A Name Collage for me!

I finally decided to make something for me, and not for someone else! :)
This is a name collage of my son. I have a ton of photos of him in his school uniform, but only a few of him in "civies". This is one of my favorites. :)

Material List

Printed Digi Scrap Pack - Jeanne Marie's Scraps

(you can purchase this at www.acherryontop.com)

Red Hemp Twine

CTMH Bitty Brads - Aged Copper

Sponge Dauber

Stampin' Up Ink - Baja Breeze

Tearing Edge Rule

SVGCUts.com Monthly Challenge Entry

For the SVGCuts.com Monthly Challenge, Mary and Leo chose a scrapbook layout to work with, and the theme is "All About Me".
Now..............this is truly a challenge for me for many reasons: first, I have very few recent photos of myself, as I am normally the person behind the camera! Second, I do not like talking about myself - it's not my favorite subject. And last, because "All" about me can't possibly be summed up in just two photos and a small journaling area.
With that said, this is my entry. I spun it so it is more "All about me, in love". This made things a bit simpler to put on paper, and to keep it looking "cohesive". A page that entailed more "about me" would have ended up one big jumbled mess, and I would have had to pull my hair out at the result - jumbled, messy scrapping is not my style! (It's a control-thing, just nod and go "uh-huh, uh-huh....okay".)

Material List


CTMH That's Amore Designer Paper
Stampin' Up Buckaroo Blue Card Stock
Pastel Pebbles Brads
Prima Flowers
Sure Cuts A Lot
Cricut Expression
Stampin' Up Marker - Chocolate Chip
Distressed Stickles -  Aged Mahogany, Mustard Seed
SVGCuts.com DigiCarts - Breezy Meadow Butterflies,  Little Sweet Peas, Lovers Lace Freebie, Spring Flourish Square Freebie, Strawberry Lane
Cuttlebug
Embossing Folder - Swiss Dots, Butterflies
Sponge Daubers
Stampin' Up Ink - Soft Suede, Whisper White Craft Ink
Gel Pen

I made the square "Me Collage" and "in Love" title box using SCAL and some fonts (sorry - I forgot to write down the ones I used for the "me"'s). The "in Love" is a welded "Ballpark Wiener" font.  The top layer is embossed with my Cuttlebug using a folder called "Butterflies" and the "in Love" is embossed with the "Swiss Dots" folder. I then used a white gel pen to add the faux stitches, and I sponged the edges and raised images with Whisper White Craft ink to help them stand out.
I used "Label 2" bottom from the Strawberry Fields DigiCart to create the background layers, which also has some gel pen "stitching" on the top layer.  The Heart Frame is from the Little Sweet Peas DigiCart for the frame around the top right photo, This is embellished with the Stickles Mustard Seed glitter glue. The Butterfly is #9 from the Breezy Meadows DigiCart. This is sponged with the Soft Suede ink on the edges of the top layer. I used pop-dots to add dimension to the wings.
The Lovers Lave cut-outs have Stickles embellishment in them, and the simple rectangle frame around the photo on the left bottom has more white gel pen "stitching".
The Spring Flourish was layered on top of some designer paper, and I added Prima flowers, Pastel Pebbles and the butterfly to dress it up.
The journal heart is something I made in SCAL using the Basic Shapes file (circles and heart).
Thanks for checking this out! It was definitely a challenge for me, and win or lose, it was great fun to put together!

A little PSE fun today!

This weekend was my son's last weekend for school. every year there is a "Junior Ring Ceremony" held at St. James Chapel on the campus. This ceremony is when the Juniors receive their class ring. A senior presents the junior with his ring, and then the junior turns his ring around to signify the end of his senior year and the beginning of the senior year for the current juniors. So........Kyle is now "officially" a senior!

After the ceremony was over there was completed, several of the juniors hurried to "Senior Circle". This is the lawn area in front of the barracks buildings. There is a gazebo in the center of the circle, and there have been stone paths laid from four different directions to the center. Underclassmen are, under NO circumstances, allowed in this circle; it is for seniors only, and something that each and every underclassmen understands from the first day they set foot on campus.

I clicked a photo of Kyle at the gazebo that I just love - it shows his beautiful smile, and his face is beaming with happiness. It is as if I managed to catch the true feeling he had of becoming an "official" senior. I'm certainly not a pro photographer, so when I come home and see that shot that captured him best, I am thrilled!!

