National Scrapbooking Day!

 

Hello everyone!

 

 

It's been a while since the last time I've posted. I have been busy with school and getting ready for Wesley. I am 34 weeks and I can't believe how fast this pregnancy has progressed. It seems just like yesterday that I found out I was pregnant. Now, I am mere weeks away from holding my little boy...I can't wait for him to be born!

 

So yesterday was National Scrapbooking Day and I did most of my homework on Friday so that I could join in on the fun! I decided that once again I would join in the fun at Big Picture Classes . This is the third year that they have had a NSD cyber crop with fun challenges and prizes. I have taken many classes from them and have LOVED them all. The great part is that they are archived so you can go into your account at any time and review the class. There are no time limits!

The first challenge was from Stacy Julian herself and it was to use an I story to create a layout. I had pulled out a Iris photo container labeled Summer 2010 earlier in the day and decided whatever photos were in there, I was going to scrap them! So I decided to pull out photos of the first tomatoes I grew when we moved here to West Virginia. I love how it turned out!

 

 

Supplies Used:

Crate Paper ~ Little Sprout Collection Sunshine

Brown CS ~ Bazzill Basics

Jillibean Soup ~ Minestrone~ Chopped Tomatoes

Scenic Route ~ Scrap Strip ~ Sonoma

Tomato Seed pack ~ Freshly Picked Cricut  Cartridge

Green CS ~ Cricut Earthtones

Red CS ~ Tim Holtz Distress Collection

Corrugated letters ~ Unknown

Tags ~ Unknown

Tim Holtz Distress Ink Gathered Twig ( My FAVORITE brown)

SMASH journaling pen/glue stick in black

 

 

My next Layout is for challenge #2 and I seriously pushed myself on this one! My supply of paper is seriously lacking in summer papers so I had to find something that was bright and cheery for the photos I wanted to use. I found the perfect match with All About Girl from Fancy Pants. I was bound and determined to make it work and I think I did a great job!

 

The challenge was to create extra space for photos by creating a pocket page panel. Aly Dosdall used a We R Memory keepers 4" pocket page that she cut down. I did not have any in my stash but what I did have was Memory Book flip Pocket pages! I have had these for at least 5 years and I knew that was exactly what I wanted to use. The flip pockets are individual 4 x 6 pockets that you adhere to the page or you can use it on the outside of the page protector. I decided to make cut down a manila file folder and adhere them inside. I have been using file folders and making my own flip books for years as a way to add valuable retail space on a page. I was overjoyed when Heidi Swapp came out with her system! It saves me a lot of work!!

 

 

This is what it looks like when completed. In each pack you receive 6 page protectors. I had enough for all my photos and some more space for journaling!

 

I also made a flip book on the left page so that I had plenty of room for my title and more photos and journaling. I covered the file folder with paper but you could also use Glimmer Mist or Heidi Swapp's Color Shine to color the folder. If you decide to go that route beware that the file will curl and warp a bit. I used a paper iron to flatten it out or you could place it under a heavy book overnight.

Cardstock is from Wausau, everything else I used is from the All About Girl kit from Fancy Pants!

 

 

I had every intention to scrapbooking all night but my legs and back had other plans! I have Sacroiliac Dysfunction on my right side so managing to sit and scrapbook for 8 hours without having major discomfort was amazing. My poor lower legs though suffered the consequences..major swelling! So at 1030pm I called it a night and went upstairs to put my feet up!



 

 

 

 

 

 

Wesley's First Pages..

Hello,

It's been a while since I posted so I figured I needed to update all of you. I am now 26 weeks pregnant and while I feel good, I do have gestational diabetes. So far I'm doing well controlling my BS with just diet. Yay! Me!
I'm also in the last week of College Algebra and so far I'm maintaining a B average, which is great for me considering I'm horrible in math. this 41 yr old brain still can learn new stuff! LOL

I have had 2 finished layouts on my table for weeks now that I want to share with you..One is of the ultrasound photos when we found out we were having a boy and the other is of Wesley's namesakes.

