Timber!

The issue challenge for this week at Club CK is to use a card as inspiration for a layout.  I cruised the Cards, Crafts and Decor forum over there and found this awesome card by Patti in last week's challenge.

I really like how the ribbon divides the page and how the sentiment is to the bottom left.  So, here's my layout based off of it:

I pulled out one of my new punches - love it!  I'm falling in love with border punches, I have to say it!

I cut out my title using my Cricut - first time that I've pulled out that baby since June.  I used a 3-D flower from my stash and then stitched a little flourish using baker's twine.

I put the journalling where the sentiment was in the card and voilà - that's it.  The white ribbon, star brad and little clothes pins came with the kit that I used for the papers.

Baby Brother

I love these two pics of Baby A and Big Sister K.  She was so, so proud to be a big sister and just loved her little buddy.  So I wanted a simple page to show off the pics and I love the design of this page by Melissa Johnson:

So, I scraplifted it and came up with this:

Yep, you saw it right.  I used mist on the page!  I don't use it often so it ended up being too much for what I wanted but that's OK.  It still gives the white cardstock a little something.

Come and join us!!!

We're going to have lots of fun all weekend long over at Skrapnchat (click on link in sidebar)! There are going to be challenges, fast scraps, prizes and lots of chatting from Friday to Sunday. It's such a fun group of ladies and so inspirational! So, if yoy'd like some scrappy fun, come on over!

1 Month Old

I'm finally at A's one-month photos.  Yep, that's it!  However, I have done layouts from other points in his year but I can't believe how slow it's gone.  Wowzers!  And that's with all my scrapping last year too!  Oh well, at least I'm enjoying the process.  :D

These papers are old - I have no idea of any lines or anything.  Just using up my stash!  I was quite proud of myself for using some foam Thickers (I rarely use them) but I needed them to match so I inked them.  Note to self (and others):  NEVER INK THICKERS WITH REGULAR INK!  Nope, it doesn't stay on.  I thought it'd dry but it doesn't - it just keeps smudging.  Yuck!  I ended up getting ink on the background paper because of this fiasco.  Hence the flower trails!  lol  You gotta be creative to cover up your boo-boos, right?  I do like how they fill up some extra white space - I have issues embracing white space so filling it up is good for me.

Lucky

There are two challenges that I have committed to doing on a monthly basis.  One is for 2012's "One Little Word" and the other is for the Thanks Living challenge over at Club CK.  For January's layout, I knew exactly which one I wanted to use but I needed some time to think about how I wanted it to come out.  It took me a while to make it all come together because I wanted to make sure that the design, colours and embellishments gave the right feel to the layout.  Here's what I came up with using Melissa Bennett's digi kit "What About Love":

I know the journalling isn't very clear so since it's such an important part of the LO, I'm including it:

Ever since we discovered the lump on K’s chest, we’ve been worrying.  Worrying about what the lump is from, about how she got it and most importantly, what it means.  We went for the blood tests and ultrasound on December 15th and Dr. S said that if we didn’t hear from him, that everything was OK and to see him in three weeks.  We didn’t hear from him but it wasn’t reassuring enough.  D and I constantly had a worry in the back of our minds about this bump and what it could mean.  We tried not to think about the negative possibilities but it’s tough not to, especially with L’s battle with leukemia right now.

So today, I took K to the ER to meet with Dr. S again.  Thankfully, his report was great - the lump is getting softer and it’s moving, which means that there’s nothing to worry about.  This was the first time I had felt relief in weeks.  It was like a huge burden had been lifted off my shoulders.  However, I think this scare was exactly what I needed to gain a better 

perspective.  These last few months have been really tough with the move back home, buying a home and trying to get settled and me going back to work almost full time after being at home with K and A for five years.  I was not appreciating the beauty of being a mom; instead I was too caught up in the frenzy of life.  Now, though, I’ve changed.  I’m more patient, I’m more caring and I’m just more aware and thankful for those little moments and our beautiful little girl.  I think of these past five years and realize how very lucky I am to have K as my daughter.  God knew exactly what He was doing.                                                                                   January 5th, 2012

What was 2011 for me?

2011 was a milestone year for me in terms of scrapbooking (well, at least the first half).  I did 281 pages!  That is incredible for me!  Most of them were digi and most were our monthly "summaries" but they're still pages and they're still recording memories.  I was doing so great until we left Jamaica in June.

