How can this be?

I spent forever last night digging through my library-of-congress size stash of paper and I realized I have next to NO baby girl paper! That is just dreadful, don't you think? I mean, sure, I have no girls to scrap for, and all my friends and relations have only boys as well. (Seriously, all the babies in the generation down from me have been boys!) And sure, I have a ton of pretty, flowery paper I could probably use for a baby girl project. Bu it just wasn't what I wanted for this project. I finally found one piece I liked, but it's not super baby-ish. This is an altered comp book (one of my fave projects!) for my dear friend Toby's baby shower tomorrow. We're all SO excited that somebody is finally having a girl!

By the way, I think I know what I'll be keeping an eye out for at the Scrapbook Expo next month -- baby girl paper! (Along with about 1000 other things... this is me, counting down the days and saving up my pennies!)

ONE YEAR of JOY!

I am loving this scrapping non-chronologically thing so far. I did this layout for Regina Easter's Base Camp numbers" challenge over on her blog: http://regina-bittenbythebug.blotspot.com/. I knew when she gave us the details, this was just the sort of thing i wanted to do. And isn't my little guy a cutie? All the numbers and letters (with one exception) were cut from Base Camp as follows: small numbers at 1 1/4", big 1 at 5 1/2", "ONE YEAR" and "JOY!" at 1 1/4". "of" was cut with the Cuttlebug "Curls and Swirls" alpha. The tags (which will have more pictures of the big day" were cut from Zooballoo at 3", once on shadow (the dark blue) and once on silhouette (the colored outlines). Paper is from Basic Grey. TFL!

Family Ups & Downs = Time for Cards!

Whenever a member of my family or a loved ones has a happy event or a challenge in their life, one of my first thoughts is "Hmmm, what kind of card would work best for this?" Sad, I know, but there you have it. Here are two cards I made last night. The first is for my little sister, who is going through a very difficult time, and I wanted to remind her how much we love her.

If you'd like more info on this card, here is a link to where I've posted it, along with all the materials and instructions, on the Cricut messageboard:

http://www.cricut.com/messageboard/tm.aspx?m=991201

And this one is for my little brother, who just entered the MTC today in preparation for serving a two-year LDS mission to Nicaragua. Hooray! I am just SO stinkin' proud of him. As I thought about what advice I would give him and what I learned from my own mission, I just thought "make every minute count." So this card is based on the number of minutes in two years, which turned out to be a little too abstract, since I had to explain it to everyone... Oh well, you win some, you lose some!












The striped and polka dot paper are from My Mind's Eye, and the "Called to Serve" paper is from Rusty Pickle. I cut the clock from Going Places and the numbers from Base Camp (both Cricut). The corners are hand cut.

Stay tuned -- in a similar vein, I'll be making a card tonight for my brother and sister-in-law, whose adoption of sweet baby Noah is being finalized tomorrow!

I am a liberated scrapper!

So I finally decided to liberate myself from trying to "catch up," and I've really been having fun! Here are three pages that I've been wanting to do forever but I was trying to get caught up to them. They are all for the scrapbook I've been doing for my family -- it's 8x8, so it's easy to scan and make prints for everyone.

This first one is my sweet little nephew Noah, who is just the most precious baby ever. I decided to focus on how much everyone in our family loves him, so I couldn't pick just one or two or five pictures.... :) I cut the title with the Stamped Cricut cartridge, and the flourish stamps are from CTMH.

This one is my handsome little bro Nick and his sweet girlfriend, Crystal. Nick was just tickled pink when I asked for a copy of this pic to put in the scrapbook, and that made me really happy. Always nice to know your efforts are appreciated! I just love these scrumptious papers from Sassafrass Lass -- when I saw them at the store, I had no idea what I would use them on but I just couldn't resist. I thought they worked perfectly for this pic!

This last one is from our family reunion this summer. I think this would take the record for the fastest digital layout I've ever done -- I just set up the boxes, slapped the pics in there, and put in the faux label tape and little journal note. I love a fast page!

Do I dare?

Stop scrapping chronologically? I don't know if I can do it! I've always gone in order, but I have gotten to the point where I don't think I'm ever going to REALLY get caught up, and there are a lot more projects I have in mind that I feel like I just can't do until I get caught up. But then I think I'll have scrapper's guilt over the 11 months or so that won't be in the scrapbooks, if I just give up and start from right now. So I think what I'll do is work on the projects I actually WANT to do right now, then if I have extra time and energy and desire I can go back and work on old pics later. Anyone else have this same dillemma? Dilemna? How is that word spelled, anyway?

