Willie's First Snow

We finally got some real snow here the day after Christmas. I really wish it had been on Christmas so that we could have played with the dogs during the day on Sunday, but I got a few photos at 2:00 AM (when Katie needed to go out), 5:00 AM (when everyone got up) and 4:30 PM on Monday (when I was clearing the walkway).

At first Willie was not sure about it. He was a little freaked out with the snowballs that stuck to his paws and all over his fur. But once he was outside with Harley, the fun began. They started running lightning fast all through the yard.

Of course I had to do a layout of Willie's first snow experience. I struggled with what to do. I knew I wanted to do do the December Challenge#19 at Lasting Memories . The challenge was to produce a winter themed layout. Well, I had the photos, but no direction. Well, today on Facebook, Let's Scrap posted the January Sketch Challenge. Wow... that was it. It's a Julie Bonner sketch for a double page layout. Just awesome....



My pages came together quite easily after finding this sketch. Here's page 1 ....

And page 2.....


And both pages together.... I used Echo Park's Wintertime collection and cardstock. What great papers.


I obsessed so long about the winter themed layout, the challenge is due tonight. But there is plenty of time to check out Let's Scrap and give Julie's sketch a try.

Santa Claws

This week's challenge at The Paper Variety is a photo inspiration challenge. Suzanne chose the most adorable photo for inspiration.


Such a sweet puppy. The challenge is to create a project with something from the photo being your inspiration. Of course doing a project with a doggie subject is pretty easy for me. For this one I decided to incorporate the Scraplift challenge for Scrappin-n-Chattin also. I scraplifted Suzanne's project for this week's TPV's challenge. Her page is just too adorable. I even used paper from the same collection Suzanne did - Echo Park's Everybody Love Christmas. Jax is so good, and just too darn cute.


And here is my page. I took Willie to see Santa today. He was pretty good about it.


Thanks for looking. I'm off to plan another page or two....

It's A ..... Thing

I made a 2nd layout over the weekend. This one was not of Ben, but of Willie. I followed the current sketch at the My Mind's Eye blog. The sketch also comes with a challenge. The challenge is to make the project in the theme It's A .... Thing, and fill in the blank. I have been playing with the dogs, trying to get decent photos of them with Christmas hats on. I ultimately want a picture of all 4 of them, dressed up, under the tree - TOGETHER. That's pretty difficult. So the title of my page is It's A Trial and Error Thing. Here is the sketch:

And here is my page:

I used a couple of mis-shots. It has taken so many tries to get a decent photo. I'm glad I was able to use a couple of bad pictures.

I used My Mind's Eye Wild Asparagus papers. I was very surprised at how well these non-Christmas papers worked on this Christmas layout. I used some glittery letters from a DCWV Christmas pack I had got on clearance last year for the title. So this layout will also qualify for my 2nd Sparkle layout at Scrappin-n-Chattin.

Thanks for looking.

Baby's First Christmas

The weekend of Ben has spilled over to a 2nd weekend. I did a layout today of Ben's first holiday photos.

I followed a sketch provided by Ashley at Scrappin-n-Chattin that came from Beggahuna. OMG!! I really loved this sketch as soon as I saw it.


I used Echo Park's Merry Christmas pack again for this layout. I love those papers. In addition to entering this into SnC's sketch challenge, I am using it as the Song challenge on SnC. The challenge is to use a Christmas song title as the title of your layout. Baby's First Christmas is a song recorded by Connie Francis. I am also playing along with Challenge #13 at The Paper Variety. The challenge is to create a layout or other paper project about or for a child.


Thanks for looking. I will be taking a break from photos of Ben to do a few of the doggies.

It's A Boy

The weekend of Ben continues. I feel good that I was able to get a few pages of him completed. I have to study some more photos and get them together to do more.

This layout contains Ben's hospital photo. I'm glad I finally got it done. I was so excited to see the flourish in this week's Sketch Along Tuesday Sketch at Frosted Designs. I felt the layout of the sketch was just perfect for the baby picture.

This is the page that I created:


I used browns and blues to coincide with the color challenge at Scrappin-n-Chattin. I was so happy to be able to use my brown flourish that I found on clearance at Michael's.

Thanks for looking.

The Gymnast

I've been working on pages of Ben this weekend. Three done. Pretty good.

This page is of Ben while at gymnastics. All of the boys were in gymnastics for a little while. I think Ben is the only one with photos though. The layout is based on this week's sketch at Sassy Lil' Sketches. I really liked this sketch. I think it worked out pretty well. Here is the sketch:



And here is the page.


This page will also be my 2nd entry for the child challenge for this month at Scrappin-n-Chattin.

Favorites

I did not create as much as I would have liked during my time off this week. I did relax and did some organization in the office. It's getting close to being done. It's so much more pleasant working in there when it's clean. I managed to get the tree up this week. I wanted to have it up before David left. I hope to get a picture of him in front of it today or tomorrow before he leaves. I photographed the progress as I put the tree up. I even took some photos of my favorite ornaments. I used these photos to create a page this afternoon. I used this week's sketch at Sketchy Thursdays as my base for the page.


For some of the elements I followed the challenge this week at The Paper Variety. The Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge is so much fun. We had to create a project with 3 items in a row.


I actually followed 2 Tic-Tac-Toes. I followed the row across the top, and diagonally from top left to lower right.


The layout contains 3 photos. The diamonds that form the title banner are cut from my Cricut, the Jasmine cartridge. The photos and the papers (Echo Park's Merry Christmas) are in the holiday theme.

This page also qualifies for this week's challenge at Design Dollies - Layer upon layer upon layer... The project was to include at least 5 layers. I chose to display these layers on my most favorite ornament - my little angel. This is an ornament I received as a child in 1965. It is triple matted with 2 background papers behind it.

I am using this layout for the Sparkle challenge for Scrappin-n-Chattin. The challenge is to add glitter, bling, gems, etc. on your layout. I added a couple of rhinestones above the ornament sticker as well as sparkly string on the ornament and the banner.

It felt good to create. I am optimistic that I will get another layout or 2 done this weekend. Thanks for looking.