I tried many different products, techniques and just branched out so much.  I also joined a new scrappy message board, Skrap 'n Chat, where I met a fabulous group of ladies and where I continue to be inspired.  With the challenges going on there and at Club CK, I had so many neat ideas to work with.  I also started this scrappy blog to share my projects with fellow scrappers.  Along with that, I became more involved in blogs of other scrapbookers and realized how much of an inspiration they are!

July to December was a period where I did nothing creative and just tried to get myself settled in our new life in Canada.  Going back to teaching was a huge shocker in terms of how much work I have to bring home, which meant no free time.  And any free time I had during the day was spent enjoying my kiddos!

All in all, 2011 was a year of learning for me in many different ways, both creatively and just in terms of life.  Here's to 2012 being a year of peace and balance!

Stretch!

Another new baby layout!  I've been going in order since restarting so it's all about when A was brand new. lol

I started this layout for an SNC challenge to do everything on the skinny - thin and small embellies, trimming down the photos.  It started off fine but with the number of photos I wanted to include, it just didn't look right so I had to add in some bigger embellies.  However, the weekly issue challenge is to use pink in a different way than usual so I went with that!  I put a few different touches of pink on this layout - the pink middle border, the pink gems, the pink letter in the title.  And I really like it!!

Gramma's Little Chickadees

I can't believe that I've done so much scrapping in the last few days - it's amazing!  Especially after not having done any for so long.  But yay for me - I'm not complaining!

I did this layout for two challenges - the weekly challenge over at Club CK to use something new on a layout and Stacy's challenge at SNC to pull out the stamps and use two different ones on a layout.  I used a little bit of this and that for this layout.

I did the title using my new banner alpha stamps from CTMH - love them!  I wanted to add "Little Chickadees" in small alphas but I don't use them that much so I don't have a variety of colours.  The ones I have wouldn't work with this colour scheme.  So, I pulled out my new Bic ultra fine markers and voilà.  I'm not convinced I love my printing in the title but at least there's some of my printing in the album.  Everyone says how important it is so there you go!  lol

I pulled out a new little birdie stamp that I got in a RAK last year but have hardly used.  I thought I'd add them along the banner for some added interest.  I used my new CTMH watercolours to colour in the stamps.  I can tell I'm going to need lots of practice to make my stamps look better but it's a start!  I'd  never shaded in stamps before so another new thing for me.

I added a little button cluster to the baker's twine on the left and then a sticker, a birdie card, some sparkly bling and a bit of ribbon to finish it off.

A...So Sweet

This is a layout that I began before we left Jamaica but wasn't able to finish before we left.  Well, it had been left untouched until this week when I finally dug out my scrappy supplies.

It's so funny how my layouts always change as I'm going along.  I had initially thought of just the borders, the bears and a title.  As I was working on it, I decided that I needed more embellies with the bears so along came the hearts, flowers, tags and stitched circle.  I wasn't sure how I'd do the title, but I knew I wanted it to go in that space on the left.  I thought I'd use up some of the monograms I have from CTMH and then stickers from the kit I used.  I wanted to add some ribbon to make it part of a challenge over at SNC so I added a little tab of it.  When I was finished, I hadn't journalled anything but it wouldn't fit into the design - this happens to me often!  But I really wanted to include the story of how this was one of my favourite outfits of A's.  So, hidden journalling it was!

One Little Word

This past week there has been a lot of talk among scrapbookers about their One Little Word.  Ali Edwards is the person who created this concept and she has a class about it.  I've never done the class but have been interested in the concept for a while.  I chose a word last year but honestly, I don't even remember what it was.  I obviously didn't connect with it.  This year, however, it was different.

I haven't been doing any scrapbooking for the last six months because of the major life changes that have happened.  This Christmas vacation has allowed me to slow down, recharge my batteries and reflect.  One day, my word came to me.  Peace.  That is what needs to guide my life this year.  I need to live a life of peace.  I need to slow down.  I need to return my focus to my family and to myself.  I need to sleep well and eat well.  I need to give to others as well as to myself.

And so, that is my One Little Word.  Over at Club CK, there is a monthly challenge happening focused on your OLW.  I'm so excited to be a part of this challenge, along with the monthly Thanks Living challenge, and I feel that doing them will make my year be a great one.  Here is my project to inspire me throughout the year.  I googled inspirational quotes about inner peace and I chose my favourites.

