Grandma's House - FINALLY!

Sooooo ... I began working on this layout a year ago ... ran across it today while I was reorganizing my scraproom after moving everything from the small upstairs bedroom to the downstairs spare room Saturday and yesterday. I decided I just had to finally get this thing finished. I was originally going a little bit different direction with it, but was just never satisfied with what I had arranged, and now I am much happier with the design.



This was my grandmother's house and my mom's house when she was little. This house was torn down when I was about 2 years old. The Corps of Engineers was building a large new reservoir in East Texas, so they built my grandmother a new house about 200 yards away that was on higher ground. Many years later when I spent summers with my Grandma, we would walk around at the edge of the water and find old bottles and other artifacts from when the house was there. My grandma's was my favorite place in the whole world to visit - she passed away when I was in college, and I miss her and visiting the old family place terribly, even after all these years!

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Book of Me Page 2 (What's In a Name?)

This is the layout I made for the second page in the Book of Me group over at Simply Scrapping Crafts. Of course, I'm still on the Webster's Pages wagon, so more of the Life's Portrait collection. I like the whole banner craze that's going on in the paper crafting world these days - it's such a versatile design! I had fun making this layout - there's something satisfying about cutting with scissors and getting my fingers dirty with a little ink and glue!

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Summer Banner (part 2)

I took some better photos of the summer banner, and have some individual shots so you can see the details of each piece.

















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Summer Banner

Simply Scrapping Crafts has a Wacky Wednesday challenge each week, which might be to use a particular technique, design element, etc. May Week 3 challenge was to make a card or layout that incorporates a handmade banner. Last summer, Laura McCullough from A Kiss On the Chic used one of her kits (which I purchased at the time) to make a beautiful banner. I used her design as part of my inspiration, and came up with a banner that incorporates some of the colors and themes of summertime.

These photos were taken in the evening when the lighting wasn't so great - hopefully the sun will be out tomorrow and I will hang the banner and take better photos. Here's a closeup of part of the banner.



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Love these butterflies!

Amy, one of the beautiful and talented design team members over at Simply Scrapping Crafts, designs her own digital stamp images. She is soon going to have them available for sale, but in the meantime, she has so graciously allowed the other DT members to use them. Wellll, she has this butterfly that just SPOKE to me when I first saw it, and I just couldn't resist getting creative with it. I printed it in two sizes, and flipped the image on the smaller version. I colored them with colored pencils and blended the colors with gamsol. The papers on this card are all Basic Grey Kioshi.

I also made a card for the Simply Scrapping Paper Scraps May Week 3 challenge - the challenge was to use narrow strips of paper to make a card or layout inspired by a colorful photo of a maypole.



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Book of Me

Over at Simply Scrapping Crafts (see the blinky in my left margin) we just started a new Book of Me group, and our first assignment was to make a title page. This is what I came up with.



I used a sketch that was for the May Week 2 Sketchy Saturdays challenge, and just turned it on its side so that it would fit what I needed. All of the papers are Webster's Pages Life's Portrait collection. The trims, flowers, and other embellishments are a variety of things from my stash. The two paper roses are made from a tutorial that Brianna, another of the design team ladies over at Simply Scrapping, provided.

Thanks for coming by to look, and we would love to have you join us over at Simply Scrapping Crafts!

Miscellaneous Creations

I spent last weekend working on some random scrapping projects and just trying to get my scrapping mojo back in general.

This first layout is of my little nephew Michael, who is an absolute heart stealer! I used some BoBunny papers that I had in my stash, along with some various embellishments. I used a sketch from Simply Scrapping Crafts as the inspiration for the design.



This layout is inspired by Ingrid Gooyer, who does a lot of designs with a plain white background. She was the guest designer for My Creative Scrapbook kit club in April, and I fell in love with her style. The papers used in this layout are Basic Grey Kioshi and Webster's Pages Life's Portrait. The photo is of my two older sisters, taken some time within the last year - the original background of the photo is wood paneling (yes, my mom is still living back in the 70's), so it looks a ton better with the background cut out of it.



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Simply Scrapping Crafts NSD Online Crop

In honor of National Scrapbooking Day, we had an online crop over at Simply Scrapping Crafts. We started on Friday, April 30th, and ended late on Sunday evening. There were loads of games and challenges and tutorials, with prizes and loads of fun and camaraderie!

The first challenge I tackled involved making a particular type of flower, and it was hosted by Bev. I made this card for my mom to send her for Mother's Day!



Then I tackled another of Bev's challenges, which was to use blocks of scrap papers to make a card of layout, so I made another card.



Then I was on a roll, so I decided to try Patricia's blind challenge. She gave us a "recipe" and some basic measurements and directions, and if you followed her directions, you came out with something like the following. This is my youngest nephew, Isaac - he's such a cutie pie!



Then there was a challenge to make a toilet paper roll brag book, hosted by Ginger, so since I happened to have some toilet paper rolls that I had been saving for just such a project, I made the following:



Then I decided to try the paper scraps challenge, hosted by my dear Amy. I used some of the scraps from the toilet paper roll brag book to make this:



And last but not least, I made a little tag album for Rona's challenge. Her example was really unique, but I just went for the easy route. I had all of these K&Co Blue Awning products, which are from my all time favorite line, so I decided to put something together with pictures of my cat, Boo Kitty, and my little dog Brandy who died almost two years ago, but who I still miss!



After all that I was too pooped to pop! I like to stand up when I scrap, because I move around a lot looking for particular things that I want to use, so after spending large portions of two days on my feet, I was ready to go back to work on Monday and recuperate (not really, but you know what I mean).

My daughter also joined me for the weekend. She was home from medical school for a few days, so she got into the scrapping groove also. She made the following as a Mother's Day gift for me:



It was a wonderful time for everyone, and we have a fabulous group of ladies over at Simply Scrapping who enjoy a good time, good friendship, and making beautiful things out of paper and "stuff". Please come over and join us anytime, and thanks for looking!