Take me to the Beach...

Each summer, my mom and I like to take the girl cousins (her granddaughters/my nieces and daughter) to the beach.  There are currently 5 of them, but 1 is only 2 years old, so we only took 4 of the 5 girls to the beach.

I had recently found and bought a Polaroid camera for $10 at the Antique Faire and wanted to try it out.  Since Polaroid discounted the film for the cameras, I found that a company, Impossible, now makes the film...although pricey, it is still fun to use.  We used all 8 exposures on our trip to the beach.

I know it is kinda busy with all the patterns and such, but I like all the colors in the layout.

I had taken a photo of all 8 of the Polaroids in the sand to post on Instagram.  I then let my mom and the 3 older girls take their favorite Polaroid home.

The "Going on an Adventure" tag is from Amy Tangerine's Stitched-Jump Stitch.  The "A Day at the Beach" stamp is from Ali Edwards Beach stamp set.  The background paper is Dear Lizzy's Happy Place-Beachy Betsy.

I had subscribed to the Studio Calico Stationery kit for a couple of months and the "June 2016" card came with one of the kits.  I stamped "Friday" with the Amy Tangerine's Oh Happy Life roller stamp.  The "Life is better in Flip Flops" is from Kaisercrafts Sandy Toes stamp set.

This envelope was also from the June Studio Calico Scout Stationery kit.  I used the We R Memory Keepers typecast teal ribbon to type all of our names in the 'sky'.  The ampersand is from the Project Life Value kit Notes & Things (I think). 

I used Amy Tangerine Stitched-Applique, Amy Tangerine Stitched-Bobbin, and Amy Tangerine Stitched-Thrifted papers to layer the photos on.  The "so love the sound of the waves" is from the Ali Edwards Beach stamp set.  The camera paper clip is from American Crafts.  The "shine" bit is from Webster's Pages These Are the Days-June.

I think I got this wooden tag from Michaels--the glitter was already on the tag.  The "California" and "girls" is from a discontinued Kelly Purkey stamp set.  The hearts are from the Amy Tangerine's Oh Happy Life roller stamp. 

The journal tag is from Amy Tangerine Sketchbook bits pack.  

So we didn't take my youngest niece, Max, to the beach with us because she is two.  Later, my mom texted me to tell me that she had drawn all over one of the Polaroid photos.  I found it too funny and I like to think she was mad that she wasn't able to have a beach day with us :)

This "Polaroid" bit from Maggie Holmes Confetti ephemera pack was perfect for this layout.

I hope my links help you find any of the products...I do not get any thing for linking any of the products.  I am actually not sure if I am going to link in the future since it takes a while to find some of the items since a lot of the stuff I use is older.

Thank you for looking!

Wicked Good Time...

About a month ago, my mom took me, my daughter and two of my nieces to San Francisco to see the play Wicked.

It was nice...my daughter and I had seen it before, but it is still awesome...and funny!  It was the first time that my mom and nieces watched it though and they had a great time.

It took me a couple of weeks to complete the layout (and another couple to post because I am a slow creator), but it is finally done.

One of my main blocks was the background papers.  I didn't know if I wanted to use plain black cardstock or plain white card stock, but then I found this Amy Tangerine Plus One paper in my stash that was perfect to mimic the black and white of the poster.

The inspiration for the layout was the poster (in the layout above) and the playbill.

I actually wanted to put it on the layout, but it was too big for the layout plus I already had a good picture of the girls in front of the poster for my layout.

From the playbill, I pulled out the black and the white and of course the green, but I also pulled out the red from her lips.

Everything I used was from my stash (yippee!) and I am sure it is all pretty old.  Along with the background paper, I used the backside of another Plus One paper (the polka dot), a black glitter sheet from the DCWV Street Lace pack, green swirly glittery paper from K&Company, American Crafts white and dark red cardstock, white glitter paper, my mega date stamp, green thickers, Heidi Swapp color shine in white, black velvet, & citron, and a journal card from the Stampin' Up PL Love Story. 

I am really trying to use stuff that I have and not buy too much anymore...but that doesn't mean I haven't bought anything this past month! haha

Thank you for looking! :)

Some Things Old and Some Things New

A few weeks ago, a couple friends and I were drooling over the new Target Spot goodies (thanks to the Instagram enablers--haha), so we went all on scavenger hunts checking the Targets around us looking for these cute supplies (over about a week's time).

After we had rounded up the items we wanted, we met up at Starbucks to trade our goodies with each other--It was so fun!

At our meet-up, we challenged each other to do some memory keeping and use the stuff we just got :)

Our challenges were to:

~Do 1 Project Life (pocket page) layout
~Do 1 (traditional) Scrapbook page
~Decorate our Planners
~Journal/Create in our Fauxdori
~Use the stuff we just got (either on 1 or all 4 of the above)

We gave each other 2 weeks--although, we are so lenient that we will get them done when we get them done--haha.

