Just a quick little note to let you know about a couple fun holiday-y goodies I have up in my shoppe for Tadpole Tuesday. Woot!
Here's a peek at Cranberry {clipped} and Clippables: Balsam. I love the idea of something with a little whimsy and simple classic sentiments for the holidays and these little goodies can add just that to your photos, pages, blog posts and even cards or notes.
Both are available (with many other amazing goodies from the girls) for $1 today only! Woot!
Happy Friday!! I hope that everyone has had a beautiful week!
December is, quite literally, THE busiest month for us in our house and family. Apart from all the holiday-y fabulousness (which you already know makes my heart so happy), there are no fewer than 9 birthdays to be celebrated this month. And not even like John Doe the random neighbor down the street birthdays. I’m talking family and such-close-friends-they-should-be-family kinds of birthdays. Today was my dear husband’s birthday. He’s one of the reasons I love scrapping so much. He makes me laugh every.single.day. He makes life beautiful. You have a person in your life like that? I hope so.
All this to say…it only seemed fitting to smooosh lots of news into one post, since December is all about smooshing as many celebrations and as much love and happy into each day as is humanely possible. And so today I’m happy to share two {fresh seeds} arriving in two different places. That’s right…I say two, because I’m so very happy to be guesting at Scrap Orchard for the month of December!! I am so lucky to be among such wonderful company there and all the fun happening this month with their wonderful Advent Calendar event.
And today I’ve released Paper Garden {volume two} there. I am a paper lover. I love pretty paper. I love paper play and fun with shapes and all things paper-y and layer-y. Paper Garden is inspired by all of that. And this is the latest.
You can snag Paper Garden {volume two} at Scrap Orchard for 20% off through the weekend. Woot!
Next, it’s BYOC time at The Pad!! I have always loved the amazing and unique products the girls release at the start of the month, and this month’s BYOC is no exception. I am in love. And, as ever, so grateful to be a part of this amazing team of designers.
Meet my offering for the December BYOC: Cranberry
I so hope you like it! And as always you can grab Cranberry for 20% off through the weekend. Double woot!
If you are a newsletter subscriber, you will have received special coupon for a bit of extra exclusive subscriber savings. If you aren’t, feel free to sign up so you can get extra little gifties too in the future. ♥
And I will leave you this evening with a smattering of amazing inspiration from the girls and Pollys. Wow!
I hope you all enjoy your Friday! I am unplugging a bit to say “yes” to my Bugga as part of the latest Grow With Love:Kids prompt and challenge, but I’ll be back later with our first Grow With Love: Holiday post and some encouragement for the busy weekend.
Happy Scrapping!
So it’s officially that time of year. That beautiful time of year. And we are about to embark upon Grow With Love: Holiday. As per usual, Crystal and I will alternate blog postings, wherein we share the prompts, a smattering of inspiration and some insight and encouragement along the way. All the while we *will* be continuing with GWL: Kids posts on Mondays (here) and Thursdays (at Crystal’s blog)…yes, we may very well be totally cuckoo. BUT, as always all the Grow With Love posts and projects will remain on our blogs indefinitely so anyone can dive in anytime or come back when the time suits them best. We know it’s quite a lot to be getting on with, but we wanted to get these holiday posts up during the holidays and hope they will enrich and encourage you in your storytelling and in your living this season. And so without further ado the holiday blog schedule will look like this:
Day One: Friday 3 December at Sara’s blog (plantyourstory.com/blog)
Day Two: Saturday 4 December at Crystal’s blog (liveyourstories.com)
Day Three: Tuesday 7 December at Sara’s
Day Four: Wednesday 8 December at Crystal’s
Day Five: Friday 10 December at Sara’s
Day Six: Saturday 11 December at Crystal’s
Day Seven: Tuesday 14 December at Sara’s
Day Eight: Wednesday 15 December at Crystal’s
Day Nine: Friday 17 December at Sara’s
Day Ten: Saturday 18 December at Crystal’s
Day Eleven: Tuesday 21 December at Sara’s
Day Twelve: Wednesday 22 December at Crystal’s
Whew! Wish us luck! Hope to see you along the way!
