1st Christmas

I have another page to share tonight.  This one is also of my granddaughter.

Since Leena was going to be in the hospital for Christmas, all of her NC family got together on the 23rd to celebrate her 1st Christmas.  This layout is of a photo of her before she started opening her gifts.

I used the 2nd sketch for January at Sketches In Thyme.  I think this was the perfect sketch for a Christmas page...

I used Oh Deer! collection from Fancy Pants for this page...

Thanks for looking...

First Day

Oh my!!  I can't believe it's been since May that I have blogged.  Wow.  Life has just been in the way.  I managed to make 3 pages today and thoroughly enjoyed it.  I really need to make crafting a priority.  It really made me feel better.

So the first page I have to share today is a layout of my granddaughter.  I used the January 1st sketch from Sketches In Thyme for my page.

Such a wonderful sketch.  I used Echo Park's That's My Girl collection.

Leena had to have a piece of her skull removed on Christmas Eve.  She got the band to reshape and protect her head on the 15th of this month.  She is such a trooper.

Thanks so much for stopping by.  I hope to share many more in the weeks to come.

Home Calendar November Page

Being snowed in today, I had hoped to get a lot done.  I was only able to get 1 page done.  I did the November page for our home calendar.

To create the page, I used the current sketch from Sketches in Thyme.  I was so happy to hear that they are back, and this was a very nice sketch to use...

I used DCWV's The Natural collection for this page.  I used a photo to documents what happens every evening around here....

Thanks for stoppping by....

Relax - Stew's April Page

I have been pretty busy trying to get our calendars completed.  For 2012, it was March before I was done.  That can't happen again.  I am very close to finishing Stew's.  I want to share his April page now.  For this page I used Sketches in Thyme Sketch #98 for this one.

I also followed the current challenge at Frosted Designs.  The challenge is a recipe challenge, where you choose 4 items from the list:

rubons
transparency
brads
eyelets
misting/masking
punches
stamping
stickers

Here is the page....

My recipe items are:
Transparency - The flowered paper on the right side of the photo is a transparency
Brads - In the centers of the little flowers on the lower left side of the page
Punches - Punched flowers and circle.
Stickers - Sticker letters for the title.

I am also entering this page into our monthly challenges at Scrappin'-n-Chattin', the Summer challenge.

Thanks so much for looking.  Please stop back by to see more pages.  There are going to be a lot of posts in the next week or so....

Where's Shadow

My son posted a picture of their kitty on Facebook last week.  Shadow was outside hiding in the hosta outside their apartment.  I really loved the photo even though Shadow is very difficult to see - she's black.

So I nabbed the picture and decided to create my 52 Week Challenge layout with it for Scrappin-n-Chattin.  I used Thursday Take #77 at Sketches in Thyme for the page.

Such a wonderfully versatile sketch.  I put a gem circle around Shadow on the photo.    Doesn't help a lot, but in person you can see her.

I am also entering this page in a couple of other challenges:

Die Cuttin Divas - Flowers (die cut from the Paper Lace Cricut cartridge, Flower #4)
Scrap It Girl - Flowers

I hope everyone enjoyed their weekend.  I hope your week flies by and you have a nice long weekend next weekend.  Thanks for looking.

My December Page

I was able to create a couple more pages for my calendar this week. On Monday I did my December page. I used a photo that I got last year of Tessa and Willie with Santa.

To create my page, I used Sketch #71 at Sketches in Thyme. I thought the sketch would be great for that photo, until I got started. Then I remembered that I bought stamps to create the months on the pages. The sketch has the title around the circle embellishment.


So I decided that it would be cool to have the month go around the circle. I used some Thicker to create the word December.


I used this page as my entry into the Toy Challenge at Scrappin'-n-Chattin'. The 2 teddy bears are the toys. Thanks for looking.

Lola Loves Harley

I had to create my 52 Weeks Challenge layout tonight. I'm finding that the week after trials, I have hard time getting my layout done early. So I had it planned out in my mind, and put it together tonight.

I loved the sketch at Sketches in Thyme from November 10th. So I had to use it....


I used only papers from the Home is Where the Heart Is, Mind's Eye collection. I really love the wonderful colors in this collection. I am using this layout as my entry into the Masking challenge at Scrappin'-n-Chattin'. I cut the dog's paw from the Paper Pups cartridge and sponged over it with an orange ink pad.


The page is all about how Lola really loves Harley. The journaling explains how she was an only child for most of her life. Then Lukie, Katie and I invaded her life. She accepted all of us, but she really didn't fall in love with Luke and Katie. Then we got Harley. She wasn't sure about him at first, but he won her over. Lola and Harley have a special relationship. She only loves him. She accepted Willie and Tessa, but she doesn't go out of her way to be nice to them.

