Mothers Day 2013- Square Punch Banner

Last year was my first Mother’s Day as a mom of two! It still sounds cool to say that I have two daughters. They just light up my life. :))

I was feeling floral and romantic at first when I started to pick my papers, but the layout just evolved and too florally just didn’t work anymore. I just added some fussy cut roses from my original floral paper to satisfy the girlie feel I was aiming for originally. ;)

I used more LilyBee papers and some scraps, as usual (why cut up a perfectly good 12x12 sheet of paper!? I can’t bring myself to do that often without good reason. #paperhoarder much huh? Did I just hashtag in my blog post? LOL). I finally used the blue paper behind the photo mat. It was accidentally wrinkled in a spot, and it was noticeable, so what did I do? Make it look even more distressed; at least it has an intentional l00k now. ;)

So, before I started to make this banner, I realized that I normally get so frustrated when I make these banners because the “tail” ends of the paper are never symmetrical when I want them to be.  The thought the winning trick dawned on me in 3 seconds after realizing I needed a better solution. Born was this idea: use a square punch to “half punch” triangle shaped banners perfectly! Just put your strip of paper into your punch at an angle, so either end of the strip of paper are diagonal and form a right triangle. Then punch. It worked like a dream so I thought I would share my little trick. :)) My punch is 3/4 of an inch (by EK Success) but I think anything bigger would just make bigger “tails.”

Sketch inspiration by Paper Secrets for this layout. :)

Do you have any dual purpose punch tricks you want to share with me? Sharing is caring! ;)

Thanks for peeking by! have a wonderful, fabulous day! :)

Intuition- Banner and Simple Pinwheel

The older I get, the more I am in touch with my intuition. I think sometimes we want to ignore a “feeling” we have about any particular thing, and the logical part of you says there is nothing to worry about… only to later find out the “feelings” were based on something set in reality. We were right with the first “hunch.”  How do we pick up such sudden cues? Amazing.

I have included hidden journaling on this layout, behind the photo, in a library pocket. I wanted to make this page simple and focus more on my journaling, which I did. I made a banner a few projects ago, for my family shadow frame layout,  but ended up not using it, so I used it here instead. I also already had the pinwheel flower made from a NSD 2013 challenge, so the hardest part of this layout was putting down twine, along the banner, and making ties (that I glued down individually.. I couldn’t figure out how to have two tails on my twine bows if I made knots as I went along, KWIM?). So this was a seriously simple design and layout.

I’m including this layout in my “scrap therapy” album because of the personal, and not so happy journaling I’ve included. Its important to scrap all the stuff going on in life, the mundane, the happy, and even the pain. One day you can reflect and see how far you’ve come. :)

Sketch inspiration from Lets Get Sketchy this time. They are having a design team call until May 24, 2013 using this sketch BTW. :)

Thanks for stopping by! :))

Scuba- Jamaica Vacation Layout

My mother and sister went on a super fun vacation to Jamaica last Summer to celebrate my sisters 16th birthday (who needs a Sweet 16 party when you can have a week long vacation?!). I found these great photos of them learning to scuba dive, so of course I had to scrap them ;)

Normally, I mat my photos on paper but the blue water made the photo already pop against the soft purple/pink and white background and colors, so I went sans mat. :) I have been loving the splattered look I see in scrappy world, but I didn’t have any mists to try that effect. I tried to get innovative and figured I could splatter my alcohol inks directly on my paper. I didn’t get much control of the drops but that’s fine. It was a close enough effect for me. Ha!

This page is almost all scraps and I hardly used anything besides a dollar store doily (I love those things lately!) and some old Prima flowers from my stash. I made this layout with the sketch inspiration from Inspired Blueprints.

Thanks for much for checking me out! :)

National Scrapbook Day 2013

National Scrapbook Day this year for me was busy with non-scrappy related business until 8:30 PM! I was pretty motivated and so I made these layouts in a few hours with help from several challenges. I finally quit fighting the sleep monster and put myself to sleep at 2:30AM! ;)

Below is the sketch I used for the above layout. I made use of lots of scraps with idea help from Scrap Your Stash 2013 NSD challenge, which challenged us to use ribbon, 2+ punches, tags, twine, and wood pieces. I finally used up all those tiny wooden hearts! LOL :)  I even left the wood in their natural color after trying to decide to paint them or not. 

