I really wish my crafty-feelings were operated by a switch. That way I could turn it on whenever I wanted.... unfortunately, like most things, it is not that easy. I have made some cards but no pages in awhile.
Hoping the forecast for this weekend looks good!! I have a goal of 15 Layouts this month and so far I am holding at 12... 3 more by the weekend - I can do it!!!
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Friday, March 20, 2009
Having a Big Brother...
Having a Big Brother means learning things from a boy... and Unfortunately, the lessons she's been receiving may not be my favorite. However, from the bundle of pictures I got of this happy girl made it worth it. I'll tell her no tomorrow....
Monday, March 16, 2009
What's Going On Tonight???
This was a page I created this evening, from a "creative juices" sketch in my cafemom group. I chose to leave out journaling, 1) because I didn't want to cover up the patterned paper anymore and 2) it was busy enough in my book with all the colorful guitar pics and doodled background paper! I just love sketches - they really get my motor going!!! :D
Friday, March 13, 2009
I love getting inspired!
So I am constantly reminded of how inspiring scrapping sista's can be! I don't know where I would be without my friends in my favorite Cafemom scrapbooking group! Recently in a how-to section, was how to make these adorable Lollipop "Prima" flowers.
I really wanted to share the video with you also!!
But if you wanted to see a few steps from my journey, here they are:
Step One: Cut nesting circles 
*the video has a great Quick tip about cutting squares first for an easy circle, since you are going to distress the heck out of these circles there is no need for perfection here. And that is my favorite kind of tip!
Step Two: Distress the edges of all the circles. 
*You can use an edge distresser like mine, from Close to My Heart, or even scissors.
Step Three: Use a white acrylic paint & your finger tip to paint the edges of all the circles.
*I have so many pictured here because I was making 3 flowers. I didn't use 5 for each flower, or make them all the same size. As "they" always say There are no rules in scrapbooking!
Step Four: Arrange and align your flowers and insert a brad in the center.
*Here's one with just 4 circles.
Step five: Using a spray bottle with water, or a glimmer mist, spray the flowers and using your fingers curl up the edges of your circles. 
*You can do this as much or as little as you want. Add more water if you find the paper not maleable enough. Shown here is the difference between curling or not. Definately gives a lot more dimension. The acrylic paint, when moistened with the water, will act as a stiffener and will hold your flower's dimension after the next step.
Step six: Using a heat gun or heat source, dry your flower.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
March Layouts
Here are some of the pages I have completed this March. I am a member of a Cafemom scrapbooking group and most of these pages are from color challenges, sketch challenges, how-to's and such. I am returning to scrapbooking after taking a few months off... I am working on finishing my son Marcus's 3rd birthday album... especially since his 4th birthday is in 3 weeks - YIKES!!!
be'be'
i {heart} my boys
But I will tell you one thing I have learned to really embrace...
If I am behind on scrapbooking, it's no cause for stress... all it means is that I have a lot of scrapbooking to do!! (And since I love to scrapbook, it doesn't seem like much of a punishment, does it?)
be'be'
A page featuring my daughter, Cora, at 4 months old
i {heart} my boys
A page about my boys, my husband Michael and son, Marcus. The picure is from Marcus's first ride around the block with Daddy on the motorcyle, summer of 2008... while I waited in the yard with Cora - a bit nervous.
Ramblings of a Ribbon-Aholic
This is the true story of one scrapper, in love with stunning ribbons, stuck in a slump of a storage nightmare as her growing affection outgrows her once-smart solutions…
The first step is admitting you have a problem. Hello, My name is Sara and I am addicted to ribbon. Done. Step two was actually the beginning of this whole saga. I rejoined the world of scrapbooking after a few years off. I hadn’t really ever used ribbon before… so when I discovered cafemom scrapbooking, ribbon, eBay and I was feeding a 5 month old baby 3-4 jars of food a day – the combination seemed perfect. I had thought baby jars were such a great idea to organize my ribbons by color! And it was perfect when all I had was an eBay order of solid and polka dot grosgrain ribbon cut by 3 yd increments and no spool. It was so pretty and colorful, inspiring and wonderful a top my desk hutch.
However, my growing addiction soon landed in chaos. Almost immediately after I found myself drawn to $1 spools at my LSS and other craft stores. I would open these spools and shove ribbon in jars. Scrapbooking later was turning into a nightmare, and my pretty jar decorations seemed like every other sacrifice for beauty. Painful.
A shopping trip to Family dollar seemed to finally answer my prayers when I found a cheap and adorable piece of furniture that I thought would solve all my woes. And it did. For many months. Ribbon left on the spool would occupy one drawer. Snipits and odds and ends, much like a kitchen junk drawer, occupied another. Giving it a home, flanking my right side, I thought I had reached Nirvana.
But how many times did I pull a drawer out, search for ribbon and while hunting stumble upon an adorable print that would have been oh-so-perfect for the layout I had agonized over days ago. I knew I wasn’t crazy, that I had an aqua butterfly print ribbon, about ½” wide. Dang. Okay… doubts started creeping into my mind.
It would all change one innocent Friday night. Getting together with my two best friends, across my neighborhood, after kids are tucked in, we scrap. We scrap, we laugh, Crystal usually makes cookies or brownies…. It’s not always super productive for me; however, some nights at home I only accomplish one layout because of distractions. So getting a few pages done and having fits of giggles throughout is always a successful night in my book! It was one of these boisterous evenings that I had, in my haste to be at Crystal's, just thrown the “junk” ribbon drawer into my large re-usable CookieLee shop-bag (which, by this point, the drawer had more ribbon in it than a clearance bin at Wal-Mart). While scrapping I exposed this chaotic mass of ribbon to the girls and they were understandably concerned. I was forced to admit that I, Sara, did indeed need a new storage idea for ribbon. It was the first time I had said it aloud.