My Little Sweetie

I really wanted to get a layout in for the challenge at Paper Lovin' Gals. The inspirational photo has some wonderful colors and shapes.


I really wasn't sure what I wanted to do. Then the colors sparked an idea, which led to me check out how much of my Basic Grey Olivia collection I had left.

Well, I had enough, but what subject? I wanted to find a 1 photo sketch. Under pressure, since PLG contest ends tonight, I couldn't remember a lot of sites to check for sketches. I found that Sketches in Thyme posted the new members of their design team today. In the post was the sketch that was used for the dt call. I loved it.


And the subject for a girly line of paper - why Tessa of course.


I played off the colors and the circles in the inspiration photo. Thanks for looking.

You and Me

Since Stew is working 2nd shift this weekend, I am using the time alone to work in the scrap room. I have completed 1 layout so far.

This one is based on this week's sketch at Sketch Inspiration. It's been a while since I have been able to participate at SI. I really like their sketches.


I chose a photo of Pete and Jenna taken at her mom's house earlier this year. I am going to use this layout as my 52 Weeks entry at Scrappin'-n-Chattin'. Finally, I won't be working at the last minute this week.


I am also going to enter this layout into the Wee Memories challenge for this week, which is Free for All. In addition, I am entering this week's sketch challenge at Sketches In Thyme which is and Open Challenge.

Now I'm off to think about another page... I hope everyone is having a scrappy weekend.

Tell Us Your Secrets

Good morning again. This week at Lasting Memories, the challenge is all about Secret ideas. This can be hidden journaling, some hidden photos or a hidden treasure. We want you to show us how you hide something in your layout.

For my layout, I used the current sketch at Sketches in Thyme. I thought it was perfect for how I wanted to hide a couple of elements on the page.


I decided that I would use a photo that I had taken of all of the ribbons that Willie earned at his first agility trial in June. Last week in the mail, I had received the certificate that he earned for advancing a title and I wanted to include it on a layout. So here is my page....


The mat that the photo is on is actually the cover for my hidden area. I scanned the certificate and printed it small enough to fit inside this area. I also printed a small photo of my very favorite picture of Willie from that day. The photo has already been scrapped, but I just love it so much. I included details of the runs that earned him the new title below the photo.


When I place this layout into the page protector, I will use a utility knife to cut around the area that opens so that the details can be viewed at any time.

I am using this page for my 52 Week's Challenge entry this week at Scrappin'-n-Chattin'. I am so excited that I have been able to keep up with this challenge, for 33 weeks. I haven't even needed to use a pass yet. It will also be entered into the Ticket challenge SnC which is part of the regular monthly challenges in the group this month. I used a ticket that came with my latest Artful Delight kit.

Hop on over to LM and discover the Design Team's secret. They have created wonderful pages. Remember, too, that LM is having a DT call. If you are interested in serving on the team in the next term all you have to do to qualify is to follow all of the challenges in August. Karen is so creative and wonderfully nice. She's awesome to work with. I can't wait to see everyone's work.

I look forward to seeing some awesome secrets this week.

I Love My Big Brother

I hope everyone is keeping cool during this heat wave. It seems most of the country is sweltering. I hope we all see some relieve soon.

It's time again to reveal a new challenge at Lasting Memories. The challenge is all about the title. Make the title stand out or use an unusual technique to create a memorable title. Check out the video that Karen has linked on the LM blog.

To create my page, I used the current sketch at Sassy Lil' Sketches. I loved this sketch as soon as I saw it. I took me a little bit to find the photos I wanted to use with it.


I love the banner, but I don't have any pre-made ones left, and I didn't think I had the time to cut out all of the triangles. But I was inspired by one of the design team members, Lisa Rounds. Her banner was made with circles folded over the string. That seems easier to me. So this is what I came up with.

I used a variety of alphas to create the title, and a punched heart and heart button for the word love. When we picked out Tessa, we got her from the same place we got Willie. The guy told us that they have the same parents. We hope so. Willie has been nice to her since we brought her home, but a little standoffish. This past week, he has been getting very friendly. He is constantly playing with her, letting her climb on him and pulling on him. He seems very concerned about her, always making sure that she comes back in from outside, or helping to look for her when we can't find her.

I am using this layout as my entry into Scrappin'-n-Chattin's 52 Week Challenge and this month's twine challenge. I used twine for the banner, but you can't see it. I also used twine on the heart button in the title and the buttons on the centers of the flowers.

Make sure to check out the stand out titles the design team came up with. I hope you will give it a try too.

