really been enjoying this process. 

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Tea Themed Pocket Letter

I mailed off my first pocket letter swap today so I thought I would post some pictures here. In case you are not familiar with Pocket Letters, they are typically made using trading card/baseball card page protectors which have 2.5" x 3.5" pockets and craft items, like extra scrapbooking products. Hmm, now, where would I get some of those? Janette Lane, inventor of the concept explains it here: http://janettelane.blogspot.com/2015/02/what-are-pocket-letters.htm

The swap I participated in is a tea themed swap where we had to include 9 teabags (typical pocket letters contain one) along with the other usual components of a pocket letter. Here's what I came up with.

Here's the reverse side showing all of the teas.

In between the two sides, I tried to include some goodies such as tags, die cuts, glitter, shaped paper clips, and I even had a teapot stencil that I was able to fit in.

This is how I packaged it before putting it in a 6" x 9" padded envelope. You can fit them in a regular business sized envelope if they are not too bulky but I was having fun adding layers and didn't want to worry about restricting myself for this first one!

Here are close ups of some of the pockets.

 This pocket contains an envelope which holds some paper butterflies.

Here's the front of the envelope.

And here's a view of the back.

 The tag in this pocket contains some samples of washi tape wrapped around it.

I made the pink "hello" shown on this pocket with the new CTMH Hello and Thanks thin cuts. I included a little envelope, which contains my letter to my swap partner, behind the vellum rectangle here. 

I made a couple of extra hello die cuts to include in another pocket but here's a look at it by itself. I love how these came out!

I used my CTMH Cricut Artbooking cartridge to make the envelope which holds my letter. Here's the front of it.

 Here's the back.

 Here's the back with the flap open. I included little velcro dots on the envelope flap so that it can stay shut.

I hope my swap pal likes it!

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Happy Times Happy Birthday

One of the things I'm most excited about in the new CTMH catalog are the half size page protectors (6 x 12 vs. 12 x 12). I like to scrapbook a lot of pictures of an event onto a two page layout. I either will add a whole other layout or I'll use Flip Flaps to add more photos. Being able to simply include a half page of extra photos gives even more versatility and I am over the moon to have this option. I'm calling them half page pocket protectors but officially they are Memory Protectors™ Pocket Plus™  and you can find them here. There are a variety so you can choose whether you want to include 4 x 6 photos in a portrait or landscape orientation OR if you want to include 3 x 4 photos in either orientation. Love them!

I used Memory Protectors™ Pocket Plus™ Design 1 and here's the product description from the website: 

Add extra photos or artwork to your layouts with these Memory Protectors™, which feature a full gutter so they lie flat in post-bound albums.

10 protectors – 6" × 12" with 3 horizontal 4" × 6" pockets.

You saw that about the full gutter, right? Wahoo! You can use the in post bound albums, no problem!

So of course the first thing I created when I got my order of new stuff was a double page scrapbook layout with a 6 x 12 page protector in the middle.

Here's the left side of my double layout. The balloons and "Happy Birthday," are cut with the CTMH Artiste Cricut cartridge and the tag is from Art Philosophy, both now retired. I used the Happy Times paper pack which was a special in May. Do you see the hinges on the side of the paper mat? Aren't you proud of me for using them? Those are really old!

I included some envelopes, cards, and stickers from the retired My Crush In the Pink Assortment on the right side of my double page layout. 

Here are both pages with the 6" x 12" page protector in the middle. 

Another view with both pages and the half sized page protector flipped over. I love being able to include more pictures in my layouts without crowding them in.

 So you can probably tell that I tried to really incorporate some of the NUMEROUS embellishments which I already own. I've been organizing this summer and even though I'm not finished with my scrapbook organization, it's so much easier to see what I have and can use. Does anyone remember brads? I have so many! And so many flowers! Here's a close-up of some of the details on the first page.

Even though I used a lot of older supplies which weren't all in one coordinated set, I think they meshed pretty well. Let me know what you think!

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The New Catalog is Live!

It's live! Have you seen the new CTMH catalog yet? Click here to go to the electronic version of the 2016-2017 Annual Inpirations! Just contact me if you would like to have a physical copy to page through.

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From the Notebook—July Stamp of the Month

I have been playing around with July's Stamp of the Month, From the Notebook.

I love the small icon stamps and have been trying them out in my planner. It's been making my task lists more fun!

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Thank You Panda (Koala)!

I have long been waiting for Close to My Heart to come out with a panda stamp since that is the mascot of the school where I work. It would come in so handy for cards for the students and staff! 

By chance, I came across this amazing video tutorial made by Stephanie Davis. She shows you how to turn Close to My Heart's Cute Koalas stamp (D1642) into a panda! I do recommend watching the video but essentially you mask the koala's nose with a piece of tape when inking up your stamp. Before stamping, you simply remove the tape. In her video, she also masked the stomach but since I was using a different koala stamp from the same set, it ended up being too complicated for me to do that. Then you use a capital "O" and a lower case "o" to make the ring around the eyes. I was blown away! So of course, I had to try it.

Here are the ShinHan Touch Twin marker colors I used.

Here are all of the stamp sets I used.

The two from the Cricut Collection are both from the Cricut® Artfully Sent Collection. 

Since I would be coloring, I stamped with Memento ink to avoid smearing.

So, after taping off the nose and stamping the "O's," the koala looks a lot like a little panda (without a nose). The eucalyptus even looks like bamboo to me! 

Here's a progression of photos to show you how I colored the panda.

As Stephanie explains in her video, start with your lighter gray and then add shadows with the darker. Then go back in with the lighter to blend.

 Since pandas have a band of black across their chests where their arms are, I just colored in where I thought it would go.

Then I darkened it in!

I colored in the bottom and feet using the same concepts. Since I couldn't mask that "tummy" line very well, I just kept it in and used it!

Next, I colored in around the eyes and added a nose.

I used the Light Orange, just like Stephanie, for the ears and to add color to the cheeks.

After using the Colorless Blender, the ears and cheeks look more subtle and then I added Pastel Green to the bamboo.

I stamped, colored and cut out a bunch of pandas to begin with.

Don't they look cute!

Then I worked on the card base. I used papers from Zoe, Florence, and Magical. I also embossed strips of Pear.

I based my card design on a sketch from the April 2016 Cardmaps designs (the second one displayed on their page). I used the Cricut® Artiste Cartridge to get the notebook style cut in the upper left and CTMH's Scallop Border Punch on the red paper. 

I did use one retired product, which I miss a lot! Loved these borders but I did hoard them so I'm still able to use them.

 My final result was this card.

Since I had to make a lot of thank you cards, I ran out of my background paper so I subbed another similar one from a retired paper pack. Bonus points if you know the name of that paper pack!

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