Thirsty Thursdays - Must Have Products

WRMK Luck 8 Punches - I remember over a year ago when i saw these punches I immediately put them on my "must-have" list. I love the concept of these punches, but rumor has it that there have been some serious technical difficulties with these punches so before I invest over $30 a piece for them I am going to wait to hear the feedback when they offically hit the market.



The Blues - I am really ejoying the blue color combinations from this CHA and I have several collections on my list -
Heidi Swapp's new line (always been a fan, I was so excited to see her products!)


Teresa Collins - not always a favorite but I have my sister's wedding photos to scrap that will match this collection perfectly.

And Colorbok - this line is being released through JoAnn's stores. I popped in there last week to pick it up but the papers weren't in stock, just the embellies and you know I have to have it all so I will try again this weekend.

Again not usually on my list, but I adore these Tim Holtz stamps.



And I MUST HAVE these buttons, they are sooo cute and soooo out of stock at most of my favorite retailers, lol.

SMASH Wednesdays - My Inspiration

So the question for today is "The thing that most inspires me to actually sit down and create is....." but instead I have a person. I know I mention her a lot but Mika is such a big part of my life. Not only are we scrap buddies but we are very good friends. My day doesn't start off right unless I talk to her. When I am having a good day she makes it even brighter and when I am having a bad day she is a non-judgmental sounding board. She and I are close enough to tell each other when we are wrong without any hurt feelings. We have had minor bumps but trust me I wanted to get past them fast, she is the last person in the world that I would want to be mad at me. We are a little competitive too, we try to keep up with one another with creating layouts and we are always comparing booty size, lol. She inspires me in so many ways, especially to be a better person and a better scrapper, I love you girl!

We Interrupt Our Regulary Scheduled Blog Post.....

For an important announcement! But I can't tell you what it is!!!!!!!!!! Well not yet anyway but I have some big news coming. It is something new and exciting and I am super happy to be a part of.....................oh crap, I almost gave it away. Keeping a secret is harder than I thought! Stay tuned and I will keep you updated! But it is going to happen soon, I promise!

Technique/Tool Tuesday - A Sticky Situation

I love my Xyron Machines! First of all I love any machine that does not take batteries and does not need to be plugged in. Just some good old-fashioned manual power does the trick. Here is my family of products and each machine serves a specific purpose for me.

So as you know the number on the xyron represents the size of the paper it can take, like these 150's can take paper up to 1.5 inches in width. I use these the most especially when working with my cricut or slice machines. I get total even, non messy coverage on the smallest of cuts.

My 510 can handle paper up to five inches in size and comes in handy when I am doing craft fair projects. I have a variety of cartridges for this machine including the two sided lamination and the one side lamination and other side magnet cartridges.

My 250 is great when making cards, again I get all over coverage and this one is big enough to put a couple of cuts through at a time but small enough to not be bulky or in the way when I am creating. One of my favorite tricks with the xyrons is to put an image in right-side down and then cover the sticky part with glitter for a quick and easy sparkly accent.

WIP Mondays

So rumor has it in blogland that I have indavertently contributed to the number of Mika's WIPs and I must say that I am guilty. I have a tendency to start a layout and not post it because it just needs something....................................what I don't always know but I will not mark it complete until I figure it out. Case in point this layout, besides the obvious missing journaling I feel like there is something missing. I may add some rolled flowers or some swirly acents and some bling but I haven't committed to anything just yet but I will by Friday, just you wait and see!

Woohoo! It's Friday Baby!

Ummm....................yeah this is my hubby celebrating in his new SpongeBob pjs, lol!

I have my five year old niece's birthday party to attend and my crafting class to teach this weekend but I do still hope to return with a ton of scrappy goodness.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Inspiration Bullseye

Me and my daughter were in Target this week for a few items when we ran across this display. I was immediately drawn to the colors and despite her pleas of "Mommy please don't take a picture of that in the store!" I did anyway to use as inspiration for a few cards.




The bag with the butterfly was my inspiration for this card-

The next card was inspired by the colors but with a twist. I used the backing from one of my clear stamps as a transparency (see below), trimmed the excess and then ran the transparency through my xyron to adhere to the card, The results are fabulous.

