More intros

I have a couple more people to introduce you to before we get started on May challenges. Let's meet our Guest DT for May - Joelle Hiller!

"My name is Joelle Hiller. I’ve been a high school math teacher for 14 years, but I’m currently on a temporary leave to care for my daughter who was born last September. My husband and I also have a 6-year-old son. I’m grateful to have the opportunity to stay at home and focus on being mom for a bit – I love spending time with my beautiful baby girl and sharing in all her wonderful baby “firsts”, and having the freedom to volunteer in my son’s class on a regular basis.

I was first introduced to CTMH at a local scrapbooking convention. I fell in love with the paper packs and the coordination of the paper, ink, and embellishments – I think it appealed to my orderly, mathematical brain! I had been scrapbooking for a few years before this, but had never tried stamping before. I tried it, and I got hooked. I am more of a hobbyist consultant right now, but would like to become more actively involved in the future.

A few other random bits about me…I’d choose a good book over a good movie every time; a Mediterranean cruise was my favorite vacation; I have to admit it, though I’m a little ashamed…I love my iPhone and am not sure I could live without it; and when I’m not scrapbooking, I am working on researching my family tree and preserving old family photos."

Welcome Joelle! You can visit Joelle at her blog Scrapbook Snippets.

Speaking of Guest DTs, I would normally say goodbye to our April Guest DT, Shari Maclaskey, at this time but, due to our taking a week off this past week from challenges, I have asked Shari to join us for a challenge in May so she will be popping back up sometime this month so stay tuned!

I also have two new sponsors to introduce to you but will do so on Monday when we start our challenges back up. See you then!

Thank you and intros to share!

First, I would like to thank everyone who has contacted me with thoughts and prayers as our family goes through this most difficult time. I am also so thankful for my wonderful Design Team who have supported me and offered words of comfort, as well. You all touch my heart and I am so grateful to call each of you my friend. We are hanging together strong as a family and from them, God and each of you, I am beginning to find peace and solace, if not answers.

With that said, I thank you all for the challenge-less week. My heart just wasn't into it and it felt like the right thing to do. But we do have a lot of changes coming up here at H2H and I wanted to get back into the swing of things and share some news and info with you all before we get back to the challenges this coming Monday!

The current Design Team started in January and were to end their term on April 30th. I made a change along the way and asked the team to stay for an additional 2 months and was thrilled when they said yes!! With the exception of two of our gals who will be leaving after our next challenge - and leaving for a very good reason, I might add! Lisa and Corina will be leaving the team as they will have committments preparing for their teaching stint at CTMH's Convention this summer! Congratulations ladies and we wish you great success! And while I am sad to have these very talented ladies leave the team, I am equally excited to introduce you to two new DT members that I asked to join us. And without further ado, here are their intros!

First up, Haley Dyer!!

"Hi!  I'm Haley Dyer, AKA the Inky Scrapper.  I started out mainly as a scrapbooker, but love how I can use my supplies to create cards, home decor, and more.  I've been a CTMH consultant for 11 years, which is a very natural extension of my love of paper crafting and teaching.  (I've been teaching elementary school- 5th grade in particular- for more years than I care to count!)  My favorite scrapbook subjects are my family: my husband, two daughters (almost 13 and 10- Yikes!), our dog, and our cat, plus our extended family too.  In addition to paper crafting, I love to read and travel.  As if this weren't enough, I'm also a consultant for the Longaberger Company.  Paper crafting, however, is my passion."

You can stop and visit Haley's blog at The Inky Scrapper (and check out her blog candy giveaway while you're there)!


Our 2nd new DT member is Jody Gustafson:

"My real name is Barbara but you can call me Jody. I've been married to the best husband ever for 43 years. I'm a mother of 2 great children, Mikel and Carrie. I've been blessed to be a grandmother to 6 super wonderful grandchildren, Autumn, Joshua, Alicyn, Alexis, Ashley and Zachary. I have been an independent consultant with Close to my Heart since 1998. The reason I joined this company is because I was looking for a fun way to make a little extra money. When I saw my friends beautiful handmade cards and scrapbook pages I knew I could have fun with this business. My time with this company has been filled with special times and special people. It is a real privilege to work with the finest products in the industry.  One of the greatest joys of the job is the people that I have met and that I now call "friend."

And Jody's blog can be found at Cre8n' Memories - and be sure to leave her some love while you're there!

Welcome ladies - we are looking forward to your fabulous creations!!

How about more introductions? Watch for another post soon when you will meet the Guest DT for May as well as our two new sponsors.

