Hello there! Allie here today, and I'm super excited to be sharing my first Simple Stories post with you today! I am in love with the new Life in Color collection. Those woodgrains and florals are just gorgeous! The "Here & Now" patterned paper was too pretty to cut up, so I used it as the foundation of my first layout.

Hello Friends! This is Alexandra.  Today, I'm very excited to share my first pocket page spread for Simple Stories.  For these pocket pages I have used the beautiful collection called Life in Color.

I have been documenting our daily life for a few years now and one thing I know about a great collection of papers is that it has to offer a variety of colors together with some neutrals.  Life in Color caught my eye instantly because of its mix of neutrals and pops of colors and boy do we need a little color in this dreary Chicago winter!

On this page, I included pictures of the places we went (Chinatown, the morning commute) together with cards and gifts I received and a picture of the news, the new barbies! The colors on the cards pick up the ones on the pictures making for a balanced page

I love this 6x4 card on which I printed the number of the week and the dates. This almost "trompe l'oeil" adds both definition and depth to the page.

I was immediately attracted by that pocket page (Design 10) for its combo of 3" square and 3x4 rectangles. Of course, Simple Stories has thought of including all of these formats and more in their Pocket Page Variety Pack. For the top line on this page, I did something I often do when I have lots of pictures which is I categorized by subjects (Hubby's business trip,  our trip to Costco) and made two photo-collages under Picasa.

I used a label sticker to add the date underneath the Coffeecake I had made. Love the fact that it has a very light grid! Not only does it add depth but it also makes it much easier to align and print the text properly.

I also added a arrow sticker to direct the eye toward my daughter.

Thank you for joining us today. I was very happy to share a bit of our daily life documented with Life in Color.

Hi planner friends! Vanessa here with you today to show how you can dress up your Carpe Diem planner with a few items from the You & Me Simple Set and the So Fancy collection.  With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, I wanted to use these two collections in my Robin’s Egg Carpe Diem Planner because of the beautiful color scheme and romantic florals. 

Throughout the month of February, I placed some of the double-sided cardstock papers from the You & Me Simple Set in the pockets, the Carpe Diem number stickers, and the DIY Tag Foundations. These elements, along with the I AM... clips can be beautiful details to add in a planner, but functional as well. I love using the diy tags to write down important dates or events and the 2x2 or 3x4 cardstock elements can be punched or taped into the planner inserts.

For my dashboard, I really wanted to make it more personal for Valentine’s Day by utilizing the cardstock paper and stickers from You & Me, as well as the chipboard frames, bradz, and enamel dots from the So Fancy collection. Using the self-adhesive bradz and enamel dots add more texture to the dashboard and a mixture of patterns.

One of the things I wanted to pay more attention to in my planner were the monthly pages. All too often I neglect them and focus on the weekly or daily pages, but having a monthly view can help plan for the whole month and upcoming events.

To help me want to utilize the monthly pages, I decorated the pages with the same theme and customized the top of the pages. I used the You & Me Love Story cardstock to add a pop of color and the coordinating cardstock alphabet stickers. To fill the dates, I used the Carpe Diem number stickers in one color for a streamlined look and a few more of the You & Me cardstock stickers for layering.

I hope your creativity runs wild with these collections for February and happy planning!

Hi there Chantalle with you today - sharing a layout I have created with the bold & beautiful Life in Color collection.  I absolutely adore this collection and it’s amazing to see how it interpreted so many ways in projects I’ve seen online. I’ve gone with a bit of an irreverent feel, playing on those awesome drawn stars and edgy patterns.

Using the painted stroke Fundamental stickers as inspiration, I’ve used some brush stamps and pulled out some matching ink cubes. I then went about stamping in the top third of my page, creating a faux painted band. Just under that, I’ve also adhered some adorbs Life in Color Washi tape. Finally I machine stitched roughly over the strips to give a nice bit of texture.

Decorative clips can be a fun way to add to a story plus hold a few layers in place!

