Autumn Layouts and ATCs

One morning last week I signed into FB and read that my friend Penny had Autumn sitting on her porch flirting with cooler temps and a break from the humidity. It was so nice to have a break in the 100 degree weather even if only for a day. Autumn is my absolute favorite time of year, and I am trying to WILL it to come now. :) It makes me happy to find the store   shelves filled with Fall, Halloween, and even a bit of Christmas.

These pictures are actually from the 4th of July, but I thought the creamy neutrals went so beautifully with her dress and the deck. (Boohoo, can't believe how much my pixie has grown in a year!)

Notice the new fabric Primas? I love the mix of textures and colors.

I'm so sad I forgot to get a full shot of this layout. I love how it turned out. These papers are GORGEOUS. They are a great mix from several of the new lines. Sherri does a fantastic job kitting it all.

I like how my Maya Road leaf turned out. First I stamped it with a background stamp. Then I inked it with chalk inks, and added diamond glaze over the top. Made it look like a grungy fallen leaf. :)

I mixed the new Primas with handmade flowers and cute stickers from Karen Foster. 

This next kit was brown and grey and I added a touch of green. It's just pictures of me and my little ones playing out front enjoying the cool weather last year. 

I do like how my leaves turned out. I layered the chipboard leaf over the adhesive-backed felt leaves, dry embossed the chipboard, layered it with new Maya Road trim, and a butterfly cut from 7 Gypsies new paper. 

 I love this star embossed paper from Jenni Bowlin. That was from my stash. I'm getting better at the not hoarding thing. (Sort of :P)

I used the rest of the kit to make these ATCs. 

Yes. I do love them. Yes, they will cause problems with my resolve not to hoard. Fear not. I have already turned them in. I promise not to weep if someone swipes them. ;)

The bird is from 7 Gypsies paper, the twig is new from Prima, and that's the MR trim again. I was feeling very Darwin at the Galapagos as I made this. 

 This ATC was inspired by the tag I made for the Artistic Journey last week. I used Martha Stewart's new microbeads around the window. The only thing I don't like about the microbeads is I can't go torment my hubby by wiping them on his face like I usually do with glitter. :D 

Eeeeee. I still love it. I used a Maya Road chipboard window, and maya-misted the different pieces with buttercream and bronze. It came out very soft.

Thanks for stopping by. Happy Scrapping! DeeDee

Art: A Window to My Other Side

I am taking classes at The Crafty Scrapper's "Artistic Journey" in October. It's a huge event being taught by the Maya Road design team, and I am so looking forward to it.

Anyway, they issued a challenge to make a tag detailing our personal artistic journey and then post it to the FB page.

 I had Maya Road's new window chipboard pieces out on my craft desk so I wanted to play with those. Break out the paper stash! 

This is what I came up with. I scrounged up papers from my scrap box. I know red and teal don't typically go together, but I thought it would work if I kept the red sort of muted with the cream and black. 

I have also been wanting to play around with these mini-banner pieces. They're so sweet! I hate that I didn't have two more e's so I could spell out Dee Dee. I hate when people just call me Dee (with the exception of Sherri and Becker). I know. There are bigger things to worry about. 

Anyway, I am enjoying more time spent crafting just for me lately. Hope you get some craft time this weekend. 

Dee DEE :D  

Wedding Scrapbook Album

Busy days with school starting and Fall fast approaching. This time of year is both wonderfully and dreadfully busy! I want to share an album I made over a year ago, but never got around to posting the pics.

 It's a wedding I made for the GASC that happens in Arlington every year. 

I used mostly Graphic 45, kraft paper, and some vintage music papers from my stash. 

I kept everything cream and black, and think it would be gorgeous with black and white photos. 

I love the shape of this Maya Road album.

I hope you're up to wonderful and busy pursuits. Happy Scrapping! DeeDee

27 Layouts

I am finally done with the huge album I have been working on all week. I have had it on my desk for 3 weeks, but was too sick to do much before Monday. I did a happy dance around the house when I finished the last page. It is so hard for me to work on only one project at a time. I do like to complete things, but my artsy little fingers were itching to start something new after about 4 layouts. :) I think it is all the new paper coming in from the latest CHA. 

When finished, I completed 27 layouts! I think I may have now scrapped more for A than for myself. Guess I have some catching up to do. 

Here are a few peeks at the pages.

A loves kraft paper and neutrals so I used a lot of soft colors as my coordinating theme throughout most of the album. 

I loved the torn edges of this family photo. 

I tucked a journaling tag behind the photo, and layered just so on the patterend paper with the journaling lines left in. 

I used Stampin' Up and Pink Paislee rub-ons as a flat embellishment that added just the right amount of detail to the layouts. 

This is one of my favorite pages from the album. I left layered a photo matte and some coordinating flowers on this great journaling paper from MME. 

To add a tiny bit of definition to the background paper I stitched around some of the journaling prompts. 

I loved working with all her school photos. The navy silhouette piece is from Webster's Pages. It adds a brilliant touch of color to the layout. 

 The other side is layered with cut-outs from the Webster's Pages paper, and Maya Road chipboard. 

This was my favorite of all the layouts. Empty photo mattes because I created it before I got to see which photos she'd be sending.

