2016 Happy Planner™ BLOG HOP!

Welcome to the new 2016-2017 Happy Planner™ BLOG HOP featuring posts by the me & my BIG ideas Design Team!  I am SO glad you are here. I can not tell you how excited I am for today's post. I am fortunate enough to be among some incredibly talented ladies who LOVE to use their planners & visiting all their blogs to see all The Happy Planner™ happiness will be so inspiring. 

I’m excited to show you the style of my new 8.5 x 11 inch 'Stay Golden' Happy Planner™ and share how I plan to use it come July. This planner is larger than the standard Happy Planner™ which is 7 x 9.25 inches. It will available March 1 in the mambi shop! Just LOOK at this beauty!!

I mean, really. It IS so pretty. Is there anything better than gold and watercolor right now? I think not! As a mixed media artist and lover of all things paint, when I opened the cover I was done. 'Stay Golden' had my little planning heart skipping a beat. Plus, throw in the brush script cover, colorful laminated tabs, GOR-geous colors throughout and the prettiest of turquoise rings - I'm in love. 

Now, being an avid memory keeper the most exciting thing about this beauty of a planner is that when July hits I will be keeping all those precious stories of life right in my Happy Planner™. YES! It took me awhile to figure out my plan for memory keeping in 2016. I was having a REALLY hard time trying to figure out what I wanted to do. For the past 4 years I have been recording our family stories in a pocket style scrapbook. 2012, 2013 and 2014 I used a 12x12 pocket page system. In 2015 I wanted a change and used 6x8 albums. For 2016, I was feeling like trying something different again. When I headed to CHA in January I still had not figured out how I wanted to document 2016. That is when I saw this beauty and my creative memory loving wheels began to turn. After seeing the 'Stay Golden' in person and the amazing discussions with my fellow Design Team Girls...I knew I wanted to do my 2016 storytelling right in my Happy Planner™. 

Tutorial for re-sizing photos on mambi blog. New Page Protectors used on right.

 If you are wondering what I am doing for the first 6 months of the year, I decided to use my current Happy Planner™. In July I will move into the the larger size. It is no different that my previous years. I always had at least 2 albums for the year. :) The great thing about the disc system in the freedom and flexibility. At the end of June I will be able to remove the first six months and keep them as a separate album. SO fabulous! As much as I don't like when time feels like it is flying, I have to say that I am a little anxious for July to get here. I can't wait to move into my new planner! :) There is more room to record and I know that this planner will only be for documenting the year. 

Monthly 

  

Weekly

One of my other favorite things about this planner is the Currently page that begins each month. My current planner has the same type of page at the beginning of each month and I love it. I think at the end of the year it will be super fun to look back over the year and see what I was loving at the time.

I'll be sharing all my Happy Planner™ & memory keeping goodness right here and on Instagram. I hope YOU will too. Thank you for stopping by. 

 Keep the HOP going by heading over to mambi Design Team member Tiffany at VillabeauTIFFul's blog to see which Happy Planner™ she's got her hands on! http://www.villabeautifful.com/blog

Happy Creating!

A DIY Spring Wire Board

Yay! It's Spring! I really do love the cold & coziness of winter, but I am ready for everything springtime. How about you? 

So, in celebration of the new season, I'd like to share one of the projects I made for CHA 2015 in Anaheim, CA back in January. This darling DIY board was on display in the me & my BIG ideas booth. It started as just a plain wood square with chicken wire in the center. After adding some mambi paper, stickers, and embellishments it had a whole new life. :)

Here are the steps I took to fancy it up. I am sure you can still find the plain wood base in a craft store near you. (I found mine at Joann's.) 

First, I painting the wood edge with white acrylic paint. After it dried, I added pink and white chevron border stickers from mambi to the sides. I placed some Mod Podge on top of each sticker to make sure it didn't go anywhere. (I also added Mod Podge around the rest of the sides so the finish was the same)

While that was drying, I began working on making paper flowers using various pieces of 12 x 12 paper. I like my flowers to look varied and unique. In other words, I just start cutting random flower shapes and hope they turn out OK! :) 

See, I just cut flower shapes by hand and then continue to cut smaller ones to set inside. I rough up the edges a bit and then hot glue them together. That is it! I also punched out a bunch of butterflies to add to the flowers and board. 

