Scrapbook Wednesday

OK, OK... I know this is supposed to be Scrapbook Monday, but either blogger or my internet provided has been testing my patience!  Every time I would try to upload a picture, it would either be cut in half and pieced backwards, or just missing part of the picture.  So today, I used the connection at work and everything worked perfectly!

This is another MDS page I created.  I would still rather create hands on, but it is getting easier to make my pages look a little better.  There are completed templates where you can just drop in pictures, but I'm obsessed enough to feel like that's 'cheating' if I post it on my blog!  I used some of the pictures from our big hickory tree for this layout and decided to make this an 8 1/2 by 11 page instead of my typical 12 by 12.  I do love how easy it is to resize everything in MDS!!  Unfortunately, I did not make a list of what I used on this and honestly, I don't remember now!

This past weekend, my girls and I had a little getaway with my sister.  We went to Gatlinburg, TN to attend a youth conference that is associated with my sister's church.  The speakers were wonderfully motivational & thought provoking, and there was a lot of fun and games too!  Of course, we couldn't go to Gatlinburg without shopping!!  Lots of walking, lots of reflecting, and most importantly, lots of girl time!  I have to admit that it was pretty good to sleep in my own bed again on Sunday night, but after looking at the pile of laundry on Monday, I was wishing for another break!! Why can't someone invent self-cleaning clothes?!  

Just a reminder that today is the last day to sign up for my blog candy give away found here!  The baker's twine is all ready to be packed and mailed to one lucky commenter (is that a word?!).  So if you haven't already, be sure to leave me some love on that post!!!! Have a wonderful Leap Day!!

It's a Major Award!

No, I didn't win a fishnet leg lamp, but I did win this and twice in one day!!!!!!!

Thanks so much to Karen at Busy Bee Creations and Lucia at FondoBlu Design for giving me this wonderful award!! You like me; you really like me!!


The idea of the Liebster Award is to bring attention to blogs with less than 200 followers.
So in the spirit of good fun, I am passing this award along to five other bloggers.  Please stop by their blogs and encourage them by leaving a little love on their creations. If you have a second to register as a follower that would be great too!  We all know, the more the merrier:)

For the blogs that I have presented this to please:
1.  Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
2.  Reveal your five picks for the award and let them know.
3.  Post the award on your blog.
4.  Bask in the love from the most supportive people on the blog-share-other blogers.
5.  Finally and the best rule of all - have fun and spread the love!  :)

I'm awarding this to 5 very special blogs:


At the risk of being a regifter... I have to make one of my choices Lucia.  She makes the most amazing recycled projects ever and I vow I will make one of her journals very soon!!


I also chose:


Heather at Crafty Sahm I Am (such creative and fabulous creations from a craft dungeon!!)


Lisa at Adventures in Paperland (a wonderfully talented crafter with amazing scrapbooks!)


Chas at Crafty Scrub Nurse (if you are looking for wonderful MDS pages, be sure to visit her! She does some pretty amazing things with paper and stamps too!)


and last but definitely not least, the ultra-talented, super crafty, always amazing (and I'm not just saying this because she's my upline and friend!!) Kelly at Scrap Happy!  She is the queen of MDS!!  She's not too shabby at everything else either ; )




I have to say that choosing only 5 blogs was extremely difficult since I follow so many talented crafters.  Narrowing that down to people with less than 200 followers helped a little, but it was still a hard thing to do!  I hope you enjoy visiting my choices as much as I do!

Scrapbook Monday, um...Tuesday

I had one of the most stressful, emotional weeks, last week.  Both vehicles broke down, two deaths in the family, and just general 'stuff' that bogs me down from time to time.  As I was feeling sorry for myself (a real pity party, let me tell you!), I received a call that really put things in perspective.  I'm unable to go into details, but some parents I know suffered one of the most horrific blows one can receive, their child had died.  Suddenly, my drama didn't seem nearly so dramatic and I realized that while I felt like God was giving me an awful lot to deal with, things were much worse for others.  This led to the realization that we often get so caught up in our own struggles and burdens, that we lose sight of the blessings we have.  Both deaths in my family were people who were battling cancer and while we weren't ready to lose them, they are no longer suffering and enjoying eternity.  My car was fixed the very next day after breaking down, causing me to give thanks for our family friend who always manages to squeeze us in at his shop.  But most importantly of all, last night I was able to hug and kiss my husband and both of my daughters good night, something I won't take for granted any time soon.

This long, extremely emotional, and personal post, is my long winded way of explaining why there wasn't a Scrapbook Monday on Monday.  Most of my followers know I can't say anything simply ;-)

Today's project is rather unusual for me.  I used MDS to create my page.  I am very much a 'hands on' person and while I have this program and think it is wonderful, I tend not to use it often!  I was playing around with some of the different layouts & features and came up with this CAS page featuring my 'baby'. I will probably end up going back and matting some of the pics.  It feels a little too CAS!

