Stretch Your Haul: Close To My Heart Workshops on the Go

We see a lot of scrapbooking posts and videos about "Scrap Your Stash" and shopping hauls. I would like to do something a little different. 

First of all, I purchase the items in my stash with a purpose, because I love them. I don't want to just "use them up", I want to use them to their fullest, on as many projects as possible. I want to stretch my stash. 

So when I am shopping, I keep this "stretch my stash" mentality in bold at the top of my mental wish list. I only buy a whole collection or a kit if I know I have a use for every piece of it. Otherwise I just buy the pieces that have a specific purpose, or can serve multiple purposes. I also tend to spend more of my hard-earned scrappy spending cash on tools and other things that can be used over and over, like stamps. 

Perfect segue - enter Close To My Heart Workshops on the Go kits. These kits feature the catalog's current paper collections and an exclusive stamp set, including stamps sized for page titles, at a package savings. Each kit also includes some embellishments and extra cardstock in order to complete the layout in the step-by-step guide included in the kit.

Most of the kits are scrapbooking kits, but there are also a couple of card-making kits. In the video below I show you the contents of one of the card-making kits and explain how I am going to stretch its contents for my scrapbooking. Please excuse the video quality, but I hope it is helpful!

While this specific kit is no longer available for purchase, the Laughing Lola papers and embellishments are still available from the last catalog, you can purchase those here: 

Laughing Lola Paper and Complements:

http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/retail/Products.aspx?CatalogID=2002 

Laughing Lola Embellishment Assortment:

http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7336&CatalogID=176

Stay tuned for my next post when I will share the projects I made with the Laughing Lola line!

I'm still alive, stay tuned!

Hello crafty blog-reading friends!

I just wanted to drop a quick note, as I know it's been waaaaaaaaay too long since I have posted, and my apologies for that, as I never wanted to be one of "those" bloggers - life has just gotten the best of me, and my time!

I am hoping that soon I will become more in control of my time so that I can resume weekly posts.

Please don't give up on me!  And NEVER stop crafting!

Old Habits Die Hard ... But You Find Fun Things!

So by my left-brained nature, I am a chronological scrapbooker 99% of the time, it's just how my brain works, and we can go into that more some other time.  Well, recently, for the purpose of other research for event planning for my church's youth group, I spread out the memorabilia for the past 8 years of youth work I have yet to catch-up on (another dirty word, I know).  

Because I like to do all my youth ministry scrapbooking in a separate book, and because I like to share my finished pages, I decided that this is to be an area of focus for awhile, of course mixing in some other mini albums for variety. 

So I am launching the process of making myself a master list of pages / topics to be scrapped, because I do not have anything physical to refer to.  Some topics have memorabilia on these piles, some don't.  Some have printed photos, some don't.  Some have digital photos, some don't.  Some I still want to search for others' photos on Facebook to use. Multiple sources feeding into my memory hoarding, and my left brain just screams "MUST MAKE LIST!"  And I can imagine those of you that are far right-brained are cringing right now just at the thought of all of that list-making. 

But the fun of it is reliving those memories again, just for a brief moment, as a preview of what they will be once they are scrapped.  And one of the treasures I came across is the layout below. 

One of the things I do the most in my volunteer role for my church's high school youth group is to help or lead the planning of retreats and trips.  For our fall girls' retreat in 2006, I asked all the girls to bring a favorite photo of themselves at any age. And we then scrapbooked it as one of our activities in the hotel suite where we gathered, listing our own qualities and blessings.  This was my layout. 

 

It is probably one of the simplest layouts I ever made, but it is still a treasure and a good reminder, not only of that event, but also of my identity.  

So I leave you with two pieces of encouragement:

1. Don't be afraid to go back and dig, treasures await to be found and enjoyed!

2. If you never have before, find a favorite photo of yourself and document how awesome you are!

Layout Share: Book Addict

Another layout about books?  Yes, I hope my fellow scrapbooking bookworms are reading! I actually ordered two of these Scholastic paper packs from Close To My Heart because I loved the book and library papers so much, knowing I would have to do at least one layout on which I cut the book paper apart and stacked it like a stack of books. Well here it is!

What's great is just by cutting apart one piece of that patter, I have many more "books" to stack on other layouts if I should desire to do so.

I will confess I struggled a bit with how to arrange the layout.  However, out of the struggle came one of my favorite spontaneous self-made embellishments. 

It was one of those "well let's try this..." moments that resulted in impressing myself.  The heart was cut using the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge from Close To My Heart that lives in my Cricut, it is literally my default for die-cutting.  I wrapped some navy twine and included a brad (also from Close To My Heart) and wa-la! An embellishment is born!

So because I am here to share my love for scrapbooking, and tips if you want them, here you go:

1. Don't be limited to cutting straight lines from your patterned paper - try finding ways of cutting into them in a way that works WITH the design of the paper.

2. Can't find an embellishment that fits your theme/colors/size needed?  Try throwing some things together and make your own!

