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!!!

30 days of Inspiration Challenge

I was thrilled and honored when my friend Heather, who owns Scrapbook Bakery, asked me to participate in her Inspiration Challenge. Its easy, pick anything that inspires you: a piece of clothing, a picture in a magazine, etc. Anything that gets your creative juices stirring. I loved this Victoria Secret bag because I would never think of using pink and red together with yellow accents. Since Mother's Day is coming soon, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and take care of my Mom's card at the same time. I used some crepe paper tucked behind the front of the card to represent the tissue paper in the bag. So please visit Heather's blog HERE to participate. At the end of the 30 days, all participants who link up their project to her blog will be entered in a drawing for a prize.

Chunkers

Just a quick LO for you. My son Aydan had these huge legs with rolls in them and I've been dying to scrap about them forever! Those chunky legs are just irresistable! Used a ton of October Afternoon paper. Love this stuff! Also used my Studio Essentials Slice card for the photo corners and the tags. TFL! Supplies:
Patterned Paper: Making Memories (circle background) and October Afternoon
Date Stickers: October Afternoon
Die Cut Machine (Slice), Animal Crackers and Studio Essential Slice Cards, Staples, Epoxy Stickers: Making Memories
Ribbon: Bazzill
Rub Ons: Making Memories and 7 Gypsies
Marker and Pop Dots: Stampin Up
Distresser: Heidi Swapp
Flexible Ruler and String

Creative Scrappers Sketch

This layout is for the Creative Scrappers contest celebrating their 2 year birthday! You can see the sketch HERE! I love sketches and I'm finding myself having more fun scrapping if someone else does the hard work for me by making the arrangement for me. LOL!

This layout is about a super small but well known popcorn and candy store in my husband's hometown. Its a really nice old fashion place with cute shops and lots of tradition. The store was built in the alley between two shops. Its probably 6 feet across. Seriously! They have a ton of the old candy that we had as kids...we love visiting there. Almost everything here is AC! I love their stuff because its so bright and colorful and even when you mix the lines it still matches! Used some of the Dear Lizzy stamps as well. Thanks for looking! The supplies are listed at the end of this entry.

And someone got herself a new toy...got the new magnetic mat for the Slice. Such a nice tool. I can plop my Slice down and do other scrapping while its cutting. I use my Slice a lot and thought it was worth it! I also like it because the cuts are straight and you don't have to worry about it moving. Supplies:
Patterned Paper, Blue/Green Cardstock, Vinyl Thickers, Letter Stickers, Journaling Pen, Stickers, Stamps, Ribbon: American Crafts
White Cardstock: Archivers
Ink: Versamark, Staz On
Embossing Powder: Ranger
White Pen: Inkssentials
Punches: Stampin Up and Fiskars
Circle Cutter: Making Memories

creative scrappers celebration

I was so excited when Creative Scrappers asked me and some other scrappers to make a LO based on a sketch. They are celebrating their 2 year anniversary this month and have a ton of events to celebrate. My LO went up today as well as some other awesome pages! Check out the other layouts and the original sketch HERE...and while you're there check out the link to over 100 sketches!

Supplies:
Cardstock: Bazzill, Stampin Up
Patterned Paper: KI Memories, Making Memories
Specialty Paper: KI Memories (sheers)
Chipboard Letters: American Crafts
Badge Brads, Ribbon, Rub-Ons, Slice Die Cut Machine (Just Chillin Card): Making Memories
Gloss Medium: Ranger
Flower Gems: Hero Arts
Other: String and Cork Paper

A Dozen Assorted Odds and Ends

Just a few things going around here now:

1. Just purchased our tickets for our trip to San Diego and Disneyland scheduled for early summer.

2. Hubby and I spent the last 2 days painting our yellow living and dining room a taupe gray with a super dark wall in the back.
3. My Baby Aydan is registered for kindgarten...gasp.

4. Both kids are signed up for baseball.
Above: Kendall in her t-ball outfit last year.

Below: Her practice today for coach pitch...she hit the ball! And yes, still in our winter coats here.

5. DWTS has started, yay! Jeff and Jordan are gone from Amazing Race, boo! And American Idol is pretty bad this year :(
6. I am now a semi-redhead.
Sorry for super close up...had to take a self portrait here and I have a fixed lens. Yikes!

7. Crop Chocolate sent me a kit to make a project for their site. I haven't seen it up yet, but it will probably be there soon. I love their store! Used a ton of Slice cards here too.8. Maui is in her second level puppy course...I don't know who passed her through the first one. lol!
9. I am signed up for Karen Russell's photography audit class that starts in June! I CANNOT wait!

10. My HS classmates on facebook are planning our 25th reunion (do I sound old???)!!

(At my 10th reunion with my classmates, who were also in my church youth group. We spent a lot of time together in HS)

11. Had to take the little guy to the ER a couple of weeks ago. 14 out of 18 kids in his class got the rotovirus at the same time. He couldn't even keep down a sip of water...poor guy :( He is always full of energy so its hard to see him so quiet and somber.12. And last, I saw my very sign of spring this evening in my in-laws backyard. They were these gorgeous little blue wild flowers. So cute. And this pic was taken with my cell phone at dusk so pardon the quality.

Hopefully I'll get some scrapping done tonight or tomorrow...been a crazy week around here!

Jillibean Sketch and a Mini Album

Jillibean soup posted a real cute sketch on their blog and the winner gets some of their goodies! You can see the blog entry HERE. Below is the sketch:

Its perfect for 1 or 2, 4x6's. I decided to replace the left pic with a journaling sheet.
This is just me being totally sarcastic about how difficult it is to have a 5 month old puppy. Maui loves to dig and the ground has been wet for a long time, well you get the picture. Not fun!

Used my typewriter again for the journaling. I don't think I can stop using it!

I have a pretty long scrapbooking "to do" list in my scraproom. One thing I've been wanting to do is keep track of all my colors...inks, markers, paints, embossing powders, glitters, etc. Sometimes when I'm scrapbook shopping I see something I like but not even sure if I have that item or color. I knew that I wanted a small album that I could keep in my purse but I seriously had no idea what kind of design I wanted to make. I was rumaging through my library catalog and came across my tri-fold journaling cards from my 365 project last year. I only used a few but I saved them just in case. I trimmed the edge that is opposite of the tab and put the folded edge through my Zutter binding machine. I just got it a couple of months ago and haven't used it yet. I was able to fit 12 of those cards in there and I've already started putting my color samples in it.

To make the color samples I used my Crop O Dile and punched a line of holes through some stencil paper. Then I put the stencil paper on the journaling card and painted right through it. I also did the same for my ink pads. To make those I used a blender pen to pick up the ink. I tried sticking to the Roy G Biv route in labeling but I know that's impossible as I add colors in the future.
To make the cover I decided to find colorful letters so I chose some Alphabet soup letters from KI. I knew that I needed a cover that could handle the death trap that is my purse too. That's how I decided to use the KI sheet paper and I backed it with my favorite colored turquiose cardstock from Stampin Up.

I'm so glad that I finally started that project. And I can't leave without a few pics of my 5 month old monster.

Supplies:

Free to a Nice Home

Cardstock: Bazzill (pinks) and Archivers (black)

Patterned Paper, Journaling Sheet, Brads: Making Memories

Puffy Letters: American Crafts

Embellishments: Ki Memories

Glitter Pen: Sakura

Photo Software: Picasa (to make the black border around photo)

My Colors Album

Cardstock: Stampin Up

Sheer Paper and Acrylic Letters: KI Memories

Binding System: Zutter

Mini Alphas: Making Memories

Journaling Cards: Creating Keepsake