I've been scrapping!

A few weekends ago, my girlfriend Marianne and I attended an all day/all night crop with Ide Ratherbee.    I had a great time and got quite a few pages done.  

I love the colors on this page!  The design is inspired by the filmstrip die cut on the left.

I've had this page 1/2 done since spring break. I'm really happy with how it turned out.  I love the white on white, which is perfect as this is her baptism dress.  

I have been wanting to use this quote/die cut as I love it and think it is so so true!  I came across this picture of the kids at Big Springs.  I spent lots of time here as a child, so I love the picture even more.  I love the colors, the quote, the picture, everything!

I really wanted to show off the pictures here.  More filmstrip inspiration.  

Trying my hand at layering.  I like how the little cluster turned out in the top right hand corner.  

I love the fun feel to this page.  

My March 2013 spread.  I really love my new method of capturing each month.  I love taking a picture a day, but have not loved trying to scrapbook each picture, even in a project life format.  This works so perfectly for me.  I take my daily pics with my iPhone and then upload them to dropbox.  At the end of the month I send them to Costco and put them in a collage.  The collage can hold 30 pictures.  I shuffle it a bit until I like how it turns out.  I print it at 8x12 and then on the opposite page, I write a note about each day.  

I'm soooooo looking forward to summer, and hopefully the chance to craft even more!

Spring Break Joirnals

The kids and I made spring break journals and are excited to record all our fun!

Bring on 2013 - or how I'm going to scrap my daily pictures

For the past few years I have worked on a picture a day project. Basically, taking at least one picture everyday. I keep track of it online using Shuttercal (http://www.shuttercal.com/calendar/myliesmom/2013/3/), but haven't really found a way to put all these pictures together in my scrapbooks. I've tried a few different times printing all the individual pictures and putting them together in a project life format - but that didn't work for me.

Last night I uploaded my monthly pictures to Costco and created a 8x12 collage for January and February. Tonight at a crop I put the following layouts together. I'm totally happy with how they turned out. It is a very manageable way for me to do it and I easily see myself being able to complete all 12 months. I'm a bit giddy with excitement (or sugar from the crop.)

Family tree!

One of my favorite recent projects for my dear friend Karen's birthday. Now I can't wait to make one for me!!

Shower Decor

Recently we had a bridal shower for a friend at work. I volunteered to make some little party favors and a banner. It was a lingerie shower and this friend loves to garden. For the favors I made little birdhouses which got filled with kisses and flower seeds. For the banner I decided to do it as a clothesline with hearts, bloomers, and bras. It turned out so cute!!

I used my silhouette for the birdhouses and the silhouette and cricut for the banner.

Pretty Paper!

Although not as often as I'd like, I have been getting some scrapbooking done. I've realized that although I really love that I am preserving my families' memories, the real reason I love to scrapbook/papercraft is for the creative outlet. I just like to play with pretty paper. Here are some pages I have been working on.

The "love" is my own handwriting cut out on my silhouette.  So cool!

Home is where your scrapbook supplies are

Or something like that. I have quite a few rolls of vinyl in my craft cupboard and decided to test out my Silhouette Portrait with the vinyl. Just like butter. I started with the front door. Who knows what will be next!!

I *heart* crafting! (No pun intended - ok, its intended!)

I got a little ambitious the last few days making homemade valentines.  So much fun!

Little birdhouses for my girlfriends.  Birdies courtesy of Studio Calico.  Freakin' adorable birdhouses courtesy of the silhouette store (Lori Whitlock).

My 5 year old is a super hero fanatic.  This is what we made for his preschool class.  Plus he got great practice writing his name!  We are doing the same thing for his teachers, but with water bottles. 

And here are a sampling of Valentine's for my 8 year old daughter's class.  Cuts and cupid courtesy of the silhouette store.

A bit of summer crafting.

Summer break is finally here (insert gleeful exclamations!).  However, I haven't had too much crafting time yet.  Hopefully that will change soon.  Here are a couple of things I have done so far. 

This is a quick father's day card for Jeff's dad. 

Here is a cute page about my little man.  It is his fall and spring preschool pictures.  He is growing SO fast.  This page is from the 35mm kit at Studio Calico. 