Supplies:  Vanity Fair Aubergine digi kit (Jen Allyson)

Font - Francine

Santa Claus Parade

I am posting a layout - yes, you read that right!  In fact, it's a two-pager!  :D  I started these about a month ago after we went to the Santa Claus Parade here in town and then December got so busy that I never finished them.  Yikes!  So, I sat down a couple days ago and put the finishing touches on them.  Yay!

I took the kids to their first Santa Claus Parade and they loved it!  We got hot chocolate and then waited for all the floats to arrive.  You can tell we're in Western Canada with the theme of the floats - chuckwagons, tractors, Harleys.  :D  It's been so fun to be back home for Christmas.  All the festivities and preparations are just awesome and it was the first time K and A were able to experience it.  Yay!

The layouts are very simple.  I used a template by CZ, made some adjustments to suit my pictures, did the title, just location and date and that was it.  I wanted the pictures to tell the story and not let my words dictate the layout.  I'll tell the story another time.  :)

Template:  Cathy Zielske

Papers:  Echo Park - All I Want for Christmas

Festive Word Art:  Ali Edwards

2012

Wow, it's 2012 already! Where has the time gone? These last few months have been a whirlwind of activity for me. Once we decided to move back to Canada, life has flown by at a frantic pace. Our summer months were spent finding jobs, getting resettled in Canada - getting banking issues worked out, doing our driver's tests and road tests again, all that good stuff! - buying a house, renovating said house. We had two weeks to get as much done in the house before starting our new jobs. We obviously did not get it all done but we've been working slowly at it. The floors and walls are done now. We still need to replace lighting and windows but that'll happen in the spring.

I went back to work after staying at home for five years with the kids. I'm so utterly grateful to have had those five years. I loved that my job was to cook healthfully for our family and to raise our children. Of course, D was so supportive and is such a great husband and daddy and has been an equal partner in it all. However, with the move back home and having to buy a house when housing prices are very high meant that I'd be going back to work. I'm very thankful to have a wonderful homeroom class this year. I'm teaching 83% in French Immersion and Core French. I really enjoy teaching but it is so busy that I have found that life is very unbalanced. So that's one of my goals for 2012 - to find a better work/family/me balance.

K started kindergarten in the fall at the same school I'm at. She goes every other day. She has made some good friends and has a fantastic teacher, which makes her school experience great! A is staying home and we have family who is coming out to take care if the kiddos. My aunt, mom and D's parents take turns coming out and it's been so wonderful! One of the things that we didn't want to have to do was put the kids in daycare and this arrangement is perfect! The kids get to know family better and we know that they're being raised with the values that are important to us.

It was a frantic last few months but we're getting more and more settled in our new home. We like the schools we're at, our neighbourhood, our town. It's just a matter of being able to slow down enough to enjoy it! One thing we did amongst the madness was to make Sundays "family day". So we stopped all the busy-ness of life and just enjoyed time with the kids and together as a family. That made things so much better!

Happy New Year to everyone! I plan on being around more this year than of late. Now that my scrappy area is out and organized, I will be creating more!

Wow, way too long!

I have been absent from both the scrapping and blogging worlds for far too long.  I've missed scrapping so much but life has been so overwhelming.  We have moved into our new house and done lots of work with it.  We are finally done with the flooring and the painting and the baseboards are in too.  We've been busy unpacking all our things - our shipment from Jamaica and the things we had stored at both my parents' place and DH's parents' place.  Trying to find places for everything and making it all come together has been lots of work but lots of fun too.

I've also gone back to teaching after five years staying at home with our kiddos.  It's been tough but I'm very thankful that I have a great homeroom class so it's made the transition much easier.  I still wish I could stay home and be a homemaker but it's not in the cards.  I've also started selling ViSalus nutrition products. I've been taking them and I feel so much better, just healthier, and I want to share that with others.  I included a link in case you're interested.  :)

Tonight, I was so darn tired from life in general so I decided that I needed to do some scrapping.  I wasn't sure how it would go since I've had no creativity flowing through these veins in months, only practicality.  lol  But a good friend of mine has been patiently waiting on me to get a baby announcement done for her.  Her sweet baby boy was born in August so I decided that this was the project for me.  And I'm happy to say that I finished it and it turned out great!  Unfortunately, I can't share it with you.  But I'm hoping that this is the start to my return to the scrappy world.  I miss you all so much and I hope to get back into the swing of things soon!

