Close To My Heart page protectors converted for use on Creative Memories pages

  For those of you who are/were Creative Memories ladies and are now left without those products, especially things like page protectors. I ran across this wonderful video, I think on FB, that gives an excellent tutorial on how to convert Close To My Heart page protectors so that they will work for Creative Memories albums. Shaunna Richards is one of our newest CTMH consultants from Down Under! We are so glad that they now have a company to supply their needs and look forward to seeing the work of creative ladies from that part of the world.
   Anyway, she created a wonderful video to show how you can continue to protect those pages that you might still have from Creative Memories or those albums that you want to finish and/or use.






                                              
   Hope this helps. Go HERE and order yours today. http://pollylewis.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=1051&CatalogID=35 for a 10 pack at  $5.95  or better yet, get the value pack http://pollylewis.ctmh.com/Retail/Product.aspx?ItemID=1037&CatalogID=35 a 50 pack for $22.95

While your there shopping be sure to check out the "while supplies last" section. You'll find some great bargains. You need to come back and check this area often, as it is always changing.
      Blessings,     Polly

Big Picture Classes hosting a free Pajama Party and featuring our new Close To My Heart "Artbooking" cricut cartridge!

Last post I was telling some about our newest Cricut cartridge and now you can get a sneak peek. Big Picture Classes is going to be hosting another Pajama Party featuring Close To My Heart and most exciting of all our newest Cricut cartridge, "Artbooking", on Wednesday, July 31 at 6pm Pacific Time! There will be a live chat, contests, and prizes! I'm sure we'll be learning tips and tricks, inspirational ideas, and there will be a project all for free! All you need to do is head over to Big Picture Classes and sign up HERE. There you can find a project list and other info. You will not be able to order this cartridge until Aug. 1, but this class will show you what you can do with this cartridge and it will be archived in your classes so that you can go back and access it at a later date when you have that fantabulous cartridge in your cricut machine just waiting to cut!
  Here is the featured project.





So go get signed up for the class and  then go HERE and order your cartridge. Also, at the Big Picture site you can see the list of all the supplies you need to complete this project, so check it out and get your order in for everything you need now!
      Blessings,   Polly

Another new Cricut Cartridge from Close To My Heart!

   I absolutely LOVE Close To My Heart's Cricut cartridges. They are so packed full of images, 3-D objects, cards, words, and so much more. I think after each one I can't imagine how Jeanette will come out with another that can be as good or better than the two we already have. I have not near used up everything I'd like to make with the Art Philosophy or the Artiste cartridges. They each have one font and over 700 images. These babies are loaded, they each have 6 feature keys. But as you've already probably guessed or seen on other blogs, she's done it again!! The new "Artbooking" cartridge is jam packed like the others, but with all new stuff. It has one font and 30 themed Double page layouts all size coordinated, 10 themed Mini Albums (8x8, 6x6, 5x7) with a minimun of 8 pages each, Full and Partial page overlays, loads of phrases, themed accessory images and themed and decorated photo mats!!!!
   We were able to create one of the mini albums at convention and they used soooo many cute cuts from this cartridge, including the file folder pages.
   I have my cartridge, but alas, I have been so busy with other stuff and I haven't made the first cut with it :(((

   This cartridge will be available to customers on Aug 1! You can preorder  one from me and I will give you free shipping and tax or better yet, host and online party and earn it for 1/2 price.! Remember, Close To My Heart cartridges also come with 3 sheets of coordinating chipboard shapes and 3 D-size stamp sets. Just email me and let me know you would love to have one.
  




 I have to say that the only thing I haven't used as much on the previous cartridges was the stamp sets, but I am absolutely in love with these!



One example of a mini book. Don't ya just wanta open it up and check out the lusiciousness?!

And the new catalog is full of so much fun and creativeness! I just want to order a truckload! I will be sharing some of all that sweetness in the coming days. If you would like a copy of your own New Idea book let me know and I can share with you how to get one for free.
   Don't miss out on the great promotion for the month of July.  The Workshop on the Go Canvas Art Kit in the 2013 Spring/Summer catalog is now 1/2 price! For $19.95 you get a 12"x12" chevron printed canvas in neutral colors, a C-size stamp, 1 yd Cashmere Bakers Twine, 10 clear sparkles, 2- 12"x6" Dimensional Elements in Color-Art Shapes and an instructional guide. The stamp set alone is almost worth that amount and you'll have it to use over and over. Hurry and grab yours as these are only while supplies last! Go to: pollylewis.ctmh.com and while your there be sure to check out the great bargains under "While Supplies Last" in the left column. There are some super, duper deals there.


 
 I believe that is enough goodness to share for this post. But never fear, I will be back soon to post more. I still plan to post my scrapbook pages for convention. But I loaned them to another consultant and I need to take some close ups of some of the special things I did and so I will have to wait to get those back later this week.
    Blessings,    Polly

I'm Back! I hope....

I thought the last time was bad when I neglected to post for about 4 months and now its been much more than that! I hate to even acknowledge it, but I either quit completely or get back into it and so here I go. I can give you lots of excuses/reasons as to why there's been such a long time with no posts and I will give you some, but truthfully I coulda at least checked in and let ya'll know what was going on.
It has been a VERY busy year for me to say the least and I've really done very little crafting. In Jan. and Feb. I was spending a lot of my time next door at my elderly neighbors house taking care of her. She didn't fair so well through the winter, especially since she has COPD. And she doesn't have family close so I have "adopted" her. In March I was working on getting some seeds going for the garden, beginning to sew for the upcoming wedding and making preparations to go to Indiana to see our newest granddaughter. She was born April 4th which was a week or so before we thought she'd come. This was our daughter's first daughter and long awaited. She has 5 boys already! They thought they were quitting, but then they got a beautiful
surprise!
                     
