It’s the end of July, which means that our current Annual Inspirations Idea Book is about to retire—along with a bunch of amazing products featured inside of it!
We’ve rounded up some of our favorites that will be bidding us adieu. Make sure to snatch up these goodies before they’re gone for good!
State & Province Stamp Sets
With a mini stamp set for each US state, Canadian province and territory, as well as the countries of Australia and New Zealand, these stamps are great for a wide variety of crafting projects.
We love the idea of using them to document vacations, road trips, engagements, and to send love from one state to another.
And the best time to get these stamps is right now because for every two stamp sets you purchase during the month of July, you get one stamp set of equal or lesser value for free as part of Stampaganza! So get the whole collection (and save!) before it’s gone!
Thin Cuts
All of the Thin Cuts metal dies in Annual Inspirations are retiring! This includes the star shapes, as well as some timeless sentiments for both scrapbooking and cardmaking.
In addition to our Fundamental paper packets and Complements, the Fundamental ribbons are saying farewell. We love these ribbons because they can be used on any project—and the colors will be sticking around next year, so they will still coordinate with the new Fundamental collections.
What projects can they be used for? Well for starters, they make great additions to cards and scrapbook pages.
They are also great for other projects, like DIY bookmarks, banners, and home décor accents.
Plus, they are great for presents! Any gift looks even better with a bit of twine or ribbon added to the mix! 🙂
Again, these products (and others!) are only available until the end of July, while supplies last, so hurry and grab your favorites before they’re gone!
Which products are you going to miss most from Annual Inspirations? Tell us in the comments below!
Our new Annual Inspirations catalog goes live August 1, and we can’t wait to show you all the exciting things we’ve been working on for the past year. In fact, we’re SO excited that we’re going to give you a sneak peek at one of our favorite new products—another installment of our Make It from Your Heart™ pattern book series (and the crowd goes wild)!
Volume 3 of Make It from Your Heart is a real game changer. Why? Well for starters, it comes as a collection of loose, 3-ring hole-punched pages that fit inside any of our Everyday Life™ mini albums. You can rearrange or pull out pages anytime you want. Just think: you could pull out the page you need for an upcoming crop and insert it into your Everyday Life™ planner next to the day of the crop. How awesome is that? 🙂
Also, this pattern book features 36 two-page layout patterns that use standard photos sizes (no trimming down photos over here, folks!). The layouts are organized by how many photos they use, so if you are looking for a layout that uses four photos, you can simply turn to that section and look at all your options.
We also have not one, but TWO pieces of artwork inspiration for each pattern! This is a great way to show off the creative potential of a single pattern, as you can in these examples:
Pattern 14
Pattern 26
In addition to these 36 patterns, this book features artwork inspiration that demonstrates how to incorporate additional photos into your layouts using our Pocket Plus™ Memory Protectors™…
…as well as our traditional pocket scrapbooking Memory Protectors.
This exciting new pattern book will be available to order beginning August 1 (which is in 12 days, but who’s counting?). And there’s no need to camp out in a long line in anticipation of the launch date because you can order this great new book on your Consultant’s website or closetomyheart.com as soon as it is made available (along with more new products)!
So get ready to snap up your own copy of Make It from Your Heart Volume 3. Gotta love scrapbooking made easy. 🙂
In a day and age that makes taking and printing photos so easy, you would think that more and more parents would preserve these photos in books and scrapbooks. However, it seems that most photos nowadays don’t leave our computers or social media accounts—and at times, even our cameras!
The art of printing our family photos, writing down our stories, and placing them all together in the safe arms of an album seems to be a dying art—and it’s something that our kids are going to miss someday. When they want to see what they were like as babies and toddlers, the years they will remember very least, they will have nowhere to turn.
Here are 11 reasons why your children will want to have baby books:
1. They will know where to find photos of their childhood.
You may know where your favorite pictures of your babies are on your computer or on Facebook, but in 10 years will your kids know where to look? Not so much, unless they can grab their baby album off of the bookshelf.
