Latest Scrapalicious Pages

It was fun dropping my latest pages off at Scrapalicious yesterday. The store was a hubbub of activity, as Vicki Boutin and Layle Koncar were there teaching an all-day class. I would loved to have attended it. Their classes are always an absolute blast! But with the latest scrapping trip I recently announced (it's Creative Escape, for those who weren't quite sure based on my previous post) I may be cutting back slightly on the scrapping budget between now and the end of August! But Arizona will be worth it!
This layout and the one above are created with the stunning new Basic Grey line Marrakech. I love the rich orange and blue tones in this collection. It's great for masculine or feminine layouts. I was quite balanced this time around, and did one layout about each of the kids. This pleased each of them! :-} The photo of Evan feeding the birds with Uncle Roy is from almost four years ago. He's so small! At left, Snow White (aka Alicia) serenades us on the piano on a sunny weekend afternoon. So totally unforgettable!
This page blends Marrakech with the soft and pretty Penny Lane by My Mind's Eye. The page shows a progression, with photos of Vanessa over the past three years. She is so mature now at six, and I love the main photo of her taken on a special day at school. Those of you who are scrappers probably already noticed that she is stamping in the photo - making her mama proud! ;-} I couldn't resist taking the title of this page - Don't Call Me Baby Anymore - from one of Vanessa's favourite songs.

(. . . and if you know the song, you are probably singing it now, aren't you! Don't worry, you aren't alone. I've been singing it all weekend!)

I still have more of these papers and am going to try to fit in a page or so more shortly. Have a great week, everyone.

Scrapalicious Sneak Peek

I had a great time playing with the combination of Basic Grey's gorgeous new Marrakech line and the new Penny Lane by My Mind's Eye. Here's one little peek at the latest pages I've created with my latest Scrapalicious DT kit . I've got a few finishing touches to put on a couple of layouts, but should have them ready to post in the next few days. Have a great weekend and stay tuned!

I'm Too Excited for Words

So I'll just post a picture instead . . . . . . Yippee!!

A Winning March Break

Well last week was March Break at our house, and we had a hectic week with the kids and all kinds of activities. First, I was lucky enough to see Fleetwood Mac in concert with my friend Leanne. We had great seats, the concert was awesome and we had a fantastic time. This was the view from our seats, and if you look really hard, you can see Stevie Nicks belting out a song on stage!
Our girls turned six years old last month, and some generous family members helped us pay for tickets to Disney on Ice as part of their birthday present. The show was fantastic and the kids were in awe for the majority of the performance. While the well loved characters were great to see, the kids vote for the best part of the show was It's a Small World.
I had a lot of fun trying to get photos of the show. The smoke that was present so much of the time made it tough to get great shots, but our seats were nice and close to the ice and I managed to capture many of the night's memories. The characters closed the show by shaking hands with the kids, which they loved. If you have a chance to go, I highly recommend it.
I closed off our winning week by drawing for my 2nd Blogoversary RAK. For the first time, I tried using Random.org to select a winning number for me, and turned out it selected comment #7. The girls, however, not pleased with having their role of selecting a slip of paper from a basket taken away, became involved in the process by making "Congrats" signs and posing for a photo, left.

Thanks to everyone who posted comments and shared their ideas about tutorials. Congratulations to Chelle who has won this RAK give-away. Chelle, please e-mail me with your postal mailing info at mama to 3 tots AT gmail D0T com (with no spaces) and I will get your prize out to you as soon as I can.

I have more to talk about, but it's late and I need to get to bed, so stay tuned for some upcoming Scrapalicious layouts and more of the latest scoop from our house. Have a great week!

