The Best Farkle Counter

When the Cosmo Cricket line "Boyfriend" came out, I loved all the patterns and colors. It's actually a school line with pencils and test worksheets, but I wanted to do something different since I'd already used it for a page about my Dad teaching. I had printed some pictures about my cousin's oldest son playing farkle and thought this paper would be fun. I figured it would still work since the pencils would go along with filling out score sheets.

At this point in the weekend, I was still friends with my Revolution so I used two different fonts and some of my favorite October Afternoon sticker letters. I absolutely love the look of cork on scrapbook pages. A few little Basic Grey brads added some more color and depth.

Here's another close up. I punched out a few circles from different patterns and tucked them under the edge. Adds a nice little detail and layer.

Life is Better When it's Fun

This is the second page I did over the weekend. Last summer, I went to the State Fair with Erica and her kids. While we were walking by all the food vendors (aka Heart Attack Alley) we saw this Twinkie the Kid cutout and couldn't resist the fun photo op. The background paper is My Mind's Eye and the rest is October Afternoon's 'Seaside.' I've wanted to challenge myself by using the beach/ocean themed line for something non-oceany and the colors ended up matching the photos great. The banner is cut out from one of the patterned papers. I was trying to use it on another layout earlier, but it didn't quite work. So after all the work of cutting it out, I was happy it worked for this one.

The title (taken from my handy dandy 'Inspiration Station' book) is a combination of October Afternoon stickers with a line of stitching run through it. I really love stitching. Anytime I work on a page, nothing looks quite finished till it's stitched.

I also had the kids sign their names for a personal touch. Sarah wrote her name then drew a star next to it. So when it was AJ's turn, he writes his name and asked if he could draw a star. Next was my turn and Erica told me I had to draw one too. I think it turned out cute. Plus, now there's a fun story about the pictures and even one about putting the page together.

Rockets Red Glare

Here's the first page I did over the scrapbooking weekend. It always amazes me how long it can take to put such a simple page together. One thing that makes me feel better is something my Uncle said once, he said "Each page is like a small work of art." Which I completely agree with. The tricky part about this layout was deciding on the size of circles to use and how to overlap them. I do really like how it all came together.

Since the pictures were taken in the evening; I kept the background light and added red, white, and blue for a patriotic theme.

The circles were a mixture of papers from October Afternoon and Girl's Paperie. Another little detail is two straight stitch lines down the circles. Plus, they're distressed and inked. The stars are wood veneers from Studio Calico which I inked to tone down the light wood color. The title was fun too because I used three different Quickutz fonts. It's a mixture of Blossom, Rollerskate, and I think Chocolate. For more texture and interest, the "th" and "July" are cut from cork.

I have to admit, the more I look at this page, the more I like it. I'm proud of how the pictures turned out and the layering. My practice at layering is starting to pay off... I'm still gonna keep trying new things, but I do see an improvement.

Let the marathon begin...

It's been awhile, but I'm back on track with scrapbooking. The planning is over, the scrapbook weekend is over, and I have eleven new pages. I had planned for about 30, so hopefully I'll just keep working on more and posting more. I thought I would get more done, but scrapbooking is a bit of a process with me. Everything gets sanded or distressed, inked, and sewn down. Plus, there was A LOT of die-cutting. It's worth it though when I can get a font out of whatever paper I want (and not have to worry about running out of "e's" or "a's"). So here's the first page of the scrapbooking marathon... it's a page I did about my Great Uncle.

The papers are from My Mind's Eye 'Alphabet Soup' boy line. I love the colors and the patterns were really fun to mix. The sticker letters are new from October Afternoon. (At this point, I got a little tired of die-cutting so having some cute stickers came in handy.)

The story behind the photo is my family was at my Grandma's house and our Great Uncle Bernie let my sister and I tie him to the chair with yarn, put barrettes in his hair, and cover him with dolls. You have to be a great person to let two little girls torture you and still love them.