September 18, 2018Create, Memory Keeping

FREE More Magical Scrapbook Pattern!

Close To My Heartadventure, Bring Back My Pack, campaign, constant campaign, dreams, fairy tale, free, free pattern, layout, magical, More Magical, pattern, sale, Scrapbook Pattern, scrapbooking, September 4 Comments

Once in a while, right in the middle of an ordinary day, we give you a fairy tale that looks like a free scrapbook pattern!

This timeless pattern made its original debut years ago with our You Rock collection. Without the need of any pixie dust, the instructions have been revamped so they can be used with any papers and for any occasion!

We created a truly enchanting spread by pairing this pattern with the More Magical paper packet, coordinating cardstock, and stamp set. Our current More Magical workshop kit makes 4 coordinating two-page layouts to preserve all of your magical adventures. Download the pattern and cutting diagrams below and use them to make a fifth coordinating layout to add to your album!

Download Pattern

As usual, we encourage you to make this, and any, pattern your own by being flexible with its parts. Take a close look at our completed layout for some examples. Instead of using a small photo at the top of 2D, we filled the space with a stamp. Then, we added another 4 x 4 photo to the layout by splitting it down the middle and attaching half of it on each page to complete the row of photos across the top.

Free Scrapbook Pattern #CTMH #CloseToMyHeart #CTMHMoreMagical #MoreMagical #freepattern #freescrapbookpattern #scrapbooking #free #download #scrapbooklayout #magical #adventure #dreamscometrue

And don’t forget about those pocket cards that are part of the paper packet! Use them whole, cut up, or even torn to incorporate additional patterns, sentiments, and accents. Adding a pocket card with a lighter design to a page made up of darker patterns is also an easy way to create space for stamping.

No matter where your happiest place on earth is, take advantage of the bright patterns and motifs available in the More Magical collection and use them to preserve all of your fairy tale adventures. Remember, this collection is only available through the end of the month while supplies last, so make sure to grab yours while you still can!

For even more timeless scrapbook patterns, check out our Make It from Your Heart™ pattern books! If you love the free scrapbook patterns we share on the blog, you’re sure to be blown away by the patterns and inspirational artwork in all of our how-to books.

Recipe

12″ x 12″ Dreams Come True Layout
CC8183 My Acrylix^® Dreams Stamp Set, CC8181 More Magical Paper Packet, CC8182 More Magical Coordinating Cardstock, Z6505 Carolina Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z6509 Candy Apple Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3314 Black & White Dots, Z4194 White & Gold Skinny Ribbon, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape

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May 3, 2018Celebrate, Create, Memory Keeping

A Mother’s Day Freebie

Close To My HeartBeautiful Friendship, free, free pattern, Freebie, mother's day, national scrapbooking month, pattern, Scrapbook Pattern 2 Comments

A Mother's Day Freebie #ctmh #closetomyheart #ctmhbeautifulfriendship #beautiful #friendship #mother #Mother'sDay #mom #loving #compassionate #strong #admire #fondest #memory #taughtme #scrapbooking #layout #nationalscrapbookingmonth #May #free #freebie #pattern #cuttingdiagrams What better way to pay tribute to our amazing mothers during National Scrapbooking month than with a free scrapbook pattern?

This pattern made its original debut with our Surf’s Up scrapbooking Workshops on the Go^®. Paired with the new Beautiful Friendship collection and sentiments to celebrate one of the most special relationships of all—we just love how the finished layout turned out! It goes to show just how versatile and timeless our scrapbook patterns really are!

Download Pattern and Cutting Diagrams

To create your own layout, download the pattern and cutting diagrams above. You’ll notice that we didn’t follow the pattern exactly as we created our layout, and you can do the same. Instead of using a small photo on the large mat, we went ahead and used a large photo to turn this into a highlight of a special person. The journaling on the left page was changed into what you see, three large descriptive words, that we cut using our Cricut^®, as an extension of our title. And then, we added a whole bunch of journaling on the right page where we answered three prompts: What I admire most about you…My fondest memory of us…Something you have taught me…

As we celebrate our mothers and National Scrapbooking Month this May, let’s remember the reason behind every layout. Document your relationships, and the love behind them, with every memory.

