You Don't Know Jack

I am convinced that I had a "celebrity siting" when I was in NYC December 2013. I snapped a covert pic of who I think is Sean Hayes (and yes he is breakfasting with a lady with red hair worn in a syle that seems to be very Debra Messing but no comment on that...
I posted this pic on Facebook in December and I had friends who said it wasn't him, but I wanted to leave him privacy and not interrupt his meal ( or spoil my own illusion ) so I just kept this pic on my phone and cherished the memory of my own celebrity siting. :)

The ruffle is by Glitz Design, the paper and border are from the Basic Grey Highline collection, those awesome blingy jewels are also Glitz and I have just hoarded and drooled over them long enough! That mist is by Maya Road. The gold diecuts are from Clique Kits, they are the diecuts from the May kit, Field Trip and they are cut from the Fancy Pants gold paper in Field Trip. LOVE that gold paper!!! My favortie Momento Tuxedo Black journalling pen decided to quit on me right after I started journalling on this layout. Oh well, I hope to replace it soon. In the meantime I'll just use whatever I can find around here that will work. The tiny word sticker is from Authentique, the letter stickers are from Echo Park and Basic Grey.

Noted Food Traditions

Since moving to the NOVA area, I have changed some traditions. One of my FAVORITE new things is going out to eat on New Year's Day. I actually did this my last year in Memphis and found it so much more fun than cooking myself. So I have a current favorite BBQ restaurant here and went this January 1st for the second year in a row. I had a couple of snapshots on my phone so I decided to document this new tradition. Formerly I would have cooked some sort of pork product to eat, I decided BBQ was easiest a few years ago, but I used to cook this frozen Corky's BBQ that I would buy in Memphis. I would also cook some sort of potato and some greens and blackeyed peas. I was the only one in the house who would eat the blackeyed peas and I don't know why I didn't think to just go out to eat years ago.

The ruffle is by Glitz Design and I've had it in my stash for a long time. There is one piece of black cardstock used as a layer and the rest of the papers and stickers come from the Basic Grey Highline collection. LOVE these papers.... the colors are AMAZING! The letter stickers are from Ellie's Studio and Jillibean Soup.

At the Diner

Diners, love them or hate them... they are everywhere in this area. I really enjoy the fact that they have a variety of food, and that they all look so interesting. The closest diner to my current home is called the Jukebox and it has a bit of a nostalgic rock n roll 1950's-60's type of decor. I love it! I learned a trick with my coffee spoon over the weekend and decided to document a little about the diner. 

I LOVED using the colors in Field Trip to document this diner, because I feel like that pink just fits right in with the photos. That is an ACTUAL slide used as an embellishment and I borrowed the cutest little heart punch from my friend and went to town on a scratch piece of paper from the kit to make those little tiny hearts I then stuck everywhere. Those eggs look yummy right now! They are piled on top of a pile of cooked veggies, broccoli, onions, squash, etc... oh and there is cheese. YUM! Along with paper and letter stickers and cut files cut from the gold paper in the kit, I added buttons from the matching button set by Fancy Pants (the As You Wish collection buttons, Flowers from Maya Road, a postage style coffee stamp and some steam stamps borrowed from a friend, stickers from the As You Wish collection pack and Thickers.

Friend Canvas

I was working on some pockets for a Denim Pocket Swap I'm doing with my crafty friends in TN, and decided to send the hostess a little canvas. Man I miss scrapping with her!

It's a 3x3 little canvas painted with black Gesso, Stencilled with Graphite colored Ferro over a cityscape stencil from The Crafter's Workshop. I added a Heidi Swapp Chipboard heart that I misted with some Mr. Huey's mist. The tiny type is from Cosmo Cricket and the flower is by Sassafras Lass. 

As a side note, it's almost my birthday and I got this in the mail on Thursday, May 22nd:

Brave New World

Woo HOO! How is everybody feeling today??? I'm all excited and have my pom poms in the air!!! I really love this month's kit Field Trip and LOVE all the colors and patterns! Honestly this is a collection that would normally just get hoarded in my stash and I'm so glad I have so much inspiration and encouragement to USE this stuff!! It's way too pretty to stay hoarded up! Our theme this month is "Be Brave" I didn't have very long to think about what subject matter I would choose for that, I simply chose my move from Memphis, TN to Annandale, VA all by myself. Well I had friends that helped me pack up and get here but I am now 6 hours from my nearest relative and for someone who grew up in the rural south, that is kind of a big deal!

