College Life

Hello All, I hope you have wonderful plans for New Year's Eve ~ we are headed over to a neighbors to celebrate, then to bed early ~ I have to be at work early in the morning! 
Today I have for you a LO that I made using Color Combos Galore's palette # 173.   
Here is the palette.....
I have also used the Page Maps sketch from over at The Scrapbookers Paradise Blog.  
Here is a look at the sketch...
 And here is my take on it

I have used Bazzill cardstock and some from my stash. The patterned paper and chipboard are from Heidi Grace. The ribbon is from my stash and the journal and title blocks I have cut using my cricut. See that spot at the top of the LO that looks like I spilled coffee on it? That is actually very nice and sparkly. I painted it with Glam, and it looks very nice in person. It is a grey, dreary day here, so my pictures are not so hot. I will be so happy to see sunshine again! 

Happy New Year!

Family Reunion

The Holidays are finally past us! 
And I can get back to scrapping. I hope you had a wonderful time with your family and friends over the past few weeks. All my company has gone home, the house is clean again, and the Christmas tree will come down on Friday, packed away until next year. 
Today I have for you a LO I made using Color Combos Galore Inspiration Board #172 , green, white, yellow and red. These were Christmas colors, but I decided to not use them that way. I did a LO for a Family Reunion.  
Here is my take on the colors. I have added kraft, which is one of the options, ad my background.
Very rainy here today, so my pics are not to good :(   Those wonderful pattern papers are from foo-fa-la, as well as the matching ribbon that I have made a flower with. 

The flower is felt, the chipboard has been painted and then had Tim Holtz Rock Candy crackle applied - love that stuff. 
Hope you have a Merry New Year!

Adore

Hello all, I hope you are having a Merry Christmas Season. It is rush, rush, rush around here! But I am managing to squeeze in a little time to scrap. Today I have a very sweet LO that I made using the sketch over at Pencil Lines . Here is a look at the sketch,
I have also used Palette #36 from The Color Room I am a little late getting it uploaded to the site (rushing , remember!) but it was great fun anyway :0) . Here is the palette
and here is my LO,,,,
I have used Core' dinations Cardstock, Graphic 45 (the new Once Upon a Springtime, my NEW favorite paper), 7 Gypsies and Making Memories, Dusty Attic, Basic Grey, Maya Rd, Prima, Glimmer Glam from Tattered Angels. The Title pieces are from The Girls' Paperie - love her stuff, and Margie is a HOOT - if you ever get the chance to take a class with her, DO IT. You will love her.

I believe - Take 2

Have you ever finished a LO and then taken a second look at it and thought "good grief!". I just did. 

 If you read the journalling in the post below, you will notice that I printed the word "that" two times. I added the glitter arrow to cover one of them, which I thought accented my "I believe" title. Not a bad mess up after all :0)

I believe

Today I have a very sweet LO of my DD and one of her friends from high school. This was her sophomore homecoming dance and she was quite the little princess. My inspiration for this is a quote from Audrey Hepburn that they have posted at the Getpicky blog and it is the Inspiration challenge #2. This is a great challenge site and you should check it out when you get a chance. Onto my LO,,,
I have used:
papers and ribbon from MME, Websters Bloomers, stick pin from Maya Road, chipboard from Heidi Grace, the crystal butterfly and the other embellies are from my stash. I cut the border at the top on my Cricut, then inked and embossed it. All the pearls are from KaiserCraft (I love them). 
I am also entering this in the PageMaps Challenge. Here is the sketch that I have used
 I think PageMaps are my favorite tool. Really - how did I scrap without them??? 

I hope you are having a wonderful holiday season. I would love to know what you think about my LO - please leave me a comment below with your thoughts.

Swirlydoos Tag #10

The challenge for this one was "Layered" - I have layered the "To/From" portion of my tag on top of gorgeous chipboard snowflake, which is layered on top of another tag. Here are the details,,,

I have used MME papers for the tag itself . I love the texture of this glittered paper! I have stamped it and inked it as well. The large snowflake was painted with a paint dauber and then covered with vintage crushed glass. The other embellies are from Maya Road, Prima and MAMBI. 
Here is a close up of the snowflake. I love the texture of this! It is very sparkly in the light - I could not get a good photo of it no matter what I did :( 
We are up to day 10 over at Swirlydoos ~ 15 more days to go! You should stop by and get in on the fun if you haven't already. 

