Sometimes Sassy - Always Sweet - Lasting Memories #462 - Fruit

Hello, everyone! I am back with my second post of the day. If you are looking for my reveal for The Studio Challenges, please scroll on down.

It's time for the last challenge of the month at Lasting Memories and I  had a chance to play along! I'm hoping that now that summer is winding down that I will be able to get more scrapping done.

For August the theme at Lasting Memories has been "Plants" and our last challenge of the month is "Fruits". We want to see some fruit on your layout. This can be in the papers, embellishments, or in the photos.

Here is my layout:

I have had this fruity piece of paper from Bella Blvd in my stash for quite some time. To be honest, I really didn't know if I would ever use it. I'm so happy that I have an excuse to get it used! I love how colorful it is and it was perfect for this photo of Ada looking sassy after her haircut.

I fussy cut a few pieces of the fruit and wound up only using one of those. The strawberry and watermelon slice blended in with the background too much. Here are a couple of close-ups:

I stamped a label and added the date - both in pink. I finished it all off with a few puffy hearts scattered around the spread.

Ada had been wanting to get her hair cut all summer long. Abby told her she would take her before school started. Finally, that day arrived and Ada was so excited to get it cut. Abby said the whole time the girl was cutting her hair that Ada would say, "It's looking good already"! How cute is that!

I just love the sassiness that she is showing in this photo. When Scott saw the title he said I had it backward - that she is always sassy and sometimes sweet!

Be sure to head on over to Lasting Memories to see the beautiful layouts from the rest of the design team. I would love to see your fruity layouts, too!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a great day!

Wildflower Bouquet - The Studio Challenges - Monochromatic

Hello, everyone! Happy Sunday to you! I hope that you are having a fantastic weekend! We are getting a little taste of fall around here this weekend. Yesterday I don't think it even hit 70 degrees. A nice little preview but I'm not ready for summer to be done just yet!

It's time for a new challenge at The Studio Challenges today. This week we want to see a monochromatic layout. Use shades and tones of one color on your layout.

I don't do a lot of monochromatic layouts but I had a lot of fun with this one!

I was going through some older photos last week and I came across these photos of Abby and Shawn just a couple of months before their wedding. I knew I wanted to do a pink layout and thought these photos would work well with that. 

I pulled out all of the pink papers that I had included in my August Counterfeit Kit (you can read all about it here) and these were the papers that made the cut! I then went through my die-cut boxes and sticker books and pulled all of the pink pieces I thought would work. The only thing that wasn't in my kit was the thin washi tape but it was laying on my desk from another project. Having all of this already together made this layout come together so quickly!

I am so happy that I got one of these heart paper clips used! I love how it looks with the puffy heart in the middle of it. Here are a couple of close-ups:

I didn't want just a plain box for my journaling so I put washi tape around all of the edges to dress it up a bit. I added a couple of pink flowers to the corner. I love how it turned out!

About the photos - as I said before, this was just a couple of months before Abby and Shawn's wedding. We all went for a walk in the field behind the house. Shawn started falling behind so we stopped to let him catch up. When he finally caught up with us he had a little bouquet of wildflowers that he had picked for Abby. Being the usual ham for the camera, he had a goofy look on his face, but I thought this was pretty adorable and sweet!

Head on over to The Studio Challenges to see the monochromatic layouts from the rest of the design team. I hope you have some time to join us for this challenge!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I will be back soon with another project to share with you!

You're Never Too Old For Toys - Scrap Our Stash

Hello, everyone! Happy Hump Day! I can't believe it is the middle of the week already. The weekend will be here before we know it!

It's time for the second half of the Scrap Our Stash design team to reveal their takes on the July - Pick Your Side Sketch Challenge today. Here is a look at the double-page sketch that we had to pick a side from:

Along with the sketch we have an added challenge to use 5+ patterned papers and twine on your layout. Here is what I came up with:

I used the left side of the sketch for my layout. It was perfect for the photos that I wanted to use.

