I’m so happy to be hosting the first It’s In the Cards challenge for this year! It seems like this time of year is great for cardmaking from last minute holiday cards to thank you cards, to early Valentine’s Day cards to new year cards, there are a lot of possibilities.

Here’s the template for this challenge:

My sample is a thank you card using What Say? by Erica Zane.

And here are the amazing examples by the creative team – they really rocked this template! Thank you gals!

Tamara (tsmspt) used Way To Be: The Works by Andilynn Designs

Kat (ktanker) used Frosty by [WM]Squared.

Rebecca (reboscraps) used Better Days Ahead by Jady Day Studio and Stolen Moments.

Cathy (scrappycath) used the Cupcakes and Candles collab by the ScrapMatters Design Team.

And Carina (cinna) used Renaissance by Laitha’s Designs and Viva Artistry.

What a beautiful variety of cards.

I can’t wait to see what you create!

Download the template here!

To earn your Matter of Scrap point for the month you need to photograph and upload your card to the Hybrid Challenge gallery – It’s In the Cards section by the end of January then post it in the thread for the Jan 13, 2011 It’s In the Cards as well. This challenge follows the rules of the Matter of Scrap challenges so check on those for any clarifications! Happy scrapping and crafting!

Take a look at this awesome Thanks Snow Much Card by sporte91. I just love the sentiment and look at how she’s presented it as well!

Congratulations Sarah! Be sure to stop by the gallery and forum to leave her some well deserved love for this fabulous project!

-Michelle (msbrad)

First of all, I love the beach. Take a look at this great page, Paradise in the Sand, from kjrogers01. I love the page composition, perspective of all 3 photos, and just remembering this moment. Nice work with kit combination too.

Congratulations Kim! Be sure to stop by the forum and gallery to leave her some well deserved love for this awesome page!

-Michelle (msbrad)

Hello, hello, hello and welcome to another edition of our Sunday Spotlight. I hope everyone has had a wonderful weekend so far. I’m excited to bring you interviews with our two awesome Guest Designers this month, Micheline Martin and Armina Designs.

Let’s jump right into a little Q&A with Micheline Martin.

1. Your screen name? Your real name? Micheline Martin (both my screen name and my real name)

2. What is your main job/career? I currently self employed and run an in-home daycare.

3. Are you married/children/pets? I am happily married for 8 awesome years!

4. Where is home for you? My home is in Canada.

5. What are your 3 favorite foods? My three favorite foods are Lasagna, Grilled Cheese, Ceasar Salad.

6. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream? Vanilla

7. Snacks…Salty or Sweet? Sweet, I have a huge sweet tooth.

8. Beverage of choice? Pepsi, definately Pepsi!

9. What’s your least favorite food? Ground Beef….yuck!

10. PC or Mac?  PC

11. How long have you been digi-scrapping? How did you get started? I rarely ever make layouts. I can count the amount of layouts I’ve made in my whole life on two hands.

12. What was your 1st LO about? I have no idea, it was such a long time ago.

13. Do you have any other hobbies besides digi-scrapping (are there other hobbies)? I love reading, watching movies and having family time with my husband and children.

14. What is the most challenging part of scrapbooking for you? Honestly, picking the colors. I’m such a perfectionist that it takes me hours to find the perfect colors that look well together.

15. What would you like to learn to do (or do better) not related to scrapbooking? I would love to sky dive.

16. What are your favorite movies/TV shows? My favorite movie is anything that is old school horror and tv show is definately The Big Bang Theory (I want to marry Sheldon lol).

17. Describe your “scrapping” environment. Music? TV in the background? Drinks? Snacks? Where? Pepsi, music on my ipod, I can’t design in a too quiet environment.

18. If you only had 2 elements to use on a LO, what would they be? Um, if I would need to scrap a layout I need an alpha and a ribbon.

19. Would you like to share a little known fact about you…? I am french

20. When did you start designing? What is your favorite product that you’ve designed for ScrapMatters? I’ve been designing for almost 6 years.  So far, I have a Grab Bag available in the SM shop.