2. A baby book is tangible evidence of your love.
When your kids go through the emotional highs and lows of the teenage years, the baby books you made for them will remind them—and you—that, despite what it might seem like at times, you love them with all your heart. 🙂
3. Your toddlers will love to look through their baby books.
Though you may think your kids won’t value their baby books until they are older, chances are they will actually love them as toddlers. Toddlers love to see pictures of themselves as babies; it’s part of a phase where they begin to discover their own identity. Also, baby books make some of the best bedtime stories!
4. They will love to look at their baby pictures when they have their own kids someday.
When your kids start to have kids of their own, it will be so much fun for them to look through their baby books and see how their traits and mannerisms were passed down to their own kids.
5. They will want to look through their siblings’ baby books.
Nothing bonds siblings together quite like looking through each other’s baby books. They will laugh at silly pictures of each other. And even though they may not have memories of their siblings because of age differences, they will get to see those memories through your eyes.
6. They will love to show relatives who come to visit their baby books.
Your in-laws or grandparents might live far away, but you can help them feel more connected to your children by showing them the baby books you’ve been working on when they are in town visiting—and once your kids are old enough, they will love to be the ones to pull out their baby books and talk your visitors through each page. 🙂
7. Life goes by lightning fast, and baby books make it easy to stroll down memory lane anytime they want.
Childhood flies by, so your kids will want to revisit their old memories. And if you’re a young mom, just trust us. You will want to revisit those baby pictures over and over again. Especially once puberty hits. 😉
8. You will forget the stories, even if you preserve the photos.
Though you may save all your photos in one way or another, the stories that go along with those photos will be lost unless you document them in a book. And moments from those sweet baby years are moments both you and your children will want to remember forever, even the small ones.
9. They will love to see your perspective.
You may think baby books are all about your babies, but they’re also a time capsule of you as a mom. As your babies grow into parents themselves, they will love to look back on your perspective as a new mother. Even seeing your handwriting will bring back good memories.
10. They will cherish their baby books more and more with time.
A baby book is something that increases in value with age. Just imagine how much that book will mean to your kids when they have grandkids and great grandkids! It’ll be a family treasure!
11. They will turn to their baby books in difficult times.
When life gets your kids down, they will turn to their baby books for comfort, to reminisce about the good old days, and to gain some perspective (though you may not see them doing this as teenagers because that would be so embarrassing! 🙂 )
There’s something special about the New Year: It’s a time filled with big hopes and dreams, renewed purpose and focus, and for all of us here at Close To My Heart, a new idea book packed with tons of new products!
If you haven’t had a chance to browse through our new idea book yet, you can look at the electronic version here. In the meantime, here’s a quick summary of what’s new!
Scrapbook Albums
Now you can get pink, white, and Sea Glass My Legacy™ albums in both the D-ring and post-bound styles!
Paper Suites
As always, we have new themed paper packets with coordinating Complements and embellishments! Check out our Sugar Rush collection, which is perfect for the sweetest Valentine’s Day projects ever!
Metal Dies—Words & Shapes
We’ve got new Thin Cuts, including the cute “xoxo” that you see here! How adorable would that be on a Valentine’s Day card? We’ve also come out with basic hearts and circle shapes as well as coordinating stamps that fit perfectly on these shapes.
More Complements!
We’ve got more Complements that coordinate with our Fundamentals paper packets.
We are SUPER stoked about our new Cut Above™ layout kits. These kits contain all the materials you need to make one traditional layout, like you see above, as well as a coordinating pocket scrapbooking layout.
The pieces are all pre-cut, so all you have to do is follow the instructions and attach the pieces as shown! These kits are great for those new to scrapbooking to get their feet wet with two different styles of scrapbooking.
Now, in addition to all the product in our new idea book, we also have a very exciting special product for the month of January—a DIY succulent wreath kit! To see how this kit works, check out the video below!
Which new products are YOU most excited about? Tell us in the comments below!
Homemade bookmarks would be a great gift for your kids’ teachers as they head back to school, for your friends who love to read, or for your book club buddies. They’re also just a fun way to get you even more excited about the books you’re reading.
