Thankful Blessings

I'm just loving this new fall collection that Little Yellow Bicycle sent me to create with. And let me tell ya, fall is a welcome site about now. We're still in the mid-90's here in Texas so the thought of cooler weather is exciting. Key word is cooler, not cold though. This new collection is very versatile, from scrapping memories of home to the obvious fall events.

I chose to scrap about my cute little Indian at her Thanksgiving program at school. They dressed up as Indians and Pilgrims and had a lovely feast. They sang songs and were just WAY too cute!

This collection has an amazing assortment of leaves, from die cuts, to chipboard, fabric and sticker leaves, they are wonderful. The colors matched the feathers on my daughter's costume perfectly so I scattered them around her photos and added a tree limb at the top to create the swirling, falling leaves effect.

The title was a breeze with the new die cut words. I just stitched over it in brown thread to give it a little extra oomph and then journaled below.

So, what's the weather like in your neck of the woods?  Is fall setting in yet or is it still hot or if you're on the other side of the world, maybe it's Spring/Winter. Hmmmm. 

I'd love to know what you think and would love it even more if you'd visit me on the Little Yellow Bicycle blog TODAY!

Little Yellow Bicycle Feels Like Home collection:

FLH-103 Fall Floral/Red Lace Frame

FLH-105 Denim Chevron/Gold Knit

FLH-279 Chipboard Shapes

FLH-134 Journaling Cards

FLH-305 Paper Crafting Kit

FLH-220 Fabric Favorites

FLH-145 Die Cut Words

FLH-135 Favorite Pieces-Stickers

Spring Creek Mining | October Afternoon Guest Designer

I am so excited to be back up on the October Afternoon blog today. I’ve been having so much fun creating with the Daily Flash collections. I used the bits and pieces of the summertime collection to create a 12x12 layout which you can see HERE. This week I created some life spreads using the photo sleeves and the new Snapshots collection.

I have to admit that I got a little carried away with the various picture and card options and ended up created 2 complete page spreads for one event but, that’s what’s so nice about this. I was able to scrap all my favorite photos of my daughter’s first gem mining moment.

When I’m documenting a moment in time, I usually only use between 1 - 3 photo on a spread and that is what gets scrapped. With Daily Flash, I can scrap those main photos and also include the others that help tell the story.

I started by choosing two photos that would end up getting scrapped on their own page, one each side of the paper and then matched up the right cards to the various sleeves and printed the photos to the sleeve size.

I scrapped this page like I would any other, knowing that the 1st coordinating page could hold my title and journaling. I had fun layering papers, cards blurbs and snap caps. I create a sort of mini title using the

Daily Flash roller stamp.

I still had a lot of photos that help show the progression from sifting the pebbles and sand through the water to finding the gems so I created a 2nd spread.

I snapped this photo of my perfect little gem showing off her perfect little gems and added it over more layers of papers, cards and blurbs. I did all my stitching on this page and the other side before I actually adhered it to the layout so that the stitching wouldn’t show through on the other side of the paper.

Finally, I added additional journaling cards and card sentiments that when read together almost form another title on their own. I outlined some of the cards with washi tape, as I did on the title card in the 1st spread.

I added final touches by hand-stitching over a few speech bubble cards and added my journaling.

Thanks for joining me again this week. I'd love to have you visit me over on the October Afternoon blog today as well. Head on over there and let them know what you think!

Smile, I'm Guesting at October Afternoon!

I was soo excited when I got an email from the October Afternoon team asking me to guest design and I was even more thrilled when I found out I'd be playing with their new Daily Flash collections.

I've created one layout already, which I posted last Friday HERE and I'm sitting here at my scrap desk looking at two completed Daily Flash spreads that will be up on the blog this coming Friday. In the meantime, make sure to visit the October Afternoon blog, where I did some Q&A and first debuted this card that I whipped up real quick for my Q&A post, using the Travel Girl collection.

I just love the colors in this collection and all the coordinating die-cuts, stickers and embellishments. I decided to pair the cute smiling gal with something that reminded me of green grass and sky rays. I cut them all to different sizes, extending some past the edge of the card and others short than the card. I then stitched them on.

Thanks for stopping by. I'll be sharing 2 spreads from the Daily Flash Snapshots collection, which was so fun to create with! Take a stop by the October Afternoon blog and pay me a visit over there! Now go on and get crafty!

A Day In The Sun | October Afternoon Guest Designer

Hi there everyone! I am just over-the-moon excited to be guest designing for October Afternoon this month. I mean Hello, I've been a fan for years and years so I jumped at the chance!!! So, I'll be hogging their blog every Friday in August. I would soo LOVE it if you'd visit me over there too!

They sent me an fabulous package of Daily Flash goodies to create with and immediately got to work planning out projects. Everything from layouts to Project Life-style pages to an altered item or two - I was ready to go! I thought I'd kick this off by showing how versatile the Daily Flash collection can be by creating a 12x12 layout.