Just Cre8's April Reveal

The Just Cre8 April kit is totally gorgeous! It's just bursting with colour and so perfect for spring The floral papers from the Bloom & Grow line by My Mind's Eye were calling my name and just asking to be hand cut and placed in the corner of this layout. And for those who don't do much cutting, the die cuts from this line are just as stunning and so easy to use.
Are these girls beautiful or what? Our girls enjoy dress up play, but seem to love it all that much more when they have a playdate. It's as if they think the fun is multiplied with the number of girls playing - and they're probably right about that part. On Family Day, two my cousins and their kids came over to play and we all had a great time. The girls broke out the dress up bin and tried on costume after costume, while the boys dug out Evan's old trucks. Then went all went to Swiss Chalet for dinner and had a ton of fun.
I really wanted to do a boy page with these papers, and this page about Evan was the result. As I was going over title ideas in my head for this page, the name of this paper collection jumped out at me as I trimmed the product ID strip from the paper, and the page became Bloom & Grow. The photos here are of Evan at age 2 and age 8, and the journaling talks about how much he has changed as he's grown. He sure looks grown up in the later picture, don't you think? In my last post I showed a little peek at the title for this page.
I did a little more hand cutting of the floral paper in the upper corner of this page, too. This release was the first for Just Cre8's new 2009 Cre8ive Crew, and you can check out our bios here. There is a ton of talent on this team, and I'm so excited to be a part of it. See what the rest of the team did this this kit in the Just Cre8 gallery.
This layout is a tribute to how much the girls love being in a double swing. Since our girls are twins, they grew up playing in the green baby double swing together. They loved it. Once they outgrew it - believe me - there were plenty of tears when it was time to take it down. But now they play together on the big kid's double swing and enjoy it just as much. The Scribblz Art word Spring is featured on this layout.

To find out more about Just Cre8's awesome monthly kits, click here.


And I'm not finished with this kit yet! There will be more to follow later in the month.

Just a Peek!

Now that it's officially March 15th, the Just Cre8 April 2009 kit is now up and I can officially give you this little look at it. Not only does this little sneak peek let you see a tiny piece of one of my pages, but if you know your scrapping paper manufacturers, it tells you one of the paper lines in the kit, too! ;-} I'll be posting my first few layouts with this kit as soon as I get a chance.

Stay tuned!

Don't Stop Thinking About Tomorrow . . .

I don't know about you, but I can't stop thinking about the April 2009 kit reveal coming up tomorrow at Just Cre8.

On March 15th, the new 2009 Cre8ive Crew will showcase work from their first Just Cre8 kit - and it's a gorgeous one. I'm excited to upload my creations and also am excited to see what everyone else has created. Be sure to check it out here. Oh, and there's another reason I chose this title and photo - I'm lucky enough to be heading to the Fleetwood Mac concert this week with my friend Leanne. I can't wait! So what if I'm dating myself - if you're too young to know who this group is, you don't know what you're missing!

Besides, any rumours you may be hearing of my advanced age are just that - Rumours! That's my story anyway, and I'm sticking to it! ;-}

BTW, Sunday is the last day to enter the draw for my blogoversary RAK. Check out the post here and enter before tomorrow night for a chance to win. Don't miss out!

New From Scrapalicious

Don't you love the die cut in this photo that says Pure Joy? I sure do, and I'm feeling pretty joyful looking at this lovely new DT kit I'll be working with for Scrapalicious. The blend of rich jewel tones from Basic Grey's beautiful new Marrakech collection and the soft and pretty My Mind's Eye's Penny Lane line looks wonderful together, and I'll be creating with them soon, so stay tuned!

More Scrapalicious Designs

I've finally managed to post these two additional layouts I made with my latest DT kit from Scrapalicious. I thought it would be fun to scrap a boy layout using the Twitterpated line from Imaginisce, so I used these two adorable photos of my sweet nephews. Jared is the big brother and Nathan the little, and I was lucky enough to see them when I was in Edmonton in January. Aren't they adorable brothers? I don't know about you, but I think this line works quite nicely for masculine layouts.
This page is made with Basic Grey Urban Prairie and Pink Paislee papers. This layout reminds me of the fun we had last summer seeing the animals at African Lion Safari. As the journaling says, "It wasn't the lions that we found most memorable at African Lion Safari. Nor was it the acrobatic monkeys, the tall giraffes or the crazy ostrich who came right up to the car window. These beautiful flamingos, so peaceful and calm, captured our hearts." We loved the waterpark too, but that's another page!
Here is a detail shot of the Urban Prairie papers and the hand cutting. I have more Basic Grey coming up soon with their lovely Marrakech line, so look for that coming soon.

And if you haven't already, be sure to post a comment by March 15th for a chance to win my Blogoversary RAK mentioned in this post. You can't win if you don't enter!

Scrapalicious Oakville

If you're local, you really NEED to head to the huge Customer Appreciation Sale-a-bration sale today at Scrapalicious Oakville. See more details here. With 50% off of papers and scrapbook supplies, many fixtures for sale and an "everything-must-go" attitude, you would be crazy to miss out. Are you going? I definitely won't miss out. See you there!

11,000 Maniacs (aka My 2nd Blogoversary RAK!)