Here at Close To My Heart, we’re all about preserving stories, so it’s no surprise that we really love to read! We thought it would be fun to ask around the office to find out what everyone is reading lately. Jeanette is currently reading The Success Principles by Jack Canfield, following the same schedule as our Consultants and our Training department. Here’s what the rest of the Home Office is reading:
Fiction
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
A Nation Divided by Robert Marcum
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
The Girl on the Cliff by Lucinda Riley
Fantasy
Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett
Mistborn: Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson
The Mayfair Witches Series by Anne Rice
The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
Non-Fiction
Dead Wake by Erik Larson
Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter
What to Expect When You’re Expecting by Heidi Eisenberg Murkoff and Sharon Mazel
The Hour of Land by Terry Tempest Williams
Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow
Painters of Utah’s Canyons and Deserts by Donna L. Poulton and Vern G. Swanson
The Buddha Walks into a Bar by Lodro Rinzler
Self-Improvement
Broadcasting Happiness: The Science of Spreading Positivity and Creating a Spiral of Success by Michelle Gielan
The Journal of Best Practices: A Memoir of Marriage, Asperger Syndrome, and One Man’s Quest to Be a Better Husband by David Finch
May Cause Miracles by Gabrielle Bernstein
Change Anything: The New Science of Personal Success by David Maxfield, Joseph Grenny, and Kerry Patterson
Fearless by Max Lucado
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin
Work Rules! by Laszlo Bock
Creativity
Big Magic: Creative Living beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert
How to Be Like Walt: Capturing the Disney Magic Every Day of Your Life by Pat Williams
Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace
National Book Lovers Day is the perfect excuse to make some cute bookmarks and then curl up with a blanket, a cup of hot tea, and your favorite book—but first, tell us what you’re reading right now by leaving a comment below!
Our new line of Fundamentals papers just became available, and we couldn’t wait another day to show them off! Just like their name suggests, these papers are fundamental for any scrapbooker. With versatile, monochromatic patterns in our exclusive colors, they’re perfect to pair with cardstocks and other patterned papers. Once you try them out for yourself, you won’t be able to live without them!
Today we’re showcasing our Uptown Fundamentals, which feature neutral colors and special materials, like foil and vellum, to give them a little something extra.
Look at the elegant feel that the Uptown Fundamentals bring to this layout with that beautiful script font, the gold foil polka-dots, and the striped vellum. Because they feature neutral colors, we could create our own color scheme using just a couple pieces of cardstock.
Here we have totally different cardstock colors also paired with the Uptown Fundamentals for a completely different look!
Those adorable glitter titles and other accents on these layouts are part of our You & Me Complements, designed to coordinate with the Uptown Fundamentals. We even have an Uptown ribbon pack to give you even more mixing and matching options.
The Uptown Fundamentals are just one of the newest paper collections we’ve released today—but there is plenty more where it came from! Head on over to closetomyheart.com to check out all our new products. There, you can also learn how to get the Uptown Fundamentals for free!
Now go ahead—treat yourself to a few minutes of browsing through our new products online. Or a few hours. We won’t judge. 🙂
We don’t know about you, but thinking back to Convention last week gives us all the feels! From the happiness of seeing dear friends and the excitement of revealing new products, to the amazement of seeing our Consultants’ generosity toward Operation Smile and the pride of watching our award recipients come on stage—Convention 2016 is sure to be a core memory we’ll revisit again and again!
In fact, let’s revisit it right now! Join us as we take a train of thought to Convention Island!
We got an inside look at how Jeanette’s creative mind works—well, sort of! General Session on Thursday morning took us inside the mind of Founder and CEO, Jeanette Lynton. Inspired by the Disney movie Inside Out, characters named Adventure, Whimsy, Enchantment, and Basics, who run the control panel inside Jeanette’s head, helped her invent our brand new Fundamentals line! Additionally, on Saturday Consultants got to attend a Q&A with Jeanette, which, as always, made us laugh and cry. We sure love Jeanette!
The Directors Dinner proved truly magical. Directors enjoyed a delicious meal together, which included a great photo op with Mickey and Minnie, after which they boarded boats to take in the spectacular Disney firework show. We love spoiling our Directors—they work so hard and deserve some pampering!
Our 25-year longevity Consultants got up close and personal with Jeanette. Consultants who have been with us for 25 years got a personal meeting with Jeanette. It was a beautiful moment, as they reminisced about the past and looked forward to the future.
