Feel like snow? Click the image to go to this site and you too can get sucked into the addictive fun of creating DIGITAL paper snowflakes. I'm gonna have to show this to the kids - they'll love it! By the way, that is MY snowflake towards the upper right.

Wear Your Cake!

Here's a 2-pager I did of my daughter at a wedding about a week ago. We were joking that she paid too close of attention to the bride and groom who had smashed cake on all over each other's faces.

Journaling reads:
Abi began eating her cake at Eric (Barry’s co-worker) and Heidi’s wedding very tidy with a fork. But, it didn’t take long before her fingers found the plate and soon, she had abandoned the fork completely and was ramming huge handfuls of cake into her mouth. Perhaps she was paying closer attention than I thought to the bride and groom’s technique, because she ended up wearing about the same amount of icing on her face as they did when all was said and done!

The icing doodads are by Mo Jackson from her birthday cakes kit. The photo border is from Blair's Borders.

This Week's Art for Worship

Pee Wee Proverbs

This morning the kids and I were reading from the book of Proverbs. We got discussing them and I asked them if they had any of their own proverbs - words of wisdom.

This is what I got:

"Never go in Elizabeth's (big sister) bed." Anna, age 8

"Don't let he little kids in your bedroom."
"Don't jump on the bed or you will break your leg."
"Never surf down the stairs with a sled."
"Boy's have cooties and are weird; they are strange human beings from Mars." (This one should make her dad happy to hear. ;)
"Never make Anna laugh because she will never stop."
"Follow the 10 commandments."
Elizabeth. age 11.9

"Never, under any circumstances, hold a kitty by the neck."
"Don't eat too much syrup (even though it's good)."
"Always plan your slumber party."
"Don't keep you [library] books until they are overdue."
Anna, age 8

"Never jump on the stairs."
"Don't bonk your head."
"Don't put your hands in the holes or you get stuck."
Patrick, age 4

I thought they were cute. It would be fun to keep collecting these though the years. By the way, don't tell them I posted them here. I got a feeling they might not really appreciate it. Hmm...does that make me a bad mom? ;)

Stepping Out!

Yep! I am WAY behind! These are photos from over a year ago when my baby girl learned to walk. I completed the page on the left right after it happened. The pictures in the page on the right happened exactly one week later, but I never scrapped them. I was going back through last years pictures and found them and decided to do a page that sort of matched. I colored them in PhotoShop and then put the layout together in FotoFusion using the split frames feature which is kinda fun.

Been Scrappin'

I have been busy scrappin' and have neglected to post these on the ol' blog here.

I did this one for the digi-scraplift challenge blog: http://digi-scraplift.blogspot.com/ I've really been enjoying this scraplifting thing. It's helping me get out of my scrappers block! The original LO I copied was by Shabby Miss Jenn called Two Boys.
I used a mix of Mo Jackson's doodads on this and the foam stamp action from atomic cupcake for the "6"

Journaling reads:
6 bibles. The first items moved into our new home were each of our 6 personal bibles. Since we have discussed from the beginning of our building process that this is “God’s house,” Barry thought it would be good to invite Him and His Word into our house first. So, on the evening that we got possession of the house, each of us brought our bibles with us as we unlocked the front door and officially entered into OUR new home. We talked with the kids about how we want to seek God FIRST in our lives here and we prayed. Then each of us placed our bible in our bedroom. Now, the rest of the move could begin!

Feeling Springy

When I did this a couple of days ago, it was a really GREY day and I was craving some sunshine and spring! So, I dug out this photo from last year and created these petal pink and spring green goodies to go with it. At least it can be spring here in my cyber world!

Everything here was created by me. It was sorta inspired by a card that a friend sent me. Sadly, when I compressed and shrunk it for the web, a lot of the detail was lost. Something I need to work on, I guess.

The tag has Song of Solomon 2:11-13 and reads:
"See! The winter is past; the rains are over and gone. Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come, the cooing of doves is heard in our land. The fig tree forms its early fruit; the blossoming vines spread their fragrance. Arise, come, my darling; my beautiful one, come with me."

