You make everything more Beautiful...

Here is a beautiful page I did for my daughter's scrapbook with 2 pictures of her and then boyfriend (now Fiance (spell?) back in September 2004 at my cousin's wedding. I used several designer papers - Basic Grey, Bo-Bunny, My Minds Eye, some large silk flowers, sticker rhinestones, Staz-On saddle brown ink, and a 3-D black gel pen, Diamond Stickles and the fiskars circle cutter. I will be applying this layout to The Scrappiest #96 this weekand also Frosted Designs "Fridays Challenge" to use a quote on a card or layout this week. Which I hand wrote my quote

 Instead of just journaling the basic stuff I added a quote/ saying to the left side. My color inspiration came from my daughter's blouse which worked out well with these Bo-Bunny papers I found on my trip to Las Vegas last week when I went to a few scrapook stores out there. I believe she will really like this page added to her scrapbook collection- I'm sure -if not I would like to add it to my scrapbook...lol

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #35

     Well, it's the last day of the year and I can't wait till 2011- hopefully you all are celebrating the New Year with friends and family- or like me with my Husband at home playing games and ordering out and just relaxing. With the new year approaching I have been thinking about some goals and resolutions I want to make for myself- (everyone does it every year) but I want to be realistic about the goals I make. Last year I set a high goal of 365 page layouts (a page a day) to accomplish and I DID IT- 413- wow!!!! yet it was alot of work and determination to get all those pages done. So I guess I can set that goal again for 2011. But, that is pretty extreme for most people, so be kind to yourself when setting goals- or you will get discouraged and not fullfill them. When setting goals (crafty ones) break it down into weekly or monthly accomplishments that would work with your everyday schedule. I only work part-time and have no children at home anymore, so I have alot of time for crafting- so my goals are to accomplish a lot in a months time.

These are my four wonderful children last year at midnight on New Year's Eve-acting silly as usual-this year they are all over the place and I won't be able to celebrate with them- so I will be a little sad-but happy that they are all healthy and doing well on their own. So I have made a resolution for myself (not a crafty one ) to  take better care of myself and get healthier for my family & me and live a happier and longer life. Which would mean I have to quit smoking, exercise more often and eat healthier foods- so that is my plan or resolution this year. So, I need to sit down and make a plan for myself to accomplish these goals also- which will be alot harder to do than the 365 pages- but I think scrapping will help me thru some of my tough days and I know it will make me happier- when I scrap some great memories of my four children/family to add to their many scrapbooks I'm currently working on.

Well I wish you all a healthy and Happy New Year and see you next week .

Another layout for SOUS -just loved this sketch

Here is my second layout this week for the sketch over at SOUS- isn't this just a wonderful sketch to work with -the possibilities are endless and love the circles. This photo is for my daughter Linda's book (who is dressed in a peach colored blouse) so I used that as my inspiration for colors in this layout.

click on photo for enlargement

Love the Bo-Bunny papers I picked up last week when I went to Las Vegas to visit my other daughter for Christmas- I just happen to know where the 2 scrapbook stores are out there.. lol. Materials used Bo-Bunny paper for the flower cut outs, Crate Paper- lime green  paper for background,  Memory Box- peach floral paper for large scalloped circle cut from Gypsy Wanderings cartridge, white, blue and green cardstock for other cuts from Songbird, Accent Essentials and Calligraphy Collection.  A sanding block, rhinestones, forest green and diamond glimmer mists, and Flower Soft in Sweet Pea for edges of the peach flowers, and a Bo-Bunny journaling tag

Wish You Were Here layout

Here is my layout for the sketch over at SOUS- which by the way I love to work with their sketches. I really take my time and plan these pages out- and they end up being some of my favorite pages. Well here is one of my layouts to this sketch ( I did two this week) which will be in my next post. This picture was taken at Presque Isle in Michigan with 3 of my 4 kids and I'm doing this page for the daughter that is not in the picture-but thought it would be a great page to but in her book- titled Wish You were Here.

Materials used:  Lilac House Garden Gate for background paper, Lots of Bo-Bunny "Olivia's stripe, baby's breath paper, cut out flowers from Bo-Bunny also. Provo craft edger scissors, pop dots, rhinestones, stickles and several Cricut cartridges- Wild Card, Home Accents, Printing Press along with my Gypsy for some welding

All 4 one-one 4 all layout

Here is a quick layout I did for Sassy Lil Sketches this week titled All 4 one and one 4 all of my 4 children back in 2004 just goofin around in the front yard one spring day. I used  scraps of misc papers, circle punch, mint green cardstock, chipboard letters and numbers, Staz-on Azure ink, blue rhinestones, polka dot ribbon and made a journal tag, oops which I forgot to journal on- will have to do that later.

