The Blog Guidebook has a calendar download available for free (there is also a MINI version available as well)! While this download includes images and an actual calendar for 2011 (now expired for the most part), I'm sure many of you would still be interested in the gorgeous images. The good news is that they will be offering a 2012 version on December 1st of this year, so be sure to check back on their site. Enjoy!
At my last count, there are about 20 different album kits! The photo shows just a fraction of what's going to be available. SO exciting.. but I'm also wondering where all of these kits came from?! ♥
This is my latest project featuring photos of my cutie-patootie nephew, Owen. I can only hope my kid comes out that adorable! ;) Anyhow, if you love this creation, it'll be available soon as a kit! Stay tuned for deets. ♥
I've finally reorganized my craft room so that I can get back to kitting the millions of albums I've created recently. Yay. J is off having dinner with friends so I'm taking the opportunity for a few more hours of scrap time. Mushu apparently has other plans. Yes, that's him plopped down in the center of my workspace. ♥
I love old things. I'm a huge fan of vintage. Maybe I can attribute this to the fact that I was so close to my grandparents as a child, or maybe my attachment is simply due to the nostalgia factor. Whatever the reason, I could not stop myself from buying a vintage 6-pack of Coca-Cola during a recent trip to Wal-mart, even though I almost never drink soda. I must admit that I've also been a semi-fan of Coke merchandise over the years: I have a t-shirt that proudly displays the Coca-Cola logo in Japanese and I own a few Coke cans from the Middle East a la J's time there. Even J is from Atlanta, the home of Coca-Cola! So yes, I found myself drawn to these old soda bottles. But what to do with them to justify my purchase? After some thought (and vaccuming up way too many rhinestones) I found these bottles to be a great use for storing bling! If you're like me and you manage to find a place for bling on every project you create, you probably have a ton of these jewels laying around. Why not store them in a fun way, like in Coke Bottles? If you're a bead girl, this would probably work just as well. Now if only these bottles had a wider neck so that I'd have a home for buttons! A girl can dream.. ♥
A few years ago, I was lucky enough to attend a program called Dolphin Quest in Hawaii. Dolphin Quest allows people to interact and swim with dolphins in captivity. I've always been fascinated by these amazing creatures so this was a lifelong dream fulfilled. I love crossing things off of my "lifetime to-do list" and this was definitely one of the most incredible experiences of my life. What sort of dreams have you seen come to fruition? I'd love to hear them (I could use some ideas of things to add to my own list)!
My cousin, Troy, actually took most of these photos- he worked for the company and was able to get my siblings a friend and I into the lagoon for the day. I was finally inspired to get these photos into an album and thought acrylic would work beautifully for this project. Hope you enjoy!
SUPPLIES:
Rusty Pickle 8x8 Acrylic Album. Papers by Scenic Route. Embellishments by Rusty Pickle, Scenic Route, Hambly, Heidi Swapp, Prima, EK Success, Making Memories. Ribbon by Offray.
♥
I hope your holiday season was just wonderful. Life has been crazy around here (when isn't it?). I promise to have an actual "update post" on Friday (tomorrow is quote day!). For now, though, I leave you with some peeks from an album I created recently about a trip to San Diego's Wild Animal Park. If you've never been, it's something you MUST put on your lifetime "to do" list.
SUPPLIES:
This album was created from a Rusty Pickle Slim Jim album (one of my all-time faves)! Papers are from: Rusty Pickle, Hambly, Sandylion, Provo Craft, Karen Foster and more. If you're interested in a certain paper, email me for the manufacture name.
p.s. I'm in the process of reorganizing the photo albums and will have this entire project posted within the ART album over the weekend.
♥
If you know me, you know that there are two things I LOVE to scrapbook with- buttons and ribbon. I just love how such a small thing can add so much to a project! Because I love these products, I tend to purchase them as I see them (read: buy what I DON'T NECESSARILY NEED). Now, this isn't normally a problem- until I have piles and piles of spools of ribbon. I figured out a while ago that leaving ribbon on the spools actually takes up way more room than it needs to. My solution? I found a hinged box (I got mine from Ross) and some chipboard sheets (ask your local scrapbook store for the leftover sheets from paper packs- some stores sell these). I measured the inside width of the box and cut my chipboard sheets to fit. Then I wrapped my ribbon around the sheets of chipboard and set them in place with a needle or a strip of tape. Now your ribbon has a home and is completely portable! The best thing of all? It's pretttty! ♥
Obviously, by the title, I have Harry Potter on the brain 24/7 (remember the choir version in the third Harry Potter movie? It's stuck in my head right now). As promised, a few photos from my latest class at Ever After.
To create the album, I used two chipboard sheets from a Rusty Pickle Arrow Chipboard Album for the front and back covers. For the inside pages, I folded a few brown paper bags in half. Using the pre-punched holes in the Arrows as a guide, I added holes to the paper bags. Bind with rings and voila! The papers used in this album are the latest Halloween line from Making Memories. American Crafts letters, Rusty Pickle buttons & ribbons by Offray. This is a quick and easy project for kids.. and with any luck, it'll get them excited about bag lunches!
As it turns out, I taught this class to a group of kids at a birthday party on Sunday. Like I said in my previous post, i'd forgotten how much I enjoy teaching for kids. They just make the experience all the more fun and exciting for me. THE BEST PART of my day, though? The happy faces on the girls as they piled out of the class and then as I started to clean up, spotting this on one of the kraft-paper covered tables:
Do I have the best life or what? ♥
Craziness! That's the word i'd use to describe it, really. ;)
On Saturday, I had the AMAZING OPPORTUNITY to host a Make & Take for Rusty Pickle at Ever After's annual Survivor Crop. There were 170+ women in attendance, all making a contribution in their own way to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. The final tally for the weekend of funds raised were in excess of $68,000! I was in awe the entire day- the event was just out of this world. The costumes were fun and it was great to meet some new faces as well as get reaquainted with some familiar ones. I have to say, I was truly humbled at meeting some of the Breast Cancer Survivors.
One of my other favorite moments from that day was meeting Leah Fung. I don't think she had any idea how much of a fan I was. She is a role model for me both professionally and personally. I felt like a grinning idiot when after flipping through an album i'd left out on a table, she complimented my style. It just makes you think about how just a kind word can do so much for another person, often without you even realizing it.
On Sunday, I taught a class for a children's birthday party at Ever After. It's been about a year and a half since i've taught a class with kids and I forgot how much I ENJOY it. They're just so carefree and willing to try ANYTHING that it makes the art more fun (yes, more fun than it already is, if you can imagine that!). We created a Halloween album using some paper bags. Pics to come! ♥