 

The second layout was inspired by two challenges, Scrapbook.com’s NSD pinwheel challenge, where we had to make a pinwheel. I’ve never done these before, but how cute and easy are they? I just knew they would match my daughters cloth diapering pictures. :)  The Paper Bakery Kit Club gave me lots of inspiration for this layout when they posted their NSD sketch challenge too. :)

 

 

The third layout was completed when I was about done for the night. I thought it would take me another hour to finish a layout, but the happy surprise was this layout made itself in like 20 minutes. No paper to fuss with really, so super simple but I loved the flow of it. :) I made this layout with scrapbook.com’s NSD sketch challenge sketch. At first I didn’t know how to make it work, but then I totally realized I could make it vertical and not horizontal, and well, now you see my interpretation. :)

Did you make lots of cool projects for NSD 2013? How many layouts/projects did you finish? I try so hard to participate every year, so I’m glad I made some time this year for it too. :)

Thanks for looking!

Love- Family Shadow Frame Layout

My sweet baby was sick over the weekend, so even though she is feeling better today, she can’t go back to daycare until tomorrow. This means I had to miss my classes today (all FOUR classes and their lectures), but the plus side is that during nap time I was able to scrapbook and now I get to snuggle my 14 month old a bit longer then usual today. :)) There is always a silver lining, no?

I have been trying to work on getting pictures into frames this last month. I have like a million photos in my photo storage but I can’t decide which to put into frames, or the frame isn’t the right size to fit the photo. But I am finally wanting to personalize my walls with my favorite shots. :) In any case, I remembered I bought a shadow box literally years ago, with intentions to make a layout to fit inside, but never did; well, until today. :)

My sister came down to visit us last year for Easter and she took a set of family portraits for us in front of our old house. Isn’t she great? :) Adella was only 2.5 months old here and Alexis was just five. Its already been a year since this photo! Anyhow, this is one of my favorite family photos so it is going to fit beautiful in that shadow box frame along side of my collage photo wall. :)

I used a few LilyBee papers (yellow and gray), the red scalloped circle is My Minds Eye (Stella and Rose collection), the smaller flowers are by Prima, and the black flower is actually from a Halloween themed package by Pink Paislee (Phantom). I also included a paper doily (dollar store) and two sheets of sheer meshy stuff (also dollar store) and some yellow twine. Throughout I used scraps of what was on my table and scrap pile and I used stuff I have had in my stash for years. :)

I made this layout with the April 2013 sketch inspiration by My Creative Scrapbook. :) I just omitted the banner part of the sketch because the banner I was made was too busy for this layout. I like it just fine without a banner. :)

Do you always follow a sketch exactly?

Thanks for peeking by!  Have a wonderful day!

Master List of Sketch Challenge Blogs

Anyone who has been on my blog before knows that I *LOVE* a good sketch! I am constantly working with sketches because I am so inspired by them and all the different outcomes from other people. I have the hardest time finding sketches when I’m inspired because I don’t have a way to browse through a variety of blogs at once that show me the sites most recent sketch challenge or sketch. I find myself looking for over an hour at random sites trying to figure out if they have sketches there and if there is a challenge running based off a particular sketch.
I googled “sketch challenge blogs list” and got a few good hits (I’ll link below), but how do I keep the blogs most relevant to me, and my crafty mood, in one place? Maybe you’ve had a similar and frustrating experience of wanting to scrap but needing a start point first? Thus, this blog post was born to keep a master list of my challenge sketch blogs all in one post. I’ll also include some recipe sites (color palette inspiration), and a few card sketch challenge sites too. :)

Sketch Challenge Sites:
Creative Scrappers
Got Sketch
Lets Capture These Sketches
Lets Get Sketchy
Inspired Blueprints 
My Creative Sketches
My Scraps and More Sketches
Paper Loves Studio
Paper Secrets
Punky Scraps
Scrap Our Stash
Scrapbook Challenges 
Shop Scrap Much
Sketchabilities
Sketch N Scrap
Sketches in Thyme
Sketches with a Twist
Stuck Sketches
The Scrappiest
 
(Above sketch by Creative Scrappers)

Recipe Challenge Sites:
Color Me Scrappy
Paper Mixing Bowl (includes sketches)
Scrap Friends
Sketch With Color (includes sketches)
The Color Rooms

(Above recipe by Paper Mixing Bowl)

Login Required Sites- Sketches Challenges+ Community of Scrappers:
2 Broke Girls Scraps
Colorful Creations
Scrap That

Card Sketch Challenge Sites:
Cardabilities
Sketchy Friday

(Above sketch by Cardabilities)
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More handy lists that I’ve found:
For a list of all currently running challenges, including a list of any prizes, visit ScrapChallenge.
For a list of sites that offer general information about a variety of challenge sites, visit DTCalls.
For a list of sites that have challenges running, including a thumbnail sketch and any winner announcements in any of their posted challenge sites (normally card sketches and challenges), visit FelinePlayful.
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What challenge sketch sites do you frequent that I haven’t mentioned here? I’ll be glad to add them!
Thanks for stopping by! God bless!

