Crazy?

Good Wednesday Morning!

I finished a page last night and wanted to share it with you.  It's based off of Sketch 268, from Creative ScrappersSketch 268, from Creative Scrappers:








And here is my take:

Really, I did start off looking a lot like the sketch; until my loose circles fell to one side as I lifted the cardstock from the table.  As you can see, I really liked it.  Still, to be sure, I slept on it; put the circles back; turned the sketch on it's side and wound up putting it back the way The Powers That Be intended for it to be.  I really do like this sketch enough that I intend to keep playing with the general design. It might become my go-to sketch when I'm stuck.

I only took a couple close-ups but I want to mention several things about this page:

• The plain cardstock in the back was NOT making me happy.  Still, I knew I needed a large chunk of "white space" for the journaling that I'm adding, now that the pictures have been taken.  A bottle of Ranger mist has been sitting unloved for a couple years, so I combined that with my favorite stencil to create the slightest hint of interest in the background.  That was apparently my premission to have some fun.
• While I spent about 24 hours trying to decide on where I was going to put my circles, I fussed with each of them to start the layers as seen in the sketch above.  I managed to distress and ink the edges of the two navy circles before I left for a crazy-long appointment.  By the time I got home, I was tired and had forgotten to finishe the rest.  I'm telling myself that the outlining I did on two other circles AND the heart (also before the appointment) made that okay.
• Several days ago, I was finally brave enough to stop "loving" my foil paper and start cutting some of it up.  The bajillion gold and red stars are in a container, waiting for their turn, but I wasn't about to throw out the left overs.  Ergo, the red foil strip behind the circles.
• Sprinkled ink and sequins are slowly making their way into the "I Freaking Love This" category.

• What do you think about the paper airplanes?  I have been inspired by one of the sheets that Crate Paper released recently.  Then, I remembered that a couple other crafters used handmade paper airplanes on their pages within the last year.  I'm absolutely doing that again.

• Did you recognize the Dr. Seuss quote?  I LOVE that man, and about flipped my lid when I saw that Fancy Pants had a stencil with this quote.  Problem:  I only have the one stencil and am not yet prepared to attach IT to a single page.  Solution:  I popped out the letters inside the stencil for a furture page (that's one use).  I traced the inside of the stencil for this layout (that's 2 uses; but I can really do this as many times as I want).  When I start to get tired of looking at the thing, I can give myself permission to get the stencil messy by dabbing out the quote with inks, paint, etc (that's three/more uses).  Finally, when I'm REALLY done looking at the thing, I can just paint it; embellish it, do whatever I want with it and add the stencil itself to the page (that's four uses; and kills the stencil).  OH!  But check this!  I've still got the letters that I popped out, so I can pretty them up and use them as well (five/more uses to make that buck stretch.  Score!).
• That last (pretty empty) third of the page will be used for the lengthy journaling.  When The Boy starts to act overcome with energy, he will often ask me if he is crazy, or weird.  In that moment, I easily answer yes.  He quickly tells me, "Wrong answer."  My mom thinks I'm putting negative thoughts in his head.  I don't see it that way; so I want to explain to him how being crazy, or weird, is a VERY GOOD thing; that the world needs more weird people who aren't afraid to be creative, energetic, genuine, and true.  He's not "normal," and I love that about him.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

The quote in the top left is a stamp from Jillibean Soup.  It was the reason I bought the set.  It was time to start using it.  Oh, and the circles of stars are part of that same set.

Party Animal

Happy Thursday! How does this day find you?  I have to admit, I'm pre-writing again, so I'm just going to say it's beautiful here and hope I'm right. Really, it's supposed to be hot and sunny. This could be a great day.

Yesterday, I mentioned that I was trying something new (to me) this past week -- the splatters.  I tried it again on another layout.  It's less daring and just "okay" in my opinion, but I'd really like to read your thoughts, if you'd care to share them.

This page was inspired by another Birthday Sketch at Creative Scrappers.  More specifically, it's this sketch here:




It is such an unexpected design that I at least had to try it.  There are two strips of paper in the background.  The rest are, what I'm calling, washi tapes of the world.  Translation:  I don't remember what company made which tape.  I just have them and use them.  The red vellum behind the photos was exactly what my eyes needed to focus on the pictures of the day.

I kinda jerry-rigged my journal spot.  I wanted something red.  I wanted to use some of my new love -- corrugated paper.  I wanted to be able to keep some part of the incline created in the background.  Solution:  1 Fancy Pants journal card + home-made photo frame overlay = content Momma.  Again, story told and in the books.  If you're curious here are a few of the (easier to read) details.

