Love This

Some times I accidently go monochromatic.

 

My picture was pretty neutral so my options for color schemes were pretty wide open, but I kept coming back to the beautiful peachy oranges in Maggie Holme's Open Book and by the time I finished, I had myself a monochromatic layout. 

 

 

 

Michelle

Smile

For the most part I like to scrap seasonally. During the spring, I scrap spring. During the summer I scrap the summer....but I always struggle when it gets to about Halloween time because I will still have loads and loads of summer stories that I want to document, but my mind will be in fall mode. And this gives me some anxiety. I guess you could say I have paper issues! Ha.

Recently, as the self-inflicted pressure began to grow in my brain, I decided to end my misery and, as Queen Elsa would say, I let it go. Summer stories can wait and I am sure I will appreciate returning to the warmer memories during the much colder and less busy season that winter is for me.

So here you go, my last ode to summer before I put it on a little bit of a hiatus so that I can totally emerse myself in the holidays and all the scrapping that accompanies it.

 

My littlest and my dad enjoying the water during a trip to San Antonio. (Seeing my dad with my kiddos always makes my heart melt!)

 

 

 

I used a combination of Webster's Pages and Teresa Collins for this one with a little bit of Heidi Swapp mixed in.  Think this might have my made my top 10 list of favorites!

 

Michelle

Christmas Past Meets Christmas Present

I am not a big time hoarder of scrappy products. For the most part I use what I purchase and I am not one to hold on to something that I am really not that into....but that is not the case when it comes to Christmas themed products.

Now, to keep it in prespective I have only two full Iris cases of Christmas products, but I am extremely protective of the contents of these boxes. Usually, I am all about sharing with my oldest daughter, but this is NOT the case with my Christmas supplies. I might even keep these in a special place and only open them when I am alone ;). 

One of the qualities about Christmas products is that I think for the most part, they are timeless. Christmas does not get too much of a makeover every year. There are new trends, ect., but the basics are always there and this makes it easy to combine various product lines, old and new, when putting together projects.

And since I have been in a snap happy Christmas mood, here is a little look at how I did this, combining old and new holidays products, on scrapbook layout.

One of the newest additons to my Christmas stash is Elle's Studio's newest holiday line, Good Cheer, and I knew I wanted to use it as the base of my layout and compliment it with cork stars from Studio Calico, and brads from October Afternoon's Silent Night (from 2012??). 

 

I started out by simply layering a few patterned papers, stapling them into place, and dropping some Gold Lame Color Shine.

 



 

I then kindly asked my four year old if I could please use some of my crete paper and adhered it to the layout with some machine stitching.

 

 

Because I loved the red patterned paper so much, I cut down my white cardstock and framed it with it. I think this really made the whole layout go from just okay to exciting.

 





 

And here is the final product...



 



 

 



 

And now, all I want to do is scrap Christmas!

 

Michelle

Lap Dog

This past summer my husband and I took a grown up only camping trip. Wait, strike that. We took a grownup/canine only trip :). Well, we had a great, relaxing time and due to the childless nature of our adventure I was able to take my time to explore the area, read uninterupted, and snap lots of pictures.

Once I was home, I decided that this grand adventure deserved its own album and committed myself to documenting the mini-vacation in a Handbook and this next layout, scrapped in a 6x8 format, is my second addition to this project.

 

 

 

I just smile everytime I see this particular photo. Early on in our trip I had decided to sit in the backseat of the Jeep because our dog, Rincon, really likes to stick his head out the window and I just did not fancy sharing a front seat with him the whole way. Well, my graciousness did not pay off! Ha. Joke on me. I ended up sharing the backseat with the guy anyways :). And truth be told,  I didn't mind at all.

 

Michelle 

 

You

Tomorrow night my son plays in the All-Star game for our area's youth football league and I could not be more proud. This next layout highlights a milestone from this past season.

 

 

 

Sometimes my journaling gets a little sentimental and sappy. But hey, I gotta go there. I have to know that my loved ones know how I feel. And frankly, in regards to this handsome guy, I don't think he really listens to me when I do tell him, so I am hoping by putting it in print he can come back to it later and finally take it all in.

 

Michelle

Magic & Merry and my December Daily Confession

Confession time--Documenting Christmas was my favorite subject to scrap, until I met December Daily.

Now don't get me wrong,I love seeing every one's take on this Christmas tradition from Ali Edwards and I am so inspired by all the beautiful albums. So inspired that for the last two years I have bought a kit and began to put it together. Last year, I think I even made 5 complete pages. LOL.

Sadly however, that is as far as I ever got. The last two years I have crashed and burned before the first week of December was up, even though I prepared ahead of time for it.

This past weekend I went to my Christmas boxes and pulled out last year's--I almost wept. The album is beautiful, the products are gorgeous, and it is so far from being done. And the worst part is that those 5 pages was all the holiday scrapping that I did. Such an important and meaningful and favorite part of the year was left untouched and that is a tragedy.