I've used my August Counterfeit Kit that I put together for the first of the month. You can see my kit and read all about it here. All of the papers are from my kit with the exception of the red paper. I didn't have much red in my kit that didn't have pink it so I dug into my scrap box and found this red paper.

You can see my 5 different patterned papers in the photo below - a blue stripe, blue dot, arrow paper, red paper, and the fifth paper is found in the banner - a blue star paper. I punched 5 pinked edge circles from the different papers and folded them in half to create my banner

I punched a few tiny stars to scatter around the page. 

About the layout - these photos are from Scott's birthday last year. Matthew had come up with a great idea for a birthday present - a Deadpool figure - something that Scott always looked at but would never purchase on his own. Matthew knew it would look perfect in his Dad's 'Nerd Nook' (his gaming room). Scott was so surprised and thrilled with the gift. He even posted a photo of Deadpool standing beside his birthday cake with a caption of - "You're never too old for toys!" - which was the perfect title for this layout.

I love how this layout turned out and it just may be one of my favorites this year!

Head on over to Scrap Our Stash to see how the rest of the design team took on this challenge. I hope you have a chance to play along with us this month!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I hope you have a great day!

Good Luck - Sketch N Scrap Card Sketch #152

Hello, hello! Happy Tuesday to you! I can't believe that it is already time for our last sketch of the month at Sketch N Scrap today! August is just flying by!

Our last sketch of the month is courtesy of Sketch Artist Lisa and it is one that I know I will be using again and again!

There are so many possibilities with this sketch - using as is, turning the long strip into a banner piece, changing up the shapes...lots of ways to have fun with it!

Here is what I came up with:

My scrap box has gotten a bit of hand and was overflowing, so I decided to go through it and see what I could use on my card. I had two 6x6 papers from Echo Park's - We Are Family - collection - the flower paper and the striped paper - in the box...I think they might have been the last two papers from that paper pad so I pulled them for my card. I found a piece of navy and a piece of red in the box, too, so this card came together pretty quickly.

I used Close To My Heart's - B1484 Jennifer's Hand - alphabet stamp set for my sentiment. I don't use this alphabet set nearly enough - I love it!

The little crepe paper flower was in a set that I received either as a RAK or in a prize, and I don't know why the pack was in my scrap box, but it was perfect for this card. It really matches the little light blue flowers in the patterned paper better than what the picture shows.

Head on over to Sketch N Scrap to see the beautiful cards from the rest of the design team. I would love to see your take on the sketch, too.

Thanks so much for stopping by today! Have a great day!

Counterfeit Kit Challenge - Challenge #2 - What Is Summer To You

Hello, everyone! I hope your weekend is going good. We had a fun visit yesterday with Abby and Ada and got to hear all about Ada's first two days of kindergarten. She's having lots of fun and is ready for more. When we asked what her favorite part was, she, of course, said - recess!

Counterfeit Kit Challenge has their second challenge of the month posted today and this time Cindy is challenging us to scrap about what summer is to us. 

Here's a reminder of my kit for August:

Summer, for us, means spending lots of time in the pool or keeping cool in the water in some form. I have made a layout for my granddaughter's Summer Bucket List traveler's notebook. She is playing in the water at the splash pad - one of the items on her bucket list:

Everything on my spread came from my August kit with the exception of the small pink alphas.

I actually used a few die cuts from my die-cut boxes and some of the stickers from the Shimelle sticker book and the Heidi Swapp 'Color Fresh' sticker book. I could not believe that I was lucky enough to find a sticker in the Heidi Swapp book that said - checked off the bucket list...how cool is that?!

Here are a couple of close-ups:

I added a mix of stickers, stamps, and die-cuts on the full photo page. I wanted to add a little more color to that side of the page and I love how this turned out.

As I said before, I am finally getting started on Ada's summer bucket list traveler's notebook. I figured since Ada had started school and they had marked everything but camping off of their list, that I was safe to get started on it! I am so excited to get this started - and completed - and for them to have a fun reminder of the summer before she started school.

