Playdate

One of the things that I love about my relationship with my hubby is the way that we play together.  I am a very playful person and enjoy having someone to play with.  With that said, there are very rare times in which he is willing to snap the photo or be the subject of a photo when we are playing.  A few months ago, one of those rare days where he felt up to being both the subject and the photographer, we got some photos of us goofing together.  This weekend, I finally got around to scrapbooking them.

I was super excited about this layout for a few reasons.  First, a while ago, I went through a Basic Grey phase, I still love Basic Grey, but I had a phase where I HAD to have EVERY SINGLE LINE.  The most unfortunate purchase as a result of this phase was the Obscure paper line.  I'll be honest, I have NO IDEA why I bought it.  It's not my style, I have no idea what to do with it, and my husband when I asked him for ideas told me it was really ugly and he had nothing to help me out with.  Either way, when I went to the Scrapbook Expo Crop, I packed it as the paper I was going to use.  This paper will be used since I bought it!  I have to say, I LOVE the way that it turned out.  Never in a million years would I have thought I would like the final product.  AND to top it all off, when I got home and showed my dear hubby, he didn't even notice what paper it was and liked the way it turned out.  Second, I got to use my new Tim Holtz Vintage Camera die.  I am in love. 

And just some notes on the layout:
1.  I used a sketch from the sketch eBook published by Creative Scrappers. You can find it on their website.  http://www.creativescrappers.blogspot.com/
2.  To get the shinniness on the camera, I used the Sakura glitter pen.  I love that thing.

Supplies:  Basic Grey Obscure (Pattern Paper); Bazzill Raven, Bazzill White (Cardstock); Felt Stars (Maya Road); Foam Letters (Pink Paislee); Tim Holtz Alterations Camera Die; Stampin' Up! Basic Black Classic Ink.

Catching Up on My {Real} Scrapbooking

Although I am just as busy as when I am in school full force, I have been finding a little more time to play with my paper than I would normally.  This has meant time to sit down and do things that take more time that usually need to actually scrapbook.  As that has been the case, I have been working on some of my personal scrapbook layouts.  Today I thought I would share some of those with you, so get your cup of desired drink and sit back, relax and read.

1.  Truckasaurus!
I love monster truck rallies, they are so much fun.   My dear hubby took me to one almost 2 years ago, and I took a TON of photos.  When I say a TON I mean well over 300 for about 3 hours of fun.  At this particular rally, rather than having the demolition derby, they had truckasaurus.  I'll be honest with you, until this point, I totally thought that Truckasaurus was only something you see in an episode of the Simpsons.   Either way, I came home with a ton of photos that have been sitting and waiting for the perfect day with the perfect photos.  So, here is the first of several to come:

 

For this layout, I used some of the retired Well Worn Designer Series Paper from Stampin' Up! (totally should have gotten more) it went so well with the rough and tumbleness of a Monster Truck Rally.  The Layout is based off a sketch from NutsAboutSketches, and can be found here.  For the time being, I have left this one rather unembellished, but that may change.  I have been having a hard time with these photos, so I am letting them sit for as long as they need to.

Supplies: Stampin' Up! Well Worn (Pattern Paper); Bazzill, Recollections, Stampin' Up! (Cardstock); Making Memories, Chatterbox (Chipboard Letters); Silver Acrylic Paint (Ranger Tim Holtz)  

2. Kitty Litter
My hubby and I are still young and in a young marriage, which means no babies, as of yet.  But we do have a little fur baby.  She was a gift to me for my birthday 3 years ago.  She is often the source of many of my layouts, and is our fur baby - part of the family.  She is our mischief maker, and on this particular occasion, she was making her home in my Scrap basket.  It is one of her favorite places to play (and on occasion sleep).  Here are the photos that go along with this one:

 I got the sketch from Creative Scrappers, and it can be found here.  One of the other things that I have been working on is mixing up my tittles.  I have always been terrible, and I mean terrible at mixing type fonts and letters from different packaging.  I love the look of it, but for whatever reason I struggle, so as I begin to run low on different letters from different packages, I have been working more at doing mix and match.  On this layout although it was difficult and took some time, I am very happy with the end result.
Supplies:  SEI, Basic Grey, Unknown (Pattern Paper);  Bazzill, Stampin' Up! (Cardstock); Making Memories, American Crafts, Pink Paislee (Letters); Ticket, Journaling Spot (My Mind's Eye); Jolee's (Embellishments)


 
3. Visit L.A.
I am ashamed to say that these photos have been sitting around WAY too long.  Primarily because well, as hard as this may be to believe, I don't have any travel themed scrapbook paper and supplies!  I have started to collected travel themed things, but as any collection takes time, so does collecting travel themed craft supplies. These photos were taken on our first ever visit to Los Angeles, and let me tell you it was an eye opening first experience.  Here are the photos and the layout along with the photos.

