5 Friday Favs

Today I thought it would be fun to post 5 of my favorite things right now. Ready?

Number ONE: The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah

This book drew me in and I loved every minute of it. The characters were beautifully crafted and the story pulled at my heart. It is the story of a family living in France during WWII and it just felt so real. I have such a deep admiration for people who lived through that war. There were everyday heroes everywhere. Read this and you won't be sorry.

Number TWO: Pure Barre

Back in September a new Pure Barre opened up just 4 minutes from my house and I decided to give it a try. I've been hooked since the first class. They only do classes and they are all so challenging. I feel stronger and more toned. Plus I love that it's small, isolated movements and not an hour pounding on a treadmill.

Number THREE: Magic Cookie Bars

Yes, I've made Magic Cookie Bars multiple times in the past, but I recently made this recipe from Six Sisters Stuff and love the addition of the sprinkles on top. It was just a perfect, playful way to top off one of the most delicious flavor combinations. Make these soon and your family will thank you!

Number FOUR: Stitch Fix

It's been almost three years since I signed up to receive my first Stitch Fix box and I'm still loving it. Each month a stylist sends me 5 clothing items in a box. I keep what I want and send the rest back. This is so perfect for me because I really don't have a lot of time to go shopping. If I do have time, I really don't enjoy it. So this allows me to save time plus try things that I might not have picked up at the store, but discover that I love. There is a $20 per month styling fee that goes toward purchasing anything in the box, so as long as I keep one thing, then I'm not loosing any money. If you are thinking about giving this a try, you can use my referral link that earns me credit. (The credit is absolutely not why I'm posting about this! I really just love this service.)

You can see my most recent Stitch Fix acquisition in the photo above that I wore to CHA earlier this month. I loved the bright floral print on the front plus it is seriously the softest shirt ever.

Number FIVE: Elise Gets Crafty Podcasts

I do a lot of driving and sometimes like to fill my time by listening to Podcasts. One of my favorites is Elise Gets Crafty where Elise talks with creative small business owners about creativity and applying it to a small business setting. She talks with many inspirational people and I love having ideas sparked by these interviews.

Well, there you have it! My first post of 2016. I hope you enjoyed hearing about a few of my current favorites and maybe one of them will spark something that you want to try. Enjoy your weekend!

8 Ways to Embellish a Page at Scrapbook.com

Did you know that Scrapbook.com offers classes that are totally free, inspirational and fun? In the fall they asked if I'd be interested in going a class for them and I was excited for the opportunity.

It took a month with intense creative time to create all of the content for this class. It was great to have a reason that I had to create every day. Sometimes I just need a little extra motivation to start creating and there's nothing quite like a deadline to add some motivation. I had a great day filming at the Scrapbook.com office. They have a beautiful filming studio and they were all so nice and friendly. It was such a great experience.

I developed a series of eight lessons for my class 8 Ways to Embellish a Page. There are a lot of playful techniques like using wood + mist to create a page background, new ways to use 6X6 paper pads, using washi tape to create tabs and more!

It is so much fun to challenge myself to come up with content for teaching. I love breaking down the creative process and getting to share ideas with others.

Remember the class is totally free. You just need to sign into your Scrapbook.com account and click on the classes link near the top of the page. If you are looking for a little extra entertainment during your crafting time, consider checking out a few of the lessons. Hopefully I can give you a little scrapbooking inspiration!

The Cut Shoppe + Scrapbook Circle Blog Hop

Hello! I'm excited that Scrapbook Circle and The Cut Shoppe are teaming up this week to bring lots of inspiration and prizes to our readers. We are working with the Scrapbook Circle June Have a Little Fun Kit plus The Cut Shoppe cut files.

Here's a look at what I created.

The title was cut using the A to Z alpha. I placed it my Silhouette software and then made it as big as possible to stretch across the page. I also used the "selfie" and "smile" cuts came from the Captured on Camera file to add a couple of extra accents on my page.

Hop along with our Scrapbook Circle team and comment as you go. You can start the hop over on the Scrapbook Circle Blog. We will be selecting a winner from all of the blog hop comments to receive a $20 credit to The Cut Shoppe Hop. Each comment is another entry, so comment all along the hop!

Be sure to stop by The Cut Shoppe blog and hop along to see what their team created with our June kit. Comment on The Cut Shoppe hop and you are entered to win one of our June Kits!

Hope you find some inspiration today!

Anniversary Blog Hop

It's hard to believe that Scrapbook Circle is celebrating it's 9th anniversary this month. That means we've created over 100 main monthly kits plus many more add-ons and project kits. Good thing I love memory keeping!