In my new attempts not to hoarder, I'm trying to go ahead and use multiple die cuts and ephemera on a layout. I love when someone else does it, and when I hold back, I just keep things in my stash that don't get used as often as I like. I used several exclusive printables that came with the kit, the tiny anchors from map paper, That AWESOME washi tape and my die cuts, I layered the letter stickers over some paper from the kit to help them show up better on the stripy background paper. I fussy cut several flowers from the papers and layered them around, that gold file folder contains a ton of journalling and the little chipboard globe is by fancy pants as are the chipboard buttons scattered around although they didn't come with the kit. LOVE the accent of those Studio Calico stars! I did edge almost everything with Black soot distress ink to kind of define edges a bit better. Here are some detail shots:

Here is the lineup... be sure to stop by everyone's blog... I hear there is a fantastic giveaway! Thanks for stopping by here!

Clique Kits ..... The hop starts here

Gia

Jody

Erica

Lacey

Sophie

Brooke

Madge

Charity.... You are here

Gina
Rosann

This was Tobey Telarico

I had a very special family come in to my life while I lived in Memphis, TN and worked at Germantown Parkway Animal Hospital. And they came because of an adorable little yorkie named Tobey. As my final post from scrapping on NSD 2014, I have this layout of my little man Tobey. He passed away last year, but I will always treasure my memory of him and the fact that I got to have his Mom as a special person in my life.

There is some Crate paper and some Recorded by Allison Kreft layered up to emphasize my sweet Tobey, along with a journal card from Studio Calico. Thickers and canvas lettters by Prima and Candy Dots by Basic Grey.

Stop by tomorrow for a special Pep Rally post. Here's a sneak...

Can I fix it? Yes I can!

I dropped my phone the other day (this is my favorite time reference btw) and shattered the glass. I have a Samsung Galaxy S3 and while it used to be THE thing, that time has passed so when I took it to the mall to have it repaired (to the tune of 130.00 at the cheapest place) I was told that they had no glass for my phone. I went to two places at the mall and tried calling a third in the area and no luck. Long story short, Amazon.com had repair kits for less than $20.00 and as I'm a Prime member and wouldn't have to pay shipping, I decided to give it a go. I repaired my own screen. AND then made a layout:

I love so much about this, where do I start?!?  Ok this is made with products from my May kit from Clique Kits. As soon as I got this kit I videoed it's contents here:

I then took the printables and went ahead and printed them and cut them out. They are sitting with my kit bits and pieces so they are ready to go, I also took the gold foil paper and cut all the cut files out of it so I could use them as I scrap. There are so many sheets of paper here that I just want to hoard, but no... I must use them ;). The green paper in the background has some white paint that I used with a new stencil I picked up at my LSS... on this layout it looks like a motherboard to me, but it's called Subway. 

If you are new to using Stencil's then can I PLEASE recommend this class by May Flaum (tell her Scrapfaire said you HAD to take it... so much content). 

Anyway I love this kit and the stuff I threw in with it (um come to think of it, I just added pics, a few thickers and that um blue textured paper and the stencil... everything else came from the kit. 

Mother's Day Diamond Card

A diamond is my Mom's birthstone. It's also one of her favorite things. I used stickers and papers from the Date Night Collection from Chickaniddy Crafts to make my mom's Mother's Day card (and she LOVED it!).

I did go over the diamond sticker with some Distress Stickles in Rock Candy to get that shimmer.

From Mom

Still going over layouts from NSD and Yes, I have done at least ONE project post NSD, LOL! I made this no photo layout that talks about things I learned from my Mom, but not just things she told me but things I learned from observation. I used a pretty little stencil from The Crafter's Workshop and no photo... did all my journalling on a piece of purple vellum I've had in my stash for more years than I've actually been a scrapbooker. The background paper is from October Afternoon and there is also a lovely piece of Cosmo Cricket paper from the Creative Surfaces pad.

The stickers are from October Afternoon and Chickaniddy Crafts. The heart paper is from Crate Paper.

A Pocket Page about Bees and the White House

I've done several pages already about my friend Monica's visit from February like these and this one and I've had this one partially sorted into a pocket page protector (this one is from Echo Park, I ordered one of their Photo Freedom collections last year) but had never finished with the embellishing and journalling until NSD10K got me into gear! Here is the completed page... it covers our walk by the White House and our trip to an awesome bakery!

The papers here are just Kraft mixed with prints from Chickaniddy Crafts Date Night collection. I LOVE that paper from the 6x6 pad with the little dance footprints on it because we WALKED a LOT that day! I used the Wish You Were Here stamp set from Lawn Fawn to decorate one of my pockets... LOVE that stamp set!! Those kraft arrows are from Maya Road, The stickers and little epoxy hearts are from Chickaniddy Crafts, The slide frame is from Crate Paper, The Pier Colleciton, The flair is from October Afternoon.

Pocket Pages of NYC!

As a special treat, I got to see New York City all dressed up for Christmas in 2013. It was an amazing and exciting thing for me, girl from Clanton, Alabama (it's in the center of the state people). So I took MANY photos and decided that pocket scrapping was the way to get these photos and stories documented. Here are the pages I completed for NSD documenting this trip to New York. I have printed pictures for the start of another pocket page but haven't completed it yet.