Sticky Boy found his love! If you’ve been following Sticky Boy’s Facebook account, it probably won’t surprise you that he met up with his one, his only, Sticky Girl! Lucky Consultants found her hanging out at Convention on the walls, tables, and other surfaces.
Our Consultants raised A TON of money for Operation Smile. Consultants donated over $28,500 for Operation Smile in connection with Convention!!!!!! Can you believe it? It was a treat to hear from Dr. Ruben Ayala, Vice President of Medical Affairs at Operation Smile, share more about the vision and purpose of this great organization.
The highest selling bundle in our Operation Smile auction, created by the talented Michelle Synder, went for $1,500! We are so proud to be associated with such generous, selfless women.
Did somebody say new products? We sure did! We gave all of our attendees a copy of both our new Annual Inspirations idea book AND our Holiday Expressions idea book. We also gave away heaps of brand new products, including brand new scrapbooking albums! But for now, these new items are Consultant-only—they’ll be available to everyone starting in August, and we can hardly wait for you to see what we’ve been working on for the past year!
As we wrap up this trip down memory lane, we want to thank everyone who attended Convention, whether in person or virtually. And thank you to all of our Consultants—you inspire all we do, and we feel privileged to work with each of you. We hope to see you all at Convention 2017 in Salt Lake City next year!
***GIVEAWAY***
We want to see the Convention scrapbook layouts you create using our Magical paper packet. Share a picture of your Magical layout with Convention pictures on social media using the hashtag #magicalconvention for a chance to win one of our brand new My Legacy™ scrapbooking albums! Be sure to post your picture by July 25, because on July 28, we’ll randomly select five winners and announce them on the blog!
The fun thing about mini albums (besides the fact that they are mini!) is that they’re so versatile—you can tackle all different sizes of jobs with them! Today, we want to share with you 10 reasons to make a mini album that maybe you haven’t thought of before.
1. Thank a Hostess
After someone throws you a party, a shower, or invites you over for dinner, create a mini album with pictures of the event and give it to the hostess as a unique thank you gift.
2. Watch Your Love Grow
Put your wedding picture in the front of a mini album. Then, snap a photo each anniversary and add it to your mini album. Years down the road, you’ll be able to see how much you both change with each year of renewed love and commitment.
3. Entertain Your Kiddos
Have young children or grandchildren? Create an interactive “Quiet Book” for them to play with when you’re at the doctor’s office, at church, or anywhere else where they need to be quiet. Our hook & look dots, which feature Velcro-like material, are perfect for creating shapes that can be removed and attached.
4. Give Some Lovin’ to Your Pet
Create a mini album to celebrate your furry friends (and other pets!). You’ll love looking back on the many memories your pets have shared with your family.
5. Create a Personalized Recipe Book
You make homemade food—so why not make a homemade recipe book? Use our Cricut® Artbooking collection to create tabbed dividers. This would be a fun gift for a bridal shower, high school graduation, or for sharing family favorites with neighbors and friends.
6. Get Inspired
Create a mini album filled with things that inspire you: pictures of beautiful places, your favorite patterns, inspiring quotes, photos of loved ones, dried flowers, etc. Use it for creative inspiration or simply for relaxing when you’re stressed.
7. Remember a Loved One
Create a memory book to honor a loved one who has passed away. In addition to the peace this album can bring, it will also help your children and grandchildren get to know their family members who passed away before they were old enough to remember.
8. Thank a Teacher or Coach
Create an end of year album with pictures from class activities, recitals, or games from the past year. Give it as a gift to those who mentor your children or grandchildren.
9. Capture Kids’ Silly Phases
When it comes to scrapbooking, it’s easy to focus on events—we went here and did this. Some of the things you don’t want to forget though are the quirky phases your kids or grandkids go through, like the phase when they insist on wearing their Spiderman costume everyday! Create a book dedicated to capturing what makes them unique each year of their lives, such as their height, likes, dislikes, words they mispronounce, interests, and other silly quirks.
10. Help Your College Student Remember Home
Create a mini album filled with pictures of family, pets, and your home for your college students to take with them to school. That way, they never really leave their family behind!
Which mini album do you want to create? Tell us in the comments below!
Also, most of the mini albums pictured in today’s post are available at a discount though our Flash Sale! Head on over to your Consultant’s online business address (OBA)! The discount is only good until 3:00 pm today or while supplies last!
