Take a Hike! with Anything But a Card

No, I'm not telling you to get lost (unless you enjoy doing that on a hike!) or anything like that!  I'm sharing my creation for Anything But a Card's challenge 'Out and About'.  We are inviting all of you creative people to share what you love about the outdoors.  It could be celebrating the seasons, nature, your favorite place, vacations, cookouts, or any outdoor activities!  The choices of inspiration are as big as the great outdoors themselves!

My family loves to spend time camping and hiking, so my DT project is a scrapbook page about hiking in one of our favorite places.  We usually hike in the spring or fall when the weather is a little cooler, and the bugs are a little less active.  The photos I scrapped were from the fall, so I chose fall colors for my page.

I have not scrapped in a while and it took me a little while to get my muse in gear!  It took longer to pick out the papers than it did to put the thing together!!

I think most of the page is pretty easy to figure out.  The only thing that was a little more involved was the red leaf.  I used the autumn accents die to cut the leaf, creased the cut leaf in half and ran it through the woodgrain embossing folder.  I inked up all of the edges with some crumb cake ink to make it more earthy!  Easy peasy!

I hope you will make time to share a special outdoorsy project with us this week!  Thanks so much for stopping by!

Anything But a Card Challenges #29-Fall into Fall

Hello! It's my turn to share a project for our current theme, Fall into Fall, at Anything But a Card Challenges.  I decided to make a scrapbook page holding photos of my favorite girls playing in the leaves.

I used an old Page Maps sketch for my inspiration.  I wanted to use brown as my primary color, but didn't want the whole page to blend in too much, so I chose an orange base and worked in a few accent colors too.  After I added the punched lace ribbon border, I thought it needed a little something to make it stand out a bit more.  So I colored some basic rhinestones with a pretty blue sharpie and voila!  I really like how the page turned out and I even managed to squeeze a ribbon flower on there! The leaves were some spares that were left from a different project, so I added more mustard ink to them so the colors worked with the page.

the ribbon flower (love making these)

the sharpie colored rhinestones-they really are shiny in person...

I hope you enjoyed my page and I would love to see you link up with us!  There are some wonderful projects to be view too!  Have a wonderful week!

Page Recipe:  Paper- orange base from stash, Orchard Harvest DSP (ret), early espresso, more mustard (ret), daffodil delight, Ink-crumb cake, early espresso, more mustard (ret), blue sharpie, Accessories-autumn accents die, woodgrain embossing folder, jumbo sticky rounds, island indigo ruffled ribbon (ret), lace ribbon border punch, orange alphabet stickers from stash

Flashback Friday- Happy birthday to...oops!

Hi! Yes, it's me! I know, you thought someone hacked my blog since I haven't posted 3 times in one week for so long!!  It's amazing what I can get done when everyone else in the house is busy!  

Today's page is a flashback in almost every sense of the word; the only fairly new items on this are the black and white cardstock!  Everything else is either stash or retired SU.  Also, I have to give you the background story for this page so my title makes sense.  One of my nephews has a birthday at the end of October.  From the time he was a little guy, he always had these creepy crawly cakes. Well, this was his 16th birthday, so Grandma added a car to the worms and bugs crawling on his cake.  As we were preparing to take a picture of him with the cake, the cake began to slide and half of it broke off and promptly fell on the floor!! OOPS!!  We all had a good laugh and managed to salvage the half that didn't hit the floor.  I am sure he will forever remember this birthday cake!

Now, on to the flashback goodies... Even the pictures are over 3 years old!!  While the leaves could have been new, they were actually extras from a different page I made a while back, so that makes them 'stash' in my book. I also used some really ancient stickers and a retired corduroy button.  Oh, how I wish that was new...mine are almost gone...sniff! sniff!  I know it's a little silly, but I always feel like I'm accomplishing something when I use up my older supplies.  Plus, it makes room for new goodies, and who doesn't love that?!

Well, that's it for me today! I have a very busy weekend planned.  The child care center where I teach is moving to a new facility and I'm going to spend my weekend cleaning my new room and packing up some of the supplies from my current room.  I'm excited to have a new space, but I really hate packing!! Wish me luck!  Hope your weekend is full of much more crafty goodness than mine!

Page Recipe: Cardstock-basic black, whisper white, real red, daffodil delight, Autumn Traditions DSP (ret), orange (stash), Ink-river rock, chocolate chip, black journaling marker, Stamp Set-Just Journaling, Accessories-woodgrain embossing folder, autumn accents die, pumpkin pie corduroy button (ret), linen thread, stickers and cardstock sentiment (stash)

Flashback Friday- Something Old, Something New..

