Hey there!  Melissa here, welcome to Day 3 of the Simple Stories & Taylored Expressions Blog Hop Week!  We’re so excited to team up with Taylored Expressions to share some inspiring projects with you this week.

We’ll be giving away a great Taylored Expressions prize package at the end of the week, so be sure to play along and check back on Sunday the 30^th to see if you’re the lucky winner!

Here are the different ways you can play along –

1. Like Simple Stories on Facebook
2. Share this blog post on your Facebook wall and tell us you did on our Facebook wall
3. Follow Simple Stories on Pinterest
4. Follow Simple Stories on Instagram at simplestories_
5. Comment here on our blog or on Facebook

Taylored Expressions is also posting projects and giving away prizes, so be sure to check out their blog and Facebook page, too!

I've been steadily working through a backlog of photos that I need to edit from the end of 2013, which makes now the perfect time to finish up the remaining half dozen or so weeks in my 2011 album. I love skipping around while scrapping my weeks since it gives me lots of freedom when matching products to photos, and for this particular week I went with the A Charmed Life collection- along with some fantastic Taylored Expressions dies, of course!

My birthday is on St. Patrick's Day, so of course my first inclination is to use A Charmed Life to scrapbook photos from that event (and, honestly, I probably will be using it for that, too!), but I'm also a big fan of using collections for something other than their theme suggests. During this particular week in 2011 I was participating in Ali Edwards' Week in the Life project, so I had lots of great photos that reminded me of everything I love about my life and our home. "A Charmed Life" seemed to be the perfect sentiment to go along with them!

The two sets of Taylored Expressions dies that I used on this page were the inspiration for my title card for this week. The 3x4 Photo Frame from their Pockets and Pages collection was the exact size that I needed to frame up a 3x3 Insta-Square card, and the Label It die cuts make adorable banner strips (and a perfect parking spot for my dates!).

I used the Label It dies in several places on my layout as a grounding element for stickers and embellishments, helping to bring a bit more color and remove the "floating" aspect that can sometimes happen on my mages.

I've also put together a short video showing how this layout came together from start to finish!

Simple Stories' 12x12 SN@P faux leather albums in aqua are the perfect place to hold my layouts when they're finished, and for 2011-2013 I've stuck to Design 3 Pocket Pages to make things easy. I've pretty much got making layouts in them down to a science now!

Head on over to the Taylored Expressions blog and check out what their Design Team has created using their stamps & dies and our Simple Stories products! They’re also hosting giveaways as well, so what are you waiting for – head on over! 

Check in again with us tomorrow for more inspiring projects from Simple Stories & Taylored Expressions!