Challenge 7a

Here's my interpretation of Challenge 7a.

1. Cricut's Opposites Attract font, done in Stampin' Up (SU) Brillant Blue and Gable Green
2. Circles made out of Whisper White (SU)
3. Paper with Creative Memories Circle Punches
4. Lisa Bearson Chipboard elements
5. Some Lime green rivets . . . of which I wish I had two more.

Shrunken

Googly eyes galore. Only two more layouts to go and I'm done with Chicago. Woo Hoo!

Challenge 6a

This is my take on the challenge. I'm using this page as a title page for the Chicago album.

I printed the pictures out on the my printer, which believe it or not, there was no cussing involved. (I hate my printer, HP Officejet 6310 AIO. It won't accept photo paper half the time. A fourth of the time it gets jammed. The other fourth of the time the paper is somehow forced through and the pictures make it onto the page.)

-Cut photos to 2 1x2" squares
-Mounted them in a pleasing manner on a white piece of cardstock :)
-Cut Vellum to lay over the letter squares
-Cut out "CHICAGO" on the Cricut
-Cut out "2008" using the Cricut software to weld it together
-Stamps the arrows around the teal paper
-Mounted it all

Voila!

Scrapbook Wall

So, I said we needed to post pictures of our scrapbook spaces, and our favorite organizational fix, and I haven’t done it. Well, finally I have.

I used to have half of the play room, but Griffin really needed a room of his own, because he kept the other boys awake. So, I tried to just put his little bed in the playroom and keep the scrap room. That absolutely did not work. One night I came in to check on him before we went to bed and he was sleeping on an x-acto knife. AAAHHHHH!!! The next day, the scrapbook room was moved down to the office. The scrapbook stuff inhibits half of the office.

Doesn't that just look like a ton of stuff? Why don't I always have what I need? I started my first scrapbook when I was 12. It's a Garfield scrapbook from Hallmark and let me tell you, I obviously really liked tape. I started avidly scrap booking when Joe and I got married. Those scrapbooks are a hoot. They are some of my favorite, though.

O.k. here's the other half of the room. Has this room ever been this clean before? Nope. I don't think so.

I have a couple organizational things I've done that I just love. I have some really weird quirks. For instance I can't stand seeing the spools from ribbon. These black boxes Amy give me really helped with that. I found the tin box at Target's dollar shop. I should have bought two but I wasn't sure they would fit. I went back to get more and they were all gone. Oh, boo hoo!

Ribbon not on spools goes on a clothespin or just into a glass jars, also from Target.

How do I organize paper you ask? I keep a very limited paper supply.

These are solids. I made a rack from the grid shelves at Target. --I see a theme with Target stuff developing.-- If you want more information about that email me and I'll send you directions. So all the 12 x 12 solids go there. Patterned 12 x 12 are in the a file like the one next to the solids, that white thing to the right, arranged in color order. If a 12 x 12 gets cut down it, goes to the accordion file below. I also house 8 1/2 x 11 here.

Bits and pieces go here-see below. I bought this at IKEA. It was really fun to put together too. Will helped me nail it all together. I've been going to paint or stain it for years. Maybe someday.

You can see what goes into the drawer below thanks to the labels. I used the Pea Jenny font, from 2 Peas in a Bucket.

I just completed one of my favorite stamp organizational things.

This is my book of stamp sets. Doesn't the title I put on sound like a ten year old? All MY Stamps, geez! Anyway the following boxes coordinate with the tabs on the stamp directory.


I've stamped all the images from each stamp set onto the cards. Now it's really easy to find stamps and also come up with what stamp to use. I wanted to get the Bind-it-all for this project, but no dice.

This little cabinet has my sewing stuff and other crafty things.

That's a trip around my creative space. I wish I could take over the whole room, but with the giant window and open floor plan, I'm kind of limited, for right now.

Zutter Confusion and Delay

Anyone who's has a child addicted to Thomas the Tank Engine probably gets the title. It's one of Sir Topham Hat's favorite things to say. Well, without the Zutter, but utter.

Anyway, quite a long time ago I went to Maggie's and ordered a Zutter Bind-it-all, in hopes of binding it all. But unfortunately they were sold out, so I had to order it. Being the kind of person that wants stuff NOW, NOW NOW, like Veruca Salt, I was pretty bummed. But at 40% off and using my store credit, how can I complain. The order was going in that day, so I should have the thing within 3-5. I ordered it on the 4th of February and I'm still waiting. That's how I get to complain.

I writing this blog for one main reason. If I complain about something not happening, arriving, getting done, it tends to happen, arrive or get done that day. So, wish me luck. I have the calendar pages done for Joe's mom's present and I wanted to have it to her in February, but now I guess it will be a March-February calendar.

Scrapping up a Storm

I went old school on this page and cut the title and chick feet out by hand. It just needed a down on the farm feeling. BTW, the pictures are straight on the pages, but I'm getting some "fisheye" with my camera, which is throwing off the prospective.

I finished the second page of this layout. I had to add some flower to pull it all together.

Museum of Science and Industry

I could have done an album just from the pictures from the Museum of Science and Industry. We have tons.

