2013 Hero Arts Catalog Blog Hop

Hello, everyone!

Welcome to the 2013 Hero Arts Catalog Blog Hop!  You should have arrived here from my amazing friend Stephanie Howell's blog. I know she had something spectacular to share with you and I bet by now you've seen so many gorgeous things! Please remember, if you find a link that doesn't work or if you happened here by means other than the hop, if you wish, you can always jump back to the Hero Arts Blog for a full list of direct links to all the fabulous eye candy on all the blogs in the hop.

AND if you want to see ALL the eye candy Hero is going to be releasing this winter at the Craft & Hobby Association 2013 show, you can go HERE! (I promise it's a MUST see!) 

To create my project, Hero sent me a several of their brand new stamps and I completely fell in love with the two shown below. Not only do I adore wood-mounted anyway, but WHO could resist that sentiment (not me!) and the herringbone pattern had me swooning!

I've been wanting to do something with the sunburst idea for quite a while and the "Special" stamp (K5656) couldn't be more perfect. I stamped the imaged onto cream cardstock, embossed and cut out. Then I emphasized the word "SPECIAL" with a salmon-colored gel pen.

The lime green and salmon-colored rays were both stamped with the herringbone pattern (S5654), but the  green was embossed while the salmon got a tone-on-tone treatment.

I finished up with some twine and ribbon and of course gems along the rays for some shine. 

Supply List: Hero Arts Stamp K5656 (Special), Hero Arts Stamp S5654 (Herringbone background), American Crafts Zing Embossing Powder, Ranger Inks, My Minds Eye & KI Memories patterned papers, BoBunny & Coordinations Cardstock, Zig pen, Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L Adhesive, Xacto Decorative scissors

Other: Twine, ruban, rhinestones, gel pen

Now for the extra "good stuff": The super-generous folks at Hero Arts will be giving away several prize packs with winners randomly chosen from ALL of the blog hop comments received by midnight PST on Monday, December 17 - so be sure to leave one HERE and at all the blogs you visit along the way such as the talented Mariana Grigsby, the next stop on your Hero Arts blog hop!

And again, please remember, if you find a link that doesn't work, you can always hop back to the Hero Arts Blog for a list of direct links to all the blogs in the hop.

Have a wonderful Friday and HAPPY HOPPING!

xo, 

k

A Little December Daily Share + Holiday FUN!

Hello, everyone! Happy 12-12-12!! (The math geek in me is seriously loving today's date!)

I have so much to share with you today so I hope you'll indulge me just a little. I promise at the end there will be a great reward! Or at least something fun for you anyway! 

Today I wanted to put up a little of my December Daily. If you recall, I have/had? great hopes of finally finishing one - after three attempts! I must admit it's not looking good as it's now the 12th and I've only completed through the 5th but it is what it is. I'm going to try and keep plugging along, cross my heart.

Anyhow, after initially starting my album, I revamped it just a bit. I added a bit more sparkle and bling to the spine as well as some shimmer mist that doesn't show up well in photos but is SO gorgeous in real life. I've been loving my Pink Paislee Portfolio album to hold my DD. It is larger than any I have done before and I'm digging the size AND the divided page protectors it comes with. It might just convert me to a project life gal in the new year. 

For the snowflake, I punched several pieces of paper and glued them together with my Xyron, then sprinkled them with glass glitter. The star is covered with red Stickles and the gems are old Heidi Swapp. The little hook at the top was designed by Janet Hopkins and was a Heidi product back in the day. I've had mine since a Creative Escape years ago and have horded it for just the right project to use it on. So glad I had it for this!

I always like to do a little intro with my December Dailys. I especially love white on white so I had fun with the snowflake punches on the left side of the binder as well as stringing them with twine on the right side. The music note paper is BasicGrey Aspen Frost and the other papers/stickers are Echo Park's This & That. (My album is mostly Echo Park this year :))

This is the completed page one spread. The title was cut with my Silhouette (I created it - my first attempt at my own such design!) and I made the envelope myself out of white Bazzill Cardstock.  

  

And by flipping the envelope over, this is the the completed Day 2 page spread.
The envelope contains the story of my boy's favorite tradition (I think you can read it in the photo below) as well as a photo of C during it on the other side. There's more Echo Park here (I love love love that newsprint paper) as well as some BasicGrey alpha stickers and My Mind's Eye washi tape. That yellow stripe is just speaking to me right now!

This is Day 3 and Day 4. More Echo Park with some BasicGrey Aspen Frost and the  snowmen from BasicGrey's holiday line a couple years ago (Jovial - my fave ever!). And if anyone is wondering, the awesome snowflake punch is from EK Success. I love the size of it.
Day 3 features the triumph of me getting the boys' holiday photo and Day 4 the littles and I watched Rudolph on TV. I didn't have any photos of that so I relied on images from the internet to show it. 

And finally Day 5, our holiday parade. For this day, I used the Pink Paislee divided page protectors because I had lots of photos I wanted to show (there is the back of the right page as well filled). I made my favorite Santa photo large and then fitted in the photos I thought told the story best into the dividers. (And I swear there is even a selfie of me and the oldest on the next page!) The large star is old Technique Tuesday chipboard and the black metal "5" is I think old Making Memories.