Sleeping Beauties- My Mind’s Eye

The girls are so sweet looking when they are sleeping, double cuteness when they sleep cuddled up of course. :)

 I wanted to make a polaroid style photo mat to fit this layout and I am happy with the outcome. I just used white cardstock for the matting this time, but next time I try this look I’ll distress my paper or choose a slightly more tanned/yellowed paper to look more true polaroid like.

I used mostly My Mind’s Eye, Lime Twist Happy Go Lucky collection again and added a few scrap pieces of paper that I’ve had in my scrap pile. I always go through my scrap file cubes first before cutting into a new 12x12 paper. I hate cutting beautiful paper! Lol. I was able to even use scraps off the actual patterned paper (you know the manufactures info tab part along one side of a 12x12 paper) for the long strips near the butterflies and near the top right too. I cant bear to part with even small pieces of paper! Smh!

I did some doodling along the layout too (butterflies, heart above photo and along the edges of the papers too. I was feeling crazy so I took out some (fat) thread (is it yarn?) and did some hand stitching too down the butterflies.  I have been using hot glue as glue to all of my layouts for a while now (tape runners are so expensive and aren’t sticky!) so when my little letters in the scalloped circle started to flick off, I just ran the hot glue gun directly over the middle of the words to make sure they stayed in place. It looks like I used the 3D glossy accents stuff to me.

I made this layout with inspiration from the My Minds Eye blog (March sketch challenge). How I heart sketches!

Thanks for peeking by!

Synced Pregnancies- Best Friends Forever

January of 2012, when I was, umm, very pregnant with Adella, my awesome BFF, Nicole, made a “surprise” visit from California. I knew beforehand she was coming but my husband told me Nicole didn’t know she was coming, and that her husband was surprising her; thus the “surprise” visits for both of us, though we were both fully aware (just not aware that the other person already knew!). LOL. Can’t say the husbands didn’t at least try. ;)

I hadn’t seen her since November of 2009, when we least flew to Cali to see her, so having her here in Maryland was amazing! We went to DC for the day and toured a bunch of touristy places, went to downtown Baltimore to sightsee, and did a mini session of bargain shopping before her flight back home.  Oh, did I mention we were both pregnant at the same time? I’m pretty sure we synced our pregnancies so our babies would be close in age (our older kids have just 3 months of age difference between them), and our pregnancies were nearly exactly 12 weeks apart. Plus, now she has two boys and I have two girls. Haha. How cute are we? No really? We are extra cute though with our bellies, right? ;)

I used all Heidi Swapp Sugar Chic paper because the colors are so Nicole and the pattern was too fun to not use. I freaking miss her! Note to self: Must make trip to see her again soon. Maybe we can marry off our babies. ;)

Thanks for looking! :))

Hello Kindergartener

We are almost through with my big girls first real grade, even though it seems we just decorated her scrap-cardboard Kindergarten “K” in buttons and string just a few days ago. In a few weeks Kindergarten will be over and she will begin first grade. How does a whole year fly by like this?  Time just passes so quickly. I can’t say this enough.

When I think about how grown she is getting I’m excited for what’s to come but sad that her baby days are way gone and her school years will be also passing in a flash. Always bittersweet.

For this layout I used My Mind’s Eye (Happy Go Lucky Lime Twist collection) papers for most of the background and embellishments. I also used some scrap paper that I’ve had forever (pink striped paper and glittery paper) and some buttons. The title is My Mind’s Eye as well. :)

The sketch I used for inspiration had to be modified a bit as my background was too busy looking without a solid strip of paper behind my paper layer clutters, but it still looks like the sketch I think. :) It is sketch 87 for Inspired Blueprints. I told you they were fabulous. ;)

Have a blessed day! :)

You Are So Beautiful To Me

I’m going to be playing catch up with scrapbooking for a while if I don’t put my creative hat back on tight again soon! I do so love the scrappy bug when it bites, but then life gets busy again, and there goes my will to scrapbook! Ideally I can make at least 4 layouts a month this year, one per week(?), so that I can feel a bit better about continuing to hold tight to my hoarded stash. ;) Last year I think I completed 15(!!!) layouts all year, but the year before that I did 88, and before that was over 100 for the year. Wow, I’m slacking! Someone come be my scrapbook buddy so I can stay motivated! :)

The neutral and pink color scheme can be so feminine and soft, so I knew that for these photos (meeting my baby girl for the first time), the colors would be perfect for the occasion. I used Bazzil’s Vintage Marketplace collection to make this layout and used Prima flowers also. The “you are so beautiful to me” tag is by My Minds Eye.

I did use a sketch for this layout, but I can’t find it anywhere now! :( If I come across it, I’ll update this post.

