Birthday Girl

I am blessed to have 2 sisters and 2 brothers. My youngest sister's birthday was in Feb and I had some photos of when she was little, so I decided to create something for her special day. She is a quilter and very precise with her work, so maybe she will be able to relate to this handmade gift. Hope so!
The birthday fairy on the front of the mini album is a Red Lead Stamp and the young lady on the back cover is from the Tim Holtz Collection. The ink and buttons are Close To My Heart and the paper and embellishments are assorted scraps. Thanks for looking!

Paper Roses

I am in love with paper flowers of all types and now I can make my own mini-roses! I saw this technique on YOUTUBE but didn't get the artist's name written down. Still searching for that info to share. I love making paper roses with Close To My Heart's cardstock. The inner white core allows you to see the different layers of the rose and gives it a bit of a shabby vintage look. The day after I saw this technique a friend told me she was in need of prayer and support for a serious medical situation. I made this card for her and she told me she received it before she had to leave for the hospital. I'm so glad.
Hope you had a nice weekend!
~L

Happy Valentine's Day

I made a few cards to send out on this special holiday and wanted to share one of my favs with you. This card is made with all Close To My Heart products except for the vintage lace and the figure of the little girl-she is "Country Girl" from Oxford Impressions-love their images! I used "That's Amore" paper pak x7107B because it offers so many beautifully coordinated patterns. The card design is a combination of designs offered in CTMH's card design book "Wishes"-one of my favorite tools. Now instead of taking me hours to create a card, I can easily find one in my "Wishes" book and follow the cutting diagrams including the exact measurements! Thank you, CTMH, for speeding up this process for me-love it!
Last night some good friends watched John and Grace so Brian and I could go to dinner with friends from work. What a rare relief to have an adult-only meal! We need to do that much more often! Today we spent a quiet day at home, exchanged Valentines and little goodies between the 4 of us. THe kids got in some good sledding time and we enjoyed watching the Olympics between doing laundry and naps.
I hope you had a peaceful day too.
~L

CTMH Hearts for Haiti

Textured paper is one of my favorite tools when it comes to creating scrapbook pages and paper art in any form. Close To My Heart has the most beautiful textured paper and I use it all the time. Right now you and I can make an easy and rewarding donation to the crisis in Haiti using some of this gorgeous paper. Please take a moment to read the details below.






Our hearts go out to the victims of the earthquake in Haiti, and like so many of you, we’re eager to help. We’re excited to announce Close To My Heart’s February Constant Campaign, Hearts for Haiti—where you can get a great deal while doing great good for those affected by the devastation in Haiti.

From February 1-28, 2010, our 12” x 12” textured cardstock combo packs are buy one, get one FREE—and with every offer purchased, Close To My Heart will donate $2.00 to Operation Smile’s Haiti relief efforts.

Order any textured cardstock combo pack at full retail price ($14.95) and receive a second textured cardstock combo pack of your choice FREE. The textured cardstock is printed with our signature white core. Each sheet of textured cardstock features a rich Close To My Heart color on one side and a lighter shade on the opposite side. Combo packs include 24 sheets: 4 each of 6 colors.

Note: You may choose a FREE textured combo pack that is the same or different as the full retail combo pack.

For only $14.95, you get two packs of 12” x 12” textured cardstock (a great deal at about $.30 per sheet!) and Operation Smile will receive $2.00 to benefit the urgent, important cause in Haiti. I encourage you to stock up on every color combination: Basic, Spring Harmony, Summer Celebration, Autumn Harvest, and Winter Cozy.


Operation Smile is always a fantastic charitable partner—offering free facial reconstruction surgeries to needy children throughout the world. They’ve currently marshaled their medical teams and resources to provide emergency relief in Haiti, and the donations given as part of Hearts for Haiti will be used exclusively for Operation Smile’s efforts in Haiti. For more information on their on-the-ground response, you can visit www.operationsmile.org/haiti.

To Place Your Order February 1 - 28...Go To My Website
www.laurabohall.myctmh.com

One Little Word 2010

Scrapbook Artist Ali Edwards has inspired me to chose a word for the new year that I will embed into my life faithfully. That word is commit. I will commit to completeing projects I have set for myself and my family. I will commit to working on tasks whole-heartedly to completion, rather than laying things aside to be finished later, maybe. We all have the best intentions and I want to commit to many that I have considered over the years, including reaching out to friends that have moved out of the area. And creating a healthier lifestyle for me and mine-better food choices and more outside activities! Prioritizing housework ugh is a big must on my commit list. These sound like New Year resolutions but for me the action is to commit .
Working on this blog is another good example of something I will commit to being active on a weekly or more basis! This chance to have an electronic journal of me and my family is a great tool to record happenings in our life that I can come back to and scrap or simply print out to add to a more permanent "storycatcher" like an album.
So there it is.....commit. Easy to say, easy to understand.

Winter 2009

...brothers and sisters...

Mom and her sons - Roy and Richard


Mom and her daughters - Susanna, Peggy and Laura

On Christmas Day we only got pictures of the adult siblings as a group-shame on us for fogetting to put all the cousinz together! We were kinda busy trying to fit everything in before the weather turned icy and made driving off mom's mountain treacherous. These pics were in Grammy's kitchen at the farm in Charles Town celebrating mom's 75th birthday. love ya, Mom!