I just knew she would love the kraft paper base. I hope she finds something fun to add the the silver medallion in the middle. 

I'm not sure I've ever seen the combo before, but I was loving the plum, kraft, and chocolate color combination. 

I see a mix of like 5 paper companies here. :) I altered this MR envelope to work for the layout. It was too tall for the layout so I trimmed it in half and stuffed it with journaling tags. 

I thought this daisy was lovely with the wedding photo. 

All these pieces are from the new MME Lost and Found line. Delicious! I used all my buttons, and they're already sold out in at my LSS after one day. 

Love this tiny pennant banner over the new baby photo. 

I finally broke out my Cosmo Cricket Mr. Campy paper for this. It is so yummy. I am sad that some of it is gone now. :) I wanted something that would work for an outdoors layout, but also function for an alternating Christmas layout and the colors of these papers were perfect. (Notice my rich Stampin' Up ribbon? OoOo lala.)

This is a peek of the Christmas layout. Love the colors. There is so much more I could show you, but I will spare you. :D

I am now fully ready to dive into Fall and Halloween scrapping. I know it is a bit early, but the 100 degree weather is TOO MUCH. I figure if I start scrapping colder weather maybe I can cool myself off. :) Hope you all have a great weekend! Dee2

Simply Artistic Wonderland Swap #1

Last month I heard about simplyatc.com, an ATC challenge and swap site, that was starting up from Sasha Holloway. I totally love her blog, scrapping style,  and tell it like it is personality. 

Anyway, I checked out the first prompt and I was totally inspired to participate. :) We had to use these dresses -

and Avril Lavigne's song "Alice" as our inspiration. So I wrote down some lyrics while listening to it, and this is what I came up with -

It's a bit simple, but I like it. I am ALWAYS stressed about being late. My kids make it almost impossible to be out the door in a reasonable amount of time, and something always seems to be forgotten. So I thought I'd remind myself that being late isn't the end of the world. :)

I am getting this (the red one) ATC in return from my partner Angie Backen. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

It felt great to participate in something artsy and fun just for me. Hope maybe you'll join us next time. The next challenge is up: vintage Alice. 

Happy Scrapping! Dee2 

A Book about Me

Well, not me exactly. It's a custom order for a fun sweet woman I met through eBay, but it's turning out so cute I wish it were for me! :) I've been working on this 24 page album in my spare time this week - think 2 minute increments with kiddos invading my ribbon supply.

 I am designing it with kraft papers, and soft neutral hues. (My mom would so love her Jan Brady hair.)

A close up of the dimensional details. I am trying to be careful not to over-layer since it is going in an album. I picked out a ton of rub-ons and stamps to work it. ;) She wants to do lots of journaling so I figured this My Minds Eye paper would be a perfect first page. 

 The little envelope opens up for more journaling space, and she could tuck some scraps or a note inside. 

This layout is a reworking of what she'd already done with the page. She was stumped with what to do next with it which so happens to me. A little tag-team scrapping. I love the flowers she picked out to match the ones in the picture.

 I just moved some things around and layered on the tags, rub-ons, etc. Voila! Now who is going to make a me book for me? 

Oh, and does anyone know why I've had 60 visitors in the last two days? Curiosity has finally got to me. 

Dee2 :)

The Last Bit of Summer

I have a few pics from our recent tea party to share. I had pictured this intimate garden party under our gazebo, but since it was 103 degrees out I finally consented to having the party in our living room. (Change of scene took place 30 minutes before the party. Eeek!) I'm still learning to go with reality instead of the dream. :)

I set this up in the center of the tea table with napkins and colored pencils. We ran out of time before we could do water colors and drawing, but I still sigh in pleasure at the idea. :)

My daughter is always fascinated with my glitter so I poured a smidge into funky bottles, and labeled them. So cute. She wanted to use them like salt and pepper. :)

I found these antique lace-edged napkins at an estate sale out in Waxahachie, cleaned them up a bit, and tied some SU ribbon around them. 

This pedestal held bit and bobs for the kiddos to put on. I found that corsage at a thrift store for 75 cents, and changed out the black flowers and ribbon for white and green. 

This mirror fit the color scheme exactlty, and was my only real purchase for the party at $16 from Joanns. 

I made these little ATCs to tie onto the gift bags, and Sofie stuffed the bags with back-to-school supplies and cosutme jewelry. 

The back of the ATCs. 

This is a hand-dyed basket that I filled with the extra save the date cards, and an old copy of Little Women I found at a garage sale. I still have it out on my counter to hide my hubby's keys and wallet. 

The party guests licking the frosting off their vegan strawberry cupcakes. :) Isn't Sebastian's bowtie so sweet? His Mom made it just for the party. LOVE.

We played lots of balloon games. Sami was our victor in "who can hold the most at once." She was the essence of sugar and spice and everything nice. 

Little Boy Blue ran around foraging food the other kids abandoned, and dancing around in the tulle we used to decorate the chairs. :) 

And my sweet girl was a charming (and slightly hyper) hostess. She gave everyone a super big hug when they left, and managed to hand out our handmade gift bags without breaking down :) . I am so proud of her. She is ready to plan the next party.  She's thinking costumes so maybe around Halloween. We'll see. ;)

Hope you got to do something fun this Summer. Dee2