Crafting with Kids

My daughter is kinda-just-a-little-bit exactly like me.  Which is delightful and frightening at the same time.  But one way she is like me is that she loves to craft just as much as me.  The other day at the craft store I picked up this notebook so she could make her own smash book (journal) for summer.   I may have helped with a little cutting - but this is all her.  So cute!  (She even took the picture on my phone so I could post it!)

Today she told me, "Mom, do you know why I love crafting with you?  Because everything you do is so cute!"  I swear ... I didn't even pay her to say that.

Spring!

Since it is nearly May - I figured I should get a spring banner hung up.  Our Valentine's Day banner that my sister Bailey made me was oh so cute and so we have just kept it up ... until today.

Here are a few of the cute details.  I embossed all the letters (cut out with my cricut - embossed with my cuttlebug).  

Here is the final product -don't mind the top of Max and Ruby's head.  

Happy Spring!

Scrappin' the night away!

My girlfriend Melissa and I went to a crop on Saturday.  We took our girls with us in the morning and they had a delightful time.  In fact, Mylie got more done in the morning than I got done all day!!  We took them out to lunch and then took them home and then went back for kid-less scrapping. 

Here are some of my layouts from the weekend:

Almost all of the layouts were made using primarily Studio Calico kits.  Jeff got me a subscription to their monthly kits last year for my birthday and I love getting a surprise every month!

Here is another layout that was in my stack from last month:

Here it is as a 2 page spread.

I am so looking forward to summer and getting to spend more time scrapping! 

Using your stash for non-crafty projects

A few weeks ago I volunteered to make a poster for a service project at my kid's daycare in April.  The last few weeks have been crazy, busy, insane (basically insert any adjective here), and somehow April snuck up on me.  I grabbed a piece of posterboard at the store today and since I fly to Las Vegas in less than 12 hours (and I still haven't slept), I figured it was now or never. 

My sweet husband told me he would make the poster for me, and while I adore his offer of help, the anal crafty side of me could not agree to that.  Our service project is collecting dog food and cat food for the humane society, so I knew I wanted an animal on there somewhere, but that is about as far as I had planned. 



Please excuse the quality of the 3 am photo.

So I just started out like I would with a layout.  I wanted to use my fringe scissors to make grass at the bottom so I did that, then cut the puppy and his bowl out on my cricut (Everyday Paper Dolls).  Of course, no project would be complete without Thickers, so I personalized this bowl.  The blue sky is just cardstock painted with white paint.  All the info about the fundraiser is on the yellow sheet and I cut the big red letters out on the cricut.  I decided I wanted to add a little more, so I stamped the bees (studio calico stamp) on yellow cardstock and then cut them out.  I didn't feel like cutting butterflies out on the cricut and I remembered the Basic Gray black and white fabric flowers that had been sitting in my stash for a while because I couldn't decide what to do with them.  I misted them with Mister Huey's and then stapled them in the middle, glued them down and drew antennas = insta-butterfly!

 

Now granted, this is more cutesie than I scrap or craft, but I still had a lot of fun making this and it was still a creative outlet ... plus, the isn't about what I like, the whole point is to catch the attention of the preschoolers and their parents in the lobby ... mission accomplished!

Message Board

This is a message board that I made for my dear friend Karen's birthday.  I learned the HARD way that magnetic spray on paint DOES NOT work.  This was made from a 12x12 canvas.  

Layering Challenge

Instead of grading papers, I am participating in some of the challenges at Studio Calico today.  The first one I did was a challenge to use layers.  I like the way the pages turned out - however, even more importantly I scrapped some pretty special pictures that I have been waiting to work on for almost a year and a half.  And honestly, even though I LOVE all these pictures, they kind of make me sad.

The journaling reads:  Mylie started going to Alicia's for daycare when she was 16 months old (March 2006).  Four and a half years gave us lots of time to become wonderful friends.  When we found out there would be be moving to Arizona in September of 2010 - part of our hearts broke.  I know that Alicia loved my kids fiercely and she had such a big part in their early years.  Mylie and Drake are the best of friends.  Alicia and I both welcomed little boys into our families and Blake and Henry are the best of frenemies.  :)  Alicia is a dear friend and I miss her terribly.  This is from the last day they were here.  Pics 9/2010 Journaling 1/2012