Thorns in my side

Hey, I didn't pick the title! My friend Linda did! Yes, I caved to peer pressure! lol ALthough, there are days...... My little beauties can try the patience of a 1000 saints, but then again, they can also be the sweetest most considerate children in the world as well. I just have the advantage of having mine with me 24/7 since I homeschool them and with that much togetherness there are days that make me question my sanity about that decision.

ANyway....again with the Cosmo Cricket papers....I really do love this cherry paper. Seems so summery and yummy!

Home Suite Home

Judy at Simply Scrapping sent the design team an awesome pack at the beginning of summer. I LOVE getting her goodie boxes and I went crazy using up most of it right away. The Cosmo Cricket Early Riser papers (or something like that, totally blanking on the lines name right now) were a bit cutesy for my taste and I had a heck of a time using them.

See, we are SO not morning people here. Actually, as I type it is 11 am and I am still in my jamas and Livy just rolled out of bed about 15 minutes ago. Early Riser? There are NO morning pics or breakfasty kinda things in our world. And like I said, a bit cutesy and well, I'm not really a cute kinda gal.

But, they did have a fun homey feel and I decided they were perfect for our hotel pics from vacation. We got a suite and the girls never wanted to leave...they loved the little kitchen, having cable (major novelty in our world) and that said cable was on a tv inches from their sofabed.

You Enchant Me

I'm not totally sure if I am done with this page...something is just off (suggestions are welcome). I took some June Bug papers and teemed them up with this great Glitz Designs cardstock sticker from Simply Scrapping. I LOVE these colours....the purple and orange just look so exotic yet fallish and fun.

I Ain't Mis'bee'havin'

Okay, seriously, how freakin' cute is my nephew?! Livy snapped this pic of him getting into my purse one day when we were out shopping. I found it on my camera and laughed. My purse is a hugely fascinating place to the little guy, prolly because there is always some little goodie that I picked up for him stashed away in there (currently there are 2 sesame street figures and 4 mini Elmo board books, just goes to show)

Beauty Seen

Another layout using the BG June bug papers...these are so fun! I did 4 different layouts using these papers and they all have a really different feel! Love when you can do that! This paper was a bit busy though (I LOVE the patterned papers that have these kinds of designs, but they are soo hard to use as you don't want to cover anything!) so I just doodled a bit where I covered the design and then threw on a huge chipboard butterfly. A bit of liquid pearls to show his path and it was done.

Just my youngest chickeepoo with her puppy in front of the roses

Focus!

There is a new look over at "Shoe" blog but the challenges are just as awesome as ever! The current Fashionista Friday challenge is to use the colours Red, Yellow and Orange in your layout.

Here's my take, the BG June Bug papers that are part of The Scrap Queens June Bug kit fit the bill perfect along with the matching stickers. I didn't have any yellow flowers...but no worries, I did have some light tan ones and my sunflower glimmer mist! A bit of spraying and the problem was not only solved, but I got a bit of shimmer to brighten my day as well!

Thanks as always for the inspiration ladies!

I finally scrapped!!!!

Yesterday was literally the first day I had scrapped in over 2 months. Wow! For me that is unheard of. But, I was too busy making memories this summer to preserve them. So, now I have a HUGE pile of photos to scrap!

This was a quick page to get me started. Just some pics from a park in downtown Sandusky on the Lake Erie shore.



Then, yesterday I got my CTMH card kit. The papers are sooo cute! I'm not a card maker for the most part, but I loved the papers so I used them to make this page. The card kit is a special this month, it makes 16 cards, comes with a stamp set, papers and everything you need for embellishing plus 2 mini inks in two of my fave colours dutch blue and chocolate. If you spend $60 on stamps, you get it free or you can earn it by hostessing a show through the end of September or signing up to become a consultant during this time. Contact me if you want more info!

In the meantime, here is my family at Tofts ice cream at their factory shop....it's sooo good! Ice cream is a major no no for me, but this stuff is soo worth the pain I suffer!

Go Fish

The girls went to Columbia Reservation earlier in the month and heard a talk on fish and they also took fish molds and covered them in fabric paint and made decorated shirts. They got very creative!

Challenge was from Adina, who wanted us to take our scraps and use them in a new way. I made a bunch of prima flowers out of mine (about 30 of them actually, this was my favourite)

Childhood

Tanisha posted this challenge...you had a use a Michael Jackson song title.

I watched my nephew last week and he is soo fun to have! I really enjoy seeing how easily amused he is and how everything is new to him since my girls at, 8 and 9, are pretty blase about common things these days.

It's a Midwest Thing

This one if for my friend Stacie who is THE BIGGEST polar pop junkie I know!

For those of you NOT from the midwest, soft drinks are called pop in our neck of the woods. Not cokes, not soda, no fizzy drinks....POP! And if you get it from a fountain they are sublime.

