Too Sweet For Treats

Posted on June 30, 2010 by daydesigns
Just a quick post to get my latest scrapping creation submitted before the deadline. I’ll come back after dinner and add details. It’s for Sketchy Thursday’s latest sketch which I instantly fell in love with and can see myself using over and over! This was Marley’s first Hallowe’en party with her baby group. It was quite the experience!! Enjoy!
I’m back – Happy Canada Day!! I don’t normally add which materials I used but I think it’s something I’m going to start doing so ….
Paper: yellow & green – Jillibean Soup chicken broth & sliced bacon; black – from Recollections Hallow’en pad
Pumkin candy bowl sticker – Jolee’s by You dimensional stickers.
Cordouroy flowers – MyHouse Corduroy Craft Fair by American Crafts
White Alphas – Recollections (they weren’t really showing up too well so I added the black marker with my Copic marker.)
Journalling sticker – Remarks journalling stickers book by American Crafts (Journalling Veggies in Chestnut & Leaf)
Posted in challenges, Halloween, layout, Marley's Baby scrapbook, Scrapbook | 1 Comment

Happy National Scrapbook Day!

Posted on May 1, 2010 by daydesigns

First off … I’ve been featured on Ideas for Scrapbookers!!! Check it out! Mine is the 3rd layout down.

http://ideasforscrapbookers.blogspot.com/2010/04/happy-national-scrapbook-day.html

Pam had sent out a call for submissions so I thought “what the heck! Could be fun!” She responded immediately to say she’d use it and wanted more info. If I’d known she was going to put everything I’d said about the layout on her sight, I probably would have kept it a bit shorter! LOL! You’ve probably figured out by now that I have a problem keeping things short and sweet. 🙂
Anyway, I’m pretty pleased. Yay me!

I also have a new layout to show you. Here is Turkey Day – another page for Marley’s baby album. I’ve only got 4 more months to scrap and then I’m done her 1st year. Only 5 more to go after that, right? LOL! Oh yeah, and then there are two other kids to focus on!! Gak!

The sketch I used is Sketchy Thursday’s sketch from last week. I wanted to have this finished in time to submit it but … ah, life with 3 kids! The sketch shows some paint splatter work in the upper right corner and I have not ventured into the misting/splattering world yet so I figured a little paper ripping could work instead. I think it DOES work, don’t you? Also, the addition of the banner adds more fun interest to that corner.
I’ve been seeing a lot of banners on layouts all over the blogosphere and decided to try one out myself. When picking the paper for this layout I knew I wanted to use a blue and yellow theme (Marley’s travel high chair stands out so much in the pictures I thought I’d just use it as my colour inspiration.) When I went digging through my stash I found the Studio Calico Homefront line that I’d won AGES ago but not found an appropriate use for yet and the scalloppy (is that a word?) paper worked perfectly to create a banner. I also love how the wood grain alphas really pop against the yellow striped paper.

Well, there you are. Hoped you like it.
I’d better head into the shower now and try and recover my “it’s going to be a fun day” vibes. Between waking up to a dirty kitchen, baby’s that show EVERY sign of being tired but refuse to nap, and 6 year olds who are clearing suffering from PMS, my good mood went racing out the window pretty darn early this morning. That’s quite an accomplishment seeing as I’m not a morning person to begin with!!! I hope to get some scrapping in today but as Greg is at a golf tourney for most of the day, it will depend on how much I can distract the other three!! Wish me luck.

Hope you all manage to get your scrap on today!

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Helping My Mojo!

Posted on April 27, 2010 by daydesigns

** April 30th: I finally have edited this post. All added text is in blue. Sorry for the delay!**

I’ve been working on 3 layouts (for Marley’s baby album) of our trip to the UK in September of 2004. It’s been a slow process! I used a PageMaps sketch for the first page and then just adapted it (kind of) and used the same papers for the next two pages. The last layout has been sitting unfinished on the dining room table for about a week or so (just got it done a little bit ago) so Paige decided to help me out. I’d been playing with adding button embellishments to it so she took it to the next level!!

