up for a Challenge?

Good Morning!

It's my turn over at Scrapbook Challenges to host a November Gratitude challenge. I got to pick 'Wildcard' which means it's my choice to design my own challenge...so head on over the Scrapbook Challenges site to see the post!

This is my layout that I created and the rules are pretty simple, create a layout using four (4) different pieces of patterned paper using one of our sketches...include one (1) piece of fiber, like ribbons or twine, at least two (2) bits of some kind of metal, I chose studs...use at least one (1) technique like sanding or inking and include one (1) stamped image...as you can see I've stamped the flowers and leaves and I've sanded the edges of my photos and inked my paper!

Now these are things that most of use do in our day to day scrapbooking, but in the theme of keeping my life simple these days...I thought this was challenge enough for our Scrapbook Challenge members and for you as well!

I've put to use some REALLY old papers from Close To My Heart and the stamp set that coordinated with it...both are discontinued now but if you are anything like me...you probably still have papers from years and years ago that you should be using up! So dig into your stash of stuff...that you still like! and get playing with some paper and glue! Happy Wednesday everyone! Thanks for stopping in today :)

Polaroid Challenge

Good Morning!

It's my turn to host a two week challenge over at Let's Scrap and seeing as my life has been crazy busy these past few months and I haven't had a chance to participate in many challenges myself, I thought I'd throw a nice and easy one at everyone!!!

Polaroids! Yup, ones that you re-create because I'm pretty sure there aren't many folks out there that still have one, but the look is fun...so that being said here's the challenge:

Incorporate a 'Polaroid' looking photo into your layout...check out this link for the details of this month's challenge and some helpful tips to get you creating Polaroid looking photo mats for your photos and layouts!

I've been hanging onto these photos for a couple years...you know when you scrapbook some photos from an event and then you don't finish?!! Well that's me with many things in life, but in the end, this sketch and challenge was just what I needed to get these pics into the album!

All scraps from my Footloose paper packet and the sun and clouds were leftover cuts from my BC Crop for Kids classes...so this layout was crazy easy! Which is nice for a change :)

Thanks for stopping by here today and have a fantastic weekend, hopefully you'll have a chance to play along for the chance to win a RAK from me!!!

Wednesday's Let's Scrap Sketch!

Hello! This is my last layout as one of Let's Scrap current design team :( I am looking for a little holiday from the Design Team aspect as it is fairly time consuming and seeing as December and January are so busy for me, didn't think it would be fair to all the hard working gals on the DT if I wasn't active during those two months!

We are getting ready in this house for the Holidays and for our Christmas in Mexico! 

So excited!

Hope you have some fun with this weeks sketch!

I am constantly working away at the kids' school albums and I've completed three double page layouts for Marissa's last day of school where her teacher, Mr. Willms, took his class to Castle Fun Park for a day of FUN! Here's one of them!

Super fun papers, journalling tags, buttons, alphabet stickers and twine used here. Jillibean Soup mostly, die cut papers were from Jenni Bowlin, twine from Twinery and the mini alpha were from October Afternoon.

I love those pkgs. of Jillibeans' journalling spots...perfect as embellishments or journalling tags...I will complete Marissa's Top 5 Memories once she comes home from school!

Those mini alphabet sheets in various colours have got to be a staple in my scrapbooking stash for sure! I love to use them, as I can create long titles and phrases that can explain the page without lots of journalling :)

...YES! that is my crazy daughter hanging off the 

mini-merry-go-round!!!

Up for a fun challenge???

Good Morning! I hope you've had a scrap-tabulous week so far and have an even better weekend lined up!

I have plans to add some festive spice to my home this weekend and might even be able to talk my hubby and son into adding some sparkle to the outside of the house...fingers crossed that the temperature can stay above zero...they are fair weather boys and will not easily be persuaded to endure the extremes in the name of Christmas lights ;)

Today is Friday, as you all know, and it's my day to post a Design Team challenge over at the Let's Scrap site...here's a challenge for you if you care to join in...I'd love a link up to your blog in my comments if you want to join in!

What's the challenge you ask? Well incorporate some momentos/memorabilia into one of your LO's...click on this link to read my post at Let's Scrap for more information!

These are photos from my daughter's field trip from June 2008! I have been hanging onto these tickets to add to her layout, once I got around to doing it! 

Here's my boxes of other keepsakes that I need to add to layouts...Do you think I'll ever get it done? Oh well, who knows, but I do know that in the meantime, I have to keep it all!!!

Let's Scrap Sketch for Wednesday!

It is with some sadness that my term on the Design Team at 

Let's Scrap is nearing an end. It has been a very fun and creative time there, but I am also ready for a break...it's a lot of work on DT's and I am looking forward to getting some inspiration from some of the New and Returning DT ladies! 

