Happy Valentine's Day

Every Monday night I get sucked into the train wreck known as The Bachelor on ABC. Every season I swear not to watch the next. But, I do.

Jokingly, I suggested to Kevin that we should do something based on that for his Valentine's Day cards. He loved the idea. So, we had to do it. I made a photo collage with text so we could do 2-up on a 4x6 print.


We went with "Valentine - Will you accept this rose?" for the girls in his class. He wore his suit in the photo. I had to make his rose out of tissue paper and a green colored pencil. For the boys in his class, he put on his basketball uniform and the cards read: "Hey Friend - You're a SLAM DUNK!"Since there are more girls in his class than boys, we made more for girls and Kevin wanted a red background. We did a second funny pose with the rose in his mouth and the sentiment: "Hey Beautiful - Will you accept this rose?" for me and his aunts. Oh, and we gave that one to his teacher, too!

In closing, I'd like to share this layout I scrapped last week about last year's Valentine's Day. I am amazed at how much Blake has changed!

I used the February Studio Calico kits Candy Shoppe, Lollipop, Licorice Twist and More Color. I added red floss to the page. I really like hand-stitching even though it slows me down. A lot!

Have a wonderful Valentine's Day!

Catching up...

Last week we had TWO more SNOW DAYS. Ugh! That puts us up to 11 missed days for this school year. We are hoping that there won't be any more!

Luckily school was in on Friday and Kevin was able to play his Upwards basketball game that night. Our superstar scored EIGHT points!!! We were all so proud of him! On our snow days, I was able to work in some scrap time. I came across this layout that I remember making in the car (yes, you read that right!) on the way to Evansville for Thanksgiving. I hadn't journaled though. So, I added the journaling strips and called it done.

The layout is a lift of a Laura Vegas layout I saw on the Jillibean Soup blog last fall.

I used my January kit from Studio Calico for this layout about fried green tomatoes.

I sanded down the alpha stickers that spell "green" and then sprayed them with Mr. Huey green apple. The tag is actually the My Mind's Eye packaging that the trims in the kit came on.

"Popcorn Delivery" uses papers and corrugated alphas by Jillibean Soup with Doodlebug letter stickers, too. It's a near exact lift of of layout by Shannon Zickel on the Jillibean Soup blog.

I love these alphas!

I was also inspired by a turkey I saw on another Shannon Zickel layout, so I made one myself that is similar to put on this layout. (The layout isn't a lift.)

I think I should have used bigger hearts for my feathers. Tomorrow it is back to school. I'm really hoping for a full week this week!

Thanks to Shannon and Noel...

I had some more Shannon Zickel layouts that I wanted to scraplift that matched up with Christmas photos, but I was out of the Echo Park Christmas line. (Remember all the layouts I made with that line over the weekend? See here.) I decided to pull out my Noel Mignon "Bedford Falls" kit.

For my first layout, I wanted to use one of Shannon's layouts that had a big arrow on the page. Since the Christmas patterns I selected seemed more formal, I opted to leave off the arrow. This layout is more of an "inspired by" page than a scraplift. The main elements on this page that I pulled from Shannon's original include the strips to the right of the photo and the monogram circle wrapped in twine in the upper left corner of the page.
Layout #2 is a scraplift! I even pulled out my Scenic Route notebook paper for the background.

I added more tags to my page and switched up my embellishments a bit. Instead of using a heart, I decided on a star. (My first time using Studio Calico's wood veneer - love it!)

Not sure if you've noticed, but I'm really starting to use my button stash! It's to the point where I finish a layout and then look to see if there is a spot to add a button (or brad) anywhere. Oh, and then I have to make sure the button is either sewn or tied. We can't have a bare button just sitting on the page! ;)

So many photos, so little time...

Family Game Time with Scrappin' {Sports} Stuff...

For my design team assigments at Scrappin' {Sports} Stuff this month, I ordered the "Campfire" line by October Afternoon. I planned to knock out some layouts with Blake's many Scouting photos. But, when I had the papers in hand, I realized the color scheme was really fun and perfect to use with some shots of us playing Monopoly over Christmas break. For this layout, I used four sheets of the Campfire papers, coordinating buttons, Jenni Bowlin bingo card and bingo chipboard buttons, American Crafts Letterman Thickers, and Fancy Pants' alpha stickers.