I really wanted the title of my newest RAK post to be 10,000 Maniacs. Since 10,000 Maniacs is one of my all time favourite bands, I thought it would be cool to give a RAK away once my blog hit 10,000 view - a little tribute to my readers and to the band at the same time. Well, life and time managed to slip a way from me, and here I am already past 11,000 - definitely too far past 10,000 for a 10,000 RAK.

But since I still want to do a little give-away, I though I would do one today. You see, today is my blog's second birthday, so I have a doubly good reason for a RAK! Welcome to my 11,000 view and 2nd Blogoversary RAK. It's totally easy to win, so I hope you will all participate. Here's what's included:

Heidi Swapp and Cherry Arte patterned papers
Autumn Leaves Stampology clear acrylic stamp set
Prism cardstock and Bazzill die-cut cardstock
K & Company and Colorbok chipboard alphabets
American Crafts ribbons
Junkitz transparent ribbon
A Colorbok heart-shaped mini album ('cause I love that you include my blog in your day!) ;-}

What do you have to do to be entered into the draw to win this RAK? It's easy, really. I recently did a blog post about the decorative candle tutorial I created for the Just Cre8 blog. I had a ton of fun creating this tutorial, and would love to make more. Here's where you come in. I would like you to post a comment mentioning what type of tutorial you would like to see. It could be a specific stamping technique, an altered item or an embellishment creation - whatever you would love to learn to do. You have until March 15th at 11:59 pm EDT to enter your comment in order to be eligible for the draw.

Go for it!

Thank you!

OK, I totally need to play catch up!

Recently (relatively speaking, anyway!) I was lucky enough to be sent these blog awards from 3 of my scrappy friends - Mary, Marge and Jennifer. I'm so grateful to count these gals as my blogging friends.

I'm embarrassed to admit how ridiculously behind I am in responding to these gals' tag requests. So far behind, in fact, that tagging anyone would be almost moot, since most of my blogging pals have already been tagged. So instead of tagging more bloggers, I'm going to do a little RAK in my next few posts. Stay tuned and check it out.

And I just want to say thanks to everyone - the gals who tagged me, the family and friends who check in here regularly, and all of the scrappers. Thank you for visiting my little corner of the world. It really gives me a boost to know that you follow me and my family through all of the craziness, the scrappiness and the happpiness. Thanks!

One Year Later

I was tagged by my friend Kimmie in this post and asked to go to my 6th photo folder, post the 6th photo there and tell its story. This photo came up for me, and it really makes me smile. It's a photo of my hubby with our two girls on our first day in Disney World last year, and we were all so excited! It was taken close to exactly a year ago, and the girls have grown so much since then!
Here are the girls from just a few days ago at a celebration at school. Vanessa was quite excited to have lost her 2nd tooth that day, and shows it off in this photo. The girls turned six last month, and it leaves me wondering - where exactly does the time go? The girls are now in their final year of kindergarten and they will be moving on to Grade One in September. Seems just yesterday that I was carrying two infant seats everywhere I went!

I am tagging some blogging friends - a few who blog regularly and a few who need a kick in the pants ~ you know who you are! ;-}

Trish, Connie, Lee, Angie, Tara and Leanne. (Happy Birthday to my friend Leanne, by the way! Leanne is a brand new blogger, so keep checking back for her posts as I'm sure her blog will be gorgeous - once it happens!)

Here are the instructions for this blog tag:
Go to your Picture Folder on your computer or wherever you store your pictures.
1. Pick the 6th Folder, then select the the 6th picture in that folder.
2. Post that picture on your blog and the story that goes along with the picture.
3. Tag 6 other people that you know or don’t know, to do the same thing and leave a comment on their blog or an e-mail letting them know you chose them.

I can't wait to see what photos come up for these cool folks! Thanks, Kimmie, for including me in your tag.

Happy Birthday Leanne!

Please join me in wishing a wonderful birthday to my friend Leanne. Leanne is a great scrapbooker who is constantly thinking not just of scrapbooking, but of how she can help others to have a great time while scrapping, too. Leanne is the organizer who makes sure that scrapbooking retreats and crops happen amongst our little group of scrap friends.

Leanne makes things happen, and we all appreciate it so much!

Leanne, I want to wish you a wonderful year full of happiness and a summer filled with wonderful weather for boating! You deserve the very best! Have a beautiful, scrappy, family and friend filled, fun and happy birthday!