Many Thanks

This weekend has been so busy with activities! I am ready to go back to work to rest a little bit! Ever feel like that? Saturday was my oldest's Robotics tournament at WSU. They competed against 35 other schools and this was their first year to compete. We had 2 teams going to the competition, one for the beginner level and one for the intermediate level. My daughter was in the intermediate group and they had to give an oral presentation with slide show to 3 judges. After the presentation the judges asked each of the team members questions. They were judged on everything from the way they entered and exited the room, how they presented the information, how they answered the questions and if their slide show fit the criteria the judges were looking for. They won first palace in presentations! I was one excited mama! When they called our team I was standing up yellin' "WOOHOO! YEAH! YEAH!" then when they got up to the stage to accept their award I started to cry! Sheesh! I am so proud of all of them! Here is a picture of the team after the awards.

So this week I thought it would be nice to make the coach a thank you for all the hard work he put into doing this. He is a parent that volunteered many hours to make this happen for our kids and there were many challenging practices and he was very patient with them even when it was hard to be patient. I made this card for the kids to sign and they all chipped in for a gift certificate to his favorite restaurant.

The card is really a simple design. I used a nice "manly" plaid patterned paper (left over from another project *wink* gotta love it when you use those scraps!) for the top of the card and a shade of green card stock that matched the the green in the plaid. I ran this piece through the Cuddlebug with the Swiss Dot embossing folder. I just wanted to give the card a little bit of texture since I wasn't going to use any bling. I ran a ribbon across the card and tied a knot for added demention. I stamped the verse on white card stock using the Stampin Up stamp set Lots Of Love. This set is so versatile, you can use it with circle punches or Stampin Up has these great tag punches that work great with this set also.

As you can see here there are a few more lines on this stamp but I chose to use a marker, in this case it was Night of Navy, to ink up only the lines that I wanted to use for this sentiment.

Then I used 3 different Stampin Up punches to layer and create this look. After stamping the verse I punched it out using the 1 1/4" circle punch. Then I punched a 1 3/8" circle from the same green card stock that I used at the bottom of the card. Finally I used the Circle scalloped punch from...you guessed it...Stampin Up to make the final circle to our homemade embelly.

Just to add a little finishing touch I used a paper piercer and the Stampin Up piercing pad to make little holes in the scallops.

In this photo you can see there is another template along with the mats. You can use this template to help you pierce paper in a straight line...I have issues with making a straight line so this little tool comes in handy a lot.

Well, thanks for peekin' in tonight my friend! Talk to you soon!

Beautiful

Happy Wednesday! I am so glad that we are half way through the week! This is a layout of Haley and her best little buddy Megan. They went to school together from 1st Grade- 5th Grade but now they go to different schools. The girls have maintained their friendship and I am so happy that they have been able to do this. They really are good friends. Megan is such a good kid. One of the things I like the most about her is that she doesn't try to be something that she isn't. She is funny and quirky and makes us laugh all the time and when ever they are together I usually have to tell them to quiet down because they are having so much fun!

I have several other pictures that were taken the same day as this photo and had intended on making this a two page spread but this page just turned out so good with the one photo as the focal point that I am going to make the other page have it's own title. I will post that tomorrow. But here's the scoop on this page. The pink cardstock is Bazzill and the green and pink patterned paper is from Flair Designs and is the Paradise Paisley line.


I was looking for some white rubons to use in the corners but I didn't have any that were the size I wanted so I pulled out my acrylic stamps. This design was made with a stamp set from Autumn Leaves and the ink is a white craft ink pad from Stampin' Up.



Gotta have a little bit of girly bling right? The word BEAUTIFUL is from Me & My Big Ideas.



Here is a picture of the acrylic stamp. I have both wood mounted and acrylic stamps and I like them both but the advantage to using acrylic stamps is that you can see where you place them on your page. The journaling around the photo was done with the white gel pen. I found that Uniball Signo is the brand works the best. I like the way the pen writes with an even flow with out skipping any spaces.



Thanks for peekin' in. It's always good to hear from you!

Mother's Day 2007

Hi friends! How are you doing this wonderful weekend? Hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's day. Mike and I had a quiet dinner out. It is so nice to be in love with someone that loves you back. Sounds funny doesn't it? I have been in some one sided relationships in the past and I am just so blessed now. I love this man more and more each day!

Well now, here is a layout that I finished up this afternoon of Mother's Day 2007. My hair was a little shorter then huh? I liftedthis layout from the Page Maps book. When I first got this book I wasn't sure if I really liked it but I have found that I use it quite a bit when I have layouts with 1 to 4 photos. I like the way that they incorporate many different colors and textures into the layouts. The paper in this layout is from Scrapworks and it is their Florabella line. It is double sided so you get a pattern on one side and that great distressed look on the otherside. I picked this up at Scrappin' Time in Derby, if you haven't been there you should pop in there the owners are so nice and they aren't too far from Scrap Funattic in Andover another great little store here in Wichita!

Any way...the red scalloped boarder was done by hand with this Fiskars oval template. This isn't a very good picture of the template but see how the edges are scalloped?

The green double stitched ribbon is Wild Wasabi from Stampin' Up and the brown rick rack is from Hobby Lobby. I am a pig about embellishments! It is sick how many I have around here so I was digging through my stash and came across these cute little pink button flowers from Sassafras they just blended just right and set the page off. Don't you just love it when you find the perfect embelly for your page?

I had to add a little bit of girly bling to the photos on the bottom of the page so naturally I had to use pink right? Here is a closer look at them. The rhinestone bling is from Hobby Lobby. If you watch their sales sometimes you can get them for 50% off. This girl loves her discounts!

