An update, and a giveaway!

I know it has been FOREVER swince I have updated my blog, which is one reason that I really struggled with starting a blog to begin with. I am planning on posting {nearly} everyday with my December Daily (or as I call it Family and Friends 2009) album, so I can stay on top of it this year.

The reason for this post however, is to tell you about a Kit giveway from my favorite club Studio Calico. The giveway is on the Craft Gossip blog, and is for the SC November kit! You can get all the info here.

Thanks for checking in today, and stay tuned! More to come later this month! :)

So it's been awhile...

A very long while. I always knew that I wouldn't be very good about keeping up to date on my blog posts and I was right. Oh well!

Hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July yesterday! We had lots of fun with fireworks last night. We had a friend over, and the neighbor and his dog joined us. Candy (the dog) was SO EXCITED to be buy the fireworks. She would bark and run around in circles when you set one off, and then come look at you begging for more with her tail going a mile a minute! It was too cute!

Well, I really don't have much else to say and I have a lot of photo's to sift through from the last few weeks but as soon as I can I will be back this week with some photo's of my niece and nephew, some camping photo's, and some from our fireworks the last few nights! Have a happy Sunday!

So this is spring?

Well, I guess in Minnesno{w}ta it is! This is what we woke up to today. The only good thing about it is it shouldn't really last too long. It also didn't cover the sidewalks, so that makes it a bit easier to handle!

Last night Mike, Pat {his mom} and I went to see his nephew - Curtis and his band {Start Of Something New} perform at Club 3 Degrees in Minneapolis. They were there for a wildcard round in which they needed the most people to show up in order to advance to the finals. They did it! They had 118 people show up to see them! Click on the picture below to visit their Facebook page to listen to their music and read more about them!

So last week I went scrapbooking with my buddy Nicole. I got a few pages done, including the one that I have been working on here and there for a few weeks now. I am so excited to finally have it done! It was for a DT challenge over at SC. The challenge was to scraplift any layout from DT member Nik. Seeing as she is the reason that I started over at SC, I knew I had to do this challenge! Her work is so very inspiring to me. The layout I chose to scraplift is this one. I love her use of paint and punches and stitching! Now I must admit, I have no idea how to use a sewing machine, so I faked it on this layout. I simply used my EK Piercing Bugs to make the holes, and then a black pen to be my "thread" in between the holes! All product is from SC kits (Garment District {March 09} and Center Stage {December 08}).

My siblings and I decided to make a calendar for my parents for Christmas last year using family photo's for the top each month. My sister and I managed to get my parents to look through their photo albums with us in search of my mom's favorite photo of my dad from when they were younger. {Though they had no idea that was why we wanted to look through the albums.} While we were going through them, I would randomly take a photo or 2 here and there that I wanted to make a copy of {mainly so it wouldn't look odd when I grabbed mom's fav...} and in doing so I found these really cute photo's of my brother and I.

My brother has no idea that I made copies of them, and he probably has no recollection of them even existing! I made extra copies of the photo's to give to him, and then scrapped this using the September 08 {Iconic} kit from SC. Can you tell that we grew up posing for the camera?

This last layout that I worked on last week is one that I decided to do after realizing that I had been shunning the roll of mom because I didn't have any kids yet. I kept thinking to myself - why should I have to do this that and the other? Why doesn't Mike have to help me? It's not like we have kids! I'll do it no problem when we do have kids though. That's when I realized that the "mom roll" that I had been so against taking on is really not a mom roll. I just always though of it as one because it's all the things that my mom did as I was growing up. Maybe it was a desperate attempt to avoid growing up? I guess I'll never know for sure, but the day that I started thinking about it I wrote my journaling down in my journal book.

The flowers I back stitched following the holes that I made using a Bazzill Basics Paper stitching stencil. {I got mine on clearance from OTC} The floss I just picked up from Michaels. Everything else is from the March 09 {Garment District} kit from - you guessed it - SC.

Well, that is everything that I have to share for today. I hope that you all have a wonderful week, and that you will be able to spend some time with your loved ones next weekend! Take care!

A simple lazy Saturday...

Today has been one of those days to hang out and get to projects that have been put off for awhile. For me, that means I am messy scrapping. Something I only do so often, but I have decided to go all out with it. I have been stamping with glue and adding glitter, applying gesso to chipboard shapes, and then using maya mist on those same said shapes. I will share photo's when it's complete.

Last week we had our St Patty's Day Party ~ we had a lot of fun! I will be sharing some photo's soon...just have to do a little editing! :)

Today's project is actually one that I did awhile ago, but am just getting around to sharing. This is a layout that I did of our first house through the seasons. The reason that I am sharing this with you is Missy on the SC website asked us what the craziest thing is that you have done for art/photography/a layout. For me, that was to take a photo in each season from about the same place of our house (better yet, our tree in the front yard) so I could put them on a layout. The plan is to have this somewhere in our house when we try to sell it.

So, what is the craziest thing you have done for art? I would love to know! I am hoping to post again this weekend, but you never know what will happen. We have a birthday party for Mike's brother and sister-in-law tomorrow afternoon which should be fun. Well, I hope everyone has a beautiful weekend!

Guess it's a Sunday thing...

