Hello Stealers!  I’m so excited today to be introducing you to our next guest designer.  Nikki Hobbs, scrapbooker extraordinaire, so graciously accepted my invitation to work with the Imaginisce Lucy Bird collection and I’m pretty sure that you will agree with me that she did a fantastic job using the kit!

I’ve been lucky enough to know Nikki through the scrapbook industry for several years.  She’s an amazing woman that seems to have figured out doing it all!  She’s a wife, mother, crafter and a passionate exerciser and baker!  I asked Nikki to share a little bit about herself with all of us.  Here’s what she wrote:

Hi, my name is Nikki Hobbs. I am a 31 years old, SAHM. I have three amazing children, Austin-9, Aidan-6 and Adriana Isabella (Bella)-2 1/2. I have been married for almost 10 years to my hubby Dustin and we live in sunny California. I have always been some what of a scrapbooker, I remember taking my camera to school all the time when I was younger, and I always added my pictures to albums. I started “layout” scrapbooking in 2000 when I was pregnant with my first son, it was one of those CM parties and I did a layout chocked full of the classic “Sticker sneeze” look, and to this day, I kid you not, I still love that layout LOL, of course I have come a long way from the good old title and a bunch of stickers on a page day. Thanks to that though I was hooked and never looked back.

I am a HUGE scrapbook supply hoarder lol, I have so much Basic Grey, Chatterbox, Thickers, embellishments, etc, I could scrapbook until I was 100 and still have supplies left over for the next three generations of our family to use. My scrapbooking style has come along way since that first encounter with CM products and scrapbooking “layout” style. I love so many different things, lumpy, bumpy, shabby chic, clean and simple, bright and color popped. My style really just depends on how I am feeling at the time that I sit down to work on something. I currently work for, Creative Xpress, Provo Craft, and Little Red Scrapbook kit company. I’ve also had my work featured in various publications, idea books, and special assignments for other manufacturers. Aside from scrapbooking and being a mommy full time to my kiddos (which is a job in it’s own, Team mom anyone? lol) I am 100% a book nerd! I LOVE to read! I wear cute nerdy shirts that say how much I love to read lol and one of my favorite places to spend free time is in a book store, you can usually find me down one of the isles, sitting on the floor, a book in one hand and some starbucks in the other. I love it! I was so honored to get the chance to be a guest designer for the Scrapbook Steals website and blog, I hope you like what I created with this amazing kit!

Now I’m pretty sure you will not only *like* what Nikki has done with the kit, but you will *love* it!  I’m such a simple scrapper that I’m always in awe of the talents of scrappers like Nikki.  I love the layering and inking and all of the little extras that Nikki so effortlessly incorporates onto her layouts.  I also especially love the journaling strips on her ‘Sweet Girl’ layout.

What I was particularly drawn to in Nikki’s ‘Best Girl’ layout is how she used so many different patterns of paper, yet didn’t overwhelm the layout by using a piece of white cardstock as the background.  I also love the scalloped edges that she has on this layout.

Nikki is not only incredibly talented with layouts but she is a fantastic card maker.  Look at how she used the Lucy Bird kit to create these beautiful cards that will truly brighten someones day.  I love on the ‘Thank you’ card the little splash of ribbon across the top.  The scallops and folded flowers on the ‘Hi’ card are my favorite!

Thank you Nikki for being our guest designer today.  If you’d like to see more work by Nikki, be sure to check out her blog.  You will definitely find all sorts of stuff to tickle your creative mind!

Until next time….happy scrappin’!

Hello everyone!  I’m so excited today to get to announce the winners of our 2nd ScrapbookSteals online crop which was held last Friday night!  It’s always so great to host a video chat with you and to just get to spend some girly time with all of you fantastic girls.  I know I’ve said it before but I’m gonna say it again, how lucky I am to get to work so closely with each one of you!  There’s one thing about scrapbooking that I positively love is the ability that it has to bring people together from all over the world and become friends through our passion for the hobby!

I was STUNNED at the amount of participation from you girls!  I consider myself so lucky that I was able to go through each and every entry for the challenges on our Facebook page and see just how you girls put a spin on the challenges that I issued.  Even though I’ve been scrapbooking for what seems like forever, I have to say that I walked away, once again, a better scrapper for the ideas that you girls give me.  I think I’m fairly confident in saying that I’m not the only one that feels that way either!

So without further adieu let me introduce you to the winners of our second on line crop.  Oh and much thanks to Random.Org that chose the winning numbers for me, cause in my book ALL of you are winners!

The first challenge that I issued was to create a layout using the color green somewhere.  You have to admit that when you think of March, you just have to think of green!