But before I sign off, I want to announce the prize winner from the Bunny blog Hop! We had so many participants and I think everyone had a great time so we're calling it a success! Thank you to everyone who played along.

So I plugged in all of the numbers of the players at Random.org and the prize winner is......

#39 - Lisa Sargent!!

Lisa, email me at mbryt1@bex.net with your address and I will get the prize out to you.

Ok, that's it for me  - but I will be back soon with more info to share!!

A week of silence

Hello Heart 2 Heart readers this is Jessica here filling in for Mary. It is with a heavy heart that I will share with you today that last week Mary lost her infant granddaughter Liberty. The upcoming months are going to be very difficult for Mary and her family and I ask that you would keep them in your thoughts and prayers. We as a design team decided to take this week of from our challenge in memory of little Liberty. We will be back with our next challenge next Monday and in the meantime you can still play along with any of our other challenges from the month. We will also be back later this week with the winner of the random prize drawing from last weeks bunny hop, so make sure you check in to see if it might be you!

It's time to Hop, Hop, Hop!

This week is a From Our Heart to Yours challenge in which we, the Design Team, share something with all of our fabulous followers - and newcomers as well!

As Easter will end this week, we thought that a Bunny blog Hop would be a great thing to share with all of you!

Here are the details - in case you missed them. Your project MUST include Close To My Heart products (if it does not, it will be removed). It must also be Easter or Spring themed. You must link to your post below between the hours of 8 am EST and 8 pm EST TODAY ONLY! No other entries will be accepted through the week.

Then the fun begins - just hop around to all the links to see what everyone has created! And be sure to leave comments along the way cause who doesn't love comments???

You will want to check through out the day as more and more links are added. Spread the word - let's get as many people as we can playing along. One lucky player will be getting a prize too so everyone post and hip hop down the bloggy trail.

To kick us off, I have a fabulous easter card to share with your from our April Guest DT - Shari McLaskey:

I know! How awesome is that card?? Fabulous work Shari and thanks for starting us on the Bunny Hop! The rest of the DT will be found in the links below so link up and have a great time hopping!

It's Bunny Hop Day!

From Our Heart to Yours, we present the 1st H2H Bunny Hop! We will start posting links at 8 am so come back then and post away! We can't wait to see what you have all created!

One more day till our Bunny Hop

Are you ready? Got your Easter/Spring artwork ready to post? Cause our 1st H2H Bunny Hop is tomorrow!!! 

Only one day this week to post your artwork and that's Monday, April 18, from 8 am EST to 8 pm EST. Then we can all hop around through the day and check each other's artwork!

Join in the fun - grab your Bunny Hop badge below (right click on the badge and Save As to your pc, then upload as an image to your blog) - and we'll hop over for a quick hello on Monday!

If you missed all the details on this hop and want to be ready, scroll down to this past Monday's post. Remember, all artwork posts that do not use CTMH products will be removed!

Blog Hop badge

Just a reminder - our Easter/Spring Bunny blog Hop is this Monday! Get your artwork ready now so you can link up Monday, April 18th between 8 am EST and 8 pm EST. These are the only hours in which you can leave a link for your artwork next week!!

Here is a badge you can place on your blog post to advertise the hop. Be sure to add our blog address as well: http://heart2heartchallenges.blogspot.com/

So hop to it and plan on participating in the Bunny Hop! See you then!

Bunny Hop reminder!!

Don't forget, this coming Monday, April 18th, we will host our 1st ever blog BUNNY HOP and we want you to participate!

Create a project with an Easter (or Spring) theme, post it to your blog, then come back here Monday, April 18th from 8 am EST to 8 pm EST and add your link. YOU CAN ONLY LINK TO YOUR PROJECT ON MONDAY! After that, the link list will close.

So hop over here, leave your link, then bunny hop around to all the links on the list for a fun Easter showcase of artwork!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Bunny Hop info!

So much to tell you so let's get right to it!

Before I get to this week's challenge, I want to tell you about what will be happening next week. Every other month we have a From Our Heart to Yours challenge. Well this time around, we want to share a blog hop with all of you!! On April 18, we will be sponsoring our first blog hop - the H2H Bunny HOP and we want you to play along.

Here are the details: Before Monday, April 18th, create something Easter or Spring themed. Post it to your blog. Then on Monday April 18th, add your link to our Mister Linky here on the H2H blog. You can ONLY post your link between 8:00 am EST and 8:00 pm EST on that Monday!! After 8:00 pm, the link list will be closed and no other entries will be added through the week. You also MUST include CLOSE TO MY HEART products or your link will be removed. Then through out the day, you can bunny hop among the links to see what everyone has created.