My goal this year was to blog more often. At least once a week. I have been meaning to come here all week to blog my newest layouts, but have been too busy until today. Maybe I should change my blog name to "Something About Sundays"! :) Oh well. At least I have been keeping up with the at least once a week part, right? Hee! So I have a couple of layouts to share with you. These were both made using the Confections (Aug 08) kit from Studio Calico. I love this kit so much! Well, I love all their kit's! What can I say? April and Scarlet rock at putting kits together! If you are in the market for an awesome kit of the month club, you should really check them out! Ok, ok I'll stop rambling and get on with it. :)

This first one is a layout about the cherry blossom tree in our backyard. I took these photo's last spring - Mike laughed at me because I was taking pictures of the tree everyday after work for about a week. Can you blame me? I just had to make sure that I had really good photo's of it in all it's glory! :)

Journaling reads:

These are the photo's that got me hooked on photography. They just turned out so beautiful! I love how rich the colors are - the bright pinks and greens - how can you resist? Of course now I realize that this love of photography has been hiding inside me, all along - passed down from Grannie to my dad, and from my dad to me.

I remember when I was growing up, dad always asked us to come get our pictures taken when we were playing outside. it wasn't until I was thinking about photo's I would be taking of my children as they grow up that I realize how similar we all are! Though we didn't like our photo's taken at the time, these are some of my favorite photo's now!

The second layout is of photo's I took when I first started to like photography. The story that goes with it actually has little to do with the photo's, but I didn't have pictures to support the whole story, so they will have to work! I will have a follow up layout with my favorite childhood photo's on the opposing page in my scrapbook. Thanks for checking out my blog!

New Layout

So I just love that last photo that I posted so much that I had to make a layout of it!

I used the September 08 (Iconic) kit from Studio Calico to make this layout along with a peice of notebook paper from everyiota.com as the journal block.

That's it for today - happy Sunday!

Happy Hump Day!!!

Although today didn't really seem like a hump for me because I had Monday off, I am still very happy that I am now home from work.

My sister's birthday was fun...Love seeing my niece and nephew! We played the board game moods...anyone else ever play that? If not you should - we had a blast! One of the favorite moments of the night was when my sister-in-law (SIL) had to read the sentence "I look good in hot pants!" in the mood - joyful. It ended up sounding more like the little girl from the shake-n-bake commercial "It's shake and bake and I helped!" My nephew (who is 15 mo.) took one look at his mom and burst into tears. For those of you who don't know my SIL, she is very quite and reserved. It was quite amusing!

Anywho! I just have one quick share for you tonight before I have to get supper started.

This is a photo that I took at our friends house the day after Christmas. I wanted to share it with you because this is the photo that I adhered to the last page of my December Daily! That's right, February is almost done, and I *still* don't quite have mine done...I am so close though! All I have left is the journaling and getting new binder rings for it and I am done! Yay! Finally!

Before I go, I have one quick question. Anyone know where I can find some 2 or 2.5 inch binder rings? I have looked everytime that I have walked into a store but can't seem to find anything bigger than a 1.5...let me know if you know where I can get one!

Happy night to all!

Happy Valentines Day!

And a very happy birthday shout out to my sister and my friend Kimberly! Hope you both have a wonderful day! Speaking of my sister's birthday, she turnes 21 today! Boy that makes me feel old. (I know, I know...) So I thought I would post a few quick shares to help us celebrate this great day of love.

First I have a photo of the mini album that I made for my sister. I figured with all the celebrating this weekend, she would have alot of photo's. What better way to store them than in a cute mini?

It's actually a small photo album that I have had since I was like 5, I just covered it in PP. I still have to put some ribbon around the edges to cover the paper tear on the top right side. When it tore, my BF asked me what I was going to do now and I told him "It's not a mistake, it's an oppertunity to embellish." He thought it was the funniest thing he ever hear! My co-worker and I found that quote online at a scrapbooking tee store. Anywho.

Now I have a few cards to share with you. This is a simple Valentines Day card that I made folowing an example I saw in the Feb 2009 CK. It's from Becky's Sketch. I simply punched a few circles out of some PP scraps that I had in my scrapbox. Then I diecut the word love using my cricut. The rest of the card I did freehand using a black marker. To make the lines semi-straight (because I am a perfectionist) I used a ruler to show me what a straight line would be, then drew it freehand next to the ruler.

Easy peasy, and it would be very easy to adapt this card to match any occasion!

This next card is another really simple card using the George and the Jasmine cartridges for the cricut.

I would like to thank all of you ladies for your lovely comments on yesterday's card! It was so nice to come home from work yesterday and see that my blog does get visitors! It honestly is one of my favorite simple cards - I am so glad that you liked it too! Hope you have a safe and wonderful valentines day!

It's been awhile...

and for that I am sorry. You know how it goes. I guess right before the holidays was not the best time for me to try to start a blog, huh? Oh well. One of my goals for 2009 is to blog more often. Even if it's a simple share every few days, that counts, right? Well, in the spirit of that, I would like to share a little something with you.

This is a card that I made to enter into the PCMag's Gallery Idol last year. I didn't get into the finals, but my goal last year was just to try and enter. Well, that's it for now!