Happy New Year!

I wish you and your families good health and good fortune for the New Year!

Studio J layouts

Are you aware that Close To My Heart has Digital Scrapbooking program called Studio J that allows you to create beautiful layouts?  The beauty of Studio J is there is nothing to install on your computer and it is free to play and design.  You only pay when you are satisfied with your layout and checkout.  Click on the Studio J button above if you want to try it out.

 I will be glad to show you how easy it is to upload your photos, create your layouts, and add journaling and embellishments.  I had some Studio J credits that I needed to use by the end of 2013 and I was able to whip these up very quickly.

Click on a layout below for a larger image.

 

Welcome to the Joyful Stars blog hop for December!

I hope all your Christmas plans are falling into place!  Here are a few gift tags that I have been working on.

This first tag is cut with the Artist Cartridge at 4 inches from our Sparkle and Shine paper.  The scalloped oval is cut at 2.5 inches.  The Gingerbread man stamp is from D1557 Candyland Holiday.  It was stamped with Colonial White pigment ink and topped with Prisma Glitter.  A strip of red Glimmer Trim Z1848 is used across the bottom (A great way to easily add glitter!).

Please hop over to Betty's blog next to see what she is up to.  If you missed any of the links I have them listed below.
Enjoy!

Joyce Houck          Joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com
Nickie Hoffer         nickiehoffer.blogspot.com
Krista Hershberger   Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com
Stephanie Huber      lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com
Helen Gullett            byheleng.wordpress.com
Cindy Leek                savingmemorieswithcindy.com
Elizabeth Mindemann   ejoym.blogspot.com
Nancy Brown            creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com
Lori Meadows           CraftyMeadows.blogspot.com
Betty Locco             scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com

I would love for you to join my team! Why Switch?

Welcome to the Joyful Stars blog hop for November!

Here is my most recent Christmas card.  The picture does not capture Santa's puffy hair and beard created by using our liquid applique.

Materials Used
       Stamp Set - Santa Claus and snow flakes (C1567)  found in Holidays From The Heart Gift Guide
       Inks - Whisper (Santa), Grey Wool (snow flakes and sentiment)
       Paper - Sparkle and Shin, Ruby cardstock, Whisper cardstock
       Liquid Applique and Prisma Glitter (Z134) on Santa's hat, Liquid Applique on Santa's hair and beard
Cricut cuts
       Artbooking - sentiment oval size 1" with Real Dial Size on pg 75
       Artiste - Circle size 3" cut using center point on the sparkle and shine paper
                     Emblem size 5" pg 34 Accent 3





You are now heading back to the beginning of our blog hop with Joyce. If you missed any of the hops along the way I have listed each of them below.

Joyce Houck                Joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com 

Krista Hershberger      Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com 

Stephanie Huber          lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com 

Nickie Hoffer              nickiehoffer.blogspot.com 

Nancy Brown             creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com 

Cindy Leek                  savingmemorieswithcindy.com                          

Elizabeth Mindemann ejoym.blogspot.com

Betty Locco                scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com 

Holidays from the Heart 

We have a wonderful little holiday guide that is only available for a limited time (October 15 through December 31).  Several of the items are only available while supplies last.  Be sure to get your orders in early.  To browse the guide and order, click on the "Shop" tab at the top of this blog page. 

October Stamp of the Month

This stamp set typically retails for $17.95 but if you place an order of $50 or more during October you can purchase this stamp set for only $5.

Scandinavian Wishes

Artbooking Cricut Cartridge

Hi Everyone!

I just updated my blog to include all the Artbooking videos that are available to date.  I just love this cartridge!  Return here weekly to see new videos.  If you have any questions don't hesitate to contact me. Each of the Close To My Heart exclusive Cricut Cartridges have over 700 images,  I have a tab at the top of this blog page that will allow you to browse through all the images..  If you want to order the cartridge just click on the Shop tab.

Artbooking Made Easy: Everyday Layouts (S01E08)

Artbooking Made Easy: Fall into Artbooking (S01E07)

Artbooking Made Easy (S01E06): Designed Décor Flip Stand Album

Artbooking Made Easy (S01E05): Halloween Mini Albums

Artbooking Made Easy (S01E04): Spooky Halloween Layouts

Artbooking Made Easy (S01E03): Summer Mini-Albums

Artboooking Made Easy (S01E02): A+ School Layouts

Welcome to the Joyful Stars blog hop for October!

Here is a quick card I created.  I actually used the border stamp from the Stamp of the Month for October and curved it so it matched the oval shape (this is just one of the wonderful aspects of our stamps).  I used the adorable penguin from one of our Hostess rewards sets C1560.   I also used the snow flake stamp from the Frosted Cardmaking Workshop on the go which has a corresponding cut from our Artiste Cricut Cartridge.  This is just to show that you can mix and match our stamps.

Add caption

Stephanie is next in our blog hop.  If you get lost along the way here are the other links to the members of our hop or you can always start at the beginning with Joyce.

Stephanie Huber         lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com
Cindy Leek                 savingmemorieswithcindy.com
Helen Gullett               byheleng.wordpress.com

Meredith Hainsworth  craftyschemings.blogspot.com
Angelina Romero         papercraftingwithangelina.blogspot.com
Nickie Hoffer            nickiehoffer.blogspot.com

Elizabeth Mindemann   ejoym.blogspot.com
Joyce Houck             joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com

Betty Locco                scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com
Nancy Brown            creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com 

Krista Hershberger     Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com

Artbooking Made Easy (S01E01)

Getting Started with Cricut Artbooking  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, this cartridge!  So far I have been having fun with overlays with layouts and mini albums.

Simply Stitch It

We now have a great stitch guide for all of you interested in adding additional dimension to your artwork.  Check out this quick video for a brief introduction to using the guide.

