Mark your calendar—Saturday, June 26th we are going to partner with Bella Blvd and give away a “What a Guy” kit!  We LOVED working with their “Man of the House” line to create the kit and are excited to be able to share it with all of our readers and theirs!

On Saturday, just go to their blog http://www.bellablvd.typepad.com and leave a comment for a chance to win.  While you are there, be sure and check out all their fabulous product lines.  They are such talented and fun ladies!
Have fun and good luck!!!

I was blog surfing tonight and came across this idea on several different blogs.  I thought it would be great to use them as “starters”—either for journaling on some pages or even ideas for pages!  Wait… how about my favorite thing— a mini!!!  How fun would this be!!!
Here we go…
3 Things

Three names I go by:
1. Mom
2. Kara   That’s about it—hard to get a nickname from a 4 letter name!
3.

Three places I have lived:
1.  Boone, NC
2.  Lugoff, SC
3.  Florence, SC

Three places I have worked:
1. Certified Coder for a Doctor’s office
2.  Preschool Teacher
3.  Co-owner of All U Need

Three things I love to watch:
1.  Twilight—over and over and over
2.  Royal Pains
3.  Glee

Three things I love to eat:
1.  Reese’s Cups
2.  Five Guy’s Cheeseburgers
3,  BLTs

Three things I am looking forward to this summer:
1.  A week at the beach with the whole (my side) family
2.  All the classes and shows we have lined up
3.  Being able to scrap some of my own stuff!!

Your turn:
Take some time. Think about the answers.  Think about how you could use them in your scrapping!  We would love for you to share your answers and your creations!!  Have some fun—scrap about YOU too!!!
Or—you could use this as a family exercise.  Have each family member answer the questions and create a page or mini with all the responses!  Now, that would make some great family time!!

As if I weren’t having a hard enough time with my one and only going off to Middle School in the fall… I decided to use our Limited Edition Graduation Album to show the progression of her graduations.  Yes, graduations—plural.  I thought it might be fun to see just how she has grown up since that very first graduation from 3K.
I was not prepared for this day, and cried.

Then, on to 4K graduation.  Yep, cried again.

Kindergarten Graduation was pretty rough!  I wasn’t ready for her to be in first grade!  So, more tears!

She was in a 1st to 3rd Montessori class, where at the end of 3rd she “bridged” to 4th grade.  NOPE, not ready for that either!  Lots, of tears with this one!

Now to present day—on Wednesday she will be graduating from 6th grade.  Once again I am not ready for her milestone—Middle School!  But, I have a page all ready for the picture!

Without spending too much time thinking about them, I also have pages ready for her 8th grade, High School, and College graduations.  I may not be ready for these upcoming days and I am sure there will be more tears shed…but at least the album is ready!

Reliving these moments, brought back the same fears, the same joys, the same hopes, and of course the same tears I had on each of those special days!

Julie and I volunteered to work at Donna Downey’s Artist Inspired Weekend—helping out in classes.  It was a great opportunity for us to learn new techniques, new people and even new art forms!

Late Friday afternoon we got to the hotel and eagerly registered!   We got our class assignments, our fabulous bag full of goodies, and our iCrew t-shirt!

We had some time before dinner—so on to some shopping in the Marketplace!  I instantly knew it was going to be an amazing weekend when I walked right by Ali Edwards!!  Then, down the hall I caught a glimpse of Stacy Julian (more on her later!!).    After a fabulous dinner, we headed off to our first class.  This was a beautiful vintage frame/album with Jenni Bowlin.  We got a chance to learn all about glass glitter!  We are really looking forward to playing with some! She is a wonderful artist, and we look forward to working with her again in August in Charleston!

Our next class was with Margie Romney-Aslett.  This class was a fun little folder album.  Margie is a lot of fun and loves to share her vision!  I truly hope we have the chance to work with her again!

Saturday morning we were recharged and excited to see what was in store for us!  We checked in with Donna’s  fabulous staff and were directed to our class.  We were going to be spending the day with Dara Troshane, a wonderfully talented mosaic artist.  Throughout the day we helped with three classes full of amazingly talented women.  I could not get over the fact that everybody, as they came in, got the same class materials, but left with completely different projects.

After a full day of running around, it was time sit down to dinner.  We, the iCrew, were literally falling asleep at the table!  Well, I certainly perked up when the keynote speaker came out—Stacy Julian (again, more on her later)!
We were truly exhausted—yet totally Inspired!