You may find this hard to believe, but this is a CHRISTMAS layout. But, of course, it is of my little princess, Anna, sporting her new hair jewels from Libby Lu's. I bought the jewel tool thing as an afterthought for her. I thought it was cute but not for the $25 they were asking. BUT I spent enough in there that I was eligible to buy is for only $5. LOVE a bargain and it is one of her favorite things!!!

Anyway, journaling reads:
I never would have guessed that Anna’s favorite Christmas gift from us would be the hair jewel tool from Libby Lu’s purchased as an afterthought because it was on sale. We have nicknamed it her “Bling Bling” and she has had a blast dolling herself up with jewels!

I used Doris Castle's Pink Frills quickpage and added the princess crown from her Little Princess kit and the alpha from her Paper Flowers kit!

Tagged

Something new for me - my cyber friend Lisa tagged me with this little quiz:

What scrapbooking lines/products/etc do you DISlike?
(Digital) Scrapbooking sets that look TOO computer generated. I prefer elements that have the look of real paper.

What is the hardest thing you’ve ever had to scrap?
When my baby girl had to go to the ER. Actually still haven't finished that.

What technique do you use more than any other?
That's hard to say because I tend to be pretty eclectic in my scrapbooking. I really enjoy tweaking my photos and colorizing them, but that is not really a style. I think I used to have more of a clean graphic style with few elements, but now since I am on 2 design teams and have access to many beautiful kits, I add a lot more goodies now.

Ever been published?
YES!
I had 2 pages in the MEMORY MAKERS Computer Scrappin Special Edition May 2004,
a page in WOMAN'S DAY Specials Scrapbooking & Keepsakes magazine Fall 2004,
a double page in the CREATING KEEPSAKES book, "30 Minute Pages" (June 2005),
and I will have 2 pages in the upcoming Memory Makers book called Graphic Scrapbooking.

What’s the smallest scrap of paper you save?
This doesn't really apply to digital scrappin', but back in my paper days, I would save anything an inch or larger. I think that is why I do SO much better with digi stuff - way less clutter!!!

Ever have any scrapbooking-related injuries?
Back in my paper days, I cut myself with a coluzzel cutter. Now I have to fight off things like my food falling asleep because I was sitting on it while scrappin' on the computer.

Give us your best storage or organizational idea.
Organization? What's that? Actually the best thing I do is organize my kits by designer. Each designer has their own folder. For individual elements, I sort them by types in folders (i.e. overlays, ribbons/fibers, tags, etc.)

You just won a week-long scrapbooking cruise for 4. Who’s going with you?
Wow - I don't do much social scrappin (no laptop), but I would have to invite my scrappin bible study girls, Chris, Angela, Cindy, Cory and Connie as well as my scrappin friends, Laura and Carol Ann. (Yes, I realize that's too many! I'll worry about that when I actually win one!)

Age Gauge

I am:

52 years 5 months younger than Walter Cronkite, age 89
47 years 9 months younger than Nancy Reagan, age 84
44 years 9 months younger than George Herbert Bush, age 81
37 years 6 months younger than Barbara Walters, age 74
35 years 4 months younger than Larry King, age 72
29 years 1 month younger than Ted Koppel, age 66
25 years 9 months younger than Geraldo Rivera, age 62
22 years 9 months younger than George W. Bush, age 59
17 years 8 months younger than Jesse Ventura, age 54
13 years 5 months younger than Bill Gates, age 50
8 years 7 months younger than Cal Ripken Jr., age 45
2 years 9 months younger than Mike Tyson, age 39
1 year 4 months older than Jennifer Lopez, age 35
6 years 9 months older than Tiger Woods, age 30
13 years 3 months older than Prince William, age 23

This also means I was:
32 years old at the time of the 9-11 attack on America
30 years old on the first day of Y2K
28 years old when Princess Diana was killed in a car crash
26 years old at the time of Oklahoma City bombing
25 years old when O. J. Simpson was charged with murder
23 years old at the time of the 93 bombing of the World Trade Center
21 years old when Operation Desert Storm began
20 years old during the fall of the Berlin Wall
16 years old when the space shuttle Challenger exploded
14 years old when Apple introduced the Macintosh
14 years old during Sally Ride's travel in space
12 years old when Pres. Reagan was shot by John Hinckley, Jr.
10 years old at the time the Iran hostage crisis began
7 years old on the U.S.'s bicentennial Fourth of July
5 years old when President Nixon left office
3 years old when Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace was shot
not yet 1 year old at the time the first man stepped on the moon