Happy Scrapping!

What's in a Name? I AM Tickle Me Scrappy

As I was debating what to blog about this week, my husband jokingly suggested I blog about tickles. Sounds odd, I know, but it did start me thinking, made me realize that I haven't really gone into explaining why and how I chose the name of my brand and blog. It's not exactly one story but rather a mixed stew of a number of different thoughts and parts of my "unique" personality. So where to start . . .

First of all I have to mention that this brand name did not come about easily. I recall lounging with my husband on a random weekend afternoon, brainstorming a list of about 40 possible names, most of which caused us laughter.  I then narrowed it down, Googled the semi-finalists for competitors, narrowed it down again and picked this one out of three finalists.

So here is a not-so-brief explanation in bullets:

• Let's get the obvious part out of the way: I am a scrapbooker, obsessed with my hobby, and my cup runneth over, so I wanted to start sharing with a larger audience.  I hope you enjoy what I share, Audience.

• Just like photos freeze a moment in time to be seen again later, I scrapbook to take that one step further. On my pages, I take those photos, combine them with words and art that hopefully convey the mood and spirit of that memory, to later cause me a journey back to that moment in time. Just like you get a tingling sensation when you hit your "funny bone" in your elbow, looking back at my scrapbook pages causes me a shiver of a great memory.  It tickles my "memory bone". Which leads me to . . .

• That phrase "tickle your funny bone" when something makes you laugh, with freedom and joy.  Humor is important in my life and my marriage.

• My feet are extremely ticklish, and my husband makes it his daily mission to tickle them.

• That humor I was talking about? Yeah, it abounds in our household.  I tell you I am legally sane, and then I introduce you to Chiwwy, the Shivering Penguin. We have no pets or children as of yet, and therefore my husband and I have built a bigger personality for this little guy than we would admit in court. So he is this blog's mascot, and you will see more of him in the future!

 

So if you were looking for a light-hearted, downright silly blog about scrapbooking and memory hoarding, you are in the right place, click to "Follow" before you think about it too hard. If my flavor is not your cup of cocoa, I wish you many blessings, but if you still choose to stick around, I promise never to be something I'm not.

Happy scrapping!

Their Sketch, My Way: Scrap Zone

Welcome to another first for me! I've been a Close To My Heart consultant for a couple of months already, and a customer for two years, and this is the first time I used one of their Workshop on the Go (WOTG) guides. I can sometimes be a stubborn rebel against things that I think everyone is doing, but I can admit to using sketches from time to time to dislodge a crafter's block. And I adore any artwork I have seen designed by Close To My Heart thus far. Plus, if you have been reading my blog, you will know that I am a strong believer that there are no rules in this art form of memory keeping, so therefore if sketches are your forte, I think that is fantastic, and I encourage you to consider the books and kits that Close To My Heart has to offer.  But I digress.

I have already used some of the Laughing Lola WOTG kit on the Debbie Reynolds layout (seen here: http://ticklemescrappy.blogspot.com/2013/12/layout-share-debbie-reynolds.html ), so I felt I should next use these lovely papers on the included sketch before I used up too much to resemble their beautiful design. But of course I had to make it my own!

First, is a picture of how the guide layout looks, so that you can see my starting point.  

And (drum roll, please!) here is my layout!

As you can see, the original design is definitely apparent in my layout, but I have also made some adjustments, such as:

- The 2 pictures on the far left are a bit bigger than the sketch, and I used black hemp to define the line between them.

- I substituted one of the 4 photos on the left for a journaling block.

- In place of one large photo and a large open space on the right page, I stacked three, again using the black hemp as a dividing line.

- I used the purple patterned paper instead of the plain cardstock.

- I used different stamps and accents than shown on the example in the guide.

- And of course in my habit of stretching your supplies, I mixed in some non-Close To My Heart items (I am typically not a product purist).

Here are a couple of detail shots. 

First, I used other  Close To My Heart stamps than intended to heat emboss my title.  The word "Scrap" is done with an alpha stamp set, and the word "Zone" and small arrow in circle is from the ProPlayer WOTG stamp set.

Here is a picture of the embellishment cluster to the upper right of the layout, again adjusted from the original sketch to include more banner pieces and the chipboard camera accent.

I love how this turned out, and I hope you have enjoyed it too!  And I hope my layout has inspired you to take a sketch - whether it is how you usually scrap or not - and make it your own.  Your Life, Your Art, Your Way!

Want to get your hands on the products I used? Here's how!

Laughing Lola Workshop on the Go - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7402&CatalogID=1639

Laughing Lola Paper Pack - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7394&CatalogID=2002

Laughing Lola Complements - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7322&CatalogID=2002

Laughing Lola Assortment - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7336&CatalogID=176

Framework Alphabet - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7475&CatalogID=1836

ProPlayer Workshop on the Go - http://ticklemescrappy.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=7404&CatalogID=1639

Follow me on Facebook!  https://www.facebook.com/ticklemescrappyctmh