My Favorites so far from the Craft and Hobby Association Summer Show

While I did not get to attend CHA this year, I have been closely following a few of my favorite companies new releases.  I also love to get inspiration from how each manufacturer decorates their booths to showcase their products to the best advantage.  One of the best displays I have seen so far posted is from the fabulous designers at DCWV....take a peek at this awesome detail !  Can you spot all the places they used PP?

well, do you see all the pattern paper opportunities in this display?  I love the deer above the mantel...but the paper wrapped logs are beyond clever !  The stockings, frames and mantle decor are all made with lovely DCWV patterned paper and the cute little sleigh is also beautifully done up in patterned paper.

Another thing I spotted as I blog hopped through CHA photos today was this awesome display of kits
to make fantastic flower necklaces from Ruby-Violet ..a Prima spin off line.  I can not wait to get my hands on a few of these kits.  I wonder how much they will be priced? 

Well I bookmarked a few other favorites that I will post later this week.  What have you seen from this CHA you really want to get? 

It's A Wrap Blog Hop

Welcome to the It’s a Wrap Blog Hop hosted by Cool Beans By L.B.

Do you like to receive gifts? How about give them? Well this hop is all about the outside…the wrapping; Gift bags, boxes, baskets and more. There are several wonderful stops on this hop and

we hope you will take some time to stop in and see everything we have created to inspire you.  

You should have arrived here from, CoolbeansbyLB , which is the start of the blog hop.  

Here are a few different gift wraps I have made lately for special events: 

There is one thing I am always needing when a birthday rolls around and that is a gift bag for the present.  I like to stock up on plain colored bags in bulk from local craft store and keep on hand to create a unique gift back to fit the occassion and person.  Most of the time I use my Cricut to make adorable die cuts in birthday themes.

All the designs for this project were created using the Cricut Birthday Bash cartridge. The big birthday cake on the bag was cut at 7 inches, the yellow cake base cardstock was embossed with the Cuttlebug, and I added some yummy frosting using Martha Stewart chunky white glitter. I even used foam dots to pop-up the birthday word.

Here is a close up so you can see the details better.

I made a matching mini birthday card as a tag using the cake card shape on the Birthday Bash cartridge cut at 5 inches. I added some "paper sprinkles" to the icing and highlighted them with stickles.

I also like to personalize the gift bag with a monogram, like I did here for graduation presents for a couple of special friends daughter's high school graduation. I used the colors of the college they would be going to in the fall as inspiration...they loved them !

But I don't stop at just making gift bags...I LOVE to make pillow boxes for gifts too.

I recently went to a wedding and made this as a bridal luncheon gift holder.  The bride thought it was so pretty she didn't even want to open it  to see the handmade cards that were the gift inside.

I made the box out of a shiny cardstock that I don't remember the name of but have had laying around for a long time by using a template. Then added ribbon trim to the edges. For the tag, I glimmer misted a manila tag, punched the edges with my Fiskars Apron lace punch. Stamped a frame and hand lettered the brides name. And then added a Prima flower that I glimmer misted in pearl. I tied it onto the package with some sheer ribbon.

Thanks for stopping by on this fun hop. Leave me a comment to let me know you stopped by please.

Your next stop on the hop is Cindy.

What an honor !

My "Splish Splash" Layout was chosen as

on the Cricut Circle Blog today !

Thanks PC for picking the layout. I love it too! \

P.S. Our resident silly 8 year old was thrilled to see herself on the blog today ! That kid is such a ham :)  

Splish Splash !

I absolutely love ECHO PARK's  paper collections. They are definitely one of my favorite paper companies. If you haven't checked them out, you really should do so.  Their paper is a wonderful quality and their paper collections are a great mix of patterns and paper embellishments plus at a great value. Can't ask for more in a perfect scrapbook paper line. 

When I bought the Echo Park Summertime  paper line the colors just SCREAMED summer to me. And as luck would have it, I had the perfect summer photos of Bianca learning to swim to use with it. 

I used the Cricut H20 cartridge for the titles, pool floatie and girl.

I matted the title and a focal point photo and used a Ranger Inkado

White Pen to add faux stitching. I cut the sun shape out of two different colors

and popped dotted one over the other for added dimension.

 I then added a hidden Echo Park journaling

card sticking out of the top of one photo. 

The pool float and girl were made separately and then

I just slipped her into the horse floatie.

I used my COPIC Markers to color her skin. Love how it turned out !

The H20 cartridge even had the perfect Jumpin! word phrase

to match my photos.  How did they know! LOL

This is a fun, colorful layout that really helped make these pictures come alive. I just love scrappin' summer photos, don't you ?

Cindy Loo Magic...

I just love the Cindy Loo Cricut cartridge and try and use it any chance I can get.  Lucky for me, I stumbled across one photo I had not scrapped from when I was the design team lead at a local scrapbook store. Sadly that LSS has closed but the memories still remain. We had a fantastic time at the National Scrapbook Day Crop that year and took a photo of everyone in front of the store.  Our store colors were black and pink so I used those colors on my layout.

I created the frame and flourish using Cindy Loo.

The title was made using Gypsy Font.

The flourish is a layer on the frame.

On a separate piece of paper, I made the flourish layer

and then added stickles over the top.

I love how it turned out and added a bit

of glam to the layout.

It's so sad that many of our LSS have closed. I do my best to support LSS whenever I travel. I think the LSS helps keep our favorite scrapbooking hobby going and we need them.  I encourage you to also support LSS wherever you travel too.

So Beary Cute

Well, as many of you may know, I make alot of layouts featuring my silly granddaughter, Bianca.  She is a happy, joyous and creative 8 year old and an endless source of photo shoots. Over the winter we were at my dad's house and she started hamming it up so of course I had to capture her silliness once again.

Here is a layout I made using Twinkle Toes Lite Cartridge. 

Bianca is fascinated with my dad's Grizzly rug.

Here she was making a "BEAR ANGEL" instead

of a snow angel. Silly, right?

I used Twinkle Toes Lite Cartridge to

make this adorable bear.

I tried to mimic Bianca's shirt on the

skirt of the bear using Copic Markers.

On the title I used some pretty half dome pearls in pink

to add a feminine touch.

Fixing Up The Place

Here is a layout I made using the Handy Man Lite Cricut cartridge.  This cartridge had perfect images to enhance the story I wanted to tell about helping my dad build his new house.

To add a little special touch to the title

I used Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher staples

This Handy Man Lite Cartridge even had an adorable

house that looked similar to my dad's Victorian house

we helped him build.  I added some details to the

die cut using Copic Markers and black dome dot

for the door handle.

I used Fabulous Finds cartridge to make a clipboard

just like the one my dad used to keep track of

building the house.  The yellow journaling notecard

was perfect to make the checklist.

 My daughter and granddaughter and I had gone over to help  my dad with the painting on the inside of the  house.  We had a great time together and it was fun to help.  My dad's new victorian house turned out gorgeous!