DON'TCHA JUST LOVE...

secrets!

Not February QuicKutz secrets.

Or sparkly Glimmer Mist secrets.

Or Distress Inks shipment secrets.

But just general-run-of-the-mill-I'm-a-goofy-blogger-fun-to-have-under-your-hat secrets.

Well I love 'em...and I get to share it with you in just a couple of days. On Super Bowl Sunday. On birthday Sunday. In four more days!

{you're going to love it - just trust me on this one - and relax it doesn't involve shopping!}

Hey - it's Wednesday. "Hump-Day" if you will. WOOT WOOT...how about a little more inspiration today?

A little die-cutting, inky-stamping, lovey-dovey inspiration!

Lolly is already in the Valentine spirit, and is cranking out some beautimous cards...

Lolly just received this QuicKutz Butterfly die and is IN LOVE with it. {Rumor has it she has covered an entire bedroom wall, filled three nightstand drawers and decoupaged her refrigerator!} She decided to make up a few Valentine cards that weren't necessarily heart-filled or predominantly red...and I LOVE THEM! She used the butterfly, the smallest Nesting Label from the Santa's Workshop Gift Set and the Oatmeal font.

Here is the same card "layout", but she changed up the colors, the patterns and the supplies. She used the same QK Butterfly and the Nesting Label...but she cut the label out of thin cotton batting. CUTENESS! What a fun little backdrop for her turquoise-blingy flutterby! Fun, fun, FUN!

EmmBee is also working on Valentine cards, but with her little girlies. This idea she came up with is perfect for young ones. They can do the assembling all by themselves! She used the Spellbinders Nestabilities Classic Heart die {the third largest heart cut twice, the smallest heart cut three times}. A couple of circle punches, for the eyeballs and they were all set. Teach your kiddos how to set-up an assembly line...and you photograph the fun! {The font she used is a Sizzlits Strip called Honky Dory}

Here is one more kiddo-approved card. Cut your card bases from the Spellbinders Labels Eight - folding your cardstock in half first, and keeping the fold inside the left hand cut line. VIOLA - a shaped card. Then use your Spellbinders Classic Hearts again, the QK Lemonade font for size-appropriate letters and any 2x2 QK Heart and let your young spellers go to town. LOVE 'EM...just love 'em!

Lara wanted to throw out one more idea using the January QuicKutz release. She made up a bunch of invitations and decided on a mass-production style. This means, she printed her information onto cardstock from the computer and simply added a die-cut as a finishing touch. She used the NEW Alarm Clock {I think it's one of her faves!}.

And when I say she mass produced them, I mean mass produced...

She said it was great using up a bunch of scraps for this project, and no two are the same. Each person got a unique invite...and she was done with the project before she knew it! BRILLIANT!

I've been chatting with several of you about my excitement with the new stamp lines Dani is bringing to Scrapy Land. But have no fear ladies...I love die-cutting as much as I love stamping. I'm not giving up one for the other. The thing I love about the lines he ordered is I think they mix so well with shapes in the QuicKutz line and Nestabilities in the Spellbinders line. They work wonderfully hand-in-hand.

I used "Mer Ian" from The Greeting Farm {the cutest little merman I've ever seen!}, colored him with bunches of Copics {I will get better about photographing the stack of colors I use, I promise!}, cut him out with my Deckled Rectangle Nestabilities, tossed on a starfish and seashell from the Relax NSD Gift Set and added my sentiment with Oatmeal and Moxie.

This translates to "see you later". Had to get "sea" in there, and used a little teen-talk for my daughter. This got tucked in her suitcase this morning as she heads out of town for 3 days.

Scrapy Land LIVE! DEMO tonight:

• no password needed
• 6pm MST {AZ time...that's 5pm in CA, 7pm in TX and 8pm in FL}
• no supplies, it's just a demo tonight
• we'll be talking ALL THINGS EPIC, Epic cutting, Epic embossing, Epic Flex Mats, Epic platforms, etc.
• bring your questions, or email me ahead of time
• if you want to chat live, or ask questions on the fly, you'll need to be logged in
• spread the word, the more the merrier!

Any questions - you know what to do. And GOBS of comments yesterday, YAY! Lots of entries for the "birthday celebration week" prizes. LOVE IT! Same goes for today...leave 'em here to be entered!

{Sorry for the length of this post - but I'm now officially caught up with everything the "Fab Four" sent me while I was at CHA! THANKS for reading along to the end!}

I'm here for your habit...

DAY TWO OF MY WEEK LONG CELEBRATION...

and the fun is just beginning!