Because of the hype of the circle, others were present taking photos and I had to do some editing to make my pride and joy the focal point of this picture. I used Photoshop Elements 8 to work some magic. I outlined Kyle using my Polygonal Lasso Tool, and then "copied via layer" under the Layers Menu. I then hid the other layer and clicked over to the "Quick Edit" mode to brighten his cutout image a little bit.
Back to "Full Edit" mode, I showed all layers again, making sure that the cutout highlighted image was the top layer. I then hid the cutout image, went back to "Quick Edit" and darkened the bottom layer a little. (The goal for me here was to create more of a contrast between the background and Kyle). Once the layer was darkened to my liking, I went back to full edit, and while still working on the background layer, I chose the Gaussian Blur effect. This created a blurred, darker image for the background. I then flattened my image to the photo you see here! I can't wait to work on the scrapbook layout with this. I think I'll make it a 5x7, and after adding it to the other pictures, this will make a nice double page layout. :)

Cruise Layout

This is a page that I pulled svg's from several of my favorite blogs, plus made the porthole frames from the SCAL Shapes Library, to pull the whole page together. I welded the seasurf svg together to create the bottom water border.

Material List

CardStock - Stampin' Up Whisper White, Ballet Blue, So Saffron, Buckaroo Blue, Cool Carribean

The Paper Co. - Chromatic CardStock

Paper Studio - Shimmer Grey 

Stampin Up Punch - Word Window

Silver Brads

SVGCuts.com DigiCart - Swirlies  (SeaSurf svg)

Denise's Scrapbooking Room - Cruise Ship SVG

Together

I just love the colors of the CTMH Emporium papers, and think that they go well with these pictures.

Siblings & Friends

I have decided that I am in LOVE with this paper pack! And I also can't believe I was hesitant to use MANY photos on layouts in the  past - I think this turned out great. I typically limit a dbl layout to about six photos, max, but thought I'd try this "quilted" layout with more.

Materials List

CTMH Paper Pack - Silhouette

Prima Flowers

CTMH Chocolate Brads

CTMH Spring Brads

Craft Ribbon

Sticky Tape

Stampin Up WHisper White Craft Ink

Glitter Pen

SCAL2

Cricut Expression

Fonts - Wrexham, Abadi MT Condensed Extra Bold

Stampin Up Corner Punch

An accomplishment!

Today I finished a single page layout that I started Sunday morning. The awful gloom of the weather had knocked me flat in the afternoon, so I slept. I had to work today, so I bee-lined to my craft room afterwards to finish this!

A lot of retired colors on this page, but they matched the clothing in the photo well, and I had them, so.......deplete them I am! :)

Material List

Paper COmpany Light Blue Cardstock

Stmapin Up Marigold Morning, Tempting Turquoise, Green Galore, Barely Banana

Stampin Up Bold Bright Brads

Stampin Up Cuddles & Tickles DP

Stampin Up Five Petal Flower Punch

Marvy Medium Flower Punch

Zots

Cuttlebug Swiss Dots Embossing Folder

(I did this to the title letters, but the pic didn't pick it up)

Oh I wish I were there!

This lucky young man took a trip with his family to Ireland, and the pictures were sent to me to be included in the scrapbook I'm working on for his mom.

Material List

Stampin Up Ballet Blue, Handsome Hunter, Whisper White, Barely Banana, Basic Black

HOTP Designer Paper

BlackMoor Castle Font

Cricut & Sure Cuts A Lot

Basic Shapes File Heart & Oval (welded to make the shamrocks)

Paper Company Mulberry Paper

Tearing Edge Ruler

Copper Embossing Powder

Heat Tool

Sponge Stamp

VersaMark Ink

Cuttlebug & Floral Screen Embossing Folder

Hinge SVG from Wanda's Cards & Crafts

Pop Dots

Busy, busy!

Today was spent doing housework, light shopping, mowing the grass and working on a layout.
This layout doesn't have the journaling on it, yet (I'm waiting for the information from the person I am doing this for). The journaling will be in the top left corner of the left page.
This is a two page layout. I used a bunch of papers and scrap from my stash - no particular brand to list, sorry. All the squares along the top and bottom are 1-3/4" with a 2" base layer. The two square photos on the right page are 5" square, the small photo is 4" x 5", and the largest photo on the far left is a 5" x 7". I really like the look of the layout with the larger photos!
Hope you like!