• The Boy has learned to be creative with cake design.  He actually dictated about three or four different cake design ideas.  One, was going to involve me crafting a treasure chest out of Rice Krispy treats and Kit Kats, then filling the chest with fondant-laden dragon eggs.  Yeah, he knows about Nerdy Nummies.  We settled on SpongeBob with a Terminator eye.
• He's a typical gaming boy; so he was happy with his haul.
• The crown on his head!  He designed that crown on copy paper, cut it out and had me staple the back so he could have his very own birthday crown.  He even wore it to school on his birthday. Yep!  That's my boy!

Beyond this, I'm eyeballing colors for another project.  I'm staring at a printed photo for one more; and trying to  pick a direction with a third -- shall I go one page or two?  I'm also trying to reorganize my space ans stash.  I've done the annual shopping spree and haven't exactly put it away yet.  It's just so pretty; but I'm left with almost nowhere to scrap!  Ah well, I'll figure it out.

Egg-cellent Decorating

Hello!  Happy Wednesday!

It turns out that I get a week off from my usually ickiness; and I've been lucky enough to play with my crafty crap.  Yay, me!  I've even got two pages done so far; so I'll have at least that many posts to keep things going.  That's good, right?  I thought so.

In both cases, I decided to try something new (to me); that inky splattery thing that has been all the rage.  I resisted it for so long because, well, I didn't "get it."  Fun fact about me:  I'm a literal person, EVEN when I'm feeling creative.  Most of the time, I have to figure out a logical theme that matches the story. Everything has to be connected; somehow someway.  When people sprinkle their mists or paints, it does look REALLY cute.  I enjoy watching people splatter in videos.  I like seeing it in the galleries.  I just couldn't convince myself to try.  Mists come with spray pumps for a reason; and apparently that reason is to cover the spread of a stencil on my paper.....  Yeah, I know.  I'm getting better; especially with the help of patient acquaintances in a scrappy group I joined last year.  I asked them why they sprinkle and splatter, and they had some really good reasons.

• It can help tie the colors in a page together; so you don't have to rely on just the paper.
• It helps spruce up white space.
• It adds a layer.
• You can create a visual line for the viewer.
• It's funky.

So, I sucked up the buttercup and I tried it.

AND, since I decided to add some fun and funk, I gave myself permission to play a little more:

Ever found yourself completely without the perfect color of thread, floss or twine?  I did; so I used an old, but well loved, stash of Glimmer Mist (color) to dye some twine and fake it.

THIS was a learning experience.  I'm going to have to keep practicing it.  Well over a year ago, I read a magazine article about adding Liquid Pearls to your project.  One woman added drops to her page, waited until they were almost dry and pressed down to crack the finish.  Hers looked A-May-Zing!  Mine...Well, maybe you can see why I kept thinking I was really popping really fabulous zits. For me, it will take a minimum of three hours drying time before I can even consider crushing them again.

OH!  OH!  Also, the green tags upon which I globbed placed my pearls is actually (at the base) a 4x6 card from the Fancy Pants/ Be Different line; green with cream polka dots.  I used a navy embossing powder with a label stamp on the card; cut out three; cut the largest into 2 pieces to place on the left and right of my photo block, and tucked the other two.

Now, the overall design is thanks to Sketch 267 from Creative Scrappers.

 

I took a few liberties.  It's a great sketch; and I love seeing what everyone is doing with it.  Unfortunately, I am currently lacking in single-photo stories.  HOWEVER, I liked the big square of background paper and decided to use this 8x8 collage of photos in it's place.  On this one, I can now relax.  Story told and in the books.

Reel Me In, Papa!

 Good Tuesday morning! Okay, now I am faking it. I'm a couple different kinds of yuck, but I'm working on feeling better. In the meantime, I'm grateful for the foresight to have taken pictures a few days ago.




 Last weekend, I was a crafting fool. I really like the birthday sketches at Creative Scrappers AND I was still excited about my new found method of adding more photos. I used it again for this page.

 For the past couple years, there have been quiet discussions and dreams of taking The Boy fishing. This Summer, it's supposed to become reality. Both The Boy and my dad are so excited. Dad pulled out his fishing rods to make sure they still worked. It looks like he had the perfect bait to catch a grandson.

