Convention Postcard contest Part 1

Today was all about family.  I enjoyed lunch with Zane's Grandma.  My mom and I went grocery shopping then brought home take out.  Kind of ironic isn't it.  Buy a bunch of groceries, and pick up pizza on the way home.  Then again, cooking is not my thing and Monday is my day for dinner duty.

Emily and I spent the evening at Zane's mom's.  Tyler and Zane didn't want to go, they must have had important boy things to do.

I have been fretting a bit over what to wear to the CTMH convention in July.  When you work in scrubs, business casual clothes are not something I have a lot of.  I am a jeans and sweater or sweatshirt kind of girl.  Luckily, my MIL and I are pretty close in size and she is the queen of Goodwill finds.  Yup! Not above wearing hand me downs. 

Typical visit to her house......
MIL:  "I picked these up at GW Boutique the other day, I don't like the way they fit."
ME: Try on clothes, pick put which ones I like.  Pay her for them and she takes back what neither one of us liked.  I always make sure I have a $20 in my pocket when we visit.  Now we joke that she is my personal shopper and she takes requests :).  Love my MIL!

I did have a few minutes here and there in between running errands and visiting family to start working on my entry for the postcard contest at convention.  Everyone going to convention received this postcard in the mail, only we didn't know it was for a contest until a few weeks later.  Luckily, I like to "save" things and still had it tucked away.  You know me!  Love a good contest or challenge.  They push  my creative gears.

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 Postcard before.....

Postcard meets exact-o knife.......

(love cutting things apart, to make my own custom accents)

A little more cutting and start layering........

(first attempt)

Scratch first attempt, moved elements to opposite sides.  

Added a mock photo mat, since I don't know what picture I am using yet. 

Used the CTMH stitching ruler and Legacy Writer to add some journaling lines to the journaling block.

Then added some pen stitching and outlining around a couple areas.

Nothing is glued down at this point.

I will be back with an update as I continue to build and add to the layers of the page. 

My work week starts tomorrow.  Ugh!!!  Really wish I could play with paper with my morning coffee.  Maybe I will get up early,  no probably not.

A very productive day

We had a very productive today in the Highland house today.   Emily and her friend spent a good part of the day working on a display board about Slave Trade for a school project.   I have been thinking a lot lately about how I don't seem to photograph the little details of our day to day lives anymore.  These are the things that make up who we are. 

Emily's hands the way they are, this day, this moment in time.  

I managed to revamp my crafty corner, and finish putting together 40 cards I had leftover from various home party projects.   Woo Hoo!  Granted I started them Friday evening and all the pieces were cut.  All I had to do was stamp and assemble. 

But wait there's more!  After everyone headed to bed, the insomniac in me made a pot of coffee and finished the page I posted a couple days ago.  You know, the "thought process" one. 

I added some flowers stamped with the Hooray Bouquet set, lace trim and the "Ivy" name block.  I really didn't know what else to add and didn't have any "carrots" laying around to go with the story.  

 

How's this for a carrot top? Hijacked this picture from facebook today of Hazel.  Love it!

My thought process.....

As you develop your scrapbooking "style" you will notice you have a pattern in how you create. 
I almost always start with a sketch or challenge. 
This helps me get the gears turning.
I then choose photos.  Sometimes I pull from my stash of pictures and sometimes I print off just the ones I want to use. 
Next is paper, generally I use cardstock for the base.
Lately, I have been pushing myself to step out of the box and use pattern as the base.
I start layering, often adhering as I go.
Once I have the bones of the page, I outline.
Which means using my black fine and bullet point Sharpie to outline certain elements of the page that need a little extra "boost" to separate them from the other patterns, etc.
Then comes the Title.  I like to layer the title over pictures and across the various patterns to help pull them all together.

So I have this.............

I really wanted the story to be a big part of the page.
I decided to use a big journaling block to record the conversation behind the pictures. 
I knew right away, I would need something along the top and bottom to "frame" the page, so I stamped a stitching line across the top and bottom.
Notice the black sharpie work around the pictures and letters?
Now, I need to add accents. 
I haven't decided yet what I am going to use, so I will sleep on it and see what my brain comes up with tomorrow.

I generally complete a page over several small increments of time.
Adding little bits here and there until I am pleased with the results. 