Sketches in Thyme weekly challenge

Here is my sketch that I worked from this week from the new Page Maps #2 book- which I received for Christmas- and I couldn't wait to start scrapping today, since I haven't had the chance in about 2 weeks. I'm starting all my pictures from the year 2004 and this was my cousin's wedding and a family picture and one picture of 3 of my 4 children that attended the ceremony. Titled "I Do".

Materials used were:

White cardstock for background, scraps of black pattern paper and some cream with pink and green floral papers, Cricut cuts from Tie The Knot and Accent Essentials cartridges, White felt floral ribbon, pink silk flowers, rhinestones, moss green and orchid inks, and a stardust gelly roll pen. This will be applied over at Sketches in Thyme for their challenge this week to use any sketch for a layout.http://sketchesinthyme.blogspot.com/

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #34

Well Christmas day is only 24 hours away and we are all so busy with last minute things to do and spending time with family and friends- so this will be a short post to we can get back to the important things in life-. In fact as we speak I am in Las Vegas spending some time with my daughter and then flying back tomarrow to spend the rest of Christmas Day with my husband and youngest son, and then on Sunday spending the day with my two step sons/wives and grandaughter, and hopefully get to see my other two children at the end of the week and spend New Years with them- so its going to be a busy holiday for me.
 My tidbit for the week is during the Holidays when you are doing all the gift exchanges- keep an eye out for that pretty paper, or the colorful bows and of course all the cute tags and decorations on those packages that can be used on your future projects for embellishments---ohh ribbon lots of ribbons to put on layouts. I have saved my bows for years and reuse then year after year so I don't need to go buy more- saves a few pennies- actually quite a few pennies. My kids joke about it- yet they look forward to getting some of their favorite bows that I have saved for years- its like a tradition in our family.

                                 Wishing you all Happy Holidays and a Merry Christmas.

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #33

WOW-- its' been really cold outside this whole week- enough is enough- So I'm heading to Las Vegas for a week to warm up a little and to see my daughter during my winter break and celebrate Christmas a few days earlier with her and her boyfriend- might do a little gambling while I'm there too.
My tip for the week is using items for packaging or wrapping up those last minute gifts with items you might have just laying around the house. Or save these items for future packaging ideas for birthdays,other holidays or any gift giving you might have.

Tins are great for all those baking items like cookies, nuts or candies-just wrap some decorative papers around them and add whatever embellishments you have for the occasion- you could also sparay paint them if you have time. Gift bags are great for any gifts that are hard to wrap and you can do so much to decorate a simple bag with stamps, flowers, ribbons , papers, cut outs- endless possibilities in a jiffy. I save all kinds of boxes for times I need to put jewelry or small gifts in and again easy to just wrap up and put on the ribbon or bow and its ready to go. Other misc. containers to save are jars, plastic containers in weird shapes( like cd holders) and sizes like pringle containers, Nesquick, or metal tins from coffee or even the containers some of our scrapbooking supplies come in like the little paint cans- so cute to dress up. And don't forget to make that cute little tag to attach to all your wrapped and decorated packages- the ones receiving them will think WOW- how darling- this is wrapped so cute. So when in your kitchen - rethink about how you could re-use some of these packaging products and recycle them for another use. Happy Holidays- and stay warm

Flying High

Here is a two-page layout I did of my husband and his two sons ski diving on his 50th birthday back in 2001. I am applying this at Frosted Designs to use Ribbon this week. In this layout I used grey ribbon to look like belts or straps in several places on the page.

 Here is a close-up of both pages. I used papers from DCWV summer stack in the blue and green colors, and painted with silver acrylic paint the title and journaling spots and also the chipboard buckles and put my gross grain ribbon thru them to look like straps and buckles. I added a few yellow chipboard embellishments and arrows to complete my layout

5 fantastic BOYS - Heritage layout

Here is a layout I did this weekend-after I made another 15 Christmas cards and a few other holiday projects to give as gifts this year-been so busy with other things I haven't had a chance to relax and do some layouts. So I found this reprint of my husband (lower left corner) and his 4 other siblings and his mother back in 1958 and thought I'd try my second Heritage layout- this one will be entered in two challenges this week- SOUS to use a Bo-Bunny (opt) Die- Cut, and over at  Embellishment Magazine to use the colors cream- brown and your choice of 3rd color and I used blue.

 Materials used: Bo-Bunny Die Cut, brown cardstock, misc scraps of grey, green and tan cardstock for Cricut cuts using Heritage cartridge, a vellum saying, rub-ons, stickers, silk flowers, rhinestones, chipboard letters, ink and stamp, chalks, marker and sanding block.