Scrapbook patterns #ctmh #closetomyheart #scrapbook #patterns #layouts #MakeItfromYourHeart #howtobook #how-to

For even more timeless scrapbooking patterns, check out our Make It from Your Heart™ volume 3 how-to book! If you love the free patterns on the blog, you’re sure to be blown away by the beautiful, one-of-a-kind, patterns in this book.

Recipe

12″ x 12″ My Mother Layout
E1033 My Acrylix® Inked Alphabet Stamp Set, X7233B Beautiful Friendship Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5946 Linen Cardstock, X5985 Smoothie Cardstock, X5957 Sapphire Cardstock, Z2826 Heather Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, X7233C Beautiful Friendship Complements, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z3274 Clear Sparkles, Z4196 White Ribbon, Z3290 Cricut^® Flower Market Digital Collection, Z3389 Cricut^® You Are Here Collection

Cricut^® Shapes:
Flower Market
1¾” Title <b> (p. 35, #MD715B0)

You Are Here
½” <font> “lovingcompassionatestrong”

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April 26, 2018Community, Create

Memories from the Kitchen and Giveaway

Close To My Heartalbum, cut above, Everyday Life, free, Gimme Some Sugar, giveaway, kitchen, Kitchen Traditions, my acrylix, nostalgia, Recipe Kit, recipes, stamp set 171 Comments

You may have heard it said that the kitchen is the most important room in a home. It is where you go to gather with your family and guests to cook, eat, socialize, do homework, craft, play games, and, on occasion, even scrapbook 😉 . With so much of our day-to-day happening around the kitchen, we are experiencing moments that are inevitably turning into nostalgic memories that we long to hold onto.

Naturally, because of our whole-hearted belief that everyone should be memory keepers, we came up with a system to help you preserve those precious memories from the kitchen.

Designed for so much more than to hold recipes, the Cut Above^® Kitchen Traditions recipe kit is a collection of materials you can use to create a unique keepsake. It comes with recipe cards for those memorable meals that you yearn for, while also providing a place for photos and journaling to share why the recipes mean something to you.

We offer the kit in three configurations, so you can choose what fits your needs best. The first is the basic Cut Above^® Kitchen Traditions recipe kit, which comes with 60 4″ x 6″ cards (including recipe, title, journaling, and pattern cards), six 6″ x 8″ divider pages, two sticker sheets, and a helpful guide containing tips and ideas on how to use the kit. The second option is the Cut Above^® Kitchen Traditions recipe kit with Memory Protectors™. This option includes all the same materials as the first but also comes with 6 Memory Protectors™ to hold your cards and pages. The last option is the Cut Above^® Kitchen Traditions Bundle, which is an all-inclusive bundle that comes with the basic kit, the Memory Protectors, and a Bashful Everyday Life™ album and the coordinating My Acrylix^® Kitchen Traditions stamp set (D1770).

We want to give all memory keepers—and aspiring memory keepers—the tools you need to beautifully document those special moments from your kitchen. That is why we are giving away 5 (!!!) Kitchen Traditions bundles to 5 lucky winners! For a chance to win, you will have to do a little bit more than what we’ve done in the past. First, you must be a subscriber to this blog. (If you aren’t yet, just push that big blue “Subscribe to list” button on the sidebar!) Second, you must leave a recipe you love in the comments below with a short explanation of why you love it. The drawing will take place Monday, April 30, at 2 p.m. MDT and winners will be notified via e-mail, as usual.