Spring

It is hard to believe that this time of the year would be tough for my rheumatoid, but it is: the Michigan weather changes quickly from warm and sunny to breezy, cold and rainy, and the changing barometric pressure really takes a toll on the inflammatory problems. A few nights ago, I suddenly had a hot spark of pain in my neck, right at the base of my skull, and a massive headache that made it hurt to move, or even talk. I immediately iced it, took some ibuprofen and laid down, but it was horrible. I could feel the swelling in my neck, and it seemed to travel down my spine and into my entire back. Awful. Thankfully, a nap helped the headache, but the inflammation did hang on for a few days , making it tough to have full range of motion.
Today is a day that I think could become another "matchstick headache" day. I call it that because it felt like a hot pain, like the flame when you strike a match, in my neck when it happened. The sky is overcast and it looks like it may rain at any given moment.
Why the rambling about the weather? Well, it was lunch time. I love food. Food loves me, too, because it seems to hang on tight in the form of fat! lol! Eating pierogies is not so smart, nor is it helpful for my health issues, and the weather effects my health like the food I eat effects my health. (Took the long way to make that point, didn't I?!)
I wanted pan-fried potato and cheese pierogies badly! With some red onion and olive oil, this is the tastiest! One of my all-time favorite dishes. I passed on that, though. I stared into my 'fridge for a few moments at the bag of baby spinach, and all the time I heard my doctors latest, "it takes planning and time in the kitchen to eat right. You really need to work on that to help yourself", and "The weight loss is good, but not unless you're eating right!".  So, the bag of spinach won. Here's what I ate for lunch today.

Ingredients

Baby Spinach

Red Onion

Button Mushrooms

Mandarin Oranges

Sliced Strawberries

Blue Cheese Crumbles

Croutons

T. Marzetti's Sesame Seed Dressing

It didn't take as long as cooling my pierogies would have, and it was delicious! I think doc would be proud!

On another note, my flower beds are definitely in need of some serious attention; however, my azalea bushes have bloomed beautifully this year, and we've managed to avoid the late spring night freeze that I usually lose them to! I snapped a quick photo from the deck.

Battalion Picture

Battalion Staff as a Junior! I'm so PROUD!
This is the annual Battalion Staff picture for HMS. Kyle, as a junior, was appointed the Command Sgt Major (unheard of for a junior to hold a Battalion Staff position!). He looks so handsome! (All of them do!). I couldn't be more proud!

(He is the one on the far right of the photo).

Silly Little Monkey Scrapbook Page

This is a photo from when my son was in kindergarden. When family and friends talk about how sassy and sarcastic, but fun, Kyle was at this age, this is the image that comes into my mind! My sister took this picture while we were driving down the road. Kyle did NOT want his photo taken, so after several attempts from my sister to take the picture, with him refusing to look her way, he finally swung his head around and gave her this! What a little monkey!!

Material List

CTMH Paper Pack - Animal Cookies

Stampin' Up Cardstock - Brilliant Blue, Real Red, Whisper White. Green Galore, Gable Green, Close to Cocoa, Kraft, Basic Black

Cricut Cartridge - Paper Dolls Dress Up

SVGCuts.com file - Cuddly Animals

Cuttlebug Embossing Folders - Tiny Bubbles, Swiss Dots, Victoria, Forest Branches

Font - Walt Disney

Sponge Daubers

Stampin' Up Onk - Cameo Coral, Close to Cocoa, Chocolate Chip, Real Red

I love numbers!

I love numbers! There's never a question as to how to pronounce them! In the english language, we have several phonetics for several letters..............but not numbers! A 9 is a 9, as a 5 is a 5, and so on and so forth.
So, when my son called me to say, "Guess what, mom?! I shot first in the State of Indiana!" (referring to his JROTC Air Rifle 2010 Postal), it made no sense for me to respond, "What??", did it?! lol!!
I am so proud of him. He has truely stepped up as far as his efforts are concerned. This is a child that, four years ago, I was concerned was doomed to a fate of menial minimum wage work. Seriously.............
A child that could not make eye contact, nor speak clearly to the gas station clerk in the checkout line is now winning air rifle titles! He has bumped his grades from a 1.6 gpa in the eighth grade to a 3.2 gpa as a junior. He has evolved from the boy that did whatever the neighbor kid said was "cool" to the young man that earned a Battalion Staff position (a senior position) as a junior in his JROTC program at school.
I am amazed, and extremely proud! :)
Keep up the good work, son!

Must be "Dragon Week" at my house!