Recognize the papers?
They are from the Dotty for You paper pack that is available as a special purchase this month. 

I will be back with the finished result in a day or two. 
Sweet Dreams!

Memory box continued........

While Tyler and Emily were at school today,  I managed to finish up the CTMH memory game box I started on Saturday. 
Then around 1:00 I heard my phone vibrating around on the counter.
Emily wasn't feeling well and wanted to come home. 
Picture this.... me standing in the craft corner, covered in ink, hair all astray, still in my pajamas, thinking "crap! I knew I should have showered this morning".
I was in no shape to go walking into school.
Emily would have been mortified!
Good to know I can still shower and be out the door in 5 in the case of an emergency. 
I am sure the secretary enjoyed my drowned rat appearance. Classy!


Anyways, the product of my inkiness.........

 Since this is going to my Nephew in Afghanistan, I wanted it to be very inky and grungy looking.

The memory box comes with 24 - 3 x 3 chipboard squares inside.  I added various pictures of family members on each one, then stamped random words on them.

I used the same words on 2 of each tile.  Just in case he decides to play a little game of "memory" during some downtime.  Zane thinks I am crazy for that one, but you never know.  Big tough military guys like to play too. 

 

On the backs of the tiles,  I put some bible verses and other inspirational quotes.  

So Daniel, if you read my blog, make sure you are surprised when it comes in the mail.  We love and miss you.  I hope you like the memory box and enjoy the vernors :).

That's all for now, have a great night!

Memory Game

Not much time to craft today,  I did manage to squeeze in 15 minutes to quickly cover the Memory Game box with some retired papers from the CTMH Lucky line and ink it up a bit.

Am hoping to work on the innards tomorrow :). 

New Workshop Kit added and New special starts today!

After much anticipation, the Dotty for You promotion starts today!  I love the colors in this paper pack. With every $35 purchase, you can get this paper pack for just $5.  For close ups of the paper designs, visit the "specials" tab above.

                      


A new Workshop project / kit is available!  Perfect for the boys or military men in your lives.  If you live local and attending one of my workshops in May, you have a choice of the Victory or Pemberley layouts.  If you do not live local but would still like to complete the projects, visit the "workshop projects / kits" tab above for all the details.

Happy Crafting :).

Holy Scrap Mess!

I sat down to tidy up my little crafty corner and stumbled upon a little bit of inspiration.  A few weeks ago I was cutting a bunch of 1/2" circles on the Cricut.  The negative piece was so cool looking!  I found it last night and was totally inspired to create this.

 

The design  was inspired by a sketch by Karan Gerber on the Sketchabilities blog HERE .  I used so many products for this page, hence the name of the title for today.  There are stamp sets and ink pads covering my work area.  I will spare you a picture :).

I started with this.........

 Notice the head shadow?  That would be me.  Taking pictures at 1 in the morning is a bit tricky.   To mix the paint I used about a nickel size amount of Create - A - Shade  pearl paint and 8-10 drops of Black Re - Inker.  

I used a sponge to spread the paint using the negative piece as a stencil.  This is my first time doing such a thing and love it!!! I am still trying to figure out how to get all the paint out from under my fingernails.  (Should have used a bigger sponge).

To make the flower, I stamped the script stamp from the Universal Backgrounds set to make a "pattern paper".  Then punched 2 - 2" scallop circles and 1- 1 1/4 inch circle from the piece. 

Cut about 1/2 inch at each scallop, then cute the smaller circle so you have a "pie" but be sure and leave the center intact.  Sponge on some ink and layer them up.  You then fluff the petals, some going up, some going down.  Super quick and easy!

Supplies Used (all CTMH unless stated otherwise)

Pattern Paper : Bo Bunny , CTMH retired Sweetheart

Cardstock: Black, Vanilla Cream, Sky Blue, White

Ink: Crystal Blue, Grey Wool, Black, Baby Pink, New England Ivy

Stamp Sets: A Typeface, Stitched Together, Universal Backgrounds, Florentine WOTG set

Embellishments: Retired Shimmer Brads, A Garden Color Ready wooden shapes, Banners DE, Mixed Shapes DE, Neutral Bakers Twine

Cutting Tools: 2" Scallop circle punch,  1 1/4" Circle Punch, Quickutz alphabet / Cuttlebug

Other: Create - A - Shade Paint, Black Re - Inker, Black Sharpie

Off to the store to get the supplies for some Zuppa Toscana soup for dinner.  I stumbled upon the recipe on Pinterest and am so excited to try it.  Zane isn't a big fan of soup, so hopefully he likes it!  If not, I suppose he will have cereal :).