Thought this was kinda interesting. You want to gauge your age, too?
Go to the Age Gauge page: http://www.frontiernet.net/~cdm/age1.html

Art for Worship

News

I got some fun news yesterday! I won the Designer's Apprentice contest at Scrap Outside the Box! I get to learn the in's out's of the scrapbook kit designing business which is something I have been wanting to get into. I think this would go hand in hand with the digital art I create for worship services (powerpoint size backgrounds). I'm so excited!

So Sad

I discovered this website this morning: http://savejacksonbortz.blogspot.com/ It chronicles the struggle of a family to get their 3 year old son back home with them after the area DFCS (Dept. of Family and Child Services?) took him and placed him in a foster home. This happened because the boy's baby brother died after a terrible accident. I do not know the details of it, but one news report said that he died from having a fractured skull after his mother accidentally dropped him. As I heard that, a flood of emotions came over me for these parents - this mother. I do not need to imagine what she is feeling right now, I know.

When my baby girl (now 2 yo) was 4 weeks old, I accidentally dropped her. She was in a homemade baby sling and as I adjusted it, she dropped out onto my hard kitchen floor. I sensed something was really wrong when after about 30 seconds of extreme wailing, she instantly quieted and wanted to go to sleep and not be roused. I raced her to the ER where she had a MRI (not a pleasant experience for either of us). After waiting (and waiting and waiting) the doctor came in and told me that she had a fractured skull. I cannot tell you the amount of sorrow, distress and GUILT that I felt about this. The kicker was when the hospital's social worker came in and informed me that she would have to report the incident to Child Protective Services. She assured me that this was required anytime there was an injury of this nature on someone less than 2 years old and that she was not reporting that there appeared to be any reason to believe abuse was involved. Abuse! The idea that someone could actually think that this happened willfully horrified me!

I spent the night in the hospital with her (for observation) and we were able to return home the next day. Thankfully, an x-ray 6 weeks later showed that the fracture had healed. Praise GOD! The doctor could not even SEE where the fracture had been! It wasn't until after that point that I could start letting go of the guilt I had for allowing this to happen to my dear child.

So, I read about this other family in Georgia. Not only is this mother feeling this guilt, but it is exponentiated by the fact that her baby died. The loss must be incredible! Then her case is labeled a "non-accident" and her 3 year old son is taken away from her, too. Since this time, the family has been allowed 1 hour of supervised visitation with him and cannot see him for like 2 more weeks! They do not know where he is other than in a foster home and have heard that he is depressed, not eating and running a fever. I know how I would feel if I were in this other mother's shoes. I have been too close and I shudder to think of the what if's. What if my precious baby had died or suffer brain damage? What if our home life had been investigated and our other children taken away? I thank God that He protected us during this trying time!

My hearts aches for this mother especially! Even though I do not know the details of their circumstances, I do know that they need prayers. This mother (her name is Rachel) needs to be blanketed in the warmth of God's love through our prayers. They pain she must be going through has got to be awful!

must be ME

I did this for the scraplift challenge here: http://digi-scraplift.blogspot.com/

The small text reads:
LOVE [chocolate] + [coffee]
DEVOTED Wife
Servant of God
Must CREATE
I am a Princess (daughter of the King {Romans 8:17}
MOMMY x4

All of the papers and ribbons are by Doris Castle from her Naturally Sweet kit and Moods Paper Stack. The Antiquated Swirl brushes are by Michelle Coleman and the rest is my own.

Art

My daughter got this art set for Christmas and was totally blown away by everything in it! I had to capture her exagerated expression!
I had fun creating this scrapbook page and used lots of goodies! The papers and ribbon are all by Mo Jackson as well as all of the art supply doodads. The alpha and circle tag are both from Ronna Penner at Scrapbook-Elements and the paint stroke brushes are from Michelle Coleman at Scrap Artist.

