While the boys are away...

The mom will play! My husband took the boys to Chuck E. Cheese and then Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs today so I could have some much needed time to myself. I have gotten 6 layouts done today and I am contemplating doing another. Here are 5 of the 6 I did. All of the layouts except the 4th one were done using sketches from Nuts About Sketches . Thanks for looking.

We are in mourning today.

My son Ethan's little rat, Michelle, died last night. She's the light colored one in the picture. He was devastated. He is such a sensitive soul and this really tore him up. He was so good though, he held her and pet her until she passed. We will be having a rat funeral today. The other rat is now searching the cage and calling out for her. They are very social and we will need to get another rat to keep her company. Ethan is okay with that.


On a lighter, less-rodent note, here are a couple LOs I created last night. This first one is of my youngest taking his first bites of cereal.



This one is Halloween pictures and paper from last year. I highlighted the tree and bats that were on the paper by using glass glitter. All I did was cover the image with my Beacon 3-in-1 glue and then applied the glitter. Easy peasy and it really made the LO pop. The diecuts were cut by my mom several years ago on her Xyron PCS-I love them, especially the witch.

Thanks for looking and have a glorious weekend! Oh, and hello Willow hoppers.

Cupcakes and Scrapping

If you are looking for some great, fun Halloween treat ideas then check out the October issue of Ladies Home Journal. There are tuns of treats and crafts in there. Yesterday my little guy and I made Black Cat Cupcakes. This isn't the best picture, but they turned out really cute. Excuse my kid's tongue. He refuses to pose for a picture without making funny faces. Anyhow, we made chocolate cupcakes and then frosted them with chocolate frosting. We then covered generously with chocolate sprinkles. The ears are made from chocolate wafers cut into triangles and stuck to the edge of the cupcake. The eyes are a slice of yellow gumdrop with a chocolate sprinkle down the middle (easier than cutting black licorice whips like the directions stated). Then we piped the chocolate frosting for the nose. Now the whiskers are supposed to be black licorice whips, but I couldn't find any. So we just used food coloring to turn the frosting black and piped it on using a baggie with a corner snipped off. Worked pretty slick. The little guy had a blast helping me and they were a big hit with the neighbor kids! Again, this was not my idea...It belongs to Ladies Home Journal. (Oh, and please forgive my dirty kitchen floor...that's on the list for today :)


Now for some scrapping! I am still going strong in the Willow Traders LEO challenge. I'm 10 for 10. Challenge 10 was to do a LO that shows progression. I love the way this turned out. I used the Baby Boy kit from A Kiss on the Chic April. I included the ultrasound pic, a pic of me right before leaving for the hospital (ha! you can hardly even tell I'm pregnant--don't worry, my 2nd pregnancy was different, LOL), oldest son right after he was born, and then his 3 month picture. The journaling just talk about the joy of having him. And what does said son say when he sees this LO?????? "Mom, is that what you wore when you worked on the farm?" Grrrr....he should be kissing the ground I walk on for bringing him into this world, not making fun of my wardrobe choices when I was in labor!

And this fun little LO was done using The Boyfriend part of my The Scrap Room kit. See the title....the S was really an 8, the C was an E, and the O's were a "q", "d", and "g", and the l was a k!

Thanks for looking!

School Pictures

I think school pictures are hilarious. My son's 3rd grade picture was no exception. He is not a "smile-on-command" type of guy, so we always get some goofy pictures. I'm not sure what this face is saying, but I think it's cute. We thought about retaking them, but decided, this is who he is. I used my fabulous September Scraptacular kit. The LEO challenge at Willow Traders was to scraplift from a gallery. I chose a LO by Cindy Stevens in the September Scrapbook Sussies gallery. It's called Concentration and is second from the bottom of the page. Thanks for looking.

I'm in love....

with Nuts About Sketches. I created this LO last night using one of the sketches by Shawn. I just love how it turned out. It used the new Cosmo Cricket Boyfriend line, which I got in the September The Scraproom kit.

This isn't camping....