Today, the "Fab Four" have some fun stuff to share. Lots of dies being used from the QuicKutz January release. And since bunches of you placed orders on the 19th I'm sure there are dies all over the country, just waiting to be used!

How's this for some inspiration...

Veronica is working on an album of favorite recipes. Something she can add to, a few pages at a time, when she gets the opportunity. She is using the QK Gingerbread Album. This page is her recipe for Peanut Sauce...{and yes, I already tried to decipher the ingredients, she'll have to help us out!}...she used the NEW QK Food & Drink die for her bowl of rice and chopsticks. CUTE! Her title is cut from the Chicken Noodle font.

This page is for her secret recipe for Orange Lemonade. She's used the Food & Drink die again for her bottle and the NEW Citrus Fruit for her lemon. Her title is Chicken Noodle again, and her very realistic looking orange blossoms are the 2x2 Square Petal Flowers. LOVE IT!

EmmBee had the January Club Die to play with and came up with this adorable use for it. Computer generated letters spell out part of her greeting. ADORABLE! She also used her Cookie Cutter Monogram U for the main part of her greeting. It's embossed with the QK Paisley Embossing folder. Love, love love how simple this is - unique twists are always fun and inspiring!

Lara is still motoring through her resolutions for this year. YOU GO GIRL! She made a notebook to hold her exercise journal and her food journal. For this section of her book she used the NEW Rev Alarm Clock, the NEW Rev Weights, Blossom Classic, Blossom Mini and Banana Split fonts. Great little stitching accents make the page all come together! CUTE!

She even made pages for her book...CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE PDF!

For the food/diet section of her book she made this page. Using the same fonts along with the NEW Rev Scale and the 2x2 Strawberry, Peas, Carrots and Pear.

More custom pages inside...CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE PDF!

Love her project. How cute it is, how practical it is and how useful it's going to be for her as she goes through her year! She bound her entire album, divider pages and custom pages, with her Bind It All. {I have got to get one of these...!}

I have even more adorable projects from the Fab Four to share tomorrow. Cards from Lolly, Valentines from EmmBee, projects from Lara and surprises from Veronica. I might have a thing or two to throw in as well. {wink, wink}

Scrapy Land LIVE! DEMO tomorrow night - 6pm MST. I'll try to keep it to 30 minutes, but I keep adding points to mention. LOL - I'll do my best. You DO NOT NEED A PASSWORD, just follow the link in the sidebar to UStream.

Thanks for the comments yesterday ladies - WE LOVE comments. We especially love comments from first time visitors. WELCOME and thank you! All comments were entered in the drawing...as will all comments on today's post.

Remind me and I'll show you the prizes during the demo.

I'm here for your habit...

ONE MORE POST ON RESOLUTIONS...

since that is the theme for the January release from QuicKutz.

Resolutions - a perfect theme for January. But not just resolutions are addressed. There are a few dies that could fall into categories like goals, to-dos, should-dos, and dreams.

The Scrapy Land "Fab Four" and I have been working with these dies for several days now. And you've probably guessed that we love them all. But everyone picked a couple of their favorites to start with - so let's dive right in:

EmmBee was most excited when she saw the newest QK Cookie Cutter Shape...

the Rooster! It's not because she lives near a farm, it's because she and her friends and family are ALL addicted to Farmville on Facebook. What a riot! But since it's part of her life right now, she saw this die and decided a page was in order! She also used - the retired QK Star Classic and Mini fonts, and 2x2s Present, Cat, Seed Packet, Sheep, Tulip, Funky Chicken, Strawberry, Cow, Tomato and Penguin. The "fence pieces" that come with this die could easily be formed to also make a T, a L, an E, a M, an N, an H, an I, or a K. What a cute idea!

Lolly was most excited about the newest QK Revolution Tags.

I looked at them and saw "more tags". Lolly looked at them and saw NEW TAGS! Here she wanted to just show you the size - as all four tags are on one die. But she also sent some closer peeks at her bitty tags of fun...

Using patterned paper, vellum, decorative scissors and stamped sentiments - she made up stacks of cute tags to include on goodie bags, in cards, oh backpacks or on edible treats! Don't these look just like cuppy-cakes?

And look at the lime green hearts {she catches on quick, doesn't she?}. How much fun can one person have with one little tag...

LOTS! See how she snipped the green tag to reveal little wedges of the brown cardstock underneath. CUTENESS! All kinds of cute ideas...just from tags.

When Lara saw this next die she said she knew exactly what to do with it...