We would love to see a big turn-out for this hop so spread the word! There will also be one random blog hop participant chosen to win a prize so you want to play along!!  I will post reminders through the week so get your creative thinking caps on!

As for this week, we have an early Earth Day challenge for you! We want to see what you can include in your artwork that is recycled or re-used. This can be a piece of ribbon from a gift or a scrap of paper that came from a book or anything you can repurpose and use in your artwork. Let's see what the Design Team created - and be sure to visit their blogs for a description of what they recycled on their project -

Lisa 

Debbie

Lorrinda

Mary

Corina

Karen

Jessica

Melinda

Oh, these girls know how to go green! Now let's see what you can reuse or recycle. Create your artwork using Close To My Heart products and link up below. And don't forget to work on your blog hop project for next week too!! We are looking forward to seeing what everyone creates!!

Spring has Sprung!

Well it's not really Spring-like where I am quite yet but it is time for those dreaded April showers! And that's part of our theme this week but before we get to that, I have a lot to announce.

First, be sure to check out my post from yesterday announcing our March Top Ten and our Guest DT for April!!

I also was offering a little goodie package to one lucky player from last week's challenge and that person is......#7 Chrissy Winters!! Chrissy, please send me your mailing address so I can pop something in the mail to you!

This week we are starting up with 2 new sponsors - please welcome Michelle Zimmerman of Life's LITTLE Things and LeAnne Dudley of Dudleychick Designs.

LeAnne is offering one lucky player from April's challenge the following prize package:

and Michelle's prize is what you see below:

Thank you to these two generous ladies! Remember, you have the whole month to play along with the challenges and the more you play, the more chances you have to win!

Now on to the challenge. The theme is April showers brings May flowers so we want to see what you create with showers and/or flowers. Let's see what the DT created:

Karen

Corina

Melinda

Debbie

Lisa

Lorrinda

Beautiful and sooo Springy!

Now it's your turn - create something with showers and/or flowers and let us see your artwork. Just link up below (be sure to use a direct link to the page of your blog with the challenge artwork, not to the whole blog) and we'll stop by and see what's "springing" up in your artwork~

Oh and be on the lookout for an announcement soon about our 1st blog bunny hop that you can participate in - it promises to be a hare-raising good time!!

Our March Top Ten and April's Guest DT!

I'm a little later than planned this week with the Top Ten and Guest DT post but I have good reason - I became a Grandma this week to a 1 lb. 1 oz. baby girl!! Born 15 weeks early, little Liberty Ann is doing well and she already has all of us wrapped around her very tiny finger!


So here we go - 1st up, I'd like to introduce you to our Guest DT for April - Shari Maclaskey:

"I am 34 years old (sshh, my son still thinks I am 28), I just celebrated my 5 year anniversary with Close To My Heart in March, I have been married to my soul mate for 15 years and I have an amazing 14 year old son.  I also have 2 dogs, a Yorkie named Dallas and a Bassett Hound named Flash.  Plus, two cats, Smokey and Julius Caesar.  I have been a housewife for the past 15 years although I did work for the postal service as a Postmaster Relief for 5 years.  I have been paper crafting for the past 6 years and I enjoy it immensely, though I have to admit that 6 years ago I told my friend, a CTMH consultant, that I would not like it one bit, but agreed to hold a gathering anyway.  I have been hooked ever since.   I am also crazy about ancient history.  It started when I was 7 and read a National Geographic magazine featuring the discoveries at the ancient city of Pompeii.  I am an avid reader of anything to do with ancient civilization and culture.  I stay very busy with CTMH since I teach a scrapbooking class weekly at my local library and my son keeps me on my toes with all his school activities.  I enjoy spending time with my family and we still take the time to play a board game or card game at least once a week.  I also love working in my flower gardens and decorating around the house."

Welcome Shari - we're happy to have you joining us this month! You can visit Shari at her blog Shari's Paper Trail and check out her CTMH site HERE. Shari will be joining us for 2 of April's challenges so stay tuned!

And now we have our Top Ten to introduce - let's take a look at our picks for March:

From the Color Challenge week:

From the Times 3 challenge week:

From the Home Decor challenge week:

And finally, from Baby week:

And our top of the Top Ten and our May Guest DT is.....

Joelle Hiller! Congratulations to our Top Ten!

The Top Ten will all be receiving badge information by email soon. Jennifer, Theresa and Amy - please contact me at mbryt1@bex.net so I can send you the badge info.

That's it for me until tomorrow when we welcome 2 new sponsors and issue our next challenge. See you then!