MDS Blog Hop - Valentine's Day and a Guest Blogger!

I was hurrying to finish my project this morning when I realized, Goodness Gracious!  I already have a finished Valentine's page!  I created it for one of the Leadership projects I did.  It's part of a "Year in Review" book that I did and it's perfect for today's blog hop.  I'll post the entire book another time, but for now, you can enjoy this page :) I love that my little guys are using my Stampin' supplies to make their own Valentines - isn't that cute?  They had so much fun!

Supplies used:

2011 Notable Desktop Calendar	Lucky Star Embellishments	All Holidays stamp set	Taffeta Ribbon Color Pack
Punch Shapes	My Digital Studio software	Downtown Grunge Photobook Template

InLinkz.com

Make sure to check out the rest of the blogs on the hop - there's some really cute stuff to be seen!  Oh, and did you notice that we have a guest blogger today?  Pretty exciting stuff!  Welcome to the hop Kelly - we're glad to have you with us!

1. Jeanna Bohanon
2. Mandy Grant

3. Julie Leblanc 

4. Amber Meadows (glad to see you!)

5. Terri Mongeon

6. Cindy Schuster

7. Erica Shaw

8. Heather Summers

9. Alesha Walls

10. Holly VanDyne

11. Kelly Birrell (this week's guest blog hopper!)

MDS Blog Hop - Something New!

Welcome 2012!  I hadn't planned on taking a hiatus from blogging, but it happened anyway.  What is it about the new year that makes it feel like a fresh start?  Maybe it's all the hype about New Year's resolutions.  I'm not much for the resolutions - I prefer to set small goals throughout the year - but I am feeling the desire to attack this year with more energy and purpose.  And I have to say, I like it.  I haven't felt like this for awhile, so I welcome the change.
Now, on to the reason you stopped by - the fun MDS projects!  We were challenged to use something new and that wasn't too hard - Stampin' Up! has been putting out some adorable downloads the last few weeks.  I want them all!  But for now, I had to pick just a few.  We did just finish Christmas after all.
We're doing a Super Saturday (a giant craft day) for our activity this month at church and I needed some Valentine cards to go along with this adorable envelope we're making.  I found some free downloads online and could have used those, but then I saw all the fun Valentine's downloads and decided that I would be making my own.  They're too cute not to!  Here's my version:
Front:

And back:

Each card is 4 x 2.5, so they're small, but this way I was able to fit 8 on a page.  They're perfect for just a quick little note to my kids each day.

Here are the downloads I used:

Hearts Collection Punch	My Cute Valentine	Sweetest Ever Valentine's Designer Template	I {Love} Love stamp
Thoughtful Overlays stamp	Love Impressions DSP	Pretty in Pink Designer Series Paper	Taffeta Ribbon
1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon	Polystitched Ribbon	My Digital Studio software

I hope you enjoy the rest of the projects on the Blog Hop!  I know there are a couple of ladies who aren't participating this week, so I've taken their names off.  They plan to be back with us soon  :)

1. Jeanna Bohanon
2. Rochelle Gould 

3. Mandy Grant

4. Amber Meadows (nice to see you!)

5. Cindy Schuster

6. Erica Shaw

7. Heather Summers

8. Alesha Walls

9. Holly VanDyne

Until next week!

MDS Monday #1

Some of you may know that I belong to a great group of stampers called Utah Divas International. I haven't been involved in the forums for the last few months, but Max (our fabulous leader) asked for volunteer designers for their upcoming MDS Monday blog posts. I thought it would be a great opportunity to get involved again, so - here I am!

My first creation for MDS Monday is a fun Valentine's Day card. I have to say, I'm a recent convert to this holiday. During my Jr. High and High School days, I was always so irritated that I didn't have a boyfriend to send me flowers that I did as any jaded teenager would do - I proclaimed that Valentine's Day was "lame".

Now that I have an adoring husband and two handsome (and kissable) little boys, I'm singing a different tune. I've realized what I should have known all along - V-day is a great excuse to show the special people in your life just how much you care.

I'm busy looking for all kinds of ways to make the holiday fun for my family - and that includes sending cards! Wouldn't you love to get this in the mail? It was so much fun - and so fast - to create using My Digital Studio.

Supplies:

Stamps - XOXO, Love U, Framed with Love, Chat Room Love

Papers - Perfect Plum and Pretty in Pink DSP

Embellishments - Love Birds Digital Kit, Staples and Stitching

School Valentine

I've seen these cute Valentines of kids holding suckers all over the blog world lately and I absolutely HAD to make one. I'm not sure how long the idea has been floating around, or even who started it - but I found my inspiration here. Adorable, right?

It would have been so easy just to add some text to the photo and print it, but the scrapper in me couldn't leave well enough alone. Why not pull the picture into MDS and make some fun Valentines for my adorable little kindergartner?

Andrew and I put our heads together and this is what we came up with:

Would you believe he picked the background paper? I did the rest and he gave it his stamp of approval.

I should tell you that my little man was a little grumpy when we took this picture because I made him change out of his pajama shirt and put on a nice red one. What's the big deal? I let him keep the bottoms on! After a little teasing about how his grumpy face was going to break my camera, he perked right up and gave me some awesome goofy smiles.

I procrastinated too long to be able to print them at the copy shop, so I had to use my own printer. Not great quality, but it gets the job done.

Using my hobby blade, I cut two slits in the picture and slid the sucker through. Super easy, and Andrew loves them!

Love Birds

I was playing around with My Digital Studio today and opened up one of the new downloads I just got - the Love Birds kit. It's adorable - I've been eyeing it in the catalog since it came out - and I was so excited to see it become available for MDS. I absolutely love that the same papers and embellishments I use all the time are also available in a digital format. Stampin' Up designs are the best out there!

My friend Stephanie - also my upline - is having her first girl (after 3 boys!) and she mentioned that she'd wanted to create some wall art for the nursery using MDS. I offered to send a few ideas her way, however the visions that were in my head just don't seem to be coming out right on paper. Good thing I'm not actually wasting any supplies!

Anyway, as I was playing around with yet another idea, I stumbled onto this design and thought it would be perfect for a Valentine's card. Simple, not too many elements. I like it. I think my hubby might like it too :)

I really wanted to add a scalloped rectangle, but since that punch doesn't exist I had to make my own. I used the square scallop punch and expanded it to the size I wanted. I duplicated the square and then overlapped them to make the rectangle.

After that, I used the Paper Fill option. I had to line up the paper so that the seam wasn't noticeable, but it wasn't too hard. I double clicked on one square to bring up the paper, and moved it around until it was where I wanted. Just FYI, you won't be able to add a drop shadow if you use this technique, because it will show the seam.

Now - I'd better get back to that wall art!