Well thanks for peekin' in on me. I love to read all of your comments...and I see that I got a few of you to comment on my last post...LOVE IT!

Another Girlfriends Christmas

Hi friends! How are you doing this week? Are you ready for Valentine's day? We celebrated tonight since the girls are off to their dad's this weekend. We had our traditional heart shaped pizza and soda in wine glasses. The table was decked out in our fancy valentine table cloth and we had little candles lit too. It's just a special little thing we do every year.

Here is a lay out that I did of my annual Christmas dinner with a few of my girlfriends. This time I thought I would go into detail with you about the tools that I used. So here it goes. I lifted the layout idea from Becky Higgins Sketches book. Becky has to be one of my all time favorite page designers and I use her books for ideas frequently. The cardstock is Bazzill and the patterned paper is from Cosmo Cricket's Twist & Shout line, it's not really Christmas paper but here is a great example of thinking outside the box. Mary, one of my favorite managers from Scrapbook Garden (Sarah would be the only other favorite) helped me pick the paper out for this one. Mary is always so good at getting someone to see things in a different way (and not just with paper...love ya my friend *wink*)

These fun little brads are from Creative Cafe...I picked them up on clearance somewhere just can't remember where now.

See how small I got these picture at the bottom of the first page? I used my little Epson Picture Mate printer. Best $100 I ever spent. The quality of the photos is incredible! The neat part is that you can print as large as 4x6 and as small as well small enough to fit on a charm necklace! You can also tweak your photos with it too, like making the photo black and white or sepia tone.

Here is what the printer looks like. It is so simple. You don't even have to hook it up to a computer. Just pop in the memory card from your camera and BAM you are a printin' fool! I got mine at Best Buy and the refills are pretty inexpensive.

Now we all know what a punch queen I am right? Well I just can't help it! Stampin Up has some of the best punches! See this photo corner?

I made it with this punch. When you use this punch you get two different sizes so if you wanted to layer in a different color you could for a neat accent.

And how about this fun embelly? You like it don't you? I do too! It is so versatile! The words friends forever was a little stamp that I had. I used a marker to color the words so that I could stamp them on two lines. Remember that old trick?

So to achieve this totally groovy embelly you have to use this punch, which is also from Stampin' Up. Now if you are interested in purchasing either of these goodies then let me know because I do sell Stampin' Up.

And finally, this is what I have been using for adhesive recently and have grown quite fond of it. This big wallet wrecker is called the ATG Gun. Wallet wrecker? Yes, the sucker is $60 and when you purchase it, it does NOT come with adhesive. Yes people, that was extremely difficult for me to stomach...personal opinion here but I think for 60 smackers the thing should have came with adhesive. But needless to say the adhesive refills are only around 5ish and you get 1000 feet.

So if you are still reading, you get a prize. I am not sure what yet but never less it is prize for reading (all the way to the end) the longest blog entry in my history. Hope you have a great Friday!

Robotics Trial Day

It was such a beautiful day here in Kansas today! We spent a majority of the day at WSU for the Lego Mindstorm Trial Day. We had a very productive day. We have two weeks before we compete and I think the kids got a good taste of what everything will be like so I think they will be working hard to prepair for the challenge day. Sidney caught this cute picture of Haley as we were wrapping things up and this LOVE sculpture was right outside the building we were in. Well, I hope this post finds you well and if you are here in Kansas that you were able to enjoy this beautiful day! Thanks for stoppin' in friend!

My Little Valentines

Hi friends! How is your week going so far? Only one more day left this week. I am looking forward to the weekend but it is going to be a busy one. Haley is on the Robotics team at school and they have their trial day Saturday at WSU and Friday evening we have family pictures for the church directory and sometime in there we are celebrating my dad's birthday. I am really hoping to get some scrapbook time in too. We shall see.

Here are my valentine cards that I am sending out to family. I was thinking about purchasing some photo valentine cards but they are between $1.25 and 1.50 per card...at least the ones that I liked were that much. As I am trying to watch my budget I thought maybe I should make them myself. So last Saturday I decided to see what I had in my scrapbook room that would work. It seemed like it took me forever to come up with a design. I know it probably doesn't look like it but I was trying to work some patterned paper into the layout and I just couldn't make it work for what I had and I was bound and determined that I wasn't going to purchase anything. So here is my end result. What do you think? I just can't believe how fast the girls have grown. It seems like not that long ago they were toddlers. My goodness where does the time go?

Hope you have a great weekend!

Sidney's 8th Birthday

Here is a layout that I did this weekend. Still playing catch up...this was from 2006. It feels so good to get this layout done! I used Bobunny Double Dot for the background and the patterned paper is Creative Imaginations. The titling was done with foam Thickers and the flowers are Heidi Swapp ghost shapes. I painted them with acrylic paint then used a circle punch to punch out some of the flowers for the center design. To top the flowers off I used some diamond glaze to give it that glassy look and when it was dry broke it up a bit to give it that cracked glass look.

I am working on my Valentine cards now. I have the layout done and finished one sample so all I have to do is put them together. But I am having this issue with time. Why is it that that always happens?

Today I went to a funeral for a co-worker. She worked on the same floor, not directly with me. It was so sad. She suffered from an eating disorder and that is what took her life. She was in her late 40's. So sad. I wonder what it is that makes a woman feel so bad about her image that she would hurt her body like that? I know there were many that felt like they should have done more, but I know that those around her tried to get her to get help on many occasions. You can't force someone to get help, they have to want it. But it still doesn't change that question in your mind...could I have done something? If you are reading my post scroll down to the bottom where my music is and click on the song Freckles. Listen to it. It is such a positive song about self image.