My Top 5 Reasons I Love CTMH!

My Top 5 Reasons I love Close To My Heart!

5. Jeanette Lynton~ How can you not love her? She is an amazing woman who started this company and has so many wonderful ideas under that great head of hair. (Picture taken at the Regional Celebration in Calgary. I was so excited to meet here and told her that I was glad I didn't throw up on her... Morning sickness from Peter)

4. New Products~ How they do it time and time again is totally amazing to me. Each new Idea Book is filled with such amazing items that make we so glad to work for this company.

3. Crafting~ I love to craft, wish I had more time to just sit in the office and get lost in all those great products.

2. Convention~ Days full of crafting ideas, seeing the new products and meeting new friends... what's not to love!

1. Making new friends~ I have met some amazing ladies over the years because of CTMH, we have laughed, cried and crafted together. Thanks to all of you who have entered into my life and I too hold you "Close To My Heart!"

More Cricut projects

I LOVE how much I can do with the Close To My Heart Cricut Art Philosophy cartridge. Here are a few of the projects I've been working on from left to right:
1. French Fry box
2. Candy bar- 3-D flower
3. Journal- both the Font and flowers (stamped image after cutting out flower)
4. Cupcake box

All these projects would have taken me hours without the Cricut machine... I'm totally sold! Look for more projects to come in the next few days. :)

Cricut Christmas Trees

When I first saw this tree by Mandy Leahy, I though it would make a great hostess gift for the holidays. Why not make 3 trees, 1 6" and 2 4"! This project became one for the whole family and man what was I thinking when I decided to do 2 sets? Actually it was a very fun project to work on and the girls really enjoyed helping. Nothing will compare to Peter doing the what I now call the 'Cricut Dance' as it was cutting out the flowers.
I used the following products from Close to My Heart:
Z 1686 Art Philosophy cartridge
X5907 Light Green Shade Pack (Sweet Leaf, Juniper, Ponderossa Pine)
X5907Dark Green Shade Pack (Garden Green, Olive, New England Ivy)
1272 Cranberry Cardstock
x5914 Buttercup Cardstock
Z2110 Buttercup Ink
D1482 Love Life Stamp Set

After rolling and pinning 850+ flowers I love how they turned out and the quality crafting time I spent with the kids. Hopefully the hostess who will be receiving these trees will love them too. Happy Crafting!

Cricut Crazytown

After many years fighting the urge to buy a Cricut machine, I broke down this summer and bought one. It was a small one-- 12x6 and was very nervous to use it. Then this summer Close To My Heart came out with their Art Philosophy only available from a consultant I was excited to learn all that I could do. Slowly I started using the Cricut and then I discovered some projects that would suddenly be so much easier to complete with the help of something that would cut for me! I'm totally hooked! I recently finished 2 projects and am amazed at how much easier they were, while at the same time totally awesome. :) Pictures to follow tomorrow!

Now I'm discovering all the amazing stamp sets that come with the Art Philosophy package (Cricut cartridge, 3-D size stamp sets and 9-9x12 Dimensional Elements sheets). I love all the different images, 700 of them in all... fonts, shapes and 3-D items. But when you think about all the different sizes that you can cut, the number is endless! I have now purchased a 12x12 Expressions Cricut and am loving the items that I've been able to create.

Check out my website www.katymartin.myctmh.com for more info or contact me. Happy Crafting!

All Set!

After several attempts to get everything organized I finally finished my crafting closet! I love how it turned out and NOW can start some serious crafting projects. I started this project last year before Cory was coming home from Africa, it was a little me gift and something that really needed to be done. I had so much paper and accessories that I couldn't find anything, plus I had multiples of just about every paper pack that Close To My Heart makes because I couldn't find what I needed when I needed it so I would order more. Yikes, you should see how much I'm going to be selling!!!

I've set my list and am all set to start crafting... First item on the list, learn to use my Cricut machine (or should I say machines). I first bought the portable one, holds 6x12 papers and when CTMH came out with their own cartridges I HAD to get the 12x12 Expression one. Cory almost flipped when he saw yet another box from UPS, good think he loves me! I'm working on some fun projects and hope to get pictures posted very soon. Happy Crafting!

CTMH Convention 2011

What a great time this last trip to Disneyland was and it didn't include a trip into the park! Close To My Heart's convention was at "The Happiest Place On Earth" and it truly was magical. For a whole 3 days I got to take off so many of my hats and just wear my crafty one. I loved meeting new people, seeing the latest and greatest and just being inspired by so many things. Pictures will follow of the items we created and some things I have come up with. For now I leave you with the new mission statement of CTMH and something I will strive to live by in my business.

We show you how to celebrate relationships through discovering your creativity, to preserve and share the moments that matter most.

Happy summer crafting and if you want a catalog... let me know! :)

Procrastinating!

I always look forward to receiving my Real Simple magazine each month and when the April issue arrived, I was excited. The main article is "Spring Cleaning Shortcuts," which I'm all about. Other articles include 15-minute dinners, save smarter and colorful fashion. Down at the bottom you will find "How to Stop Procrastinating--Now." As usual I start at the first page and read the articles one by one and when I like something, I rip the page(s) out and save it. On approaching this article about procrastinating, I skipped over it and know I would come back to it... yes I just procrastinated reading an article on how to stop procrastinating! So after a long day of putting things off I finally sat down to read the article. WOW! I'm totally going to follow all 7 suggestions and hopefully find myself procrastinating less and less. For those of you who might not read this wonderful magazine, here is an overview of the article.
1. Do the worst thing first
2. Start your day over at 2pm
3. Make the job smaller
4. Create an audience
5. Race the clock
6. Don't interrupt yourself
7. Plan an unprocrastination day

I have started with #1 and decided to write a blog entry. Next will be to keep updating this blog every other week. See how I just added #4 from the list. I'm going to focus on my Close To My Heart business for the next 6 months, so I'll be updating my calendar with lots of fun events, including one big sale. I'm looking forward to this new challenge and will hopefully be successful in all the areas of my life. :)

Card Crazy

So I have gone card crazy the past 2 weeks! I have finished 12 Workshops On The Go (WOTG) and have 2 more left before I can start with the new products in the current Close To My Heart catalog. Its been a labor of love with a few side projects thrown in as well. I'm so excited (and so is the hubby) to have several cards to chose from when I need one. Contact me if you are interested in joining my card workshop group and be on your way to having lots of fun cards to chose from as well. :) I'll post the next set of cards hopefully next week.

I'm back!

OK, so I said that I was going to post about once a week when I started this blog back in August... Well, it's February and I've only posted twice. My new goal is to post twice a month and keep you updated on my crafting projects. Life had been very busy with 3 little ones in the house and for some reason I forgot to put ME on the list, but all that has changed and I'm back, in more ways than one. :)

So...what have I been doing you ask...working on lots of projects. More to the point Close To My Heart's Workshops on the Go (WOTG)! I was cleaning out my crafting closet getting ready for the new catalog and I discovered that I have 15 past workshops that I never completed. Oops! So after making a goal of not ordering anything new from the catalog until I start these WOTG, I got to cutting and stamping and putting together several of the projects. Now with Valentine's just a few days away, I'm taking a break from the WOTG and working on a few things for the kids friends. Pictures to follow next week. My other projects are Grace's invitations for her 6th birthday party and finally getting to "play" around on Studio J. Once I get all these projects complete I'll post pictures.

As for the new stuff...my order is set to arrive today and man am I going to work like a crazy woman so I can play with the items. Who needs sleep when there's crafting to be done! Hope you all are having a great day, happy crafting!