THis is a sketch that was posted for the crop this weekend.

4H Public Speaking Competition

Livy participated in the Cloverbud category of the 'speech meet' last week. Her group did so great and despite being hugely nervous, she delivered her line perfectly and loud enough we could hear her from where we were sitting in the back! Yay Livy!

She was soo excited about getting her ribbons and presidential gold dollar. But, the best part was at the end of all the awards they had prize drawings and Livy won $20! She was thrilled!

This page was done for the Simplify challenge, where we were to try and use only a third of our page and leave the rest of the space empty!

Endeeringly Cute

A couple weeks ago, the girls participated in the Clan of the Caves program at Wolf Creek. It was a program where they learned about the earth through various clans (elements) using interpretive dance, art and so forth. They really enjoyed all 4 days of it!

On our way one morning, we were delayed a bit by this little fellow. He was sooo little and after he crossed the road, he collapsed into the weeks exhausted! Fortunately, I had my camera (of course I did! lol) and was able to take pics of him since he was so accomodating.

The page was done for the Vintage challenge (had to use nautral colours, lace, a vintage image and distressed and inked edges.

Knuckle Down

This weekend is an online crop at If the Shoe Fits ning site. Awesome! I got soo much done!

These pages were done for 2 different challenges, the first page a sketch and the second an elements. I needed 2 pages as I took lots of pictures at the American Toy and Marble museum at Lock 3 in downtown Akron. We went there for a field trip earlier this month and the girls learned the history of toys and how Akron was such a huge part of that and how to officially play marbles. Then, they each got a bag of marbles to take home.

Oodles of Doodles

That is the name of a class my friend Michelle is teaching over at the Debbie Hodges site. It starts June 15th and runs Monday and Thursday for three weeks. There are 7 lessons and prizes and fun. The classes include lessons in doodling, hand cutting, and sewing techniques.

I had the pleasure of taking the first class with Michelle in person before she moved from Ohio and it was awesome! It really inspired me to start doing my own art in my layouts more.

You can check it out here:
http://debbiehodge.squarespace.com/oodlesofdoodles/

Here's the layout I did with Michelle's inspiration:


Hope to see you there!

Happy Birthday You're 8!

Oops! So, I see I forgot the "you're" part on the layout....quick rub on fix in my future.

This was made with the Scrap Queen Summer Fun kit as well, I really love the date paper, at first glance, it isn't something I'd pick out, but with some judiciuosly applied key lime glimmer mist (my answer for everything these days) I really love the paper. Plus, how perfect for a birthday!

Watching Liv open gifts is SO fun....everything is "Just what she wanted!" and as you can tell, her expressions are priceless and she gets SO excited!

Uh Oh it's magic

We went to a magic show on Mother's Day at Columbia Reservation and the girls loved it (so much we are going to another magic show elsewhere this week).

Papers are Core'dinations cardstock and Jillibean soup. I was basically just trying to use up my scraps on this one.

Mom I'm bored!

Oh, how often I hear those words from my eldest. Ironically enough, while I was scrapping this page, in she walked and uttered those words (and of course, when I started laughing my butt off, she got very dramatic and did her patented eyeroll and sigh....so nice that my 9 yo thinks I am the biggest idiot on the planet, I was hoping it would take her a few more years to figure that one out).

This is for a challenge at The Scrap Queen this month, we were to use 4 different fonts on a layout. I sketched the "Mom" and then cut it out and faux stitched it, the "I am" are thickers, the "so" and "Bored" were made using CTMH alphabet stamps.

WIth the the exception of the yellow paper which was from my scrap hoard, the rest is from TSQ Summer Fun kit from this month.

Love challenge

Simply Scrapping has LOTS of great challenges up this month! I have been trying to work my way through them, it's a great way to get motivated and caught up!

The June 12th challenge must be about a loved one (I think my darling nephew and the girls fit the bill) and have LOVE in the title.

The papers are from Judy, they are by scribble scrabble and soo fun for summer/warm weather layouts.

Artsy Fartsy

Trin's my artsy girl and she gets so excited about field trips to art museums. While daddy was on vacation last month we finally found time to go to Oberlin's art museum.

Small, but packed with great art! Definitely worth checking out if you haven't been there! And they have great little activity books for the kids to go with their self guided tour.

Trin's favourite was the giant plug (off to the right of the bldg outside behind the ginormous tree). She also loved the dragon statue.

Field Day

I had such great memories of field day when I was a kid, that I was totally excited when I saw that Lorain County parks was doing one for homeschoolers. It wasn't quite the day we had growing up, but it gave me some great ideas for next year.

The girls love any chance to go out and explore so they loved it. And we learned about galls, which are something we had never noticed before this year. Amazing thing that you can go through life 30+ years and not see something that is apparently pretty common.