Since I haven't watched too much tv lately (there is nothing on!) and I gave up reading for a week, I completed 3 of the 4 challenges on the 4th of July weekend.

Here is my traditional scrapbook layout:

I used the gold washi tape from the Target Spot.  I also used washi tape from the Dear Lizzy Fine & Dandy line and some plain lime green and some green polka dot washi that I've had in my stash (I don't remember from where).

The two wood veneers (the pineapple and flamingo) are from the Pink Paislee Citrus Bliss line.  I used Color Shine to color them both.  On the flamingo, I had first sprayed the primrose color shine, but you couldn't really see the outline of the bird, so I went over it with a marker...well then the outline was too dark, so I sprayed a couple more layers of color shine and it worked out ok for my liking (the pack gives you 2 flamingos so if anything I could have started over with the other one).  On the pineapple, I used a paint brush to color the top with Citron Color Shine and Gold Lame Color Shine on the bottom--the gold is just enough without being too much for the layout.

I used a yellow cardstock (just from a Recollections pack I've had forever) as the base and the accent papers were all from old lines.  The Pink with swirls was from Sandylion Barbie line.  The pink plaid is from the DCWV Blossoms & Butterflies 6x6 pack.  The white with yellow polka dots is from the Dear Lizzy 5th and Frolic line.  And the yellow plaid is an old KI Memories Summer line.

The photo frame is from Crate Paper.  The journaling block on the left side is from Crate Paper Darling line.  On the bottom left, the journal sticker came from Pebbles--from 2009 and I can't find them online.  The title stickers are from the Amy Tangerine Rise and Shine line.  I also used the Heidi Swapp date stamp and the Amy Tangerine markers throughout.

On the right, I used a journal card from the Project Life Trinkets Value kit and word embellishments ("the little things" and "good times") from the Project Life Notes & Things Value Kit.  The "laugh more" sticker is from Amy Tangerine's Yes, Please line.  The pink  arrow is from Amy Tangerine Rise & Shine and the black arrow is from Heidi Swapp Hello Beautiful Collection.  The yellow with white polka dots is also a very old line from Bo Bunny Shabby Princess line.  And the "Create" epoxy sticker is from White Blossom (I can't find online).

I know most of the supplies I listed are so old and maybe it is pointless to point them all out, but I wanted to show how I used some new stuff with lots of older stuff that I have been hoarding.  I had pulled all my supplies that I wanted to use and tried to do a 15 minute page like Jaime Waters showed was possible in her BPC class, but I totally failed.  It took me about 2 hours to complete this page! ha ha.  That is ok, I wasn't doing it for the race, I enjoyed making this page.

About the page--this past May, I got together with Jossie, Liz, and Theresa on National Scrapbook day...the theme was Pineapples and Flamingos (hence the theme of my page).  We had an awesome fun time and I couldn't wait to use the supplies I've had gotten for the page (the veneers and Dear Lizzy washi) and incorporate them with older supplies.

Thank you for reading all my babbling, if you made it this far--haha :D

I was going to show all the challenges complete on this post, but it got way too long...so I will do separate posts for each :)

Paper Collection...

...aka Paper Hoarding!

My craft room organization has been going on for some time, but I really like my paper storage and don't plan on changing it.  I've had these Michaels cubes (turned sideways) and Cropper Hopper paper holders for some time.

The cubes are housed under my work table which is easy to get to and works perfectly.

So what do I have in there?

1. 8 1/2 x 11 Cardstock (mostly Recollection brand)

2. 12x12 Cardstock (Some Bazzill, CTMH, DCWV, and Recollection)

3. White & Black 12x12 & 8 1/2 x 11 card stock (Recollection brand)

4. Dear Lizzy, Maggie Holmes, Basic Grey, and Recollection paper packs

5. More paper packs (Amy Tangerine and DCWV) and some water color paper 

6. 8x8 paper pads (DCWV and Slabs)

7. more 8x8 DCWV pads and some 4.5x6.5 DCWV pads

8. 6x6 paper packs (Simple Stories, DCWV, and Basic Grey)

9. Christmas papers and pads

10. More Christmas, Halloween papers and some Valentine's packs

11. Disney papers (missing from photo) and Basic Grey papers (lots!)

12. Assorted CTMH paper packs and cardstock

13. Miscellaneous papers (sorted by lines--Love, Elsie, Rusty Pickle, etc.)

14. Miscellaneous papers (sorted by themes--baby, school, sports, etc.)

15. 12x12 DCWV paper packs and Slabs

16. 12x12 Michaels Slabs

As I am typing this, I am realizing I have a lot more than I remember.  I also have 3 more 4.5x6.5 paper pads in my Ikea Raskog cart!  But I am going to focus on the Slabs in this post.

