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!

I'm So Excited!

. . . and I just can't hide it!!

I am so thrilled to have been selected as a 2009 Cre8ive Crew member for Just Cre8. Yahoo! I don't envy Sue at all, as the talent she had to select from was absolutely incredible! She has selected an amazing group, though, and I am flattered yet at the same time a wee bit intimidated at having my name alongside these talented ladies. I've included below the names of the new crew as well as links to their blogs or galleries.

Take a look at the creativity and diversity of style and talent that these ladies possess ~ you'll be blown away!

Ann Costen
Leica Forrest
Jennifer Hottinger-Sloan
Amanda Lepage
Jessi Lute
Lori Mancini
Jill Sarginson
Cindy Stevens

As the new Cre8ive Crew, we have big shoes to fill, as the pool of talent that the 2008 crew brought to the table was massive! But it's going to be a blast, and I know that we'll be up to the challenge. See Sue's announcement on the Just Cre8 blog here.

The layout I included in this post was part of my submission, and it features a photo of my brother Chris and my adorable niece Aeden when they were visiting here last summer. Isn't she sweet! I used some of my favourite elements ever in this layout, including gorgeous Maya Road and Prima flowers, Making Memories and Doodlebug ribbon, Queen & Company adhesive felt and a Tim Holtz grungeboard swirl.

Thanks for sharing in my excitement! Yahoo!

Best Creation papers

I created this layout for Scrapalicious a while ago, but somehow managed to take it over to the store without taking a photo of it. So when I was dropping off my latest pages last week, I took a picture of it. The paper used for this page is by Best Creation. Their papers, many of which are themed, have beautiful detail including flocking, gloss and glitter. This photo was from a trip we took to Jamaica. We took a boat across to a beautiful Thai restaurant at the Sandals Royal Caribbean for dinner.

I was quickly reminded of the restaurant when I saw the glittered design at the bottom of this page. You can see the restaurant behind me in the photo. Ahh, tropical vacations! Don't you wish you were on one right now?

Better Late Than Never!

I had the best of intentions, really!

As usual, though, I have more project ideas than time. Here is the (finally completed) 2009 Basic Grey Calendar that I had planned to make as a surprise for my hubby - first for our anniversary in November, and when that didn't happen, for Christmas. I settled for making it part of his Valentine's Day present, and he was quite happy with it. The calendar was fun, quick and relatively easy to make. I liked it as soon as I saw it advertised last fall, and it literally flew off the shelves at Scrapalicious, selling right out.

It was my plan to go back and buy more after finishing the first one, and make a few for family, but I didn't work fast enough to get that far! I deviated from the sketches in a number of places, simply to make the page masculine vs. feminine, and to change the theme of the July page, since the template is American and created for a 4th of July page. I haven't seen a lot of these finished and displayed online, despite how well they sold, so I thought I would share mine so others can see the end result.

I enjoyed this project a lot. I would definitely buy this again in future years, if BG continues with them. To view this project in a larger format, click here.

The Latest Scrapalicious Designs

Here is the first set of layouts I created with my latest DT kit from Scrapalicious. I still have plenty of this Imaginisce paper left, so there will be more to follow. My first page shows off this adorable photo of my niece Aeden, who I photographed while out west a few weeks ago. I completely fell in love with the cute polka dot top she is wearing in this photo, and couldn't help but highlight it using this flocked dot paper from Doodlebug, along with the whimsical Imaginisce paper and a chipboard bird from Maya Road.
I posted this photo as my peek a little while ago, and I used it because I completely love this Urban Prairie paper from Basic Grey. This paper was literally calling my name from the paper racks, saying "hand cut me!" ;-} Of course, I couldn't resist doing just that. The patterns are truly beautiful, and the colours make me happy simply by looking at them! It makes me think of spring.
I printed this longer, horizontal photo of Vanessa warming up with the rest of her ballet class quite a while ago, and have been waiting for the right inspiration to scrap it. I think I found the right papers for the job. This particular morning, the class was warming up prior to a little recital, and I loved the reflection of the teacher and the dancers in the mirror. You'll notice that their little 4-year-old attempts at mimicking their instructor are adorably imperfect! I placed a Maya Road crown on Vanessa's head to identify her.
From the archives, here's an older photo of Evan and Alicia from 2005. This was taken on the first trip we took after purchasing our first DSLR camera ever, a Nikon D70S. It was so exciting getting to know the camera a bit, and while this shot is far from perfect, technically speaking, I love the way it shows off the relationship between the siblings. Evan has always been a protective big brother, right from the start. I had fun crumpling and distressing the edges of the Doodlebug paper on this one.