 

It's a Baby Boy

 

I used Bella Blvd's Baby Boy collection..love the giraffe!

 

 

Your Namesakes

 

I used an old Chatterbox kit that I had in my stash to complete this layout.

 

Thanks for Looking!

 

17 Weeks

Hello friends Happy Snowy Saturday!!

It's been snowing here in WV since yesterday afternoon..We only have about 5 inches or so to show for it. So I'm busy in my studio finishing up on some projects and homework!

I have been scrapping the new baby's Ultrasound photos..trying to keep this book updated! LOL

I used Bella Blvd's We're Expecting collection for this layout and I love how it turned out!
The yellow heart doily is a dollar store find from last valentine's day. The pack came with white, pink and white. I used Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in Jingle Bells to color it yellow. The Wiggle Worm accent is an epoxy bubble I have had so long that I forgot I even had them! I backed it with yellow CS. The flowers are a mix of old Prima paper flowers and Making Memories. The brads are Making Memories. The title is Thickers Lullaby in charcoal. The purple dots is a journaling card that slides out to reveal the journaling.

Thanks for looking!! I hope you have a great weekend!

Playing catch up!

Hello Friends!

Where has the time gone? I'm so behind with my posts..but I have an excuse..Pregnant brain! LOL

So, since I have baby on the brain, I found some of Emilee's ultrasound pictures that were yet to be scrapbooked!

Here is the first one. This paper collection from Flair I've had probably 10 years! I kid you not, so I guess it was time to use it!

 

Next one is when we found out sweet Emilee was a girl..

 

 

The layout is based on a Jan 2013 Page Maps sketch

 

And the last one is of the postitive pregnancy test that certainly took me for a loop!

 

 

I used the W'ere Expecting paper collection from Bella Blvd.

 

 

 

More baby layouts to come!

 

Merry Christmas!

Hello Friends!

I have my christmas card for this year to share with you. It was my Grandmother's tradition to always send cards with the three wise men on them. She said it was an old Irish folk lore and it was to bring good luck in the coming year. You are suppose to hang it on the back of your front door to bring good luck! I can remember as a child always seeing the wisemen hanging on the back of her door.

I used the three wise men stamp by Tim Holtz and Stamper's Anonymous. The background was made by swiping it through Evergreen Bough, Festive Berries Distress Inks and Tarnished Brass Distress stain. The star is from Christmas Memories from Tim Holtz and Stamper's Anonymous. I used Ranger's Queen's Gold Embossing powder to make it pop.The card base is precut cards from DCWV. Inside I put a little quote of the Irish tradition.

Wishing all of my friends a very Merry Christmas!







 

1st semester is over!

Hello Friends!

I know it's been a while since I posted anything crafty! The last 2 months have been rough between starting school and then finding out I am pregnant and then fighting morning sickness..well to say the least I've had a lot on my plate!
I am officially on Christmas break and have started making Christmas cards so I will sure to post them when I get a chance! Plus I am starting an 8x8 Disney album next week too. It is a christmas gift for my parents! Can't wait to start it. I got a great deal on Scrapbook.com on a Queen and company Disney mega kit. It retails for $99 and it was on sale for $37.99!! I saved over $60!!! The rest of the kit will be used for various Disney projects from our first vacation.
I bought the album from Disney and I have to say that for the price it is well constructed and also comes with papers and stickers. I can't wait to share them with you!!!




 

Happy Halloween!

Hello Friends,

It's been a busy month for me with Faith's birthday on the 8th and my parents coming to visit. School started on Oct. 1 with Design Principles and so far I have an A in the class! This week is our last week and next week I start Typography and Color Theory.
I also got some shocking news on the 19th! I am expecting!! At almost 41, I did not think having a baby was in the cards but God's got a plan!

By my calculations I am about 7 weeks and due around my Mom's birthday which is June 13th! I am excited but also a little apprehensive because I feel like i'm starting over..Faith is 10 and Emilee is 5! I know this is God's plan, there is no other way to explain the fact that I am pregnant with the extensive history I have!
So, that's my October..and the reason I have been MIA! I have been feeling kind of crummy with nausea and indigestion but I'm hoping that goes away soon!

