We have dearly loved the beauty, talent, and generosity of spirit that Wilna Furstenberg and Michelle McCord have brought to the JBS team over the past several years. They are both taking on new adventures in photography as well as keeping up with all the new adventures of their active kiddos, so they are stepping down from JBS. We will greatly miss them, but hope to entice them to visit us from time to time. :)
It's another vacation mini-album, this time from Michelle McCord chronically a family vacation with baseball at its center! Michelle writes, "I used the JBS Look Hodge Podge Mini-Album to document our trip to Saint Louis last week. All items in the mini-album are JBS or vintage items. Love the feel of the different sized pages!" Thanks for the inspiration Michelle!
Today we have vintage storage for paints from the studio of Michelle McCord who writes, "I found this wooden pepsi crate long ago at a garage sale of all places and decided it makes GREAT storage for my paints! It kekeps them contained and not all over my scrap room."
***the BPC Giveaway below is still open! and there's another one on Facebook and TWO MORE at Moxie Fab World!***
"I used the JBS butterfly stamp and my Chewing Gum Paint Dabber to create the butterfly on the corner of my wall art. I love the way the dabber ink works with the stamps. It gives the stamps more texture and depth for me."
"This time I used the Chewing Gum Dye Ink Pad on the butterfly stamp and applied it to some vintage sewing pattern paper. Try using your stamps on other paper besides just cardstock or patterned paper for different looks. Stamping on the thin pattern paper makes it look almost see through."
We hope you'll pop over to Ella today for another Spring Training workout! Today's topic is "distressing" and since Michelle McCord is our resident distressing master, we asked her to share a few of her distressing secrets with you. :)
One of my favorite things to do on a layout is distressing. I have lots of different 'tool's that I use to get the distressed look. One of my favorite things to do is tear paper along a straight edge of a ruler. It gives it a little bit of an uneven edge, and then I can curl the edges up with my fingernails if I want. You can see on my Best of Friends layout, I did just that. 
Another one of my favorite 'tools' just happens to be my fingernails! I love to turn up the edges of embellishments, paper, whatever can be 'bent', really. On my 'Goofy' layout, I used my fingernails to turn up the edges of the penant banner so that it looks as if they are blowing in the wind. I also used my fingernails on the hearts on the page, and put a crease in the middle of them before adhering them to the page. It also gives the hearts a 3-d look.
Yet another favorite tool of mine is not a scrapbooking tool at all....a serrated steak knife! with practice using the knife, you can get some GREAT looking distressed edges and rips in your paper that look like they really are supposed to be there. On my Goofy Girl layout, I used the steak knife around the edges to soften them up a bit.
We are in for an exciting month ahead! Here is a little peek from Michelle McCord showcasing some of the pretties in April's Papercrafting Kit. And here are some sunshine yellow exclusives to bring on spring thaws! You can find more April Hints design team chatter on our new forum. The gallery and all the new stuff will go live Thursday at midnight CST! It's going to be a big release! All the usuals, plus an extra add-on, an extra Easter project kit from Jenni, extra spring papercrafting items, and the entire "Be Our Guest" line!
Here's a peek at March from Michelle McCord! Plus a glimpse at some of our exclusives and vintage items in the main kit this month. We'll have more for you tonight at midnight! 
Membership does have it’s benefits. . . Beginning March 1st, JBS Mercantile will offer member’s first rights to purchase Add-On Kits as well as other special additions offered on the 1st of each month. For the first full day of the month, only members will be allowed to purchase the member-Exclusive products. On the 2nd of each month non-members will be offered any of the kits that remain. As is currently the policy, member’s will also have the option to add these items to their monthly kit shipment at little or no additional shipping charge. To make this change a little sweeter, we are also debuting an additional Add-On Kit each month – that’s two add-on options to match your kit each month, both with one-of-a-kind vintage items to boot!
Michelle made this adorable altered clipboard from our new release, Be Our Guest, to hang in her daughters' room. The colors are just perfect for a vintage loving mama.
She made her folk art inspired sun from one of the Maya Road XL bottle caps in our mid-month release.
The charming flower garden was made from her stash of circle and heart punches while the butterfly was soaked in her favorite ink, Chilli Powder.
I created this wreath with some pages from a vintage book . All you do is fold the pages in half longwise, then fold in half again, wrap the folded page around a wire circle and hot glue into place. I embellished the wreath with some mini JBS chipboard butterflies sprayed with JBS chili powder dye ink. I also used my heart punch to create paper hearts and added some JBS vellum butterflies.
The middle of the wreath is created using two JBS chipboard Valentine buttons threaded with some vintage pink thread.
Sweet! Thanks for the inspiration Michelle!
It's been soo long since I created a mini album so I thought it about time. :) It is entitled Love You and it is filled with random pictures for my mom who is in Rochester receiving radiation treatments. I wanted her to have something up there that she could look at and remind her of home.
I created the butterfly and flower using my heart punch and layering the hearts up. I will admit I am addicted to the heart punch.
I covered the inside of the mini album with JBS tickets. I could have done the whole album with tickets, but I think I am saving that idea for another mini!
I used some of the journaling cards as little tabs for each page so the pages are easy to turn and gives it a unique look.
Thanks for the inspiration Michelle!
I love how the colors of the JBS Homespun papers remind me of summer, so I decided to make a little wreath for display. You could also use this as a table centerpiece.
Starting the wreath I used a flower foam as a base for my wreath and wrapped the foam in some neutral white fabric to cover up the green. I then started with two strips of 2inch by 12 inch paper, and just accordian folded both strips. I hot glued two of the ends together and layed it down on the circle form of my wreath. Making sure it is the correct length (cut any excess off) I then hot glued the accordian folded paper to the wreath. 
To make an accordian fold flower, I cut a strip of paper 1 inch by 12 inches and accordian folded the entire strip. 
After folding the entire strip, hot glue the two ends of the strip of paper together forming the circle. Then push the inside of the circle together and hot glue the back so the middle stays. I have posted a video on YouTube awhile back that will show you how to do this if my directions seem confusing to you... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QG5QsTQRlA
I used some JBS papers and butterfly stickers to give the wreath some more dimension.
What a great idea! Thanks for the inspiration Michelle!
Today's inspiration is another peek of the June kit from Michelle McCord. She says, "I absolutely LOVE the butterfly stickers! I bend them slightly before adhering them to the page so that it looks like they are ready to fly off."
This is what Michelle had to say about her lovely "Winter Blues" layout: For a 3 dimensional look, I decided to 'melt' the hand cut out butterflies. This is really very easy and trial and error as to how much you should melt your cut outs. I just used a candle lighter and held the cut out over the flame until the overlay started curling up. As soon as you think there is enough curl, then stop melting it. It is a very addictive technique to try! ;-)
I had to try butterfly melting right away! How about you? I'm now in love with this technique! It IS very addicting! Thanks Michelle for telling us about it!
A couple more tips: The plastic curls TOWARD the flame. The flame caused some black soot, but I was able to get most of it off the overlay by rubbing with a damp paper towel.
Try it! You'll like it!