I simply ADORE this layout from Christine R.  Not only are the colors fantastic, but the design is truly right up my alley.  I LOVE the balance of design and white space.  I love the circle with the rectangle strips of patterned papers layered underneath.  And oh my goodness…the title?  It just couldn’t get any better than that!  Thank you Christine for sharing with us!

Our second winner of the green challenge is our Facebook Fan, daily hint seeking extraordinaire, Lisa M!  I love how Lisa chose to do a layout about she and her husband.  So often when we get little ones we get so excited to scrapbook pages about them that we dont take the time to scrapbook pages about ourselves, which will be equally as precious to our posterity down the road.  What a treat that her kids will be able to look back and see how she and her husband looked when they first met.  I love all of the little details that Lisa included on this layout.

Our second challenge was to create a layout using the word “Lucky” somewhere in the title.

Again, I have to applaud Misty B for creating a layout about she and her friends. I I love her configuration of photos on this page.  I love the flow of photos from left to right and top to bottom combined with the spray of butterflies in the opposite direction.   Misty also has fantastic handwriting, which I have already begged her for a copy of!  If only we could all be blessed with such fantastic handwriting for our pages.  Yeah….my handwriting = stinko!

The second winner of the “Lucky” challenge is Nikki Tyhurst.  I’m always in awe of digi crafters.  It’s truly an entire world that I just don’t understand!  I guess I’m just so much of a “hands on” scrapper that I just can’t seem to get the hang of digi.  I think the photo that Nikki used is simply precious!  Such a great documentation of her little ones on St. Patrick’s Day.

The third challenge that I issued was to create “Something Spring”.  Didn’t matter if it was a card, layout or decoration.  Just something featuring flowers or springy colors or even photos of little ones dancing in the rain!

Kristal S. did a “Spring-tastic” card!  As soon as I saw her card I was so drawn to the texture in the torn and curled edges of the paper as well as the fringy grass.  I love the buttons in the center of the flowers and the sun!  Such a great card!

Our second winner of the “Something Spring” challenge is Chana P.  Chana created such a great 2 page layout.  I love how she created a flower using her photos and carried the theme across to the other page.  Her little peanut is such a cutie too!

Our final challenge was to create a 2 page layout.  So often I get in the rut of creating one page layouts that it’s fun to utilize the design space of a 2 page spread.

Michelle B. is the first winner of our “Double Dose” challenge.  Another fantastic digi scrapper for sure!  I love the journaling on her layout as any of us that are mothers of boys can surely relate!  I love her placement of photos and how she was able to fit so many onto one 2 page layout!
)

The final winner of our crop challenges is Sara G.  She created this amazing 2 page layout of her little one in the autumn colors.  I am so in love with oranges and reds so I am completely drawn to this layout!  I love the photo corners and the matting of some of her pictures.  I also think the tree embellishment is darling!

Congrats to all of our winners!  Be sure to send an email to me at orders@scrapbooksteals.com with your address and we will get a little “something” sent out to you! I just want to thank each and every one of you again for participating in our 2nd online crop and for being part of the best scrapbooking community out there!

Be sure to stay tuned to our Facebook Fan page as well as the blog for upcoming steals, guest designers and info on our next online crop!

Happy scrappin’!

All right girls, it’s finally time for our second Scrapbook Steals online crop!  Our last crop was such a huge success and I’m so excited to get to host another crop tonight!

Here are your four new challenges:

1 – Show Some Green! That’s right girls!  In light of St. Patty’s day this week lets see a layout, card or other creation with the main color scheme, featuring none other than the favorite color of March…..GREEN!

2 - Lucky! I guess I still have St. Patricks Day on the brain because I want you to show us a LAYOUT featuring the word LUCKY somewhere in the title.  This can be anything from being lucky that you have such a special someone in your life, lucky that you have been blessed with things in your life, or even as silly as being lucky that you have a Diet Dr. Pepper, or if you are *really* lucky a maid to come and clean your house!  (Yeah, I’m really wishing I were lucky enough for that one today!)

3 – Something Spring. This challenge can be adapted into a number of ways.  Let’s see your layouts or cards featuring delightful spring colors or even a spring themed layout.  You could do a layout about the flowers in your yard starting to bloom or even get those photos scrapped of your kiddos coloring Easter eggs!  I know you’ve got those photos, so why not do something with them!

4 – Double Dose! Yup. I want to see some 2 pagers.  So often we get into the rut of creating single page layouts, but think of the possibilities presented with design space when creating a double page layout.

Submit your challenges by Monday at 9am! We will be having a prize drawing for each challenge!  Go to our Facebook page here to share and view photos, layouts, and of course chat! Be sure to put the title of the challenge in your post upload.

Click here to see the video chat tonight from 6:00 – 6:30 MST! There will be secret Scrapbooksteals popping up in the chat room! You won’t want to miss it!