Joyful Stars Blog Hop for September

I am still in a home decor mood so I made this simple little frame.

I absolutely love the Huntington papers so I used that for the photo mat. I used the original photo mat that came with the frame as a template.

 The Stamp set is called Poster Tidings and is the Stamp of the Month for September. If you place an order for $50 or more you can get the Stamp of the Month for only $5 (a 17.95 value).

 I wanted to highlight a few of the words in the stamp. There are couple different ways you can do this. For this frame I decided to use sponge daubers to apply different ink colors to different areas of the stamp. Since this can take a little time to cover the entire stamp via a sponge dauber I "huffed" warm breath onto the stamp to moisten it and then stamped onto the "Sunset" card stock.

 I decorated the frame with a strip of our new Jute Ribbon and some retired wooden shapes. Our current Idea Book has Trinkets Wooden Shapes that are just adorable. All our wooden shapes are stampable. I just used daubers again to add ink to the wooden shapes. I then added Liquid Glass to give it a nice sheen.

This project was inspired by a project Joyce shared with me a few months ago.  Thanks Joyce!

Thank you for visiting, your next stop is Betty Locco - just follow the link below.  Have Fun!

Betty Locco                scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com

Angelina Romero         papercraftingwithangelina.blogspot.com

Nancy Brown            creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com

Joyce Houck            Joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com

Nickie Hoffer            nickiehoffer.blogspot.com

Krista Hershberger     Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com

Stephanie Huber         lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com

Helen Gullett               byheleng.wordpress.com

Cindy Leek                 savingmemorieswithcindy.com

Elizabeth Mindemann   ejoym.blogspot.com

Meredith Hainsworth        craftyschemings.blogspot.com

Convert our page protectors to work in a CM album.

A CM customer contacted me to see if our Close To My Heart page protectors would work in her album. They will and here is a video to show you how. I wanted to share this with anyone who is no longer able to purchase CM products to complete their albums. Our Close To My Heart page protectors are a great value at $22.95 for 50 and they are an exceptional quality too. Feel free to contact me with any questions.

Welcome to the Joyful Stars August Blog Hop.

For August we decided to showcase anything from the new Fall/Winter Idea Book.  It was a difficult choice because there are so many great new items.  Our 4-H Poultry Club has a silent auction to raise money at our Fair every year.  I thought the new Designed Decor Frame would be perfect.  I wanted to keep it fairly generic so I held off on stamping sentiments on the photo frames but added a note to let everyone I would gladly customize it for their family.

I loved working on this project because it is a very high quality product.  The frame is beautiful, sturdy, and has perfectly mitered corners.  The chicken wire is a single insert that is on a wire frame with nice clean edges and it can easily be removed if you want to place fabric or paper between the frame and the chicken wire.

I used the Artiste Cartridge to create the coop with the nesting box.

Please hop on over to Krista's blog next:

Krista Hershberger     Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com
Nickie Hoffer            nickiehoffer.blogspot.com
 Meredith Hainsworth    craftyschemings.blogspot.com 
Stephanie Huber       lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com
Hellen Gullett             byheleng.wordpress.com
Elizabeth Mindemann   ejoym.blogspot.com
Betty Locco                 scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com

Angelina Romero         papercraftingwithangelina.blogspot.com

Cindy Leek              savingmemorieswithcindy.com
Joyce Houck             Joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com
Nancy Brown          creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com             

Background Stamps

Background stamps are a wonderful way to enhance your designs.  You can use a bold ink color on light cardstock, tone on tone, or a variation.  It is fun to play with all the different combinations.

Close To My Heart is a wonderful Debt-free company.

 Join my team by clicking on the link above or contact me for more information.

Welcome to the Joyful Stars July Blog Hop

Chantilly Swing Card

 

This is a swing card using our Chantilly paper.  The swing card base is cut with the Artiste Cricut Cartridge at 5 ½ inches.  The swing cards are on page 52 of the Artiste booklet (the S key) and this particular shape is Accent 1.  The decorative oval shape on the front and inside of the card is cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge page 62 Oval 5 and is cut at 2 ¼ inches.  I have a cheat sheet that I received from another consultant that lists the different swing cards and their corresponding shapes and sizes.  I will include that in another post and I will try to find her name so I can give her the credit she deserves.

I apologize for the quality of the pictures.  I hope to have it corrected before my next post.

 

Please hop on over to Stephanie’s blog next:

      
Stephanie Brown       stephanielovesscrapbooking.blogspot.com
Heather Flaherty        papercrafteranonymous.com
Crystal Davis             craftingwithcrystal.blogspot.com
Stephanie Huber       lavendersagedesigns.blogspot.com
Hellen Gullett             byheleng.wordpress.com
Elizabeth Mindemann   ejoym.blogspot.com
Krista Hershberger     Kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com
Betty Locco                 scrapbookgirl2.blogspot.com
Jean Murphy               stampandscrapjeanie.blogspot.com
Cindy Leek              savingmemorieswithcindy.com
Meredith Hainsworth    craftyschemings.blogspot.com
Joyce Houck             Joyce-joyfulcreations.blogspot.com
Nickie Hoffer            nickiehoffer.blogspot.com
Nancy Brown           creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com

My First Convention

I attended my first Close To My Heart Convention this year and it was a blast.  The Convention was at the Coronado Springs resort in Disney World.  We got a sneak peak of the new Idea Book and all the great new papers, stamps, and products.  We have a new Cricut Cartridge that will be available August 1st.  As a consultant we are able to purchase it this month.  Even if you are just a hobbyist there are so many perks to becoming a consultant.  Feel free to contact me for details.

Stitch is my favorite Disney Character - mischievous enough to be fun and kind hearted enough to be loveable.



Muslin Gift Bags

Monogram Stamps