But I still used the Bella Blvd Camped Out line for this LO. I think these papers are very pretty. This goes in my vacation album and I didn't feel the need for a title. The sketch is from Nuts About Sketches. And I used this tutorial by Barb to not waste all my brown cardstock: http://supermamascraps.blogspot.com/2009/08/please-tell-me-that-someone.html. This LO uses the Fiskars Threading Water punch to meet the "use an edge" requirement for the next LEO challenge at Willow Traders. Thanks for stopping by!

Thank Goodness for Short Weeks!

Work has been absolutely insane this week. Thank goodness it's a short week due to the holiday. Just when I thought I couldn't take anymore, Friday arrived. It's a quiet day at work today, so I thought I would take some downtime to do a blog post. Just in time for the Willow Traders Blog Hop. I created a very quick LO last night for the LEO challenge. This time we were to pick a sketch from the May page on Nuts About Sketches. Shawn's sketches are great. You can see them here: http://nutsaboutsketches.blogspot.com/2009_05_01_archive.html . I chose Week #56. Here is my quickie version of this. Life has been super busy and I didn't have much time to scrap, so I whipped this out very quickly. Thanks for looking.

Basic Grey!

I can't help myself! I love it. I am currently in love with the Junebug collection. I got the Sept kit from Scrapbook Deals 4 U and it's beautiful. And then I had to purchase the coordinating Woolies because I just could not resist! The current LEO challenge at Willow Traders is to use old photos. Well, hello, I had been doing that already this weekend but of course those were done prior to the challenge being posted. So I dug out these pics of my oldest son, Ethan, from October 2001. Shhh...don't tell him the title, he would not be pleased!

I love scrapping old photos.

I must be feeling nostalgic this weekend. First I scrapped the old photo of my grandmother and me. While I was digging for that photo on Friday night, I found pictures of my dad and I at the beach with my Great-Aunt Mildred. My dad passed away suddenly a few years ago and I miss him terribly. So after I got done crying, I decided I had to scrap those photos and I had the perfect paper from a Zany Zinnia kit. The flowers on this LO were from my stash, but the rest is from the kit. This is my new favorite LO. I based it on a sketch from 52 Sketches...52 Weeks.
My mom just informed me that the year was 1981 (I was 3) so I need to finish up the journaling. She also told me that I made her put my hair up in a bun to match Aunt Mildred's, so I think I will fix the journaling to include that.

And then I needed to complete a LO for Challenge #3 of the Willow Traders LEO challenge. This time the challenge was to use a recycled item on a LO. I used to have a bunch of tags from clothes and stuff stashed away, but in an effort to declutter, I threw them away (gasp!!!) So I wasn't sure what to use. But then I remembered Lisa's (LisaNroxy) LO for challenge #2. She used cardboard as a mat for a picture of her sweet little pug. And inspiration struck! So I tore apart a kit box and then spritzed the cardboard with gold Maya Mist. This is my family during our summer vacation to Lake Geneva. This is totally us. Ice cream on the little guy's face, husband holding an ice cream cone, goofy faces. I used an old A Kiss on the Chic kit for this LO. I have also been inspired by Lisa and other's fabulous clustering skills, so I have been trying to improve at that.

Thanks for looking!

Scraplift Queen

I am the Queen of Scraplift! And I am not ashamed to say it. There are so many beautiful LOs by so many talented ladies that I just get so inspired. I can't help myself. I am not nearly as creative as some people, and the lifting really gets the mojo flowing. So last night I came home from eating too many greasy appetizers and drinking a big old Perfect Margarita. I needed to complete the second LEO challenge at Willow Traders. I had absolutely no creative powers, so I went for a direct scraplift. I found this picture I love of my paternal grandmother and I together. I think it may be the last picture taken of us together before she passed. And the challenge was to use a specific color palette. So I copied the choice a few others had made (and made my life simpler) and chose Crate Paper Lillian. Then I went to the June TSR Member's Gallery and found a LO by rgeile and directly lifted it. So without further ado, here is my totally lifted LO!

And hello to all the Willow Traders blog hoppers!