And then two days after she was born we got the terrible news that my husband's brother had been killed in a tragic accident. So we left for Indiana a few days earlier than planned. It was a very bittersweet week. All of our children and grandchildren got to spend some  time together which hadn't happened in quite a while and little Myla brought smiles to very sad faces. He will be greatly missed, most especially by his wife and he left behind 3 children still at home and one married. He never even got the chance to love and kiss on  a grandchild. He was such a happy, cheerful person and never met a stranger. His viewing and funeral were testimony to that.
   Then it was back home to prepare for a Feast week and then I had a couple weeks to prepare for a bunch of Indiana family to come down for our oldest son's wedding on May 19th. We had a houseful and then some. Our two married children and their children stayed here and so did my parents. My husband's sister and husband stayed at the neighbors and we had others staying elsewhere. Most of them stayed almost two weeks! I loved it, but got very tired of cooking and cleaning up! I would not change it for anything. I had prepared quite a bit of food ahead, (I thought,) but it seemed like we were running to the grocery or Wal-Mart everyday. We also had started an upstairs bathroom remodel (very much needed) a few months before which our son was doing. After he started he was called out of town to work and was only home on weekends. This lasted at least 6 wks and so we were remodeling a bathroom even as family was showing up.
  I also, had taken on the job of altering the bridesmaid dresses and somewhat remaking the bridal gown. It was at least 4 sizes to big! But she loved it and couldn't get it in the right size. It began as a strapless and I added the top part on so that it sorta had cap sleeves and gave a bit more coverage. She also didn't have to go around holding it up all night :) I did manage to get that done before my family all came in. Here is a picture of her in her dress.

  And then as soon as all the family left and things were mostly put back in order I began to work on my layouts for the Close To My Heart convention album contest. This years theme was "Live" or Viva!. I had been gathering ideas, sketches, techniques and info for almost a year so I had quit a bit to start on, but it still took me about 5 weeks to get 5- 2 page layouts completed before I left to go on June 26th. I was soooo ready to get back in my craft room to actually scrapbook and then I practically lived there for those 5 weeks.
   My poor crafting ladies that meet monthly must have felt very neglected. We didn't meet in April or May at all! But they remained loyal and put in orders each month anyway.
   And so....that is the first half of 2013. I have much more to tell and I will be sharing my layouts in the next couple of weeks. Telling of some fun and exciting new things I learned at convention  and showing some new product. Close To My Heart is an awesome company to work for. They care so much about their consultants.
  I believe this will be all for tonight. And unless some major catastrophe comes up I plan to be back with more in the next day or so.

Blessings,   Polly

Clearly The Best: Re-vamping with Overstamping (S01E12)

Let this video show you how to get more use out of your stamps.

Experimenting with Pop-up cards

    Drats! I've gone and done it again! I am so ashamed and apologize to those who may be following me. You sure haven't had much to follow lately. I have been busy and haven't even had the time to craft like I would like to. And then what I have made I haven't posted. I am going to start my resolutions early and resolve to make posting a higher priority.
With that said, my card ladies have been wanting to do a pop-up card and here's what we did this last month for class. I will have to say that I was definitely winging this one. But I am pleased with the results. Making a decision as to  how many pop-outs you want and the depth and height of them is the first decision. I recommend you Google pop up cards and get some ideas from out in Google land, because there are so many ways you can do them.
On this card I made 3 pop-outs. The two outside ones stand out 3/4" and the inside only 1/2".
I used a lot of cuts from the Art Philosophy and Artiste Cricut cartridges. We did alot of piecing. The turkey was cut 3 times with different papers each time. One was a shadow layer and then the actual body and head part I just cut off the wings. The middle layer I used Close To My Heart Clementine paper. I really like the dimensional effect. The pumpkin I cut 5 ovals and then layered them. It didn't look so much like a pumpkin until I put the leaves and vines on. All the leaves were cut on plain cardstock and them stamped and ink distressed get the texture. I used a Close To My Heart stamp for this technique. Stamp set B1355 Timeless, which I believe is retired now.
On the outside, the background paper is from the retired pack Passages. I used the over stamping technique with the leaves and acorn and used the same stamp set as listed above. I will post a video showing how to do this technique next.
Thanksgiving was cut from the Artiste cartridge and "celebrate" is from the Say It In Style stamp set D1283.

And here is a look at the inside.

The sentiment on the inside is from A Little Thanks D1444.

I am also going to use this for a challenge over on Word Art Wednesday a blog I just found.
Hope you enjoy. If you are interested in purchasing some of these products or don't know what Close To My Heart is all about, look to the right for the "shop with me" button.
                           Blessings,   Polly

More paper flowers and a color challenge

This card sketch comes from Mojo Monday #256 and a color challenge from Heart 2 Heart challenges that I admit I had some trouble with. Just wasn't sure how to use Pear and Lagoon together. I used two of the wonderful papers from the Dotty For You paper pack and then the Lagoon flower is from the Stella paper pack. The sunset flowers are cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge white cardstock and my waterbrush. The Lagoon flower was cut from the newest Close To My Heart Artiste Cricut cartridge. I used the flower on pg 54 using Accent 3 and shift key. I cut several at different sizes and then added the stamens. The green chevron banner is stamped using our National Stamping Month special stamp set. "It's Your Day" This is a double stamp set and a super deal. Order $35 in product and get this set for $5 more!

 If you would like to take advantage of this awesome deal just hit the "shop with me" button on the right. You won't be sorry!
Our color-ready seam binding that I spritzed with water and scrunched up and let dry like that and a stick pin from our Bling Assortment completed the flower cluster.
So here is my card

and a close up of the flowers

and I even decorated the  inside

This card was made for a special friend who has a birthday tomorrow!
Blessings,    Polly