CC1136 My Creations™ Mini Album Bundle
CC1129 Mini Book Bundle (2-pack) Recipes
Thank a Hostess Mini Album
CC1136 My Creations™ Mini Album Bundle, C1625 My Acrylix® A Thousand Thanks, X7210B Calypso Paper Packet, Z3076 Gold Glitter Paper, X5760 Cotton Candy Cardstock, X5773 Pixie Cardstock, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 44751 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z891 VersaMark™ Ink Pad, Z2068 Ranger™ White Super Fine Embossing Powder, Z1956 Hip Pics Album, Z2013 Sequins Silver Assortment, Cricut® Artistry Collection
All these products are available through one of our Independent Consultants. To find a Consultant near you, visit closetomyheart.com and click on “Find a Consultant” in the top right corner of the page.
You’ve set some great goals for the new year, and you’re ready to get to work (especially after reading our tips for goal-setting success)! What better way to keep track of your progress and motivate yourself along the way than to create a cute mini goal book? With the help of the Cricut® Artbooking collection and the La Vie En Rose paper packet, you can create a trendy mini book like this:
Look how fun! We got really creative with this project, starting with the cover: Those colorful “2016” numbers were cut from some Picture My Life™ cards, while the bookmark flags come from the La Vie En Rose Complements. But that’s just the beginning—let’s take a peek inside!
We’ll start the grand tour with this motivation pocket. It’s full of stamped cards with encouraging reminders for the day. Bright watercolors are the perfect way to add extra excitement and energy to these motivational sayings. Watercolors also come into play on the next page, where each goal fits into a category, and each category has its own color. Has organization ever been so cute?
Here’s another card from Picture My Life Through the Year! It’s already so decorative that just a couple embellishments are enough to complete the page. Charts are great for keeping track of your goals, so we created a pie chart with a twist. It coordinates with the goals on the previous page, and you can fill in the chart with watercolors as you complete your goals, proving that keeping your goals can be fun and creative!
Finally, check out these lists—beautiful and inspirational! Isn’t a reminder of what your goals are all about a perfect ending for this book? It’s a great reminder about why goal setting is really important. On the surface, goals seem to be all about what we do, but they are actually about discovering who we are and the inner strength we have.
What’s especially neat is that this applies to creating art with paper. On the surface, you’re stamping, designing, and arranging, but what you’re actually doing is learning more about yourself as you discover your own creative potential. Pretty neat, right?
We hope you enjoy fulfilling your goals as much as you enjoy creating a fun mini book like this one to track them!
Recipe
Mini Goal Book
B1482 My Acryix® My Story, E1031 My Acrylix® Dated, E1033 My Acrylix® Inked Alphabet, D1661 My Acrylix® Crazy Good, B1484 My Acrylix® Jennifer’s Hand, X7201B La Vie En Rose Paper Packet, Z3177 Picture My Life™ Through The Year Scrapbooking Program, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 1386 Black Cardstock, X5770 Glacier Cardstock, X5930 Slate Cardstock, Z1375 Kraft Cardstock, Z3146 Watercolor Paper, Z3128 Paper Fundamentals Basics, 44751 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2193 Cotton Candy Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2641 Glacier Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, X7201C La Vie En Rose Complements, Z3095 Whisper Thick Twine, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z2013 Sequins Silver Assortment, Z3169 Cricut® Artbooking Collection, Thread
Cricut® Shapes: Artbooking
7″ Photo Mat 1 <3> (p. 40)
7″ Photo Mat 2 <q> (p. 48)
7″ Shift+Photo Mat 1 <W> (p. 49)
6 ¾” Photo Mat 1 <e> (p. 50)
7″ Photo Mat 1 <r> (p. 51)
4 ½” Photo Mat 1 <u> (p. 54)
7 ¼” Shift+Photo Mat 1 <O> (p. 56)
All these products are available through one of our Independent Consultants. To find a Consultant near you, visit closetomyheart.com and click on “Find a Consultant” in the top right corner of the page.
We love the idea of using them to document vacations, road trips, engagements, and to send love from one state to another. 
Again, these products (and others!) are only available until the end of July, while supplies last, so hurry and grab your favorites before they’re gone! 
