4 Generations/ welcome home

Love these photos- 4 generations- again I made the circle embellishments and Cricut cut the title and some polka dot ribbon on this simple layout

 Some pics of Bears new nursery- which I helped my daughter decorate during the spring..and once Bear arrived I went home and made the BEAR (his nickname) Banner to hang above his crib...it turned out wonderful. And of course he has received a few teddy bears since he has arrived- how adorable this is in his room along with the handmade crocheted blanket in neutral colors that I also made. I have dbeen very busy!!!

Welcome Spring!!!

Finally, Spring has arrived. was getting so tired of the rainy cold spring we were having. So I went downstairs the other night and whipped up this cute door wreath- not your traditional wreath though. I used chipboard and cut out 3- W"s and glued together then found some papers that were very colorful and spring like to cover the W. (size is 12 x 8)

 I then went into my stash and pulled out a few items like the bird and cut out butterflies and silk purple flowers and rhinestones attached them . I made a cute banner with colorful scrap papers and used sticky alphas for the lettering of Welcome  to my nest.

These photos don't pull out the wonderful colors that well against my spa blue door...but the background color of the papers are a  lime green ( my favorite color)

I also made a nest out of chipboard pieces that I just cut and inked and layered them on to resemble a nest. Did some doodling on the banner and then found some raffia and blue silk ribbon and hung it on my front door. Welcome Spring!!!!

A is for ANGEL

This is such a precious photo taken of my second cousin- so angelic. I had to scrap it for her mother (my cousin). It's not the best quality photo- since I copied it from facebook, but its still is nice to do this layout - which will be a surprise when I mail it to them.I will be applying this layout over at Challenge me Happy- Anything goes.

 I took some creme colored floral paper for background and inked the edges in brown then added a cricut cut from Home Accents in blue and a colorful floral paper and layered them on top. Then added the photo which i wrapped some silk shiny ribbon on the two corners and then added stickles all around the edge of photo. Then went inot my flower stash and grabbed a few white -purple and yellow flowers and layered them on the three corners. Added the large letter A (Heritage- Cricut cartridge) with some rhinestones also for the centers of all flowers & more ribbon in top left corner. Cut out my own green leaf stems and inked them. Also I had handmade my own flourishes on acetate with a lavendar tulip paint  and cut them out after they dried and added them in three areas of this layout.

Just loving all the colors and how beautiful little Anakin ( her name) is- I'm sure they will appreciate this when it arrives in the mail...I really enjoyed doing this layout also.

LUCKY to have YOU in my LIFE

 I had so much fun with this sketch from Memorable Seasons and I love to do layouts of my dogs. I am applying this layout to several  challenges today which I have listed below.  Many supplies were used also- but most of all I used more than 50 % of Kraft paper by My Mind's Eye and Chevrons, painted on Layout with paw prints, used staples for the banners and the word Lucky in the Title. Other embellies like the flowers were punched from several papers and inked and pop dotted on

 Also used several sticker and thicker alphas for the title and some washi tapes and journal tags, oh yeah  a few metal brads -which some of them I covered with the washi tape. Some stamps were used on the banners also. Misc scrap papers were used for the chevron pattern and punched flowers, and the hexagon pattern on the other papers which were torn and inked edges.  I just love how this whole page turned out with all the embellies and the color combo that I used- I will have to use this sketch again in the future.

Applying this layout to the following challenges:

Sketch - Memorable Seasons

use staples - Memorable Seasons

 Chevron challenge- Frosted Designs

Kraft cardstock-1 tag-paint/mist and at least 2 kinds of Alphas- at The Studio Challenge

word LUCKY - Bo Bunny challenge

Kraft it up- Scrap Our Stash

Chevrons/hexagons-TPE #48 challenge (scrapbook)

Formal Night-with new friends

Get it- "Friend Ship"meeting new friends on their cruise...this 2 page layout has very large photos that they had taken as their souvenirs- so I didnt want to cut them or put anything on them to cover it up so I went very simple yet elegant .

As you can see I pulled out the colors in the photo's gold black white and touch of burgandy. I used my cuttlebug/folder for the gold paper squares and simply inked the edges of the black & white floral paper squares. I punched many little flowers in burgandy and gold papers and just added Stickles to the centers of them. Then with some Tulip paint I made my own florishes in gold and copper. added some chipboard that I painted white and added the titles to them in black tulip paint also and tied a black ribbon them. Then lastley added some sticker square bronze colored dots to the photos in a few places as I was done.