 I sanded the edges of the layout and the picture and used a rubber stamp with words on to stamp on top of the chipboard letter with black ink

 I place vellum behin dthe windows of the house and chalked it and the trees and added a few stickers

Here are the silk flowers with rhinestones in the middle and the vellum saying " Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a mother" How my mother-in-law handled 5 boys is just amazing to me and a few years after this picture was taken she finally had a baby girl so a total of six children which is just amazing.

Happy Holidays-Penquin card for granddaughter

This is such an adorable Christmas card for my granddaughter this year with 3 moving Penquins (which I saw on a tutorial this week I believe at Fantabulous Cricut blogsite)

I will be applying this card at Aud Sentiments #17 to use Happy Holidays on your project, The Paper Variety -a project for a child, and at PPCC #59- colors of blue, purple and teal.

The materials used were Recollections teal star patterned paper, blue and purple cardstock with torn edges, 3 Penquins cut from 3 Bugs in a Rug- paper with wire underneath for movement, stickles, glitter, glue pen, snowflake punch, black marker and lilac ink all on white cardstock.

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #32

 Well I hope all of you are staying warm ,cause it sure is cold in this part of the woods (midwest, northern Illinois) and I spent all last weekend making Christmas cards and some ornaments. I was going thru my scrap pile the other day and was looking for Christmas papers to make these quick and easy ornaments. The supplies you'll need are the following:
Chipboard, patterned papers, adhesive of your choice, sanding block, ribbon, inks, brads, plain cardstock for tags, misc stamps-(opt) misc sm. punch (snowflake) and I cut the letters with my Cricut and cartridge (George Basic Shapes) which you could cut by hand if you wanted.

Basically, I just cut all kinds of letters out to represent one's first or last name(they are about 4 1/2") covered with paper and sanded the edges, then made my own bows with paper- attached a tag that is inked with a brad , then stamped a saying for the holidays and another plain smaller tag to write the year on or to whom your giving it to. Then make a hole punch in the top left corner of the letter attach a ribbon for hanging. These make great little gift tags that one can then use as an ornament.
There are so many options for decorating one of these simple letters up-ribbons , glitter, flowers, punches, emboss them- you name it- what ever you have around your craft room that you need to use up to embellish these cute little tag/ornaments- my family will enjoy them and will be a  great keepsake- I make an ornament every year with the date on it to give to my large family-of about 60. So I wanted something that is nice but, yet simple to make since I have so many of them to make and the number keeps getting larger. Well enjoy your weekend and be creative.

Home is where the Heart is...

Here another project I whipped up last night and it turned out adorable-now I'm not sure if I want to give it as a gift or keep it for myself. I found the wooden 4 x 6 picture frames at the dollar store 2 for $1.00, so I bought 3 sets.Then got my Gypsy out and found the lettering for the words from Ashlyn's Alphabet and cut it out on black vinyl and put the vinyl on top of the glass, then where a picture would go I found paper from DCWV designer paper (Once upon a time) premium stack and cut 4 x 6 pieces which is exactly one sheet of 12 x 12 paper and put inside frame. Then I used a gross grain ribbon and stapled it to the back of the wooden frames to hang...woolah it was finished in about an hour and a half. The picture didn't turn out great, but looks really nice in person and I'm sure both of my daughter's will want this-so I have to keep it for myself or make another one or there will be some fighting over this project. ha ha

Busy busy busy making all 100 of my Christmas cards.

This past weekend I spent the whole time in my craftroom making all my 100 Christmas cards- and I really glad how they all turned out- now I have to get busy and do all the addressing and getting them out in the mail by Friday.
I went shopping here in my town at the great -Hannah's (scrapbooking store) and found this lovely paper stack b DCWV  and had to have it. The colors just caught my eye blues, browns, golds, mint greens and greys- wonderful winter colors so I bought this and the matching cardstock pack to make all 100 of my cards with these papers for the cost of under $25.00 plus a few pennies for the ink and stickles I used., and I have a few scraps left.

I also used an idea I saw at Practical Scrappers a few weeks back on making origami Christmas trees- they turned out great- so I made 36 of these cards. ( I used some solid thinner papers instead of cardstock for the trees-otherwise they were kinda thick and hard to fold and probably would be hard to get them in an envelope for mailing).  I used several other tools like punches, cuttlebug and several folders, embossing and sanding techniques, button , ribbons, border punches, stamps, inks and seems like I put stickles wherever possible to give the cards some shine and glimmer for the holidays. I did not make all the cards the same- as you can see from the pictures- but I did use all the same papers and cardstock- I have quite a variety of patterns. When all cards were done I went to my computer and typed out a saying for the insides of the cards and did a mass print out and cut and applied to the inside of every card- so all I have to do now is address and send. Seems like alot of work, but the outcome is so much better and my family and friends look forward to my cards every year-so I wouldn't want to disappoint them.

