Sunday, October 23, 2011

Thinking of you card

A member of our work family was recently diagnosed with terminal cancer.  She is too sick to receive conventional medicine and therefore is seeking out alternative medicine.  This lady works in a branch of our company located in Alberta and we are in Ontario.  She has no idea what we've been up to =)

A couple of ladies at our division have started to fund raise for her to help with some of the costs she is facing.  Our boss has graciously decided to at least match the funds that are raised.  We've had a bake sale, BBQ and are currently running a 50/50 draw.  We also have a penny drive in place and every day that I go into the office people have been putting in $20 bills!  One person tossed in $100 but sadly we'll never know who it was.  Thank you to that person though! 

What is so amazing is that because this lady works in Alberta, our employees have never met her.....but they just know that someone needs help, and in true form, they have answered the call.  I work with an amazing bunch of people! 

So, here is the card that I created for everyone to sign.  We'll send it to her along with all of the $$$ we were able to raise for her!  I saw the idea in a magazing and just made it a lot bigger!  I wanted a card that was cheery and bright to help lift her spirits!  I love the little tag that I hung on the pot.  It says it all, "Wishing you Strength for Today and Hope for Tomorrow".

Please say a prayer for my coworker, Lorraine.



Friday, October 14, 2011

Let's Go 2 The Ex

Wow...it feels like a lifetime has passed since I've posted a blog!  The past month or so has been crazy busy at our house.  I did find time to knock off a few layouts.  Here is one of my favourites.  I've been struggling with this photo for a long time.  It was taken about 20 years ago and I only had one to make the layout with.  Going to the CNE is one of my fondest summer memories from when I was young and I knew I wanted to document it some day in my album.  There was so much I wanted to journal about it that I had to come up with a way to include hidden journalling.  I hope you enjoy!



You may or may not be interested in the journalling but I'm always squinting to try to read other people's so here it is it large print for anyone like me =)


Going to the Ex was always my favourite part of summer.  It was the last "big" event I got to do before school started again in September.  My Grandma and I would work for Nadrofsky Lumber all summer long, making pallets so that I could save some spending money to spend at the Ex.  She and my Grandpa Orr, Great Uncle Tony and Aunt Wanda would gather my cousin Amy and I up and head down to Toronto.  They would give us some of our money (never all of it as we were not much for budgets) and let us loose.  We were always instructed to meet back at the flag pole at a certain time where we would "check-in" and always get some more money!

I have so many fond memories of Amy and I enjoying the midway and playing games.  We'd always take some time to do a little shopping and play some games.  We'd stick our heads in a photo booth for a few fun shots too!

I have two memories that stick out among the many.

The first was the year we went down and won the big stuffed animals.  We had just started out in the morning, after leaving the parents and grandparents behind, we were dressed in our coolest clothes, bicycle shorts and hyper-coloured T-shirts, and decided to play games.  I won a jumbo teddy bear playing a game where you toss a t-ball into an area of hundreds of cups, aiming for the coloured one in the centre.  Immediately after that, Amy went to the game where you throw the baseball into the basket and low and behold, she won a jumbo parrot!  The only bad part was that we had to carry these stuffed animals around for a few hours until we met back up at the flag pole....boy were we glad to get them into the van!

The other memory was while we were riding, "Music Makes the World Go Round".  We were enjoying the ride when all of a sudden the guys that were running the ride started talking to us over the mic.  They wanted to know how old we were, so, Amy looked at me and said, "Well Tam, how old do we want to be?"  I think we told them 16 which was off by a few years as we were only about 13 or 14.  As the ride came to an end they didn't let us off so we ended up riding it a few times in a row!  After about the third time, a guy jumped into the seat with us and said to us, "hi girls, my name is Barry.  Just think of strawberry and you'll never forget me."  I guess he was right considering 20 years later I still remember.  They finally let us off the ride and a couple of them joined us to go on a few more rides.  I loved it as Amy was always scared of heights so I could finally go on some rides that she wouldn't go on.  A while later we reallized that we were late for our check-in at the flag pole.  We told the guys good-bye and ran to the cable cars.  Half way across the park the cable cars stopped and we were hanging up there in mid-air.  Just as we were about to hyperventilate they started up again and carried us across.  We ran to the flag pole where there were some very cross adults waiting for us.  We blamed it all on the cable cars (as we swore each other to secrecy about the boys) and finally were allowed to head off again.  Many years later, Amy was my maid of honour and the secret of the boys was a secret no longer as she spilled the beans during her speech!

