CTMH Promotion for Relief Efforts in Japan

Close to My Heart is holding a wonderful promotion. This A-size stamp (typically $8.95 Cnd) will be available until April 30th for $5 + tax and shipping.

Close to My Heart will donate 100% of the profits from the sale of this stamp to the Red Cross to benefit relief efforts in Japan.

Contact me if you'd like to order one (email, text or phone, details on the side of my blog)!

Message Can

Elora is bottle fed now which means I have tons and tons of formula cans (powdered stuff) going through the house. I started saving a few thinking I would either donate them to a youth group for crafts or make something with one of my monthly gatherings. I intended on saving... oh... six or so. I estimate I have about two dozen. With the move looming on the horizon it was time to DO something with them!


There are several ideas I have an I intend to do a few more soon (tm), but the one I'm showing you today is the Message Can for kids. I tell my children every day, several times a day, "I love you" and "I'm proud of you". But as Koen learns to read I wanted to make a place I could put little notes for him, messages like how it made me smile when he did X, or how sweet it was that he did Y. The key is to drop the messages in there when he's not looking so it's always a surprise when there's a new note! (He also has a mailbox for when Grandma sends him letters or parcels).


Of course I'll do similar cans for the girls, but for now... I used Hooligan paper and some dollar store ribbon. The "goo" is a Martha Stewart edge punch. For the hole in the top I used a punch from Stampin' Up and made a stencil, then cut out the hole by hand.


Another use for these cans is the Baby's Firsts can. When Koen was born it was super easy to jot down in my pre-purchased book when he first crawled or when his first tooth came in. The details were then transferred to his baby book, which I had lots of time to make! With the arrival of Kerowyn things got a bit hectic. What I have recorded is stuck on a sticky note and shoved into her incomplete baby book (she's nearly 3 now). Elora... baby book? haha what?


So the Baby's First can works the same way as the child's Message Can. When your baby does something remarkable you jot down the date and time and a sentence to remind you what it was and drop it in the can. It can sit on a shelf and be all pretty and when you are ready to work on the baby book, all those "firsts" are in one safe place.


One more for the road... the Snaps can (thank you Legally Blonde). A family writes notes about positive things they've seen the rest of the family do during the day and after supper (or when ever) they sit down together and take turns drawing them out and reading them. The movie reference would then have everyone say, "Snaps for you!" and much finger snapping. It's a great "feel good" bond building exercise, but better for children who can read.


Thanks for checking in!

Embossing Day Four: Scratch and Sniff

Been a while since I posted on my Embossing Extravaganza, I apologize for that. Today I'm revisiting a technique a friend of mine taught me a few years ago (thank you Chris!) called Scratch and Sniff. When she showed me it was with clear embossing powder, but I wanted to try something different.

First of all you need your sniff... I used kool-aid powder. Yes, you read that right. I would like to try it again sometime with jello powder since I can't find any Green Apple in Kool-aid. I chose tropical punch and mixed two different color embossing powders together (Cranberry and Outdoor Denim) to try and match the purple kool-aid a bit. I added some sparkly embossing powder after I'd mixed it... it needed sparkle.

Next I grabbed my new Mayberry stamp set and stamped a few plums in versamark and dipped them in my mixture. Careful when heat embossing here because the kool-aid can make it a bit tricky to heat evenly and you may find it starts to bubble and even burn!

Once you're done let it cool off... then rub it with your finger and sniff!
I completed my card using Close to My Heart's retired paper Bella... one of the main colors is "Smokey Plum", it had to be done! Not related to embossing but... if you're inking, watch for fingerprints when you put down pieces of your card (in other words, I have no excuses for those purple fingerprints on the card lol).

Thanks for stopping by!

Moving sucks

Happy Saint Patrick's day!

I'm still in the throes of a packing nightmare as I prepare to move to my new place. Three small children really complicate things!! We take possession of our new house on April 1st (hahah, no joke).

