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We're about to make haste for California, though before we officially exit Utah and head straight way to the West coast, we've a couple more projects we'd like for you to look at, including an extra from one of our international designers! Today's focus though is primarily "Neighborhood" and to begin with, here are a two beautifully orchestrated cards from Amy Heller...
From freshly trimmed blades of grass to bee sequestered flowers, Amy's captured those Spring traits we often crave so much this time of year being that Winter is still upon us! Thankfully, we've California to rescue Crate this weekend! Yeah!! We could use a bit of warming up!
The busy bee says "bzzzzzzzz...." and we respond, "How cute is that?!" Speaking of cute, how about this refurbished Neighborhood pie tin from Jenny Chesnick?! If you'll be attending CHA this weekend, be sure to stop by our booth to see this project in person - it'll be on display alongside a host of other handcrafted items from our design team!
And now for a slight detour and a quick turn towards Portrait as we present this final project from Anne Jo Alexander. She's mentioned to us that this lil' guy is her nephew and at the time of capturing this photo, he was only all of "three weeks old"! So very tiny, don't you think? And of course, precious as can be....
The next time you'll hear from us is after we've arrived and settled into our booth at CHA! While waiting for the latest and greatest news concerning the big event and images of our "booth-in-the-making", remember to leave a comment in response to the previous post for a chance to win one of our brand new releases!! Review the previous post for further details - hurry, you've only the weekend to do it!
Posted at 04:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (30)
As promised yesterday, we're moving ahead with more projects from the new product collections. Today's focus is Toy Box and Emma's Shoppe. Our contributors include Jenny Chesnick, Davinie Fiero, Kaori Watanabe, Lori Gentile and Michelle Lanning. All of these girls claimed one of the first opportunities to create beautiful things with the two collections and we're pleased to present them to you! With that said, we're giving you a second opportunity to win either Emma or Toy Box - all we ask is that you leave a comment in regard to the creations shown today..none too complicated. We'll announce our winner right after we return from CHA next week!
Is it true that that dresser drawers/trays are still tremendously popular amongst crafters and scrapbooker alike? We're almost certain they are because of their infinite alteration options! This would be the first ever Emma's Shoppe drawer/tray to be done up and staged here. It's from our altered project expert, Jenny Chesnick!
"Cute as a Button" came to mind when we saw this Michelle Lanning layout upon first approach - it's about "all things girly", which we love! If there were ever a reason to play with Emma's Shoppe, it would be because you've a little girl in the house that you're wanting to scrapbook about - this is the ideal collection for posing and preserving her!
Another sweet girl layout from Emma's Shoppe, though this homespun vintage inspired layout belongs to Davinie Fiero. We adore how she's brought a combination of sewing stitches into the mix over the top of our Emma Shoppe frames - so very clever!
Just as our Emma's Shoppe is girly, Toy Box is the epitome of all things boy related! Think in terms of gaming, army figurines, vehicles with wheels and long-winded outdoor rough & tough activities. Toy Box represents all of this and more..which brings us to the next layout - it's classic Kaori Watanabe! The dash and sprinkling of elements across her pages is what we admire most about her scrapbooking style - look at the way the ribbon hangs loosely across the page - it's perfectly situated and blends in seamlessly with the background. What a great way to use the Toy Box ribbon or any ribbon for that matter!
And finally, our very last layout of the day - an intellect in the making, Lori Gentile's lil' guy deeply ingrained within a book that's almost bigger than himself - how cute!! If you peek at Lori's layout closely, you'll notice that she's created "book stacks" from various materials, including Toy Box's phrase stickers and ribbon! Again, another series of clever ideas that we love!
This brings us to the end of today's presentation! Don't forget to leave us a comment before leaving to possibly win either Emma or Toy Box before it arrives in store! It'll ship mid-February to the winner! Good Luck to you!
With CHA is nearly right around the corner (The booth is on the truck! Yeah!), and being that there are still a dozen + projects we've yet to share from our designers, we're taking the next couple of days to show you their work. To simplify things a bit though, we've assigned each day a collection - the first to be paraded of course is our already well recognized "Portrait"..so many of you expressed that this particular collection was your favorite, which simply elated us because it just so happens to be our favorite as well! We really consider it to be the core collection of this season's release! To demonstrate this further, we'd love to share with you Tara Anderson's modern, whimsical take on Portrait via one of her delicate and admirable mini albums - it's quite the treat - at least we think so anyway...
