A 2-pager...

I did a 2 page layout today, which is rare for me, so I thought I'd share it. These are my favorite pictures of Madison from each month in 2008. I'm planning on doing more layouts like this for each of the girls from birth to age 18. I think they'll be great albums! This is the first one I've done so far and I'm really happy with how it turned out...

*Inspired by a Becky Higgins sketch in the August 2008 issue of Creating Keepsakes

The papers are all from Basic Grey's Urban Prairie line, which I really like. Thanks for looking... ;)

More layouts...

I was able to sneak in some scrapping time today and got 2 layouts done...yay me! Here are my pages...

The first one is Madison having some fun with the leaves outside. She would pile them up, scoop a bunch together and then throw them in the air and yellllll! It was really cute to watch. ;)



The second one was inspired by a challenge my scrapping group is having to do a monochromatic layout. I think I did pretty good with it (I even had matching ink, lol!). The pictures are from when the girls and I went to the Biltmore Estate with Mark's mom last December. I've been before but this was the first time I took both girls and it was really nice...



Both were pretty simple to do (I just did my usual trimming/distressing/inking), and I really love how they turned out. ;)

My Coffee Cup

I was able to get another layout done today. In a scrapping group I'm in, we were challenged to scrap something we love...something we could actually hold in our hands. I instantly thought of my favorite coffee cup! Here's how the page looks...

My sweet friend Cathy sent this cup to me last year for my birthday and I really do love it. It's the perfect size, beautiful in color, has a wonderful Scripture on it, and it makes me think of our amazing friendship every time I use it. What's not to love, right? ;)

For the layout, I kept it simple. I used K&Company papers for this one...their Wild Saffron paper pad. I cut a half circle to do the journaling on and a mat for the photo, and then inked them both. For the picture, I lightly sanded the edges and inked them. I laid everything out and then after I wrote in the journaling, I decided to add a small picture of Cathy that I had. I think it fits perfectly and I love the finished look...

I Love You Baby

I did a layout today that I'd like to share with you...and it actually has me on it! ;) I scrap so many pages of the girls that sometimes I forget about Mark and myself, lol...

My wonderful friend Peggy recently joined the design team for Song Bird Scraps and they just posted their first challenge, so I decided to do a layout for it. Here's what I came up with...



The colors I used are somewhat brighter than what I normally choose to work with but I'm really loving how this looks!! All of the papers are from the Basic Grey Urban Prairie collection and they just match each other perfectly, don't they? ;)

Putting this one together was very simple. I did some cutting, sanding, inking and painting, and then put everything in place where I wanted it. I'm very happy with my results!

Be Still

I did a layout of Emily late last night that I really love. I took this picture of her on 5/20/07 when we were over at Mark's Nanny's house for Mother's Day. She was outside playing and just walked over and kneeled down to smell the flowers. It was a beautiful moment and one I definitely needed to scrap!

I thought that "Be Still" would be a perfect title for this one because the more I looked at the picture, the more I thought of one of my favorite Bible verses, which is "Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm 46:10). I love the feeling it gives...

2 new layouts...

I actually got some scrapping time in yesterday so I decided to try out my new Basic Grey goodies. I am in LOVE! I used the Sugared Collection on both layouts and it is so girly and it all matches wonderfully!! I may have to start saving my pennies and get some more packs. ;)

The first one is a picture I got of Emily in the early morning when she was still all curled up and just looked so beautiful. :)

To start, I took out my trusty dinner plate and drew a circle onto the patterned paper, cut it out and inked the edges. Next, I took the picture, sanded the edges and also inked them. Once I put the circle and picture in place, I added some beautiful Prima flowers and journaled around the edge. Very simple and I think it looks great!

The second one is Madison helping me make a cake for Emily. I went in the kitchen to start getting the stuff out and she came running in asking if she could help me. Of course I said yes!! ;)

I had 3 pics I wanted to use for this layout but thought they would cover up too much of the patterned paper if I left them all full size so I cut 2 of them down and left the last one full size. Next I took a template that I have (a square with rounded corners), used it to make the corners of the pictures rounded, and then inked the edges.

Once that was done, I took the pink piece of cardstock I wanted to use, placed the pictures on it where I wanted them, and trimmed the rest. Then I inked the edges and placed the entire piece in the center of the patterned paper.

I felt like it needed a little something else, so I decided to do a title. These letters are Basic Grey chipboard letters (Hip) and I reallllllly like them. They were raw to start with and I thought about inking them but realized they would just blend into the background so instead I painted them white. This was the first time I painted anything for a layout and I really like how it turned out! I'll definitely be doing more in the future...

So there you go! I did a layout for each of my girls that I'm really happy with and also tried something new. That's a pretty good day in the scrapping world, huh? ;)

Nature...

I did a layout yesterday with Mark and Emily on it. The picture is from a trip we took to Looking Glass Falls in Brevard, NC back in May of 2007. It's about 40 minutes from where we live and it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL there! Here's what the layout looks like...

This one was so much fun to do! The patterned paper is actually not patterned paper at all. I took the back of the packaging that my Basic Grey chipboard albums came in and cut them into 4 matching squares (isn't that a great way to reuse something you might have just thrown away?). I took some brown ink and my Tim Holtz Walnut Stain Distress Ink (which is a little darker than my brown) and inked the sides of all of them. Next I took a matching brown piece of cardstock, inked some of it with the brown ink to give it a little texture, and then took the squares of my homemade patterned paper (lol!) and placed them in the corners...

I decided that I wanted to put something in the middle to draw the pieces together. I used a piece from one of the chipboard albums as a template, drew it onto some white cardstock and cut it out. Then I took the same 2 ink colors and inked the edges and all over the surface to make it the color I wanted. It came out just right!

For the picture, I sanded the edges of it and inked them, again with both colors of ink. I wanted the edges to blend with the background color. Then I chose a vellum quote (love this one!) and matted it onto another piece of white cardstock that I had inked with only the darker color ink. It came out the perfect color behind the vellum and matches the edge of the picture really well.

I'm really happy with my results here and I truly wish I had more of this packaging to make some more layouts with...it's so beautiful!