Tags, tags, and more tags

This year there are so many great challenges going on to keep me motivated to make tags. And I need the challenge let me tell you. Every year I start out with the best of intentions - I will make tags for all my gifts! But as the holiday draws near, I never have enough done. Not so this year! I will get it done. I made this little beauty last night to get in on the challenge over at Swirlydoos ~ they are have a 25 Tags of Christmas event. It is super fun and you should check it out. 
The challenge for tag #5 was something dangling - I have the little charms dangling from the bottom. To make the background on this tag I painted a thick layer of Claudine Hellmuth's paints from Ranger ~ these really are the best paints EVER ~ and then I stamped directly into the paint with a large background stamp. No ink involved, I just wanted texture. Then I used my heat gun to dry it quickly. I then inked over it lightly with some VersaMagic ink. I added ribbons and bling, and a stick pin from Maya Rd. The papers are from K&Co and the collage words are from The Girls Paperie.
Happy tag making.

SMACK!

Today I have a LO from wonderful sketch over at Pencil Lines . I had a lot of fun with this and used some techniques that I don't normally use on my scrapbook pages. I used gesso, and paint, and crackle, and lots of layering of mediums. I use these a lot- just not on my LO's. here is the sketch
and here is my take on it
I have always loved this photo of my girls. It is from a rare snow here in Dallas, and I had just taken some "real" photos in the back yard. As they were headed back in the house, Heather sneaked up behind Jade and smacked her on the back of the head with a snowball! It was by pure chance that I happen to snap the shutter just as this happened :0) - gotta love those kids!
I have used paper from Bo Bunny and Basic Grey
Cardstock: Bazzill
Ribbon: May Arts and Maya Rd
Paints: Ranger, Claudine Helmuth
 Flowers from Prima
Stick pins: Maya Rd and Heidi Grace
Stickles, glass beads, metal findings, glass leaves
Bling: Recollections and unknown?

Here is a close up of the title in the center of the page. 

I painted the page with gesso, then added punched snowflakes in three different paper weights. Then painted over some of them again with gesso and sprayed with Glimmer Mist. I really love how the differnt weights of paper absorbed different amounts of the glimmer mist.  I added the titles (from Basic Grey) and then added the glass beads to the center of the snow flakes and stickles to the letters. I was really happy with the result.
I am also using ( loosely) the colors from Our Creative Corner

I am knee deep in Christmas baking right now - and my kitchen cabinets are STILL not finished! AAARRRGGG!!!! One cabinet is possessed - I am telling you it is. They have been out three times working on it. They promised it would ALL be done in time for Christmas dinner. Here's hoping!

The Ballet

Today I have for you a sweet page I made of my daughter a when she was little.  This is a Christmas tradition for she and I - we get dressed up and go to the ballet. This year's was The Nutcracker  ~ one of our favorites.
The paper is Websters as is the Bloomers ribbon. The pins are from Maya. The ticket and the spinner pieces are from Tim Holtz. The other embellies are from my stash. The stamp is from Impression Obsession - I think. I can't find it right now, so I am not for sure! This LO is only 6X6 - I have a very cute "album" on my desk at work that I keep these little LO's in.
This was a challenge from one of my groups over at Pages In Time ~ the item had to have a "nutcracker" of some kind on it. Mine is there in spirit. :0)
I hope you are having a great week so far. I love to read your comments - so please leave some love.

SR Pic's

Today I have my entry for the challenge over at the Get Picky blog. This sketch was super cute and I had a lot of fun with it. I have also used the colors for the Inspiration Board #168 over at Color Combos Galore ~ LOVE these colors! Here is the sketch from Get Picky
 And here is my take on it,,,

I have used papers from Making Memories ~ Brun Antique. Brown is not usually a color I scrap with, but I loved these papers. I have also used some chipboard from my stash, some K&Co, some tatted lace, some lace from Maya and Websters, the pins and the doilies are from Maya also. The  playing card is from Bazzill, and I have inked it to match my papers. The flower is from Prima (of course!)
This gorgeous birdhouse is a laser cut chipboard piece from Dusty Attic. If you can get any of their stuff, do it! it is beautiful.  The Designer's Challenge over at Color Combos Galore was to use Birds ~ so there is my cutie little bird , out of the cage. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