Mojo Monday sketch Challenge

My friend Lisa made this card for the Mojo Monday sketch challenge this week.  Isn't it adorable!  I love all of the layers and the watermelon seeds!  Totally makes me wish it was a nice sunny day instead of the rainy day we have had today.  She doesn't have a blog (yet), so I am posting on her behalf.  Yay Lisa! Congratulations on participating in your first challenge!

Florentine Cards

It always amazes me how much you can do with just one little stamp set and 3 - 4 ink colors.  I have a tendency to get overwhelmed with options.  To counteract this, I like to pull out 1 stamp set, 1 set of papers and 3-4 coordinating ink colors and see what I come up with.  If I feel like the project needs a little extra umph, then I turn to the Cricut or Cuttlebug for some embossing or die cut pieces.

 

I really like the Florentine papers for cards.  This is the first I had played with this paper line and am quite pleased with the results. 

Other supplies used - A garden stamp set, Twilight, Cocoa, Olive, and Creme Brulee ink.  Various copics, Pearl Opaques, Flutter Paper Shapes, Misc. Ribbon and Floss.  Cuttlebug / Embossing Folders / Border die, Circle Punch.

Mixing the old with the new

This layout showcases one of my favorite pictures of  "the bestie crew".   I used sketch #198 from the Creative Scrappers blog. If you can't read the text on the picture it says "You have been blinded by Brenden's what he calls abs... and we call ribs :)".  This is a little tidbit of Emily's photo editing.  I nearly spit my coffee out when I seen her little journaling added while browsing pictures on the computers.  These 4! What a hoot!

I combined some new Footloose papers with some old Miracle, then threw in a little Typeset.

A quick update on Tyler's wisdom teeth extraction.  He did well and was able to return to school after 2 days.  He was quite entertaining while his "conscious sedation" wore off.  He kept saying "Hey" then follow up with something like "you know what's funny, Emily had to go to school today" or "Hey, is it ok if I swallow".  Then there was the yell from the kitchen that he missed his mouth.  I go to check and he was covered in Gatorade.  Yup, totally , missed it!  He asked me the same things over and over, and was quite confused how he got from one place to another.  He couldn't figure out how to buckle his seatbelt or eat applesauce.  Of course, he remembers none of this.  I should have recorded him, kind of like this person did.



Have a good night and happy crafting!

MoJo Monday Entry

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter with your family and friends.  We over indulged on dinner at Zane's parents.  Tyler had extra in preparation for the dreaded wisdom teeth extraction tomorrow.  Said he was storing up since he will be limited on what he can eat for a few days. 

I managed to put together this card for my entry into the MoJo monday challenge this week. You can find the sketch and challenges here .

I used more papers from the Dotty For You special coming up.  Have I said yet how much I like them?

Supplies Used (all CTMH unless stated otherwise)
Paper : Dotty For You
Cardstock: Colonial White
Ink : Black, Lagoon
Stamp Sets: Stella WOTG set, April SOTM
Other : Black Sharpie , Cricut AP cartridge and Neutral Bakers Twine

Thank you for stopping by!

Dotty For You

I was finally able to play with the Dotty For You papers that will be available to you on April 17th.  You can find all the details under the specials tab.

For my page I used a sketch from sketcheswithatwist.blogspot.com.   I recently stumbled upon this blog, and since I am all into banners lately, it was perfect!

I used one of the sunbursts from the March SOTM set to stamp a border around the page.  There are 5 different sunbursts in the set and can see using them a lot for this.

The butterflies and the 3 labels were cut out of a couple of the Dotty For You papers.  The Journaling block is from a retired Mayberry Stickease set.  Am always happy to use up a little retired stash :).