To kick things off, here’s a recipe from Close To My Heart President Monica Wihongi:

Frijoles a la Charra (Bean Soup)

Ingredients:

1 cup fresh cilantro
1 diced white onion
6 strips cut bacon cut into 1 inch pieces (raw)
4 cans La Constena pinto beans
1 can Rotel Mexican Festival tomatoes
3 cans petite diced tomato
¼ cup mild Herdez Salsa Casera

Directions:

In a large pot, boil the beans. While you wait for the beans to boil, fry the bacon in a separate large pan. Once the bacon is soft, add the onion and sauté it in the bacon grease. Add one can of diced tomatoes at a time and bring to a boil each time. Add the Rotel tomatoes and bring to a boil again. Add Herdez Salsa and cilantro and bring to a boil one last time. Combine your mixture with beans in the large pot and bring to a boil then simmer for 10 minutes.

Now, it’s your turn. Can’t wait to see what’s cooking in your kitchen!

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March 8, 2018Celebrate, Create

Hello Spring!

Close To My Heartalphabet, banner, easter, free, printable, printables, season, seasonal, spring, Thin Cuts, wreath 14 Comments

Even though we knew it was coming, as it does every year, spring is sneaking up on us fast! Technically it won’t be spring for another couple weeks, so there’s still time to pull out and sort through all of those brightly colored decorations. (Phew!)

And because spring is all about new beginnings, we have a few fun things in store for you to add to your stash! Just keep reading! 😉

First, we want to show you how to dress up a wreath you may already have with a fun pennant banner made using our Block Alphabet Thin Cuts dies (which are 25% off through the end of the month as part of our Die-namite! sale).

If you look closely, you’ll see that we layered each of our letters with silver foil. Using our Thin Cuts, we cut our sentiment out twice, once out of White Daisy cardstock and then again out of silver foil paper. The silver foil letters were cut in half and then attached to the White Daisy using an adhesive runner. Then, we attached the letters with thin 3-D foam tape onto individual pennants that would later form our banner. To make the pennants, we simply cut 1½” x 3¾” rectangles and dovetailed one of the ends.

Attach the pennants to white twine using a hot glue gun to spell out your words—one word per strand of twine. Make sure to leave enough twine on the ends to tie the banners to the wreath.

You can make a banner like this one for pretty much any occasion just by changing the sentiment. From welcoming a new season, to holidays, or birthdays—the Block Alphabet Thin Cuts give you the tools for spelling out whatever it is you want to celebrate in style!

And since we are talking seasonal décor, we have a special treat for those of you who’ve made it this far: two FREE printables for the upcoming Easter season.

hello spring #ctmh #closetomyheart #hello #spring #pennant #banner #wreath #thin #cuts #diecuts #thincuts #dies #alpha #block #letters #alphabet #home #decor #decoration #decorating #diy #easter #hesirisen #myredeemerlives #printable #redeemer #lives #matthew28 #risen #resurrection #floral #flower #watercolor #free #printable #printables

Download your 8″ x 10″ printable here:

He is Risen
My Redeemer Lives

As we celebrate this season of new beginnings, we thank you for reading and sharing this blog. Our hope is that the inspirational artwork ideas and tips we present here help crafters of all types to discover their creativity and to exercise their creative muscles in new, exciting ways. Happy Easter!

Recipe:

Z3351 Adventure Fundamental Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z3366 Silver Foil Paper, Z3386 Thin Cuts—Block Alphabet, Z3216 White Twine, Z3372 Adhesive Runner, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape, 12″ Wreath, Hot Glue Gun

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February 13, 2018Celebrate, Create

A Valentine for You: FREE Card Patterns!

Close To My Heartcard, cardmaking, free, Fundamental cards, pattern, valentine, Valentine's Day, whimsy, White Pines 5 Comments

Free Card Patterns #ctmh #closetomyheart #whimsy #fundamental #paper #packet #free #cards #patterns #pattern #happy #heart #likeanartist #artist #believe #make #difference

We have an early Valentine for all our loyal readers—three free card patterns for you to celebrate along with us and share the love!