The last of the ATC's

and they are off in the mail on Monday. :0) They are due by the 1st ~ so here is hoping that the postman is moving quickly! 
For all of these I have used stuff from my stash. The only thing new is the Tim Holtz fragments, and they aren't really new, but I just haven't used them!
Ok - one thing is new - see the cute little snowman there on the left? I made him with the super cute Maya Rd. pins I bought last month. As soon as I saw them I thought "mini snowmen". This one looks a little french, I am still working on the hat. :0)
This one is my fave I think out of the 5 cards. I love the sentiment (which is a $1 stamp) and I love that I was able to pile a BUNCH of stuff on it. White space is my enemy ~ it should be eliminated at all costs.  And I really, really love that new Websters paper that came out this year. Yummy!

The mess on my worktable

today I have for you a project in progress. It is part of my Christmas decorations for this year. I am all about the paper rosettes - big ones little ones - on my pages, on my gifts, my banners - everywhere. So I decided that I would make a bunch of them (like 50) in all different sizes from all the extra Christmas paper I have (because I am a paper addict and can't stop buying it even though my kids are grown and I don't have that many Christmas pic's anymore) and use them all over the house this year for decorations. Here are a few that I made tonight. They are still in the base stage, they don't have all the decorations on them yet, no ribbons or sticks. But they are starting to look cute. 
 The largest one is 12 inches in diameter and the smaller ones are 8 inches. I made these with the Martha Stewart Score Board made by EK Success. I have to say it is a pretty cool little tool :0)
In a few days I will have a whole bunch of them glittered up, and be~ribboned, so check back for a look at the finished project. 
Have a great week! 

ATC Cards

Wow- has it been I week since I got to post??? Time flies when you are remodeling a kitchen! But the new cabinets will be delivered on Monday and installation starts Tuesday morning. Yippee! 

Ok - on to my ATC card - this is for the Holiday SWAP over at Pages In Time. If you have never been there, please see my side bar for the link. It is a great place with lots of fun ladies. One of the groups I am in is having a SWAP of 5 ATC's for the winter holidays ~ this is my second one. 
I have used Webster's papers, Bazzill Cardstock, some lace, a flower and some brads from my stash. The papers are layers on the card, then I punched the Santa from another piece, layered it onto the cardstock, sewed it for texture, then popped it for added dimension on the ATC.
I have 3 more to go this week, so check back soon. I promise I will get them up quick, because they have to go into the mail ASAP!

Sweet Treats

Today I have for you a beautiful little box I made
for a wonderful friend of mine. She is going to be so surprised when she gets a box of goodies in the mail from me! I have a few things to send her, but first things first - she will be getting this pretty little gold box ~ it is a Martha S. box~ that I decorated up for the season. 
Isn't this the cutest thing! I used the new Websters papers ~ Waiting for Santa and Sweet Season~ and the beautiful ribbon on the front is from Websters too. 
  For the top I have fussy cut one piece of paper and layered it over another.  I have added flowers, some glass leaves, a snowflake charm from my stash, a brad from Making Memories, and a super cute stick pin from Maya Rd. 
These papers were inked, layered, then stitched. I have added some snowflake outline stickers, beautiful Websters ribbon, a little bling from Prima and another snowflake charm from my stash. 
And now, take a look at what is inside the box!
Yummy, yummy, home made fudge!~ I make this every year to give out around the holidays. I am making an early start this year :0) 
Have a great day!

Lollipop

Today I have for you a LO that I using the wonderful new papers from My Minds Eye. I picked these up without a specific project in mind, but I love how they look with this pic of my daughter at Disney World eating the HUGE lollipop she always thought she wanted. She was so disappointed when she realized that the color was only on the outside of the lollipop ~ not all the way through!

In addition the the MME papers, I have used, Webster's ribbon, LOTS of little trims and ribbons from Maya Road ~ love, love, love those little tickets that I stamped on~ some Prima flowers, some stamps from Technique Tuesday and Inkadinkadoo, a rub-on from Creative Imaginations, Basic Grey buttons, a rosette made with the new Tim Holtz die and the wonderful crocheted flower is from my good friend Sandy. She is a doll and makes me flowers in what ever colors I ask her too. Who could ask for a better friend!?