What are Slabs?  180 pieces of thin paper that Michaels sold in a pack.  Now they sell "Paper Pads" which are a bit thicker paper (but not much).

When I first started scrapbooking, I was constantly buying the Slabs when they would come out…with the weekly coupons, it seemed cheaper that way…but I never used most of it--so it wasn't cheaper!  

A few years ago, one of our nieces asked for donations of craft supplies for her daughter's Girl Scout troop, so I took 2/3 of every Slab and lots of cardstock to her.  Well since then I still haven't used any of the Slabs!  (ok, I used 2 sheets on one card I made for my friend's mom, but that is it!)

Lately, I've been going through all my supplies and setting aside items in boxes to donate to a local Girl Scout troop--preferable a Brownie troop since I was a Brownie so long ago :D

So I will finally be donating the remaining papers from the Slabs 1-6

At least that was the plan…except for Slab 3 which I was never going to donate because I plan to use that paper when I finally complete our Honeymoon (to Mexico) album.

But then as I looked through the papers, I wanted to keep Slab 6 as well since it has always been my favorite Slab.  (Maybe I will only keep half of it.)

Then, I took out a few more papers from the other Slabs.

Shhh!!!

I actually thought I had sworn off paper packs a long time ago, but within the last year, I have been collecting American Crafts paper packs from Dear Lizzy (3 pads), Amy Tangerine (2 pads), some Recollection pads, and yesterday I added the Maggie Holmes pad!!!  eeekkk…I have a problem.

I so need to used them up and stop buying more paper!  

I am waiting on 2 deliveries though--one contains 50 sheets of Bazzill (got it for cheap through Blitsy) and the other contains Simple Stories Say Cheese line (again got a good deal).  

And I am drooling over the Amy Tangerine Plus One paper pack…and then that is it…I will quit paper! ;)

Fleur de Lis Mini Album (surprise winner!)

My kids and husband laugh at me because sometimes I "heart" every single photo on my Instagram feed.  I like the pictures because they are always awesome!  Sometimes I don't even read what the photo is about.

So a few weeks ago, I did my normal...'I will like this photo without reading the caption' and the next day I see that I am tagged in this photo:

What???  I didn't even remember entering a contest.  Normally, on Instagram, you have to tag people to win stuff or repost the picture and hashtag and tag the contest coordinator.  So this time I had to look to see what I won.  It was a cute Fleur de Lis wood mini album from Genuinely Jane Studios.

Luckily, my kids went to a high school where the fleur de lis was their emblem--otherwise I would have felt bad for taking the prize. :/

I knew right away that I would decorate it and put their first day of school for each year they were in high school.  I could have just used the book as it was, but I decided to take it apart and only use 2 of the "pages" as the cover and the back.  Then I traced them to make inside pages in the school colors (orange and blue).

After, I painted one wood cover blue and the other orange.  My local scrapbook store, Scrapbook Island, carries 12 x 12 paper with the local high school names and logos and coordinating paper. So I covered the front and back with that. 

After all the work of tracing, cutting the odd shape, painting, and using an exacto knife to trim around the paper I covered the front and back with...I was pretty much done...I was at the point where I just wanted to finish it.

So here is my pretty plain mini album...maybe someday I will go back and embellish a bit more...maybe.

I can't believe it is ending soon!  My daughter was a sport and took a selfie on her first day of college for me, but I am sure my son will "forget" if I ask him.

My Christmas Paper Collection

This year, I swore I wasn't going to buy any Christmas paper because I have too much Christmas paper!  But then this beautiful Kraft Christmas Theme paper followed me home from Michaels :)

Even though I have yet to make a Christmas scrapbook layout, I have used the Holiday paper to make some cards and also used it to make albums to store past Christmas cards received.  

Then there was this one time I went through my stash and gave some of the paper (from Christmas Slabs--not the good stuff--ha ha ha) to my niece for her daughter's girl scout troop.

But other than that...it just sits there waiting...wanting to be used.

I had an obsession with the Slabs and Stacks for a while.

In addition to those, I have a few single papers from various collections--aren't they so awesomely pretty!!

Basic Grey-Figgy Pudding & Blitzen

Love Elsie-Noel

Various papers

My Mind's Eye-Be Merry

Bo Bunny-Snowfall (not all that "Christmasy" but oh so yummily pretty!!!!)

I did not add links since most of these papers are so old that they are no longer available to buy.

Like my November Project Life, I plan to combine my December Project Life into a December Daily // Journal Your Christmas format.  Ali Edwards has done the Daily December for years as a mini album, but again, just like November, I don't have time or enough items to take double pictures of every day for an entire month (and why have scrapbook the same thing twice).  So this is my solution.