Cloth Critters...so cute

I really like the idea I came up with for these next three pages I did of the cute little cloth critters that the staff left in their rooms daily...how cute are these?

This first page is the welcome aboard page of the room- with the port hole and anchors and one cute critter. I was stumped for awhile about embellishments to use on these pages- then I had a light bulb moment!!!. I was at my scrapbooking retreat and thought I'll make some do-dads out of a washcloth- kinda like the critters were made of..So I went to my hotel room and grabbed a washcloth (I know, bad me) and cut out circles and folded them a bit and added a flower brad to the centers of them

This next layout is of two more critters and their stateroom number..I used the same papers on all three pages and cricut cuts for the words and chalked them in blues and peachy like colors or left them white. I matted all the photos in brown cardstock

and the last of the 3 layouts of Cloth critters I also added their names to the layout and inked all the 12 x 12 edges in brown...so simple yet, so adorable I think. I know she will really like these pages when she finally sees them.

Bon Voyage....

Bon Voyage 2-page layout turned out great-I had some map like papers which had money and passports in the middle of the pages- but I covered them up with the photo's- so you can only really see the map part of the papers- which is what I wanted. I matted the photo's in red cardstock to really pop out and stamped the banners on primary colors -blue, yellow and green with black ink and pop dotted them onto red cardstock for 3-D look. All the other embellies where just saying which I cut out and put again on red cardstock and added a few rhinestones to the corners of them along with the large chipboard "bon voyage"  as the title.

Cruisin Buddies was another pre lazer cut which Im using as the title and simple black mat on large photo. I selected the paper from the paper stack of world travels and just added a few sticker embellies and cut out a cloud shape from lined paper with some chalked edges for them to journal on later. Oh yeah I had cut the little blue waves for the bottom of page also.

Park Guell-Barcelona

The next three layouts of my friends Europe trip are taken in Barcelona Spain at the Park Guell. She also wanted to incorporate some memorabilia or papers that she saved from her trip- so I have included as many as I could on the pages where I thought they worked best. Below I have made a rosette in black and white with the yellow center to represent the colors of spain's flag. I yet to think of something else to add to the centers of them.     (postcard on left) Papers from Scrap My Trip

Let the journey begin..is the title for the next layout which I really like how this one turned out.  Making the flag banner and adding alpha stickers and inking the edges in red- and a journal area for them to fill it later.

Another layout of Park Guell in Barcelona- but one of the photos is really a postcard (on left side) and as you can see how I came up with the florette to match the design on the medallion in the photo. Crimped some papers and added some gold brads for the simplicity of this layout. Which I still need to write on the florette the name of this place. My background paper resembles columns -again which I pulled from photos.

Meant to Bee...

     I just love love this one- I did almost all of the decorations at my daughters wedding at the barn last spring and of course I did all the embellishments to be the same on this page also-  I hand stamped all the sunflowers on the pale yellow cardstock and them colored them in and added brown fluff to the center of the flowers, I cut little squares of burlap and painted on with tulip paint- Meant to bee and hung them on twine with the 3 little clothespins- just like at the wedding. I do believe this is the last post of any wedding layouts I am finally done- with all 3 books that I did  this has taken me all summer and fall to finish.

2 stamps for 12 Days of Christmas

Here is my take on the project to use 2 stamps for the Frosted Designs 12 Days of Christmas challenge. I stamped the large sunflower and then colored in with markers and added some stickles and fluff to the center then I stamped several mason jars and cut them out which I will eventually journal on them to decscribe all the handmade details and decor that I made for my daughter's reception- which is what these photos are taken of to add to my book of projects that I have done.

Cliff Jumping into Lake Superior

A two page layout for my books- a variety of pictures of my kids enjoying Presque Isle in Marquette Michigan during the week of Forth of July in 2008. A tradition we do every year we go up there. But today they decided they were gonna do some cliff jumping into the cool waters of Lake Superior.

I used little yellow bicycle papers  and laser cut sclloped cirle in the middle of the two pages, stamp brown branches added a few leaves and cut my own water spouts and added glitter to them. A few journal tags- which I need to yet do and used a floral punch on one of the pictures with the close-up pic of my daughters.

Handmade Bird Nest.

 When I saw these papers awhile back I knew I had to get a few- just love the design and colors from recollections "bird nest" as my background which I tore the edges and then from Memory Box paper I hand cut out some branches and layered them in the corners of the page. three Martha Stewart butterfly punch with rhinestones and matted the 3 pictures

But what I like the best is the bird's nest I made...by cutting fine strips of brown paper which had a slight striped pattern on and the laying them down to look like a nest. I then cut out of blue cardstock 4 little eggs (to represent my 4 little birdies) which I inked and hand drew to look little little robin eggs and pop dotted them onto the nest I love it...I just wish I had taken better pictures- they're kinda dark.