She is helping to organize a "Spa Day" for her MOPs Group at church this Friday. Her contribution to the decorations...table cards! She used the NEW Revolution Bathtub, Wintergreen Scalloped Page Inserts, Santa's Workshop font along with her C3 and C5 Copics for the tub feet and shower head. E47 also colored her die-cut letters. The moms are going to love these!

I wanted to make sure that the Revolution Paper Doll fit inside the NEW Revolution Bathtub die. It does! I also used the NEW Revolution Spa Paper Doll and the NEW 2x2 Water Bottle. The letters are cut from the NEW 4x8 Garden Mini font.

EmmBee also chose to play with this DoubleKutz die...

the NEW Revolution Tea Set. {Wow this is a cute die, with lots of possibilities. I think they'd make the cutest invitations for a bridal shower.} EmmBee cut her tea bag from QK Adhesive Backed Vellum, and colored the "tea" with her E47 Copic. Gives the vellum a great, sheer look! She embossed her tea set with the Perfectly Paisley Embossing folder. Love how this looks! The font here is QK Sticky Note.

I told you Lolly loved the NEW Revolution Tags...

here she used the triangle tag from the set, added the NEW Garden font, and had an adorable little "love banner" for her husband. I've now got Valentine's Day ideas tumbling through my head. Thanks Lolly!

One of my resolutions this year is to better drinking water. My goal is 6 refills a day of this sized bottle. The NEW Cookie Cutter Door Hanger is perfectly sized to be a bottle neck tag...

I cut my letters and numbers from the NEW Garden font. All I have to do now is keep track each day of my "refills". This one tag lasted me all last week...and I was relatively successful in my water consumption goal! {LOL}

Lara also got to play with these dies...

the NEW Revolution Scale and the Revolution Weights. She cut her scale from QK Adhesive Backed Metal and embossed it with this folder. Love the look it gives! The fonts she used are QK Sticky Note and QK Chemistry.

Do you remember the pop-up card we did last November? Well EmmBee turned that simple pattern into a cute birthday card...

She printed her sentiments from the computer and used the NEW Revolution Cruise Ship & Waves. She added a teeny-tiny "HB" for her happy birthday ship with Studio SkinniMini - but the ship could be personalized with anything appropriate. CUTE CUTE CUTE!

Here's a front-on look so you can see how cute this ship is. Love the double-cut waves she added. Just love it!

This piece is from Lolly. And we've just changed her name to "flower-die-cutting-crazy-woman". Holy SCRAP! She cut 1.4 million Sizzix Flowers!

She made the base of her "calendar" out of a magnetic vent cover...{sound familiar??}. She made herself a window frame from chipboard, made a sleeve that can house whatever patterned paper is seasonally appropriate {teal wood grain paper is seasonally appropriate right now!} and then used all of the flowers to decorate the edges of the frame. But her centerpiece is the NEW Cookie Cutter Border Months of the Year. Hers is die-cut, and then she just free-cut a border around the shape. She put magnets on the back of her border die-cut...and then cut out all of the dates from the NEW Garden font. {she also possibly used this flower, and these flowers...LOL!}

All of those calendar dates are housed in this tiny little matchbox...

The dates again were die-cut and she hand-cut their border. More magnets and any kiddo you know can officially be the "family date changer" at breakfast each morning. What a fun idea!

And just to give you a better feel for the size of this border, Lolly sent this picture...

It's huge, and I am sure you'll find 1001 uses for it. A monthly collage of random photos, a fave photo of the month, a reminder of a "family night" once a month...all kinds of great stuff. If you've got on, feel free to share it!

Lara made one final card today, getting a start on her Valentine's cards...

she used the NEW Revolution Credit Cards, QK Banana Split, the 2x2 Hearts Mini and her Scalloped Border. Couldn't these be personalized a bunch of ways? How about using them for "coupons" for your kids or your husband. Great idea Lara, thanks!

I loved the NEW Revolution Apples as soon as I saw them...

This card went together in about 10 minutes. I used the NEW Apples, the Spellbinders Label Three and the Garden font.

And to show you a close-up of this NEW font, that it seems we all love...

it is a unicase font, but it has numbers and punctuation. Love that...thanks QK!

One more project tonight - and I'll save the final few for later tomorrow. I just have to show you how I've been using the NEW Days of the Week border.

My kids share a bathroom - but each have their own sink. They are forever standing at their sinks in the morning arguing over the "car schedule". Who is going where, what time is pickup, who gets dropped off where, etc. I hit on this idea when I opened this die.