College Bound

So the reality that my baby is no longer a baby is settling in. It was hard to accept and I have had my moments of still trying to hang on to those aprons strings but it is really out of my control. Tuesday we made a 4-hour round trip to Hershey, PA to interview for a college. I sat in on her interview and it was hard not to interject. She did a good job but I wish she would have highlighted more of her accomplishments. As in the quote from Marianne Williamson (or Nelson Mandela depending on who you believe) "Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine". ....................I feel a layout coming on, hmmmmmmmmmmm.

Another Diaper Cake

Definitely one of my favorite crafts to make. Here is my most recent diaper cakes, filled to the brim with goodies for the new Mom.

Happy Mail

This picture does not do this collection justice, but i am very excited to have American Crafts Chap collection.

These flowers are so pretty in person I don't want to use them lol, time for another farmhouse layout and I must include these brads.

I already have the perfect layout pictured in my head for these alphas and I have some post-it notebooks pictured to use the stamps.

Bad News mixed with a Freebie!

I was so surprised to learn that picnik is closing! I wonder if Picasa will still have all of the same editing options once they close? As a goodwill gesture Picnik is offering all of their premium services for free until they actually close so if you have pictures to edit now is the time to do it.

Official Announcement: Picnik is closing
Since joining Google in 2010, we have been creating editing magic in Google products while continuing to keep Picnik awesome. But now we get to focus on even awesomer things. Picnik will be closing on April 19, 2012.
Your photos liberatedAmazing photos are created in Picnik, so we have launched a new feature, Picnik Takeout, that easily downloads your photos to your desktop in convenient zip files. You may also elect to copy your photos to Google+ where you can store and share your creations. You may request your photos at any time and use this handy tool as many times as you like until our closing date of April 19, 2012. Learn more.
Premium RefundsTo our primo Picnik Premium members, we'll begin processing a full refund of your current membership fee within a week of this announcement. By "in full" we mean the whole darn thing. Yep, this means even if you are on your very last day of an annual membership, we will refund you the entire $24.95. Just because we want to say thanks.
Now the Good News - Free Premium for ALL!To express our gratitude for your support over the past 5 years, Picnik Premium is free for everyone! Use Picnik in all of its premium glory, for free, from now until our actual closing day. Touch-up, Textures, Advanced, and more are all free for you to use!
We have been incredibly proud of building a product that is used and beloved by so many of you. We continue to be amazed and humbled by the photos you create and we are immensely grateful for all of your support, creativity, and passion.
We are excited by the photo-editing fun we have already brought to Google products, like Google+, where you can find many of your favorite Picnik effects in Creative Kit. We encourage you to visit Google+ and give it a whirl.
Please visit the Help Hub for more information on our wind down, and check the Picnik blog for updated information on our April closure.
It's been awesome,Team Picnik

© 2011 Google Inc. 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 You've received this mandatory service announcement email to update you about important changes to your Picnik account.

Back on track

Since our anniversary and with all of the holidays and birthdays we have had over the past few months my husband got off track with giving me flowers. I didn't really mind since he has been so consistent for so long so I was surprised when I came home and found these lovely orchids.

Lucky

From the day I had my first daughter people warned me about how difficult it is raising girls, especially when they become teenagers. I took parenting classes and worked hard to keep the lines of communication open with them and to this day I am the proud parent of two teenage girls who have never given me an ounce of trouble. They are not disrepectful in any way and they do well in school, some people say that I am lucky and that may be true a little bit, but really I am blessed and I appreciate having them in my life.

Making the Cut

How do you know when it is time to get a new cutter? Well the first sign might be you screaming at the top of your lungs "I HATE this thing!!" lol. Then there was a recent conversation me and Mika had about how frustrating it is even with bumping up the edge of your cardstock against the guides that it is sometimes hard to get your paper to cut straight. And then finally the icing on the cake for me was the fact that all of my numbers wore off. I mean I could work with it for a little while by counting and estimating but finally I gave in and there is peace again in my scrappy world. Although I have a rotary cutter for big tasks, I enjoy using a regular cutter for day to day work. Having the proper tools is so essential. My new cutter works well, cuts straight and is pretty so I am happy!