Be sure to check out the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog to see what summer means to Master Forger Laura and Master Forger Lisa. We would love to see your kits and creations, too!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! Have a great day!

She's So Cute - Sketch N Scrap #183

Hello, hello! Happy Thursday to you! Today is Miss Ada's first day of kindergarten and this Nana does not know what to do with herself! After 23 years of having someone either in school or having Ada come over while her mom was busy teaching, well, let's just say I don't know what to do with myself! This photo was taken at open house on Tuesday evening. I'm sure I will get the official "first-day photo" later today! She was sure excited about going and I hope she has a lot of fun!

It is also time for a new sketch at Sketch N Scrap! Heather has created a fun 2-photo sketch for the mid-month sketch:

And since my mind is on Ada - I scrapped a couple of photos from when she was 6 months old:

I changed things up a bit from the sketch. The main photo I wanted to use was vertical instead of horizontal and I didn't want to cut my smaller photo down any smaller than a 4x4 - so I made it work! I omitted the circles on the right side of the sketch because I wanted to add a subtitle and some journaling. I could have probably gone ahead and added the circles, or rings, but I was afraid it would make it too busy.

It's a little hard to see in the photo, but the title reads 'She's so cute - strangers give her money'. Yep, this really did happen! I know I've always been a little biased about how cute Ada was - and still is - just look at that face, but she was always getting compliments when we were out and about.  On this particular day, Abby and Shawn were out shopping when a little old lady stopped them and told them that Ada was so cute. She then proceeded to reach into her purse and pull out a $20 bill and gave it to them and told them it was for Ada because "she is just so cute"!

Here are a couple of close-ups:

I've used my August Counterfeit Kit Challenge kit for this layout. Everything, except the white and grey papers, is from my kit. I couldn't see cutting into a 12x12 sheet for just those pieces, so I looked into my scrap box and found a white print and a grey print that worked perfectly.

Be sure to stop by Sketch N Scrap to see the fabulous layouts from the rest of the design team. I would love to see your take on the sketch, too!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I hope you have a great day!

Stuck on You - LM #459 - Cactus

Hello again! I thought I would pop in and share my take on this week's challenge at Lasting Memories. 

Our theme for August is "Plants" and this week is all about the cactus. We want to see a cactus or two on your layouts. This can be on the papers, in the photos, or an embellishment.

Here is what I came up with:

I used Photo Play's - Stuck On You - collection. When I bought this collection I really wasn't sure how I would use the cactus elements, but this challenge pushed me to some of it with this cute photo of Abby and Ada. 

I took this photo of my girls a week or two ago when they came down for a visit. They had on matching outfits and looked so cute! Ada was quick to point out that they weren't an exact match - her shirt has words on it and the stripes on her shorts were a different direction than Abby's, but I say it's close enough!

I originally was going to add a title to my layout - either 'twins' or 'mini-me', but after I added the stickers to the layout there were already a lot of words, so I decided to just let the sticker that says 'Stuck on You' serve as my title. 

Here are a couple of close-ups:

The chipboard cactus came from an Echo Park set that I found in my stash. It was just the right size for what I needed.

I cut the journaling card from one of the cut apart sheets and added a couple of stickers to the top.

The 'everything is better together' banner is from the cut apart sheet, too. I fussy cut a few of the little cacti from one of the patterned paper, but this is the only one that made it onto the layout.

Stop by Lasting Memories to see the beautiful layouts from the rest of the design team. I hope you find some time to play along with us!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! Have a great day!

Pretty Much The Best Thing Ever - The Studio Challenges Sketch Challenge

Good Sunday morning! I do hope you are having a good weekend. It's turned back hot and humid and days are being spent in the pool!

The Studio Challenges has a fun new sketch challenge posted today. This sketch was inspired by Lisa-Marie's layout from our Stars & Stripes challenge. You can see it here. Lisa-Marie had to step down from the design team so this sketch is a tribute to her.