Anyone with a Lab will appreciate how difficult it is to get still shots of this dog!  I can't tell you how many pictures I took just hoping for a few decent shots.  He really is such a sweet dog and I love that he keeps my feet warm while I craft!  My DH accuses me of loving Shadow more than him!

One Last Valentine and please stop this ride...

I know Valentines Day is officially over, but wanted to post the cards my preschoolers received this year. I had intended to post this sooner, but somehow everything went crazy and I ended up finishing these Sunday night and then I didn't get time to post the picture until today!  This picture shows two of the cards.  I made 30 and used a variety of colors for the interior hearts.

This project was great for using up a lot of the 12x12 white paper I had that wasn't SU.  I also used a few sheets of non SU colored paper as well.  The hearts were cut with the hearts framelits and I used my trimmer to cut the slots for the pencils. I stamped some hearts on the labels using pretty in pink and then printed the sentiment using a wp program on my computer. It says "Valentine, you have the WRITE stuff!"

I usually try to do 2-3 posts a week and last week I barely managed one! If it wasn't for scheduling posts ahead of time, my Monday post wouldn't have made it!  It was one of those weeks that reminds me of being trapped on a carnival ride going out of control.  I wanted to yell "Stop this ride! I want to get off!" but instead I just closed my eyes, held on, and hoped for a new week!  I had parent-teacher conferences, field trips, and Valentines parties at work.  Then there was Girl Scout cookie booths, music practice at church, a birthday party to prepare for, and a house that looked like a cyclone hit it!  This did not include the cards I needed to finish, the gift bags for my sister's patients that needed to be put together and dropped off, and the SU club projects I needed to prepare...  This week is not looking like it will be much better, but next weekend, I get a mini vacation!  I'm counting the days!

Well...Owl be...

Happy Valentines Day!  We don't really do a lot for Valentines day at our home.  The girls share cards with their classmates and friends, but other than that, it's a lot like any other day.

My oldest DD just celebrated her 13th birthday and since she loves owls and purple, I combined those to make her card.  Let me tell you, it's not so easy to be inspired by purple owls, but she loved her card, so I guess that's all that matters!!  Sorry about the not so great photo quality.  It was overcast when I took this picture, and too cold to be outside!

I used a lot of goodies from my scrap box and some purple glitter glue from my girls craft supply.  The sentiment was created on my computer and the inside says "Well, OWL be darned!"

I was so looking forward to an evening of eating out, when she informs me the morning of her birthday that she wanted my pork roast with carrots and potatoes.  Fortunately, I only had a morning class on her birthday and was able to get everything into the crock pot and had it ready for dinner!  Maybe my DH will fix dinner tonight... After all, it is Valentines Day!

Just a reminder that there is still time to be entered in my blog candy giveaway!

Card Recipe: Cardstock-whisper white, perfect plum, wild wasabi, tan paper from stash, Ink-perfect plum, rich razzleberry, peach parfait marker, Stamp Set-Punch Bunch, Accessories-owl punch, modern label punch, scallop oval punch

Scrapbook Monday-Christmas

I am super proud that I've managed to stick with my resolution so far!  It has helped me get over half of my 2011 pictures scrapbooked, and it's only February!!  My girls have been enjoying looking at pages without saying "When was that?" or "Where were we?"!

Today's page is from Christmas.  Now don't get all excited, I'm not almost finished with the year! I've been jumping around to different occasions as the inspiration hits and this time it just happens to be Christmas.  Tomorrow it might be Easter, Halloween, or some random moment!

The stockings were an afterthought.  I wanted to punch all four sides of my journaling block with the eyelet border, but the corners were off just enough to make me not like it! So, as the saying goes... "There are no mistakes in paper crafting, only times for embellishment!"  In the end, I really like the sparkle the stockings added to the page.  It was also the only Stampin' Up! supplies I used other than the eyelet punch!  I am slowly but surely making a dent in my hoarded scrapbook paper and stickers!

Well, today I'm feeling rather old.  My oldest DD is officially a teenager today!  Isn't it funny that my birthdays don't make me feel older, but my kid's do?  She is picking the place for dinner tonight, which is a bonus for me since I won't have to cook dinner!  I'm just glad we've moved past the age of choosing McDonalds!!

Page Recipe: Cardstock-red glimmer paper, and stash goodies, Accessories-stocking builder punch (ret), eyelet border punch, stickers from stash

Scrapbook Monday-Back in my day

Well, I'm running a little behind on my posting, but it is still Monday and I do have a scrapbook page! I actually spent a lot of time Saturday in my crafting space and managed to finish 6 pages!! Woo! Hoo! I kept catching myself thinking 'oh this paper would be cute on a card...', but I was determined to scrap.  It was very satisfying to show my DH all of the 2011 pictures I had finished and I was feeling rather proud when he smiles and asks "Where are 2010's Christmas pictures?"  Umm...on the computer or on the memory card?!  This is why I have a blog!  No digs at my huge files of unprinted pictures, no smarty pants comments, and a true understanding of why all of my pics aren't scrapbooked!