This way I can just play with sketches and be a member...I hope to have a chance to participate in more of the DT Challenges, Scrap Your Stash Challenges and get some BAM (Book about Me) Challenges done too!

I am loving the simplicity of this sketch, even though I've only created one side of it...I hope to get a double page LO done from this sketch sometime soon because I love the number of photos we can incorporate and the fact that you can really use up some of your 'stash'! Which I know we can all do!!!

This layout was perfect for the final photos of Matthew's Grade 5 Sports Day from a few years ago! It was a miserable raining day for the whole time and they just went ahead with it! I wasn't thrilled because it is hard to take photos in the rain, but it made for some fun photos too! At one point. Matthew had this incredulous look about him and I love that I captured it...and the rain :)

This is by far one of my all time favourite paper packs with all their great embellishments and of course my clear CTMH buttons! and super awesome Twinery twine!!!

Wednesday's Let's Scrap Card Sketch!

Hello! I know, I know...it's not Wednesday! You're right, but it's still a great day for a sketch! Especially seeing as this is the third Wednesday of the month, so that means we are playing with a card sketch...

I decided to dig into some of my Sonoma paper pack...we are going to be working on this paper collection for January in my Hostess Workshop Clubs...I love the purple and tan and cocoa colours together...I hope you have a chance to play with your paper and glue!

I've used the Cricut Art Philosophy cartridge to cut out this card base at 4 1/2" with Desert Sand paper and used the Sonoma B&T duos paper with some Colonial White cardstock to cut the tag (also, AP from Cricut) and stamped the Winter Wishes in Petal from the 'December 25th' stamp set (C1469)...added a Mocha Opaque to the centre and tied it onto the card with some purple twine from my store! Thanks for stopping by!

Wednesday's Let's Scrap sketch time again!!!!

Good Morning !

This past week has sped right by...I went to a 12 hour Crop on Saturday and participated in a Scrap your Stash Class...which I'd like to adapt for instructing here at my Workshop!

Lots of work preparing for the class as each participant needs to put together paper and photo 'kits' and then you are guided through assembling a LO...they are all single LO's but could easily be adapted to doubles...

This class will be an awesome way for you to power through getting LO's done in a short period of time as the LO's are already pre-designed for you and all you need to do is bring the required papers and photos! Spend time at home doing your 'homework'!!! and you will be very happy at the end of the class!!!

More Class details to come for this 'Scrap Your Stash Boot Camp Class' and check back soon for some Christmas card and layout classes for this month and December...

Now here's this week's sketch!

and this is what I came up with!

I used my square punch so it made short work of this layout!...the subjects in these photos are so intricate that I wanted to be sure to not overpower them too much with my paper choice, but in saying that I also wanted to pull out some of the colours in them as well! 

I found some older journalling tags from CTMH in my stash and added some Sassafras stickers for my title...the corrugated shape was punch from my Corrugated shapes by CTMH and the antique copper brads are also from CTMH..

We took our kids to Disney World back in 2001 and again in 2009...instead of scrapbooking two separate albums, I've decided to put the photos together...the large main photo was taken in 2001 and the photos on the RHS were from our more recent trip. 

Thanks for stopping by and why don't you try this sketch out this week! It's a perfect sketch for those of you that have little bits of paper laying around that you don't want to throw out yet! I could make 100 layouts from this sketch just because I'm one of those people that keep everything!

November SOTM Blog Hop!!!

Good Morning!

I hope you have been enjoying this month's SOTM hop! 

There are 57 creative gals showcasing November's Stamp of the Month 'Cherish The Day'

Now hopefully you've arrived from Krista's Blog...this is one big loop of blogs so if you find yourself somewhere else along the way...have a look at the very bottom of this post so you don't miss anyone!

After playing with this stamp set I can honestly say that it will work with both my layouts and my cards...I've already used it on three different layouts, but I'll show you just one of them today :)

I really LOVE our wintery paper line called Wonderland...the colour combination is so versatile and of course it works beautifully with those snowy photos!

Don't you just love all these snowflake shapes? I've cut them using the snowflake images off of my Art Philosophy cartridge...now if you are late getting to the Cricut Party... let me tell you that Close To My Heart has partnered with Provo Craft's Cricut and are now creating stamp sets that work together with these cut shapes so that we can create some fabulous, quick and easy embellishments!

I have cut my snowflake and then I ran it through an embossing folder for some added texture and dimension...I originally had plans to stamp on these snowflakes but thought it might be distracting...I've tucked under two ticket shapes (also cut with the Cricut machine and the Art Philosophy cartridge) and simply stamped the January stamp in Petal ink and added the day in Lagoon so it would stand out a little better...that and coordinate with my twine!