There will be more to follow with these papers in a little while. Thanks for looking! :-)

ScrapScene Mention

One of my favourite scrapbooking resources on the web is the blog ScrapScene. ScrapScene is described as being the who's who of scrapbooking, and their pages are always filled to the brim with current news of the scrap world. From trends to classes and sneak peeks, from the newest products, kit clubs and manufacturers to tutorials; this blog always has the latest and greatest!

I was excited when the recent decorative candle tutorial I wrote for the Just Cre8 blog was mentioned on ScrapScene. I just posted about about this tutorial here. You can read the Scrap Scene article here. Take a peek!

And if you don't already have this blog bookmarked for daily reading, what are you waiting for? ;-}

Family Day Fun!

Activity at our house seems to never stop! We had a wonderful Family Day long weekend filled with celebrations, family, friends, food and a whole lot of fun! Since the girls' birthday is so close to the long weekend, we held a skating party for them for both adults and kids. It was a fantastic party! Both girls were very excited and so proud to be turning six.
The girls had some school friends, a few family friends and some close family at the party. Even Nan, Ray, Sarah and Danny came out - Uncle Danny even got on the ice for a short time, and stood up momentarily too! The girls had so much fun playing hockey with their Daddy and scoring tons of goals. I think we may have hockey players with pink laces in our future!
Cousins Sierra and Kristian came from out of town for the birthday party and stayed over for two nights. Our kids always love seeing their cousins and we try to spend as much time with them as we can. I lived far away from most of my cousins growing up, so I'm glad to have family reasonably close by so that the kids can spend as much time together as possible.
On the Monday holiday, more cousins came to visit and the girls had a fantastic time playing dress up while the boys pulled out tons of trucks! It sure rounded out the weekend nicely. We went out for dinner together and everyone had a great time. With 13 of us, 8 being kids, our waitress was a bit overwhelmed at times, but she held it together reasonably well!

So as you can see, we crammed a lot into the weekend, but I also managed to scrap a tiny bit. Look for more Scrapalicious layouts, coming very soon!

Decorative Candles

I was so happy to create a tutorial this month as part of my Guest Creative Crew stint over at Just Cre8. I wrote about altering candles with photos and stamping. You can see the step by step instructions for these decorative candles by visiting the Just Cre8 blog. I loved the Scribblz Art word "baby" and couldn't resist using it along with this cute photo of my nephew Nathan, who I just posted about here. Isn't he sweet?
In addition to the photo candles like Nathan's, I also made some smaller candles using stamping and heat embossed stamping techniques. These were quick and easy and make a fun Valentine's Day gift idea. Keep in mind, these decorative candles are intended as a fun novelty and not for burning. Many embellishments are flammable. No lit candle should ever be left unattended.

These candles are so quick and easy to make. I used Just Cre8's exclusive En Francais and Boy in the Bubble Wrap stamps to create these candles. I hope you are inspired to make a few of your own.

I hope that you have a wonderful Valentine's Day with those you love. Wishing you all the best!

Good Genes!

Two weekends ago I was lucky enough to travel to Alberta to see my Mom, my brothers and their families, as well as celebrate the birthday of one of my closest, long-time friends. I had a fantastic trip. It was totally relaxing, the weather co-operated, and I managed to spend time with almost everyone I was hoping to see. Oh, and the photo ops were plentiful!
I stayed at the home of my brother Chris' family. His sweet daughter is Aeden, above - isn't she gorgeous! I don't think she cried once the whole time I was there. Our kids are sure lucky to have such adorable cousins. I just wish we lived closer together. My brother Howard's eldest boy, Jared, is the spitting image of childhood Howard, just without the afro! ;-}
Jared is so proud to be a big brother to Nathan, who I met for the first time this trip. He takes on his brotherly duties with enthusiasm, although he has been known to wake Nathan up on purpose, just to get Trish's blood boiling! Nathan is a real charmer, and a good eater - which pleases his Mom and Dad greatly! He's also great at looking at the camera.

In addition to being surrounded by these kids with great genes, I had a wonderful time visiting with Mary, celebrating Cathryn's birthday and just enjoying the feeling of being around friends and family who love me without reservation or condition. I'm truly lucky.

And of course, what trip would be complete without hitting the LSS? I had a wonderful afternoon with my friend and awesome scrapbooker Connie, which involved food, fun, and - what else - scrap shopping! If your travels ever take you to Edmonton, be sure to visit Treasured Memories. Their selection is out of this world, and their designer Anam is one of my favourite scrappers ever. Check out her blog here - she is sooo talented!

I'd love to post more on this trip if I get a chance, but in the interim, I have a tutorial, a Valentine's Day present for hubby and some layouts to finish, so I'll sign off for the night. More to follow soon.