I've been nominated for

My friend Patsy Jackson has nominated me for a "Nice Matters" award! I feel so honored to be in the group she nominated. She does beautiful work -- you should really go check out her blog (there's a link in the list of blogs I love at the left). Now I'll have to think about who I'd like to nominate!

Going through scrapping withdrawals!

Well, we're still here in the hospital in Idaho Falls. We were hoping to go home yesterday, but it's looking like we won't be out until tomorrow at the earliest. At least Dan is feeling much, much better today. He's actually feeling great! We just can't go home until more of the infection is cleared out. So really we're both just sitting around bored out of our minds! Thank heavens my dad loned me his laptop, or I'd really go crazy. I miss my scrapping stuff! I have some fun projects I was looking forward to starting, and now I have all this time on my hands and no supplies. :)

Yesterday was a great day in one way, though -- my scrap space was featured in the Cricut Chirp! I was so excited when I got the email last week. It means I get a free cartridge, too, and I'm crossing my fingers that they'll hook me up with Accent Essentials (still waiting to hear if that's a possibility). I think the best part about it is just the gratification of knowing others think your projects are great, too!

The results are in!

The results of the "favorite companies" poll are in:


Scenic Route
10 (14%)

Crate Paper
15 (21%)

Chatterbox
13 (18%)

7Gypsies
17 (24%)

Autumn Leaves -- LOVE the clear stamps
27 (39%)

Scrapworks
4 (5%)

Other -- send me a comment and tell me what else you can't do without!
27 (39%)


In the "other" category, the clear winner was Basic Grey, but companies like Daisy D's, Chatterbox, and Bo Bunny Press also got votes. And these lines are high on my list, too! Just goes to show why you can spend so much money so fast when you love paper goodies -- so much great stuff out there!

Would you scrap an appendectomy?

This morning I was at about mile 2 of my first ever 5k when my sweet hubby called me from Idaho Falls, where he was on a business trip, to tell me he was heading to the ER with what he thought was a kidney stone. After I finished the race I called for an update and he said the doctors thought it was really his appendix! My wonderful dad immediately volunteered to drive me up to Idaho Falls, four hours away, to be there with Dan, so we left the boys with my mom and jumped in the car. Before we left, though, I was sure to tuck my camera into my bag -- after all, one doesn't get appendicitis every day!

And thank goodness for that! Poor Dan was in so much pain. By the time they were able to get him in for surgery, his appendix had ruptured and had an abscess and all sorts of yuck. After the surgery Dan felt a whole lot better and has done really well throughout the evening, which I feel is a wonderful blessing from Heavenly Father.

It makes me wonder, though, why I feel so compelled to document all our family happenings, both good and bad. In my quest to get "caught up" with my scrapbooking, I always feel guilty if I skip over some event or cute picture (which is why I am still so far behind). I guess I just want to make sure that all our ups and downs are preserved! We learn from both sides, I suppose. For instance, today I was so worried about Dan, but it made me appreciate him and love him more than ever! dBut now I'm falling asleep even as I type, so, from the EIRMC in Idaho Falls, I'll say goodnight!

My first ATCs!

I've been wanting to get into ATCs ever since I heard about them! ATCs (Artist Trading Cards) are 2.5" x 3.5" works of art -- the way I understand it, you can use any media and turn them into anything you want! ATCs are meant to be traded, never sold, so I made these ones for a "not paper" swap on the Cricut Messageboard. You all know I LOVE paper, so I thought I'd better challenge myself to do something without it!

I just love it when you have a project envisioned in your head and it turns out just as great as you imagined it! I've been planning these for weeks, and I love them so much it's going to be hard to send them off!

The metal card foundation is from Making Memories, and so is the scallop stamp on the sides. Oh, and the little tags are MM too, I think. I punched holes for the lacing with my cropodile. The flourishes are Basic Grey rub-ons, and the flowers are Primas.

My self-imposed shopping ban...