Three pages for three different books

I did three pages for 3 different books using all the same papers and ideas and mostly the same pictures in under 3 hours- this was great. They are misc. pics from my cousins wedding we attended  and I wanted each of the three children to have a page for their books.

 I made alot of my own embellies such as the flowers on the top page from paper towels ( which I already had made and was in my stash) and the journal tags and added some tulip paint for flourishes.

 This page for my son I punched the flowers and hand cut all the green leaves and inked them in 3 colors of green and again did the tulip paint for flourishes

And the last page I did the flowers from paper towels and flourishes but added some cream paint as borders on all the pictures. I used papers from DCWV "Once upon a time" stack which had the purple colors I needed to pull out the colors of the clothing- to try to pull all these misc pictures together.

Frosted Designs Fall Blog Hop LAYOUT

OMG..I had a blast doing this layout tonight after I read each of the Designers blogs at  Frosted Design Fall Blog Hop to get all the ingredients to participate in the challenge. There are 12 ingredients to choose 6 from to do a project and I choose to do a layout and I used all 12 ingredients in my layout-- WOW.
My project also has the Fall theme....pictures taken a few weeks ago of my fall decorated front yard, which I had fun painting on all the pumpkins, too!

 A list of the 12  ingredients and how I incorporated them into my layout:
1. Embossing: dry embossed the mats and the leaves with my Cuttlebug/folders
2. Buttons: 5 orange buttons with floss tied on and painted dots in black & white
3. Die-cuts: Used Straight from the Nest cartridge to cut out many fall leaves and embossed and inked
4. Stickles/ Glitter: I used both glitter paper / Stickles in orange on the pumpkins and leaves in bronze
5. Spray Mists: I used Tiger Lily and Oriental Poppy Tattered Angel Mists on the pumpkins with yellow cardstock
6. Alphabet Stickers: The title "My Fall Yard- Autumn Greetings &  There is a Chill in the Air"
7. Fall Leaves:  Die cut leaves that are embossed and inked in gold and bronze glitter-scattered on page
8. Stamping: I stamped the pumpkins with a rubber stamp in black ink and then cut out and pop dotted for a 3-D effect
9. Rhinestones/gems:  I used purple rhinestones for the center of my flowers
10. Flowers: I hand crocheted  six of the maroon flowers
11. Lace: I also hand crocheted the maroon lace on top half of page
12. Pumpkins: I stamped 3 pumpkins and cut out

Here are a few close-ups of the layout: I used all papers by DCWV-The Natural Stack- great for fall projects. I also inked the edges of all the papers in black or dark brown, scrapper's floss was tied on the buttons and the H O M E  letters on side of page and curled, I also painted a faux stitched border all around the 12 x 12 paper and then painted a thin white mat look on the pictures to make them pop a bit more. The little house and tree was from my stash of embellies that I never throw away anything you never know when you can use something. I completed this project tonight in under 3 hours- after I did the blog hop and got lots of inspiration from designers- it made my Friday night! 
    Thanks ladies for all wonderful ideas and the hop- also some of the designers have an additional surprise of goodies to enter to win- so be sure to go check them all out. Anita is one of them who has a wonderful pile of goodies to a lucky winner, - I would love to be picked for this!

CRAZY LOVE

Crazy Love- is probably one of my favorite layouts I did this past weekend..and my daughter(the bride) came to visit me at the retreat and she just loved it!!! So I think I will be putting this page into a frame and giving it to them to display in their home.

With this layout I did not stick to the "Meant to Bee" theme or colors that I have been using in all the other layouts. Since the background was the red barn door- I thought I'd use this color in my papers and when I saw this crazy love paper a few months back I knew I would be using it somehow. But I did manage to add some burlap  into the title of You & Me banner (heart punched and faux stitching) and attached them with some black letter brads in my stash. Used a black a white diagonal paper, which I then colored in the red areas with marker and added a premade cutout ADORE with some heart brads and double matted the pictures. Once again- I really enjoyed working with this layout and like the simplicity of it. But, I want to put this in my scrapbook!

tornado warning at retreat- wow

Well what any eventful retreat this was...I only got 37 fabulous pages done- but had the best 70 minute massage ever, my daughter stopped by Friday evening at the retreat and spent the night visiting with me and my scrapbook buddies, and we had a tornado close by so we had to go into the lobby hallway for about 1/2 hour till the sirens went off...how exciting!! First time this has ever happened to me.

