A Pinata for his graduation party

Here is my take of the sketch over at Let's Capture these sketches. this is my first entry at this new blog site I found last week titled "Pinata". It is of my son at his 8th grade graduation party trying to hit the pinata-blindfolded and with a fly swatter- it was so funny watching the kids all attempt at breaking the pinata open it took many and many swings- which gave everyone the opportunity at trying.
 I used My Mind's Eye Complete Boy stack papers, painted the trim on the photo's in Brick Red acrylic paint, dark blue cardstock for background paper, found some blue and white striped fabric to look like the one they were blindfolded with and attached it to the layout and tied a knot in it. Painted the chipboard letters in brick red also and then sanded them. Added a journaling spot-but forgot to write before I took this photo

January Sketch for Little Yellow Bicycle

Here is my take on the sketch for the month of January at Little Yellow Bicycle which I found on Liz Qualman's blog site a few weeks ago. I used K&Company, Jillibean, and Paper Pizazz papers. Just matted the photos on one of the papers, used Cricut cartridges- Graphically Speaking, and Zoobaloo for the b-cool dude and the real deal on black and white small polka dot paper, black brads and twine for the zebra print flags. I just love this color combo-one of my favorite. This is my son Brian (b) posing 3 times on the day of his 8th grade graduation acting very silly-cool dude and casual which pretty much describes him  "The real deal".

Sketches 100 & 101 from The Scrappiest

I'm posting two layouts here on this post for the sketches 100 and 101 over at The Scrappiest- this week they have been keeping me busy with all their great sketches.
Here is sketch 100 titled "Monkey Business" I used K&Company papers from the Urban stack and white cardstock, cut out two large tags and attached some yellow ribbon on them, added a K&Company embellishment for the title and saw this tutorial this week on these round yarn embellishments and had to try them out. They are so simple to make and I really like how they turned out and look great too. I used bright yellow yarn and added a large orange metal buckle like brad and a smaller white brad in the middle, then with black marker added the words goofing around on the edge of this yarn embellishment- not sure what to call them.

 This next sketch is #101 and I used  all K&Company papers again with the pink and green colors for these photos of my cousin "the bride" with me and my daughter taken back in 2004. I made my flowers with 5 different flower punches and attached a brad in the middle and curled the petals with my piercing tool, and some green rhinestones and the title "Cousins" I used a glue pen to write and added pink glitter to it

Sketch along Tuesdays at Frosted Designs

I was at a Crop till you Drop held at a local school  in your town today (it was 2 blocks from my home) so I couldn't pass it up, so I got a few pages done and alot of them for this weeks challenges- so I'll be having a few posts on here today. This Challenge is for Sketch along Tuesdays by Frosted Designs and I did three of them with this sketch- a great one to work with- with one photo. But I'm only entering the first one for the challenge , but thought I'd post them all to look at the different ways I did them.

 This first one I used all papers form K&I Memories -all cute doggy papers in great colors, Found some scrap letters mounted on K&I papers and inked and sticker alphas for the title, the bones were cut from the Mickey and Friends cartridge, crimp a piece of chipboard and distressed with black ink, and made a journaling tag and doodled on it with dots,  then added a sticker "You are Loved".

 This take I did a mask and sprayed with 2 colors of Tattered Angel Mist (Patina & Riptide) then matted the picture with white cardstock and drew a black line around the photo, stamped the bird and then embossed it with green and blue powders and trimmed it and added pop dots. The chipboard Alphas  for the title "Say Cheese" and some misc scrap for the flower border cut and layered and last  a journaling tag inked in lime green.

This take is very similar to the last one , using the same scrap strips, but instead of spray I splattered white paint on the background and stamped flowers with black ink and just added black stickles to them and stamped the title "Let's get together" So simple and so many ways to embellish this skethc- I'll have to put this one in the favorite pile of sketches.

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #39

First, of all I want to thank all of you for the wonderful Birthday wishes for my special day on Wednesday. And you still have time to enter a chance to win my Birthday Blog Candy to be given out to a lucky winner on Monday 31st.  Go to my left side bar on top and click on the picture to take you to the original post if you haven't already entered and leave a simple comment- telling me what was one of your favorite/memorable birthdays.
     Well onto the tip of the week: This one is so easy to do when your in a bind and don't have the right color of rhinestone or pearl bead that you need for that project. You just simply get out your permanent markers and pick out the color you need and color the pearl bead while it is still attached to the plastic wrap it came on. I like the Sharpie brand the best and they have such a large variety of colors to choose from - but there are other permanent markers you can use.

