Alphabet Wrapping Paper with July Stamp of the Month

Storybook Alphabet—July Stamp of the Month

Beautiful Stamps, Amazing Discounts

Each month you can purchase a new D-size stamp set, available for one month only, for just $7.50. When you place an order of $75 or more in Close To My Heart products, you qualify for this special Stamp of the Month pricing. 

Today I would like to share with you my project which features the Storybook Alphabet—July Stamp of the Month available exclusively throughout July 2017 for $27 or for just $7.50 when you spend $75. I used the Storybook Alphabet—July Stamp of the Month

to create WRAPPING PAPER! 

Using Black Memento™ Ink Pad I stamped J's all over the brown paper cut big enough for my sons friends birthday present. 

After I had stamped all over the wrapping paper, at the join I stamped his full name JAMES! Quick and effective wrapping paper.  

I've made this kind of wrapping paper before = see my blog post from a few years back. Click HERE for instructions and lots of pictures.

This page and card are what Close to My Heart artists have created. 

Hurry to order today because only 9 days left in July to order this gorgeous ABC stamp set for only $7.50 with a qualifying order. Go to www.vandra.closetomyheart.com.au to purchase today. 

There are some special stamp sets this month brought back just for the Buy 2 get one free stamp set offer. See flyers below and my website for more information. 

Magical Australasian Blog Hop

Welcome to our Australasian Close to My Heart Blog Hop featuring this months featured pack called Workshops Your Way™ Magical Scrapbooking Kit.

. If you have arrived here from Megan Lawrence at Crop Craft Create then you are in the right place. If you landed here another way, please join in by following the link at the end of this post. Follow the links, check out all the amazing ideas and eventually you'll come right back here to where you started.

We are all creating with the Workshops Your Way™ Magical Scrapbooking Kit.

This kit is featured by Close to My Heart in July and is until the end of the current Seasonal Expressions Ideas Book (so will be retiring at the end of August 2016). NOT LONG!!

There are pages, cards and Picture My Life layouts featured in this pack. I made the pages as directed and cut the cards and then I mixed them up a bit by changing around the backs and fronts of some of the papers to create different and unique cards. Below shows what you can do by varying how you piece the papers onto the cards. 

I really love this stamp set called Fairytale Birthday - I can see myself using it lots and lots. 

The next thing I did with the pages was complete them and then continue with photos I had in the series, to make this page below. 

I had lots of photos of a ball fun pit air-cannon area at Dream World on the Gold Coast so made a page using them. 

I dotty paper on the bottom of the page is the 4x6 picture my life cards from the pack that I cut in half longways so they are 6 x 2 inches. Then I used the Zip Strips and one of the Picture my life card thats "love this" with a strip cut off the bottom and stuck on the other page. 

To cover the joins on the pages I used Honey Cardstock and Stamped black ink on White Daisy Cardstock using the Amusement Park stamp set, I adhered them with 3-D Foam Tape. I stamped the tickets as journalling boxes and will write in them later. 

I was really happy with the dots for the plastic ball cannon area because it suited them so perfectly. I finished it off with a few of the Magical Complements 

for a little bit of dimension. 

This month is also the LAST MONTH OF the Annual Expressions Catalogue. Go to my website or your consultants website to see all the exciting products available BEFORE THEY'RE GONE FOREVER!! (yes I'm being dramatic - I don't want anyone to miss out!!!). 

Thanks so much for dropping by to check out my latest project, I hope you get inspired. I'm really interested to hear what you think about it, so I'd love you to leave a comment before heading off to the next stop on our Australasian Blog Hop which is Lauren Moore - CTMH Craftings.

  Come back to see me again soon.

Happy Everything Operation Smile Blog Hop

Welcome to our Australasian Operation Smile Blog Hop. Welcome to those that arrived from Lauren Moore- CTMH Craftings or those that came from another place, please continue to follow along to see all the blogs in the loop until you get back to where you started.

Close To My Heart is partnered with Operation Smile^®, a private, Not-for-profit organization that provides free, life-changing surgery that repairs smiles and reshapes lives, one child at a time.
 
Today we will be sharing some inspiration using the C sized stamp set which is featured on the back page of our Seasonal Expressions 2 Idea Book called Happy Everything. By purchasing this set at full retail price of $27 you can help change the life of a child as CTMH will donate $US3 from your purchase to Operation smile from now until 31st August 2015. 
 

  

I absolutely LOVE this stamp set. I've made a selection of cards because I just got so many ideas with this set. I couldn't stop, its the perfect card making stamp set (although its a perfect scrapbooking stamp set too). To start with I made the card on the back of the Catalogue.

You can see on the back page of the catalogue that its slightly different because I didn't have the Stitch Guide but I loved how this turned out with the Blossom Paper Packet,

12" X 12" Flaxen Cardstock Flaxen Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Lagoon Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, 12" X 12" White Daisy Cardstock,

12" X 12" Sunset Cardstock,

3-D Foam Tape,
& Chalk It Up Assortment, 

I used a Sponge Dauber to colour in the balloon with Lagoon Ink and my Non-stick Micro-tip Scissors to cut out the balloon.