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if you are coming to this post anytime after the end of year 2011, you can now find all the posts in one happy, coordinated place in the Grow With Love: Archive {HERE}
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Also wanted to point you in the direction of a fabulous post from Crystal over at Vanillabees. She created a compilation of her favorite picks for all the latest and greatest holiday kits..which will be a great resource for picking kits for this or any other holiday project. Woot!
Now for another little something fun…I created these layered tag templates that can be used for this or any holiday project and pages. They are completely customizable (and completely free!) and each tag includes many options for building your own tag. You can create tags with scalloped edges, with punched edges, with alphas, with cut-out numbers and combinations of each. Lots of possibilities to create tags that really fit your page design.
You can snag them by clicking the image below or by clicking {HERE}
So hope you like them and have fun with them! Happy Scrapping!
Ooh and stay tuned because I have two fabulous {fresh seeds} coming Friday. Can’t wait to show you!
So I know I’ve mentioned once or twice 191 times how much I love this time of year and everything advent-y and holiday-y: all the anticipation and fun and family and tradition infused into every day of the season. One of our (very) new favorite holiday experiences is Elf Magic.
Last year we decided to add this extra element of fun into our December. Elf Magic, for those who aren’t familiar, is quite a lot like the Elf on a Shelf only maybe a little more “cutesy” in appearance and a little less focused on the “I’m-watching-you-and-reporting-back-to-Santa”. It’s a little more on “let’s-make-holiday-memories-and-have-mischief-and-fun” and said fun can really be tailored to underscore what is most important to you and your family during this season.
So, last year, shortly before Thanksgiving, we wrote a letter to Santa asking if one of his elves could stay with us during December in the time leading up to Christmas. We had heard that some elves do just that and they always have tons of fun. So we wrote and we left out some ice water and crackers (which apparently are the favorite eats of elves) and then we waited patiently to see if the elf would arrive. And sure enough, our elf arrived at the start of December!! Her name is “Rachel”, which we thought was pretty special because Rachael was my grandmother’s name.
ANYway…so throughout the month we would wake each morning to see what fun and adventures Rachel (isn’t she cute?!) had been having. One morning we woke to see she had set up our nativity sets, another we saw that she spent the evening watching A Charlie Brown Christmas while eating popcorn (both of which she brought for us from the North Pole). Yet another, she had built a huge tower out of Bugga’s blocks and “repelled” from the ceiling fan. Some of our favorite elf adventures were when she: took a bath in a sink full of marshmallows, went for a joyride on Bugga’s tricycle, went “fishing” for Goldfish crackers, wrapped presents, made a candy cane reindeer and left instructions for us to make some too, read the Christmas story in the Bible, and made a candy train and set up a cottonball winter wonderland. Well, as you can tell, she really had loads of fun. And so did Bugga. And so did we. It was a fun way to create fun with David and for us to really enrich our holidaytime with Bugga.
Let me tell you, Bugga’s face and anticipation each morning was a treasure. She LOVED this experience. And so we were excited to write Santa again last week to see if Rachel could spend time with us again this year. I made a fun little template for us to write and then Bugga signed it and we gave it to Daddy to mail to the North Pole.
Tonight we put out the ice water and crackers. Here’s hoping Rachel arrives tonight. I have a good feeling she will. 🙂
Let the magic begin!
Since I created it for us and for fun anyway, I thought I’d share our “Dear Santa” template with you. It’s just a simple little something you can customize for your own Elf experience or just for writing Santa in general.
Anyone who wants to can snag it by clicking the image above or by clicking {here}.
Hope you have a fabulous and fun first day of December!
Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends in the US celebrating today!! I hope that your days were full: of friends and family, of good food and good memories!! We nestled in to a good day with friends and enjoyed some good eats. I always feel so reflective and so grateful today and throughout the holiday season. I am so very blessed and my heart is full of thanks.
Thank you to you too, for all the warm support and inspiration and kindness!