Now, on  with the page! These pics were from Mother's Day last year.   My whole family gathers together and the guys do the cooking and the ladies get to eat first!  It's a wonderful time and we all love being able to catch up and visit.  My Grandma was always famous for saying "When I was little..." or "When I was a kid..." followed by a story from her past.  This was usually followed by the appropriate eye rolling from my siblings and I.  Unfortunately, we didn't learn to appreciate those stories until after she was gone and we love retelling them to our kids.  But, we all still laugh and roll eyes anytime anyone says "When I was a kid..."

At one point during the day, the adults realized that while we were all outside enjoying the beautiful day, our children were nowhere to be found. But a quick trip into my sister's house solved the mystery.  They were all playing or waiting for a turn on the XBox...  This was a perfect time for "When I was a kid..." to come into play!

This page has zero SU product on it!  Everything is from my stash and while I was surprised that no SU goodies made it on the page, it felt good to use up several things that had been around here for a while!

Don't forget about my blog candy and be sure to leave a comment on that post and 'share the love' with others if you have a blog!

I'm positive it's negative...I think...

Hello everyone!  As I have mentioned before, I'm somewhat addicted to pinterest (no, really...just one more pin...Oh wait! There's 5 more...) but I have found a drawback.  I pinned a wonderful Valentine card and made my version by looking at the picture, but when I went to link to the blog to give proper credit, I couldn't find the card on her website... I'm sure it's on there somewhere, but whoever pinned it, didn't pin the actual link only the blog. Grrrr.... So... the inspiration for this card came from Nature of Crafty Things blog, but I can't give you the direct link! Anyway, here is my card...

Wondering how I punched those pretty hearts in different places? I DIDN'T!! I used the new hearts framelits from SU!  It also did the cool embossed layers around the cut out hearts!  Of course, since my supply of scraps are limited (did anyone really buy that line?!) I knew I needed to do something with those heart cutouts.  So, my second design is a complete negative (or would that be positive, since it's the center?) but using the same supplies!  The DSP is also the same paper, but the opposite side.

I am getting closer to completing my Valentines and I'm hoping I can keep the mojo going a little longer to finish!  I keep finding all of these other techniques and stamps I want to use that aren't Valentines!!  I'm hoping this weekend will allow for some uninterrupted craft time so I can finish them and then maybe even get some scrapbooking done.  Monday will be here before I know it and I don't have a page to post yet! AAAAHHHH!!!!

If you are looking for the candy give away, you will find it here!  Hope you have a wonderful weekend and thanks for stopping by!

Card Recipe:  Cardstock-real red, pretty in pink, Raspberry Tart DSP (ret), Ink-stazon black, real red, Stamp Set-Just Believe (sentiment), Accessories-heart framelits

A CASE of CAS

As if paper crafting and blurfing weren't enough addictive habits to consume my time, I also found Pinterest a few months ago! Oh the possibilities! The card I'm sharing today was inspired from Mandy at A Little Space of My Own.  I loved the clean look and the huge pop of the red against the white.  It was also super fast and easy to make and since I'm only half way to my required goal of Valentines, this is a very good thing!

In case you missed it, I'm offering blog candy on the post below, so be sure to check it out! Have a wonderful day!!

Card Recipe: Cardstock-whisper white, red glimmer paper, Ink-cherry cobbler, Stamp Set-Loving Thoughts, Accessories-heart to heart punch and dimensionals

It's an Anniversary Birthday Party!!

    

I just celebrated my 1 year anniversary as a Stampin' UP! demonstrator in January, and  the Black Shadow Creations blog will be 1 year old on February 22nd!  Where did the time go?!

Since I'm in such a celebratory mood, I decided that I would do my first ever BLOG CANDY!! I have been fortunate enough to win some wonderful blog candy from some fabulous blogs; so I thought that in the spirit of sharing the love, I would celebrate my anniversary and my blog's birthday with a gift!

and here is my first ever Blog Candy...

No... It's not just one package of Stampin' UP! Bakers Twine, not two, not three...but it is the entire collection of colors of SU bakers twine!!! Woo! Hoo!  That's right EIGHT packages of baker's twine!

While I welcome people to follow my blog, and would love it if you wanted to,  I'm not making it a requirement of the blog candy.  If you like what you see on my blog and want to be a fellow stalker, then you are more than welcome to join.  I may not be the most innovative crafter, but I like to think I'm at least a little fun (my kids don't think so, but they don't count here!)!  But I digress... 

Here are the Official Rules for winning the blog candy...

1. Leave me a comment on this post.
2. If you have a blog, please post it in your comment. Like I said before, I love to blog stalk!
3. Spread the love!  Let others know about my blog candy by linking back to me on your blog.
4.  Make sure I have a way of getting in touch with you. You can't win if I can't find you!!

I will be drawing the winner on February 29th and will post the winners name on March 1st!