Mind What Your Mama Told You.

My mom always told me the last thing to go on the tree and the first thing to come off is always, always, always the angel. I never gave this much thought, just figured this was some superstition of my grandmother's that had gotten passed down, though I always followed this rule of Christmas decorating quite emphatically each and every year.
Well, this year I forgot and as I was pulling ornaments off the tree yesterday (yes, nearly a month after Christmas) I saw that superstition or not, there was also a perfectly logical reason for this tradition of sorts. Being that the angel is on the top of the tree, any jiggling of the tree, even in the slightest, causes the topper to sway dangerously back and forth.
Lesson learned. And now, when Scott asks, "And why do we have to do it this way again?" I have a perfectly logical explanation to go along with my usual, "Because mom said!"

PDQ

That is the name of the paper line I used on this layout of our trip to the fall fair. The paper is pre-designed and ready for the addition of your
pictures, journaling and title. To add some more umph, personality and texture to the layout, I stamped, distressed and embossed some more stars, outlined the Cricut-made title in white, framed one photo with black marker and another with distressed Coredinations cardstock, which then got pop-dotted.
And that's all it took for me to get this layout done.....Pretty Darn Quick!

Gone Nutty

Want to get your kids to sit very still and quiet? Give them a nut and the opportunity to feed a cute little critter!
Okay, so normally I think of squirrels as vermin and have a natural suspicion of any wild animal. But this little guy, affectionately known in this Northern Ontario camp as Red was quite entertaining; from cautiously plucking peanuts from the kids' grasp to running right over our dopey dog Bella's nose to his angry chattering at anyone who invaded his territory.
Anyways, when you're vacationing in bear country, a cute little vermin is a far more welcome wildlife visitor!

Tidbits of a Favourite Layout.

I fell in love with a picture I'd taken of my daughter and two of her friends while we were downtown for the local Santa Claus Parade. The pose the girls struck was sweet and fun, while the colours from the cement stones, pavement, the girls' clothing and overcast day gave an edginess to the photo....so very downtown.
Well, the photo just happened to work perfectly with some paper I'd bought for an anniversary layout that never happened. The greys, blacks and reds along with the patterns and distressing was just a beautiful match.
To avoid getting permission from the other girls' parents, I am only going to show elements of the layout, not the layout as a whole. Little tidbits that I love almost as much as the photo itself...the pieces that bring everything together....the sweet with the edgy.
First shot shows two hearts I made with my new Cricut cartridge, Ashlyn's Alphabet, emphasized with 3 embossed brads (the embossing has started to rub off, but the effect is nice...I think I'll try sealing it though to avoid further damage). Below the hearts is the top right corner of the photo, along with a freehand border done with marker and a paper piercer (used to scratch the inner line into the Coredinations cardstock).

This second shot shows a chipboard circle and fancy brad securing a transparency tag that was actually from a sweater I received for Christmas. Oh how I love to be able to re-purpose for my craft!

Lastly, there's this shot of the left side of the layout. This swirl was also made from my Ashlyn's Alphabet cartridge, accented by 3 more embossed brads that are "self-distressing."

Please note, the red above the swirl is actually my table cloth, not part of the layout though oddly, it does look like it belongs!

This is the first layout I've done in the new year, and after a scrappy hiatus over the holidays it felt so good to release some creative energy. Thanks for allowing me to share it with you!

From one good thing to another.

I love having candies in my studio. Stuff like cinnamon hearts, skittles, jujubes and sour keys....you know, candies that are supposed to last a long time, but never really do? Yeah, them!

Well, recently, a tub of jujubes went empty on me and instead of bringing the tub down two flights of stairs to the garbage, I decided to make it useful again.

I've got a bunch of flowers that just sit around in their original packaging, meaning I've got to dump them out and stuff them back in each time I want to use any of them. Well, these bulk candy tubs are the perfect size to drop all my large flowers into and still be able to root around for what I want. Only problem....flowers this pretty deserve a pretty container too!

Ah, that's where getting involved in swaps comes in handy. I participated in a summer circle swap earlier this year, and these pretty, circular creations from my MMMB friends just happened to be the perfect dimension to attach to the lid of my candy bin!


It was really, really hard to decide on one circle for this project, but I went with Paula's pretty creation for a number of reasons....it's flowery, it's purple, it's got flourishes and butterflies and while it has a summery feel, it didn't say summer on it. After all.....flowers are for all seasons when you're a scrapbooker!
As a final touch, I added a fuzzy, self adhesive border ribbon cut into butterflies and flowers which helped spruce up the side of the container without obscuring the flowers inside.

And there you have it, a cute, cheap and useful container for my ever-growing flower collection.

Hope you like it!

because it was my birthday

Here's a "me" layout I did about my birthday. I just love the papers, they're all Dreamstreet that I picked up in a super yummy package at the Scrapping Turtle yard sale. That's also where I picked up the stamp set used in the title. "Because" was done on the Cricut with my Alphalicious cartridge. The flourish and point markers for the journaling are all stamped and embossed.

As happy as I am with the esthetics of this layout, the journaling is my favourite part. That's where the whole idea started; bits and pieces just came to me as the day of my birthday progressed. Here's a closeup:














Thanks for looking!

Fall Fun

It was a lovely October Sunday, and we made the best of it by heading out with friends to a local country market to pick up some pumpkins and let all of our kids play in the corn maze and on the haybales while us scrapbooking moms snapped off picture after picture.

As promised, I used just what I had on hand to make this page. I started by masking off a frame, then with a brayer rolled on a slightly darker yellow ink. Once that dried, I added on some punched leaves that I received in a punchie swap and sprayed a nice deep red Glimmer Mist angled from that corner up. I had a little uh-oh moment while peeling off the frame mask, as some of the edges were not coming up so cleanly. I probably could have cleaned them up a little more but quickly took a liking to the effect it gave as you can see in this second picture.

The leaves above the picture frame were stamped and embossed. The title tag was coloured with inks and brayer, the title stamped and the whole thing clear embossed. Similarily, the square between Kelsey and Cole's pictures was distress inked and then clear embossed for a tile effect.

Oh, and those leaf punchies I saved for another layout about this day. Here's a little peek at that.