Free Card Patterns #ctmh #closetomyheart #whimsy #fundamental #cardmaking #card #diy #pattern #free #white #pines

We’ve taken these patterns, which originally made their debut with the White Pines Workshops on the Go^®, and created new cards using our Whimsy Fundamentals creative collection and some cardstock—and we just love how they turned out!

These timeless patterns can be used for every celebration and occasion with the right combination of papers, Complements, and sentiments. If you’re not sure how to mix and match these products, we’ve taken the guesswork out of the equation for you! For effortless coordination, simply choose one of our creative collections from our idea books and stick to just those products within the suite when making your cards. It really is that easy!

Download the patterns below and share some love this Valentine’s day with a handmade card from the heart! ❤

Download Patterns

For even more timeless cardmaking patterns, check out our newest how-to book, Make It from Your Heart™ volume 4, which just debuted this January! If you love the free patterns on the blog, you’re sure to be blown away by the beautiful, one-of-a-kind, patterns in this book.

Recipes

4¼ x 5½ You Make a Difference Card (Vertical)
Z3350 Whimsy Fundamental Paper Packet, X5948 Heather Cardstock, Z3354 Inspire Complements, Z3361 Whimsy Ribbon Pack, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape

4¼ x 5½ Like an Artist Card (Horizontal)
C1685 My Acrylix^® Inspire Stamp Set, Z3350 Whimsy Fundamental Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5948 Heather Cardstock, Z2805 Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3354 Inspire Complements, Z3361 Whimsy Ribbon Pack, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape

4¼ x 5½ You Make My Heart Happy Card (Vertical)
A1192 My Acrylix^® Happy Heart Stamp Set, Z3350 Whimsy Fundamental Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 1386 Black Cardstock, X5948 Heather Cardstock, Z2805 Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3354 Inspire Complements, Z3361 Whimsy Ribbon Pack, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape

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January 2, 2018Celebrate, Create

Love Letters Giveaway!

Close To My Heartcampaign, Foil, free, giveaway, january, letter, Love Letters, monogram, national papercrafting month, Papercrafting, Rose Gold 275 Comments

As we welcome a new year, we are also celebrating National Papercrafting Month! And, to help you celebrate with us, we created a beautiful letter kit for you to assemble, customize, and display using your own personal flair. What’s more, WE ARE GIVING AWAY THREE OF THESE LOVE LETTERS KITS in the next 72 hours!

All you have to do to enter into the drawing is subscribe to our blog, if you aren’t already, and leave a comment below letting us know how you would display your Love Letter(s). It’s that easy! Three lucky winners will be chosen by 11:00 a.m. (MST) Friday, January 5^th, and will be notified by email to choose their letter.

Now, let us tell you a little more about these Love Letters!
Each kit comes with one sturdy chipboard letter base, one paper and rose gold overlay piece, die-cut banners and floral embellishments, and rose gold foil alphabet stickers to create the word or name of your choice.

As you assemble these letters, here are a few tips to keep in mind.

1. The first thing is that you don’t have to use all of the pieces included in the letter kit. Depending on how you plan to use the letter, you might opt out of the banner or some of the flowers and succulents. The number of die-cuts you want to use will depend on the shape of your letter and the length of the word you’ve chosen. Remember, sometimes less is more.

2. If you are using the banner for a word or a name, add the alphabet stickers to the banner before attaching it to the letter. It’s also easier if you begin your word in the middle and work your way out. This way, you can make sure your word is centered and you have enough room for all of your letters prior to attaching any additional embellishments.

3. As you assemble the flowers, consider using your finger, a pencil, or any soft round edge to help shape some of the petals. (Not all of your flowers have to have curved petals). Also, when arranging them on your letter, do so before attaching them. Try arranging your flowers in triangles of color. If you’re not quite sure how to do that, look at the instructions insert including in your kit. There, you will find a completed example for each letter and the ampersand. (It’s okay to copy. We won’t tell!)