I love these little die cut banners so much. The pattern on these cute yellow ones are my favorite. I added them to the flowers in a couple different spots. I also made a quick twine banner to attach to the top. Super cute!

I also used a big, gold sticker that says Be Awesome in the lower corner. I backed the sticker on a piece of scrapbook paper to give it some form to stand on. I think if I were to make this again, I would try it with some acetate. I think it would look great if the background was transparent. Hmmmmm, maybe I need to make another one! :) You can see all the large mambiSTICKS right HERE.

All I had to do was add some inspirational quotes and a picture with mini clips. It came ready to hang, so now to the wall it goes. Such a perfect springtime project!

Happy Creating!

One Little Word Revisited: Becoming Organized

Back HERE in January I claimed the word Become or Becoming for the year. The list of all the different ways I want to "become more" is quite hefty, but one of the areas topping my list is becoming more organized. One of the main reasons I want more organization in my life is to free up creative time. Who's with me? The time I dedicate to playing in my art studio can sometimes be thrown to the side because I have a hard time...finding the time. Sounds pretty funny, but it is true. All kinds of things can get in the way of actually sitting and getting my hands messy with paint or getting focused time working on a project. 

I've kinda thought about planning my time like we have planned our household budget. My Hubby always says that, "A budget is freeing." At first I was like...what? Are you kidding me. How? (He will be pleased that I am quoting him and further saying he is right! He loves a good "told you so moment.") I have to admit, he is right. If I know exactly what I have to spend on any given item or area on our budget there is no guessing. There is no wondering. There is no worrying about whether or not I have enough. If I have $50 budgeted for scrap-booking supplies this month, when I am out looking around I can spend it all or bank it and save up. The same goes for using a planner. If I have two hours allotted for studio time on Monday morning, I am going to use it! I wont worry about allllllll the other things on my list. They will have their "budgeted time" later. See....freeing! :)

So, now that I want to become more organized, thank goodness me & my BIG ideas just recently developed a fantastic new line called Create 365™ The Happy Planner™. It is an easy to use planner system that not only includes the planner, but all kinds of goodies to make it creatively fun. It is absolutely something I can make my own. If I want a lot of color, stickers, embellishments, pictures, or "fancying up," I can do that. If I want mellow, simplified, or neutral I can do that too. 

I have had the chance to work with this system while planning my March and I have loved it! At the beginning of March, I sat down and loosely planned out the whole month. I used the March calendar & only put down the things I already knew were coming that month (birthdays, volunteer days, baseball games, sports practices, appointments, etc). Then each Sunday I take a little time to plan out the following week with more detail and more fun additions like washi tape, clips, tags, quotes, stickies, small banners, etc. It can actually get a little addicting....even for this complete planner newbie! 

Here is a weekly spread with my grocery list, a quote card, and a cute clip added. The Arc system that The Happy Planner™ uses allows items to be added and taken away. SO awesome!

The best part - so far, I am carving out MORE time for creativity. YES! If you are interested in planners and want to see more you can visit the me & my BIG ideas website. The Happy Planner™ will be arriving in stores and in their shop in April. Also, if you would like more inspiration come visit me on Instagram @sadieinspired !!

Happy Creating!

DIY LOVE Canvas from CHA 2015

It's almost that time...Valentine's Day. In celebration of all the hearts and love floating about, I wanted to share a canvas I made for CHA 2015. This canvas was on display in the me & my BIG ideas booth and I was SUPER excited to see it in person. 

I made this heart inspired canvas after I fell in love with the paper from the mambi Straight to the Heart paper pack. I mean...wood grain, I love you repeated over & over in cursive and this darling heart paper. I was done. Swoon! 

Here is what I used: canvas, modeling paste, doilies, mambi Jumbo Gold Rush Alphas, Mod Podge, vellum, hot glue, Straight to the Heart paper, mambiSTICKS, and wood coasters.

I really loved how it turned out. I liked the contrast between the white & gray that I used with the gold. The little pops of red look great too. I love that the red is a super pretty muted red, not an in your face brick red. It worked well with this piece. 

This type of project doesn't have to be just for Valentine's Day either. What about a DIY Anniversary or Wedding gift for someone? Perfect right! I know I always love receiving gifts that someone made for me. Just gives the present a little bit more of love & magic. 

Happy Creating Friends!