I absolutely LOVE my new E-size stamp set Trinity Alphabet (E1021)! It is so perfect for titles and I've used it loads already but here it is stamped with more Petal ink...the little flag 'school' was stamped with the the Trinity Alphabet set too! WHY??? you ask, well because this awesome set comes with 3, yes count em, 3 different sizes of FULL alphabets!

Thanks so much for visiting! If you are interested in becoming a regular follower, just click on the Networked Followers or Google Followers in the upper right column...I love making new friends!

Now off you go to Vicki's Blog to see what she has created with this awesome stamp of the month! and remember if you get lost along the way, the full list of blogs are below!

Kathleen Androlewicz http://BowlOfStamps.blogspot.com

Helen Onulak http://www.hookedonstamping.com

LeAnne Dudley http://www.dudleychickdesigns.blogspot.com

Wanda Riley http://Creatingwithwanda.blogspot.com

Angela Tutton http://www.tuttonstreasures.blogspot.com

Paige Dolecki http://PaigesPaperParadise.blogspot.com

Beth Naumann http://www.bethscreativeblock.blogspot.com

Tamytha Jenkins http://www.paperheartist.com/

Krista Ritskes http://simplycreatingtogether.blogspot.com

Katy Donaldson http://www.scrappinkaty.blogspot.com

Traci Pasqualone http://ScrapiTraci.blogspot.com

Mary Eisen http://mestamp2.blogspot.com

Angel Sawyer http://RunningwithScissorsDesignCo.blogspot.com

Kami Welter http://www.scrappin4memories.blogspot.com/

Haley Dyer http://inkyscrapper.blogspot.com

Michelle Loncar http://michelleloncar.blogspot.com

Jen Rubio http://JenRubio.blogspot.com

Lori Brown http://www.savingmine.blogspot.com

Doreen Guilfoyle http://whereisyourhappyplace.blogspot.com

Pamela O'Connor http://cherishyourmemories.blogspot.com

Traci Godbee http://createwithtraci.blogspot.com

Gina Brandstetter http://gmbscrapper.blogspot.com/

Debra Van Patten http://memoriesoftheheartbydeb.blogspot.com

Lisa Sargent http://www.lisasargent.net

Melinda Everitt http://www.ifyoublingit.blogspot.com

Nicole Griggs http://www.nicolescreativezone.blogspot.com

Jill Lucas http://scrapwench.blogspot.com

Carla Ironside http://carlacreates.blogspot.com

Sheila Bennett http://sheila-bennett.blogspot.com

Susan Brooks http://stampingintheopen.blogspot.com

Sarita Schraeder http://www.blessedscrapper.com

Teresa Scrivens http://www.creatingwithinkypaw.com

Georgia Hauglid http://inkygeorgia.blogspot.com

Judy Burger http://www.makingtimeformemories.blogspot.com

Adeline Brill http://www.adeline-brill.blogspot.com

Amy McVey http://www.clearlystamping.blogspot.com

Nancy Brown http://creativelyartsygallery.blogspot.com/

Shirley Ross http://www.momnmescrap.blogspot.com

Brae Montgomery http://thebrae-er.blogspot.com

Wendy Coffman http://www.stampingrules.blogspot.com/

Dawn Ross http://iamahappystamper.blogspot.com

Elizabeth Mindemann http://www.ejoym.blogspot.com

Jen Patrick http://roxybonds-scrappin.blogspot.com

Dawn Heuft http://stamptildawn.blogspot.com

Shannon Beck http://www.cardsfromthefarm.blogspot.com

Melissa Laverty http://www.fancymelissa.com/blog

Annette Green http://AnnettesCreativeJourney.blogspot.com

Heather Schmuckal http://www.heatherjanedesign.blogspot.com

Allisa Chilton http://rockymtnpapercrafts.blogspot.com/

Luisa Morgan http://www.creativedesignsbyluisa.com/

Casandra Bennett http://casandra-scrappinbliss.blogspot.com/

Corina Mitchell http://www.mycreativeink.org/

Karen Fullam http://www.enrichingmemories.com

Nikka Geers http://Nikkageers.blogspot.com

Krista Hershberger http://kristascraftycorner.blogspot.com

Kristine Ponte http://kponte.blogspot.com

Vicki Price http://PriceOfPaper.blogspot.com

November's Stamp of the Month

This month's featured Stamp Set is simply perfect for cards and even scrapbook layouts! 'A Little Thanks' (D1444) is available at a discount or even free with a minimum qualifying purchase...just ask me how, or head on over to myCTMH site where you can shop 24/7