I am just thrilled to be heading out to Anaheim this weekend to go to CHA. I love connecting with friends in the industry and seeing the new product releases + all the awesome booths. One other thing I enjoy is to look for emergin trends on the show floor. As part of my preparation I have been viewing the pre-release images and I see emerging trends. I am sharing my short list of what trends I will be looking for. Some of these are brand new, some are slowly growing. What trends do you see?

Patchwork

Handmade by Lily Bee

Game On, Websters Pages

She Art, Pink Paislee

Strawberries

Pretty Party, Crate Paper

Eye Charts (this is a huge home decor trend)

Maya Road

Subway Art

Be You, Fancy Pants

This list could keep going.

• airmail
• luggage Tags/tickets
• chevron pattern
• kite tails
• union flag
• mason jars.....

What do you see?? What do you want to see as a trend?

This has to be my favorite Angie project from season one- I LOVED how hers turned out. She has them displayed on her piano and gets lots of comments about how cool they are. So what is my problem, I need to get some done!! In the meantime learn how to make some yourself.

Book Picks

I shared a book by contempory writer, Aimee Bender called An Invisible Sign of My Own. LOVED this book and I read it after I read another book written by Aimee, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, and I highly recommend both of these books. I found both stories to be quirky, emotional,a bit edgy, but definetly a unique read.

Angie choose, Theories of Everything: Selected, Collected, and Health-Inspected Cartoons, 1978-2006 , for her book pick and she says it is, “Total nerd humor. Found in the New Yorker. Kind of like Seinfeld, the jokes are about mundane, everyday life. Jokes about ‘nothing.’ Like there’s a poem to your toaster...”

*Disclaimer these links may contain affilate codes which may generate a few pennies for Ella, thanks

Wow- what a thrill to be a part of My Craft Channels first season. We are so excited to be filming season two this month. For now enjoy the episodes here on our blog over the next few days.

Stuff we couldn't show, and other random comments below.

Our book pick, the original Listography, has a super cool website and app with a place to compose your own lists plus all the additional Listography books. 

and a book I have not seen, but so want to, is the To-Do-List a book that has a collection of other peoples to do lists, what a cool idea. You can read other people's to do lists and learn more about what a to do list says about you on the book authors blog.

Do you use lists in your scrapbooking? life? do you save them?? I think I should make a layout out of old lists...

Don't forget our List-It! products, Angie does a review of them below.

Happy list making!!

Disclaimer**and when I can figure it out, I try to add Ella's amazon affiliate links so a few cents of your purchase, if you make one, may go to Ella.

I did a little scrapbooking over the break (thus the vacant blog) and have a few layouts to share.  These two layouts used the Christmas List it! and one of my favorite scrapbooking tools, my Epson PictureMate.

My formula for holiday layouts below

Bright and cheery colors + wallet sized photos + happy patterns + handwriting = cute holiday layouts!

Do your holiday pages have a formula? Please share!

It is true, I am a scrapbook product junkie and I needed a fix, so I thought why not include all Ella peeps in the process. Feast your eyes with me at fabulous holiday products that made me swoon.

1. October Afternoon's holiday line is adorable!!
2. and the cigar box from Jenni Bowlin is just waiting to be embellished
3. these Christmas strips from Elle's Studio, are ideal for adding a note to your layout or as a gift tag
4. I want all the colors of Doodlebug's Doodle twine in my Christmas stocking!
5. These brads from Crate Paper could be used for any project, holiday or not

That is my fix, what products are you excited about? What are you asking for this Christmas??

Wanted to drop in and say hi and let you know that Angie and I are hard at work on our early 2012 eBooks. So much fun stuff coming up for Ella and we do have fun holiday posts planned so stick with us.

For now, here is a link to some favorite fall tutorials at Lil Sugar, enjoy!

Books and Crafts Episode 6: Conversations

This is a favorite of mine- but we want to know  what do you think??

Quick Update!

See the list of randomly selected winners listed below in order of blog post, and get excited for more card making posts this week and later this month!
 

Embossed Cards with Sarah Hodgkinson winner is: Hallymichelle

Cards from Kits with Deena Ziegler winner is: JillT

Making Cards from leftovers with Latrice Murphy winner is: JoMama

Plus we have two giveaway winners from two of the Stretch your Sketches posts.

September is: alizadeutsch

June is: Sara Benzkofer

Last two winners, please contact Donna directly so she can full fulfill your prize. Email her at donnajannuzzi(at)gmail(dot)com

Watch it here.

The card making fun continues all month long so keep checking back so you don’t miss anything. You can check the Card-Making Month homepage by clicking the banner below.
 

The day has finally arrived: the launch of MyCraftChannel.com, where Angie and I will share a professionally produced segment each week from our new Books & Crafts show!

Watch it here. AND also enjoy today's daily deal from My Mind's Eye.

In today's episode, we talk about our List It! products, showing you how they can be used in handmade journals, notebooks, and even an art journal filled with ephemera, scraps, book pages, lists, and more.

To celebrate the launch of our new show, we're putting all of our List It! products on sale for 10 percent off! Use code LISTITNOW on our regular or digi-plus versions through October 9, 2011.
 

PLUS, each week we each share a book pick of the week! Here are this week's picks:

I had so much fun looking through the different layouts created by the boot camp participants and wanted to share just a few here on the blog.

From Bobbi she used the grammer free journaling and pattern mixing techniques, and how cute are her four daughters??

OK this layout incorporates a grid design and uses lovely colors and patterns, great job Heike.