I'll never forget the fun I had with Amy and the memories that we shared while enjoying the Ex!

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Birthday Card

A friend of mine from work asked me to make him a card that he could give to his sweetheart for her birthday.  He said that she loves homemade gifts and is a gardener.  So, I sat down and this is what I created for her.


I have used a number of cartridges for this card....let's see if I can remember them all:

Everyday Paper Dolls:
Girl, Spade

Pooh and Friends:
Fence, Clouds

Create a Critter:
Carrots, Flowers on the Wheelbarrow

Straight from the Nest:
Bird

Walk in my Garden:
Wheelbarrow, Flowering Can, all Flowers, Caterpiller

Baby Steps:
Flower on girls overalls

George and Basic Shapes:
Sun

The Butterflies are created using a Martha Stewart Stamp and Punch.

The inside of the card has Gnome from Freshly Picked and a simple, "Happy Birthday" for a sentiment.

This card took approximately five hours from start to finish but much of that time was spent finding the perfect cartridges and then trying to size everything without the use of my gypsy.  My puppy chewed the power cord and I still haven't replaced it.....

Enjoy!

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Craft Nook Challenge #4

So the ladies at the Craft Nook have done it again......put out a great challenge for us!  Check them out at The Craft Nook.  This is my local craft store....it's two towns south of me but worth the drive!

Anyhow, this challenge was to include five elements.....colour scheme to be black, white and a colour of your choice and you must include bling and stitching.  I did just purchase a new (well, new to me) sewing machine for my scrapbooking at a yard sale on Saturday for $7.50.  It's like new and as soon as I figure out how to thread it, I'll be using it lots....in the meantime, I pulled out the good ol' needle and floss and went to work.

I used the new cricut cartridge "Sophisticated" for all of the design elements on the page and some i-rock gems for added bling.  I've chosen not to put a title in the banner as I'm not sure what I'll use this  layout for yet but  I am so pleased with the outcome....hope you enjoy!


I also wanted to add that I was reading some forum questions on scrapbook.com and came across someone that I thought had a fantastic idea.  In order to use up her old stock of supplies she "pays herself" when she completes projects using only old items and not having to purchase new products all the time.  I jumped all over this as, like with many of us papercrafters, I am totally addicted to purchasing new products and forgetting what I already have.  So going forward, I am putting aside $1 for every layout I create, $2 for a two page layout and 50 cents for every card.  This will not only encourage me to craft more, but when my jar is full, I'll have lots of money to buy new products guilt free!

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Christmas in July

Seeing everyone's challenges and blog posts I was inspired to do my own layout celebrating Christmas.  This photo was one that I was saving for "the right layout" and I think I've found it here.  I'm really pleased with the outcome of this layout and hope you too enjoy it.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Over The Moon For You

Here is another layout that was designed for my friends baby.  Yes, the baby is now two months old, and yes, I'm still plugging away at this album....hope you enjoy!

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Looking Back

I decided to do something a little different with two layouts I just completed.  I chose photos of the past and present and put them together.  It was a lot of fun to create and live those memories again.  I hope you enjoy!


This page that I created features me....which in itself is a rare occurance.  When I was eight I saved all the money I could to buy this talking doll Cricket.  I loved her like a best friend and took very good care of her.  As I got older I kept her to pass on to my daughters but ended up having two sons so I decided to sell her at a yard sale we were hosting.  The cutest little girl saw her and it was love at first sight.  I knew she was the one to love my Cricket doll the way I had.  Little did I know the day I sold her that a new Cricut would come into my life that I loved every bit as much!!!



This layout features a father and son duo.  The baby on the left is my little brother enjoying his first birthday cake.  He's the only sibling that I have and is five years younger than I am so I remember this birthday pretty well.  Two years ago my little brother made me an Auntie (which is one of my favourite titles!) and the baby on the right is my sweet nephew enjoying his first birthday.  I love that I have these two photos and could put them together in this layout!

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Thinking of You Card

Here's a card that I lifted from a fellow scrapper on http://www.scrapbook.com/ - moniqueb1972 was her user name.  Anyhow, this is my attempt at the card which pales in comparison to hers but I'm happy with it all the same!  I'm loving the handmade embellishments that I've been making lately!

I'm going to give this to my Aunt who just had knee replacement surgery so I'm hoping this cheers her up a little!!!

Monday, July 4, 2011

Birthday Card

This is a big week at my house.  My youngest son turns 10 tomorrow and my oldest son turns 13 on Friday.  I just can't seem to comprehend where the last 13 years have gone too.....it sure does fly by!

