Scrap Girl

I’m out of town until tomorrow, so I hope this post-dated blogging thing works!  I threw together this New Year’s greeting for you and will probably email it out to friends and family when I get back on Thursday.  I decided to challenge myself to use a kit and see what I could come up with in 10 minutes.  The kit had some words about resolutions and a great slogan, “Embrace Life!”  I have decided to scraplift that phrase into my New Year’s resolution for 2009.  I’m going to embrace life and roll with the punches and try not to get so worked up about things, that in the grand scheme of things, don’t even matter.  I’m going to enjoy all of the blessings that are bestowed upon me, and know that there are greater things at work when things don’t go my way.  What is your New Year’s resolution?

Embrace Life kit by Sande Krieger

http://twopeasinabucket.com

Since we are getting bombarded again by snow today I want to think a little about summer time and warm weather.  When I first started digital scrapbooking I got a free kit from Scrapgirls.com.  It is called Refresh Collection Biggie and I think more than one of their designers collaborated to make this kit.  Anyway, it is bright and fun and perfect to do some summer pictures.  In August we always go to the county fair in our town and my girls love to get those airbrush tattoos.  It is hilarious when they get them because they try to be so careful to not get them wet so they will be “tattooed” longer.  Hopefully it reminds you of some of your fun summer (warm) memories.

Refresh Collection Biggie Kit by the Scrapgirls at

http://scrapgirls.com

Since the kids are home on break, I thought I’d better just find a digital layout I did over the summer.  We were at a family birthday party in May and got all of the cousins on my husband’s side to sit on the four-wheeler.  That was the only way we could get the youngest two to sit still for a picture.  I found this digital kit when I first started digital scrapbooking late last spring.  I only had one picture that turned out so I decided to try doing a 8.5 x 11″ page for a change.  Usually I’m pretty strictly a 12 x 12 gal.   It is a small kit, and I was just starting out, so it is a quick and simple layout.  My favorite part is the transparent words for the title. 

Dancing in the Sun Kit by Sarah Benson

http://secretsofthedesigners.com

After playing in the snow yesterday with my kids, I remembered that I had taken a snowman picture of them last spring.  Yes, you didn’t read that wrong.  It was last April, and we got a huge snow storm.  It was so depressing as we were so looking forward to spring.  The temps were right around freezing, so the snow was really wet and sticky and perfect for building a snowman.  Although she turned out to be a snowwoman and I joked with my kids that we should call her “April.”  It was a fun digital page to do because I got to add fun elements like the snowgirl’s buttons, scarf, and flower on her hat.  The scarf isn’t perfect, but it works if you don’t overanalyze it(like I usually do).  I found this free kit at the Memory Makers magazine website.  Thanks to Michelle Coleman of Little Dreamer Designs for such a cool kit called “Frosted.”

Frosted Kit by Michelle Coleman of Little Dreamer Designs

http://littledreamerdesigns.com

I’m thrilled!  My husband bought me a Cricut Electronic Cutting Machine for Christmas!  My mom also got me a cartridge to go with it.  I’m especially glad I’ve got one now that one of our local stores went out of business.  That was the place my friends and I would go for Friday night crops and do our laser cutting.  Now we’ll have to look at other options for crop nights, I guess, or host them ourselves.  Anyway, now I have the cricut and the two cartridges I have are George & Basic Shapes and Base Camp.  I need some advice here…what are the best cartridges to have, or the ones that you use the most?  I know for sure that I would like the All Mixed Up cartridge as I’ve used that one last year at our retreat.  I have done a little research and there are good deals on cartridges on Ebay.  Now I just have to decide which ones to buy with my Christmas money.

About 2 months ago I was working on a baby girl scrapbook gift for my cousin and his family.  They were waiting for their little girl to get through all of the mumbo jumbo and bureaucracy so she could be adopted and come home.  Well, they got the call and she flew from Korea to join their family on December 24th.  He sent me an email to let me know and a picture of her that had been taken in Korea.  She is just beautiful and healthy and a Christmas miracle for their family.  Dreams can really come true on Christmas!  Now that I know her adoption date I can finish her scrapbook and send it off to them next week.  I did a scrapbook page with the picture they sent me.  The background for the picture was a wacky blue color so I used a great tool in photoshop called the magic extractor to just pick her out of the picture and put her on the layout.  I think I’m official addicted to digital scrapbooking after doing this page.  All of the design elements are from Designs by Karyn again, using the same kit as I did the other day for the cousin page.  Thanks again for a great free kit.

