Scrapping up a storm!

The one of the best things I can say about Stacy Julian's class at BPS (so far!) is that I'm starting to feel the mojo working again! Woohoo! After tagging all my layouts, I found that I am seriously lacking in the "Places We Go" category. My W's are pretty well split, so I decided to concentrate on the "Why." For me, that is the most difficult. So I present you my class layout:




Papers - Happy Stripes and Flowers by Michelle Coleman (scrapartist.com); Fonts -CK Grocery List (journaling), Mailart Ruberstamp (Title); Sketch: Scrapbook Shortcuts (SS mag), pg. 54


The boys were seriously concerned with where I was "living" while I was traveling...The things children are worried about!

Another funny thing I noticed - I tend to leave off the "who" in certain layouts. Like I assume the viewer knows who is in the photos. Not such a good idea if my great-grandkids are looking at the scrapbook and are trying to figure out which one is Grandpa Geary and which one is Great-Uncle Adam!

I also did another layout for the Simply You Challenge at Scrapartist. This is for week 25 - Cooking. I love to cook. I also love teaching the boys how to cook. A couple weeks ago I had Dan take these pictures of me & the boys making Dinner (Coffee Spice Rubbed Rib Eyes, From Bobby Flay's Boy Meets Grill). Mmmmmm.




Papers - Chelsey's Dream by Michelle Coleman (scrapartist.com); Fonts -CK Shannon List (journaling), Dirty Headline(Title); Sketch: Scrapbook Shortcuts (SS mag), pg. 78


Both of these layouts can be seen in my gallery at Scrapartist.

A Whacky Weekend

I had this perfect Father's Day Weekend planned for Danny. I was supposed to entertain the kids for most of the weekend so he could do whatever he wanted (build models, mostly). It was supposed to be in return for my Mother's Day "day of peace." Of course, things never turn out exactly as planned.

Danny has decided that he wants to can japalenos and other hot peppers. I bought him a canning pot (it's gigantic), the metal ring insert & various tools to encourgae his new endeavor. Saturday he canned 5 jars of jalapenos. Nice! Sunday, we go out for more jalapenos and tomatoes. Tomatoes, because we're going to have fajitas for dinner and I want fresh pico de gallo! So, after all our running around, I tell Danny I want to take a little nap - I'm feeling a little tired. After that, the boys and I were going to make our special Father's Day gift. Well, 2 hours later I wake up. Yes, my wonderful man let me sleep! I get up to see what the kids are doing outside. As soon as I stepped out the back door, my left foot collapsed under me and I fell HARD on the ground and promptly starting crying! Geary rides up on his bike and just stares at me crying on the ground. He finally went to get Danny. Between Danny & Geary, they got me up and helped me back into the house. There went all hopes of Father's Day peace. I spent the rest of the day planted on the sofa.

I went to the doctor on Monday and was diagnosed with a Stage 2 sprain (on a scale of 1 - 4). The kicker - I did the same thing exactly 3 years ago! No kidding! My doctor & I had a good laugh about that! I am supposed to rest, keep my foot elevated and wear an Ace bandage for compression. It feels a lot better today, but I still have a hard time moving around. Fortunately, I can work from home. It's just as easy to yell at Oracle from the comfort of my own home as it is to yell at them in my office {wink, wink}

Laughing at Memories

OK, so I'm taking Stacy Julian's Library of Memories class. Right now, I'm organizing my photos - both digital and print. I thought my photos were fairly well organized... NOT! There is some method to my madness, but it really is organized chaos! So, as I'm going through my print photos, I find a picture from Christmas of the year my son Adam was born (he was born just a couple days before Christmas). This brought back memories of sitting in my DMIL's house with a 3-day-old baby and laughing my head off! (Ok, I thought I was going to split my stitches, I was laughing so hard!) My SIL and her husband brought a game for all of us to play on Christmas Day (a family tradition). We sat in the front room of my DMIL's house being super loud and rowdy playing Balderdash, while my 3-day-old baby slept! Yes! That boy slept through the entire commotion! All this prompted this layout:




Papers - Michelle Coleman( scrapartist.com); Cards - Balderdash, courtesy of Parker Brothers; Fonts - CK Printer (Ali Edwards), Nicotine Stains

I'm a bad blogger

I've been so neglecting my blog lately. Bad Mel...Bad Mel!

Well, the big news is I'm in Stacy Julian's Library of Memories class (which starts tomorrow!). I couldn't be happier! I'm in serious need of inspiration and advice on how to organize my layouts. I've got so few printed out for our albums. I've printed a lot of layouts for la familia, but not much for us. There are 3 digi-scrappers (admitted) signed up...included Lisa Cohen from Scrapartist! Kewl beans!
And - I got my copy of Ali Edwards' font CD - more happiness on my part! So I did this layout using 2 of the fonts from her CD:




Papers - Katie Pertiet (designerdigitals.com), brushes - Michelle Coleman( scrapartist.com), bookplate - Gina Cabrera (digitaldesignessentials.com), Vivid Color and Chocolate filters from PhotoBlast, Fonts - CK Painterly, CK Printer (Ali's Fonts), High Strung

This came about from a dinner conversation last week. Kids say the darndest things! This is the first layout I've been able to create in over a month. Don't know where my mojo went - I just hope it's returned! I hope I can get back to my creative ways. I sure miss scrapping!