I tried using up my Christmas//Holiday papers that I had for my journal cards and hoped to not buy any more Christmas paper, but after going through all the papers I had, I was a few papers short of a full month (I mean I can't use the same papers twice, right?)

So I HAD to stop at my Local Scrapbook Store--Scrapbook Island for a couple more sheets.

"Week" 4x6 cards (4 weeks)

"Daily" 4x3 cards (35 cards--31 days, plus 4 date cards)

Now I am all ready for my Daily December/Project Life-December :)  I just have to take some pictures and journal :D

Mini Album ~Birthday~

About a month ago, my friend ask me if I could take pictures at her daughter's 10th birthday party.  She wanted me to take pictures of the birthday girl with each guest so she could give them a copy of the picture in a frame as part of their favor. 

I set up using my D50 because it is way easier to use than my D300.  Then I printed the pictures out using my PoGo that I haven't used in forever.

That made me think about doing a mini album for her since I already had the pictures.  The theme of the party was "Circus", so I searched my mini album books and found a cute cupcake mini album (it kinda went together).  I wasn't sure how I was going to attack that one, so I googled to see if I could find some albums.  Well I found lots of cupcake mini albums made from a $1 mini album found at Michaels, problem was that they were made over a year ago and Michaels no longer carried the mini album (I checked a couple of Michaels just in case).  

So the wheels in my head spun around.  Finally, I found a sample of cupcakes clipart online and enlarged the picture on my screen.  I took plain printer paper and traced the cupcake on it--using my monitor as a light box.  Then I transferred my tracing to some chipboard to use as my template which was then used to cut the cupcake in different colors.  There may have been an easier and better way, but I was on limited time.

The completed project:

Supplies used:  Basic Grey Blush Be Mine and Basic Grey Lollipop Shoppe Fruit Punch, Primary Colors cardstock by Recollections (Michaels), assorted ribbon, binder ring, EK Success-Binding edge punch and some colored reinforcement circles.  All older supplies from my overstocked stash.

I found the reinforcement circles at Staples quite a few years ago on clearance for 50 cents.  The clearance sticker says 2008 and this is the first time I have used them.  I use them to reinforce (duh) the holes punched for the binder ring.

As you can see there are normal circle ones and cute flowers ones.  In the flower pack, there are also some red heart ones--someday I may use those as well :)

Mini Album ~Prom~

I have not scrapbooked in a long time.  Scrapbooking was my first hobby!  I have so much stuff because I think shopping for supplies was my second hobby :-p  Whether it was time or my other hobbies getting in the way, I just haven't scrapbooked in a while.

Then, I bought the latest issue of Mini Albums.  I normally try to steer clear of buying these because 1. they are kinda pricy 2. I have too many idea books already and 3. I never use said idea books I already have!

But this issue, not only caught my eye, it was 10% off (ok, free tax) and my awesome Aunt had given me a gift certificate to Joann's...so really it was free--she rocks!

Well I have a ton of idea books that I like things, but never go back and actually do them.  But this time, I seen a mini album for a prom and the light went on!  Last month, I took pictures of my Goddaughter before her Senior Prom.  I was totally going to make her one.  Problem, it was already late Monday and I wanted to give it to her on Saturday.  Plenty of time for normal scrapbookers, but I usually take forever to get something together.

Timeline:

~Monday--only time to print some pictures (I really need to calibrate my monitor because all my pictures are so dark when I print them!).  I also pulled out the perfect chipboard book that my equally awesome Scrapbook Bestie gave me a while back.  It is now discounted, but I finally found something cool to do with it. Cloud9 Board Book 8 x 3.25

~Tuesday--we had plans and didn't get home until late :(

~Wednesday--I went "shopping" in my craft room to find the perfect papers (DCWV All Dressed Up--totally old, but perfect!), ribbon, and looked for anything I thought I would love to use!  I started the book and only finished the front and back covers.  I was kinda bummed I hadn't finished more.  I didn't think I was going to make the deadline.

~Thursday--Finished the box and a few more pages in the book.

~Friday--Got into a rhythm and finished it in no time (like in 2 hours!)  Then I was so excited that I had to share a sneak peek to my aunt...even though I wanted her to be surprised as well.

The book comes in a box, so here is the front    

and the back

 

The DCWV papers are pretty thick and luckily the box had some extra room, but the booklet snuggly fits inside

The front cover 

Showing off the details including her beautiful shoes and his comfy sneakers.  The journaling (the only journaling I did because I hate that part of the process) says "Important Details *Hair *Makeup *Shoes Beautiful Perfection".

Her and her girl friends

Her, her friends and their dates

Her and her boyfriend

More of her and her boyfriend

Last page is a picture of her boyfriend carrying her shoes and her and her parents

Back of the book.

I really had a great time doing this book.  And I was so excited that it didn't take me forever to do!  I hope she enjoys it as much as I do.