Scrapalicious Sneak Peek

Really, I haven't been hiding since my last post! I've been to Edmonton, to Great Wolf Lodge with the kids, I've scrapped, started my upcoming tutorial for Just Cre8 and planned the girls' birthday party. Whew! Life can get busy sometimes, but I still find so much sanity in scrapping a little. Here is a little peek at my latest Scrapalicious DT kit.

You can see Imaginisce's cute Twitterpated line, along with the awesome Basic Grey Urban Prairie in this peek. There will be more to follow soon, as well as some photos from my recent travels and events - but I need a moment to catch my breath from this frenzied pace first! ;-}

Stay tuned!

Just Cre8 GCT Challenge - Get Distressed!

I'm thrilled to be the Guest Creative Designer at Just Cre8 this month. Here are two more layouts I've created with this month's kit, and I used them as examples of my GCD Challenge for this month - Get Distressed! See this post in the forum here!

We all have our favourite techniques and ways of changing things up when it comes to scrapbooking. One of my favourite things to do to my pages is roughen up the paper a bit by distressing it. There are many ways to do this – crumpling, tearing, rubbing, sanding, inking, chalking, etc. What each of these methods has in common is that each adds texture and dimension to the page, creating a feeling of messiness or grunge, or a vintage-y flair, depending on the mood or theme of the layout.
My personal favourite thing to do is to distress my pages by sanding using sandpaper of varying degrees of coarseness, or a file or emery board. A common misconception is that distressing can only be used on shabby or heritage layouts. This simply isn’t true. Here are two youthful, modern layouts created with this month’s kit which use distressing to add depth to the paper’s edge. The Outtakes layout above celebrates the craziness that goes on in our house when I try to get the kids together for a photo.

In the Family Forever layout, I somehow managed to capture them all in quite observation. I love the teddies in this enlarged photo. Some day all too soon, they won't be interested in them anymore (sniff!)

So my Just Cre8 GCT Challenge for February 2009 is to get distressed. I hope you particip8 by posting a layout here. If you haven't been in the Just Cre8 gallery, you're missing out on so much inspiration Check it out here!

Just Cre8 July Scrap Pack Layout!

I mentioned in this post that I was lucky enough to win the July Scrap Pack from Just Cre8 a while ago. Here is the first layout I (finally!) have managed to post from this awesome kit. Those who know our family well will recognize Indra; she will always be an important part of our lives and is just like family - particularly to the girls, who can't remember a time without knowing her. I loved using the Scribblz Art word "Joy" that came with the kit. I made this back at Wenonah, but am just getting to posting it now.


I can't wait to "cre8" more with this awesome kit. I just wish that there were more hours in a day! ;-)

It's Spring at Scrapalicious!

Well, it may still be winter, but this adorable new release from Imaginisce will have you believing that spring is here, despite the mountains of snow! I'm looking forward to playing with these cute products, along with a bit of Doodlebug flocked dot cardstock and the sweetest little Maya Road critters keychain. So fear not, soon you will be packing away your shovel for the season!

I'll be posting creations with these bright products sometime soon.

Wenonah Layouts - Finally! ;-)

It's been ages since I came home from Wenonah and in the the crazy business of the kids' activities over the fall and the Christmas season, I am just now getting around to posting these layouts. I can't believe it! The first layout is one I started way back in September when I was the Guest Designer for Scraptivity's September 2008 kit. I'm finally getting it posted now. I love this photo of the girls cuddling with their Daddy on Father's Day. All of the layouts I did at Wenonah were totally girly.
I think the girl layouts balance out that the other project I worked on at Wenonah was Evan's gear album. I guess I did get quite a bit done that weekend! All that was left on these layouts was the journaling. I've made a decision to be better with journaling this year - both with getting it done right away, as well as making it more in-depth. This layout is all about how much Vanessa loves playing dress up and then posing for the camera. Lots of hand cutting the frame around the layout here.

I have one more layout to post, which I created with the Just Cre8 July 2008 Scrap Pack that I won last summer, and I will post that in a separate Just Cre8 post, sometime soon.