Lisa-Marie is the queen of layers behind her photo, something I love but don't always do myself, and I had a lot of fun adding in a lot of layers on my layout.

I love this photo of Ada from last summer. I know, I say that all the time, but she is seriously cute! Her mom and dad had taken her to Itty Bitty City - a fun little play place that is just what its name implies - a little city. Inside are areas set up like different businesses. You can go into the grocery store and be a shopper or a cashier, there is a doctor's office, restaurant, a jail, a firehouse, a house...you name it and it's probably there. She had so much fun and you can tell by the look on her face that it was pretty awesome!

I used my August Counterfeit Kit Challenge kit for this layout. You can read all about it here. It was hard cutting into a couple of the 12x12 sheets just for little pieces, but I've had a lot of this paper for ages and sometimes all I need to do is cut into it to keep using it!

Here's a close-up of the layers:

I wasn't really sure where I wanted to add my journaling so I added a tag to slide in behind the photo.

Head on over to The Studio Challenges to see the beautiful layouts from the rest of the design team. I would love to see your take on the sketch, too!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I hope you have a great day!

TN Time With Lisa & Lori - August Challenge

Hello, everyone! Happy Saturday to you! I hope your weekend is off to a good start. We had a fun-filled day yesterday with Abby and Ada. Abby starts back to work on Monday and Ada starts kindergarten on Thursday so we were enjoying the last bit of summer vacation before it's back to the old grind for them.

It's time for TN Time With Lisa & Lori's August challenge.

HERE IS HOW OUR CHALLENGE WORKS: This is a monthly challenge that launches on the 10th of each month  You will have until the 9th at midnight CDT to link up your entries. If you complete my challenge link your spread below. If you complete Lisa's sketch challenge link your spread on her blog - My Creative Endeavors. If you combine my challenge with Lisa's challenge link up your spread here on my blog AND on Lisa's blog. You will then have a chance to win my prize as well as Lisa's prize!  That's a chance to win TWO times with ONE layout!!

You can always find the rules to our challenge under the TN Challenge Rules tab at the top of the page.

Now, here's my challenge for August:

(August 10 - September 9th)

I want you to use your favorite color on your TN, Bullet Journal, or Planner. Other colors can be used, too.

Here is a look at the sketch that Lisa created for us:

And here is my TN spread:

I truly do love all of the colors but if I have to pick just one, I will choose yellow! I love all shades of yellow - from the pastel to the bright and even the darker golden yellow - they all just make me so happy! However, I don't use yellow a lot when I scrap, so it was fun to challenge myself to use it on my spread. 

I'm working on my 2018 - 52 Favorites TN and these photos of Ada helping to make sugar cookies were perfect for my challenge.

I had an extra photo that I wanted to use, so I hid it underneath my journaling card.

Everything on my spread came from my August Counterfeit Kit Challenge - which you can read all about here. 

Here are a couple of close-ups:

I love the way the ticket stamp turned out. I actually had put that stamp set on a yard sale several years ago and it didn't sell, and now I am so glad it didn't! It was perfect for my spread!

I added lots of Elle's Studio die cuts and stamps on my spread - along with the journaling card (which was not in my kit).

This TN is one that I made myself from chipboard. Knowing I would be skipping around a lot, I wanted the flexibility to be able to add pages in whenever I got them completed without worrying they were in the right spot. I still need to finish the covers. I saw a Youtube video recently where someone made an album and covered it with fabric and I think that is what I want to do with this one - I just need to find the right fabric. I will be sure to share when I do!

