No kids for a week?!!?

So...

     They left about 1 this afternoon and I've managed to look at the computer for 4 1/2 hours, paint my nails and do some arm exercises.  Pretty productive. 

      I'm trying to decide what I would like to do this week, all of the lovely ideas that I've had tumbling around in the ol' noggin, and it's kind of overwhelming.  There are easily a hundred different little projects I'd like to try out and several big projects.  Everything from just scrapping to painting my dining room to tearing down my deck (prob not gonna happen).    I blame Pinterest.  So many amazing things I've seen and pinned and been like "Yeah, I can totally do that!".  All that I needed was the time.  Right?  Those little (adorable) time thieves were the reason I couldn't make my home look like a magazine or keep current with my Project Life or craft like a boss.  Sure.  It definitely wasn't me.  

     Well, now I have the time.  It's time to be productive.  Time to get shit done! (Sorry, couldn't help it.  Profanity is a motivator for me, blame my mom... just kidding...ish)  Next post should be interesting.

See ya :)

Technology..meh.

Yes, I know the title is super ironic considering I'm using technology right now to share this, but just stick with me.

The night started out with so much promise.  No games, no practices, not one thing on our crazy schedule.  One of those rare gems...a free night.  We decided pizza and a movie and some relaxation were perfect for tonight.  So, the food was great.  A meat stuffed delicious mountain of pizza from Papa Murphy's for the kids and a yummy BBQ Chicken one for me.  So good.  We even picked out a movie from Redbox that we could all agree on.  I thought...hey, we have a BluRay player, let's get that since the picture looks so much better.  Everything was going our way.  

We sat down with our popcorn popped ready to bask in the glow of crazy fiction for the next hour and a half.   But much to our dismay, a screen popped up with a message stating our player needed an update.  I tried.  I did the best my little not-tech-savvy self could do.  I downloaded, I transfered, I rebooted (following step-by step instructions provided by the manufacturer) and nothing.  Such a let down.  The kids were looking forward to it.  I even got the little one to sit with me.  

So, now, instead of spending the night all enjoying a movie together, the big ones are online looking at weird Minecraft stuff, the little one is watching her movie and I'm here.  So much for our togetherness night.  Grumble.

But...

I do have some good news about today and technology.  We recently had some pictures taken by my friend and photographer, Amanda Duncan.  She did a "lifestyle" photo shoot.  Which basically means, she followed us around for a couple hours and caught little snippets of our daily life.  So extraordinarily pleased with how they turned out.  And speaking of being together, this shows how we really are, no faking, no (well not too many) poses.  Just us.

 

Aren't they fun :)  

Thanks for looking!!

Hi...I'm not dead

Contrary to the rumors, I was not buried alive by the massive amount of scrapbook supplies piling up in my basement studio.  I just took a break, a long break. Oh, I did one or two pages here and there, but I once I got behind on my kits and my Project 12, I got a bit discouraged.  Then we had some financial issues, so both my Gossamer Blue and my Studio Calico subscriptions had to be cancelled (so, so sad). Crafting just took a back burner to life.  Isn't that always the way?

So here I am trying this crazy thing called blogging again.  Not going to be something that I stress about, not going to be an everyday kinda thing.  Just when I feel like sharing with anyone who'd care to look, I'll do that.  *To those couple peeps who do follow me, sorry I let you down  I suck :)*

Anyway, I was just kicked in the butt a little when I posted a page to Two Peas and it was chosen as a featured project for a few days!!  I was so stoked.  That just got me going.  I was on a bit of a scraproll.  (I'm claiming that phrase here and now) and got a bunch of pages done.  Now, I didn't take a bunch of detailed shots, so it's just the pages themselves, but I thought I'd share here as well as on Two Peas.

So, there you have it.  My creativeness for the past month-ish.  I'm hoping to keep it up.  I love to make.  I love to create.  It feeds my soul, ya know?

Thanks for looking.  See you soon.

Just keep scrapping, just keep scrapping...

I am working away on my kits from last month.  I am bound and determined to use them all up before the next ones arrive.  I'll be posting soon  :).

A couple things I wanted to talk about today...

 1.  I just saw that Echo Park is starting their summer camp up!  It's free and choc full of inspiration.  The only downside is you may end up spending way more money than intended on super cute Echo Park product.  Also, they have awesome badges you can put on your blog.  Love this Foxy one!

   and 2.  I watched today's 213 in 2013 featuring Corrie Jones and was very encouraged.  She had a do-over.  You know, a page you start and think it'll be great, but turns out not so great.  I was glad to see that even the pros have some struggles sometimes.  I thought I'd share my struggle working with my SC Planetarium kit from last night.

So, I had this grand idea that I would have a very neutral base with gold and silver accents and a few pops of red to match my picture.  I kept working away, changing the color scheme during the process (of course) and once I painted the edges of my cardstock with the gold Color Shine, I knew I'd just effed it up.