All Tuckered out!

 

Hello Friends!

 

 

It's been a while since I've posted, I have been busy getting the house back together before I start school on Oct. 1..I have 2 more rooms to clean! LOL

 

 

 

I used the All Girl collection from Echo Park.I once again used the negative of a previous project. ( The bird paper )  This picture is of my stepdaughter, Lindsey.

I also used Tim Holtz's Rosette die to make the rosette flowers.  Other flowers are Prima, American Crafts. Buttons ~ Unknown.

 

Make sure you save those papers that you diecut large shapes out of..You could easily use then for another project!



 

 

 

 

1st Grade



Happy Monday!

 

I spent a very short and fast weekend at the sea shore with my family. My BIL got married in my hometown on the beach..It was a beautiful ceramony and after everyone made it back to the beach house it started to pour!! It rained on my wedding day so it must be good luck!

 

So here is Faith's first grade portrait and class picture..I'm all caught up till I get this year's pictures! LOL

 

 

 Pattern Papers ~ DCWV ~ Hittin' the Books, the Grade School stack

Cardstock ~ Bazzill Basics, DCWV

K-12 Cricut Craft Room Exclusive

Hello Kitty Greetings Cricut Cartridge

Binding Edge Edger punch EK Success

 

 



 

 

 

School is In!



 

Happy Labor Day!

 

 

School has been in for my girls for a few weeks but I know most kids go back after Labor Day, so I thought I would share a school layout with you. I have been trying to get my pictures organized and came across Faith's kindergarten portrait and class picture! yeah, a bit late considering she is in 4th grade this year!

 

 

 

Bazzill Basics ~ Limeaide, Kisses

DCWV ~ Grade School collection

Imaginisce Geek is Cheek Snag 'Em ~ Glue, Speech Bubble, Milk, U Rule

Imaginisce Geek is Cheek ~ School Days

Jenni Bowlin Studio ~ Bingo Cards ~ School Days

Apple Paper ~ Recollections

Coredinations ~ St. Valentino

 

One more year to catch up on..I hope to have 1st grade posted later today!

Have a happy Labor Day!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Family

Happy Sunday!

 

 

I wanted to show you a LO that took me 2 days to complete..The photo is of my grandmother, my Dad, and his siblings..I had this photo in an old Daisy D collection kit for oh about 8 years and never knew what I wanted to do with it. So, I got it out and put the kit away and went to my newly organized papers and went to work!

 

I found this paper and was immediately drawn to it..

 



 and I decided to marry it with these..

 

 

My Stampin Up! Water color pencils!! AND this is what it turned into...

 

 

LOVE it now!!!!

 

 

Creative Imaginations Narratives~ Antique Cream Collection ~ Renissance

Bazzill Basics Swiss Dots ~ Blissful Trio

Glitz Design ~Distressed Couture Journaling CS Stickers

Stampin Up! Watercolor pencils

Scarlet Lime CS stickers (family)

MMBI family quotes

 

 

 

A plethora of Layouts !

Happy September 1st!

Inching closer to fall and I love it!!

Today I wanted to show you some of my layouts I have completed in the last week..Yes, I said week!! I have been a scrapping fool. It's so much easier to create when you are not spending half your time looking for something you KNOW you have!

I finally completed the pile of Easter photos that have been sitting on my desk forever!!

Here they are:

 

Still using the Easter paper from Making Memories. The vellum title is from Leaving Prints. The eggs are cut from the Easter 2010 Cricut cartridge. The journaling block is old Prima packaging. Finally the ribbon is Tastefully Tattered Monochromatic collection in Bahama Trio by MaisyMo Designs.

 

 

Faith ~ Thickers ~ Dolce ~ American Crafts

1st ~ cut from Heritage Cricut Cartridge

bunny and basket ~ Easter 2010 Cricut Cartridge

banner ~ MME Fine and Dandy stickers

basket ~ MLS mini alpha stickers

 

This is a picture of my daughter's PreK class at WVU's farm.