Hello! It is another wonderful Friday and I'm back with more scrapbook pages featuring some of my forgotten supplies.  As this is being posted to my blog, we are in Ft. Wayne IN with oldest DD.  She is performing with the state Honor Choir this evening and has been in rehearsals all day yesterday and today.  We decided to take a break from the everyday and tagged along to enjoy a few days away and also help out for a few hours with the rehearsals.  We are so proud of how hard she has been working this year and can't wait to see what is in store for her future endeavors.

My pages today were completed during my Christmas break, but the snowy and gray weather did not allow for nice pictures (not that these are fabulous...).  I am hoping we will have some sunnier days ahead so my photographed projects have a little more natural light.  The photos are from several years ago and scrapbooking them was quite an emotional event.  

In April of 2009, my oldest brother was in a horrible motorcycle accident.  He was driving home from my daughter's birthday party and a deer ran out in front of him.  He was rushed to our local hospital before being life flighted to a larger hospital with a wonderful head trauma unit.  They didn't expect him to survive the flight...  But he did.  The doctors did everything they could do to stabilize him and told us that he could die tomorrow or he might live to see another day.  He managed to choose the latter.  After being in a coma for several months, he began running a very high fever.  In the middle of his ordeal, his gall bladder had sustained some damage.  Because of the head trauma and limited ability to be properly examined, this was not noticed immediately and his gall bladder became infected.  They rushed him into emergency surgery, again reminding us that his prognosis was not good.  Mike woke up the next day wanting to know where he was and what happened.  We jokingly call him the Million Dollar Man because of the bills that came from the hospital, but we most sincerely refer to him as our Miracle Man!

Mike's wife has 5 grown children from her previous marriage and one of the girls was engaged to be married when all of this happened.  She and her fiance insisted that they weren't getting married until Mike could be there.  So they unselfishly postponed their wedding until he was well enough to attend.  This was the first time the whole family had been together in one place since the hospital and it proved to be a very emotional day.  I realized while making these pages that I had subconsciously held off on these pictures because of that.  It felt really good to finally put everything in order and focus on the happiness of the moment.

In the tradition of the old adage 'Something Old, Something New...' I managed to use both old and new items on these pages! My old things were the orange cardstock bases that have been in my paper pile forever,  the black letter stickers, and the pretty peel and stick lace ribbon.  My something new came from my dear blogging friend, Sherry.  After admiring the enamel dots she uses on her pages, I was pleasantly surprised to receive some in the mail from her!  They had been sitting on my table taunting me for weeks and I finally decided I had to use some! Love them!!

Their wedding was in October and I loved the fall colored flowers in her bouquet.  Since I had some left over leaves from a different project, I chose to use them for my embellishments. I think they go well with the whole fall theme. I also added a brushed bronze button. My layouts were inspired by some older Page Maps sketches (love these!!).

It was so nice to get some scrapbooking done and hopefully I will continue to get a little more caught up on that giant file of pictures that are waiting for a loving home!

I hope your weekend is full of crafty goodness and fun! Happy crafting!

Page Recipe: Cardstock-daffodil delights DSP from Brights stack, real red, daffodil delight, Ink-soft suede on leaves, black marker for journaling, Accessories-Autumn Accents die, woodgrain embossing folder, brushed bronze button, white bakers twine, whisper white taffeta ribbon, enamel dots from Sherry, Flashback Items-orange cardstock, white lace peel and stick ribbon, black letter stickers

Anything But a Card - Challenge 4

Here we are in week 2 of the Fall/Halloween challenge at Anything But a Card.  I had such a hard time deciding what to do.  There were so many different ideas! But in the end, I went with a scrapbook page since I am still plugging away at the mountain of pictures in my files.

Because I had 4 pictures to squeeze onto the page, I kept the layout fairly simple.  I also found the perfect excuse to try making some wonderfully textured leaves that I have been seeing on so many different pages and cards.  I used my new leaf die to cut out the leaves, folded them in half, and ran them through the woodgrain embossing folder.  Add a little sponged ink to the edges and raised areas and voila!  Of course I couldn't pass up the chance to add one of the new brushed bronze buttons either!

My nephew's birthday is right before Halloween and he always has the most fun parties.  His cakes often have gummy worms or  plastic bugs crawling on the icing, and it gives all the kids another chance to wear their costumes.  The year my Dad's pumpkin patch did incredibly well, we all carved pumpkins.  It was fun seeing all the different patterns and freestyle designs.  The three in the bottom picture were made by my husband and daughters.

Page Recipe: Cardstock-orange base from my stash, chocolate chip, real red, daffodil delight, Ink-soft suede, more mustard, cajun craze (sponged on leaves), Accessories-chocolate chip scalloped dots ribbon, woodgrain embossing folder, autumn accents die, brushed bronze button, twine (ret), vellum quote from stash