Ugh.  Definitely not for me.  So I set it aside, went to bed since it was about 1 in the a.m., and started again this afternoon while Becca napped.

I was bummed because my vision didn't turn out like I wanted, but I didn't let it get me down. 

 Is it weird if I was humming "just keep swimming" to myself?   

I knew I still wanted to do that cool light-strand-thingie that I lifted from Wilna Furstenburg, so since I already had the strands glued down, I just trimmed off all the gold around the edges of the gray cardstock and matted it on this nice chevron from My Minds Eye.  Then I started going thru my embellishments and found all these 5th and Frolic die cuts and stickers that worked perfectly.  I even eventually added some Color Shine back into the page.  Also my sewing machine is on the fritz again, so I doodled some stitch lines around the gray cardstock, then added some gray watercolor for a subtle darkening around the edges.

Here is the final page.

Like I said, it was a struggle, but I am very pleased with the result...warped paper and all.  :)

Remember...
        just keep scrapping.

Thanks for stopping by.

No, I didn't forget about you

May is CRAZY!!!!  

          Always is, always flies by.

 I didn't even get my project 12 done.  GAH!  I will have to post my April and May together since I haven't even printed my pics for April yet.  I am "patiently" waiting for either Archivers to get a collage option on their printer again OR Photoshop for my birthday.  That's what I am hoping for, really.  It'd be sooo much easier to print photo's that way since I don't have a reliable, quality printer at home.

Anyway, on to the main topic of this post... my pages from my Studio Calico Spencer Kit.  Another great kit!!  I liberally added in extra product on a couple pages, but the others were pretty straight from the kit.

Page 1

I did this one for one of the 2peas NSD challenges.  To use a pinned page as inspiration.  I used a page that I loved by Angie Gutshall (click here to see the page).  I liked how she cut out the circles and sewed around them.  I also got some inspiration for the title letters from Nancy Damiano's Infinity page on 2peas.  Love how the embossing powder on the chipboard worked out!!!  This is one of the pages where I added a lot of extra product.  Mostly from Amy Tangerine Sketchbook line, with a few stickers from an old winter Echo Park line.

Page 2

This page was pinned by 2peas!!  I submitted it for one of the NSD challenges,too.  I was so excited!  I love when my family looks and ooh's and ahh's over a page, but it's really something when other scrapbookers and professional scrapbookers take notice of what you've done.  Made my day.

I again added in a lot of Echo Park product to the kit. I have had these pics on my desk for a long time (does it seem like I say that about almost every page?  I have a lot of pics just sitting around) and I thought the turq circle paper went great with it.

Page 3

When  I was digging through my Echo Park for the other layouts, I noticed that diamond border sticker was almost a perfect match for stamp included in the kit.  So, of course, I had to use it on a page!  This one was just a bunch of random pieces I had left and a few embellishments.  Two things that happened while working on this one:  1 - my sewing machine would not cooperate.  So, instead of sewing thru the little trianlges, I used a thin pen and drew a line.  and 2 - right after I dropped my ink on the page, I dropped another page on top of it and ended up smearing some of the drops.  I was MAD, thought I'd ruined the whole thing.  But, I took a deep breath, and let it go.  I even ended up adding a few circles to the drops almost bringing more attention to them.

Page 4 

When I saw the orange paper in the kit, I knew I wanted to use it on a layout with these pics of my husband when he was little.  He was so cute!!  I loved the arrow paper in the kit and saw how Maggie Holmes had cut it up to use a bunch of the arrows.  I thought something like that would work on this page, too.  

Page 5

 I had some really old rub-ons from Cosmo Cricket that I added to this page.  And again the orange pattern paper went great with these pics.  Her trucker glasses were the best!!









There are five more from last month!  I have one from each kit that I am planning to do when I can get some time, plus my project 12 pages, plus pages for this month's kits.  I'll get it.  I'm all good.  No more stressing here.

Thanks for looking :)

April Gossamer Blue pages

Yes, I know it's May.  Yes, I am behind.  Yes, I am okay with that.

I recently went on a scrapbook weekend getaway.  I was so excited!!  I carefully put together several "kits" and of course took my Gossamer Blue and Studio Calico kits with me.  I think I ended up with something like 25 page kits.  