As today’s holiday wanes into Black Friday I know there is a lot of busy and family and noshing and shopping so I’ll try not to ramble on too much today. I did want to let you know about the amazing goings on at The Pad this weekend, including Black Friday sales (as in completely crazy sales — and you know those don’t happen too very often at The Lilypad) and two {fresh seeds} from me that I am really excited to share.
Here’s a peek at the happending at The Lilypad.
I have a few things available among the amazing Doorbusters, including Heirloom Garden which is making its debut at The Lilypad. If you haven’t had a chance to snag this collection of templates inspired family, heritage, history, and stories in varied scrapping styles, now’s the best chance to do so. My bundles and my fantastic holiday card collaboration with Amy Martin, Good Cheer, will also be available for 50% off. These sales activate at 4am EST and run through 10am EST. Woot!
The sales continue throughout the weekend (40% off of Friday, 30% off on Saturday, and 20% off on Sunday), so if you miss the doorbusters never fear there are still chances to save BIG. Everything in my store will be on sale (new releases excluded, which are available for 20% off through the weekend).
So speaking of new releases. Let’s take a peek at this week’s {fresh seeds}. You already had a peek at Grow With Love: Holiday, my latest collaboration with Crystal. We are so excited to share this with you and hope it will help you dive into the holidays with a storytelling focus and a heart full of perspective.
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I wanted to thank everyone who played along for the {giveaway} of Grow With Love: Holiday. I really loved reading through all the responses and hearing about your favorite holiday tunes!! I kept nodding my head in agreement with so many (O Holy Night for example — which still manages to give me chills every.single.time. I hear it) and giggled aloud just thinking about a few (Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer). So thanks for a bright little spot in my evening tonight.
I turned to Mr. Random again to help me select our winner. And I want to say a big Congratulations to…….
Congratulations, Carrie! Please send me an email to claim you prize. ♥ If you missed out on this giveaway, head over to Crystal’s blog for a last moment chance to win..there’s still time to squeak in for a chance {HERE}.
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Ok…I know I said I wouldn’t ramble too much, but I can’t close without showing you what else is in store for this weekend. I have teamed up again with the very fabulous Amy Martin. We have been conceiving and working on this fun and playful set of templates for weeks now and I’m so happy to share them with you today!
You can snag the full set or just Bugga or just Frogger. All are available throughout the weekend for 20% off.
Also, as if that weren’t enough..there is an amazing Free With Purchase collaboration, Fall Moments, between The Lilypad and Sweet Shoppe Designs. Seriously. And it’s gorgeous.
I’ll be back tomorrow with a closer look and some inspiration. For now, I hope you all have a beautiful Friday! And for those venturing out for the sales, have fun and be safe!
Happy Friday!!
This week has positively flown by for me, as weeks always seem to do as the holidays approach. We've been happily busy with holiday preps and considering gratefulness and trying to slow everything down just a *wee* bit so we can really soak up the magic of this time of year. And can I just say that reading all your comments in the {giveaway} post got me even MORE in the mood for the holidays, if that were possible. LOL!
All that to say a lot of my happily busy mood lately has been creating some {fresh seeds} and I'm really happy to share these with you today:
Plant Your Story: Quoted {volume two}
Plant Your Story: Listed {volume two}
All three sets are available in my shoppe throughout the weekend for 20% off!!
As always I looove to see your stories and art too, so please feel free to share with me anytime. Just shoot me a mail or share them on my facebook page. And if you haven't signed up for my newsletter yet you may want to do that so you can be the first to hear the latest news and get the latest exclusive savings. Woot!
Next week I'll have oodles to share with you with more news and fresh goodies on the way, including another collaboration with my dear friend Crystal. She's posted a peek at what's to come on her blog, so be sure to check that out.
Also the Grow With Love: Kids project is ongoing and we've been so happy to see all the amazing pages! You are welcome to join in anytime and we hope you do! ♥
Stay tuned for some {blooming creativity} inspiration. In the mean time I hope you all have a beautiful day!