Journaling reads:
Anna, you received this art set from Grams and Gramps for Christmas, but you didn’t open it until several weeks later. You were amazed at all that was in it and couldn’t wait to create some art!

my Purpose

I just realized I had forgotten to post this layout I did a couple of days ago.
This was our Christmas card photo this year. Nothing formal. I got the bug to get this done, sat them all on the hearth and snapped off a bunch. Then I tweaked and colored it in Photoshop so all their clothes matched ;-)

Doris Castle's Original Diva kit is PERFECT for the colors of the photo. Had to use it for a page! Everything here is from that kit except the background which is from her Naturally Sweet Kit (love that one too!) and the paper behind the title which is from her Vintage Love kit.

I titled this "my Purpose" because that is what popped into my head when I was contemplating this picture. These children - these blessings are my main purpose during this season of my life. My purpose is to raise them and grow them by the grace of God.

Another Scraplift

I did this LO to stretch myself a little bit.
I was inspired by a page featured on the scraplift blog. I used Doris Castle's You Complete Me kit and played with the layer blending modes.

Homemade Pretzels

As promised, here is the recipe for the homemade pretzels that I mentioned the other day.

1 1/2 cups warm water
1 pkg. yeast (or 2 1/4 tsp.)
1 tbsp. sugar
4 cups flour
1 tsp. salt, plus enough for tops
1 egg, beaten

Preheat oven to 425F. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Add sugar, flour, and salt. Mix well, then knead dough until it is smooth and soft. Roll and twist dough into desired shapes - letters, numbers, twists, etc. Lay the pretzel dough shapes onto two greased cookie sheets. Brush with beaten egg and sprinkle lightly with salt. Bake for 12 - 15 minutes or until golden. Makes 1 - 2 dozen, depending on size.
From "Simple Pleasures of Home" by Susannah Seton.

I remembered to get the camera out while the kids were doing the pretzels. They certainly had fun! If you look closely at the pictures on this scrapbook page, you will notice that my oldest daughter is MIA. She was there, but is going through this funny phase of not wanting her picture taken. If I am lucky enough to snap one, it either has her hand up in front of the lense or she is scowling. Since I knew she would hate all of the pictures I got, I didn't use any of them except the big one on the right of her hands. I didn't want her seeing me use a bad picture for fear that she would become even MORE camera shy.

I am happy to say that I immediately had an ideas of how this page should be put together and it wasn't even scraplifted :-) (see posts below). I used FotoFusion to put it together because it is ideal for laying out grid type layouts. Saved me bunches of time in cropping and spacing and trying to get everything even. All of the elements (technically doodads!) are from Mo Jackson (www.mojackson.com). The alpha is from her Annie's Scrapbox kit and everything else is from Dorothy's Kitchen 1 & 2.

If you are interested, the journaling reads:

January 6, 2006:
The children and I spent a fun afternoon in the kitchen today. Last night, I was reading a library book and stumbled upon recipes for both homemade crackers and soft pretzels. They sounded fun AND easy so I bookmarked them. I got the bug to try them out today and got the kids involved. The little ones were the most enthusiastic. Anything that hands on that has the possibility of being messy is definitely their thing! The pretzels were certainly the favorite and gave us the opportunity to discuss yeast as a living organism and letter shapes. Patrick, of course, wanted to make a "P." He also made some creative eyewear, as well. Abi loved making snakes and some unconventional pretzel shapes while the girls made their initials and traditional looking pretzels. They were incredibly yummy to eat fresh out of the oven! The best part is that everyone joined in the clean-up, so the whole experience was fun for Mommy, too!

Thanks for looking!

Scraplifting

Those of you in the digital scrapbooking community probably read this title and instantly knew that this layout was inspired by someone else's work. Friends, family and anyone else who stumbles upon this blog are probably thinking, "huh?" According to this article at Scrapjazz, scraplifting can be defined as:

Scraplifting (skrap-lift-ing) – The act of copying ideas and designs from another person's scrapbook page to use in your own pages. Designs or ideas can be copied in whole or in part and is largely subjective.