This could also save you a bit of money in the long run...just buy all white pearl beads -instead of buying one or two packages of each color and then color them as you need them and you will always have enough. When I was at a scrapbook expo this past summer they had a booth that had all kinds of bling and I bought one of everything- wish I knew this little trick then ,I would of bought so many white ones. They had all packages marked a $1.00-$2.00 what a deal this was. Well enjoy the rest of the week- I know I will-I'm going out to dinner tonight with husband and friends to celebrate my birthday.

My son the 2004 Graduate

When I saw this sketch this week over at Sketchy Thursday I knew right away what pictures I was going to use- so this worked out great- My son's 8th grade graduation day and a few photo's of him during the day of events and I'm even in one of them- that doesn't happen to often. I used some older papers from my stash to go with the colors I was trying to pull out in the layout  and the one designer paper looks like little graduation hats on it, but not sure who there are by. K&Company  sayings and quotes that I cut out into small stripes, white rick rack,  metal star tag for small title and distress inks for edges of mats and border, which is DCWV nuetral colors cardstock stack in a mustard gold color.The green background paper is by Carolee McMullin which has words about family, home and growing up written on it.

Again, if you haven't already entered for my Birthday Blog Candy giveaway you have until January 30th to do so- check it out at my top left side bar...just leave a comment on that blog candy post on January 23rd.

Got Kids?

Here is my take for Sketches in Thyme sketch challenge this week. Another one of my 4 kids just hanging around outside in the front yard back in 2004. This layout is for one of my scrapbooks- so I thought I'd use the saying "Got Kids?" for my title using my Cricut and the cartridge Graphically Speaking, which I just love all the sayings and graphics in this cart, and so is the half circle with notebook edge from this cartridge.

 The main papers are from Echo Park- which are bright and cheery and make for a great summer page layout. The tree is cut from the Zoobaloo cartridge and the leaves are from Lyrical Letters.The 4 ducks, the orange sticker scalloped border and Forever friends tag is by Echo Park also- its great working with a matching set of papers and embellies-make things go so much quicker. I used Studio G brown ink for distressing the edges and did a little journaling with ultra fine brown marker

And while your here- A reminder that I have some Birthday blog candy to giveaway -drawing will be on January 30th. to check it out- go to my top left side bar and click on picture of blog candy- just leave me a comment on that post- so easy.

I have finished the Skating Album

All 33 layouts/pages for my friends skating album are completed since last Friday! So, again I will post the ones I did today and then I can go work on a few challenges for the week tomarrow...after the BEARS vs Greenbay game of course. Go Chicago Bears!!!

 This page gave me some problems- because of the color red in the background so I just decided to do it on white cardstock and use a black pinstriped paper for a curtain like look and added alot of Jolee's Boutique embellishments

 Same with these photos alot of red in background which was hard to pull out the pinks and purple/blue colors in her outfit so went with white and silver ice look papers

 I had a difficult time all day with these last few pages as you can see with the reddish photos.

And the last 2 page layout is the certificate from the Illinois State Represenative for all their accomplishments last year-pretty impressive bunch of girls from the Chicagoland Ice Theatre...And I used my markers on my Cricut for the first time to do the Illinois seal on the right hand page -it turned out better being drawn than it would of if I cut it. I'll have to do more projects with this technique. Well, I have had a pretty productive scrapbooking week. I will be posting some blog candy...soon ...so check back for that on Monday!

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #38

BRRR!!!Is it ever cold outside today..I think I'll just go down in my scrapbook room and do some organizing and stay warm- then I'll scrap a few pages. Since its National Scrapbook Organizing Month I thought I'd tell you how I organize all my scraps of paper. I can not throw them away and the piles tend to build up very easily. First-designate an area for your scraps whether it be a tray/compartment, box,  or large ziploc bags- I have a 8 slotted storage compartment area for my smaller scraps right at my work table, so I can add or use them at any time. I have them seperated into groups & colors- black & whites--stripes & dots--pink & purples--browns & creams--just strips of papers(narrow ends)-- reds, yellows & orange-- blues & greens-- and any floral patterns.  I take advantage of these scraps almost on every page I do, so I don't usually have to organize this area to often.