Really?  Really.   I thought I was going to get through 25 kits??  Of course I didn't, I got 10 done.  Which is still really good for me, but now I have all these kits just calling my name while life flies by at 100 mph.  I keep thinking about them as I'm driving all over this city.  If I didn't have to be in the car for 2+ hours everyday, I could at least get one page done.  :)

Anyway, this post is to show off the pages that did get done.  I apologize now for no close up shots, but even this post is being done in stolen moments.

page 1  -  I added in some gold glitter paper and vellum w/ gold dots to help tie in the gold thickers (which I adore!!).  I also raided my stash and found these cute chick stickers to add.  Let's hear it for hoarding!!

page 3 - I was determined to use the fabric frames as much as I could.  I love them!!  I added in some washi I had in my stash and my watercolors.

page 4 - I'd seen this large banner several times and thought it was time for me to give it a try.  This time I used the frame as a place for my title, backing it with the Crate script paper (loved it!) and leaving a few choice words uncovered.  Really so happy for my momma, she's overcome so much.

page 2 - My friend Amy brought her silhouette (I want one soooo bad!!!) and I used it to cut out a mask of snow flakes.  Sprayed a couple times with my white Mr. Huey's and loved the result!  I added a few snowflake stickers (again from my crazy stash) to the centers to make them pop a bit more.  

page 5 - My son was not too happy that I did this page, but I love it.  I had seen a challenge to use pink on a boy page, and seeing as he had to wear his sisters pink boots, it was a perfect match.  I added in some strips of pattern paper to mix the navy, teal and turquoise.  The small die-cut frame and pointer are wood veneer from Basic Grey's Hipster line that I inked to match.  Love this one.  

page 6 - And last, but not least.  This page started out completely different, but I couldn't make what I had originally pulled work.  I started going back thru the kit and finally just saw this.  It just clicked.  Then once I got home and was showing everything to Jon, he kindly pointed out that I had spelled 'breathe' wrong.  I had forgotten the 'e'.  Let me just tell you how happy I was about that.  So, into surgery my page went and I fixed it good enough.  I did manage to rip the paper several times trying to peel up the letters, but it's all good.  And, that wasn't the only spelling mistake I made that weekend.  I think lack of sleep does not have the best affect on your scrapping abilities.  :)

So, there are my pages from the Gossamer Blue kit.  I do have one more that I am still thinking about and I WILL be incorporating a ruffle somewhere on that page, since I forgot to do it on all of these.

And, here are the other four I did that weekend.  Fun, fun, fun!!!!

This one was based on a challenge by Jana Werner on Two Peas.  Loved her big banner and totally wanted to do something like it.  I've had this paper and these embellies for awhile!

New Basic Grey, it feels incomplete still since I didn't write any journaling.  I might have to go back in and add some.  I was trying for a calm-white-spacey look.

Bow Ties from Basic Grey.  I saw that buggy paper and knew it would be perfect with these pics.  I kinda went nuts with the layering and  embellishments.  

This was another one that sleep deprivation ruined, at least temporarily. I forgot the word 'to' in the title.  I was ticked and my friend Amy fixed it for me.  That was the first time I witnessed page surgery.  :)  I used some old Girls Paperie and some wood veneer from Basic Grey again.

If you made it this far, thank you so much for looking.  I know this one was long.  I will post again as soon as I get thru my Studio Calico kit.  I've got about 6 pages planned for that one, too.

ttfn :)

March Project 12

I waited until the last minute to get this posted.  Hello, my name is Erica, and I'm a procrastinator.  :)

Anyway, when I started my layout this month, I had no idea what paper or embellishments I wanted to use.  None.  I spent probably an hour looking through the tons of paper I have and getting "kits" together. Then another hour trying to decide which kit to use.  I almost gave up.  I went back and forth so many times my brain got whiplash.  Finally, I decided that I wanted to use a cute Dear Lizzy paper from her 1st line with little Easter eggs all over it.  I based my color scheme off that paper and just went with it. 

 

Now, you may ask, all of this based on that one little strip of egg paper?  But, there will be an 8x8 insert about Easter that will have quite a bit more of that paper.  Well, it will when I get it done.  :)   

My layout turned out a little greener than I thought it would, but since it's March, I was okay with that.  

I hadn't really planned on doing the confetti pocket behind the title, but once I started stitching the vellum down, I thought it'd be fun.  I like how it turned out, but I didn't like all the punching.  My hand started to hurt after a bit.  

Once that was done, I started trying to decided what letters to use for a title.  And what goes better with green then gold?  So I finally got to use my gold glitter thickers! I love, love, love these!

In the other pockets I scrapped about St. Pat's Day, going to my nieces birthday and Becca's first solo attempt at spaghetti.  She loved it btw.  

The top pics are from the last storm Indiana threw at us.  It's almost spring and we get 8", the most we've had all winter, dumped on us in a day.  Of course we had a snow day, which the kiddos loved.  Even Jon got a snow day, so they had some fun outside.  

Our Spring Break was this month.  We try to hit the zoo every spring break.  It was really cold this year, but the kids didn't care and Becca had a blast!  

The last pic is what the kids came down to Easter morning.  I used a pre-lined card for my journaling and am now seeing that the lines were a bit close together.  I got all my journaling in this block, but it's not so easy to read.  I might have to redo that one...we'll see.

I will post the little insert when I finish it and show how it looks all together.  

Thanks for stopping by  :)