Today I finished a page that focuses on a photo of my son (15 years old, at the time) standing in front of an enormous Lego Dragon (some call it a sea serpent - we say "dragon") at Downtown Disney in Orlando, FL.  My family loves dragons! As a teen and young adult, I used to scour stores before Christmas looking for just the "right" dragon figurine for my step-dad. He always was a huge fan of dragons, so it became a tradition, of sorts, to purchase something dragon-related for the holiday. There are five kids between him and my mom; needless to say, he received dragons in excess!
Anyhow, this love of dragons, which is the Chinese Symbol of Good Fortune, was passed down to all of the children in our family. When I met my husband, one of the first things we found we had in common was the Medieval Era.  In my own home, I do not decorate with dragons, but we read fantasy novels, play fantasy video games and computer games, love the Renaissance Festival, and always stop to "gawk" at anything we see on our daily adventures that relates to dragons!
My point in telling you this is to convey just how "TOTALLY COOL!" this lego dragon was to us all when we saw it in the water. :) It's incredible what the Lego folks can do with their little plastic, colorful blocks, but this just blew us away! There is part of this that you can not see - there are four large arches behind this characters head that are his tail - the entire thing spanned over 75 feet of lineal water space. Just awesome!

Material List


Stampin' Up Cardstock - Night of Navy, Real Red, Garden Green, Old Olive, Whisper White
Karen Foster Paper - Dragon Scales
DCWV - All About Boys Paper Stack
Cuttlebug Machine
Cuttlebug "Distressed Stripes" Embossing Folder
Inkjet Printer
Sure Cuts A Lot & Cricut Expression
Glitter Gel Pen
Stampin' Up Circle Punches - 1" & 3/4"
Stampin' Up Corner Punch


The fantastic dragon silhouette was cut from a clip art in SCAL using the Trace Image option. (This piece of artwork was drawn by Becky. You can visit her incredible artwork site here. )
Thanks for looking at my page!

Scottish Traditions Layout

This is a double page layout that I used a CTMH paper pack (Back Country) and stamp set (Cabin Fever) to make. This is the right page of the layout:

My son's dad is of Scottish descent, and when they have their family reunions, they play Scottish games and dress in their kilts. These photos were sent to me by Kyle's step-mom, Nicole, and I wanted them to be part of his "growing up" scrapbook. The pictures of him with the armband is my favorite - the sepia one that he is looking at his own arm while everyone else is smiling at the camera. He turned twelve that year, so he was "included" in the "manly traditions" of wearing the temporary tattoo and participating in the games for the first time. Definitely a big deal for him! :)
This is the left page of the layout:

The "Generations" sign and the journaling sign are both from Dustin Pike's freebies on his blog (although I believe they have been removed recently, due to his new line of rubber stamps). I used my computer to journal, put the images around the print, and put the CTMH paper in my laser printer to create these. I cut them out by hand to add to the page.

Material List

CTMH Back Country Level 2 Paper Pack

CTMH Campin' Fever Stamp Set

Dustin Pike DigiStamps

Stampin' Up Large Oval Punch

EK Success Border Punch

Sponge Daubers

CTMH Twilight Ink Pad

Changes

Well.....I felt like something was missing from my castle page, so I played around with some things this afternoon in my craft room. I cut some clouds from Mary's Cloud 9 freebie SVG file on her blog (go to www.SVGCuts.com). I didn't use the letters and number on the cut, and made a few different sizes. I ran each through the Cuttlebug using the Swirls embossing folder, and then I sponged the edges and the embossed areas. I cut the cursive title using my SCAL and the Brush Script MT font.
I also added more layers to a few of the flowers, and a small addition to the end of the vine. I'm happy with the way it looks now. It looks more "complete" to me now than it did on my first attempt.

School Layout

Todays efforts at scrapping haven't left me with the most pride, but they'll do! :)
I had a little glue mishap with my title on this one. It was difficult to get the paper to cut this font, and I'm pretty sure I won't be using it again!

The SVGCuts collection I used on this was Back to School. I made a bank of lockers using the locker file, and I added a tiny lock from the same file. This is the base for my "HMS" title. (Font used here is "Collegiate Varsity", a freebie from www.fontspace,com). The yellow graphic paper is by K & Company (Danny'O collection). The strip with circled letters I had picked up at my scrap store locally a few years ago (sorry - no idea the designer on this one).
Thanks for checking it out! Have a great weekend!