I've realized lately that my self-discipline when it comes to craft-supply shopping is next to nil, and so a week or two ago I decided to place myself under a shopping ban until the Scrapbook Expo at the end of September. It's already been tougher than I thought! Archivers called and said they finally had a Bind-it-all in stock that I could use my 30% off coupon on, but I let it go. Then Roberts (my favorite scrap store) is having a big ol' sale this week -- all printed paper is 40% off! Surely it would be irresponsible of me to forgo those deals?! I think I am going to go down there, but just to get paper to make a gift album for my friend Toby. In my thousands of sheets of paper, I don't have anything good for a baby girl album! With so many little boys in the family, I've never needed more than a sheet or two at a time! But I promise I'll only buy what I need for the album...

On second thought, maybe I'll just do an altered comp book instead. I know I already have the supplies for that, and then I can keep feeling virtuous about my self-control... I'll have to keep you posted!

4 Different Baby Shower Invites

Well, my SIL Ann knew how happy she was making me when she asked for help making invites for her sister's baby shower. Here are three different ideas I came up with for her to choose from. You might notice that the invite with the little dress is the same sketch as my pig card from last week!

Card #1: The crawling baby, "baby shower" and the card itself are from New Arrival, and that little bit of patterned paper is from Basic Grey.

Card #2: The dress is from New Arrival and the scalloped circle is from Mini Monograms. "You're invited" is a magnetic stamp from Making Memories. The paper is also from MM. The little flower is a punch.

Card #3: Plaid paper is from Keeping Memories Alive, I believe. Another scallop circle from Mini-monos and a mommy cut on black-out mode from NA, along with photo corners from Jasmine, complete this card. On this one I'd print the shower info right in that space.

And as long as I'm at it, I'll include the shower invite I made for my other SIL (Sarah) last week. This mommy is very time and material-consuming but she sure is cute!

My Scrap Room!

My scrap space is finished! I've been having a lot of fun personalizing my scrap space over the past couple of days. The most exciting thing for me about finishing our basement was the prospect of having my own large space for crafting, since before I had a very small desk space and everything was just crammed together.
I chose this color scheme because #1, I just love this elegant black-and-cream paper from ScrapWorks and Scenic Route, and #2, I thought it would make a good, neutral backdrop for displaying my colorful cards and other stuff. Hope you like it as much as I do!





This magnet board came unfinished (made by Provo Craft). I painted it black, then heat embossed the white flourishes on and added words from Base Camp -- these are the the words I thought best embodied the reasons I love to craft. Oh, and the flourish stamps are from Close to My Heart -- one of my newest goodies!


My Prima collection -- I really need to remember I have these! Plus a T for Tomi!











I bought this as a green floral foam topiary, then covered it with about 50 1" flowers, cut with George and attached with brads. I painted the green foam black so that any gaps weren't noticeable. The flourish stamps on the base and the tin are from Autumn Leaves, stamped with StazOn. I punched the holes and set the eyelets with my Cropodile -- what a great tool!

These drawers hold all my scraps, and they were always so unsightly. I made faces for them with this Scrapworks paper, and added scalloped circle labels cut from Mini-Monograms. I used a 7Gypsies journaling stamp in the center.
Card box: Home to my card stash! This is just a regular photo storage box, altered with Scrapworks paper. The flower is from WIMG, "CARDS" is from Base Camp, and the scallop on the lid is from Mickey & Friends. The little tags are from Scenic Route.

Magazine box: Purchased unfinished from IKEA, painted black and covered on the inside with Scrapworks paper. The flourishes on the front are more of the Autumn Leaves stamps, heat embossed in white. The bookplate was cut with Fab Finds, then heat embossed in silver.

Binders: The paper in the far-left binder is from Scrapworks, and all the rest is from Scenic Route. Titles are cut with Base Camp.

The tall drawer tower on the right is from IKEA -- these drawers are HUGE! I can't believe how much it holds. A few of them are still empty!

The white cubes beneath the desk are from Crop-in-Style, and I just love them. They hold so much. My new desk measures 5 1/2' wide by 3' deep, which makes a very nice work surface.

Working away on my scrap space...

I haven't posted any new projects for a few days because I have turned my attention toward beautifying my scrap space! I've been trying to figure out how I wanted to decorate it forever, and the ScrapWorks paper I used for a couple of my cards below really inspired me. I can't wait to show you all pics! Should be done today!