I love to mix alphas!

Now onto my next project...

Thanks Personal Scrapper...

Last month I participated in a crop over at PersonalScrapper.com. The owner, Erica, sent a prize out to every participant. It was a good prize - a We R Memory Keepers "Retro Glam" mini kit. I used the kit to make a layout for Kevin's album documenting Grandparent's Day at school. My mom was able to go to breakfast with him.

Everything on the layout is from the kit except for the title/date. I used three different sets of Thickers for that.

With some pop dots, the cardstock stickers (complete with bling) made great dimensional accents.

I still have some paper and stickers left in my mini kit. You might see a Reese layout using them in the future..

It was a TEN layout Saturday...

Last week was a rough week. Blake breaking his arm really threw me for a loop. To say I was stressed was an understatement. I need my "therapy" - I needed to scrap. Saturday I did. I really didn't do much else.

Instead of staring at photos and product and trying to find a starting point, I decided I was going to scraplift a few layouts that I loved to get the creative juices flowing. I printed out some layouts by Shannon Zickel that I found on the Jillibean Soup blog. Then I matched up photos with each layout. Most of the photos I pulled were Christmas photos and they all had a story that I wanted to scrap along with them.

I still had the "Everybody Loves Christmas" line by Echo Park out on my workspace. (Remember, I used it to make a Valentine's Day layout for Crop Chocolate...here.) I decided to go ahead and use the rest of the line before pulling out any other Christmas products.

"I Got This!" is a pretty straight scraplift. I did add the "merry & bright" accent in the upper left corner and I tied baker's twine around my oversized journaling card. The circles allowed me to use snippets of various patterns. I was also able to scrap all the photos of Blake opening gifts with the Smiths on Christmas (printed b/w on a 5x7). I decided to add brads to the circles. (I have a lot of them...might as well use them!) I also used a Doodlebug alpha for my title. I love this shade of green. These stickers had been neglected. My new motto for 2011 is "if you've got it...use it!""Family Gift Time" was inspired by one of Shannon's layouts, but then I took off in a different direction. Still, it was a great starting point. Since the layout was about Blake's special gift to ME, I used a pink background. (Not that I like pink, but... I had it, so I used it.)

*Please note that I didn't cut off our heads in cropping the photo! Kevin did it when he took the shot on Christmas morning!

Oh, I love a mixed title. And pop dots. And buttons. With twine. Seeing a trend?

"Hey, it's ACDC" is an exact scraplift. Yes, I stole her layout. I admit. I liked it so much. The differences? Well, I used some chipboard stars since I didn't have enough corrugated ones and I used different papers and alphas. Plus, I cut the name of the paper line off the bottom strip of one of my papers and I added it as a "tab" at the top of one photo. Yep...MY idea there.

Background story...I remember Dad saying, "Hey, it's ACDC" whenever we'd hear one of their songs. He did that in the tractor with my boys one day and later they asked me what was so "big" about ACDC. I had to laugh. It's just one of those things... Well, before Christmas, I found a set of ACDC pint glasses in Target. I bought them for the boys to give to Dad at Christmas. HAD to scrap that memory!

The Smith family is growing! (But, we didn't have any additions this year.) With five grandkids, it's a little hard to get a good shot! We took six of the kids together and still didn't get a great one of all of them! "Say Cheese...Again!" was inspired by a single page layout by Shannon. I stretched it and added a few things, took off a few things. I wanted to lift the layout that "the gift" is based on because of a cool flower Shannon had made out of ribbon. But, I used the layout and didn't even add a flower...

The layout is simple, but one of my favorites. It tells the story about a gift Blake REALLY wanted, but I didn't get him. My mom did. I captured the photo of him thinking her. Now, if we just had video of him screaming when he opened it...

I love that I had a set of mixed alpha stickers by American Crafts that matched the paper line I was using.

