Gina's Little Corner of StampinHeaven

This month, Close To My Heart's Stamp of the Month is Friendship.  I decided to get away from the traditional colors of Red and Pink for Valentines Day.   I wanted something a little different.   I chose to make my cards using the new Lucky paper from Close To My Heart.   I love the colors of Outdoor Denim, Desert Sand and Sunset. The square card is a 6x6 card using the Background Bar pattern from Originals .  The smaller card is a 3x6 card using the patter Name Plate from Wishes . Recipes: Background Bar - Originals Colonial White Cardstock (1388) Lucky My Reflections Level 2 Paper (X7137B) Sunset Cardstock (X5758) Outdoor Denim Cardstock (1275) Outdoor Denim Ink  (Z2140) Peweter Brads (Z1366) Name Plate - Wishes Colonial White Cardstock (1388) Lucky My Reflections Level 2 Paper (X7137B) Desert Sand Cardstock (1273) Outdoor Denim Ink (Z2140) Natural Hemp (Z280) Wooden Buttons (Z1387) Dry Embossing Stylus (Z608) Sanding Kit (Z1294)

This past week was club week for me. This month my clubs worked on their Wings layout from the Wings Workshop On The Go.   The spray pen was a big hit and everyone had alot of fun spraying their pages.  On Thursday night, one of the girls had cut her pieces for the layout and was getting ready to lay them out on her base page.   The Vineyard Berry and Black damask piece had flipped over and was laying on the table with the Sweet Leaf side up.  She loved the color so much, she decided she needed to do her layout using that side of the paper rather than the side that was instructed.   She substituted the Butterfly B&T for the Sweet Leaf Cardstck and used Colonial White instead of Black for the base pages.  The layout turned out beautiful.  I just had to share.  Mandy's Alternate Layout  Original Layou   This just shows how versatile Close To My Heart papers are within their own kits!

I'm one week away from my Spring Summer Open House and I can't wait to share the new products and workshop kits with everyone!  I'm planning a Valentine card for a Free Make & Take.  We'll be using the new Sweetheart Paper, Bohemian Stampset  along with the fun spray pen technique.   Browse the new products and sign up for some upcoming workshops.   You can sign up for the February Workshop, Sophia, which we will be doing on February 24th. Or how about my upcoming Card Chatter Workshop on March 10 / March 12! After you've checked out the new products and signed up for my workshops, be sure to check my Clearance section.   I had to clean out my scrap room to make room for these new products!  I'll have LOTS of paper, cardstock, stamps (new & Used), and more at LOW prices!  PLUS, choose from many handmade cards I'll have for sale! DOOR PRIZES?  Of course, there will be door prizes!  Not only will this be a Spring Summer product celebration, I&

I've had several requests for an All Occasion Card workshop this year.  When I saw "Bless This Nest" among Close To My Heart's newest stamp collections in the 2011 Spring Summer Idea Book I just KNEW this would be the stamp I'd center my cards around.   These challenges have really helped me with my designs.    I designed one card for the Mojo Monday #173 challenge already.   If you missed it, you can click on the Mojo link.     This week's H2H Challenge was to use any animal or bird on a card.  Did someone tell them I was working on this already?  It seems like lately, the H2H team must be reading my mind!  Here is card #2 for my upcoming Card Chatter workshop. Recipe: Card Pattern:   Originals - Upper Level Focus Colonial White Cards and Envelopes (X1410) Paper - Creative Basics Wings Collection (X5812)* Ribbon - Sweet Leaf Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon (Z1383)* Cocoa Cardstock (X5642) Colonial White Cardstock (1388) Bless This Nest (C1445)* Card Chatter

I got a little behind posting last week.  My husband had to have surgery on Thursday and I've had family & friends calling and bringing food.   Now I've got several thank you cards to make!  I couldn't wait to see this week's Mojo Monday sketch.  I already knew that I would use this one as one of my thank you cards. For this week's sketch, they also asked us to use hat pins.  I still have a few left from last year when I purchased some for the Daydream Workshop kit that we did.  Here is the sketch:                              For my card, I used the new Sophia paper again.  Have I said how much I love this paper?  Maybe it is the bright cheery colors in contract to this dreary wintery weather we've had lately.   It will really cheer you up.   I also used the new Sweet Leaf ribbon around my circle - I just cinched it up by pulling the thread on one side.   My 'ribbon' across the front of the card is from one of our new stamp sets - Eclectic Edg