I would love to hear what you think of my LO so please leave a comment. Have a great day wherever you are. Anita

Joy

Today I have an ATC card that made for a swap I am participating in over at Pages In Time  It is a great site and a lot of fun ladies there if you have never checked it out. Anyhoo- one of the groups I am in over there, we are having an ATC swap next month and here is one of my cards ~
I was playing around with some of the new Claudine Hellmuth paints from Ranger. I watered the paint down and painted the background, then I used the paint to stamp a texture on the paper. BTW the paper is Canvas Paper ATC from Strathmore ~ I bought them in the $$ bin at Joann's. Now I only have 4 more to come up with and I am done!

The Color Room and Page Maps

are for sure two of my favorite places. 
This layout was done with the sketch over at Page Maps Blog
I used the new palette up over at The Color Room ~ which really struck my fancy this week. Loved the rich aquas mixed with brown!  Here is what I came up with. 
 
I have used:
Papers and embellishments: My Mind's Eye, cardstock: Bazzill
paint: Ranger, ink: VersaMagic, stamp: Stamper's Anonymous
Grungeboard: Tim Holtz, flowers: Prima, bling: Martha Stewart
brads, metal accents and buttons are from my stash
the tatted lace is from my dear friend Mary Jo

for the distressed edges, I used Rangers Distressed Crackle Paint, then when it was dry I used VersaMagic ink to really bring out the texture. The leaves are actually Offray ribbon that I have cut to shape. Love that ruffled ribbon!

Rock Star

Today I have a LO that I have entered in the Layout Challenge Friday over at Bo Bunny. Here is the sketch:
And here is my take on it
This is me with Heidi at a class I took in AZ - she is great and so much fun ~ a rock star in my book. I have used the Bo Bunny Back to Basics paper and Rock Star stickers. 
Carstock:Core'dinations, buttons: Basic Grey, Ribbon Offray and May Arts, flowers: Prima, punch: Fiskars, bling: Prima , Tim Holtz Fragment

I hope you had a great Halloween in what ever way you celebrate it. I love to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. Here is a shot of the view leading up to my front door.
Have a great week and don't forget - now that Halloween is over- the Christmas Season is officially OPEN! 
Anita



The Senior Mumm,,,

By the time my daughter graduates college, I just might be done scrapping her high school days. This LO is about her Senior Mumm. For those of you who are not from the south, a Homecoming mumm is a BIG deal. For her SR year, she required the quadruple, over the shoulder, silver and white, weighed in at 30lbs mumm extravaganza. We still have it in the closet in a special container we made for it. I have no idea how long we will be required to keep that thing!
Papers: Best Creations, Bo Bunny, Karen Neuburger
Journal sheet: Making Memories
Flower: Prima
Chipboard: Heidi Grace

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day. I love to read your comments so please leave some love!

A little trick to share

for the past few months I have been in the process of writing cook books for my two girls who have finally decided that maybe learning to cook wasn't such a bad thing after all  :0)  Daughter one ~ who likes to remind me she is my firstborn child~ never was one for the kitchen. Daughter two was not adverse to the kitchen, and in fact helped out a lot in there and knew her way around. It was just that she didn't feel any pressing need for learning any real skills. 
Enter reality.
Daughter one moved out on her own a couple of years ago, got serious with a young man and has recently become engaged. NOW she sees the value of knowing how to cook. I love those panic phone calls right about dinner time.
"MOM!"
"yes, my child?"
"I have had the potatoes in the oven for, like, 15 minutes! How long does it take them to bake?"
"Oh, young grasshopper,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"

So, my recipe recipe book will include all of the dishes I cooked for my family while they grew up, and I am including lots of little tips as well. I thought I would share this one with you, because I think everyone would want to know how to cut the cook time on a baked potato or a roasted sweet potato in half. Less time in the oven, means less heat in the kitchen, and who isn't for that, right? 
So, before you throw your next potato in the oven, poke a METAL skewer threw the middle of it. This is not as easy as it sounds, I will admit. Potatoes are hard after all. But, having that piece of metal that will conduct heat to the center of the potato will cut your cook time by about 30 minutes. Who doesn't love that?
Just an old campfire trick I learned, but it works beautifully in the oven too. And is there anything better on a fall evening than a roasted sweet potato with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon? Perfection!