Picking JUST the right button …
… and thinking about where to place it!
Pretty pleased with her composition!

She was so proud of herself that I hated to wreck her hard work! Then again, having buttons all over my journalling wasn’t the best idea. LOL!
SO without further ado, my 3 layouts:
As mentioned above, I followed a sketch for the first layout (from the January 2009 PageMaps collection) but not for the other two. I made the decision to keep them looking cohesive with the same Basic Grey papers, simple blue cardstock and similar floral embellishments. Here are the closeup/detail shots.
Our fist stop was to visit my guardians (my dear Aunt May and Uncle Alasdair) in Southampton. We managed to fit in a lot in just a few days!! Oh, and even though wee cousin Lucy was kept away from Marley, she ended up catching her Chicken Pox anyway!! Kids!
On a personal note (and totally NOT scrapbook related), Aunt May has been battling hard lately and I am very worried about her. Staring at her picture as I was creating this layout made me feel closer to her. I wish I WAS closer to her! The miles are many but my heart doesn’t know them!! Be well, Aunt May.
From Southampton we went to visit another Aunt and Uncle (I have LOTS in Britain!!) who lived at the time in a little village called St. Neots. The added bonus (besides getting to visit Aunt Dorothy and Uncle Arthur) was the fact that St. Neots was really close to the village where I grew up – Bar Hill. So we popped in to show Greg and Marley my old house (looking SO small!) and then went to explore nearby Cambridge.
 
From St. Neot’s we went to London to stay with cousins. Marley got her first taste of jealousy when my cousin’s little girl kept going to Greg! LOL!
And our last stop was in Glasgow – where all my family originally hails from! This was mostly a time to see family but we did sneak in a day in the city. We tried to go through to Edinburgh one day (I lived there for a couple years after univeristy) but that was right about the time Marley started to feel the effects of the on coming Chicken Pox and voiced her dissatisfaction quite loudly! So the trip was abandoned!
 
I will try and come back to add commentary about the pics but right now I have a raving lunatic in my lap (i.e an extremely unhappy 13 month old!) Thanks for checking out my pages. Hope to get back to this soon!!
Well, thanks again for checking back. Oh, and the “raving lunatic” is also on the mend. She been teething or something this past week and has had the worst poops and diaper rash imaginable. Plus she’d taken to only sleeping with Mommy and Daddy! NEVER a good arrangement for the Mommy and Daddy!! But (fingers crossed) I think we turned a corner last night and are on the mend. No sign of more teeth though so I’m sure a repeat or two are in our future! Great!!
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Catching up – Easter, Hailstorms and another Layout

Posted on April 10, 2010 by daydesigns

Easter was a week ago but I’ve been negligent getting new pictures posted. Oops! We had a fairly quiet LONG weekend – Marley and Greg both had the Friday and the Monday off school/work. Greg and I tried to have one of those long weekends of our youth I think. You remember the ones? Where you sleep in, then you laze around in your pyjamas til noon? Doesn’t have quite the same effect when your kids STILL get up at 7:00 and “lazing around” involves getting up from the couch every 5 minutes to stop the baby from putting yet another sticker into her mouth or getting the 10 billionth “snack” for the bottomless pits (mostly Paige right now – I think she’s going through a growth spurt)!! Ah well, we parents take what we can get, right?!

Anyway, back to Easter events … Greg’s sister Christine and family came over for dinner on the Saturday.  The “Easter Bunny” made a surprise early visit and hid some eggs in the family room while the cousins were playing upstairs.

