1,2,3, Hop!

It's the 15th and I've joined my good crafty friends, Betsy and Tracey, in a mid-month hop to highlight patterns in Close to My Heart how to books: Reflections, Make From the Heart, Originals, etc.  I love books and use them all the time.  The books, all modeled on Jeanette Lynton's card and scrapbook designs, make cards and scrapbooks so easy.  This month we focused on Card Pattern 30 from Make It From the Heart. Here is what I made.  I had the For Always paper pack already spread out on my table and Valentine's Day was chasing me so I created several cards using the same pattern, just turning it and adding different embellishments.  Quickly I had four cards!  What fun! 

 

Then, inspiration hit me and the last card happened with leftover pieces of chipboard, leftover attempt to heat emboss the heart with live in it. and my first real use of buttons.  LOL  So, I modified the measurements but the card idea is the same.  I love being able to rotate cards, change measurements to use scraps or different focus points and embellishments.  Use the How to Books to create fun cards and inspire you to plau!  Be sure to visit Betsy's and Tracey's blogs as I know did something wonderful the will awe us! 

Follow us for fun!  We'll be posting again at in the Paper Trail Hop and again the 15th of each month!  Drop a not when you hop by, I'd love to hear from you!

Mary

Spring Time Thanks

Close to My Heart is having a fabulous special offer of 24 sheets of Background and Texture paper in wonderful spring designs right now.  Each of these designs features polka dots on the reverse side, which I just love!!!  I had the chance to down to make a few thank-yous for all my wonderful friends who threw me a surprise birthday party a couple of weeks ago.  Don't you just love the spring colors!!!!  And I still have lots of paper left over.  Eat your hearts out, paper hoarders.  :)

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

I love Michael! He turns 52 today and I gave him several gifts including this perpetual calendar and a card (other gifts were no handmade....  :))  Here is the perpetual calendar I made.  Turned out to be pretty easy to do and my wonderful friend Tracey and each made one in an afternoon.  We got the idea from the Close to My Heart consultant website.

This uses a 12X12 chipboard base, Mischief papers, and various letters and alphabets.  Isn't it cute?  I was just surprised how fast it actually went together!

For Michael's card, I used a Mojo Monday sketch.  He favorite color is purple so I tried to use purple with a masculine twist:

BIG Happy Birthday to my Love!

Happy Birthday, Dear Friend!

One of my closest and oldest friend celebrated her 40 yesterday and I wanted to make a special card for her.  The internet was my life saver yesterday.  I found several cards/patterns I loved, pulled together some of my friend's favorite colors from the Roxie paper pack, switched on the Cricut, and turned out this card:

It was just amazing how quickly this card fell together!  I finished it off with two dozen lovely roses in the same pinks used on the car on the way to the party.  The whole thing just came together so easy!