This collection also has some of the BEST wood veneer shapes! (The paperclips have to be my fave.) Here I’ve used the ampersand in my title, along with the day of the week chipboard sticker. It’s fun to look past the obvious use for an embellishment, have a go at mixing the letter order in a word to come up with different options!

To get the dipped effect, I simply drew on the bottom half with a white Uni Posca marker. It has a decent opacity which is very useful when working with darker papers or embellishments.

Layering fun!

There’s that ca-uuute paperclip. Which actually works! LOVE!

Thank you so much for joining me today. Until next time!

Hi there Chantalle with you today - sharing a project I have created with the super fun ‘Let’s Party’. It’s a little birthday mini, created with a sheet of 12x12 HB2U which I’ve trimmed down to suit 4x4inch Sn@p cards inside clever little Sn@p Photo Flips. 

The front opens up (with the help of a couple of mini brads) to reveal info and pics of My DS’s birthdays between the ages of one and five.

The Photo Flips, which come in a variety pack. I used all the 4x4 ones and then used my Fuse Tool to resize some 4x6 ones down to the correct size. These Flips are awesome because the adhesive is already primed on the little sleeve, so all you have to do is peel and stick!

Under the first page, I have printed info of all the birthday info, directly onto a 4x4 Let’s Party Sn@p card. It’s pretty easy to do: I set the text in a text box, the same size as my card, in a word processing programme. Then I print out the page, tape my card in place over the top, using washi tape. I them make sure my text box has NO stroke and I send the page with the card adhered, through the printer again. This way I know for sure my text will be in the right spot and I can easily remove my card because I’ve used washi tape.

Hard to believe how quickly time has flown!

To represent the ages, I have used 'Let’s Party’ Pocket Pieces. They are double sided so if you are going to be using them in a Sn@p Album, you will be able to see it from both sides of the sleeve, which is pretty awesome. I’ve gone over with a bit of extra detail on the numbers, using coordinating enamel dots over the coloured spots.

I love using photo stickers. Sometimes I place them directly over the picture, but if I’m not feeling 100% confident about placement, popping them onto a sleeve makes them easy to move if you change your mind.

A low profile foam tape helps give the elements a bit of extra dimension, without bulking up your mini too much.

I remember this birthday was SO hot, we had his party in a park and we had to run the car with the air con on the entire time to keep the icing from melting! You can see how red their little faces were. 

Speaking of faces, Photo Stickers can also help protect privacy of party guests by being used over the ‘assistant-candle-blower’ hehe.

These cute 4x4 Sn@p cards finish off the album perfectly.

An idea like this could also work wonderfully for a birthday card with a hidden surprise inside!

Thank you so much for joining me today. Until next time!

Hey, Carpe Diem planner friends!  It’s Meka here today sharing my February planner setup. The pretty pinks and florals in the You & Me Simple Set are a must for February, and I love how well it all compliments my gorgeous #teampink Carpe Diem planner!

The Simple Stories designs coordinate so well across collections, so I couldn’t resist combining this kit with sprinkles of Life in Color, the Carpe Diem scrapbook collection, and Let’s Party.

My planner pockets are stuffed with washi paper tape, chipboard stickers, journaling cards, and adorable decorative clips. I transformed Bradz into something both decorative and functional by attaching them to paper clips. The secretarial pocket is full of everything I might need while planning throughout the week—most importantly the planner icon stickers. Those are a must for a quick, but effective way to make a task stand out on a page.

Beneath my “It’s a Brand New Day” transparent dashboard, I’ve inserted some floral paper trimmed down from a You and Me 12x12 scrapbook paper.  The front is minimally embellished with a super cute You and Me cardstock sticker typewriter and word labels.

The backside has a sturdy pocket I created from more papers from the kit. I’m using this pocket to house my memory-keeping goodies for the month.

For my monthly spread, I went with an insert from the Life in Color Planning Set. The pink pretty much sold me! Plus the fact that it’s larger than the regular Carpe Diem inserts makes it catch my eye and remind me to fill it in with cherished memories. I love how easy it is to turn the SN@P! 6x8 inserts from two to six holes to fit right in my Carpe Diem.