Last night was our CTMH Unit meeting (just me and my up-line, Leisa)... I use the term "meeting" really loosely. We craft, drink coffee, chat, and watch re-runs of Glee. But I did get a card and a two page spread finished. The pages I can't show you until after the monthly gathering... but the card I can! (Pictures always look so much better when Leisa takes them!)

This card uses the Mayberry paper with the March SotM called Sensational Seasons. I used our watercolor pencils to color in the bunny and eggs, using Honey, Smoothie and Olive for the eggs so they'd match. The shape was cut out using my nestabilities, the border punch is from Stampin' Up.

Edit to leave you with more cute!!

Scrapbox Give-away

This is an amazing give-away. So while I don't normally link to give-aways in my blog... wow. Just... wow. There's this Canada Workbox Giveaway of a whole "The Original Scrapbox"

If you want to enter to, you'll need to head over to Andrea's blog!

Additional entries for the contest can be made at the following blogs:

Canadian Nickel

Pink Star Creations

Paper Inspirations

Random Acts of Krafting

Chris's Creations

A Mom After God's Own Heart

Jenny's Scrapbooking Haven

Momma K Crafts

More Sweetheart

This is the other half of the projects we did at my first "group" gathering. (It's a group that agrees to meet and make a minimum purchase and rotate which participant gets the hostess rewards). My iphone still doesn't pick up the reds and pinks very well...

I used the Sweetheart paper pack on black cardstock. The pink cardtstock is Cotton Candy. The butterfly is an exclusive stamp for the Sweetheart Workshop on the Go and "Elora" was stamped with Old World Alphabet. The rose was made from our new designer ribbon pink collection.

The pictures are all from Elora's first few days (few hours in the case of the one with me holding her, that's at the hospital still!). This will become the first page in her baby book!

Thanks for checking in!

There be (more) dragons!

Here it is! Using the Sweetheart paper, some black and cranberry embossing powder and "Birthday Blast" and "So Lucky" stamp sets.

I spritzed the dragon's square with a mix of ink and shimmer paint to give it a glimmer you can't see in a photograph. The dragon and balloons are textured and a bit shiny due to the embossing powder.

One of the ladies in the group did a version of the card with both design papers flipped over (the black dots becomes white with pink dots and the red cross hatch becomes black) and then did the balloons in pink, and used pink ribbon, it looked great!

You may have noticed I'm really liking the dragons. Maybe. Just a little.

Thanks for checking in!

First day and blog candy

Today is the first day of myCTMH group (a group that meets once a month and agrees to buy a minimum of product and then trades who gets the hostess duties and benefits) and I'm both stoked and nervous! I've designed one 12x12 layout and one card using the requested paperpack Sweetheart. I've finished cutting all the materials for five sets (though some people can't make it so I'll be assembling three myself hehe) and I HOPE I've packed everything I need.

I'll be posting the pictures after the event... no sneek peeks!

In the meantime though, my upline is having a give-away on her blog to celebrate reaching 200 members! She's got a great blog, well worth the look!

Remodel of Aspire Card

I liked the Aspire card I did so much that I remade it for a card swap. This one was much easier than the dragon to make!!

I used Wings paper, with Whisper White and Vineyard Berry cardstock. Then inked the image, from the Aspire stamp set, in Juniper and the sentiment in black.

"If you don't leap, you'll never know what it's like to fly."

House of Plague!

So after Valentine's day my entire household got sick (we're still battling the remnants of icky). But I'm back and I'm posting, even if I don't have the next installment of the embossing extravaganza!

Instead I'm going to show you a card I did for a swap!

This card uses the Lucky paper pack and the Birthday Blast stamp set, both are new this catalogue. I used olive embossing powder for the dragon and the green balloon. Let me tell you... cutting things out for a card swap? means lots of cutting!! I made 8 cards... so I cut out 8 dragons and 24 balloons *dies*.