I cut the Days of the Week border from Navy Blue Silhouette Vinyl, and stuck it to the mirror inbetween their sinks. With a write-on-wipe-off marker {that now resides in their toothbrush cup} they can easily see who is doing what today. Love this idea, and the best part is...so did my kids! Seriously, try it. Writing on the bathroom mirror - it's a good thing!

WHEW and double WHEW! Does that give you some ideas to go on? I sure hope so. We've had a bunch of fun with these dies, and the fun has only begun. Look for further inspiration, suggestions and tips in the weeks to come.

Leave your comment-questions, your comment-ideas or your wonderful comment-love here on this post. If an answer is due, we'll get on it as soon as we can, tomorrow.

I'm off to fire-up the studio...because we're doing Scrapy Land "Release Reveal" tonight. What fun we have here at Scrapy Land. And to think - this is just the January release.

You know what next week is - right?! {snicker, snicker LOL!}

SCRAPY LAND'S "FAB FOUR"...

Resolutions projects - day two.

And today is Lara's turn.

Lara also decided to make a scrapbook page to showcase her 2010 Resolutions. She tweaked it just a bit by making them more goal-like instead of resolve-like.

I love it!

Lara decided "baby steps" would be best for 2010. {I tend to agree with her} We just need to make sure she knows that her first quarter goals will need to be done by the end of March, not the end of April - LOL! {Sorry hon, couldn't resist!}

Love the layers on this page...clouds and flowers and vines and journaling. Super dimension and lots of interest for the eye. She used: QK Yogurt (2010), QK Aquarius (did I miss 2009?), Cloud border, Vine border with some Green Copic shading, Revolution Flower and an Exclusive "sparkle" for her flower centers, but these snowflakes would give you kind of a similar look!

Here is close-up peek at how she cut her QK Vine from medium colored green, but then amped it up a bit with some darker green Copic inks. Love the depth it gives the shadows of this vine. And what a great technique to leave the centers of the leaves in the center. Looks fab!

And did you notice that she cut out multiple QK Cloud borders? Some go one way, and some go the other way...but she used my little "edge rolling" tip that I showed you back in December. It makes all the clouds look "right side up". Each cloud she edged with pen-stitches drawn with her American Crafts Memory Markers {in Cherry Red, Chestnut Brown and Marine Blue}.

As for her journaling...

she did this on her computer, easy enough. But what I love is how she put the blue "mat" behind one of the cloud borders and tucked her journaling behind a different cloud border. LOVE those kinds of fun layers tricks. Looks great and makes things not quite so "expected". ADORABLE!

So those are our two Resolution "pages". Thanks Veronica and Lara. Great pages indeed. And it looks like we can expect a "quarterly update page" from Lara come April. {or May, if we go by her quarters!! LOL...again, couldn't resist!} The next two posts will be projects. EmmBee and Lolly were up to their elbows - die-cutting, coloring, inking and gluing. Seriously - prepare to be inspired by some more great ideas.

We aim to please everyone here on the Scrapy Land blog. Resolution Pages for page-lovers, and Resolution Projects for project-lovers.

I think I'm going to make Resolution Cupcakes for cupcake-lovers. {LOL!}

Leave Lara some comment-love...just don't tease her about messing up the 2010 "quarters". It's an honest mistake...and I think I did enough of that!

I'm here for your habit...

BEFORE FRIDAY IS OVER...

I have another introduction.

The second of our Scrapy Land Fab Four "L" duo. Lolly was yesterday, today I present you with Lara:

Lara snapped this picture in Washington - where she is STILL on winter holiday. {I'm jealous!} But I pried her away from her family long enough to answer the same questions the other girls have answered. Here goes:

NAME: Lara

NICKNAMES: I don't have any {oh, let's give her one girls...ideas?}

HOME TOWN: this time of year, Antarctica...otherwise known as Rockford, IL

FAMILY: husband Scott, my sweetie pie (Emily, 3) and my punkin' (Erika, 8)

STARTED SCRAPPIN': 1999 back in the day when all you could find was Mrs. Grossman's stickers, 5 colors of archival safe cardstock and Creative Memories albums.

EARLY BIRD OR NIGHT OWL: night owl, all the way (although it's getting a bit harder to get up in the morning!)

FAVORITE SCRAPBOOK SUPPLY: inks of all kinds...stamping, pens, sprays

ITALY OR THE CARIBBEAN: Italy...for it's art history and architecture, but I'd reeeealy love to see Alaska some day.

PAPER OR PLASTIC: do you mean grocery bags? If so...I carry my own re-usable, non toxic, dye free, environmental friendly burlap bags...J/K!...either works. But if it's acid/lignin free, I'll take paper any day!