It was shortly after, I had a vision while restructuring the kitchen. This came from a common kitchen mystery… the one where your rubbermates and leftover containers disappear, somehow into thin air. Sound familiar? Anyhow, once the glory it’s cabinet was my oriental trading revolving storage container carousel thing… I have no pictures of this, but for a month it was a failing misery of a great idea. I tied ribbon around the arms of the 4 “chambers” and stacked the spools inside. Trying to clean up my abominable “junk” ribbon drawer, I used a circle punch to notch out cardboard squares. I wound up the longer odds and ends, trying to do it by color or theme. And the center of my carousel housed many of these boards. It contained a lot of ribbon, however the containing was not flawless and trying to see what was all in there was near impossible. I really needed an intervention…
Danielle had heard my plea, and for my birthday a few weeks later, 2 brand new Craftmates Ribbon storage containers were mine! Danielle, my friend since 5th grade, (and rediscovered after we became mommies) had answered the mystery all along. (For now {knocking on wood}).
I have since purchased 2 more, filled it up… and I still have stacked spools, a drawer or two of loose ends, boards of ribbons, and plenty of jars with grosgrain galore. And while my scrapbook room is really a corner of my bedroom {GROAN} I hope it to be in an office soon… and when it does, who knows what the future holds.
I guess stay tuned to the Saga of the Girl who Loves Ribbon! And please, tell me what storage solutions you have, be they inventive or retailed, that you feel suite you. Or do you have a dilemma or debacle such as I have had?? Please share your story, if you revel in ribbon!
The first step is admitting you have a problem. Hello, My name is Sara and I am addicted to ribbon. Done. Step two was actually the beginning of this whole saga. I rejoined the world of scrapbooking after a few years off. I hadn’t really ever used ribbon before… so when I discovered cafemom scrapbooking, ribbon, eBay and I was feeding a 5 month old baby 3-4 jars of food a day – the combination seemed perfect. I had thought baby jars were such a great idea to organize my ribbons by color! And it was perfect when all I had was an eBay order of solid and polka dot grosgrain ribbon cut by 3 yd increments and no spool. It was so pretty and colorful, inspiring and wonderful a top my desk hutch.
However, my growing addiction soon landed in chaos. Almost immediately after I found myself drawn to $1 spools at my LSS and other craft stores. I would open these spools and shove ribbon in jars. Scrapbooking later was turning into a nightmare, and my pretty jar decorations seemed like every other sacrifice for beauty. Painful.A shopping trip to Family dollar seemed to finally answer my prayers when I found a cheap and adorable piece of furniture that I thought would solve all my woes. And it did. For many months. Ribbon left on the spool would occupy one drawer. Snipits and odds and ends, much like a kitchen junk drawer, occupied another. Giving it a home, flanking my right side, I thought I had reached Nirvana.
But how many times did I pull a drawer out, search for ribbon and while hunting stumble upon an adorable print that would have been oh-so-perfect for the layout I had agonized over days ago. I knew I wasn’t crazy, that I had an aqua butterfly print ribbon, about ½” wide. Dang. Okay… doubts started creeping into my mind.It would all change one innocent Friday night. Getting together with my two best friends, across my neighborhood, after kids are tucked in, we scrap. We scrap, we laugh, Crystal usually makes cookies or brownies…. It’s not always super productive for me; however, some nights at home I only accomplish one layout because of distractions. So getting a few pages done and having fits of giggles throughout is always a successful night in my book! It was one of these boisterous evenings that I had, in my haste to be at Crystal's, just thrown the “junk” ribbon drawer into my large re-usable CookieLee shop-bag (which, by this point, the drawer had more ribbon in it than a clearance bin at Wal-Mart). While scrapping I exposed this chaotic mass of ribbon to the girls and they were understandably concerned. I was forced to admit that I, Sara, did indeed need a new storage idea for ribbon. It was the first time I had said it aloud.
It was shortly after, I had a vision while restructuring the kitchen. This came from a common kitchen mystery… the one where your rubbermates and leftover containers disappear, somehow into thin air. Sound familiar? Anyhow, once the glory it’s cabinet was my oriental trading revolving storage container carousel thing… I have no pictures of this, but for a month it was a failing misery of a great idea. I tied ribbon around the arms of the 4 “chambers” and stacked the spools inside. Trying to clean up my abominable “junk” ribbon drawer, I used a circle punch to notch out cardboard squares. I wound up the longer odds and ends, trying to do it by color or theme. And the center of my carousel housed many of these boards. It contained a lot of ribbon, however the containing was not flawless and trying to see what was all in there was near impossible. I really needed an intervention… Danielle had heard my plea, and for my birthday a few weeks later, 2 brand new Craftmates Ribbon storage containers were mine! Danielle, my friend since 5th grade, (and rediscovered after we became mommies) had answered the mystery all along. (For now {knocking on wood}). I have since purchased 2 more, filled it up… and I still have stacked spools, a drawer or two of loose ends, boards of ribbons, and plenty of jars with grosgrain galore. And while my scrapbook room is really a corner of my bedroom {GROAN} I hope it to be in an office soon… and when it does, who knows what the future holds.I guess stay tuned to the Saga of the Girl who Loves Ribbon! And please, tell me what storage solutions you have, be they inventive or retailed, that you feel suite you. Or do you have a dilemma or debacle such as I have had?? Please share your story, if you revel in ribbon!
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