 These are Basic Grey stamps, about 4 or 5 years old. I found them at the bottom of my drawer while looking for something else. Yay! Also, I like enamel dots but I haven't made a point of stocking up. Liquid Pearls to the rescue!

 I colored the cork alphas to make a title that would match AND stand out.
 Once again, I made an interactive page.  This time, I made sure my photos faced the right direction when flipped up.

And this is the sketch I used.

 Again, I saw DT member,  Danielle create something beautiful and knew I would try this sketch as well. , http://picsandcheesecake.blogspot.nl/2014/04/creative-scrappers-birthday-bash.html


 In this moment, I think I might spend the next two days working on a Friday Finds post. Through last week's blog hop, I discovered some amazing vendors and I want to talk about them. Till then, have a great week!

Gentle

Good Monday morning! Yes, I'm actually this chipper on a Monday. I'm weird. It seems that I'm still in a sharing mood, huh? I'll blame Spring. It's a happy refreshing time of year, why not?

Speaking of sharing, I'm going to share one of my favorite spots for scrappy inspiration, http://creativescrappers.blogspot.com/.

 I don't know exactly how their brand of magic works, but even when I'm down low with chemo side effects, I can look at their sketches and quickly know exactly how I could use each to make an amazing page. Sometimes, it will take me a few weeks to get the page done, but it feels so good to be energized and motivated to create. Last week, however, was a really good week. I've been cutting, inking, doodling, painting, writing and almost any other -ing you imagine.

Last Friday, Creative Scrappers celebrated their sixth birthday. There was an awesome blog hop. I learned about a few crafty stores that I hope to rave about this Friday. There was cake, even pony rides!  Okay, no ponies but definitely cake. As the day came to an end, they released 12 new sketches and an invitation to use them by May 30. If you share what you've made, you could maybe, possibly, who knows win a prize. Either way, I already got my prize by making this page.


Using this sketch:

When I saw Jody's interpretation here I knew I had to use it, too., http://creativeauthority.blogspot.ca/2014/04/creative-scrappers-birthday-bash.html

Now, since you can't see me in this moment, I'll let you know that there may, or may not, be some dorky clapping going on. Here's why. Several moons ago, I watched a tutorial by Glitter Girl. Her intent was to show how we can make the most of a 12x12 space, even with a large photo, multiple photos, a memoir's worth of journaling, OR just wanting to hide your journaling. I've mentioned before that I can struggle with fitting all of my desired photos on one page. Sometimes, even on a 2-pager. Watching this video was liberating.

 http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/gallery/projects/videos/1990056-glitter-girl-adventure-115-print-cut-it-out/

Tada! If you're like me, I'll add, I know, right?! Now I can have even more fun with the latest sketches, even if they call for a single photo because I have a way to add more. Now, if you wonder,  "Hey, Anne! That's great, but what about the page protector?" Glitter Girl thought of that, too. Watch this video when you have more time.

I remembered to take some close pictures this time. I even managed to score a celebrity appearance in a few.

 The ribbon is straight, but the dinosaur punches aren't. This is the paper from which I punched the dinosaurs for the layout, 7 Things About You.

 I painted the wood veneer cameras with Liquid Pearls. All chipboard pieces are from Crate Paper. I knew the collection name two seconds ago, I swear! Chemo Brain, man!

 The green striped candy dot is covering up a typo.

 Navy blue corrugated paper makes me happy!II used my long-ignored photo corner punch to make the navy corrugated pieces.  And, of course, here's the link to my gallery for a more detailed list of schtuff I've used:  crazy long list of goodies

 Can it be? A real Skylanders Giant came by to say hello. Welcome Eyebrawl. You can get off of my layout now. You're too dimensional to fit into the album.

 Alright, Eyebrawl. If you need to get that close, it may be time to see the optometrist.


I love that little boy!

The Annual Report

Good Sunday morning!

Since I'm in a sharing mood, I thought I would do it again.

It seems that I make a lot of pages to honor my son's birthday. There's the cover page for the new album, usually including x facts about him (x = his age, solve for pie...or brownies). There's the page that documents how he spent his birthday. There's also something I call the Annual Report. Basically, I make a page that shows what he looked like on all of his birthdays and the day he was born. Now that he's seven, I have 8 pictures that need arranging PLUS space for writing PLUS all the fun embellishments. This year, I struggled. Even after making a collage with the PicsArt app, it was still a challenge because there were still 8 photos. Then I saw a Sunday Reveal post from Creative Scrappers. 