Our Family

My furnace has not been kicking on: I noticed a chill in the house this morning when I woke up. I didn't really think much of it - figured it was cold outside last night, so maybe it had just dropped a degree or two in the house. I went up to my craft room to work for  a while, and when one of my dogs came upstairs to see me, I noticed his fur was rather chilly, like he had just come in form being outside. I went downstairs to actually let him go out, and noticed it felt even colder than before! We keep the house at 67  or 68, and when I looked the thermostat had dropped to 61. Brrrrrrrr..........(My craft room has it's own heat source and is not hooked into the central system, so I had stayed nice and toasty while the rest of the house was growing colder and colder.
Well, I'm still waiting for the heating guy to come over (it will be a little while - they're pretty busy today), so I finished my page. :)
I used Stampin' Up Ruby Red for the background paper. Chocolate Chip, Whisper White and Night of Navy make up the other solid color papers that I've used for various mats and frames. The clocks, gears and title papers are Sahara Sand. The ribbon on the page is Stampin' Up Night of Navy. The printed paper is from Stampin' Up Autumn Traditions paper pack from the 2008/2009 catty.
For the clock and gears I used a CTMH stamp set called "Make It Count" (this is a retired set).
The colors I used for stamping are Sahara Sand, Old Olive, Elegant Eggplant and Chocolate Chip - all are from Stampin' Up.

For my chocolate chip leaf background page, I used SVGCuts Salimah's Square Cards Collection. I also used SVGCuts Christmas Cookie Party Collection and their My Mom's Attic Collection. I thought the 2008 Founders Day layout I did was my favorite, but this one has taken it's place. I like it, and I hope you do too, and that I've inspired you to create something you like just as much of your own! Thanks for looking at what I create!

Digital Scrapping

Deanna, a fellow online scrapper and info-sharer, was kind enough to send me a template that I saw on a post she had done on SVGCuts.com forum. I'm pretty "green" when it comes to all the digital programs, so it was a great way for me to learn a few things (working on new stuff that was free is the BEST way to learn!). Here is my digital version of the layout, using the wonderful template she had sent me. :)
I did end up adding additional photos and a title, to make it a hybrid scrapbook layout, which I will add to this post once I am done taking the photo.
I actually have this as a dbl layout; one page is done as a traditional scrapbook page (no digital work), and this is the second page. I wanted to match the background paper that I used on my traditional page, so I scanned a blank sheet of the paper into my computer, saved it as a .jpg and then pulled it into the template, sized accordingly......and presto! A matched color for the background! :)

Winter Bliss Layout Page with SVGCuts.com Collection

It has been a busy, busy season! My son has been home, I've been catching up with some of the greatest friends EVER!, and I've been trying to find some time to sit down and complete some scrapbook pages I've been working on, as well as learn my new Adobe CS4 programs!  I did manage to sneak in some time to work on this sgl page layout! :) (I bought a new SVGCuts.com collection called Winter Bliss, and I LOVE it!! So I had to pull up my SCAL this weekend!) 


I have been playing with my Adobe programs, and I used a gradient map to make my photo black & white, except for my husband, to help him stand off the busy background.

From the Winter Bliss file, I used the 12 x 12 Trees file (cut at 11.5" sq). I used SU Bride Specialty paper for the negative, and The Paper Company Studio "Snowflake Diamonds" for the frame. I matted my photos on three mats that are 1/4" increments larger than the 4 x 6 photo. I used Stickles "Icicle" on the bottom white mat.
I cut the Short Icicles SVG and shrunk it down to fit my picture - this also has Stickles "Icicle" on it.
I cut the title SVG in white, and then cut a blackout shadow at .5 setting in the SU Bashful Blue color to bring the page base color forward in my layout.
I used the Snowflake 1 and two of the Snowflake 2 SVG files and a blackout shadow layer (same colors as the title), along with some more of my Stickles "Icicle" to finish it off. The top left corner of the photo frame was layered so that I had to use two pop-dots, stacked on top of each other, on the part that isn't on the photo to keep it even.



I was pleased with the way this one turned out! I just love this picture of my hubby in his snow gear! To backtrack for a quick sec - this was taken outside our garage two years ago when we had snowmobiles. We had some friends over, and spent most of the afternoon riding. It was cold, but a "good cold" and it did snow part of that day. When us "old folks" were done, we hung outside to watch the kids while we drank our cocoa (it's actually Ovaltine - I'm a HUGE fan!!! Just ask my friends! hahaha - little inside joke, there). Anyhow, he looked like a big, cold bear in his Way-too-big snow pants, so I clicked this photo on my way in to be warm! :)