Supplies: Daily Flash Summertime collection - PP-1169 - Sunshine 12x12 paper, PP-1167 - Blue Skies 12x12 paper, DC-1172 - Memory Cards, PP-1165 - 6x8 Paper Pack, DC-1170 - Snap Caps, DC-1171 - Flash Blurbs, EM-1133 - Tin Pins

Something kept pulling me back to the Summertime collection, specifically the Sunshine paper. I started with that as my initial inspiration and everything fell into place to create this layout about my youngest daughter posing by the art on the Galveston Seawall after a day at the beach. I just couldn't resist accentuating the gorgeous sun rays with a few stitches here and there. I purposely trimmed the Sunshine paper down and adhered it to the white background. I then chose white stitching so that I could extend the rays subtly onto the white background.

After placing my photo on the page, the Memory Cards and Flash Blurbs were calling out to be used. I shuffled them around a bit until they fell into just the right places. I added a bit of layering, a splash of embellishments and voila!, the layout really started coming together. I made a little pocket for the "Summertime" Snap Caps card to peek out and added some hidden journaling. I purposely didn't add a title because I think the various cards do an excellent job on their own. It could be anything from Best Summer Ever, Dog Days of Summer, A Day In The Sun or any other fantastic summertime sentiments you see on the page.

I posted more information about my design thought process and photos over on the October Afternoon blog. Stop by and say "hi". I'll be back again next Friday with more Daily Flash goodness. Now go on and get crafty!

Live in the Moment

I love to scrapbook and I usually do it based on a set assignment, which is totally fine by me because I always have plenty of photos to scrap and it's usually good to have an assignment as a starting point so I know what to focus on. But...sometimes it's great to have a "anything goes" assignment, which is what I was given for Little Yellow Bicycle this month.

I had been dying to play with the Fern & Forest Boy collection but with a girly spin so I did just that.

I snapped this photo one day when we made an impromptu stop on our way home from a trip to stop and look at the beautiful Texas wildflowers. We hadn't intended to explore the fields but dresses, shorts and flip flops didn't stop my girls from getting a little rough and tumbly on the HUGE hay stacks.

I decided to super-size the photo on the layout to help visualize through the design on the page, just how big the haystacks were. I framed the photo with the canvas banner and border and then pulled the page together using stickers that help tell the story along with the journaling.

Supplies: PY-104 Poppy Field Damask/Aqua Script, FNB-409 Whimsical Words/Brown Multi Dot, FNB-435 Cardstock Stickers - Favorite Pieces - with thermography and embossing (32 pieces), FNB-440 Cardstock Stickers - Fresh Verse - with thermography and debossing (43 pieces), FNB-579 Chipboard Shapes - with thermography (30 pieces), FNB-501 Canvas Stickers (15 pieces), VS-305 Paper Crafting Kit (66 pieces)

Thanks for stopping by today. Make sure to visit the Little Yellow Bicycle online store to get 25% off anything in the store. Just use the code LYB25 at checkout. No go on and get crafty!

Epic Discoveries Await

So here's a little fun fact you may or may not know about me...I absolutely LOVE to scuba dive! Hubby and I are pretty adventurous people and have been on some pretty amazing dives.  Of course, we wouldn't intentionally do anything to risk our lives cause we have little munchkins and well, we hope to live full lives with them. But we do have our advanced certifications and have been luck enough to dive in exotic places like Belize.

When I got the Gossamer Blue August Main kit and saw all of the travel and adventure goodies, I knew that I had to start documenting more of our travels.  This one just happens to be all about me diving the Blue Hole with my hubby, Bryan, for a 2nd time.

How amazing is this ombre chevron paper??? It reminded me of the differing colors of the ocean and it was a perfect match for this photo of me jumping off the boat into the Blue Hole. I gotta tell ya, it starts out nice and clear at the surface and gets super dark when you're 130 ft. below.

Yep, that's me up there doing what I love.  It's so peaceful underwater when all you have are you, your thoughts and whatever sea life is around you. And speaking of sea life, you don't actually see much of it in the Blue Hole. We were lucky to be the first boat out that morning so not much was stirred up and you could see pretty far and that also meant that the sharks were still resting below. You see, the nurse sharks like to swim up from deep below to about halfway up our dive so many times, they are coming up with you. Yikes. I'm told they are the more docile sharks and are also used to the divers there.  Hmmmm. In case you're wondering, yes, we did see run across a couple.

I saw the little tickets above and I knew I had to find a way to squeeze the little alphas included in the kit onto them. I really like how it turned out.

Alright now, make sure to check out the August kits shown below and visit the site. Lori has some amazing things planned for Gossamer Blue.

 
Thanks for stopping by today. Now go on and get crafty.