Here is the card that I made for their birthday (I made two the same).  It has a slide out message on the right side of the card where you pull the ribbon out....it is also the required colours for a challenge I am participating in so I'll be submitting it!

I should mention that I found this card in the Scrapbooks Etc. magazine Aug 2011 issue....I varied it slightly but basically the same concept.  I'm new to card making and not too sure how I feel about it yet....my heart is definitely in my scrapbook pages.......

I hope you enjoy and may you have a fantastic week!

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Another layout using flowers for boys

I'm struggling with the use of flowers on boys pages but considering that I have two sons and one nephew I thought I should work on how I can incorporate flowers on their pages.  The first one I did of Nathan on the gyroscope seems a bit "girly" to me and most of the ladies on Scrapbook.com seem to agree.  Here is my next attempt.  Do you think it works for a boy page???

Friday, July 1, 2011

Craft Nook Challenge #3

For those of you following along, yes, I missed challenge #2 but I was away in Ottawa.  For this challenge the ladies of the Craft Nook wanted us to use teal, yellow, orange and white plus we had to use a border punch.  Here's what I came up with.......



Now, as you may notice these pictures are of my nine year old son so I hope he gets over all the flowers and pink on his page! 

I used a HUGE assortment of techniques and mediums....I have ribbon, buttons, felt and chipboard....paint, ink and UTEE.  I used two different border punches - the ribbon threader along the bottom and the one on the bottom of the picture mat to the right.  I did some accordian paper folding for the flower base on the bottom left and some spirelli (not sure how to spell this one!) for the flower on the top right.

I also did something that I RARELY do.  I glued down my elements as I went along.......I just kept building until I thought it was complete.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Under the Sea and City Life

Hey fellow bloggers!  It's been some time since I've been able to sit down and post some new work!!!  So much has been going on at my house including a mini vacation to Ottawa which was so much fun and I can't wait to scrap some of those layouts.....I just have to finish up this baby album since the baby boy that it is for decided to make an unexpected early entry!  Much love to you Coleton, may you get strong enough to go home with your Mom and Dad very soon.....they both can't wait to have you home!




This layout was designed using the Life's A Beach cricut cartridge....I put my I-Rock to use for the treasure in the chest!





This layout was designed using the Everyday Paper Dolls and Paper Doll dress up......only the clouds and tree were found in other cartridges (Pooh and Friends and Stretch Your Imagination). 

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

two new layouts

I just wanted to thank my new blog followers for signing up.  I'm so thankful to have found a way to share my work and to gain ideas from other bloggers....

Here are two new layouts that I was working on over the past few days.  I have another baby album to work on for a baby boy soon to join the world and this is the start of many layouts to come.  Again, the new Mommy-to-be is not a scrapbooker so I am trying to make it super easy by keeping all the photo mats the right size for a standard 4 X 6 photo.

Enjoy!





This layout was created using three cartridges
Create A Critter (one of my favs)
B is for Boy
Pooh and Friends (sun/clouds/butterflies/grass)

When I made the train I used the train cars from B is for Boy but cut off the top of the car.  This gave me the look I was trying to achieve.

The train track is just strips of black paper





This layout was created using Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge
the campfire is from Camp Out
The palm tree is from Life is a Beach (I think) and I stretched it out using my gypsy

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Winnie The Pooh Baby Album

So, I made this Winnie The Pooh scrapbook for my cousin who is expecting her first baby.  She is going with a Winnie theme and I thought this would be a perfect handmade gift to present her.  She is not a scrapbooker so I had to make sure it would be easy for her to just glue her pictures in and do a little journaling.  I decided to post this as I found there to be very little Winnie the Pooh layouts online to use as a guide.  I found a few and even "copied" one or two a bit.....so if you're reading this and the page looks familiar......thanks for your ideas!  Almost every image was cut from either Pooh Font or Pooh and Friends cricut cartridges.  I hope you enjoy these as much as I did making them!








Craft Nook challenge #1

Ok, so the ladies at the Craft Nook has challenged us to make a project using the following three colours, Yellow, Orange and Teal.  Here is the card I came up with.  Quick and simple, the yellow frame is from the Wild Card cricut cartridge, a few prima flowers and some teal grosgrain ribbon and voila!

UPDATE......Although by random draw.....I won the very first Craft Nook Blog Challenge!!!  Thanks to Lillian and Linda for hosting the challenge and I look forward to using all of the new card making supplies that you are presenting me as the prize!