I am also entering this layout into the following challenges:

Sketches In Thyme - Open Challenge
Crafts and Me Challenges - Add a flower
DYSU Challenge Blog - Wings
Flutters By Wednesday - Open Challenge
Paper Cutz Challenge - Anything Goes

Big Truck

Good morning again. This month I haven't been making too many layouts. I am participating in a challenge at Scrappin'-n-Chattin' to make a Christmas card everyday. It's been a lot of fun and I am really liking the cards I have made. I will probably do a couple of posts in a day or so to show everyone what I have been creating. So between that and gardening, work, the dogs - life, I haven't had a whole lot of scrapping time. I hope to take some more time off from work real soon and get a lot more done.

But it's Sunday and time for a new challenge at Lasting Memories. Our Challenge this week is to add distressing to your layout. There are a number of distressing techniques/tools out there. Karen included a few videos on the blog to get everyone started.

For my layout I followed this week's sketch at Sketches in Thyme. I love the versatility of this sketch.


For my distressing, I tore both of the papers I used for the photo mat. On the cream colored layer, I inked the edges as well and also inked a bit on the mat itself. I also stamped a saying on the cream paper. I had won a stamp set from my friend Brenda's blog. It's a new set from K Andrew Designs. The set is Freedom Isn't Free. She has a lot of wonderful stamps set. Be sure to check them all out. The large star embellishments on the page came from Tessa at Precocious Paper. She also inked the stars for a bit of a distressed look. I knew when I saw these stars in her store that I had to have them to create a page for my son David. Check out Tessa's Etsy shop. She has a lots of wonderful flowers and embellishments.


The photo in this layout is just a random photo that David posted while he was in Iraq. Of course I grabbed it to make a page.

I am also using this layout for one of the challenges this month at Scrappin'-n-Chattin' - Torn Paper. And I am also entering this page into this week's challenge at Frosted Designs to use a quote on the page. The stamp I used says "Serving Proudly. Standing Tall."

Make sure you check out the wonderful pages the design team came up with. I hope that you will try some distressing this week and share a page with us.

So Relaxed

It's time again for the Lasting Memories weekly challenge. This week's challenge is a great one. I'm sure all of you have a lot of scraps. I know I do. Way too many. The challenge this week is to recycle some ribbon, scrap pieces of paper or something else you have in your stash.

I took the challenge a little bit further. I used some fabric, actually a piece of a sheet on my page. After toiling over how I wanted to redecorate the bedroom, I finally decided on a comforter set and bought a couple of new sheets sets to coordinate. Our old sheets were very, very worn, so they are now in the rag pile. The photo I used is a picture of Willie on the first morning we had him. The sheet in the photo is the same sheet I used as an embellishment on the page.

I used this week's sketch from Design Dollies. It's such a simple, versatile sketch. So fun to work with.


My page is very simple too. The color in the photo isn't as vibrant as it is in real life. The background paper, which is dark blue, is the only new item. All of the flowers are some I had left over and the strips of paper are all scraps. The title is made with fabric covered Thickers. This pack is my favorite and I don't have a lot of letters left. I had to use 3's for the e's and cut a number 1 to make an l.


I am also going to enter this layout into this week's challenge at Sketches in Thyme. They are having an open challenge where you can use any sketch to create a layout.

Hop on over to Lasting Memories and see how the rest of the design team recycled on their layouts. I hope you will join us and recycle some of your stash this week.

Bunny Ears

Good Sunday morning. It's been a pretty stormy weekend in many places in the US the last couple of days. I hope everyone is safe.

Easter is only a week away. Where does the time go? At Lasting Memories our challenge this week is all about Easter. We want to see your layouts inspired by Easter - it can be Easter photos, Easter/springy colors, bunnies, chicks, lambs - whatever says Easter to you.

I have never taken many photos during the holidays. And when I did, I feel the photos don't really make much sense. Easter and Thanksgiving were the hardest. When the kids would go through their baskets, I either didn't have the camera or I was too busy watching what they were doing. I was racking my brain trying to figure out what photos to use for this challenge when I remembered the Bunny Ears. My ex-mother-in-law had given my oldest two some early Easter goodies one year. Each one received a Bunny Ear visor. I remembered that someone had taken some photos of the boys wearing these hats when they were visiting their great-grandparents.

To create this layout, I used the current sketch at Sketches in Thyme. It was perfect for a 2-photo Easter page. I had to turn it to accommodate my photos.


I was pretty excited to use a border that I had just received from participating in a border swap with the scrapping group Scrappin-n-Chattin. I used a grass border that was cut by my friend Abby. The background paper is from the DCWV Nana's Kids collection that I have had for a couple of years. All of the rest of the paper and cardstock used was from my scrap collection. I was very happy with that.


