Masculine Birthday Layout

One of the most challenging events for me to scrapbook is a boy's birthday. There are so many pretty and super cute birthday embellishments on the market that are great for a girly girl, but not much for a boy. I was super excited to find the Tim Holtz birthday stamps! These are amazing! I used them to document my boys' birthday party along with the Feb Flying Unicorn kit. The brick paper is by far my favorite piece in the kit! I used the star chipboard boarder as an embellishment to the page. It really is a simple layout, but makes a great statement.

 My boys are four years apart and their birthdays fall a week from each other. So, we have come up with Brother's Day in which we have a family party for them. They each get to pick their cupcake and open their presents. Although we do not give them our presents until their actual day in which they go our to lunch with their Dad and pick what they want for dinner that night. This year Logan picked Raspberry Coconut  Cream Vanilla Cupcakes and Parker picked Chocolate Butterfinger Cupcakes.

After over 20 years of scrapbooking I have come to terms that it is time to change and move on. I just don't enjoy the process as much as I used to and it seems more like a chore than a pleasure. However, I still want to document pictures and memories so I am transferring over to the "Happy Planner" system. This has not been an easy choice to make and I have not entered into it lightly by any means. I have thought about it for months. I will periodically do a traditional scrapbook for special events or a trip. I am going to continue with traditional scrapbooking until July -- when I make the switch to my Happy Planner. In fact, I desperately want to be caught up by that point so will be hitting it hard. Once I make the switch I will share with you my Happy Planner and how I use it. I also have gotten into card making, art journaling, DIY home décor (I love to change out my breakfast nook seasonaly!) , and mixed media. My blog will reflect those types of things. This has been an amazing journey in which I have grown creatively and have made terrific friends. I hope to evolve and expand from where I am at today!

 

Until next time -- Happy Scrappy!  

Valentine's Day Card

It is that time of year. Love is in the air and we are bombarded with pink, red and hearts. I am okay with that. I love pink and red and even hearts :-P! This year I decided to use one of my new favorite things to make my Valentine's Day card -- Prima dolls!

 

 

I found the sweet little dollie heart at the Target $1 spot. They came in a pack of like 12 or 25. I can't remember. I can't even find the rest of my pack to check! The doll I used is Valentine Girl. Isn't she sweet? I used Copic markers to color her in. I tried to make this card flat so I could easily mail them without having to pay extra postage or a larger envelope. I used a sketch because I was making 10 of them and wanted to keep them similar. I later realized that I get bored after 3 and next time I need to mix it up! 

 Now, this next thing I made was super duper fun! I signed up for a card and candy bar Valentine's Day Swap. The card had to be a 5 by 7 and I had to include a candy bar. My partner likes Payday bars. I was not sure if I was suppose to make a card and just throw a candy bar in with it or deck the candy bar out too. I chose the latter option because what fun is just a candy bar right?

I used another sweet little doll from Prima and I stamped the ticket from the Valentine Girl set to add to the card as well. I then paper pieced her together. I added a pretty pearl necklace (after all she is a lady and every lady needs a pearl necklace!) and have her carrying behind her back a heart lollipop. I had the illusion of balloons running around in my brain and I like how it turned out.

 For the candy bar, I created a wrapper with the same paper I made the card out of. I stamped  the dog and dressed him up in hearts (Or her....but I like male dogs better so to me that is a boy!). I then wrapped the bar and used some ribbon from my stash and added the dog to top it off.

 This is the final product! I love love love it and I hope my partner does as well! It was super fun and super sweet! :-)

Until Next time -- Happy Scrappy!

Christmas 2015

Do you know what makes me happy? When I can complete a holiday set of layouts and actually like them! For some reason I struggle with theme layouts. I purchased Lemoncraft Christmas paper for a Christmas card swap I was in and had lots of leftovers. They just happen to match my pictures perfectly so I scrapped our Christmas using it. I also found some nice Teresa Collins paper trim and die cut flowers that ended up matching nicely with the paper. I do not like "matchy matchy" scrapbook pages. To me it reminds me of those Avon jewelry sets! Not my thing at all. 

 It never fails that I end up with a hodge podge of pictures that have to be scrapbooked, but really don't go together other than they were taken on the same day. I refuse to ever dedicate more than one page in my scrapbook for those and usually end up not liking the layout I do for them. Well, not this time! I really like this page! I think it is super cute and pulls them all together :-)

 This actually was the set of pictures that I started out with to scrapbook. It is our Christmas Eve tradition and I like each of these photos because they showcase the evening perfectly. I found a fun sketch on pintrest that I used to complete the layout. Once again, the die cut flowers came in handy! I simply inked the edges, crumpled them up and put them on a brad. So simple, yet so pretty.

 And this...this right here is by far my very favorite set of pictures from Christmas. My son finally got from his grandparents the latest and greatest DS. They tricked him and put it in a pop corn bin with the bagged pop corn on top of it. He opened the bin and was like "Oh cool! Popcorn! Thank you very much." and he started watching other people open presents. Grandma told him he better take a second look and this is what happened:

PRICELESS! It is times in which you capture a moment so perfectly that make all the time you spend on saving, scrapping and documenting worth it.

Until next time -- Happy Scrappy!

Holiday 2016 Visit with my Mom

I cannot even express how super excited I was to play with this paper from Lemoncraft and the new glitter paste from Prima! Well, new to me at least ;-) I used the paste on the scalloped circle frames of each layout. I found the sweet little pinecones on the clearance rack at Hobby Lobby 90% off. I bought 6 different types for under $2.50 and I have lots left over! 

 I added some glitter paste to the flower for more texture and the illusion of snow. You know here in the Phoenix area we get a lot of snow right? ;-) Haha!

 I was super happy that I was able to slam four pictures on this layout! It was simply luck because of how the pictures were taken. Otherwise, there was no way I could have been successful at it.

Until next time --Happy Scrappy!