Title ~ Noah's ABC Animals Cricut Cartridge

farm diecuts ~ Pop-Up Neighborhood Cricut Circle Cartridge

Pattern Papers ~ Daisy D's

Background Kraft paper ~ DCWV Playtime stack..I used the backside of the paper.

Journaling block ~ unknown

Cardstock ~ Bazzill Basics

 

 

Forgot one!! LOL

 

Pattern Papers ~ Making Memories

Cadrstock ~ Leaving Prints, Bazzill Basics

Egg Doiley ~ Dollar general

Tattered Angels Glimmer Mists ~ Cadillac Pink, Frost

Alpha stickers ~ Unknown

 

This is Emilee's hospital photo..I used a sketch from Becky Fleck's PageMaps2 book!

I had this paper FOREVER..I liked that it picked up on the floral detail of her dress but didn't know where to go with it, so it's been sitting in a pile to be scrapped..

 

Pattern Paper ~ Daisy D's Moda collection, Making Memories ~

Cardstock ~ Bazzill Basics

Doileys ~ unknown

Buttons ~ Unknown

MME  Stella Rose Hattie "Remember" stamps, Stella Roase Gertie" Girly" Stamps

Versamark Ink Pad

Tim Holtz Distress Ink ~ Fired Brick

tastefully tattered Monochromatic collection ~ Pomegranite ~ MaisyMo Designs

Stampendous! White and Clear Embossing powders

 

 

 

 

last one..I used lots of old stuff on this one! LOL

 

Pattern Papers ~ Leaving Prints, Karen Foster

white ric rac ~ Bazzill Basics Just the Edge cardstock strips ~ Avalanche

white snowfalkes ~ Quickqutz

title, blue snowflakes and snowmen ~ Winter Frolic Cricut cartridge

snow banner ~ Leaving Prints

tag ~ Making Memories

 

So there ya go! My creations from last week!! I'm off to create some more. I hope you all have a fabulous Labor Day Weekend!

 

 

 

Organized!!

Hello!!

 

I have been on a cleaning frenzy the past few days! My studio was a hot MESS..and not in a good way either. I couldn't get into my closet, I had tons of crap laying in front of it to put into it! So I decided to clean it all out and then once I got into the closet I decided to get rid of some things..I have to be careful what I put into it because the bottom  is broke so nothing real heavy goes into the bottom. Well, it just snow balled from there..Before I knew it I had everything all over the place.

 

This is a picture of my desk before..I moved things around a bit and now have more room!

 

 

 

Here is my desk now..with some rearranging I have lots more space..I can even put my paper cutter on my desk. Something I have never done. as you can see from the top photo, I always put it along side of me!

 

I simply moved the pink and black organizer down to the corner and tilted it! Voila! More space!

 

 

I moved my Ikea Alex drawer unit where I sit my Cricut to the other side of the room so I could access the slim chest of drawers where my TV is. I had 4 drawers that were empty because I couldn't get into them!

 

From a different angle..

 

Here it is now! I put my cling stamps, Masks, and other painting supplies in the drawers. All the drawers are labeled!

 

Next task was the large pile of Deep sweater boxes I had of old kits from Scarlet Lime. I decided to finally take the kits apart and separate all the products..Well, it was quite an undertaking  but I did it and LOVE the results!

 

Believe it or not, all the paper from the 2 years worth of kits I had stored fit into ONE Cropper Hopper paper organizer. When I separated the paper I first separated into shapes and floral then I separated the piles into color. While I was here I took all the prepackaged kits that I had that I also had bulky embellishments for and put them in one of the sweater boxes. It freed lots of space on my shelf and they didn't need to be on the shelf because most of those I bought for specific projects!

 

Scarlet Lime kits come with lots of different type of Embellishments so I decided to also categorize those as well. I have places for chipboard, run ons, flowers but not for stickers..So I had these 15 qt. clear totes and decided to use them. One has stickers of words, journaling blocks,trim, and edges. The other box has theme stickers and seasons. I actually had a drawer left over in my pink and black wood organizer ( on my desk) and put all the floral stickers in there.

