cool cards

I've been having fun with the Tweens & Teens set we just previewed today on the LAD Blog. My kids kept walking by and saying "cool" as I was stamping (even my 3-year-old!) It made me feel kind of cool that they were saying cool about something I was stamping. Am I officially cool now? :)








I thought this next card would be a fun Teen Valentine's Day card... I'm in love with the Peace Heart. I paired it with the swirlie heart in our Lucky in Love Mix set.




All the papers I've been using the past two days on my sneak peek samples (including the samples I've been posting to the LAD blog) have been from my December Hip Kit. Mmmmmmm. That's all I have to say about those papers...paired perfectly with our stamps. And here's a little secret... my cards were posted to the Hip 2B Square blog about two weeks ago. So in the future, if you ever want a sneak peek of our sneak peeks, go look there, you never know what you may see! ;)

I hope you love our new stamps as much as we do! Tomorrow we're revealing the February Singles of the month, and all the new goodies will be available on our website!

lizzie anne sneak peeks day one

We've started our Sneak Peek at Lizzie Anne for our Winter Release... and I've been having a wonderful time playing with these new stamps. (As usual!)



The card above features our new Wonderful World Sixlets set. I had SO MUCH FUN designing the images for Wonderful World, let me tell you! I scanned in patterns I loved, gave them a distressed look, and then worked some magic in Illustrator. I can see myself playing with this set again and again. (The Happy Day sentiment is from our Everyday Sayings set.)






Meridith designed our new Bonjour Little Bits set, and it is just gorgeous. Every image is a memory of Paris for me (read more about the inspiration for this set on the LAD Blog today.) The Parisian theme is a popular one right now... I think our take on this theme is unique. I am in love with the marionette stamp... I'm not sure I've ever seen a marionette stamp before!



I'll be back with more sneak peeks tomorrow...

made with love

I had some good cardmaking mojo going this weekend... I made TWELVE cards. And a mini-scrapbook. I think that aside from last-minute Christmas Cards, this may be a new record. A few things inspired me. We just got our Winter Release stamps from our manufacturer, and I just picked up my new papercrafting kit from Hip 2B Square. I think this one of my favorite kits yet, the papers just kill me. There is nothing like new stamps and new paper to help the mojo flow!

Unfortunately I can't show you most of what I made yet because they feature stamps we are releasing on February 1st (and they are AWESOME, so stay tuned!) but I can show you this little Valentine I made with the Winter Mix set. I also have a Vintage Valentine up on the LAD blog today, see it here! And play along with our sketch challenge too!



This is a little scrapbook I made for a friend who is getting married. She has a daughter and they are about to become a little family with her fiance, I am so happy for them. I know she doesn't have a lot of time to scrapbook as she's working full-time, so I'm going to take photos of the three of them and fill this scrapbook for her as a wedding gift. It will be a lovely reminder of their first year together as a family. I used our House and Home Sweet Home stamp singles on the inside panel.







Because we are so busy preparing for our release you probably won't see a lot of posts from me for the next two weeks. But we start our sneak peeks on January 30th, so come back then. It will be worth the wait!

january challenge

Today is Design Team Challenge at Lizzie Anne. The challenge this month is to make a card that reflects one of your New Years Resolutions. Here is my card... can you guess what my resolution is? (No it's not to kiss more. ha ha. Though I'm sure my husband wouldn't complain.)






My resolution is to cook at home more often, thus saving us money (and calories) by eating out less. This is definitely something I need to work on. I don't love to cook and so it's not unusual for me to look at the clock at 5:00pm and call my husband to pick up Chinese food on the way home cause I didn't plan anything for dinner. Meanwhile my kids are starving and filling up on chips and cookies and anything else they can get their hands on so by the time the food gets home they aren't hungry enough to eat it anyways. Sigh.

This has got to change. I'm on this one. I may not be the best cook but I'm sure going to try. If you have any favorite (and easy please) dinner recipes to throw my way please do, I'm going to need all the help I can get. ;)

Visit the Lizzie Anne blog today to see what the Design Team gals are resolving to do this year.

By the way, this card features the In the Kitchen stamp set (one of my favorites!) and Modern Homemaker patterned paper from October Afternoon. A match made in heaven!

winter layouts

Here are some more winter layouts I did using the Hip 2B Square November Kit. My favorite is the Santa page... that was such a fun night. My parents were in town and we took them on the Argosy Christmas Cruise around Lake Washington. It just happened to be a beautiful clear night (we've done this before in the rain which isn't nearly as fun) so we were able to be outside on the deck of the boat. The boat goes to different beaches where people on the beach have a huge bonfire, and the choir on the boat leads everyone in singing Christmas carols. It was such a fun night. And Santa was on the boat with us! My son won the "ho ho ho" contest, he was very proud. :)

1/1/11

Today's date is 1/1/11! Welcome 2011. It's funny what New Years Day does to you. First you start thinking about everything that happened the year before, it feels so strange that a whole year has gone by so quickly. Some highlights from 2010 for me were going to Hawaii with my husband for the first time, getting to see my close friend Ulrika who lives in Sweden (we met in Utah,) and watching my kiddos grow up another year-- they have both learned so much and I'm amazed by how "grown up" they are becoming.

I've been shocked by how much snow we had the last part of the year -- and there is still snow on the ground. My kids have been loving it. I've been freezing. :) Here's a scrapbook page I did of my husband and my daughter...he took her sledding (my son was with the bigger kids on the bigger hill.) I love these photos of the two of them together. These all feature papers from the November Hip 2B Square Scrapbooking Kit (by the way, I just previewed the December kit and I am drooling, can't wait to get my hands on this stuff!)







New Years Goals... sigh. Do I dare even mention my New Years Goals? :) Maybe if I do I'll actually do them, ha ha. I think all of us have better money management and gym attendance on our list of goals, and I'm no exception. My biggest goal this year though is to spend more time with my kids... especially my 3-year-old daughter Samantha. She's not in school full-time yet, and I want to take time to enjoy these years with her, I know they go fast. I am going to try and keep my work-life balance in check... I don't want my kids to think of me sitting at my computer when they think back on their childhood. I think this is an issue all parents struggle with... it's hard to find that balance. But I am going to try! My plan is to (gulp) get up earlier in the morning to work so I have more time during the day. We'll see if I can pull this off. ;)

Happy New Year!