Products used, all CTMH unless stated otherwise. 
Paper: Dotty For You  B & T , Sweet Leaf and Smoothie Cardstock
Ink: Black
Border: Cut from the AP Cartridge
Embellishments: Colonial White Designer Brads, Neutral Bakers Twine, vintage lace (unknown brand)
Stamp Sets: Bohemian Alphabet (E1019) , and April SOTM


This picture sums up our day today.

My nephew Daniel is in Afghanistan right now on his second deployment to serve our country.  Before he left, he drew Zane a map to his mushroom spot.  We drove nearly 2 hours to find it, then strolled around the woods seeing what we could find.  We only found 5 mushrooms, NOT GOOD!  I took several pictures, but this one is one of my fav's.

We did learn a couple things.
1. I should not lead us out of the woods.  Tyler, Emily, and I started heading back to the car.  A few minutes later we heard Zane yelling that we were going in the wrong direction!  It's a good thing he noticed before we were out of ear shot. 
2. Tyler really needs to work on his braking and accelerating while driving.  He tends to be a little heavy on the pedals.

That's all for today, have a Happy Easter!!!

The Bestie Crew

If you are familiar with my blog,  then you have seen pictures of this crew before.  Of course our kiddos, then there is our "other" kids.  These 4 have been friends for 11 years now.  They met at daycare when Kylee and Emily were just a year old, and over the years have formed such a strong wonderful friendship.  They love one another like siblings and also disagree like siblings.  They debate one another, support one another, and tattle on one another. 

Oh how I love them!  The pictures are from a weekend shopping excursion we went on before school started.  I used papers from the CTMH Cruisin' line and a sketch from the My Little Sketch Book blog.  Liz has such great sketches to play around with.

For the banner I used a section from the new mini banner in the spring / summer idea book and covered it with pattern paper.  The title is Cricut cut from the Black Letter cartridge. Then of course, had to had a little stitching detail to pull it all together.  I used a stamp from the simple stitches set to stamp a frame around the edges. 

So, what a day today was.  Today was the first Baseball game of the year for Tyler.  Tyler plays starter Left outfield and bats 3rd or 5th.  He did very well today, made contact with the ball 2 out of 3 times up to bat and made good plays in the field.  No runs, but we are just getting started.  Can you believe I forgot my camera!  It was so cold, I don't think my fingers could have operated it anyways.  I was sure my fingers and toes would break if I moved them.  Silly me, went straight from work and only had a sweater over my scrubs.  Good thing my wonderful hubby gave up his warm coat for me to wear.  Reminded me of high school football games, wearing his "varsity" jacket.  Made me feel all "cool" again!  HaHa!

A note that there are still parents that are raising perfect little gentlemen out there!  This kid in Emily's class is so polite, I have to call his mom and tell her.  You know, in case she doesn't already know.  Today his mom gave Emily a ride home from Track practice, I watched him get out of the car and open Emily's door to let her out.  Mind you, when I took Emily, him and 2 other kids to the movies, he did the same thing.  He held the doors for me, then tried to give me money for popcorn since "I paid for gas".  How cute is that!  A 12 year old actually offering to give me money!  I really need to send Tyler to his house for some of that training, because he is not nearly that much of a gentlemen.  Note to self.... "Work on that".

 Tyler has to have all 4 of his wisdom teeth removed by the oral surgeon on Monday.  That should be an interesting day.  Is it wrong to be a little excited about the scrapbook page from the ordeal?  I suppose it is, but I was taught to always look at the positives in a situation. Tyler likely won't appreciate it if I take a camera with me,  I may have to sneak a picture with my phone.

A portion of the day was spent going broke.  That is what happens when you have teenagers. Here is how the day went financially....

Me:  "Honey, we have to have $750 cash down when we go to the surgeon Monday"
Emily: "Mom, don't forget I need money for track pictures and $35 for the field trip tomorrow"
Tyler: "Mom, my baseball cleats are to tight, I am going to need a new pair"
Zane: " Honey, I took the lawn mower to the shop today, not sure what's wrong with it"
Zane: " I signed us up to bring food for 3 of the baseball games"
Tyler: "Mom, you forgot to get body wash when you bought groceries yesterday, oh and I need money for class dues"
Emily: "Oh yeah, I need money for a track shirt too. I don't remember when that is due though"

Point of story, if your kids are toddlers, start saving now!  Today, I am really wishing I would have won the millions. LOL!