It was beautiful! Magical! Perfect; especially if I expanded it into a 2-pager.

Again, I'm pretty cozy with my Fancy Pants stash. I added a couple buttons from Jillybean Soup. If you'd like to see product information, here's the link to my gallery:

 Annual Report

The little monsters in the photos are pieces of clipart that can be found when using the PicsArt app. I thought they would make a perfect match to the page design.


Overall, if you were to look at most of the pages I've made, you would see I try to include lots of pictures. Sometimes, it's a difficult challenge. Fortunately, I recently watched a tutorial on YouTube that has changed everything. I've used the trick on two pages I made yesterday. I look forward to sharing both of them very soon. I'm far too excited for my own good.


Until then, the iron is calling my name. I need to get ready for next week.

Inspired by Creative Scrappers

Hello!

You may recall a recent post that had funny-faced fruit. Recently, my son decided to explore the family tree of Mr. Potato Head. Evidently, the tree had a wild branch. On that branch, there's a third cousin twice-removed. Mr. Chinese Container Head. He's a fun guy!



Family trees aside, I've been wanting to make a page. This seemed the perfect opportunity. I used this sketch from Creative Scrappers:


And came up with this:



All paper and alphas are part of the Echo Park "About A Boy" collection.... Yeah, it still feels weird to list my supplies. I still have to tell myself it's akin to siting my source, if I were writing a paper. Plus, I think the red piece has a lot of potential in a variety of projects; I know others might feel the same. Happy shopping if that's you!

Unrelated to the page above, I'm really hoping I'll be able to share another page or two in the weeks ahead. DS has a field trip to the bowling alley. It may not sound like much, but watching 24 tiny tots push balls slowly down the isles is something I don't want to miss. Luckily, my initial blood work looked really positive, so bring on the petri dish! I'll have my camera ready.

Some Days....

Good Saturday Morning! How does this day find you? We're kinda gloomy, and I think I'm the only one missing the days of 90 degree heat, but otherwise all is well. So many parties and festivities and weekend wishes going on. Normally, I'd be freaking out, trying to figure out how to fit them all in with some level of quality time at each. Now, I'm often sleepy enough that it's much easier to chill and take life as it comes. Because somedays...

Heh, how's that for a segue? I didn't have chemo this week (and will babble about that at the bottom) so I spent some time paper crafting. One of the pages I made was about a fun moment between my son and my brother:


My husband and I have been protective parents. My brother has been waiting for the moment he'd be allowed to rough house with my son to the point of turning him upside down. This photo makes me smile and laugh a little so I had to give it some love! It was inspired by sketch 159 at Creative Scrappers:


Pretty, huh?


I used Basic Grey alphas, part of the Oliver collection. Then, I felt playful so I coated them with Glossy accents. It's hard to see, isn't it?


I tried to use the Sew Easy again. It was a little better this time, but I'm not in love with the tool. It works best on single sheets of paper. I like to layer THEN stitch. Also, I'm pretty proud of the inking work; being stumped as to how to ink in such tight quarters on this jagged piece. Then, I figured out that all I had to do was bend the paper to get two edges at once. I felt smart for a moment.



Dusty Attic chipboard gears. I just love adding gears and skulls'n'crossbones to my projects. I REALLY want to find someone from which I can buy more! The woman who sold me these is on a temporary leave from her shop, so...


So, I have to get creative! I went rooting through Cricut cartridges at my disposal. It turns out one of them has a gear border. It's one of the cake cartridges -- can't recall the name right now -- and it occured to me to cut out the border then cut the border up. I think I'm falling in love with kraft paper, by the way!

And, unrelated to this post, I was delayed another week in my chemo. It was frustrating and I almost cried. That was mainly because I was in limbo on the results of a recent CAT scan and blood work. For all I knew, two extra weeks off of chemo was really hurting my body, but....

Yesterday, I met with my oncologist. My tumors are shrinking and my cancer marker (like, how much cancer I have) dropped from 9 to 4.5. Those are definitely steps in the right direction! He was also encouraged (and it was encouraging to me) that I've gained about seven pounds since we last met a couple weeks ago. He told me that all three of these are very good signs, because I would NOT be gaining weight if the cancer was hanging on.

Somedays!

Thanks for stopping by. I have another page and some links I would love to share today or tomorrow. Here's hoping those get done....and I REALLY get chemo next Tuesday.

One Good Shot!