21. How would you describe your design style? It changes with my mood. Some days I want to be playful and design something more bright and fun, other days I like to keep it simple and clean.

22. Where do you get your inspiration/motivation? Magazines, tv, and my kids clothing.

23. When designing, do you start with papers or embellishments first? ALWAYS papers, elements are always last.

Now, let’s take some time to get to know Armina Designs.

1. Your screen name? Your real name? My real name is Armina and I’m not too creative, so I used my name for my screen name too.

2. What is your main job/career? I’m a stay at home mom. I used to work as part time web designer and a part time web design lecturer in a local university here. Right now, I’m focus on digital scrapbooking.

3. Are you married/children/pets? I’ve been married for over 10 years and have 3 wonderful children. We have fish pond and a turtle.

4. Where is home for you? I am originally from the Philippines, but moved to Indonesia in 2002 and got married. 

5. What are your 3 favorite foods? It’s not really easy to narrow just 3 foods? Hmm… mostly anything about Chinese, Indonesian and Filipino foods.

6. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?  Cookies and cream, mango and ube.

7. Snacks…Salty or Sweet? I like both

8. Beverage of choice? Make it simple, water.

9. What’s your least favorite food? Anything that doesn’t taste good, lol.

10. PC or Mac? PC forever!

11. How long have you been digi-scrapping? How did you get started? I discovered digital scrapbooking in 2007. I joined several designers to CT and and I’m still on their CT’s until now. A few months after I started scrapping, I tried making freebies and the feedback was good, so I’ve decided to start designing.

12. What was your 1st LO about? It was just simple and the shadows were not really proportional. I never did upload it since I didn’t know any digiscrap gallery that time.

13. Do you have any other hobbies besides digi-scrapping (are there other hobbies)? I love sewing whenever I have free time.

14. What is the most challenging part of scrapbooking for you? To get inspired in starting a page and find a perfect kit for my pictures.

15. What would you like to learn to do (or do better) not related to scrapbooking? Photography. I have the tools but am to lazy to start learning, hehe.

16. What are your favorite movies/TV shows? Anything at Cartoon Network, Playhouse Disney, Disney Channel and Boomerang. I like cartoons and children shows LOL. Most of the time, my kids use our TV. I do love anime too. Movies? Well, anything about Jackie Chan, Jet Li or other Chinese action movies. I also love comedies, adventure/fantasy and animation.

17. Describe your “scrapping” environment. Music? TV in the background? Drinks? Snacks? Where? I want to have a peaceful environment when I work but it seldom happens, so most of the time I hear screaming, fighting, laughing, playing and my kid’s TV shows because my PC is in our bedroom.

18. If you only had 2 elements to use on a LO, what would they be? Hmm… a flower and wordart.

19. Would you like to share a little known fact about you…? OK, I am not a chatty person.

20. When did you start designing? What is your favorite product that you’ve designed for ScrapMatters? I started in 2008. I’ve designed some exclusive products for SM and one of them is the Forever Grateful Kit inspired by my family.

21. How would you describe your design style? At first I really focused on dark colors, mostly extracted elements and a bit grungy kits. Then I needed to try something new, so I am not sure about my current style.

22. Where do you get your inspiration/motivation? Usually my kids and family inspire me. Whenever my kids do something cute or funny, I usually have something in my head to design for.

23. When designing, do you start with papers or embellishments first? I usually start with the papers while creating the preview and add finished elements at the same time.

Thanks so much for taking time to get to know our two fabulous Guest Designers! Be sure to stop by the SM shop and take a look at the amazing goodies Micheline Martin and Armina Designs have available this month!

-Kelli (kellig)

Hello and welcome to the first Saturday Special of the New Year!! It’s Jen D here to show you a little trick that I enjoy using over and over again. Have you ever seen layouts with funky paper cuts and wondered “how the heck did they do that?” Well today you will learn…

First you want to open your editing software, place a back ground paper, and open any additional papers you want to “cut”.