4. For those of you who want to take this project up a notch, there’s always some wiggle room. Look how we used a handful of additional products (not included in the kit) to quickly and easily embellish the flowers. The petals edges were given a pop of color with a sponge and some ink. We added sparkles and pearls to the flowers’ centers, and used the brand-new Bashful shimmer brush for a touch of extra shine on the green succulent petals.

These Love Letters are so versatile. Put them in frame, a wreath, or hang them on their own. Create words, names, or initials. They work in your living room, a bedroom, a nursery—really anywhere!

We hope you are as excited about National Papercrafting Month as we are. Don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a comment below telling us how you would use your Love Letter for a chance to win one letter of your choice FREE!!

For even MORE CHANCES TO WIN, visit us on Instagram and Facebook where we are giving even more of these away! (What?!) Make sure to follow us for details on how to enter these separate drawings!!

Can’t wait to hear from you!

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November 9, 2017Create

Free Basics Fundamental 64 Card Workshop Pattern!

Close To My Heartcards, free, free pattern, fundamental, Fundamentals, workshop 14 Comments

We’re giving you more free patterns today! This time, instead of a scrapbooking layout, we’ve got a workshop for you and your friends to make 64 gratitude cards—8 cards in 8 designs—using our Basics Fundamental paper packet, which so happens to be on sale right now at 30% off!

These patterns were originally introduced at our 2016 convention as part of a Fundamentals card workshop. We’ve simply updated the cutting diagrams and flat patterns and created some new cards with one of our favorite paper packets!

All you will need to recreate these cards is one of each of the following:
B1536 My Acrylix^® All the Thanks Stamp Set
Z3353 Basics Fundamental Paper Packet
Z2829 Espresso Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad
Z2831 Charcoal Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad
Z3095 Whisper Thick Twine
Z3274 Clear Sparkles
Z1263 Bitty Sparkles

Workshop Patterns and Cutting Diagrams

Download the patterns above and let the cardmaking extravaganza begin!

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August 29, 2017Create, Memory Keeping

Free Back-to-School Scrapbook Pattern!

Close To My Heartback, free, pattern, school, scrapbook, tinkerin', to 6 Comments

Back-to-school season is in full swing, and we’ve got a free scrapbook pattern to help you celebrate!

This pattern originally debuted with our Tinkerin’ paper collection, but we’ve revamped the instructions so they can be used with any papers for any occasion. We chose to use this pattern to document some back-to-school memories using our Enchantment Fundamental paper packet and some matching cardstock.

We also incorporated our August Stamp of the Month set, My Acrylix® School Year. This stamp set is designed to help you document both the first and last day of school. Be sure to order the stamp set now because it’s gone at the end of the month—you won’t want to be tardy on this one! And the great news is that you can get the Stamp of the Month for a super great price with a qualifying purchase. However you do the math, more crafting supplies for less money is the always the correct answer! 😉

Download the pattern below, and enjoy a little scrappin’ time!

Download Pattern

For even more scrapbook patterns, check out our Make It from Your Heart™ pattern books, including volume three, which just debuted this month! If you love the free scrapbook patterns on the blog, you’re sure to be blown away by all the patterns in our how-to books.

Recipe

12″ x 12″ School Is Cool Layout
S1708 My Acrylix® School Year Stamp Set, Z3352 Enchantment Fundamental Paper Packet, X5958 Peacock Cardstock, X5961 Saffron Cardstock, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 1386 Black Cardstock, Z2805 Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3090 Red Gems, Z3323 White Burlap Ribbon, Z3329 Thin Cuts—Basic Stars, Z3348 Thin Cuts—Scallop Border, Z3386 Thin Cuts—Block Alphabet, 3505 Watercolor Pencils, Die-cutting Machine

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June 6, 2017Learn, Memory Keeping

Looking for a Great Scrapbook Album? We’ve Got You Covered!