Old/ New

My Baby Girl

This is another one of my layouts that got damaged during the roof leak, amazingly the paper was fine but the pictures were ruined. I had them reprinted at Walgreens, did a little minor surgery and Viola! my finished layout. I don't normally post layouts without journaling but I have been holding on this for a while. So if I ever get around to it, it would look a little like this -

This is my grand niece and she has me wrapped around her finger. She calls me her LaLa and she is just as sweet as pie. When she is at my house she usually hangs out with my daughters but every hour or so she finds me just to tell me that she loves me. she truly warms my heart and is my sunshine on a cloudy day.

Everyday Moments

If you have teenagers who have cell phones then you know the variety of photos and poses you could find on their cameras at any given time. No way could I ever scrap them all but I do have a couple of favorites. I love my daughter's pouty face in this photo, reminds me so much of when she was a baby. J.R. are her initials.

Silver Bells

So it is widely known by any of my scrapping friends that I am the slowest scrapper on the planet so when I posted this picture last month my Scrappy Twin Mika subliminally challenged me to get it scrapped right away and I did! This layout came together so quickly and easily. and yes Gemiel that picture was taken down 13th and Walnut Streets. Center City still does a great job decorating and celebrating the season.

Coffee Break

So my husband and his co-worker were walking in Center City together when they were spotted by a coffeemate photographer. She said she just had to get a shot of these two handsome gentlemen (I agree!) while they sipped a free sample of coffemate's new products as a part of their promotional campaign (notice the obvious coffeemate guy in the background). This photo was posted on the coffemate website where I nabbed it for my layout.

Happy Crafting

I spent almost all day in my scrap room yesterday and it felt so good! This is a layout of my daughter using Crate Paper Farmhouse. I just love the colors in this collection.



This is a layout of my husband's father. This layout was damaged when we had a recent roof leak but since it wasn't completely ruined I decided to keep it. My husband found that actual 45 while walking the dogs and it is ironically one of his Dad's favorite groups. I couldn't wait to incorporate it into a layout.

Feeling a little sneaky!

I love CHA sneak peeks! So far Prima is my sleeper hit! I have really been enjoying their products lately. True to form however I am really excited about some of the new lines coming from My Mind's Eye, they always get my heart to skip a beat. Here is a link to the sneak peeks sites and some MME photos. http://www.scrapbookupdate.com/cha-winter-2012-sneak-peeks/

Christmas Shopping in the City

The girls and I took public transportation into Center City and shopped until we dropped. Here they are in front of a big Center City law firm. It reminded me of my shopping trips with my mother when I was younger (even though I don't go down there too often now). There is still something magical about being downtown.

Least Favorite Thickers

I have been (and still am) a thickers fan for a while - even though I still struggle with what to do with those extra letters, like how many "z" words can I use? But these Salutation Fabric Thickers drive me CRAZY!!! I used them once, and when I tried to put them back in the package I got a jumbled mess. I am not crazy about the script and honestly there are a couple of letters I just can not figure out. The crazy thing is I just could not bring myself to throw them away.
"What if I found a tutorial on how to use them?"
"Maybe I can salvage them for one of my many backlogged mini albums?"
"There has to be some use for them! "
Alas after my last cleaning session, and finding a couple of letters stuck to my pants I just threw them in the trash. It was a hard parting of ways but something had to give.

St. Ignatius Holiday Bazzar

This year i attempted to do a couple of craft fairs. I am not a pro at it like Tiffany http://thejoyinsideofme.blogspot.com/ , but she has inspired me to try to go bigger and better each year. Since this was a kid centered and school related event I tried to keep the items relevant. I made about $200 and my sister gifted the table fee so it was a great day. My family came out to support me and my nephews even got their pictures take with Santa. all in all it was a great day. My niece (not pictured) is going to help me get ready for the African-American Marketplace in February - I am excited.