This page was fun, because I cut into the paper and tucked the photos behind the images.

Challenge 5a

I would have blown up the 2nd page to 12 x 12 but it wasn't the greatest shot . . . a bit fuzzy. I was happily surprised when I picked it up at Walgreen's and it wasn't just a blur.

Didn't do anything fancy here, just a bit of stitching.

Challenge 4a Completed, YAY!

Ok this challenge . . . what should I say? I felt it had to be hard angles, because we're talking Legos here. Those are hard angles! Have you stepped on a Lego in the middle of the night or the middle of the heel? Anyway, it ended up very utilitarian looking. But it gets the job done.

Challenge 4a complete.

The only interesting element is the border. I used the Stampin' Up notebook edge punch (or whatever it's called) to make it. I punched along the paper, then cut it into a strip.

Rude!

If I had money to just throw around here's what I do with it today. I would buy the front page of the Oxford Leader. The headline would read, "The Rudest Woman on Earth Appears at China House." The article would say something to this effect . . .

This goes out to the woman who entered China House Take-out Tuesday at 1pm. What under God's Green Earth gives you the impression everyone at China House was interested in listening to your obnoxious voice, your obnoxiously loud abrasive voice? You come bursting through the door, on your cell phone and begin pacing back and forth as you give your "cell friend" the details of your doctor's appointment. From the top of your bleach blonde Bozo styled hair along your leathery tanned body to the tips of your knee-high, black leather, four inch heel boots you are a beast!

Retirement!

Grandma Shenfeld's Calendar

Every year I do a calendar for Joe's mom for her birthday. I'm finally getting around it, and I thought I would use it as a learning project. OMG! My head's going to get so full of new stuff it's going to pop.

Challenge 3a

Not my favorite, but completed.

Page 1

1. Using a white background, I laid down a torn piece of Scenic Route patterned paper
2. I put two photos together to make a big picture. It kind of cracks me up. It looks like a giant staircase with three sets of twins.
3. Wrote around the photos things we saw that day.
4. My great creation for this page was the word "them". I used the Cricut Monogram cartridge and cut the inside out with the X-acto knife.
5. Stuck on the tickets.
   

Page 2

1. This page was just all about cut and paste, jigsawing. Mounted on a 12 x 12 card stock.
2. Labels are layered paper

Going Digital

Since so many people had such good questions about the digital page I thought I would share what I've learned so far.

I am not using a packaged scrapbooking program. I thought it would be to limiting for me, but I think there are a great ideas for someone not really interesting in completely learning how to re-invent the wheel. Hallmark, Creating Keepsakes, HP and hundreds of other companies have scrapbooking software. If you want to just take it for a test run, without a lot of time investment package deals are probably the way to go, and pretty cheap. Here's a link to a review of Top Ten scrapbooking software: http://scrapbooking-software-review.toptenreviews.com/

Our old computer had Corel Paint Shop Pro on it which I updated to Paint Shop Pro X. Our computer died and we got a new one, so I just finally re-loaded the software. In the download there was a download available for Lynda Tutorials. Thought "I really need to learn how to use this thing." So I downloaded them too. Very helped with the basics, this is where they hook ya, but I really wanted more, so headed to the tutorial, website at http://www.lynda.com/. Great website you can sign up for a year or just a month. I get the month package, it was $25.00. What I've learned so far is worth way more than $25.00, and I'm only a week into my subscription.

I'm using Paint Shop as my editor, art studio. It comes when a few scrapbookish thing, but I've been getting things from several different websites. Here's a few I like: http://www.littledreamerdesigns.com/ and http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/digital.asp. There's tons more, but right now I haven't needed to wander. They've had anything I needed. You purchase via download: papers, fonts, and elements (ribbon, brads, staples). There's packages for things that all work together. Imagine walking into your favorite scrapbook store and there's a bag full of everything you need to complete a page and everything matchs. Same thing, just digital. Now the fun part for me in Paint Shop is I can make the elements, fonts and papers. For instance the glittery dead fish at the top of the blog is actually a cardboard thing I bought from JoAnn's. I took a picture of it -- I could have scanned it too -- digital cut it out and altered it, changed the smile to a frown and drew "Xed" out his eyes and flipped him. Here's the original picture.

Of course I'm weird do I had a total blast doing all of this. My point is you can make anything an element for you scrapbook pages.

After completing hat last scrapbook page, "Beach Bum" I uploaded it to Costco and had it printing out in 12 x 12 ($2.99) and 8 x 8 ($1.49ish). I wasn't sure what this thing was going to look like. It looked better than I expected.

I created the new title and background paper the blog with Corel Paint Shop also. I needed to use an outside source to figure out how to do the background paper, www.cutestblogontheblock.com.

That's what I know so far. I'll update as I learn and grow. :)

Playing with HTML

I'm having a blast learning all the cool things I can do on my blog . . . so you're probably going to see some crazy things over the next few weeks. Hopefully, they'll be fun. Hang in there . . .who knows what I'll come up with next.

Like the new backgroud . . . I made it tonight . . . pretty girlie for me!