 The sketch for this layout came from Nuts About Sketches and can be found here.
Supplies:  Karen Foster, SEI, Simple Stories (Pattern Paper); Bazzill, Stampin' Up! (Cardstock); Making Memories (Chipboard); Maya Road (Felt arrows); iTop Brads (Tools/Embellishments)


Thats all for today!  Thanks for hanging out with me, I hope you enjoyed looking and reading as much as I enjoyed creating.  Have a crafty fun filled day!

McCloud River Inn

During my recent Spring Break Scrap Fest, I decided that I wanted to also scrap photos from more recent outings.  I do place all of my pages in chronological order, but I don't always scrap chronologically - meaning, I don't scrap my photos in order of the timing of events.  I do date all of my layouts somewhere so I will know years from now, a general time frame.  With that said, I wanted to play with photos from a recent mini vacation that hubby and I took.  We both love to travel and have talked many times about traveling outside of the United States but we have not had the opportunity to do that yet.  Instead, we are satisfied venturing and seeing all the things that the United States has to offer.  As we are currently in California, we have been taking advantage of what California has to offer.  And one of the sites is Mount Shasta.  Being a girl from the Pacific Northwest, who enjoys unadulterated beauty, I was super excited to leave the city and go venture into Mount Shasta.  We stayed in McCloud at the McCloud River Inn, a cute little bed and breakfast ran by the nicest lady who makes the best chocolate chip cookies and breakfast in the world.  So, here is the layout.

I doesn't look like much here on the page but it very stunning in real life.  It is based off of a sketch from Creative Scrappers and the post can be found here.  If you follow my blog regularly, a little while back, I posted about a layout that I ripped the backing off of because I and my hubby did not like the finished product.  Well this is that layout.  The blue/cream/brown background is actually the final result after testing the diecuts and layout against several backgrounds.  It looks a little hideous as I sit here and write this and look at the layout, but I promise you, it is very stunning in real life.    The floral spray is hand made and my first attempt - given it was my first try at doing such a thing, I am very satisfied with the way that it turned out.  The die cut background was made using my Cricut and the Cindy Loo cartridge which has several different doily style die cuts on it.  For whatever reason, the die and it's shadow cut at different sizes, but I liked the under/overlap effect that it created and decided to stick with it.  I like happy mishaps.

And for your viewing pleasure, a few closeups of the details:

Thanks for stopping by and happy crafting!

Supplies:  Bazzill Basics (Cardstock); Die Cuts With a View (Pattern Paper); Flowers (Prima, I am Roses); Brads (Prima); Alphabet Letters (SEI, American Crafts); Tools (Provo Craft Cricut, Martha Stewart); Journaling spot (Making Memories); File Tab (7gypsies)

Thank Goodness for Small Breaks and Crafting!

As some of you may or may not be aware, I am a full time PhD student, and well that can create a lot of chaos and uncertainty in life - not to mentions wrecks havoc on your crafting time!  But with school, also come breaks, and I had a short 5 days of break between quarters recently.  Because of the short break, I got in major craft time, and I mean major craft time!  Today, I thought I would share with you the layout that started as a junk project and least favorite and turned into one of my all time favorites.

 Believe it or not, the background was the serendipitous mistake from another layout.  The text paper was being used on another layout as a background, and when I finished the layout I decided I hated that paper for the background.  So I ripped it off, but I just hate wasting my scrapbooking paper - even if it is ugly junk, I just can't part with it.  So, I went about using scraps to create a background - the purple floral is covering up the hole that was created from the ripping and tearing from the above mentioned other layout.  I used the sketch in this post from Creative Scrappers.

Because the background was already started down the grunge path, I decided to do some stamping with acrylic paint and bubble wrap - I keep some different size bubble wrap on hand for stamping.  I then created paint splashes with some shimmering acrylic paint and a paint brush.  Because I am impatient, I dried it with my blow dryer!  Those stamps come from the newly released Stampin' Up! stamp set Postage Due, super yummy French inspired images.  Here are some close ups of the details for you.

Thanks for stopping by, and as always, if you love it, leave a comment!  Everyone likes comments.

Supplies:  Anna Griffith, Unknown (Pattern Paper); Bazzill (Cardstock); Postage Due Clear Mount Stamp Set (Stampin' Up!); Apple Crate. Luminere (Arcylic Paint);  Seam Binding (ThePaperBagLady on Etsy); Glitz (Alpha Letters); Ink (Stampin' Up!); Martha Stewart (Paper Punch); Tab (7gypsies)