Close To My Heartalbum, buy, divided, flaps, flip, free, get, june, legacy, memory, my, one, plus, pocket, protectors, scrapbooking, special 28 Comments

Here at Close To My Heart, we’re serious about helping you preserve your memories with style. That’s why, throughout the month of June, you can buy one My Legacy™ album and get a second one at 50% off! For those of you who are new to Close To My Heart or who would just like to learn a little bit more about our unique scrapbook albums, this is the post for you! We’re going to cover all our bases today and tell you everything about our albums—and some of the awesome products we have to go with them!

Close To My Heart scrapbook albums #ctmh #closetomyheart #scrapbook #album #memorykeeping

Post-bound Album

We have two different styles of My Legacy™ albums. The photos above show our post-bound style. This style minimizes the gap in between your pages, so your scrapbook album looks professionally bound. The ends of the posts are hidden by the binding, and they feature easy-to-use handles for twisting open the posts and adding pages.

D-ring Album

Here’s our other style: D-ring! These albums are a great fit for those who want to be able to add pages quickly and easily. Some people like to use D-ring albums for storing their pages until they finish an album’s worth, and then they move all the pages into a post-bound album for permanent storage—and with our buy-one-get-one-half-off sale, it’s a great time to try this approach!

Above are all the colors that are currently available in the post-bound style.

And here are all the colors that are currently available in the D-ring style.

Now the best part of any scrapbook album is what you keep inside, of course. 🙂 And since we know the memories you want to preserve are precious, we offer high-quality top-load and side-load Memory Protectors™ to keep them safe. We also have some specialty Memory Protectors that can add a lot of variety to your layouts.

Up first are our divided Memory Protectors for pocket scrapbooking. We have five different styles to choose from—you can check them all out here. These make great additions to your layouts, like you can see above, or you can create an entire pocket scrapbooking album. We recommend using our D-ring album style with these Memory Protectors.

While we’re on the topic of divided Memory Protectors, we have to mention our Pocket Plus™ Memory Protectors. These only cover part of a page, so they are great for adding a few additional photos to your layouts. You can see how they really enhance a traditional layout in the before and after pictures above. For more information about these protectors and for tips on how to design you layouts to incorporate them, check out this blog post.

We also have Flip Flaps™, which are little individual pockets that come with an adhesive strip. You can attach them to both your pocket or traditional scrapbooking layouts. These come in a variety of sizes and create fun, interactive elements on your pages. For more information about these protectors and for tips on how to use them, check out this blog post.

A few other noteworthy accessories….These are our spine expanders. When you have layouts with lots of dimension in a post-bound album, you can get an album that looks like this: <. That’s because the part of your protector that holds your page onto the post is thinner than your dimensional page. Placing spine expanders between the pages of your album helps to even out the space so that your album will look more like this: =. It’s a quick fix that makes a world of a difference!

For post-bound albums with fewer pages, we recommend these 1″ posts. These posts will slim down the spine and allow your pages to be held more snugly between the covers of your album.

Finally, add an identifier to the spine of your album with one of our label holders. These fit both album styles and are a great way to distinguish your albums from one another—especially if you have a lot together on a shelf!

Do you see what we mean about taking memory keeping seriously? 🙂 We want to give you lots of options for preserving your memories! If you have any more questions about our albums, please leave a comment below. We’re happy to answer any questions you may have!

GIVEAWAY!!!!!!

Want to win a bunch of products to fill your albums with? Then listen up! We are giving 3 lucky winners the following:

1 Fundamentals paper packet of your choice
1 Fundamentals Complements pack of your choice
1 Fundamentals ribbon pack of your choice
1 value pack of Memory Protectors of your choice (top-load or side-load!)

How do you enter to win this awesome prize? Simply subscribe to our blog! To do so, click on the blue “Subscribe to list” button on the right-hand side of the page. That’s it! If you are already subscribed to our blog, you’re already entered to win!

The contest will run for 48 hours, and we will contact the winners via email.

Good luck! 🙂
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Frijoles a la Charra (Bean Soup)

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GIVEAWAY!!!!!!

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