Urban Swank Urban Lily Paper Craft Collection

Hello, All!  Today I am over on the Scrapbooksteals.com blog to show you a fun project I made with products from today's steal, Urban Swank Urban Lily Paper Craft Collection.  I had SO MUCH FUN working with these products, so go check out what I made!  

Here is a little teaser:

 

Now head over to the Scrapbooksteals.com blog and check out the rest! 

Until next time...

Simple Stories Happy Days Collection

Today is my first post over at the Scrapbooksteals blog!  I got to use the Simple Stories Happy Day Collection, which is so great for creating cards and layouts  The photo sleeve-like system makes it super easy to create fast layouts and cards as well. 

Here are a couple sneak peeks at a couple layouts I made with today's steal:

You heard me say *sneaks*, right?  ;)  Make sure you head over to the Scrapbooksteals blog to see the rest of these projects, as well as many other scrapbooking ideas!

Until next time...

Some news...

I just wanted to share some exciting news...

I was chosen to be on the Scrapbooksteals.com Design Team for the Winter term!  As I said in the announcement over on the SS blog, I feel like I have come full-circle in regards to Scrapbooksteals.  Starting from being a fan, to making lasting friendships within the SS community, to attending the crop and now being on the design team.  Aside from working there, this is about as far as I can go in the SS world!  :) 

I'm excited to show you the projects I've been working on!

Until then...

One Little Word...Breathe

Happy 2013!  It's always nice to start the new year with a some fresh perspective, isn't it?  I don't usually do resolutions because they are sometimes unattainable.  For instance, one of mine would be to live richly.  That can be interpreted in many ways...to live life to the fullest, to love to the fullest, etc.  But in my head, that would mean we need to win the lottery.  See what I mean?  :)

Some of my scrappy friends have chosen one little word for the new year and I felt like this was something I needed to do as well.  2012 was a hard year for me, mostly because of those unattainable or unrealistic expectations I put upon myself.  A mini meltdown in October opened my eyes in a new perspective and I feel like I can continue with it for the next year.  This brings me to the word I chose:

This word has so many different meanings to me. I'm not reminding myself to breathe in the literal sense.  My breakdown in October was caused by all of the stress I was putting upon myself.  I was trying to be the perfect mom, the perfect wife, have a perfect home, do all the right things and it all caught up to me at once.  To me, breathe means to relax, think before I speak/act, let go and let God.

I need to learn to just breathe before I react to things my girls do.  My youngest is a very strong-willed child and as much as I love that little nut, she really knows how to push my buttons.  Instead of just reacting to what she does, I need to take a deep breath and realize that whatever she did or said probably wasn't as big of a deal as I would have made it out to be.

I need to learn that there really is no such thing as perfect.  As long as we have a roof over our heads, food on our plates and love in our hearts, everything else will just fall into place.  If I get the laundry done in one day, great!  If I don't, oh well.  If I clean up the house every few days, sweet!  If not, no one's going to like me any less for it.

I am not sure what I will actually do with this word as far as a project or layout is concerned, but I'm sure I'll come up with something.  And if I don't...I won't beat myself up about it.  Coming up with my word and choosing to be the change I wish to see is a success in and of itself. 

Until next time...




PS  One little word is a concept developed by Ali Edwards.  You can learn more about it by visiting her blog here.

Life happens...

So much for posting cards everyday, right?!  Oy.  Life happened in big ways the past two weeks.  First, my biggie came down with the 6 year old version of RSV, with a fever and horrible cough for a week.  Then I was sick with a massive head cold all weekend.  THEN my 3.5 year old had a fever/cold for a couple days.  I was about to sit down and start a new post on Friday when I heard the news about what happened in Connecticut.  It just didn't seem right to be posting Christmas cards when so many people's lives had just changed forever.  I just wanted to spend the day holding my girls forever.  It's sad that it takes such extreme situations to make us realize how blessed we are, but when we do, it hits us hard.  I spent the weekend soaking up as much of my girlies as I could and now I am ready to share some more projects with you.

This is a card and travel coffee mug set that I made for one of my preschooler's teachers:

I love how they both turned out, but man alive was it hard to get the piece of paper into the mug!!  After all of that work I put into making it look nice, I didn't even take the thickness of the paper into account when I was trying to stuff it into the mug.  Sheesh!

Anyway, that's what I have for now.  I'll be back soon with more.  Until then...

Christmas Copy Cat...

Recently Paper Smooches had a blog hop showcasing their latest new releases.  When I got to Teri Anderson's blog, I noticed that she was doing a "25 in 25" challenge.  (Making 25 cards in 25 days.)  What better place to find inspiration for cards than a blog showcasing exactly what I'm working on?!

This is a card that Teri made:

And here is my version:

I think this card turned out beautifully.  I love finding inspiration on blogs and Pinterest because there are people out there who are way more talented than myself and they deserve a bit of copy cat flattery.  :)

That's all for today!  Until next time...

Some swanky snowmen...

Hello!  Today I am back with a couple more Christmas cards I have created.  I recently purchased a cute stamp set by Paper Smooches called Swanky Snowdudes.  I love the cute little snowmen and accents in this set. 

Here are a couple cards I've made with this set:

This first card is one of my favorites.  I paper pieced the scarf and hat and heat embossed the sentiment onto the banner.  I'm not a pro at doing the heat embossing thing, but I still like how it turned out.  

This second card is my girls' favorite.  This is one of the first cards where I've used blocking to create a layered effect.  I paper pieced the scarves and colored the rest in with colored pencils.  To make the colors look more blended, I used mineral spirits to soften everything out.

Thanks for stopping by again today!  I'll be back with more soon!

Until next time...