Good Tuesday Afternoon! How are you feeling the day after a long weekend? I had a hard time believing it was time to get back to business as usual. Of course, BAU was supposed to be a fourth round of chemo this morning. Alas, my platelets would not cooperate so I was sent home. Did you think you'd ever meet someone so disappointed that they couldn't get pumped full of toxins? Ah well. To my crafty stash I retreated. Look what I came up with!



All I wanted in this moment was to get a nice photo of my son with his sunglasses on. He thwarted me at every turn BUT, my brother was able to get some with the camera on his phone. Nice quality, I think! It's based on this sketch fromCreative Scrappers:

I took a few close-ups as well:




The vast majority of this page is from Crate Paper's Toy Box collection. Apparently, it's my new favorite toy! I'm hoping to go back and find some other once-loved collections in the next few days. There are a few more photos I want to scrap, but find myself waiting for various elements to magically appear.

Thanks for taking the time to read! I hope to bring more to you, soon!

Age 4

Good Wednesday Morning! I know, two posts in two days! Don't worry, I won't always spoil you like this. In fact, I'd be surprised if I go anywhere near a computer on Thursday and Friday; and I'll spare you the details there.

I created another page recently that is related to my son's upcoming fourth birthday. Yet again, I saw a fun sketch at Creative Scrappers and just had to do something with it.



And my take:


I know, technically, he's not four yet, but he's close enough. I had a moment of Mama Pride, watching him assemble some legos into vehicles all on his own. That set was age-ranged for kids 7 & up, I think. He's not even four and he took the initiative to actually LEARN how to assemble them into an armored car and semi truck. It was a blast to watch his brain compartmentalize the car sections, build them backwards, learn what happens when you skip a step.... *sigh* *beam*

Okay, onto the materials? Excellent!

The patterned paper and chipboard pieces are part of Crate Paper's new line, Toy Box. I swore it would be mine. I batted my eyelashes all pretty like....then learned that wasn't necessary and it was mine!

I inked the edges of the paper pieces with Distress ink. I splattered Glimmer Mist Chalk all over the place. Happily, I painted the photo frame with Distress Crackle paint, after layering the "age" chipboard sticker above the number 4.


I'd love to ramble on more. No, really, I would. The sugar from my Lucky Charms and caffiene in my coffee (first dose of caffiene in over a week) are kicking in. I've got babble power. I also can't focus and sit at the same time. In case I really don't get back online for a few days, I hope your weekend is warm enough to be lovely!

Little Boy

Good Tuesday Morning! I'm claiming some "Me Time" right now, and the biggest thing I wanted to do was create a new post. In a few weeks, my son will turn four years old. He's so big, so strong, so smart, and so funny. Last night, he tried to make me Daffy Duck to his Bugs Bunny, ala Duck Season/Rabbit Season. Only, it was the great debate on whether or not he'd get a shower that night. Yes, he actually tried to trip me up:

Him: No shower.
Me: Yes, shower.
Him: No shower.
Me: Yes, shower.
Him: No shower.
Me: Yes, shower.
Him: (with a big grin on his face) Yes shower.
Me: Agreed. Yes, shower.

He thought sure it would work!

I digress. With his birthday fast approaching, I'm taking little walks down memory lane and occasionally bawling my eyes out because he's going to be heading off to college before I know it. Of course, then he reminds me that he'll always come back to play with his toys; so I shouldn't worry.

One of my moments of memory focused around his first haircut. That's probably because I was looking for fun photos to use in the most recent sketch from Creative Scrappers:



And here is my take:


*sigh* He had his first haircut about a week before his first birthday party. He was born with soooo much of it and it only got longer and blonder with time. So much of his first year of life was spent correcting strangers that HE wasn't SHE. Finally, we got sick of it all and took him to one of those cutesy kiddie shops where he sat in a large toy car while the nice woman snipped about three inches off the top. I'm telling you, the boy had hair to spare!

The paper and most of the embellishments are Echo Park. I applied the plane, cloud and sentiment to pieces of Grunge Paper to give them more oomph.



The ribbon is a random spool from well over a year ago that I just happened to spy while my son was rooting through my stuff for "rope" that his toy alien could use to save a Transformer's arm from certain doom.



The photo frame is a Technique Tuesday tile, covered in Glimmer Mist.



Aaannnnnddd, since I just got a good look at the state of my coffee table, I think I'll bring this post to a close. Thanks for taking the time to look and read. I can gurantee that the next few posts will have something to do with Memory Lane or the upcoming birthday. You're forewarned.