 Then I also have a 12 z 12 plastic container for the larger pieces of the decorative papers- which contains all different colors and groups. Now, this container I have to go thru every so often cause it gets so full I can't close the lid. This is when I start to make some cards and tags with the scraps- cause I just can't throw it away. But, another idea is to donate the paper or make up little goodie bags with the scraps to give to a fellow scrapbooker who love to use them. A year or so ago and friend of mine-daughter age 10 ,started scrapbooking and couldn't afford all the expenses of so many papers- so she came over and I practically gave her the whole box of my larger designer paper scraps- she was thrilled and her mother was happy to.

And I was a happy scrapper, I didn't throw it away -helped a friend out and my box was organized and ready for some new scraps. One rule I do have- that I had to make was anything smaller than a 3" x 3" had to be tossed-which is still had to do sometimes..lol   Well stay warm and scrap a  few memories this weekend.

A few more skating layouts I've done

I'm still really busy doing these layouts for a friend's daughter skating album- not quite finished yet, but will be by this weekend. So I thought I'd post them for you to take a look at and tell me what you think. I am to keep the focus on the photos and she likes 2 page layouts so its been a bit of a challenge for me to not put alot of embellishments on these pages. So here they are.

Been busy working on a scrapbook Album

The past few days I've been so busy scrapping-for a friend who has picked me to do her daughter's skating scrapbook album of all the 2010 photo's she took. I started Friday night and by Monday- I have completed 26 pages so far- a few more to go, so haven't had a chance to really check out the lastest blogs. I have entered a few of the pages in some challenges in the past 2 days but, thought I'd post a few more layouts here for you to see.

 She wanted me to keep them simple and focus on the photo's more than all the embellishments( which is hard to do sometimes) and she likes two page layouts so here are a few of the ones I have taken pics of so far.

 Alot of the papers she had already purchased either at the  skating event or in the past whens she has been to the stores-otherwise I would not have had alot of skating papers to work with- so this was a great help.

 It takes some time to scrap in a different style or way than I'm use to- but once I got skating- simple and focus on the photo ideas  into my head- I couldn't stop...lol

 This one was more my style with a few embellishments like flowers and leaves and glitter- but I had to get this important letter to fit in the 2 page layout somehow-but I got it to work after an hour of trying all different angles.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my layouts that I have been working on - instead of the weekly challenges with my photos, but its more fun to do someone else's for a change and make a little bit of money while doing it. And I have already past my goal for the month  (which is to do 31) I have done 46 so far and its only the 18th of January...WOW

Painting on a Project

The challenge this week over at Frosted Designs is to paint on your project and I did just that. I used several colors-black, white, red and yellow and gave my background a graffati look of all the colors to kinda match the outfits that the skaters are wearing in their performance on ice. So here is my 2-page layout for this challenge.

 I used background paper by Scrappin Sports, white cardstock for mats, red cord for torn area, crop-a-dile, alpha stamps by Studio G for the sub titles on scraps of packaging paper, and one sticker embellishment. And of course acrylic paints in 4 colors.

 I will also be applying this over at Scrap our Stash  for the "New" challenge this week. I have never painted the whole background of a page (new technique)- but now that I've done this once I'll probably do it again- it turned out great and it was fun to do.

"Rain"

I am working on a Scrapbook for a friend, which is all about her daughter's Figure Skating and this one sure has alot of Pink in it with a bit of black and white which is the challenge this week over at The Paper Variety, so I thought I would enter this layout. The pages I'm working on are very simple because the emphasis is on her pictures , not so much the creativity- which is more of what I'm use to doing so its been a bit of challenge for me.

I used paper by We R Memory Keepers paper stack , pink and black cardstock for title cut /welded with the cartridge Calligraphy Collection and umbrella from A Child's Year by Cricut and then I hand painted the "Rain" title in white to give a 3-D look , and sprinkled some teardrop rhinestones on the title area and one on each picture. A pink and white floral leaf patterned ribbon under the title. And last, added two Rub-ons to the pictures and outlined with a fine black marker mats around the photo's.