So enough of that ;) Just a couple more things for you today.
First is the new January/February 2013 (WHAT?!) issue of Creating Keepsakes. It hit the newsstands yesterday and it is a wonderful one!

Here is a link to the online sneak peek where you will find one of my favorite layouts I've done in a while. (There's another little peek below.)

And finally, my amazing friends at Scrapbook and Cards Today are once again doing their 12 days of HOLIDAY GIVING!! I promise, promise, promise you that you don't want to miss it. I've never met more generous people or generous sponsors! And as *I* can't win, I would LOVE it if one of you would! So please, hop on over and check it out HERE!

Have a wonderful 12-12-12!

xo, 

k

SCT Winter Issue and a Holiday Giveaway for You!

*******CONTEST NOW CLOSED. WINNER ANNOUNCED AT THE END OF THIS POST! THANK YOU!*******

Hello, all!

I have something fun to share with you today! The new WINTER issue of Scrapbook & Cards Today will be LIVE at 10:00 am Eastern which means you can download some absolutely amazing scrappy inspiration just by clicking HERE!

But because I know some of you (like me) adore hard copies of their reading material, I've got you covered, too. I'm going to give a brand spanking new copy of this gorgeous issue to one of you lucky readers!!

And as a little teaser - the talented Amy Heller provided the content for our Easy, Detailed, Expert column this issue and I FELL.IN.LOVE. with this layout....(swoon)

And if that just isn't enough to get you excited, I'm going to throw in a copy of the 2013 Scrapbook & Cards Today/PageMaps sketch calendar too!  

I'm telling you, you'll have just about all you could ever want for Christmas if these two items showed up at your door! So tell me. What do you want most for Santa to bring you this year...if you've been good, that is?!

Leave me a comment in the comment section by midnight (Eastern) tonight and you'll be entered to win and these awesome copies could be coming to YOU!

Have a wonderful day!
xo, 

k.

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Congratulations to MARGIE!! The Winter issue of SCT and the 2013 calendar will be on it's way to you! Please email me using the "about me" contact in the upper right of this blog page. 

Happy December & the start of my DECEMBER DAILY!

Hello, everyone!

I’m so happy to welcome you to DECEMBER and as such my last post over at Scrapbook & Cards Today's blog for 2012 in my Old New Borrowed Cool series! I can only hope that you have enjoyed this little series even half as much I as have doing it for you.

I thought quite a bit about what I would do for a final project and it just seemed fitting that it take the form of a December Daily album. For those of you that are unfamiliar with one, a December Daily album is meant to document the daily activities of the month of December – all those wonderful holiday traditions that we have – and get them down into one place. And while it may have been someone else’s idea once upon a time, I have to give credit to the awesome Ali Edwards for inspiring me to give it my first try several years ago.

Now that said, I have two confessions. (Yes, I know. Another of my confessions!) The first is that I absolutely despise scrapbooking the Christmas holidays. I know. Shocking, right? I’ve done it tons of times and yes, I know that it might *seem* like I enjoy it, but the truth is…well, I don’t. Maybe it's because I'm  just not happy with the pictures I take because of poor lighting situations or I get bored with the same old holiday papers, or whatever the case it at the time, but it's true. I’m sure at least *some* of you feel the same as me, right?! (Please tell me I'm not alone!)

The other confession is that while this will be my third (attempt at a) December Daily, I have never managed to complete the entire album! I’m trusting you all to keep me accountable this time! But the beauty of a December Daily is that by doing a little something every day, you keep from getting overwhelmed with the larger picture. And when it’s finished (and we WILL finish, right!?!) you’ll have a wonderful keepsake that will be treasured forever. So let’s dive in....

Here is the cover of my 2012 album.

Supplies: Pink Paislee binder and tab, Echo Park stickers, Bazzill Cardstock, BasicGrey bookplate & alpha stickers, twine, EK Success punches (scallop, circle & snowflake), Silhouette electronic cutting machine, Folk Art acrylic paint, twine.

 

   

And a little detail shot here - I cut out the 2012 with my Silhouette and layered up the snowflake and "25" circle with some pop dots.

   

Supplies: Bazzill Cardstock, Echo Park PP * stickers, BasicGrey PP (music), EK Success Punches.

Since this is my 3^rd December Daily (and I swear I’ll finish it this year!), I wanted to include a small introduction to this holiday season like I have in years past. I love the look of white on white and since the interior of the album was a kraft that wasn’t in my desired color palette, I choose to cover the inside front and back cover with white cardstock then scattered snowflake punches as if they were falling from the corner. I have also found that sealing not only the outside cover but inside cover is so important, especially if they are going to be handled for years to come.

 
For more of my December Daily, please hop over to the Scrapbook & Cards Today blog. I'll also be posting more here as the days go by. For now, we're off to a Christmas Parade....Advent Calendar item #1 about to be checked off! :)

Have a wonderful weekend!
xoxo, 
k