I worked on a few of the last pages for my daughter's barn wedding reception. Here is one of them- I really like how I incorporated all the elements from the decor of the barn- burlap, bees, sunflowers, and twine in all the pages somehow.

This page turned out great- The theme of the reception was "Meant to Bee" so I made a little mini banner for this page and clipped on with mini clothespins and stamped all the sunflowers and colored them in and then added brown fluff to the centers of the sunflowers and of course some stickles for some bling.

In this page I made my own burlap flowers and added some cute button brads and some twine- to keep the theme coninued in all the pages I used alot of the same papers and ink colors. Well thanks for stopping by and I will be posting all the pages that I worked on during this past weekend retreat in the next few weeks. I cant wait to go again in January.

Two of my favorite

I called these tow of my favorite- but I really like them all- hard to pick two - but these two stand out with me because I like to work with layouts of the outdoor natural looks and the color green like in this layout.

 I torn several papers and pulled out my crimper (i forget about that tool) and used the Martha Stewart butterfly punch -I just love this punch. and added a few silk flowers and chipboard alpha's for the title and matted the pictures in a thin white cardstock.

I finally found a page to use this great background paper - which I didnt have to figure out all different papers just this one. I then used my cricut to cut out the lamp posts (since that is what they are standing by and holding on to in the picture) and added alot of small yellow silk flowers and some of my handmade embellies of leaves and flourishes and 3 more punched butterflies.

First dance/Cutting the cake

 More layouts for my daughter's wedding in Jamaica- almost finished with this book 1 of 3 that I have been working on all summer. The top layout is really like because I saw this tutorial on making your own feathers- so I did. As you can see there are two feathers in the middle of this layout and I also added some butterfly cricut cutsand a birdcage. For the feathers I used some preprinted sheet music paper that I downloaded or printed off Pinterest- inked them in several inks and then glued  the paperclip in the middle of the two papers and then cut at an angle to feather it and they were down-very simple- will have to make more of these cute embellies for future layouts.

And here is a simple layout of them cutting the cake I used pre cut alphas for the title and a cricut cut for the cake from Tie the Knot and matted the two pictures in the middle to stand out more than the other two. Oh yeah-- this page has a sheet of vellum on top of a grey piece of cardstock

More Jamaican wedding layouts

Just posting some of the last of the Jamaican Wedding layouts I did while I was at a Scrapbooking retreat last month. Here are two of the couple  getting married and at the reception at the Sandals resort in Ocho Rios.

 The top layout is used a border punch and layered silk flowers and added stickles to them. But what I like the most is the handmade embellies I did with tulip paint on acetate for the flourishes and the leaves.

Ao many pictures to choose from for the reception and just wanted to do one page so this is what I came up with for this layout and did a few Cricut cuts too. The scalloped circle is a cricut cut also and just inked the edges and placed on white casrdstock.

We've only just begun...

     I was at a weekend Scrapbooking retreat held by Scrap Cabana in St. Charles, Illinois last weekend and I did an amazing amount of layouts  62 of them WOW...and I  had so much fun- meeting new friends-scrapping and making memories..it was great and I'm going again on October (just in 3 1/2 weeks).Here is the layout that I won first place with- choosen by all the women at the scrap- such a honor and thrill to win this...

 I had wonderful pictures to worth with this time- my daughters second wedding/reception that was held here in Lake County Illinois on Memorial Day this past year- and her theme was  "Meant to Bee" chic/vintage/country and it was decorated beautifully. So it was very easy to find papers and embellies to finish this layout. The golden scalloped laser cut is by We R Memories, and the polka dot background is by Basic Grey- I inked alot of the edges and added some silk flowers and one big sunflower (like in her bouquet).

 I stamped on a few bees and beehive and used glitter sticker alpha's for the title. The flourishes I made myself -using tulip paint on acetate and then cutting them out after they were dry and placed on the layout.

 The leaves I cut out of green paper - embossed them with my Cuttlebug and then lightly sanded - and of course I used Stickles in the center of all the flowers . I really liked how this turned out and it seems like everyone else did too at the wonderful retreat last weekend.

    If any of you live in or nearby this area- you should check this retreat out- its amazing and such a great price- The next one in October will be held in Aurora- which is booked I heard, but she (Michelle) has retreats every month (total of 10 a year) go to  www.thescrapcabana.com   if you book with her mention my name- so I will get credit which will go towards my next retreat ...Thanks!!-  Happy scrappin!