Hello, Tara Here!
As soon as I received the Portrait collection, I was madly in love with the color combinations and the beautiful pattern papers! I've already used Portrait as a wedding theme collection, so today I wanted to show just how versatile Portrait could be! (I've been holding on to these pretty photos for a little while, waiting for the right project to finally use them!) I created a mini album using a hodge podge of tags; Chipboard Accents, Accent Cuts and envelopes.
This layered mini is called Dream, which I thought was quite appropriate, as the photos are of Molly, (our little pen-pal) during an Alice in Wonderland themed photo-shoot. With the help of my trusty sewing machine, a couple of paper punches and a few foam-pop dots, I created clusters of embellishments from the Designer DieCuts. Add these embellishment clusters to each photo to help tie-in the them of the album. The various size butterflies were traced and cut from a combination of Portrait's pattern paper. I thought the over-sized butterflies added to the mini's whimsical feel...and when in doubt always add a butterfly! I also filled 2 vellum envelops with iridescent teal sequins to continue with Portrait's color combination.
My favorite page in this mini is the very last chipboard tag! Here's a how to, to re-create this page: I used a left-over piece of chipboard, and covered it with Portrait - June paper from the reduced pattern paper stack. I added a border sticker and a very skinny piece of Honeymoon paper, sewn into place on the side of the chipboard. Next, I took the photo-negative strip (Designer DieCuts), then layered on two hand-cut butterflies, and very-very carefully sprayed a little black spray paint to the center of the page. I clipped the photo of Molly into place with a mini clothes pin and lightly distressed the edges of the chipboard with a page-distresser. You could also add a handmade flower to make it extra girly!
Portrait has so many lovely possibilities for our art! Hope you enjoy the photos of my mini-album and thank you for looking! ~ Tara
Why thank-you Tara for the insightful peek into your mini-album! And to continue on with the collection, both our talented designers, Kinsey Wilson & Kaori Watanabe, brought forth their interpretations of beautiful Portrait.
That about does it for today! We shall return bright and early tomorrow with a brand new set of projects entailing the delightful Emma's Shop & Toy Box! We'll see you then!
Posted at 04:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (33)
And now we're honored to present our randomly chosen winners from last week's "big premier" giveaways! So, who are the lucky two that'll be rewarded with a new collection from the eight hundred + comments left to us in response to our product preview event?! If you recognize either of the comments below, then you're our winner! Email us with your info (info@cratepaper.com) and tell us which collection (from the two shown) that you prefer! We'll ship the collection to you mid-February!
Posted by: Cynthia B. | January 21, 2011 at 10:18 PM
Oh my...LOVE both of these adorable collections, but Emma's Shoppe is a natural fit for my girly pictures!
But than again....Toy Box would be totally useable in so many ways! What a dilemma...guess I will have BOTH these collections in my future!
Posted by: Lisa Risser | January 20, 2011 at 09:42 PM
If you didn't see your name here today, continue to visit us both before and after CHA as we'll be offering multiple chances to win one of the new collections. Also, throughout the remainder of this week, we'll bring forth more creative samples from our CP Girls, including this all-boy layout from Heidi Sonboul - up, up and away!
We're not quite sure which is cuter, Heidi's lil' guy or our soon-to-debut "Toy Box" collection..either way, the two are a perfect match!
Thank-you again for revisiting us as we begin the start of the week and also, a huge thank-you to all that commented last week! As Lisa already mentioned, we love hearing from you and look forward to sharing many more days of Emma's Shoppe, Toy Box, Portrait and Neighborhood with you right here on the Crate Paper blog! A huge celebratory CONGRATS to both of today's winners, Lisa & Cynthia!
Posted at 04:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (19)
Welcome to day two of our product preview. Thank you to everyone who stopped by yesterday and left a comment about how much you love Emma's Shoppe & Toy Box. You made our day!!
Today we are starting off with the Portrait Collection.
Hi it's Lisa here again, I'm so excited to be back today to share our last two collections. I have to tell you... I'm in love with portrait! I think it's because I love to celebrate special moments in my life and capture them with beautiful photos. That really is the inspiration behind Portrait, a formal collection, yet fun and casual, but at the same time can capture a wedding, a heritage photo, or a lazy day at home. (Also, once I started looking at Wedding Inspiration I was hooked, I couldn't stop, don't do it you will be at bride blogs all day) And because of my *wedding blog love* I have beautiful wedding elements in this collection that I hope you love. Our designers showed them off nicely today. I truly think the best photos are beautiful girls in white dresses or your little girl or guy in their PJ's, and Portrait can capture them both beautifully.