Next I made the 2 cute cards using some small scraps from a retired paper packet. This Happy Everything card turned out really well, I thought.

I took some 12" X 12" Hollyhock Cardstock 

and stamped the long arrows on it from the Happy Everything set with the generational stamping technique. Then I used Hollyhock Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad to stamp the "Happy Every thing". The Green square is from the retired Heartstrings paper packet but you can still order the paper in Picture My Life™ Heartstrings Scrapbooking Program. Then I finished the card with Black Shimmer Trim and Bubbly Enamel Shapes 

and put it on the 5 1/2" X 4 1/4" Colonial White Cards & Envelopes, from the Value Pack.

Next I made this "Happy as a Bee in A Hive Card". I had some scraps of half inch strips and I put them onto the bottom of the card to make like a wall. I had strips of Pixie Cardstock 

and Heartstrings paper (Picture My Life™ Heartstrings Scrapbooking Program).

I stamped the sentiments, the bees and the buzzy line for the bee in Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad and then coloured in their little buzzy behinds with the ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Golden Yellow Marker. 
So quick, so simple and it uses half inch scraps. 

The last thing I made was for my consultant Fun Day for my swap day. We make a ten fold swap each month, we make 10 (I made 12 this time) of each item and then swap with others who make 10 items so we come home with hopefully 10 different items, so we get a variety of cards.

I made this card using the June Stamp of the Month Ice Cream Dream – June 2015 Stamp of the Month (available this month only!) with the cute little doggy with the Happy Birthday from the Happy Everything stamp set. I coloured in the dogs a variety of colours using the Watercolor Pencils. The paper pack was the Blossom Paper Packet and I ran the edges over the Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad to distress the edges in a rustic manner. I did that to the squares of 12" X 12" White Daisy Cardstock, with the doggies on them too. To finish it off I put the bows using the Glacier Extra Thick Twine and glued them on using small dobs of Liquid Glass.

Recently our VP Monica Wihongi went on a mission with Operation Smile to support the children with live changing operations. On the same trip with Monica was Kate Walsh (from Private Practice and Greys Anatomy) and I think thats cool. Check out the CTMH Blog with photos of Monica's trip. http://blog.closetomyheart.com/2015/05/04/mission-to-mexico-monicas-journey-with-operation-smile/

 

It only takes $275 (AUS dollars) to pay for 1 child to have their surgery. Go to the Operation Smile Australia website for further details. The difference in the lives of these children and their families is amazing. I am happy to support this charity through my Close to My Heart Business and I am very happy that we can all give a small part by buying and using this Happy Everything stamp set. 

The stamp set "Happy Everything" is available from your CTMH consultant and $3USD from every purchase will go directly to Operation Smile until the end of August. You can also choose to make a donation of any size directly to your consultant, donations over $2 are tax deductable. 

Make sure you leave a comment and then continue your journey, hop over to see what Shaunna at Passionate about Page has created. 

Taste Of Summer - National Scrapbooking Month 2015

May is a great month because its a whole month of celebrations with a special May only Paper Pack and Stamp set called "Taste of Summer". All month long the Close to My Heart Facebook Page, Instagram and Pinterest accounts are all being bombarded with ideas using the Taste of Summer ideas and you can search using the hashtag #CTMHTOS in all the social media arenas. 

May is NATIONAL SCRAPBOOKING MONTH!!!

To celebrate National Scrapbooking Month I attended a 2 night camp at Swanleigh in the Swan Valley with a group of consultants and a whole bunch of our customers. I had a great weekend and spent a lot of time organising my stamps and papers and labelling EVERYTHING... Yes I think I was the only person who went to scrapbooking camp with my label maker but I felt happier having things all organised. I also made a lot of other ideas for future blog posts.

The taste of summer paper pack I have used in my last blog post (Click here for the link)

After I got organised I completed a lot of ideas that I had not finished. The above picture - was a page that my upline had cut for us at our last consultant training day but I had not got around to finishing it. So camp was the perfect opportunity to complete it for us. This used the orange paper from the using the Taste of Summer Paper Pack. The Orange Stamp from the the Taste of Summer Stamp set. The oranges are Goldrush Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad and Sunset Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad (some are double stamped to get that lighter shade) and the vines with Topiary Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad. 
I'm pretty sure the paper is 12" X 12" Sunset Cardstock and I think the green is 12" X 12" Topiary Cardstock - I'm saying "I think" because I didn't cut out the card it was cut for me. 12" X 12" White Daisy Cardstock was cut to go on top. 

This is one of my cards I made using the Taste of Summer Paper Pack. With the Taste of Summer Stamp set. How cute is that strawberry. I used the Hollyhock Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad for the strawberries with Topiary Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad for the leaves and sentiment. I cut the Silver Shimmer Trim in half on my SureCut™ Deluxe Craft Paper Trimmer using Washi tape to secure it. I used the heart cut with the Cricut® Artiste Collection and 12" X 12" Pixie Cardstock.

It is great value for a paper pack for only $12.95. Go to my website to order your pack and you can get it delivered directly to your door.