Yesterday, I discovered a fun little scrapbooking blog called Digital Scrap Lifting Fun. Each day she surfs the online galleries and picks a scrapbook page she likes and posts it for inspiration. Since I have been feeling scrapbook challenged (see post below) I decided a good scraplift was just what I needed and this layout is based off of the beautiful layout posted yesterday called Dreamy Eyes by Chris Millar. It is a paper scrapped 12 x 12" page, but it easy to copy it and convert it to an 8 1/2 x 11" format. My hubby took this photo of my daughter the day after Christmas when they were both laying on my in-laws basement floor. I thought it was sweet and would be perfect for this. The papers are all from Doris Castle's Naturally Sweet kit (www.scrapbook-elements.com). I thought the colors were great with the photos and the pattern were not that different from the inspiration piece. I used a PhotoShop action from www.atomiccupcake.com to quickly "ink" the edges of the papers.
Other elements used are:
Ribbon with heart - Doris Castle's Earthen Floral kit
Flowers and little tag - Doris' Memories kit
Photo edge - Blair's Borders
Stitches - Mo Jackson's Stitches 1

This page come together amazingly fast because I merely copied with my own photo and digital elements. Much more painless than my previous layout! I guess I need to be in scraplift mode for a while. :-)

Sweet Sisters

This is a recent two page scrapbook layout.
My younger two daughters (My second oldest and my baby) got matching outfits for Christmas from their grandparents. The older one is in charge of dressing the younger in the morning and couldn't wait to put them on both of them. She actually jumped the gun and put them on for a bumming around the house day. Since I didn't want them to get abused on their first wearing I made them change, but had to snap these photos first because they looked so cute!

Journaling reads:
Anna & Abi received their first set of matching outfits for Christmas and couldn't wait to wear them! They both looked so sweet and I was reminded of when it was Elizabeth and Anna who liked to match. Gone are those days, but I am enjoying seeing both of you as loving and Sweet Sisters.

I hit some sort of scrapbooking wall when I was working on this. I had fun tweaking the photos. They aren't really great shots because I didn't bother to move the girls away from the changing table so it sits in the background. Oh well, I was in a hurry snapping them. I think by colorizing the photo and tinting it just a bit, the eye is distracted from that. I had no trouble finding some beautiful papers that looked like they were made for the colors of these photos. I used Doris Castle's Garden Walk kit (www.scrapbook-elements.com). A lot of the kit has greens which are lovely but didn't match as well, but their were several with the sepia tones and pinks alone. They are BEAUTIFUL! So there I sat with photos, papers and I could not arrange them in a pleasing way to save my life. I would even walk away from it hoping that when I came back I would see it with fresh eyes and have better luck. This went on for several days. I finally brought in the negative strip frame that I had created a while back using a tutorial from the PhotoShop CS Down & Dirty book. I ended up coming up with this and I think I am happy with it. Shoot, I am not even sure anymore, but it is time to put it to rest!

So, if you like it, let me know, but if you don't.....just don't say anything. Otherwise I will have the overwhelming impulse to do it all over again and spend massive amounts of time in total frustration over my inability to create a simple scrapbook page. ;-)

Homemade is Good

I got this book from the library titled, "Simple Pleasures of the Home" by Susannah Seton. The book is organized by rooms and in each section she has little things to do in or to a room to make it special. The first section is the Kitchen. There are many simple pleasures and memories about kitchens as well as quite a few recipes. I was intrigues by a simple recipes for both homemade crackers and soft pretzels. I don't know what got into me on Friday but after lunch I brought up making these things to my kids. My oldest had gone off to do something, but Anna was instantly enthused. And the wee ones? Well, they are into anything they can get their hands into and be messy so this was right up their alley!

We began with crackers. Here is the recipe we followed:

Homemade Crackers

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of salt
4 tablespoons butter
3/4 cup water, approx.

Preheat oven to 325 F. Sift together flour, baking powder and salt. With two knives, cut the butter into the flour until the mixture is fine. Add just enough water to make a firm dough. On a lightly floured surface, with a floured rolling pin, thinly roll out dough. Using a round cookie cutter, stamp out crackers; prick them all over with a fork, and sprinkle with salt and sesame seeds if desired. Bake on a lightly greased cookie sheet for 20 minutes of until crisp. Cool on a rack and store in an airtight container. Makes 2 dozen.