The monthly pages are decorated with stickers, Bits and Pieces, word labels, and washi paper tape from Life in Color and from Let’s Party. To accentuate February 14^th, I used enamel dots for the first time ever…

I’m in love with the POP! from the inspirational Word Label Stickers (my planner must-have) layered over washi paper tape on opposite page corners - they help give the layout balance.  

I dug deep into the depths of my old school scrapbooking supplies to find this flower shaped brad. Now my Bits and Pieces tag is an interactive element. Eek, it swings! Something super special will be hiding here by month’s end!

I’ll leave you with my Friday daily layout. 

Most of my days are flexibly scheduled to-do lists, so I generally don’t need a large weekly spread (though I sure do love to decorate them.)  Daily pages help me focus on what I need to get done the day of, instead of being distracted and overwhelmed by the entire week’s lists. Stickers and washi paper tape shown are from the Carpe Diem line and from Life in Color. Since I’ve decorated this before the day of, I was sure to leave space for more tasks that arise.

Thanks for checking out the blog today. I hope you found some nuggets of inspiration for your February planning!

Hello everyone! It's Kristine with you today and It’s wonderful to be back this year to share layouts instead of pocket pages! I will be sharing pages of my nieces, nephews, my cats, and other family members. I love the Simple Stories Bits & Pieces packages and you'll notice a great deal of those cute diecuts on my pages.

The first layout I'm sharing with you today was created using the NEW Carpe Diem Scrapbooking Collection. The papers in this collection were created based on the Carpe Diem Planner Collection and if you have some pieces left over from your planner kit then you should really get this collection!

I started this page using the pink & black dot paper. I used it as my background and then combined it with the 6x12 paper from the Elements sheet. The picture of my niece was taken in the summer and I wanted to showcase the green and also the light pink in her hat. I used several bits & pieces and created layers with dimensional adhesive.

Adding layers and creating multi dimensional elements are always part of my pages.  The flowers, camera, and tag were used for this cluster. I often add a bit of twine to my projects and this layout was no exception!

I used the feathers from the Fundamentals Sticker sheet and created this little cluster on the top of my page. Just some extra elements wrapped in twine and a small Expression Sticker. 

I used the cloud with the saying " Lovely " and created my title with it. I added " Little Miss " with the alpha stickers on the Expressions Cardstock Sticker Sheet. I really love the contrast of pink of black. I often use white on my pages and adding a bit of black just makes me happy. I feel the colors just pop off the page!  

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The next layout for you today was again created with the Carpe Diem Scrapbooking Collection. So many options with this collection for creating layouts or projects. I focused on the yellow and also a bit of turquoise. My nieces and I were playing outside one day and decided to get some paint and make a big mess outside on a huge canvas. We had a great time and that included a bit of paint on our faces! It was the best day!

Have I ever told you I love Bits & Pieces! Yes, this layout was based on tons of little diecuts and stickers. I couldn't help myself they're all so cute and went so well with Megan's happy face and turquoise paint splats!

I played with some diecuts and kept layering with chipboard, washi paper tape and of course dimensional adhesive. I added some journaling on a small piece of paper that was cut from a 4x6 journal card.  Don't be afraid to cut out shapes or adding pieces from the 3x4 or 4x6 cards on your pages.

I love sewing on my pages and wanted to show you that you can sew or create your own stitches without a sewing machine. Get yourself a ruler to keep things straight,  a black marker and draw a few lines on the edges of your paper to resemble stitches. It's that easy! Don't be afraid to mess it up, even real stitches aren't perfect ;-)

I wanted to create a fun title. I had so many little bits on this page that I wanted to keep it colorful and funky.  I added the "Captured" journal card behind the Yellow Dotted paper and added "such a" with the alpha stickers on the Expressions Cardstock Sticker Sheet. I added the word "fun" created with my silhouette cameo. I used the word " day " from the Fundamentals  Sticker Sheet that was combined with Brand New Day!  I was ok with breaking up that title to create my own.

You can see more of my work on my blog at KristineDavidson.com or Instagram @KristineDavidson

I hope you enjoyed my layouts and little details today and I'll be back next month!