On the hunt …
… “hey guys, there’s some behind the curtains too!”
Showing off the haul.
LC “helped” the Easter Bunny hide the eggs so of course she “found” some eggs too. She also tried to stuff the entire contents of one egg into her mouth! Where COULD she have picked up that trait? Greg? Anyone? Here she is with 4 Cadbury Mini Eggs plus a couple Skittles in her mouth. Looks pretty pleased with herself, doesn’t she?
While I was happily snapping away ‘cus she looked so darn cute (the rascal!) Greg was saying how unsafe it was. Party pooper! Finally I listened, stopped taking pictures and made her spit everything out. Somehow she was still in a good mood even though I confiscated the eggs! Oh, and about her t-shirt … we saw these in Hawaii and knew it was perfect for our little “Trouble”. (It says, Here Comes Trouble.)
Easter Sunday was another low key day. The girls found their chocolate bunnies on the breakfast table but were VERY disappointed to discover that he had not hidden a second bunch of eggs around the house. Hmm … may have to rethink things for next year! But seriously, how many egg hunts am I …er, the Easter Bunny … supposed to do in one weekend?! Marley kept harping on about it and even went to the extremes of searching under the couches and cushions (found a lost chocolate egg and thought she’d struck gold too) but eventually Greg managed to convince them that the EB was a bit stupid and when he saw the eggs in their baskets already he figured he’d already been there so didn’t hide any more eggs. Doh! When did Easter become about gimme, gimme, gimme?!?!?
But I digress. That is a whole other rant!
Monday afternoon we headed out to Abbotsford for lunch and play time with Ammee, Poppa, Uncle Paul, Aunt Joni and cousins. Of course, our bottomless pits sat at the counter. Easy access to the food!!
Greg and LC. (I think I need to trim her bangs again!)
Marley and Uncle Paul atop the climbing wall at the park.
All three girls on the swings. They live to swing!!! (Especially when Uncle Paul is handing out under-ducks.)
Paige and Miles on the teeter totter – I think Uncle Paul is doing most of the teetering and tottering!
That was our Easter. Pretty relaxing really. Good visits with family – that’s what it’s all about, right?
This post has the word “hailstorms” in the title – wonder why? Because this past Thursday the craziest weather system blew through here. It’s been particularly stormy lately (April has definitely come “in like a Lion” this year!) so I wasn’t totally surprised to be woken up by thundering rain on Thursday morning. My only thought was that my stroller workout class was probably going to be cancelled! But as I was listening to the rain it reach epic noise proportions and I realized it wasn’t actually rain anymore. Hailstones ranging in size from baby peas to chickpeas were bouncing off the window. The girls would have slept through it but Greg woke them up to see it! Poor kids!! Here is a picture of our patio table after the first hailstorm (there were several over the course of the morning).
Showing the range in size and the thick blanket of hailstones that the girls briefly thought was snow.
A close up. Crazy, eh?
Last but not least, my latest layout for Marley’s baby album. I realize this post is getting WAY too long so I’ll be brief.
I based it on this PagesMaps sketch by Becky Fleck although I didn’t get it off her site. Not that I can remember which site I DID find it on though. As you can tell I flipped it around a bit to suit my pictures.

That’s it folks! You made it! Phew!!
Thanks for checking out my little blog. The sun is shining and the garden is calling us to de-winter it. My tulips and daffodils are well up but still protected by a blanket of leaves. Time to clean things up!
Happy weekend everyone!!

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More Pages for Marley’s Baby Album

Posted on April 3, 2010 by daydesigns

My scrapping Mojo continues!! I’m not sure how I’m getting all these layouts done and still managing to cook, clean, change diapers, etc … maybe I should ask Greg if I’m actually managing to DO all those things! LOL! Sometimes the pages come easily and I can bang out a few really quickly. Sometimes it’s like pulling teeth to get a layout to come together! These 3 pages came together fairly quickly. Well … that’s not totally true I guess. I started the first ones at the Crop I attended last month but because I wasn’t feeling too good (remember my stomach flu episode?) I couldn’t get my head around it and the beginnings of the layout stayed in my bag until yesterday. Then with a quick change of background cardstock, it all fell into place.

