Making Memories Guest Designer

When Making Memories asked me to be a guest designer for their blog, I just about fell over in my chair. I was more than happy to oblige to say the least, lol. Here's the sneak peek but head over to their fabulous blog HERE for the whole shabang.

And thanks again to Making Memories for this wonderful opportunity. I had a blast :)

Happy Birthday Chrissy

I have to give a Happy Birthday shout-out to my younger sister Chrissy, who's birthday is Thursday. I'm a little behind in sending out my cards so I wanted her to see it.
I had fun making this card...she is a very colorful and fun person so I made this card to reflects her personality. Used some Cosmo Delovely line here for the chipboard flower and patterned paper. The scalloped border was made from the new embossed Bazzill...oh my word, I'm in love with that new line. I got it at Archivers but I saw the 8.5x11 version at Michaels.

Also did a LO of my sister and her two boys, whom she's crazy about. This LO was based on the Creative Scrappers Sketch Number 103. Love their sketches.

I took this picture of my sister and her boys on Mother's Day. The layout didn't really turn out the way I had planned. I changed my mind about the journaling spots but I couldn't take them off. And I'm crazy about yellow lately and I'm lovin the AC yellow thickers :) I used my Slice Basic Elements card here to make the hexagons...such a fun shape. I also just wanted to share a few of my favorite things lately...

My Making Memories Slice Hands Free Magnetic Mat...use this everytime I scrap, seriously.

Anything Cosmo and 6x6 paper pads. I love having the whole line in my hands, especially when I love every single patterned paper in it.

Hobby Lobby card pack. They have white, black, and kraft...and I have all 3, lol. Comes with 50 cards and envelopes for $7 and they go on sale for 40-50% all the time. You can't beat that. Even though I have tons of cardstock, I still got them because they are so convenient and a time saver. The cardstock is pretty good quality as well.

And last, a pic of my pooch Maui, who is 7 months old. This girl's nickname lately has been Mau-Mau. Cute :) Come back tomorrow, I have a nice surprise post.

Supplies:
Happy BDay card:
Card Base: Hobby Lobby
Patterned Paper and Chipboard: Cosmo Cricket
Acrylic Letters: Recollections
Journaling Spot and Edge Distressor: Heidi Swapp
Border Punch: EK Success

Family Layout:
Cardstock, Ribbon, Journaling Pen, and Thickers: American Crafts
Patterned Paper and Border Die Cut: Sassafrass Lass
Clear Stickers: Hambly Studios
Journaling Stickers: October Afternoon
Border Punch: Martha Stewart
Acrylic Butterflies: Making Memories
Tiny Attacher and Staples: Ranger
Pop Dots and Brads

Teacher's Gifts

Teachers are so important in our kids lives. We depend on them everyday to teach our kids right and our kids need people like teachers to look up to. I am actually very sad that my daughter is finishing first grade in a few weeks because we love her teacher so much.

I was searching around for some handmade gift ideas when I came across Jennifer McGuire's Blog and found exactly what I was looking for. You can see the cards in the last picture in this entry here and the product in its entirity on the Hero Arts blog here.

I used some Stampin Up cardstock in Very Vanilla and a Memories inkpad in brown. I first did a test stamp on a piece of computer paper and measured where the sentiment would need to be typed on the page. Using photoshop, I typed the text and moved it in the correct location. I had the grid on for guidance. I did a few test prints and worked it out. The flowers are vanilla HA art flowers so I sprayed them with some Glimmer Mist.

The folder was made using the technique found here. I used some Stampin Up cardstock Chocolate Chip to make the folder. Before I assembled it, I used a HA background stamp and heat embossed it with some Ranger clear embossing powder. I strung it with some ribbon and added a title. I didn't have room for the "s" in notecards and its killing me.

I made 10 notecards and tomorrow I'm heading to Hobby Lobby to get some colored envelopes. I have some white ones but they don't look so great next to the vanilla. Hobby Lobby has a great stock of AC envelopes in different colors.

I'm not sure if I want to add anything else to the front. Would love any input that you might have. Have a great week!

Organizing

Being a mom takes a lot of time, especially when they are small. Both of my kids are almost school aged now and now its time to get my house in order. Seems like my free time is so limited and its hard to fine the time or organize and decorate. My husband and I have done a few things around the house like painting and rearranging furniture to perk things up a bit. Last weekend I kind of went crazy. I took the old TV out of my armoire from the sitting area of my bedroom and utilized the space for my pics and scrap magazines. I don't have before pics but just imagine a huge old TV with a VCR. When the kids were babies, we had a pack-n-play in this part of our room and we could put on a show for them while we showered. We haven't used that TV in years now so I thought I could take advantage of this pretty big space for my precious items.

The bottom shelf hold my scrap mags and books and my Cards and Scrapbook Trends Magazines. I disposed of old mags that were more than a year old, except special issues. I usually read these in bed so I figured that this would be the perfect place for them.

The shelf above holds my empty scrapbooks. I have a lot because I got some good deals on them. lol. In the middle are 2 boxes of loose photos that need to be put away. On the right are my baby photo albums and baby books. I also keep large portraits in the folder.

The top shelf holds my wedding albums and portrait studio pics of the kids on the left side. I also have my dogs ashes up there in that small white box. I need to get a nice urn for her.

Here is a picture of the inside of the box that hold my portraits. I got this 12x12 box from Michaels. I'm also trying to use a black and white theme here so it looks nice and neat.

The right side holds photo boxes. These are all from Michaels and Hobby Lobby. Right now 3 are filled and I have 3 empty ones waiting to be filled. I recently took most of my pictures out my photo albums. I had all different sized ones and styles and it looked really messy and took a lot of space up. All of those pics I took out were taken before kids. My wedding pics and my kids pics are in albums. I've been printing large quantities of digital pics of my kids to make albums for them. Right now I have the first year of Aydan and the first two years of Kendall. Its a work in process.
The pictures in the boxes are not very organized by a timeline. Right now I 'm concentrating on getting them out of the albums to save some space. I figured that I can work on the pictures here and there in front of the TV.

Got a great deal last week. I've been wanting a small desk to put in our livingroom or family room. I was in Target and they had their desks on clearance for $32! This one was normally $129. What a steal! It has a glass top (not my first choice) and the shelf under it pulls out. I don't have a chair yet so I'm using one of our kitchen chairs. I just wanted a place for my laptop and have a pretty piece of furniture. The shelf below has a folder for my bills and I also keep my address book and stamps there as well.

A few months back I purchased this cheese keeper thingy from a resale shop and painted it white. I got some fake pears from HL and it sits in my livingroom.
Hope you enjoyed the mini tour...have a great Mother's Day!!!