We did not have our minimum of 3 players for our July challenges so no winner this month. I will be using the same prize for August - a selection of black and white goodies:

Be sure to link up your spreads using my challenge below for a chance to win!  Head over to Lisa's blog and check out her challenge, as well!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! Have a great day!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Always Looking Out For Each Other - Scrap Our Stash

Hello, everyone! Happy Thursday to you! I can't believe that it is Thursday already! It's been a crazy week with strange happenings. On Monday I found a hornet's nest in one of our trees while trimming limbs. Luckily, I saw it before I started trimming it, but we're still trying to figure out how Scott didn't get stung when he mowed and ran the weedeater around it. I have no idea how long it's been there - it's right at eye level! Then our air went out on Tuesday...it was 88 degrees in the house when we went to bed Tuesday night - ugh! And we had 4 - yes, 4 - skunks in our yard while we were trying to see what was wrong with the air conditioner. Thankfully, Wednesday was overcast and we had a little rain which kept the house fairly cool. I'm hoping the air conditioner will be an easy fix because a new unit would be hard on the ol' budget!

Anyway, I'm here today to share my take on the Saturday Cartoon Inspired Sketch Challenge at Scrap Our Stash. This month is all about The Jetsons. Along with the sketch and the cartoon image, we are challenged to create a family-themed layout and use mixed alphas.

Here is what I came up with:

I was looking for a certain photo on my computer a few weeks ago and I happened across these photos of the kids from 2012. I've scrapped these photos before (you can find that layout here), but I wanted to tell a different story this time around. In the original layout, I journaled about how we went to Bennett Springs for Labor Day as a sort of send-off to summer, but this time when I saw this photo, it prompted me to go more in-depth about my kiddos and their relationships with each other. 

It's not always easy when you have a brother with severe autism, but one thing is certain, Abby and Matthew are always looking out for their brother, ready to jump in and help him with whatever he needs, even if that is just walking across the river. 

My journaling is a bit personal, so I've hidden it behind the main photo and used a tab for easy access to it.

I've used Close To My Heart (blue heart and pink papers), Kaiser Craft (graph background paper), and Echo Park (turquoise background paper) on my layout. My trimmer is a bit dull and left some rough edges, so I just went with it and distressed all of my paper edges. 

Here are a couple of close-ups:

So, how many times have you scrapped the same photos but told a different story about the photos? I'm finding myself looking through old photos/layouts and they are triggering different stories than what I originally told, so you may see happening now and again around here!

Be sure to stop by the Scrap Our Stash blog to see the beautiful layouts from the rest of the design team. I would love to see your take on this challenge, too!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! Have a great day!

Sketch N Scrap Card Sketch #151

Hello, hello! Happy Monday to you! I hope you had a good weekend. We had a fun family filled weekend - I guess you could say our last family get together before everyone heads back to school/work in a couple of weeks.

It's time for the first card sketch of the month at Sketch N Scrap today. Heather has a great sketch to get us started:

I've been working on using some of my Close To My Heart papers and my scraps from those collections are starting to build up, so I thought I would pull some of those scraps out for my card. And this is what I came up with:

The blue dot paper was already cut to size for a card. The rainbow-striped paper is one of the manufacturer's strips that I had saved, and the scribbled circles are from a My Favorite Things die set. I love this die set but rarely use it. Now that I have it out maybe I will use it more!

The sentiment is from Winnie & Walter and I stamped the rest of the sentiment on the inside of the card. I even used a couple more scraps on the inside, as well:

Be sure to stop by Sketch N Scrap to see the beautiful cards from the rest of the design team. I hope you have some time to join us this month!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I hope you have a wonderful day!

Counterfeit Kit Challenge August Kit Reveal and Blog Hop

Hello, hello! I am back with my second post of the day. If you are looking for my Sketch N Scrap reveal, please scroll on down.

It's time for the Counterfeit Kit Challenge kit reveal and blog hop - August edition! Master Forger Cindy has picked our inspiration for this month and it's another great one!

She has chosen Citrus Twist Kit's July 2019 "Best of This Life" kit and they also have an add-on kit that you can draw inspiration from. You can read all about it and get a couple of links to unboxing videos on the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog.

Here's a look at the kits:

Citrus Twist July 2019 Best of This Life Kit

Citrus Twist Kits July 2019 Add-on Kit

And this is my kit that I am calling "All the Pretty Things"!