For whatever reason, December Daily and I just did not jive. The pressure to create something in a timely and regular matter during a crazy busy time killed my creativity.  My mojo went down the drain and my self-esteem took a steep dive for not having the ingenuity to create something as fantastic as everyone else. 

This year I once again felt the pull to attempt another DD--how could I not? The concept is amazing, the products are just as beautiful, and everyone is doing it :).  But this time I somehow managed to resist.

Instead, I pulled out some new and old Christmas supplies (Elle's Studio, October Afternoon & American Crafts,) printed out a few pictures from last year, and set about making some good old fashioned Christmas layouts. And I tell you what, I found my holiday scrapping spirit pretty quickly.

 

 

 

I had loads of fun putting together this layout featuring one of my favorite pictures from last Christmas. It felt so good to document this moment and put it in album to be looked at instead of in a box which may or may not be hiding under my bed.

 

I realize now, that I don't always have to be doing the latest and greatest and trendiest thing. I finally accepted that at this moment in time, a December Daily just isn't my thing and that is okay.

 

Michelle

Happy Moment

We blow a lot of bubbles at our house.  In fact, I think we are pretty good at it. But are bubble blowin' was blown out of the water by my sister-in-law this past summer when she pulled out her crazy awesome bubble blowing machine.  And of course I had to document it :).

 

 

 

 



Minty green is one of my current favorite colors to scrap with and paired it with some pink, red, and gold in a simple grid inspired design. 

 

The super cute heart shaped speech bubbles are from iheartstudio which is one of my fave places to go for digital cut files.  I had cut out several with the initial idea to create a horizontal line with them, but ended up just sticking with two and filed that idea away for another day.

 

Michelle

 

 

 

 

 

 

This

I adore scrappy challenges.  And occasionally, I will combine a couple. This next layout was the result of a happy marriage between a recent Sunday Sketch from Studio Calico and the latest Creative Jumpstart Challenge from Marcy Penner and Stephanie Bryan. 

The sketch you can see here and the Creative Jumpstart 03, which was a recipe challenge, you can see here.  The recipe called for 5 patterned papers, 1 brad, and 1 frame.  Fun! 

 

 

I like challenges because they are fun and inspiring.  This time I played around with the embellishments, even reaching into some older supplies to grab a brad that had been patiently waiting to be used and to take out my beloved and neglected butterfly punch to work in my 5th piece of patterned paper.  And the deer head--how great is that?! I don't know if I truly understand the whole deer head phenomenon (I am generally not a fan of any head mounted), but it's cool in its own weird way. 

Overall, I made a fave layout AND documented an important-to-me story.  Life is good.

Citrus Twist Sunday Sketch

This past Sunday was my turn to take on the weekly Citrus Twist Sunday Sketch Challenge using November's Main and Embellishment Kits.  The sketch, which you can see here, calls for multiple photos and I was quickly able to take care of some fun photos I took of my daughters recently.....

 

 

With the holiday season officially upon us, time is going to start flying by and that means with the mad holiday rush creative time will more than likely be compromised. A sketch is the perfect tool to use during these busy times because they take the guess work out of creating layouts and allow you to get scrappy when you have little time to spare.  Citrus Twist offers a great sketch EVERY Sunday and you can bet I will using them every week to check one layout off of my creative to-do list. 

 

All of of us at Citrus Twist are always excited to see how others use our sketches so if you can, please share your take on this week's sketch with us by uploading your project to the Citrus Twist Gallery. And remember, if you upload it by November 7th you will have a chance at a $5 gift certificate to the CTK Store.  Happy crafting!!
 



Here and Now

I am a slow sharer.  Which will be my explanation for sharing this bright and cheerful summer layout while currently sitting here in comfy, warm layers and contemplating taking a short trip out into the cold weather for a hot drink from Starbucks :).

 

 

Just a little fun combining pretty papers and a little bit of hand stitching.  Life is good.

 

November at Citrus Twist

The November Citrus Twist Kits are beautiful.  When I opened up my box I acted like a giddy fool.  I might have even hit a new level in regards to my dork status :).  Ha. Needless to say, paper and embellishments get me pretty excited and Trina, owner of Citrus Twist, hit it out of the ballpark with November.  Here's a look at what you will find in both the Main and Embellishment Kits.

 

You can see that the kits are a beautiful mix of Heidi Swapp's September Skies, Maggie Holmes' Open Book, Gossamer Blue, and a little bit of Amy Tangerine's new Stitched.  Basically, all of my fall faves put together :).

 

And here are three of the four scrapbook layouts I made (I will be sharing my fourth layout later this week):

 

 

 

 

I {heart} autumn. Sigh.

 

You can see what the the rest of Design Team did with November's kits by visiting the the Citrus Twist Gallery.