Blogger seems to acting up so I’m not too sure how these pictures are going to arrange themselves once I publish this. Grrr! They are detail shots of the above layout about our trip to Osoyoos (in 2004) for the August long weekend to celebrate my Aunt’s 70th birthday. My brother and his family came too and my nephew declared his love for his cousin Marley with a great big smooch! This picture is SO going to show up at his wedding!! 
I have also decided to enter this into Practical Scrappers challenge this week which is to use rub-ons. I received a whole lot of rub-ons in a blog candy win a while back that I have slowly been using up. I applied a whole pile to the bare section in my layouts and then on one side but the journalling block over top, and on the other put some pictures over top. I like the effect of the flowers peaking out from behind! I also applied the word (and definition for) KISS above the picture of Marley getting kissed by her cousin. I tried to take a close up of it but it was all glarey so didn’t use it.
The next page is using the quilting technique that I’ve seen all over the place and loved. It was a tiny bit complicated to set up but once I figured out where the squares were going it was pretty easy to stick them down and finish the rest. I thought about adding a bunch of bling (buttons, flowers, what have you) but decided to just keep it fairly simple. Sometimes it’s nice to have a clean looking layout!
Trying to show that the picture and the journalling block are popped up …

Well, thanks for tuning in to see more of Marley’s 1st year of life. Hopefully this good scrapping mojo continues for a bit and I can get more of her album finished! For today though I must pack up my scrap area as once again we are having people for dinner and will need the dining room!!

Happy Easter everyone!

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Project 12 – March 2010

Posted on March 31, 2010 by daydesigns

I’ve been able to be a busy beaver the last two days and got my March layout for my Project 12 album finished. And it’s not (technically – in my time zone anyway) April yet!! This is for the contest over at Scrapbook & Cards Today and also on Davinie’s blog – check out both these sites as they are FULL of amazing ideas! It is based on this Becky Fleck PageMap sketch.

Just as I hope to do an Olympics album (one day) I also hope to do an album on our trip to Hawaii – which was one of the big events of March 2010. It was hard to only put in 3 pictures from our trip!! But I really had to spotlight LC’s 1st birthday so the other will have to wait. Hope you like it. Thanks for stopping by!
Posted in challenges, layout, Project 12, Scrapbook | 5 Comments

Project 12 – February 2010

Posted on March 31, 2010 by daydesigns

Okay, Okay, I realize it’s almost April and here I am finally posting my February layout for Project 12. What can I say? February and March have been extraodinarily busy months around here! Scrapping time has taken a back seat to things like the Winter Olympics, birthdays, trips to Maui … not to mention the usual school, kids, housework, etc. I had almost finished my special Olympic themed Project 12 layout before we left for Maui but the majority of the work on February and March’s layouts were done in the past couple days. I came down with a terrible sore throat so took a couple of sick days and was actually able to scrap. It felt good! I’ll post the layout for March in a separate post just to keep things orderly. You may not think it to look at my house, but I LOVE order!!

Enough chit chat, here is February’s layout (based on this sketch.)

Some close ups:
The Olympics aside (I deal with THAT below), the biggest event in February for our household is the birthday of our eldest, Marley. This year she turned 6 and I thought this warranted an entire page just for her. Then to continue my idea of highlighting our girls each month, the second page is close ups of them.
I have a TON of pictures from the Olympics and hope to do an album on it (maybe an 8×8 … someday). It was such a huge event and part of our lives for over two weeks that I thought it needed it’s own layout in my Project 12 album for 2010. In future years I just know we’ll look through this album and if it wasn’t here we’d wonder why. When I originally thought of doing an extra layout for February I just figured I’d follow the same sketch for both. Then I had this “brilliant” idea to create the Olympic rings and fill them with pictures from the various events. Easier thought up than executed!! I am happy-ish with my layout but it needs tweaking. Not that I’m going to play with it anymore. I devoted WAY too much time to get it to where it is today to rip it all apart right now and start again!! Maybe I’ll try to recreate it for my 8×8 … maybe.

Anyway, here it is:

Hope you liked these two layouts. To check out my January 2010 layout go here. I am just about to post my March layout too so stay tuned. Thanks for reading!

Posted in challenges, layout, Project 12, Scrapbook | 2 Comments