Can’t wait to see you!

We would like to welcome Teresa Collins to the Scrapbooksteals family!  For those of you who have been around the scrapbook industry for a while, you have probably seen the wonderful products Teresa has designed for other companies.  I can’t tell you how thrilled I was when I found out that she has ventured out on her own to start her own company with her own unique designs.  She is a passionate designer that strives to create and design craft and scrapbook products with timeless style and chic appeal.  She loves to document life in an artistic way.  You can see her love for journaling in her products.  Journaling is such an important part of documenting our lives, I just love that Teresa’s products make it so easy!

We are so lucky to be able to feature some of her new project kits today.  For anyone that wants to document the early days of someone’s life, this is the perfect kit!

Make sure to also check out Teresa’s blog here for TONS of great inspiration!

Happy Scrappin’!

Hello my crafty friends! Wow!  I feel like it’s been an age since I’ve had the opportunity to create anything for you!  When Melodee asked me to whip up today’s steal in a blog post I was pretty excited.  Not only because it’s something completely out of my norm, but it’s stinkin’ cute!

I’m so not much of a home décor crafter, as so many others out there.  In fact I pretty much stink at the whole home decorating thing.  So often I feel like I just don’t have the space for little crafty knick knacks and that is precisely why I love the decorative block kits by My Minds Eye.  Not only do you get step by step instructions but a cute decoration that has not only one option to spruce up your home, but SIX!  Get tired of one design…simple…flip the blocks and you’ve got a whole new look to spice up a shelf or dresser or anywhere else you’ve got a smidgen of space that wants to look cute!

Now I know working with decoupage can be a little intimidating so I thought I’d do a little step by step for you, so you can see exactly how easy it is!

You’ll notice that the MME block kits each come with the blocks, papers, sandpaper, a foam brush and decoupage glue.  I guess old habits die hard, because I preferred to use my big bottle of Mod Podge Matte finish glue, as I’m familiar with how it handles and I like the final look.  Plus the ease of being able to dip my brush into the bottle was a big plus for me!

The first step in completing your blocks are to sand down all of the rough edges.  I am perhaps a little anal and actually sanded down the blocks completely.  Just be sure to take extra care when sanding the cut ends of the wood…this helps seal off the porous areas so that the glue is more effective.  Oh and another fun part of sanding is I have to say the smell of whatever wood the MME blocks are made out of is really quite pleasing.

Once you have the blocks all sanded the next step is to organize your blocks 3×3.  You’ll then want to take a pencil and letter and number each block left to right and top to bottom.  So the first block will be 1A, 2A, 3A….

Once you have the top face of each block numbered rotate all of the blocks in the same direction and begin lettering them and numbering them again.  This time it will be 2A, 2B, 2C….  Keep doing this process until each block is numbered A-F.  This is a pretty important step as it will help you make sure that the correct papers are going on the correct blocks in the correct places as well as in the correct direction.

The next step is to cut the paper of choice into 9 squares.  It’s best to choose just one pattern at a time while doing this so that you don’t have so much to keep track of.  An added bonus is that the kit actually comes with a template so if you wanted to choose different papers or even add a photo it would be easy peasy!

Now we start the gluing process.  Simply take the foam brush and either dip it in glue or if you are using the kit glue, squirt a little amount onto the block and use the foam brush to apply it to the surface evenly.

Next take the correct square of paper and firmly press onto the top of the block.  Take care to push out any air bubbles that may be hiding!

The next step that I did certainly isn’t a required step, but I really love adding ink to my projects.  I like the dimension and character that adding a little ink to the edges of things brings to a project.  My very favorite ink pads for this purpose are the Colorbox Fluid Chalk ink pads.  Perhaps I shouldn’t admit the fact that I own every color!  Yes.  That’s how much I love them!  The color that I used on this project is the ‘Chestnut Roan’.  Worked great with the color scheme of everything!

Now the next step isn’t entirely mandatory either, but another that I’d highly suggest.  I like to seal my projects by adding a top coat of glue.  In fact I have to say that I’m VERY glad I did this on this very project!  I wasn’t quite finished completing the blocks and walked into my crafting studio to find that my son had taken a ball point pen to one of the blocks and drawn all over the entire thing.  Luckily for me, the top coat of Mod Podge made quite a fabulous sealant on the block and I was able to more or less wipe away almost all of the ink.  Had the top coat of not been there, I’d have been a pretty grumpy momma with a project that was ruined!

Once you’ve completed the same process for all sides of the cubes, you’ve got yourself a darling project to add a little flair to your home!

I really cannot say enough about how fun this project was to make.  I loved that I could be crafty and didn’t have to put a lot of thinking power into it!

Until next time my crafty friends……

Happy scrappin’ to you all!