Senior Prom

This LO I posted a few weeks ago, I put it together for a challenge over at the Swirlydoo's site. But I was never quite happy with the title on it and it has been bugging me ever since. I normally don't go back and redo my LO's, but this one just wouldn't let me be :0)

I have redone the title using some journalling tickets from Tim Holtz' idea-ology line. I am pretty happy with how this title turned out! Just to give it that ticketed effect, I also ripped the tickets in half and crumpled them up a bit before adhering them to the page. I also added a few embellies to the corner of the picture on the upper left side: a paper rosette using the ne Tim Holtz die (I LOVE LOVE LOVE that thing!!!!) , some tatted lace and a Prima flower. 
Here is the new finished result.
To get the effect I wanted on the journaling tickets, I ran them thru my printer instead of hand printing the title. I also added some lace and flowers to the title, and a small ribbon and lace ruffle down the side of the large photo. To make the journaling pop ~ I re-wrote it in black ink, instead of the original dark pink ink. 

Thanksgiving

As fall is coming in, my thoughts turn to Thanksgiving and our family traditions. This year we lost the person who was, to me at least, the founder of our family. My grandmother, my Daddy's Mama, my Gussie, passed away July 10th of this year. She wasn't sick, she was just old. Ninety four years and 10 months old to be exact. She was ready to go, and so she told me every day of her last year. I had been her caregiver for the last 9 or 10 years of her life. Helping out with her DR's appointments and medications. Cleaning her house and helping with the grocery shopping. Driving her on her errands and just spending time with her. She was the joy of my life. She made me laugh too many times to count. 

Her name was Gussie Violet Riley. 
She liked to tell people that she was the flower of the family......... the bloomin' idiot. 
I loved her beyond measure. 

The LO below is one I have recently done of Thanksgiving day 2007. That was the year that my Daddy passed away from pancreatic cancer. Gussie was particularly blue that year ~ he was her baby. Gussie always said the blessing at our family dinners.  Everyone had to be in a circle, even if it wasn't round, holding hands, before she would start. And the food could get cold before she was done blessing everyone some days. But that was our tradition.

I hope that your family is taking the time to stop and look around at the times spent with those who are so important to us all, and these times that mean so much. Bless us all.



Halloween Candy

Well, it is that time of year again. Time for me to send a Halloween box of goodies off to my daughter and her room mates at college. Sadly, this is the last year I will get to do this. She is a senior and will be graduating in May.  I have taken plain brown paper lunch sacks (because I know they won't last long when they come out of the mailing box) and added cute toppers to them.
I have cut the topper from Bazzill and Core'dinations cardstocks using the Lacy Labels cartridge on my Cricut. Love that whitewash cardstock from Core'dinations. I  then stamped the and inked everything.
I used some graphics that I printed from Jessica Sprague in the center of those great Prima flowers, adding the ribbon pieces makes them look like great big county fair ribbons. 
The small cards at the upper corners are from Graphic 45 ~ the Alice in Wonderland line. I have added a ribbon ruffle to the bottoms for a bit of whimsy. Also, take a look at the small charms dangling from the bows ~ these are made with Tim Holtz Fragments, a punch out from Graphic 45 and a little bit of Glossy Accents. Thank you to Margie Romeny Aslett from the The Girls Paperie for that neat little trick, picked it up in her class at CE this year. (which, BTW, she is a HOOT! - if you ever have the chance to take a class with her DO IT! We had so much fun in her class, we laughed so much our sides hurt when we left!

Gotta run and go get these goodies in the mail to the girls. Hope you are having a great fall where you are. I can't wait to carve my pumpkins later this week. The air has turned cool and the wind has kicked up. The perfect time of year. Thanks for stopping by. 

Well, finally, I might be able to load my photos into blogger! This is a Thank You card I made to go along with the caramel corn I sent out yesterday. I made it using a pre-made card shape and my heart shape nesties. 
For the front I have sewn my cardstock and added prima flowers, a May Arts ribbon and leaves from my McGill punch. The stamp on the background of the card front is from Tattered Angels.
For the inside I have made a cute little pocket and tag, again with my nesties. I have used Bazzill cardstock and paper from Websters. More Prima flowers, some stickles, pearls and ribbon finish it off. 
The tag is made with Websters papers and a stamp and punch from CTMH. 

And last but not least, here is the caramel corn that the card went with. 
Several bags of this are on their way to a wonderful group of people. I attended an event a few weeks back that I a the best time at and I wanted to let them know it. In my opinion, food always says it best! 
Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!