These were pretty good. I think the key is rolling them out THIN. They are fairly dense and ours were a bit thick and took a bit longer to bake, but they are yummy. We just used salt on them, but I think the sesame seeds would be tasty. You could get creative and add herbs, garlic or onion powder and I think they would be wonderful, too.

We made homemade pretzels, too, but I am out of time and have to get the family up for church this morning so that will have have to be another post!

Christmas Competition

These photos really needed to have their story told in a scrapbook page.

I think the journaling really tells the story here.
Journaling reads:
I am not sure how it began. Every Christmas or so, one of these brothers would get the bug to do some creative, hard to get into wrapping usually involving copious amounts of tape and numerous boxes. I even recall the sewing machine being used at one time. This year Anjie asked me if Barry had done any “special” wrapping for Mark, because Mark had done some creative wrapping of his own and perhaps there should be a race to see who could unwrap their package first.Barry, fearing that he had stopped short in his efforts, was hesitant, but we persuaded him to take the challenge..Barry discovered his lovely looking gift covered in packing tape - even the bow. This however was not as much of a problem as the wood box that was screwed together with hex screws that had their heads stripped. As he sat contemplating how to break into such a gift, Mark was encountering some challenges of his own which included many layers of boxes and aluminum foil COMPLETELY covered in clear packing tape (which Barry claimed that the thought looked “pretty.”)
Mark was diligent in his efforts to break though the many layers. Meanwhile Barry, at a loss for how to proceed with his package, decided in his frustration to use brute strength to pull apart the box. This was successful and he was able to extract his gift just as Mark broke through his final layer.
In the end, we declared that the contest was a tie. Mark got to his cellphone car charger just as Barry pulled out his Stewie (Family Guy) DVD.I heard rumor that both boys were concocting plans for next year already. So, I expect this challenge will be revived next Christmas. Boys will be boys!!!

I used Doris Castle's Very Merry paper stack here. The frames around the photos are the flakey papers. I placed them over the photos and used a layer mask and a grungey brush to allow the photo to show through the middle (hope that makes sense). The alpha is from Doris' A Beautiful Day kit. The little runner clip is from Dover.

Thanks for looking and letting me share!

I'm Dreaming

of a DRY Christmas....

I decided to take some time to myself on this lazy Sunday afternoon to scrapbook a little more and got this double page done. It's a funny little page that I am sure daughter will hate me for in about 10 years or so. ;-) We are thinking about potty training soon and my daughter got a potty seat and a wetting doll for Christmas. She thought it was GREAT!

I used Doris Castle's Very Merry Paper Stack for the papers and the word DRY uses her Hand Cut letters.

If you are interested, journaling reads:
"I'm dreaming of a DRY Christmas...just like the ones I used to know...where there are no more diapers but little wipers who run into the bath to go...

This is why when asked what Abi would want for Christmas I announced that I thought she would REALLY like a new potty chair and a wetting doll. Grandma and Grandpa came through and Abi was thrilled with her new big girl seat and her new doll named Tinkles. She couldn't wait to try it out for herself and teach Tinkles to use it, too. She has been practicing pulling her pants up and down while Mommy reads Toilet Train Your Child in a Day. Hopefully our DREAM for DRYNESS will become a reality soon!"

The little notes read:
"Celebrating Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa's house 12-26-05"

"Abi: demonstrating how it’s done"

"When training your doll,it is always important to make eye contact!"

Thanks for looking,Trish

Scrappin?

I almost forgot how to do it! Scrappin' that is! Between being busy and having computer problems, I haven't scrapped a page in a couple of months. I am feeling bad about this and hope to start catching back up!

These are photos from Christmas day at our home of each of the children with their unopened presents. I especially love the big one of my daughter's big grin over her pile.

This was put together using one of Doris Castle's Holiday quickpages from www.scrapbook-elements.com . I added a couple of photos to it as well as the tag which is from her Old Time Christmas set. Thanks for letting me share!