Eric's 5th grade school portrait

Here is my take for the sketch challenge over at Frosted Designs this week. I used a large variety of misc. embellishments for this layout and alot of scrap paper/cardstock.  I used my crimper, which I forget to use- for its in my bottom drawer out of sight, and some stickers and alpha's from a cut out booklet. The tickets  were cut out from a magazine( a while ago- now came in handy for this page) attached with brad and some black floss tied on.  I torn a sheet of notebook paper for my journaling area and attached some metal brackets on the photo. Wasn't sure how this was going to turn out ,I just kept adding items here and there as I found them in my stash.    

Welcome to Frugal Fridays #37

 Can't  find or don't have that certain color brad for your project? Well make your own with your embossing powders and heat gun...its very simple to do. Grab those plain gold or silver ones that you can find fairly cheap in the office supply isles of your stores or ones that you already have at home. You'll need your heat gun, tweezers (clothespin) clear glue pad, and powders. Just rub the top of your brad onto the glue pad and then dip into the powder of your choice and then heat- you might have to dip it into the powder once more to get a better concentration of color. Let dry or cool off and there you go-the perfect color brad for that project. Other ideas for those plain brads (especially the larger ones) is to add a rub-on design/word to them or even add some stickles to give it a little shine or glimmer. Of course, you could always just paint them too and add glossy accent to them for a great embellishment.

Well have fun and use some of those new colorful brads on your next few layouts/cards. Happy Scrappin!

Layout for Practical Scrappers January Sketch

Nature- I just love doing outdoorsy layouts- and this is one that I really had a fun time doing this past weekend. The pictures are repeats -cause I do 4 books for my kids,, but the layouts are all different. This is a picture taken at our favorite spot in Marquette, Michigan that we visit at least once a year- a Family Tradition. This old fallen down tree trunk has been here for over 20 years and every time we go I have the kids sit on it and we take a few pictures. The tree seemed really big to them years ago, when they had to climb up to sit on it, and now they just step over it.

 Materials used for this page: Tan parchment paper by Paper Company, sprayed with Tattered Angels in 6 different glimmer mists, leave stamps called Summer Leaves with several different colors of inks,chipboard for the tree trunk and used chalks to color it, brown cardstock for mats on photos, twine for tree and corners of pictures, EK Success dimensional alpha stickers with glitter paints in copper and blue for title "Nature", and machine stitched around the edge of layout with a mustard color thread

This is for the sketch over at Practical Scrappers this month- and I will be also entering it at Frosted Designs to do a layout/project with three of more pictures/stamps this week.  This page took me some time to plan out plus I made the tree trunk out of chipboard and alot of spraying of different colored glimmer mists to certain areas of the layout.

Here's a Layout for Frosted Designs

Challenge this week was very easy and simple to do-use three or more photo's/stamps, etc. on a project. Now that could mean I could enter all of my layouts I did this week almost, so I'll just pick one for now.

And this was on my children BEING SILLY while in Michigan during the 4th of July weekend-at our favorite place to visit- Presque Isle, Marquette. I used a greenish grey cardstock for background, cut a white circle with circle cutter and inked with Jim Holtz distresse inks- with a few colors for my journaling and title areas and placed the pictures over that. Then I found this pre-designed piece of acetate (K&Company) that fit perfectly over the top and said whoola..I thought to myself I have to do something more to this page-this was way to simple and fast to be done. Used brown Zig writer for my journaling. I will be applying this over at Frosted Designs.

My son's looking like a "Cool Dude"

This picture was taken of my son Brian getting ready for his 8th grade graduation dance back in May of 2004-isn't he COOL looking? I will be applying this over at SOUS for their great sketch challenge- once again, I gave this alot of thought and like the outcome of this layout for my son's scrapbook.

 Papers used were Kaiser Kraft, Pebbles Inc. and white cardstock. Also I cut a piece of acetate in an oval shape and placed on top of the papers and used slick writer in black and Galazy marker in white for my own doodling around the edge of acetate. Made some circle embellishments with circle punch and white eyelets using my crop-a-dile. Then with my Gypsy for welding the title used the cartridge Lyrical Letters on white cardstock and layered them one underneath the acetate and one on top. Other items were pop dots, black marker, yes paste, brown and black ink.

 Here is a side view of the layout to see the acetate a little better. I like how masculine this page turned out for the Cool Dude! SOUS=Stuck on U Sketches see my left side bar for link.

