Scratch & Create Beautiful Works of Art

Disclosure- I received the mentioned product courtesy of the sponsor for the purpose of this review. All opinions are genuine, based on my experience with the product, and have not been influenced by promotional items.


When I was a kid, I would get excited over those junk mailers that had "scratch here and win a prize" on them. They were covered in those lottery type scratch off foil circles that I thought were so fun to remove. Of course, everyone won the same time share or dollars amount off a new vehicle scammy type prizes, but it didn't matter to me since I wasn't going to be cashing in on those "wins". While I don't play with scratch off lottery tickets often, maybe one or two a year, I think half the fun is taking a coin and rubbing off the foil. There's something addicting about watching the surface flake away to reveal something wonderful underneath. As fun as it is, most of the time there isn't any payoff for wasting your $1 on such a cheap thrill. Thankfully, for those of us who take pleasure in scratching off those foil covered game cards, there's an alternative for us to get our thrills and ending up with a beautiful payoff once the dust has been brushed away. 

If you joined in on the adult coloring craze, you aren't going to want to miss this new artsy craze- Scratch & Create! With Scratch & Create books, you'll use a specially designed stylus etch and scratch your way through unique, colorful illustrations, giving amateur artists like myself a whole new collection of projects to reach. 

In Scratch & Create Hand-Lettered Life, you get 16 colorful scratch boards and 4 alphabet and ornament stencils that will have you creating beautiful quotes and works of art quite easily. Simply remove the stencil page along the perforated lines in the book, center it wherever you like on your scratch board, then get to work scratching away until your masterpiece is complete. 

The stencils make it easy for people like me who don't have an artistic bone in their body to still be able to make pretty pieces while having fun. You certainly don't have to use the stencils and can freehand your own drawings if you like too! 

Hand-letting is fun, but since I am a more whimsical girl, I claimed Scratch & Create Enchanted Forest for myself. 

This book's size is about 1/2 of Hand-Lettered Life, but you do get 20 postcards, 3 lettering sets, and a set of ornaments to help you scratch your way to beautiful, personalized artwork. Both books come with an easy to use stylus so you don't have to worry about hunting down special tools to scratch away the metallic foil. 

I think Scratch & Create books are going to be the hot commodity this holiday season, just like the adult coloring books were last year. If you can't wait to jump on the craze, you can find both of these books, plus several other Scratch & Create titles at Quarto Knows. 

Do you know someone who would love to receive a Scratch & Create book this holiday season?

                                                            
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You Color My World ♥ Summer Coloring Fun Days Ahead!

Disclosure- I received the mentioned product courtesy of the sponsor for the purpose of this review. All opinions are genuine, based on my experience with the product, and have not been influenced by promotional items. This post contains affiliate links. Please see my policy tab for more information.


The countdown is on. The girls will be celebrating another school year down in just two short weeks and we couldn't be more ready! If you are like us, your year has been packed full of activities and the promise of summer break with no school commitments has you giddy with excitement. Now, as excited as I am about the idea of sleeping in late, no homework, and no early morning lunches to pack, the one thing I am not looking forward to is, "I'm Bored!" I think that's the universal phrase that grates most parents nerves during summer break. Thankfully, I've got a secret weapon stashed away to help blast away summer boredom blues.... New activity books that the girls and I can do together!

If you've been here a while, you know that we love to get our craft on, especially during the summer months. One crafty activity that we all love here are adult coloring pages. So, when I heard about Stick it To 'Em: Playful Stickers To Color & Create, a sassy book with over 275 stickers to create, color, and share, I knew I had to have it in my crafting arsenal to break out when the girls start getting stir crazy in the summer. 

Stick it To 'Em offers guided instructions for easy drawing and lettering techniques, as well as step-by-step tutorials all designed to get your creative juices flowing. There are over 35 pages of stickers, some ready to pop off the page so you can immediately stick them wherever your heart desires, some black and white stickers ready for you to color in, and some blank sticker pages so you can design your own one-of-a-kind sticker creations.

There are multiples of each sticker, so each of us can take turns putting our own unique spin on the designs. Allison was itching to start using the book as soon as it arrived, so I gave her a little sneak peek so she'll have something to look forward to during the slow days of summer.

She then claimed a few of the sweet treat stickers to pass out to a few of her friends at school so they'll have something to remember her by over break.

Allison loves this book so much, if we happen to do a holiday gift guide this year, this book is definitely going to be included in it. 

The other book I have stashed away is Mom & Me: An Art Journal to Share. 

 
I don't think this book would be great for older teens, but for the 6-14 age set, I think it's perfect. This book is a full color art journal that mom and child work on together. Side by side pages are almost identical, one for the child to work on and one for mom to work on. Mom and child can write each other letters, share the things they are thankful for, write out their emotions, and share their future adventures, hopes and dreams. 

Each page is beautifully illustrated with blank spaces ready for mom and child to add the finishing touches to the page. This book is an awesome way to open up the lines of communication between mother and child through art and creativity. There are 127 pages in the Mom & Me Art Journal, so you'll have plenty prompts and activities to keep you busy all summer long.

Each book is available in major book retailers like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones, and Booktopia across the US, UK, and AU. Be sure to order your copies before your kids are out of school for the summer and "I'm Bored" becomes the phrase of the day.


                                                              

What activities do you have planned to keep the kids busy this summer?

Library Art

Since the girls have started back to school, I haven't had much time for crafting with them. I saw our local library had painting scheduled this week, so I decided we'd check it out. I told Allison we were going to go leaf painting at the library. I couldn't believe her spoil sport attitude when she exclaimed "That sounds boring!" Tough cookies, you are going.

Of course, once she got started, she was like "This is so fun! We need to do this more often!" She liked it so much, she painted 2 pictures. Kids.... Such crazy little creatures!

We hadn't participated in any of the crafting activities at our library before this. Now I'm wondering why not? Free art supplies and THEY clean it up! What's not to love about that!? I checked next months schedule and there are a ton of fun things we will be doing. Making Halloween masks is on Allison's list of must do, and Mariah is really excited by the Harry Potter party they will be throwing, since she gets to go in costume. Fun times are definitely ahead at the library!

Does your library offer free community art events? If so, do you attend them?

My Kids, Social Media, and Sidewalk Chalk

I just gave my girls a brand new pack of sidewalk chalk. Usually this lasts them a few weeks, so I was pretty surprised when they came in after only one day of use and said they were out. I went outside expecting to see the usual rainbows and flowers, but there were none to be found. What did I see? My driveway turned into a billboard for social media advertising! I'm beginning to think they may be spending a little too much time online.