Our next Collection will have you packing your bag and heading out to our neighborhood, because we all want to live were the bee's and snails are that cute. You'll see, check it out.
How adorable is Neighborhood, I really want to live in that yellow house! This collection was so much fun to design. It really came together exactly how I wanted, full of spring and summer colors...with family and home at the quirky heart of it.
Thanks for coming by today. We have had a great time, we hope you have too. If you are going to CHA please stop by and say hi, if not, stop by the blog anytime and say hi. We love having you here. Our talented designers will blow you away with their tutorials and inspiration. Next week is full of their beautiful work from all four collections. You don't want to miss it. I can't wait! A big thanks to our design team and my blog & design team coordinator, Christine Middlecamp.
We want to know what your favorites are so leave a comment about what you love from each collection for a chance to win a portrait or neighborhood collection (winners choose what collection they want). We will pick two lucky winners!
Posted at 10:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (428)
Spring is here (ok, almost) and we are excited to show off the new 2011 collection. We are thrilled to have CP's Creative Director Lisa here with us today to show us the 4 new collections. But first lets have a peek at our first collection previewing today Emma's Shoppe.
Hi, it's Lisa here with you today. The designs of our four new collections have been a long time coming and I can't believe we finally get to share them with you. Well, what do you think? I know, I love Emma too.
When I was trying to think of the concept of our girl collection I kept thinking of those old vintage (pink) girl kitchens and of course my daughter. I decided we needed Girl Vintage with a lot of pink and color! But mostly I looked around my little girls room and sure enough I found the best inspiration there... PRETTY FLOWERS. So for the flower inspiration we can thank my 3 year old daughter Addison. But Addison has a 6 year old brother Taylor and the second I went into his room all I could see was toys (literally, I couldn't see the floor), and that brings us to our next collection today, Toy Box.
This collection is all boy, but how old is too old to play with toys? I was taking pictures of the chipboard at my house and left the room for one minute and when I returned all the toys in my chipboard pile were missing. In on the kitchen floor I found my husband and little boy with them. They were playing with the helicopter, army guys, dump truck and cars on the floor. It made me smile because I don't think we ever really grow up, we continue to love race cars, army guys, little dolls, pretty flowers and pink. Thanks to Emma's Shoppe and Toy Box we can continue to play!
Thanks for coming by today to see what we have been up to. I hope you have enjoyed the two new collections, I'll see you tomorrow to share more. A HUGE thanks to our amazing CP Girls. Just wait until you see all the inspiring designs they have in store for you.
We want to know what your favorites are so leave a comment about what you love from each collection for a chance to win a toy box or emma collection (winners choose). We will pick two lucky winners!
Posted at 09:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (465)
We have teamed up with Studio Calico to offer some limited edition products exclusively in their February Kit. Without sharing too much of a good thing though, we're following the lead of Studio Calico! Check out the info below!
Hi Crate Paper friends! It's Lisa from Studio Calico, and I'm here with you today to share some exciting news. Our February kit, Candy Shoppe, will have two double sided patterned papers & a sheet of labels stickers that were designed by Crate Paper just for us. We can't wait to share them with you - but we can't until the kit goes live on January 28th. Until then, we've got some sneak peeks for you from our design team - they're loving the Crate exclusives! You can see that the rainbow patterned paper is a favorite, as are the label stickers.
by April Foster
We're so thrilled about this collaboration that we wanted to bring you even more inspiration, so we've sent our February kit to four Crate Paper Design Team Members. I know they're going to do some amazing things with this kit! We'll have a post on our blog featuring their work at the end of the month - I'm sure they'll have some sneaks to share with you before then, too.
Thanks for letting us visit the Crate Paper blog - we hope you'll come visit us for the Candy Shoppe reveal on January 28th at 12am EST!
Posted at 08:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (12)
oh my! These collections are both so lovely!
The Portrait collection is just deliciously elegant. The Vintage Lace patterned paper: my favorite! And the camera and doily chipboard are adorable too.
As for the Neighborhood collection: I can see myself cutting apart that Picnic patterned paper for all those banners! The phone and house images are perfect choices for this theme, and I chuckled at the galoshes - so cute!