How do you save your sketches so you can find the source again? Pinterest?

Have a great day! :)

Sis Love

Catching my girls being sweet to each other is probably one of my favorite things in life. Does it get any cuter than a big sister loving on her baby?!

These photos were taken when Adella was about 6 months old and Alexis was 5 years. Lex is giving Dell a bottle of breastmilk that was left over from daycare for the day after their bathtime. You know I had to snap some shots of this adorableness! :)

I used Coredinations cardstock for the background, a paper doily, and a mesh circle, with just a peek of chevron striped paper by Bazzil (Vintage Marketplace Collection) showing through. I used a sketch by Inspired Blueprints #88 (their sketches are so versatile and inspiring! :) )

I haven’t played with a sketch for a bit so finding on I loved was nice! What are your favorite sketches blogs/sites?

Thanks for stopping by! :)

Surprise, It’s a Baby Girl!

This was the very first layout I made of my newest baby (Ok, fine, she’s already 14 months old and not a total baby, but baby enough!) finally. This was the first portrait of my husband and I with the little one, just seconds old. :) I really love the memory of this day BTW :)

I didn’t know what sex the baby would be, so when my husband announced it was a girl, I was happily shocked (really, it was a 50/50 chance of either right? But everyone said she would be a he so I was convinced!). It all happened so quickly and I don’t even remember posing for this photo, but this is one of my favorite photos naturally. :)

Page one down, another 14 months worth left to scrap! ::FAINT::

Are you scrapping chronologically your baby’s birth? Are you super behind too? Ha!

Thanks for looking!

Valentine’s Day Cards 2013

My Kindergartener got about a zillion little valentines this year for Valentines Day this year and I knew if I didn’t do something with them they would just get put in the recycle in a few days. I figured out how to place them all on a single 12x12 paper so that she could look at them and they would be out of the way and saved for years in a neat way.

Since all the cards she got were all roughly the same size cards, it worked out with just a small need to overlap edges. I’ve never dedicated an entire layout to just memorabilia, and I didn’t have extra space for a photo on here, but I figure this is still cool because I can see how the fads of the times will change as years pass (will Justin Beiber still be a heartthrob? Ha! Or will Monster High Dolls still be cool?).  Maybe I will make the adjacent page of her writing out her Valentine’s Day cards and put them in the scrapbook right next to each other. :)

Thanks for peeking by! :)

Happy Birthday Card and Corner Bookmark

Making cards, and crafting in general, have been neglected for some time, especially throughout 2012, so I am catching up on what I have done, but not have time to post. :)

Above is a card I made for my BFF for her birthday back in December (told you I was behind!), using glittery cardstock and scraps that I thought matched. :) The green paper is actually a Prima flowers package insert repurposed. :)

Below is a super easy corner bookmark that I made in 20 minutes or less. I have been reading LOTS this year, (I think I’ve read 5 books in the last month) so I needed a way to mark my pages without using those little dog-ear marks that I would normally do. Isn’t it so cute and fun? ;) Here is the tutorial I used to make mine: Pinkpersimmon's Corner Bookmark

Thanks for stopping by! God Bless!

First Generation Crunchy

Early to mid 2012 I joined a natural mama’s group on Facebook, dedicated to helping local women learn more about green living, so called “crunchies.” It was all so encouraging and eye-opening! I am so thankful to have been introduced to this group of ladies, and I am glad to call myself a “crunchy” mama now too!

I read once that some people were second generation crunchy (their parents were very environmentally aware and friendly), but my family was not green conscious at all, so I am actually the first one making this stance in my family. I hope my daughters can love this lifestyle as they grow older too and do it with their own families one day. :) So of course, I wanted to scrap this important journey in my life.

Around the edges of the layout I have journaled the things I have been doing differently now and issues I have a different stand on now then I did 2 years ago. I am no longer all mainstream, I’m walking my own path, somewhat. ;) Here are some of the things that are different in our lives now: we cloth diaper full time (BTW, no cloth diapering does not mean pins and prefolds anymore! Cloth diapers are way modernized and fashionable!), I am still breastfeeding our 14 month old, we eat organic foods whenever possible. We hardly eat out (who knows what’s in that stuff?! At home at least I know exactly all my ingredients and origins of food), we have vegetarian/pescetarian (fish eating) diets, I am newly on the gentle parenting and gentle discipline boat, plus lots of other things that are totally new alternatives to what I used to just do without thinking twice. Most recently I bought my last paper towel roll and switched to cloth napkins for household/kitchen uses (in such fun colors too!).

PS. I LOVE this crunchy journey. I am totally eating this stuff up and can’t learn enough, fast enough! :)

Thanks for peeking by :)