"Thanks Bro" is a pretty close lift of one of Shannon's 2-page 8-1/2x11 layouts. I stretched mine to 12x12, rounded my corners and straightened my photos. Every year the boys buy a special gift for each other. I even hand-cut some trees out of a paper and added them with pop dots (what else?!?). "Merry Merry Merry" is sooooo simple, but it's one of my favorites. And it's a direct lift (pretty much - changed the photo sizes). I had to scrap Blake opening his watch on Christmas since it was a special gift. I didn't use any patterned paper on this one (unless you count the Scenic Route grid background). The red circles to the right of the photos are tags by Shabby Chic Crafts. I added the brads. I used a green snowflake sticker from the Echo Park line (adhered with pop dots!).

Notice I'm getting a lot of use out of my neglected Doodlebug alphas and Jillibean Soup journaling sprouts. :)

"6 Snow Days" might be my favorite layout from Saturday. This is a lift, but I did mix it up a bit. I even broke out my new Tim Holtz Tumbled Glass distressing ink to ink my "6" chipboard. The color wasn't exactly right, so I added Mr. Huey White mist (by Studio Calico) over top and then the color was PERFECT. I liked the ink and continued to ink the edges of my layout.

I added some felt trim and a Jenni Bowlin calendar page. Even though this layout reminds me that we missed six days of school in January alone (that we have to make up!), I still love it. I really liked the row of hearts Shannon on had on one layout, so I lifted it. I did switch some things up though. Everything in the upper left corner came out of a little dish of extras I had on my scrap table. I love using up random stuff. It makes me feel ok about "saving it for later."Instead of machine stitching, I handstitched across the hearts. Finally, I wanted to scrap pics of gifts I gave this Christmas. All I took from one of Shannon's layouts was the strips below the photos. Plus, I changed the size of the layout. Added more strips of paper in the upper corner and a sticker adhered with pop dots. Oh, and more baker's twine. And now my Echo Park "Everybody Loves Christmas" paper pack is no more...

I love to scraplift. Every so often I need to. It really gets me over a hump and allows me to complete several layouts quickly. Plus, certain elements on a layout remind me of things in my stash that I should be using.

Too bad I have to go to work tomorrow...I'm really on a roll scrap-wise!

Snap...just like that...

This year our boys are playing Upwards basketball at a local church. We love it. They love it. The best part is that for the first time ever in any sport, our boys have practice on the same night at the same time at the same place. It's been wonderful. Tom has been taking them each week and I get to stay home and catch up on things during a wonderful 90 minutes to myself.

Last night the phone rang at about the time practice should have been over. It was Tom calling to tell me that "something happened" in practice and he thought "something was wrong with Blake." Then I could hear Blake screaming in the background. I knew he was hurt worse than he'd ever been before. I told Tom to head to the urgent care center and I'd meet them there.

Aside from worrying about Blake, on the drive up I went into panic mode thinking we'd all walk out of there with flu, too. I was surprised to pull into an almost empty parking lot. Luckily, Blake hadn't had to wait (or sit in a flu infected waiting room!) and was taken right back to an exam room. The nurse commented that we had just missed "the rush." At least Blake had good timing!

Right after I entered the exam room, they took Blake back for x-rays. He wanted me to go with him. He was in so much pain it was painful for me to watch. I felt helpless because I couldn't fix it for him.

His wrist is broken. The radius is split all the way across. In his right arm. Yes, he's right-handed. Basketball season is over just two games into the season. He was devastated. They put a split on his arm (which caused more pain and screams) and sent us home.Today we had an appointment with an orthopedic specialist. He confirmed the break. Blake received a new cast in his color choice of red. Today's events weren't quite as painful. I was happy to see that the real cast will allow for movement of his fingers. Plus, the cast doesn't cover his elbow like the splint did so it will be so much easier for him to dress and perform other routine tasks we take for granted. (This morning I felt like I had my "baby" back while we were trying to get ready.)When we got home, Kevin was the first to sign the cast.And then my boy put on his Boy Scout uniform and headed out for a meeting. He'll be back to school tomorrow. We follow up with the doctor in a couple of weeks for new x-rays and to evaluate how it is healing. If all goes well, he'll only have the cast for about 5-6 weeks. We are keeping our fingers crossed. Baseball starts in 6 or 7 weeks!