Family at Christmas time- what could be better

This is a photo of my Husband side (part) of the family -2 of his brothers, his son, nephew and his mother taken back in 2007 a week before Christmas, while his brother was here from Alaska during the holidays. I will be applying this sketch over at Sketches in Thyme,  Frosted Designs ,to use Glitter and at Chop Suey to use the word Family in a project. The picture came out kinda blurry sorry I didn't have my reading glasses on when I took this picture.

 I used My Minds Eye, Bo Bunny, Teresa Collins and misc Christmas papers for this layout along with lots of embellishments. Also used three Cricut cartridges for the cuts- Accents Essentials, Home Accents and Christmas Cheer. Lots of glitter in several colors, stickles, punches, double sided tape, pop dots, and 3 Maya Road leaf decorative pins

This 3-D origami christmas tree was alot of fun to make it added alot of dimension to this page and I added stickles in 3 colors and punched out little snowflakes to decorate the tree. I saw a tutorial on this tree at Practical Scrappers about 2 weeks ago and I also have nmade several cards with this tree- just love how they turn out.-

She's a Junior with Style

I just love the simplicity of this layout that I did of my daughter's Junior school portrait. I used my Cuttlebug/folders to emboss all the stars with different patterns and then lightly sanded, pop dotted them added a button with scrappers floss tied on. Used cricut cuts for the title and sub title and inked some edges in brown and outlined words in black ultra fine marker. Papers used were Pink Paislee/Street Market,  Kaiser and Coredinations. Cartridges used were Graphically speaking and Sports Mania.
This is for the challenge this week over at Frosted Designs- Sketch along Tuesday which I will be entering this layout.
I found the sub title appropriate because of the fashion statement these girls were showing by ripping and tearing there shirts for the torn look-                                                                                     this was IN Style in 2003.

Tic Tac Toe layout for Paper Variety

What a fun challenge this was over at The Paper Variety-it had a little twist to it- so here is my take on a 2-page layout titled- Crazy Bowl.  My tic tac toe is the following
Layout-  B & W and Red - Mix Alphas
 I used a plan golden colored paper from K & Company paper stack, white and black cardstock for the hand cut bowling pins and circle punch for bowling balls and some chipboard alphas that I painted with acrylics in the colors I wanted. Made a journal spot and painted some do dads on it and trimmed the edge in blue. This was our crazy banquet nite at the end of our bowling season back in 2003, with a variety of pics using a corner punch - on all 12 of them.

Star garland

I had so much fun doing this altered project the other night for my daughter's new home- I liked it so much -I cut out patterns to make 3 more this weekend. I will be applying this project over at FCCB #38 this week to use Ribbon.

Materials used:

Cartridges-Gypsy Font & Wanderings, Home Accents, George Basic Shapes, Christmas Cheer

several colors of Stickles, chipboard, acrylic paint, emossing folders, cuttlebug, 2-hole slot punch, ribbon, little pinecones and of course my Gypsy for planning and welding.. Here is a close up of one of the 5 stars -the reindeer/ winter one, which are all tied together with ribbon and bows with a small pincone in between each star, a total of about 6 feet long. My daughter plans to hang in from her white fireplace mantel.

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #31

Well ,I'm back from my trip to Arkansas to visit with my mom over the Thanksgiving holiday and I had a very nice time (too short) and plan to go back down there this summer for a few weeks. I hope you all enjoy your holiday also. My tip for this week is to get out those cookie cutters and put them to use for projects other than baking.

I have a container filled with cookie cutters that I have collected or bought in the past and thought what else can I do with these-especially now around Christmas time since so many of the shapes are holiday related ( and I don't bake much). Of course, ornaments come to my mind first, which is so easy to do -just add some ribbon and cord and hang.  Too elaborate a little more you could use paper backgrounds and add embellishments and personalize each one for an ornament. Cookie cutters are also great tools when crafting they make great patterns to trace and then decorate with embellishments to add to a card or even a layout, or put  spray adhesive inside and add glitter, trace then on paper and make holiday gift tags- they are the perfect size for this. Use you imagination and these little cookie cutters could be a big hit with your family and friends during the holidays - and they're so easy to do. Well have fun creating this week- I will be very busy making all 100 of my Christmas cards-and I might just  use some cookie cutter ideas for them.