What a weekend!!!

We will be posting a detailed account of our experience at Donna Downey’s Inspired Event on Monday!  Please check back with us to see pictures, thoughts, and lessons learned!  Don’t forget to leave a comment and let us know how YOU were inspired this weekend!  You might just be the one to win a FREE kit!!! And stay tuned….Kara will sharing her inspirations from this weekend!

This is a very special time for me.  I am writing this while sitting here in the beautiful mountains of NC.  These mountains are near and dear to my heart for a couple reasons—My family and…

One year ago, exactly, Julie and I were right here in the spot when we first had the idea of starting a business. I had just completed a little chipboard album of our kids playing.  I was asked if it was a kit or did I come up with it on my own.  Julie and I looked at each other and the light bulb flashed!

We knew right away it was going to involve mini albums, we just weren’t sure how. For the next few months we plotted and planned, threw some ideas around, threw some ideas out, and made a LOT of notes!  Then sitting on the beach in August last year we decided we were going to really, truly do this!  It has taken lots of time, tons of late nights, several worries and stresses, but to see our names on actual business licenses—it was all worth it!  Then, to come back here where it all started, with the “first” album packaged as a kit—it is truly amazing.

I cannot wait to see what the next year brings us!

Playing with your leftovers!

What is one of the best things about our kits?

We show you what to do with some of the leftover bits and pieces.  We show you how to create 12×12 pages using two full sheets of cardstock and lots of small pieces of paper and embellishments.  Now, it has been asked—“do you use everything in the kit?”  No, after you complete most of our kits you will still have some leftovers!

What are you supposed to do with them? You can use them to create even more page layouts or use them embellish your album after you add your pictures.  When we design the album we do so not knowing what size or how many pictures you want to put on a page.  So, we have to leave lots of open space!  However, once you add all your photos you have the chance to “play” with your leftovers!

Go back and put some more of those fun embellishments on or around your pictures!

Before

After

Use some paper to make a mat for a picture or two.

Before

After

The best part – you aren’t stuck with tons of stuff you have to find a place for!!

So, let me know how you decide to play with your leftovers!  Leave me a comment below!

…  A happy customer AND finding a very cool new blog to follow!

What a crazy week this has been for us.  Kara has been working like a mad woman getting classes set up, ordering gorgeous new products to use in our next kits, and keeping us on schedule.  I have been trying to get our newsletter up and running and out to you guys so we can keep you updated on the latest and the greatest!  And we both have a TON of one of a kind albums to design because a very cute local store is going to be carrying these awesome little jewels very soon! (Be on the look out for more information on that soon!!!)

Speaking of these great one of a kind albums, I was THRILLED to see an order come in last week from Andrea. She emailed me this morning to say she was blogging about her purchase from All U Need!!!  Wow!  I was totally psyched!  I couldn’t wait to read what she had to say!  And we are even teaming up to offer a special giveaway to her readers.  Please check out her blog.  I am glad I am now a follower and will be checking in on her site on a regular basis.  Her posts are interesting and fun to read.  Well worth your time.  Here’s the link:  http://patchworkpages.blogspot.com/2010/04/all-u-need-is.html

Go check out how she used the one of a kind album she purchased!!!  And make sure you leave her a comment to be eligible for the giveaway!!!

It’s time for a fun contest!  Julie and I spent the afternoon making 4 significant changes to the website.  If you can find all four changes you will win a brand new One-of-a-Kind Easter album!  This cute little egg will be perfect for all those egg huntin’ pictures you are going to be taking.

If you want to increase your chance post your comment here, on our facebook page, your facebook page, and twitter!  That would put your name in the hat FOUR times!!  Leave links and let us know where all the places you posted!

You are going to have to look all over the site to find these!!

Have some fun and GOOD LUCK!!!

This weekend comes with a full schedule of completing several special request gift orders.  These turn out to be some of my favorite albums ever!  Not only do I love creating them, I love that someone cares enough about someone else to give them a way to preserve their memories.  I truly believe there is no more meaningful gift.  When you give someone a unique showcase for their photos and stories you  are telling them their life is important—you care about ALL of them.  Not to mention they are perfect for any occasion.

A wedding….

A baby shower…

Kitchen wedding shower…

Just because you love your sweet niece…

ABC Box

Now special request albums aren’t always ordered as gifts!  Don’t forget your own photos and stories deserve a fun way to be shown off too!