Me @ 45

These photos were taken in 2008, but the LO was done a couple of months ago. I put a lot of effort into making this feminine. The bling is a merger of three different bling sets that I cut apart and put together the way I wanted them. The bird is a clear sheer which I have glued to cardstock, then I layered on the Happy rubon. The edges are punched with on of my favorite border punches. I think this LO expresses my scrap style ... strong yet feminine, strong but sweet.

Zapata Falls

Back in May my family and I went to the Great Sand Dunes National Park. It was such a great way to spend Mother's Day... camping with my dad. On the last day we hiked up to Zapata Falls and the creek and falls were still frozen over. We walked over the ice through the canyon and saw these incredible falls. 40 feet, mostly frozen. The ice was blue in places. It was stunning.

On the LO I was drawn to one of the lovely Precocious Paper flowers. I think it is the juxtaposition of winter and spring. Ice and flowers.

Easter Colors

Our Easter was filled with fun. My dad came to our home and visited with us for the day. After dyeing eggs, eating tons and watching our blue dye foam up from the baking powder we added just to watch the scientific reaction... I wanted a LO that reflected the fun. So, here it is. Fun colors and lovely butterflies.

Outstandling Leader Award

At the end of May our local service unit held a meeting for all the leaders in the area. It was a lovely evening with friends. But the best part of the night came after dinner. I was given the Outstanding Leader Award -- and I was nominated by Cora and Pattie (my co-leader)!

This LO is about that evening. I love the feminine details on this one. Flowers and bling and pins. It is on cream cardstock... wish it didnt look dirty in the photo.

70s Photos, Mini Me, and Tessa's flowers

This LO is one of my favorites. I found this photo of me when I was about 3 years old and I finally saw what everyone else already saw. My daughter looks like me. Then I found this great 70s paper, a photo of Cora and I together, some paint and a flower from one of my favorite bloggers. I love the whole 2 page spread!

Floatin' Fun

This LO is of the kids at their swim lessons a while back. I went very simple, and just enjoyed the bright color of the pool water and two handmade flowers.

I added bling to the letters, and I think it feels very watery.

Fun with Girl Scouts Collages!

I was the leader for my daughter's Juniors Girl Scout troop last year. We had a blast together. These two pages are collages of the girls over the course of the year. The first page are 'proper smile' poses and the second is a 'be goofy' page. The colors are awesome (thought the photos do not do the papers justice. Both pages are on white paper ... but you cannot tell that by these photos. :(

Happy Bread

Every time the kids bake bread with mom they have to make one loaf of 'smiley face' bread. I call it happy bread. Often it comes complete with buck teeth made by Cora.

This LO has a little paint, a little ink, some fussy cut clouds, and a happy color scheme.

Brotherly Love

Another 6x12 LO. Very simple... with a few fussy cut embellishments.

An old Page Freshened Up!

This page was a rescue from a very old Creative Memories album. The book had some water damage so I am taking it apart and using it as a reason for recreating the baby book. Some pages I have started from scratch. This one I decided to keep, with minor changes. I cut the paper on one edge with a decorative border, and added the embellishments in the bottom corner. Then I put it all onto white cardstock. I like the makeover, even though it would look different if I had started from scratch.

Sunshine and baby books

This page took forever. But when I saw this piece of paper I knew exactly what I would do. Every morning Owen went into Cora's room and said "Good Morning Sunshine!" It was so sweet! I spent a lot of time affixing buttons and bling, but I love it. I cannot figure out why the main image is sideways. It is correct on my computer. Ideas?

Cora's Baby Book -- Finally

This month I have begun a baby book for Cora - yes, she is 11 - and I am having fun using more than one sized page, varying techniques, and loads of feminine details. I am loving this project.

This page is 6x12. The photo was taken on the day we left the hospital. I used a creamy yellow paint on top of the brown pattern paper, punched one edge and added a butterfly. I love the page (though not this photo of it).

This page is very simple. I wanted the focus to be on those tiny ultrasound images and the story. It is however my first use of a doily and I love it.

Here is the first page in my book. All the photos are of my pregnancy. I have used some lovely handmade embellishments and included many little journal details. I love this page.

A little paint & mist

I have recently found that I enjoy paints of various sorts. My first attempt at paint is on this layout. I am not sure I like it, and I think the photo is awful, but I am sharing it anyway. Maybe I am just proud of the way I am thinking outside the box and trying new techniques! I am also unhappy with the bling flower (though I LOVE bling!) -- I think I will probably replace that with a flower from Tessa. I have an order coming, so maybe one is in there ... if not it is a great reason to make another purchase. :)

Butterflies and flowers

At the end of the school year all the kids at Columbine enjoyed a day of play outside for Super Kids' Day. These photos were taken in May 2009 at the end of Cora's 4th grade year. I scrapped them in the spring. The color is a bit washed out. I wish I could have shown the sense of playfulness the yellow and red brought to the layout. This summer I have also discovered etsy and lovey handmade embellishments. If I were to change this page it would be to include handmade flowers.

Playing with Thread

The photos in this 2 page spread were taken in 2008, but I scrapped them in the last few months. This is one of the first layouts where I played with thread -- creating a frame of sorts.

here are a couple of detail shots:

My art -- Scrapbooking

On many occasions I have claimed that I am not artistic. Except that I scrapbook. And recently I have realized that this is my art and that when I sit with photos and paper my creative juices flow. I love to scrapbook. Today I attempted to photograph a few of my recent pages. I am still not confident in the results but I have decided to share anyway. This page is for my husband. He is smart, educated, witty, funny, kind, loyal, honest. This page is about the second item on that list. Educated. These photos were taken on the days of his high school graduation, his graduation from Wooster and then from law school.

The color isn't great. Hopefully I can get a better shot one day soon. The butterflies are punched from photos and though the photos are old and not of great quality they are better than this pic shows. I used a white pen to create a line on my frame.

Gratitude

Today I am grateful to one of my favorite bloggers... you can follow her here. She amazes me. Her photography is stunning, her scrapbook layouts are ones of which I am completely envious, she is a mom, a wife, and an incredible blogger. One of her regular, weekly posts is about gratitude. She picks one thing for which she is thankful that week. Today she shared that her blog is now ten years old! She outlined some of the changes in her blog over those years and during the time I read her post I was inspired. I have struggled to find a focus for this blog... mainly because I thought I was writing for my audience. And I didn't know what they (you) wanted to read. Do you care about my scrapbooks? Do you care what I read? Do you want to know about the quiet ordinariness of my boring life and that I am often lonely? Or about my random memories? I last posted in June because of this confusion. I had almost decided to stop blogging. Then I read this post! I do not yet have a focus. But I no longer care. I will blog for me, and hopefully along the way a post or two will interest you. Thank You, Karen!