COKE OR PEPSI: Raspberry Diet Rite

FAVORITE COLOR: sage green - not quite as jazzy as Susan's lime :)

SCRAP-LIFTER: on occasion

WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU FOUND $100, OTHER THAN BUY SCRAP-SUPPLIES: I'd probably put it toward our Family Vacation Fund!

FAVORITE SCRAP SUBJECT: I typically scrapbook my girls...because they are just so darn cute (I'm not partial or anything!). But I really like to scrapbook everyday life subjects, right down to what I love to eat!

3 MONTHS ON A DESERT ISLAND...WHAT SUPPLIES: I'm assuming pictures aren't counted toward the three, because I could hardly scrapbook without them...as well as adhesive and paper and QK and {YES Lara, those count...now pick 3!}...okay, really...cardstock, my QuicKutz and all of my pens (Copics, American Crafts, Gels, etc.)

PAPER HO OR DIE HO? I'm a sucker for all things paper...I love the textures, patterns and smell of good paper!

SALTY OR SWEET: BOTH!...although I tend to lean toward the sweet side. But after sweet, don't ya need a little salty...and then after salty you just HAVE to have some sweet!

STRAIGHT LINES OR RANDOMLY ASKEW: I'm lost without my ruler!

IF YOU COULD BE ONE PUBLIC FIGURE FOR ONE DAY, WITH NO LASTING RAMIFICATIONS...WHO: I want to be Susan, so I can go to CHA...*wink, wink*...okay, really...Mickey Mouse. Everybody loves Mickey! Okay, honestly though, Chef Duff from Ace of Cakes. I've always thought it would be fun to do an over-the-top decorated cake!

WHAT DO YOU HOPE TO LEARN/SHARE/ACCOMPLISH OVER THE NEXT 6 MONTHS: To play well with other, not run with scissors...seriously...I hope to learn from the other women I have the honor to work with on the Fab Four. I want to inspire the blog readers to see other possibilities in the use of their scrap supplies. And what I'd REALLY like to accomplish is finishing up my 8 year old daughter's baby book. Finally!

So now we all know that Lara can't make a decision and hates to be interviewed! {LOL} Just kidding - she answered all of these questions with her mother and I'm pretty sure a fair amount of giggling took place!

Here are a few of the projects that Lara has sent me in the last 2 weeks. These are the things that caught my eye:

This re purposed scrapbook packaging just made me smile. Totally something I would do. Silly and whimsical and serves no practical purpose except for the fact that it's darn CUTE! {And cute matters ladies - don't ever forget it!} For this project, Lara used the smallest nesting square from Santa's Workshop set, the cupcake die from the Recipe Set and the QK Club Journaling Tag {which is out of stock, but this one would work just the same}.

{HEY Lara, what kind of goodies would fit into a re purposed QK package? Let's figure that out before Valentine's Day okay!}

Now these little goodies are just plain fun. Clothes Pin Magnets she calls them...and they just scream to be made over-and-over again, from season to season. Any 2x2 die would work, she used the ornament and the holly leaves from the Jolly Gift Set, the 2x2 Snowflake, and the 2x2 Penguin. Scraps of patterned paper and you've got a teacher gift, or a grandma gift, or a neighbor gift, or a husband gift...well, you get the idea. {I think we need a Lara-video with some pointers!}

You might recognize Lara's daughter, because we've seen her all year long in her Starting Blox pages. This sweet page reminded me just how good Lara is at mixing fonts. AND adding shizzle to her letters as well. Here is QK Diesel Grand, Metro SkinniMini, the Oatmeal font, QK Nesting Stars and the Scallop Border.

I have one other Lara project - but she just sent it to me last week. I'm saving it for a post all its own next week. She did it while in Washington and I am in love with the idea behind it. Here's a little sneaky-peek...

It's absolutely adorable and uses about 3,145 dies from the December QK Release. {Okay not really, but you know what I mean!} Prepare to be inspired!

Everyone join me in leaving Lara some weekend-comment-love. Let's all let her know that we need her to hurry home to her scrap-room in Illinois. {She has new dies AND a deadline waiting for her!}

Three-fourths of the way through our Scrapy Land "Fab Four"...and I've saved the slowest for last! {I'M KIDDING!} But she is the one who turned in her "interview" after everyone else did. That'll teach her. LOL!

Stop by this weekend and meeting MB. So as not to be confused with "message board" I'll be referring to her as "Emmbee". For clarification purposes!

I'm here for your habit...