I really wanted to show the spread together, so sorry about the glare on the left side. I used some precious hoarded Maggie Holmes paper... I ADORE that soft Bokeh look and it just said Christmas to me. I also have a little kraft banner sticker from Studio Calico and that 3x4 card is October Afternoon.

I went heavy on the journalling and light on the embellishing and I'm ok with that! I love that my whole playbill fits inside that pocket from WE R Memory Keepers!

What would Christmastime in New York be without store windows! I used my favorite Stamp from Stampendous and some copics to embellish my journalling, along with a copy of the "Yes Virginia there is a Santa Claus" article as the Macy's window was all about that story.

I celebrated NSD2014, did you?

I did go out to see a production of Threepenny Opera on Saturday in the middle of the afternoon... but after that I got home, logged on to Big Picture Classes and played along with their exciting NSD10K! Seriously you should check out #NSD10K... on instagram... it has been AMAZING! I got 8 layouts (ok some were pocket pages and not much embellishing) but I thought that was FABULOUS for 2 days of scrapping. I'm going to share these pages with you, not all today, but the first two. There were 10 inspiration videos for us to watch (released hourly) so there was tons of encouragement, challenges offered and just a TON of inspiration and advice!

This page was inspired by Stacey Julian's video, she advised us to make a pocket page sans pocket...

Papers here from Basic Grey Capture and 3x4 cards and Diecut Card and Beach letters from Crate Paper, Sticker from Basic Grey Capture line. Grey tiny type stickers from Jillibean Soup.

I have already scrapped some of the photos I have from this beach trip last year, but I had these in the pile of photos that I wanted to scrap and I had a bit more story about the trip to tell. 

Then I watched more videos and then decided I wanted to scrap a vintage photo of my grandmother and told a story that she had told me about her and her sister. I dug out some special hoarded papers and so thanks to Crate Paper and Maggie Holmes I have a LOVELY layout of my Big Mama. I also used a TON of Thickers, I even had to make my own "h" and "e" from those awesome gold MH ones... I am getting really low on the amount of words I can make from my favorite Thickers, guess I need to be stocking up on those.

Other supplies used in this layout are an old piece of sheet music, a strip from an old Prima Printables, Some Dear Lizzy Ruffled Paper cut into strips, Crate Paper Washi, Pier Collection diecuts, Woodgrain Paper from the Pier Collection and a few tiny wooden hearts from a Scrapbook Circle kit. Stickers from My Mind's Eye.

Once Upon a Time Layout with Process Video

It's been a while since I did a process video, and while I love watching and even making them, I feel like my setup is less than ideal... and I always feel like I fight with my camera. So I made a process video and when I was trying to upload from my sd card, some of the files were corrupted so I lost the last part of the video. I have stills of the finished layouts to share first:

The journalling is really the important part of this layout. and I was worried in the beginning of how much space I needed to leave, but I really wanted all these photos together. They were my favs from when I got married, and in 1996 polaroids were our instagram! LOL. Here is a link to the process video, any feedback at all is appreciated. HAPPY SCRAPBOOK DAY! I am actually going to an event this afternoon so I'm not sure how much crafty time I'll be getting in, but I plan on doing SOME scrappy stuff today. Can't wait to see all the layouts going up on Instagram. Hugs!!

 

The Special Order Baby book!

I have SEVERAL co-workers expecting babies, well two right now, the third one began labor Monday 4/28! NOW I can reveal that I created a baby book for her! (I'm not so nice that I did this as a gift, she commissioned it from me). This was truly a labor of love, and I put all my favorite hoarded Sassafras Lass Stash in here:

This tooth tracker page was a special request and I didn't make it myself, I googled, and found one for free online, it was already in the correct color family for my book so I printed it and trimmed it to size.

The girl I work with is Hawiian and I asked her if it was ok for me to use the word Ohana on her family tree. I then found this awesome palm tree in the silhouette store. I cut loads of butterflies out of coordinating pink and blue papers for her to write names of her family on and glue to the tree... I cant wait to see it when it's all filled out. 

This is the "and all this happened" page, it has a Heidi Swapp inspired photo stack for news clippings and places to journal "things happening in current events" type stuff.

I used the We R Memory Keepers Albums made easy and customized some 4x6 cards, I made most of the book 12x12 double page spreads and unified it by making the background all kraft. I customized some thickers with stickles and used lots of Sassafrass Letter stickers with stickles added as well. There are also some tiny type from Cosmo Cricket.

I think I've said how much I love love love this book, I wish my photos were a bit better, but I didn't want to slide pages out of protectors because I was afraid something would happen, and I kept adding things... seriously this is the book I would want myself and my friend LOVED IT!!! I can't tell you how happy that made me. 

Thanks so much for looking. Have you made anything with your precious hoarded stash???