 

I went from 4 boxes down to 2 ! One of theme/ manufacturer kits and the other has  a collection of stuff for specific projects..like Disney, Halloween, Travel.

 

Finally I come to the best part of this project..I decided to float my paint table in the middle of the room! It's a small student folding table I got when I first started scrapbooking 12 years ago. I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner! It fits perfectly and it allows me to get into my closet if I need to!

Here is one final look at the finished room! I can't wait to start creating in my improved space! The best part..I didn't spend ANY money!! Just some ingenuity and a lot of sweat!

 

Family Blessings

I'm slowly getting 2004 Easter pictures scrapbooked! This LO took me very little time to put together. The background scalloped circle was from another LO I completed some time ago and decided to save the negative!

Pattern Papers and journal block ~ Making Memories

Cardstock ~ Bazzill Basics

Title ~ Family( Gypsy Wanderings) Blessings ( Cindy Loo Cricut Cartridge)

Frost Glimmer Mist, Banana Pudding Chalkboard Mist

Tim Holtz Tumbled Glass Distress Ink



Disney Autograph Book

 So here it is!! The Disney Autograph book ( 1 of 5) that took me months to complete..but oh so worth it! I had other tourists stop me and ask me where I got them ! once I told then that I made them they were awe struck..and so were the characters! Pooh and Tigger gave me a thumbs up sign when they saw their pages! LOL

I used my Bind It All to bind them. The acrylic covers, black pages and O wires were bought on the Bind It All website. the O wire is 2"..the biggest they make!

Here is the cover ~

Cinderella is Emilee's favorite Princess.She is a chipboard piece from EK Success. The titles were cut from Mickey Font and welded together on the Gypsy.

Each page is set up the same way..One side is a character and a stamp photo frame cut from French manor cricut cartridge. The other side is a signature block and the name of character. Mickey was cut at 4.5" but the more intricate characters have to be cut larger at 6.5". Most of the Character piecings I use Recollections paper. It's the perfect weight of paper, it doesn't tear and cuts cleanly then the thicker cardstock..like Bazzill.

Oh My saying was cut from Mickey font cartridge.

As you can see..we didn't get all the signatures..the first few days we were

in Disney it rained so the books stayed in the car. I was afraid they would get wet.

The fairies and princesses were cut at 6.5". I used a white jelly roll pen to paint the whites of the eyes then colored them in with Copics..However, the copics after a while bled into the white. So I would use a pigment dye ink instead of alcohol ink.

I decided to go with the busts of each of the Princesses because the dresses would have been way too big to fit onto an 8x8 page.



Repunzel and Tiana are stickers..they are not on the Cricut Princess Cartridges.

Pattern Papers I used were from the following:

Princess 8x8 paper pack ~ EK Success

Mickey Paper Pad 12x12 ~ EK Success

Magic symbols ~ Queen & Co.

Magic Polka Dots ~ Reminisce

Magic Zig Zag ~ Queen & Co.

Purple background paper ( used for fairies) I bought from Disney store.com a few years ago not sure of the manufacturer.

I loved how they turned out!! If you have any questions let me know!

I forgot a few things! LOL I used an EK Success punches called Abstract Flower Edger and Swiss Cheese Edger. Both can be found on the EK Success website.

Tattered Angels Glimmer Mists ~ Pearl, Lemongrass, Bronze, Frost, Vintage Pink,Marshmellow Chalkboard Mist, Icicle Glimmer Glaze (wings of fairies)

I used most of these colors on the names of the fairies and princesses. I also used Copic markers E21 and E00 for the skin. It's way easier to cut the flesh cuts on white paper and color them in :)

Cricut Cartridges used :

Elegant Edges ~ cover

Mickey Font

Mickey and Friends

Pooh and Friends

Toy Story

Disney Classics

Happily Ever After

Dreams Come True

Tinkerbell and Friends

I did go onto the Disney parks website and see what characters we would see and went from there..We did not get to meet all the characters while we were there. Out of 29 characters I made we got 15 autographs. Next time I think I will make the pages and add the characters after we get the autographs!