Next, select the paper you are wanting to “cut” and select the Polygonal Lasso Tool:

Then simply “draw” an irregular shape on your paper with the lasso tool:

When you shape is complete you will have marching ants around it as a “selection” of that paper, then go to Edit and select Copy

Then go back to your original layout and Paste your irregular shape on top of your bg paper:

Continue until you have all the irregular shapes you desire on your layout:

Then finish your layout with pictures and elements….

Here is what I created using My Playlist: Teenage Dream by Amy Stoffel:

And here is some inspiration from our ubber awesome CT….they got paper cutting CrAzY!!

Andrea created this fun page using Everyday – daily alpha, Everyday – Ordinary Day, Everyday – Paper Flowers and Everyday -Basic Solids = all by Scrapmuss Designs

Jenn had some fun too and here is her amazing creation using WM[squared]‘s Lil Explorers and Stolen Moments NEW Round About Alpha

Fiona cut some pretty amazing papers in this one using Find Beauty Within by Chelles Creations:

Challenge reminders:
-You will receive one point for posting in Saturday Special 1.8.11 thread & in the Saturday Special gallery. You can receive an additional point for using new Scrap Matters products; please make a note of new products in your post. And at the end of the month you’ll be entered into a random drawing that could earn you some bonus points!

-You have until the end of January 2011 to complete this challenge to earn MOS points.

-Remember no double dipping…your photo and/or layout must be unique to this challenge.

-You don’t have to use Scrap Matters products, but we love it when you do!

Can’t wait to see your crazy cuts!!

Hi ladies Emilee (emileem) here hosting GTL this week. I noticed we have never lifted Liz (mommy22girls) before and she has such a great gallery–so let’s do it now! Catch her gallery HERE, choose a LO to lift, post your LO in the GTL gallery and post both LOs in the GTL Jan 5 forum.

I lifted Outdoor Explorers:

Tanya lifted

and made this yummy LO:

Jan lifted

and created this sparkly LO:

Heidi lifted:

and created this awesome LO:

and finally Sharon lifted:

and created this timely LO:

Have fun surfing through Liz’s gallery all month!

MOS Reminders:
-You will receive one point for posting in this thread & in the Grand Theft LO gallery. You can receive an additional point for using new Scrap Matters products; please make a note of new products in your post. And at the end of the month you’ll be entered into a random drawing that could earn you some bonus points!

-You have until the end of January to complete this challenge to earn MOS points.

-Remember no double dipping…your photo and/or layout must be unique to this challenge.

-You don’t have to use Scrap Matters products, but we love it when you do!

Happy January! Hope you are all recovering from the New Year festivities! Here’s to the first Tuesday Template challenge of 2011! I hope you like it! Here is my layout I made with it using the NEW Frosty by WM[squared] Designs.

And here’s the template preview.

And here is the download: http://www.4shared.com/file/fdA1_pc5/FranB_Template_36.html

Look at the awesomeness the CT whipped up!

Cathy also used Frosty by WM[squared] and also Family Matters by WM[squared] Designs and Graham Like the Cracker

Kelli whipped up this beauty using Pinecones and HollyBerries from GG Digital Designs, a few ribbons from Once Upon a Shabby Christmas from Haynay Designs, and Circle That Date from Erica Zane.

Tanya also used Wendy’s Frosty!

And Carina made this pretty page with Laitha´s A dream within a dream.

Challenge reminders:
-You will receive one point for posting in this thread and in the Tuesday Template gallery. You can receive an additional point for using new Scrap Matters products; please make a note of new products in your post. And at the end of the month you will be entered into a random drawing that could earn you some bonus points!

-You have until the end of January to complete this challenge to earn MOS points.

-Remember no double dipping…your photo and/or layout must be unique to this challenge.

-You don’t have to use Scrap Matters products, but we love it when you do!

For LOTW I chose “Captivated by You” by Roxxygerlie. I just love the bold background, fabulous clusterwork and amazing shadowing. This is such a fun and happy LO!

Congratulations Chelle! Be sure to stop by the gallery and forum and leave her some well deserved love!

Take a look at these awesome puppy onesies by tsmspt. Aren’t they just so adorable?!?

Congratulations Tamara! Be sure to stop by the gallery and forum to leave her some well deserved love!

-Vicki (longhorn)