I took inspiration from both of the kits when I put my kit together. First I made a list of everything that stood out to me - stars, triangles, polka dots, florals/leaves, numbers, pinks, orange, reds, blues, and mint, and I kept these in mind when I started going through my stash. 

If you follow the links under the inspiration kit photos you will see photos of just the papers in the kits. I knew I had the navy polka dot paper and the orange, yellow, and pink ticket paper (in 6x8 form) that is in the add-on kit, and I used the colors in those when picking my papers. 

Please tell me that I am not the only one that has trouble narrowing down the papers once I start pulling them! I truly meant to stick with the same amount of papers in the inspiration kits - 12 in the Best Of kit and 9 in the add-on (plus 3 cardstock), but then I saw both sides of the pattern paper in the add-on kit and liked those, so that meant pulling 9 more. And then I saw 2 different triangle papers that I liked and would work and dots...I love my polka dots, and I ended up with 5 or more of those! The bad thing is when I pull these papers and then start narrowing them down I just know that when I sit down to scrap that I will want to use the paper I put back instead of what I included in the kit - which leads me to a mega paper add on kit! Maybe one of these days I will get over that!

Here are the main papers that I will try to concentrate on using up this month - a mix of Heidi Swapp, Pink Paislee, Pebbles, Dear Lizzy, Amy Tangerine, My Mind's Eye, Bella Blvd, My Mind's Eye, Maggie Holmes, and Echo Park:

And here is my mega paper add on. Knowing I will be scrapping quite a bit of Ada this month, I added in lots of pinks:

The ticket paper that I have in the 6x8 size is one of my favorite color combos, so I used it to pull papers for a page kit or two:

While going through my Amy Tangerine paper pads I found these papers that I thought I could fussy cut and maybe get at least some of them used:

I went a little overboard with embellishments this month...what can I say, once I started I just kept on pulling more! Here are the stickers:

Not everything will match, but a good majority will, and I always forget about my sticker books, so I made sure to add a few of those, as well. 

I don't normally pull a lot of alphas since they sit right next to my desk, but I did add a few in this month to try and concentrate on getting them used up. I still reserve the right to pull other alphas if need be!

I pulled my die-cut box that I had included in my June kit again - since I didn't get much used out of it - and somehow it has now turned into 2 boxes full of die-cuts! Okay, so I have gotten several Paper Issues Swag Bags over the last year and the majority of them were still sitting in their cute little glassine bags, so I separated them out and put the die-cuts in my box - which was already overflowing, so I had to get another! Here's a sampling of what is in the boxes:

I also added in Heidi Swapp's "Color Fresh" 6x6 paper pad because, well, you know, I might "need" it for something!

Citrus Twist's - Best of - kits always includes a stamp set - which made me think to pull some of my own stamp sets to use this month - a good variety of words for titles, labels, phrases, etc.:

And now my kit is all ready to go for (hopefully) a very productive scrappy month! Here is how I have my kit stored on my desk - it's amazing that it all fits in that space!

And that is my kit - All the Pretty Things! I know there is no way I can use all of this kit in a month, heck, I probably couldn't use all of this in two months, but I am going to keep it on my desk until I'm tired of it!

Now, here's the list for the blog hop. Be sure to check it out for tons of inspiration!

Counterfeit Kit Challenges - http://counterfeitkitchallenge.blogspot.com/

Guest Designer Kate Blue -  http://kateblue.blogspot.com

Cindy - http://cindyscreations-cinmfoster.blogspot.com/

Julene - http://julenebydesign.blogspot.com/

Lisa - http://lisahausmann.blogspot.com

Lori - https://loriannie670.blogspot.com/ >>>>>>You are here<<<<<<

Laura - https://www.instagram.com/mrsp_scrapsandtea/

I would love to see your kit if you put one together this month, so be sure to link up on the Counterfeit Kit Blog, our Facebook page, or on Instagram.

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today! I hope you have a great day!