Just Cre8 February 2009 kit reveal

I mentioned earlier in this post how pleased I am to be the Guest Cre8ive Designer at Just Cre8 for their February kit, which was revealed today. Just Cre8 offers two styles of kits at two different price points, and also allows purchasers to customize their own kit, giving total flexibility. For these layouts, I worked with the Scrap Pack, as well as a few extras from the Just Cre8 store. For the layout at left, I handcut the flowers from the Fancy Pants I'm Yours paper and layered the flowers over the page.
The sweet girl acting like a ham for the camera in above layout is Rachel, daughter of my cousin Sharon from Ireland. She is personality plus, that's for sure! Both layouts here use Doodlebug's sugar coated chipboard letters in white, and the layout at left uses Bo Bunny double dot chipboard, in addition to the kit elements. The digital frame on this photo of Vanessa in the snow is also included in the kit. I'll be adding a few more creations with this kit soon, so stay tuned. See more kit creations by the Cre8ive Crew here.

Cold Enough for You?

I don't know about you, but I've had quite enough of this chilly winter weather already! Brrr! It seems my sentiments are shared by the ladies at Scrapbook and Cards Today, as this layout of a pink-cheeked Vanessa is featured on their blog today as the Thursday Reader's Submission. Be sure to visit the blog, and check out other recent posts by awesome scrapbookers like my Scrapalicious friend Virginia, and the awesome Michelle Engel, amongst many other talented scrappers.

You can browse their blog here!

Scrapbook and Cards Today is an awesome scrapbook magazine, and it's Canadian! Did you know that their issues are available to be downloaded from the internet? Check out the latest issue here.

Enjoy! And try to keep warm. ;-)

Gr8 Cre8ive Idol Happy Mail!

I had a "gr8" time last fall in the Gr8 Cre8ive Idol contest held by one of my favourite Canadian kit clubs, Just Cre8. I'm so happy with the projects I created for this contest, (see them here), and I was thrilled when I placed second overall. See the generous prize at left.


I'm also very excited to be the Guest Cre8ive Designer for Just Cre8's February 2009 kit, which reveals tomorrow. This wonderful kit is full of sweet goodness, so you simply must check it out. Take a peek at Just Cre8 on January 15th to see the kit's reveal. I will also be posting my creations here, so stay tuned!

Scrapalicious Layouts Revealed

It's been a while since I posted this little sneak peek of the awesome My Mind's Eye Laundry Line, which I was lucky enough to receive as my DT kit from Scrapalicious before Christmas. It's such a beautiful line to work with! Each of these papers had a glitter or gloss finish. I handcut the glittered flowers here layered them over the glitter dot paper. The chipboard die cuts make for easy embellishing on this very feminine layout.
I love Bazzill's new Dotted Swiss cardstock. The texture and simple pattern of this paper adds an understated elegance to this layout. This layout is of my cousin Zandra and her husband Ray celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. I don't know about you, but I really think these two look far too young to have hit their 40th anniversary! Congrats, Zandra & Ray! They are still so completely in love, as you can see from their photo.
I think many scrappers look at this paper line and immediately think of feminine layouts. I really wanted to include a masculine layout in my creations with Laundry Line, and I think pairing it up with Basic Grey's Ambrosia chipboard alphas and shapes worked well. Here you see our dude intently playing the marimba at the marimba camp he attended this past summer. Trimmed with Bazzill's great new pom-poms, these products are all boy!

With the dumping of snow we had last night, I'm really anxious for spring, and this sweet new Twitterpated line from Imaginisce sure has me thinking of warmer weather. Stay tuned for my next Scrapalicious kit, which will feature these products.

I also have more scrappy goodness coming in February with a guest design spot I have coming up and I'm really excited about it. I will share more about in a separate post, realllly soon!

A Sneek Peek to Kick Off 2009

It was great to spend the day yesterday scrapping away at one of my favourite scrapbooking get-aways, Younique. Leanne, Violet and I had a scrapping day yesterday, and in addition to having a wonderful time, I completed 3 layouts with my latest DT kit from Scrapalicious, featuring MME's Laundry Line.
Once I have some daylight to photograph these in, I will post the completed projects. Until then, here is a little peek. This great collection features gloss or glitter on all of the papers. It is fantastic to work with, even for masculine pages, like the one at left of Evan at marimba camp this past summer. Check out Laundry Line here.

It's great to get the scrapbooking year off to a good start, and I'm glad I managed to do it in some fine company. Thanks, Leanne, Violet, and Heather! Here's to a great, creative 2009!

Our December in Daily Photos

Guess what? If you are wondering where your Christmas card from us is this year, here's your answer at left. Oops! We were far behind this year, but got all our cards into the mailbox today, before 2008 was over. So, cards will be a little late this year, but better late than never, right! Oh, and handmade? Sorry, maybe next year! ;-)

One thing I did manage to complete in a timely manner was the December Daily photo project encouraged by Ali Edwards. I don't have an album created to put these into, but it's a nice feeling to know that once I do, the photos are ready!

Take a quick peek at our family's December, and once again - we wish you a multitude of blessings in 2009.