Together

Here is my take on the sketch over as Sassy Lil Sketches this week. I used papers from My Mind's Eye, K&Company and cardstock in white. Other items used were Recollections border punch xxx's, Graphically Speaking cricut cartridge for the title, green satin ribbon, orange brads, stickles- diamond, chocolate ink for distressing, vellum tape, pop dots and Fiskars edger scissors and a small flower punch. This layout is for my son's scrapbook- so I didn't want it to look to feminine with all kinds of flowers.

Blizzard Blast

Here is a winter layout of my two eskies last year when we got a bunch of snow in February and they were just pups- their first big snowfall and boy did they love it. I'm entering this layout at FCCB and The Paper Variety both having snow -snowflakes as the theme this week as the challenge.

I used several papers in blue, lavendar, mint green and white for the matts and title. I torn the edges and laid a piece of pre stamped acetate with silver swirls and snowflakes on top of photos attached with brads in the corners. I made a snowball journaling tag and used Lyrical Letters to cut the title out welded with my Gypsy. Which I placed on top of the acetate to stand out more and with a glue pen added glitter and a few sticker embellishments. I really like how it turned out and love the winter colors.

Welcome to Frugal Fridays week #36

First of all, I would like to wish you and your family a Happy New Year   As you can see I change my blog around a bit-something different for the new year and it fits the season better. So on with this weeks tidbit-I'm sure all of you scrappers have made some type of goals for the New Year and can't wait to get started on them. First,we must have the tablespace to do this and its nice to always have a clean and tidy space when we start our projects

So here is a little tip to keep your working space cleaner as you do some of those projects. I use sprays and glitter alot on my pages so I'm always making a bit of a mess and don't want to spend alot of time cleaning up or staining my table areas. So I use my older cricut mats for my everyday table saver for cutting or gluing items, old placemats or cheap one from garage sales for a table protector when I'm using my sprays and glitters. Then I purchased some medium thickness vinyl from Walmart by the yard ($2.00) and cut them up in sizes to cover my work space that I use everyday to layout my pages on. And every so often I use some water down dish soap and spray and wipe any residue away and its ready for the next time. Well have fun and start on those scrapbooking goals that you have set-I have a goal of a page a day...this will keep me busy for a year.

Buttons, Buttons and more Buttons

Was the challenge this week over at Scrapbookers Anonymous. So here I have gathered all kinds of buttons(28) in the middle of the heart in several colors and also tied thread on them. I like how this turned out for one of my many scrapbooks I have going.

 I used papers from DCWV Summer stack and some chipboard to cut out my heart to place the buttons in the center of, many little word stamps with black ink and stamped the date in the middle of the top heart. And the title  "All you need is LOVE is all you need" is a pre-cut embellishment that I found in my stash not sure what paper stack it is from.

My take for Creative Scrappers sketch #137

Another layout for one of the many scrapbooks I'm working on all at once a total of 8- so I have to repeat alot of pictures for each of the 4 kids books- so bear with me with some of my layouts (pictures).

 This sketch this week was great to work with I love to add a circle to my pages. Here I used all My Mind's Eye papers from the Complete Boy paper stack. Cricut the butterflies and then ran them thru my cuttlebug with the Swiss dot folder, Circle cutter by Fiskars, 2 scalloped punches, circle punch, Karen Foster's scrappers floss, some chalks and copper colored rhinestones for the butterflies.Made my own journal spot from scrap papers.

I will be applying this layout also over at Scrap-tures this week to use some gems on a project, and the sketch is from Creative Scrappers #137 this week

Friends

Here is my take for Sketchabilities this week #38 of my 4 kids being silly in the front yard one spring day back in 2004 this is a layout for one of their 4 books that I'm currently working on in chronilogical order. I used papers from DCWV Fun in the summer paper stack, green ink for distressing the edges, Recollections xxx border punch,chipboard embellishments (flowers and friends) from K&Company by marcella, and a little spinner in the corner.

A stands for Allyse and Anthony- Always Forever

Here is my take for Sketches in Thyme #30- a layout for my scrapbook with a few pictures taken of my family at my cousin's wedding back in September of 2004-(one of my daughter's couldn't attend) it's hard to get everyone together all the time when they get older. I used Basic Grey, Bo-Bunny and My Mind's Eye designer papers, Stickles, Cricut cut for the letter a  Gypsy Font, and Staz-On saddle brown ink and a few little embellishments and made a journal area out of peach scrap paper. The flowers are again cut out of the Bo-Bunny designer papers and I put a bit of stickles of them to dress them up a bit in Diamond and copper colors.