Ok, I have rambled enough today.  Sorry, I start typing and can't stop.  I hope you enjoyed my page today.  I best get to work at the crafting table, my "to post" pile is getting a little low.

Winning the Lottery?

The work week started with a whirlwind of hustle and bustle today.  Since I have a 40 minute commute to and from work, much of the drive is spent pondering layout ideas.  It seems that the car and shower are the two places my best ideas are thought of.  Weird, I know.

This morning, I was thinking "gosh, sure would have been nice to be one of the lottery winners, so I didn't have to do this today".  That's when it hit me, my next layout!!!

We rarely buy lottery tickets, in fact I can count on one hand how many I have bought.  But, like millions of others I bought one this past Friday.  $640 million!  Who wouldn't want to win that!   We spent Friday evening pondering what we would do with all that money!  Our many thoughts of course included paying off  debt, buying a new house, new cars, etc.  Then we had the lavish thoughts of traveling the world,  buying an airplane, me opening a scrapbook store and Zane opening a bait shop, all just for fun!  We talked about how we would randomly pay strangers utility bills, give our house to someone in need of one,  get my nephew the surgery he desperately needs and other random acts of kindness we could do to brighten someones day.

After all this thinking, we started thinking about how winning the lottery would effect our lives as we know it.  Since we live in a small town of 2000 people, we would need to relocate.  We would be afraid to have our kids walk to school because what if someone tried to steel them for ransom money.  Not that someone in our town would do such a thing, but you never know.   Money brings out the best and worst in people.  Living life with millions would not go unnoticed in our small town.  Suddenly, we would have all the snobby people wanting to be our friends.  The family we haven't had a connection with in years would suddenly want to be part of our lives, and it would be very hard for our kids to acquire "real" friends like they have now.   It would be difficult to maintain our content little life that we have worked so hard to achieve. 

So after all the debating, thinking and talking, I am relieved we didn't have the winning number.  We are thankful for what we have.  We have healthy kids, food, shelter, good friends and family.  We don't need millions, this would only create more headaches than we care to have. 

This sums up a future layout.  I wanted to put it on the blog, so I don't forget.

 To me scrapbooking is about journaling all these little things in life.  The things that make us who we are and the thoughts behind the pictures.  When someone looks at one of my pages, I want them to understand the story behind the pictures by the journaling without me having to sit next to them and explain the events on the page. Some pages hit this target, some do not. 

Lately, my journaling has been slacking, this post was a good reminder to get back to into telling the complete story.

Tomorrow when I go to work, I will be thankful I have a job and didn't win millions.

Oh how I wish......

Every time I pull out older pictures of  Tyler and Emily, I really wish they were small again.  Gone are the days that they do crazy things like this.  They are entertaining in a different way as teenagers, like always needing new shoes for various sports, bringing all their friends over to raid the refrigerator, and sulking when they have to clean their room. 

I think I used a sketch for inspiration, but can't seem to locate it.  So if it's yours, let me know and I will give your proper credit. 

Supplies used - all CTMH unless indicated otherwise

 Victory Paper, Hexagon Quikutz die, SU embossing folder, AP cartridge for photo corners, unknown brand floss and alphabet stickers.

Since the Nieces and Nephews are producing offspring, we have these little munchkins to entertain us with their silly antics. 

It appears that Roman has a little obsession with his belly button.  

His facial expressions remind me so much of his dad when he was this age.  I am secretly hoping he is just as mischievous too!  Like the time he clipped the frogs on the clothesline so they would stop hopping away :)

Notice any blog changes?

I really wanted to make the blog a place my customers could go and find out information on upcoming events. Notice the tabs at the top! Yay!!!! Now you can click on the tabs and have information readily accessible.

Plus, all my internet friends can join in on the workshops that my local peeps and I do each month.

I will be adding more tabs, workshop projects, and updating the calendar over the next few weeks, so check them often. It is my goal that you can say "Hmmmm.... I wonder what I need to get for Angie's workshop next month and when is it?", hop on my blog and have the answers at your fingertips. How awesome is that!

Here is one of the pages for the Pemberly option in May.

On that note, the Mushrooms are popping up!

One of our favorite things about spring. Walking around the woods looking for the little sprouts of fungus.

They were very tasty on our burgers tonight. YUM!!!