Christmas Mints kit by Karyn Clarke

(http://thelifeandtimesofkaryn.blogspot.com)

Another Christmas has come and gone.  All of that build up for the kids and it is over in two days.  My mom and dad came up from the Twin Cities last night for Christmas Eve and today we went to my husbandparent’s house.  I gave my parents and my in-laws their scrapbooking gifts I made and both seemed really pleased.  The vacation scrapbook album seemed to be a hit with everyone who looked at it, although I’m sure half of them have no idea what really goes into making something like that.  I also was bummed to find out I spelled my niece’s middle name wrong on the layout I posted yesterday, so I will have to go in and change that tomorrow before I forget.  I will also post a layout tomorrow and tell you about a Christmas miracle that happened yesterday in my family.  Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Merry Christmas Eve!  I just wanted to share a scrapbook page I did this week.  My brother-in-law and his wife just had their second child on December 12th.  My girls are so excited to finally have a girl cousin.  So far, they have four boys for cousins.  They love the boys but wanted to even the score so they wouldn’t be outnumbered so much.  We went to the hospital to meet her the day after she was born and of course took a few pictures.  I couldn’t believe how awake and alert she was already.  They named her Rula Sidene (pronounced Roola.)  Both the first and middle names were made up by combining two family member’s names.  She definitely won’t have to worry about other girls having the same name when she goes to school.  She’s adorable and we are so excited about having a niece.  Thank you to Karyn Clarke for designing such a beautiful kit.

Christmas Mints Kit by Karyn Clarke

http://thelifeandtimesofkaryn.blogspot.com

The Lemonade Award

I’m so excited I won this award!  One of my blogging friends nominated me to receive this.  Thank you so much!  Thanks to any and all readers, as well as my scrapbooking friends and subjects.  It is a great day in blogging land for me!  Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to my fellow bloggers and friends!

Also, thank you to Today.com for hosting my blog.

I would like to share my good fortune and nominate 6 other blogs to receive this award:

Scrapwhat(http://scrapwhat.today.com)

3 Scrapbooking Ladies(http://3scrapbookingladies.blogspot.com)

Simply Stamping(http://stampingeverythingwithcheryl.blogspot.com)

Robin’s Nest(http://tqrnurse.blogspot.com)

Designs by Karyn(http://thelifeandtimesofkaryn.blogspot.com)

Work at Home Mom Revolution(http://workathomemomrevolution.blogspot.com)

I apologize, my linking at my site wasn’t working quite right so I had to just list these with the web addresses.  Congratulations to the winners!!  Feel free to pass on this award to someone deserving one. 

1.  Put this Lemonade award on your blog.

2.  Nominate 10 fellow bloggers to receive this award due to their attitude and gratitude.

3.  Be sure to let them know at their site that they have won an award.

4.  Link up to the site that gave you the award.

5.  Have a great day and remember your fellow bloggers.  We are more successful when we help each other out and get more traffic when we link together!

I finished the vacation scrapbook gift I made for my in-laws for Christmas.  My favorite story from that trip that is in their album is about our day trip to Galveston, Texas.  We (his mom and dad and myself) all went to Houston to see my husband in the National Truck Driving Championships.  One day he had to compete behind the scenes and we couldn’t see him all day so the three of us took a day trip to Galveston.  Once our rented PT Cruiser got us there we stopped on one end of Galveston Island just to explore that beach and I wanted to see what kind of boats and ships were coming in.  The tide had gone back out and there were all kinds of shells that had washed up.  I noticed some had tiny footprints in the sand around them and after picking one up saw that there were tiny crab creatures in these shells.  Okay, we’re talking hundreds, probably, of these shells.  I told my in-laws I’d  like to bring some shells back for my girls, but we had to make sure they were inhabited with no crabs.  I found some flatter shells and my mother-in-law was also gathering.  As we were walking back to the car, I felt a tiny crab leg tickle my hand, and there was one in this shell.  So I left all of my shells of that type on the beach, to not chance it.  We put the shells in a bag she had and went about our sightseeing.

At the end of the day we were in the car headed out of Galveston back to Houston in rush hour traffic and my mother-in-law says, “We have to stop!”  I’m driving the car in traffic and have to return the car in 45 minutes.  We asked why we had to stop and then she told us there were two crabs in the bag.  I told her “Sorry, we can’t stop.”  First of all I couldn’t exit the road we were on in that traffic, and we were on a timeline.  She wanted to take them back to the beach.   About that time, my father-in-law sees we are about to go over a bridge and says, “Give them to me, we can throw them over the bridge and back to the water.”  She decided we couldn’t do that.  I told her we didn’t have time to go back to the beach and I would put them in the bathtub when we got back to the hotel until I figured out what to do with them.   In the meantime, I’m thinking okay, we’ll get back to Houston about 5:00 pm, I have to get back across town to the hotel, and I have to get ready to go to a dinner at 6:00pm.  So we get back to the hotel and I tell my husband his mother brought back two crabs from the beach, throw them in the bathtub after I get out of the shower.  Get this–So–it turns out there are six crabs in six shells in my bathtub at the Hilton when I leave for dinner.  So the crabs in my bathtub are the talk of dinner and everybody got a good laugh.  Unfortunately, my crab friends didn’t make it after a couple days without salt water.