Challenging Challenges!

Scrapbooksteals had an online chat this past Friday night and as usual, challenges were issued a few days before for us to get a head start on. Here's what they were:

Challenge #1 was actually MWM #30 (I'll post that in a minute).

Challenge #2 was to create a layout sharing a secret about yourself.

Challenge #3 was to create a layout sharing something you're lucky to have (in other words, something you're thankful for).

Challenge #4 was a doozy! It was to create a layout that incorporated EACH of the following items:

- 10 metal embellishments
- 9 inches of ribbon
- 8 letters
- 7 non-metal embellishments
- 6 sentences in the journaling
- 5 patterned paper pieces
- 4 solid paper pieces
- 3 photos
- 2 rub on images
- 1 stamped image

Holy cow, right?! When I first saw this challenge, I thought it was going to create one BUSY page, but I'm pretty psyched about how mine turned out. I'll show you what I created, starting with Challenge #1.

Here is the sketch:



And here's my layout:



Cute, right?! Alright, maybe I'm a little biased, but I think this layout turned out pretty cute. :) I decided to make a layout describing my youngest red head. :) There aren't enough words to describe this sweet ball of maddening curiosity, but I figured I'd take a few and put them on the layout and then write a letter to her saying how much I love her for being all of those things. I wouldn't change a single thing about how this layout turned out...and I hope my little Brutus loves it when she gets older. :)

I decided to combine Challenge #2 and #4. (BTW, I didn't complete #3...too much on my plate this past weekend!) I'll show you the layout first and then I'll give you all the details afterwards...

Here's my creation:



I've been very lucky so far in my lifetime that I've been able to go to Disneyland and Disney World on numerous occasions. From the first trip to Disney World back in 1986, my love for Goofy was born. Each time I've been back, I've made sure to take a picture with him. Since I could only use three pictures for Challenge #4, I decided to pick my three favorite pictures. The first was from the first time I met Goofy. (Wasn't I adorable?!) The second picture was from when my friend and I went to Disneyland on our Spring Break, my senior year of high school. The third picture was from when my parents, brother, husband and I went to Disneyland right before Christmas in 2002.

Here's the break down of what I used for this challenge:

- 9 colored, small brads, 1 decorated brad holding the flower together
- 9 inches of ribbon in the bow
- 8 letters (i am goofy - hehe)
- 7 2 flowers together as one, 1 button, 1 row of stitching, 1 sticker (the Goofy sticker in the title), the bracket chip and the star chip
- 6 sentences in the journaling
- 5 patterned paper pieces
- 4 solid paper pieces (one behind journaling, one journaling is printed on, and the #4 is made of two different colors)
- 3 photos
- 2 rub on images (zig zag at the bottom is actually two separate rows that I pieced together)
- 1 stamped image (the circles stamped onto the star embellishment)

And. I'm. Spent! :) Typing that all out was almost as exhausting as creating the layout itself, but for all my hard work, I'm pretty pleased with the way it turned out. I'm not big on using a bunch of different patterned papers on one layout, but I chose these papers from my Fancy Pants "Father and Son" kit because the colors went well with my Goofy pictures. He wears blues, orange and green, and those are the exact colors on the papers.

I should also point out that I created this layout without the help of scraplifting!! This is HUGE for me as I'm not good at creating layouts unless I have something to go by. For not having help, I think I did alright! :)