The challenge this week at The Paper Variety is to use a flower or flowers on your project. I made the flowers by cutting various circles and scalloped circles, inking the edges and stacking them. They are held together with a small brad. I used my Cricut as well. The bunny is from the Create A Critter cartridge. The stems for the flowers were cut from A Walk In My Garden. The title is made with Thickers. I have gathered quite the collection of Thickers, so I am enjoying using them on a lot of my pages.


I am also going to enter this page into the current challenge at Wee Memories. The challenge is "All Things Adorable". I really think that Pete and Ben were adorable, bunny ears or not.

I hope that you will join us this week at Lasting Memories. I have enjoyed looking at all of the wonderful layouts submitted by so many talented papercrafters. Check out the other design team members' blogs to read about their Easter inspired layouts. I can't wait to see what you come up with.

Rufus

Since David has been gone, I have wanted to scrap some photos of him on deployment. I've been collecting photos from Facebook that he and his friends have posted, and collected a few stories here and there. But I just haven't been able to bring myself to actually scrap something.

I went to Joanne's yesterday and got the Americana paper collection from K & Company. It spurred me to want to work on a page with something that has happened in Iraq. This week's Sketchy Thursdays sketch just really pushed me over the edge.



Here is what I came up with....


The story of Rufus ultimately did not turn out to be a good one. But he brought a lot of happiness to the guys for the time he was there.

I also matched a challenge at Scrappin-n-Chattin that is called Leprechaun's Gold. You had to include glitter, oval, leave and doodle on the layout. I used the oval in place of the brackets on the center photo. The red in the flower embellishments in the upper left and lower right of the page are glittery and I added Stickles to the title. I added leaves to the flowers in the upper right of the page. And I doodled around the oval and added a little smiley face on the journaling tag. This was a pretty tough challenge, but so fun to try to make it work.

I am also going to use this layout as my 3rd entry into this week's Sketches in Thyme Open Challenge.

Artful Delight

Artful Delight is a great kit blog. My friends April and Abby are on Leeanne's design team. And my friend Suzanne was a guest designer in March. Their work is always awesome and really helped to influence me to try a kit. It's the first kit site that I have ever joined and I am so happy. I got my March kit and love everything in it. There is so much awesome paper and all the embellishments that coordinate perfectly. Here is a layout that I created using just a small amount of what was in the package. I used the March sketch at Artful Delight as well....



My nephews turned 12 this week. My how time flies. It's so hard to grasp how big they are getting. I used a photo of them from 2000 to create this layout.


Artful Delight is celebrating their one year anniversary with a giveaway. Check out this blog post and become a follower. Look around at all of the inspiration and the kits. You will love what you see.

I am also entering this layout as my 2nd entry into this week's Sketches In Thyme Open Challenge, to use any sketch.

Wonder

I have been crafting today. I was only able to get one layout completed, but I made 3 cards too. So that wasn't too bad.

To create my layout I followed a Julie Bonner sketch. To make my photo choice work, I rotated the sketch 90º.


The colors and elements on the page were selected to follow this week's challenge at The Paper Variety. The challenge is a spring Tic-Tac-Toe. You are to select 3 elements in a row. I chose my elements in a diagonal - 2+ flowers, spring colors and scallops.


The scallops are on the sides of the ovals I cut for the photo mat. I used Basic Grey's Olivia collection for this layout. I love the papers. The colors are so cool for girl pages.


I am entering this layout into this week's Sketches In Thyme challenge. They are having an Open Sketch Challenge this week where you can create a layout based on any sketch. In addition I am going to enter this into the Wee Memories challenge, it Anything Goes....

Thanks for looking. Hope everyone is having a wonderfully crafty weekend.

My Boy

Well, I came downstairs to work so that I can take most of next week off. But, I read a couple of emails from my SnC group and was totally inspired to make a page. So that's what I did.

Several of the girls in the group made awesome pages for a challenge at Artful Delight. I love the sketch and all of the pages were such great inspiration. Here is the sketch:

I chose to do a page of Willie again. I wanted to do a photo of Willie how he looked before he was groomed. I really wish I hadn't taken him to be groomed now and can't wait for everything to grow out. The page went together very quickly and I really love how it turned out.

I am also entering this layout into this week's challenge at Sketches In Thyme. It is their first Open Sketch Challenge, where you can create a layout using any sketch. There was a lot of great inspiration on that site as well.

This layout qualifies for the Repeat challenge at SnC. The challenge is to repeat the same thing at least twice. With this sketch, I repeated the squares.

I am so sad that I have not had time to create much recently. I hope work calms down soon. I am actually pretty surprised that I was able to complete 3 pages this month. I will have to make a point to make time to create more in the weeks and months to come.