Thank you!

I just have to say it, I have wonderful friends!  When we got back to my mom and dad's, I had two scrappy packages waiting for me - one from my friend Jennifer and one from my friend Melissa.  They know that I've been overseas and haven't had regular access to scrappy stuff so they loaded me up with scrappy goodness.  They are both very talented scrappers and I'm so lucky to count them among my friends.

 Here's what Jennifer sent me - first the whole package and then close-ups of the goodies.  What great stuff!  Thank you so much, Jenn, for everything you sent me.  I'm going to have so much fun using it all!

And this is from Melissa.  I won a RAK from her and look at all the great goodies she sent me.  Melissa, thank you so much for everything.  I'm so excited to use it on my layouts!

I met both of these ladies over at Club CK, which is such a wonderful community.  I'm so lucky to have made some great friends there, even though I've never met them in real life yet.  I would love to meet some people off the message board but until then, I'm happy to keep chatting away with them and getting to know them better.

June 2011

June was an incredibly busy month for us and full of changes.  We took plenty of pictures with everything that went on so that means lots of pages for the month!  Since we've been just as busy in July, I didn't get around to doing the collages but I decided that today was the day!  lol  So, here is our June in photos:

Thanks for stopping by!  Hopefully I'll be back soon with July's layouts too.  ;)

Back and forth

I find that I am so much more productive and inspired when I vary the projects/layouts that I work on.  When I do too many layouts for a certain project, I get to a point where all the layouts start looking the same and there's no creativity left in me.  Since I'm not caught up, I have plenty of different projects to choose from so I can keep scrapping without missing a beat.

The latest example of this is our road trip album that I've been working on for the last few months, off and on.  I was going great guns on it but then I had to take a break.  I left it alone for a few months and worked on other projects and then finally came back to it in February or March.  Now, I work on a layout here and there and have been quite pleased with them.

After doing the layout about K last week, I've gotten my creative juices flowing again so I decided to get back at it.  I'm far from doing a layout a day but hopefully I'll get there soon.  ;)

I used this sketch from Sketch Support for this layout.  It's the second time I've used it - actually the second time for our road trip album! - and I love it this time around too.  I used Misty Cato's "Rocky Shores" digi kit for it.

I wish I had discovered this jumping back and forth idea much earlier because I know I would have gotten so much more accomplished had I scrapped this way.  Oh well, better late than never, right?  :D

Long time, no post!

I never thought that I'd ever have such a long hiatus on my scrappy blog.  It's been a whirlwind of events since we left Jamaica.  We had a family situation that made us decide to end our overseas teaching adventure and return to western Canada, closer to family.  Since being home, we've had two birthday parties for A, got teaching jobs in the town that we really wanted, have started house hunting and taking care of the business of returning to Canada.  There is an insane amount of paperwork to do when you return but thankfully, we've now done most of it so we're making progress.

That said, I haven't had any time to do scrapbooking.  However, last night, as a sort of celebration, I sat down and did a page.  I hadn't scrapped the second interview I did with K so did an "All About Me" page about her, just after her birthday.

For this layout, I pulled the colours from K's dress and used part of the from the 2010 Quarterly Assortment 4 from Sweet Shoppe Designs.  Krystal Hartley's "Wistful" kit was perfect for my layout - love the patterns, the butterfly and the rub-on.  The fonts I used were Trebuchet, Unicorn and LD Red Hatter's Hand.

Thanks for stopping by.  Hopefully I'll be able to get a few more layouts done this summer before we start work at the end of August!

Building Blocks

This layout was for June's layout tag over at Skrap 'n Chat.  There are so many of those little moments photos that I want to scrap and these were two of those photos.  A has been having lots of fun building with Legos so I wanted to snap some photos of that.  I decided that I'd like to try different stuff - especially that stitched border around the page.  Not sure if it's my favourite but I do like it for this page.

I used Heather Roselli's "Busy Little Boys" digi kit for this layout.

Since we'll be travelling in the next few days, you won't be getting many updates from here for a while.  But hopefully I can still manage to get some stuff done!