Today we are celebrating the anniversary with a blog hop around to the Scrapbook Circle team members' blogs where they are showcasing projects created with the Hello Sunshine Kit. 

Want to take a look at my page? I drew inspiration from my layout from the Pink Paislee Insta Kit that is in the Scrapbook Circle Kit. It included a bunch of frames that perfectly fit together to cover the 12X12 page.

The frames made a great base for adding photos, journaling and few embellishments.

The hop starts at the Scrapbook Circle blog and I'm the last stop along the hop. If you just arrived here, be sure to stop by the Scrapbook Circle blog to start hopping. Comment along your way while visiting our team members' blogs. Each comment will be one entry in a random drawing where we will be giving away FIVE May Hello Sunshine Kits.

I hope you feel inspired today!

Comments close at midnight PST on May 21. We will post the winners on the Scrapbook Circle blog on May 22.

After seeing all of the great layouts, do you feel like you need a May Kit?!?

Scrapbook Circle is offering a FREE past kit with all new May subscriptions this month, so now is a perfect time to try out their kits. With only 2 months commitment to get the discounted kits, you don't have to promise to get many kits. You can find all of the free kit details here.

Epic Story

Hello, hello! Happy Monday to you. Hope that you had a fabulous weekend. One fun thing I did this weekend was participate in the Scrapbook Circle Instagram Round Robin where our team shared layout inspiration using the May Hello Sunshine Kit.  I loved getting to see what the team created with the kit!

Here's a look at the layout I shared:

The inspiration for this page came from all of those gold rimmed tags that are on the page. They were scattered on my desk and the idea of scattering circles on my page sounded like a fun plan. I pulled out a couple of my circle punches and had fun layering the circles and photos on the page.

When I think of the word epic, I think of words like awesome, cool and amazing, so it felt like epic was just right for the title of this page about a weekend away to Seattle with my husband. I've actually already created one page with these same photos, but I has an extra set in a pile on my dest and decided to play with them. You can see my original layout with these photos here.

I love documenting our stories!

Three Simple Design Techniques

Playing with paper and photos is one of my favorite things! Today I want to share a favorite recent layout I put together with photos from a visit to the Top of the Rock in NYC.

I'd like to point out three simple techniques I used to help this layout come together.

1. Paper Tearing. I went a little old school with the technique along the right side of the page on the edges of the layered paper strips. Paper tearing adds a nice extra touch of texture and looks great when layered with a stack of papers. The little white edge add an extra touch of contrast.

2. Grid Design. This is a classic way to layout a page. I love using grid designs on my pages because it gives me a place to focus where photos and embellishments are added to the page.

3. Journaling Between the Lines. Looking for lines in patterned paper that can be a guide for your journaling is a perfect place to incorporate your handwriting into the page design. The lines in the paper design help keep the writing neat and straight. This triangle design didn't provide a traditional straight line to write on, but it gave a great space for writing and kept my journaling straight and neat.

Next time you're stumped of how to start a layout, you could give one of the about techniques a try to get you started. I'm sure you'll have a finished layout in no time.

This is the last of the layouts I'm made for now that include photos from our recent girls trip to NYC. As you can see if you've been ready my blog this month, I took a lot of photos! It feels so good to have some favorites printed, combined with words and ready to go into an album.

Layout Supplies /// Let's Do This Kit /// This Way Add-on /// Love It Add-on

Playing Along with Paper Issues

Hello! Hope you've had a fantastic weekend. We enjoyed Hannah's last soccer game of the season, a bit of relaxation and some family time. Now I'm ready for a new week!

This week Scrapbook Circle is sponsoring the challenge over at Paper Issues and I thought it would be fun to play along with the Prints Charming Challenge. You can find out all of the challenge details over on their blog. A Scrapbook Circle kit is up for grabs, so I hope you'll join in the fun.

For my take on the challenge, I decided to mix seven different patterned papers to create this layout. Since some of the prints only show slightly, I think the overall balance of print and color works on this page. I used white cardstock and and this digital cut file to create the random circle cutouts. Adding white to the top of the paper helped to mellow out all of those patterns.

This page is all about a visit to Billy's Bakery when we were in NYC last month. If you look closely in the photo, you will see a vintage floral wallpaper in the background and that is where I took inspiration for the colors and flowers that were used to embellish the page.

It's been so much fun to go through our NYC trip and print out a bunch of favorite photos. One of my favorite things about a trip is getting to relive the highlights once I'm home and scrapbook about them.  

Now one more of our stories is recorded. I love documenting our family stories!

Layout Supplies /// Let's Do This Kit /// This Way Add-on /// Love It Add-on