One of the things on my TO DO list for today was to work on the Sophia Workshop on the Go.   This is the workshop project that my clubs will be doing in February.  I needed to finish it before we meet this month so they can see what they will be doing next.   The Sophia paper is sooo pretty!  When I saw today's Mojo Monday sketch, I knew I had to use the Sophia paper for it.     Here is the sketch for this week's Mojo Monday:   My card will give you a little sneak peek at the new Sophia paper that is coming in our 2011 Spring Summer Idea Book. Recipe: Colonial White Cards and Envelopes (X1410) Sophia My Reflection Paper (X7131B) Pear Cardstock (X5764) Sophia My Acrylix Stamp (Available ONLY in WOTG Kit - G1019) Card Chatter - Birthday (D1475) Buttons Pink Assortment (Z1370) White Daisy Grosgrain Ribbon (Z270) My Exclusive Ink - Pear (Z2197) My Exclusive Ink - Goldrush (Z2123) Corner Rounder (Z578) All products are Close To My Heart If you want to see more great cards for

One of the things I wanted to resolve to do in 2011 was to challenge my creativity.   To do this, I am going to participate in more blog challenges!  The Mojo Monday challenge was created by Julee Tilman in 2007 on her own blog.  It grew so much in popularity that now Mojo Monday has its own blog with a very talented design team! These challenges are meant to inspire and challenge your creativity.  So join in on the fun. Challenge yourself. Here is this weeks card sketch : I recently received my new Close To My Heart Spring/Summer products and I couldn't wait to start playing with them.   One of my 'instant' favorite stamps from this book is called Bless This Nest .  I HAD to have it.   The card I have designed here will be one of the cards in my Spring Card Chatter Workshop (Date still TBD).   I can't wait! And now.... my card: RECIPE: Colonial White Cards and Envelopes (X1410) Paper - Creative Basics Wings Collection (X5812)* Ribbon (is included with Creative

I'm taking a break from my Organizing to post my entry for the H2H Challenge.  It is a well deserved break too!  I've been doing so much sorting and straightening lately. Take a look at my scraptable! It was just BEGGING me to mess it up! I was excited about doing this H2H Challenge. The H2H Challenge is a color challenge and I was ready for a change in colors!  I still had not received my order of the new Spring Summer products to play with so I've been working with the new Wings paper kit almost exclusively. Here are the colors for the challenge: We were allowed to add a touch of sorbet. Here is my H2H Color Challenge entry:  "Dream" For the color of Sky, I used B&T paper from Magnifique and Sky Cardstock.  Pear came from the B&T paper from Olivia and Pear Cardstock. "Dream" is stamped in Sky u sing the new "Dreams Come True" Stampset that is featured in this month's January Inspiration Brochure.   This stamp is regu

It's is something I'm trying to overcome.   I LOVE the look of ribbon, buttons, brads and lots of bling.  But I have this fear that I will use them up and won't have any left.   It's not like I don't know where I can get more! I remember once doing a card in a workshop that was embellished with 15 tiny brads in a semi-circle.   It looked really cute but OH MY it was hard for me to add 15 brads for just ONE card!  I'm getting better though.  I think I'm about to overcome this behavior.  But in the meantime, I've got lots of embellishments!   I love the look of embellishment jars that you see lined up on cute little shelves in magazines.   But until I get that dream scraproom that is just not functional for me.  I need easy access and if I go to a crop I want to be able to take what I need without having to pack a box of jars! I'm ALWAYS looking for ways to store my embellishments.  It will be one of those ever changing parts of my scraproom.    But

When you are a scrapbooker, cardmarker or into any kind of papercrafting I think it is very hard to throw away even the smallest of scraps. You never know when you might need just a piece of something and if you are like me, you hate to cut a big sheet of 12x12 just because you need a small square! So I'm saver of scraps! In the beginning, I had a terrible time deciding how to keep and organize my scraps so that I would actually find what I needed and use them! Finally, I think I found something that works well for me. First lets cover the printed paper scraps, or, B & T (Background and Texture) as we Close to My Heart die-hards call them. I rarely buy any other printed papers anymore because I have always found what I needed from CTMH. When you buy the My Reflection Level 2 kits you get 12 sheets of B & T and 10 sheets of cardstock. I can create alot of things with a Level 2 kit but I STILL have nice size pieces of scraps left in addition to that 'itty

A fresh new year means a fresh new start in my scrap room!   I like to clean up and file everything from the previous year's business and usually this means taking a look at how I've stored and stocked my supplies in addition to how I have kept my business records!   This month I'll devote my blog to organization so over the next few weeks I'll share with you how I organize (or NOT) all things scrapbooking/papercrafting and record keeping! My Uppercase Living Quote above my workdesk Now, I don't have a nice big studio that we all dream of.  You know the great big room with huge windows that let in lots of natural light.  The walls are painted a light yellow like sunshine and there are shelves and closets on every wall full of baskets and drawers.   A big worktable in the middle of the room high enough to stand and work if you choose.   The worktable has shelves and drawers to hold all the essentials.  There is a computer/cricut workstation area tucked in the c