Stamptember blog hop

Cheers to the first hop from our new blog home! We hope you enjoy this month, as we join in the rest of the paper-crafting community in celebrating Stamptember! Each of the girls have come up with a project alllll about stamps, and we can't wait for you to see them!

Home. <<<< you are here

Jenny http://mycreativelife29.blogspot.com/

Kristin http://rukristin.blogspot.com/

Trisha http://www.trisha-grace.blogspot.com/

Suz http://livealifeextraordinary.blogspot.com/

Ellie http://scrapbookmamaof4kidz.blogspot.com/

Shay  http://sbookinshay29.blogspot.com/

Thanks for joining us this month, and don't forget to check out the color challenge and link up YOUR project to win a chance at guest hosting the next one! 

featuring SUZ.

Have you gotten to know any of our butterflies? If not, now's your chance! Each of our butterflies will be featured here on the blog, giving you a little bit more about them, and showing off some of their incredible work! First up......

Name: Susan "Suz" Mannecke

Born: A Cheesehead but have currently resided in Nixa, MO for 8 years now.

Family: Married to my DH for 17 years, I have two boys ages 14 and 10, and I also care for four, 4-legged pets; 3 dogs: Rudy, Lily, Bella and one orange tabby named Hugsley. (He loves to give hugs!) ;)

Papercrafting since: Since I was a young child. I use to doodle and draw for hours and make cards for my family and friends out of my creations. I began scrapbooking well before they had specific tools for it. (Think, paper + Scissors + glue. Period! I guess that makes me ancient or rather vintage! LOL) I got seriously into papercrafting in 1998 after the birth of my first son when I was invited to a Creative Memories party.

Favorite scrap supply: Hmmmm...this is a toughie! Right now I am fond of washi tape, flair/badges, Studio Calico veneer embellishments, and mists!

Favorite scrap tool: Hands down, my Silhouette Cameo :) :) :)

Favorite iphone app: Instagram

Currently reading: Courtney Walsh's A Sweethaven Homecoming (the second in her fabulous series)

Other interests: (to name a few): photography, curling up with a good book, tennis, taekwondo, hanging out at the lake with family and friends

Quirky thing about me: I like to fill up my gas to a nice even number, and if that's not possible, the nearest quarter of a dollar. Weird, no?!!

Inspirational Sources: everything around me! :)

Style: I consider my style to be clean and eclectic with graphic lines and strong color and design theory. I like to play with the newest trends while still holding true to my own design aesthetique. Currently I almost always incorporate Silhouette die cuts, washi, misting, sewing, flair/badges, arrows, triangles, chevrons and more onto my designs (although not all necessarily at once! ;P I love that my crafting is a constant evolution of my current favs, the latest trends and techniques, and is a running timeline of my life and my creativity.

Here's a few pics of Suz's amazing design work:

You can also find her work at the Little Black Dress kit club where she is a designer, & in several issues of Cards, Scrapbook Trends and Create magazines! She was also previously a designer for Freehand Scraps :]

To see more from Suz, check out her blog: http://www.livealifeextraordinary.blogspot.com

& the winner is....

Thanks to all those who hopped along with us this month for the August blog hop! I hope you enjoyed our color palette & hope you'll play along with Trisha for September :]

We are SO excited for Kristin & her new shop, and would like to give away some of her awesome journaling cards! Congrats to ASquared06 who wrote on Amanda's post-- "WTG girl. I love the layout and really like the 3-D effect with the circles and cut outs. IT looks wonderful." If you could e-mail me at sbookinshay29@aol.com & give me your addy, Kristin will get those sent out to you :]

If you didn't win, & would like to purchase these great items, go check out Kristin's shop, which is NOW open!

[linky] party time.

Nothing like a linky party to kick off the new blog! Hopefully you are familiar with our blog hop group, but if not, check out our new site & get familiar with our Butterflies, see past blog hops & be inspired by our NEW challenges!

Our first NEW feature is our monthly color palette challenge. In August, I challenged the girls to not only find inspiration from another creative member of our group, but to also use the colors given to them. It was a blast and the projects they came up with were some of the best I've seen from the girls!

Now every month a different Butterfly will be hosting a challenge with a new color combo, starting you off with a paper-crafting project to get you started!

You will have an entire month to get projects done & add them to our linky party, and we will pick ONE lucky crafter to join one of our Butterflies in hosting the next months challenge! Trisha is here to get the party started with this color combo & layout:

I was inspired by Crate Paper's Storyteller collection. I tried to find colors that I do not normally use. This was seriously out of my element because I usually use bright or pastel colors.

Here's the layout I did for this month's color challenge.

I tried to stay true to the color palette but I couldn't resist adding some other color accents to make the layout softer, since the colors are very bold. 

Here are some more close up shots of the layout:

Sometimes after making and designing a layout we end up with a lot of scraps! I know I do, I have a drawer full of scrap papers I want to use. So, I decided to create a card to go along with this color challenge.  I used the left over patterned papers and the same stamps that I used in my layout.

A closer look:

If you have any question about the layout or the supplies that was used for this project, email me at trishacakes24@gmail.com

Now, it's your turn! I challenge you to use this color palette to inspire yourself and create something splendid! Don't forget to use your scraps! I hope you enjoyed this month's color challenge! I cannot wait to see what you will create with these colors!!! Link up YOUR projects below for a chance to help host NEXT months SMB Color Challenge :]