MCM 72

This week's scrapbooksteals.com Monday Card Madness was so pretty in its simplicity and very inspiring! I managed to knock out these three cards during naptime. 

As an update on my personal challenge, I have completed 12 of 25 projects and am working on my first mini album (lots of pics to come, maybe!). I also logged another 4 miles, bringing me to 14. At this rate, I'm thinking that I'll bring my projects to completion before hitting my mile goal - which is funny only because I thought I could hit 50 miles first! Who knew that I'd get into card making?!

Scrapbooksteals.com online crop challenges

February has held several firsts for me - and attending any sort of crop is among them. While I had problems keeping up with the chat tonight I did manage to work on a few of the challenges during it.

Challenge 1 -  Amethyst 1 MWM
Challenge 2 - Keepin it Real

Paper: Love Elsie
Quote: Cosmo Cricket
White numbers: AC Thickers

The Amethyst sketch used 14 pictures! Wow. That was an interesting challenge. While laying in bed the night the MWM was posted I came up with this idea - a few of your favorite things. And then lo and behold the next day the challenges were posted, show something the way it really is. Well, let me tell you, this is how it really is. With two little boys there are toys everywhere! Thankfully, the boys typically leave the toys in piles by kind with very little integrating of messes, resulting in quick clean-up and slightly organized pictures.

Challenge 4 - Something old, new, borrowed, blue

It could be anything from a card to home decor.

Well, this one I fudged a little. No scrapbook paper involved here but I did meet the other requirements, and it was something I have been really wanting to do and never made time for so at least I got another project done!

Old: the curtain rod we got with wedding gift cards -- 7 years ago

New: brown vinyl and my Silhouette machine were both bought  (from SS) within the last 7 months

Borrowed: "borrowed" the idea from pinterest, also "borrowed" the Scientists' hanging expertise, "borrowed" the boys' artwork to display

Blue: there's quite a lot of blue paint. Trust me on that, they kept asking for more blue.

I'll be working on the third challenge this weekend - scrapping about my scrap space. 

EDIT: I'm done with challenge 3, just waiting to print the picture of my space. Printer ink is lousy right now so I'll have to go get prints. Here's the page and the picture (which will go in place of the black cardstock) for those curious about my layout for the page.

Challenge 3 - scrap your space

Papers: MME Happy Go Lucky and random scraps
Letters: Basic Grey Oliver and Piggy Tales Twinkle Twinkle, and others

My closet/scrap space. 

These also bring me to a total of 7  8 projects out of 25 for my personal challenge, I've only gotten in a total of 10 miles since I started it but that's at least getting off the couch!

he shoots, he SCORES

It's time again for The Paper Girls Challenge Blog's challenge (#2) - this time the challenge was to include a photo booth style photo strip within a layout. I've been seeing a lot of of this design element lately and thought it would be a good way to squeeze in a few extra pictures so I used more than one.

I wanted to keep the photo strips as the dominant element so there wasn't much to the page and it came together while the boys rested - if you've ever dealt with two boys under 4 years old, then you know resting is brief affair. The longest part of the process was editing and printing the photos.

Paper - Cosmo Cricket Lil'Man
Ribbon - MME Fine and Dandy
Stickers - Pebbles My Guy
Amy Tangerine Lovely Thickers

MCM 71

Mondays are typically one of my days off, which means that in addition to cleaning the house I squeeze in a little extra scrappy time (and let the boys have extra TV time to allow it to happen!).

My project for today was the Monday Card Madness sketch over at Scrapbooksteals.com - it is a weekly card challenge that I have just started participating in.

MCM #71 sketch from scrapbooksteals.com

And then here are my two variations on this sketch. 

"you are so"
Blue cardstock: AC Amy Tangerine
Other cardstock and fussy cut die: MME Lost and Found 2
Ribbon: MME Lush
Tim Holtz Distress Stickles
Generic buttons

"here comes trouble"
MME Abbey Road
7-Gypsies brads
i-rock gemstones

For those of you keeping track with me, this is projects 2 and 3. I have also completed 5 miles since starting my personal challenge. Way to be productive over the weekend - hoping to get another 10 miles in this week.

Personal Challenge

A couple of the girls over at scrapbooksteals.com's Facebook page were talking about doing a _#_ Project Challenge before spending more money on their stash (with exceptions for things like glue!). It got me thinking about how much crafting stuff I've acquired in the last couple of months, I'm putting a personal spin on it:

25 Projects or 50 Miles

Now for some of you 50 miles may not seem like much, but this winter The Scientist and I got out of our exercise routine and that first 50 could take a while to hit - or since I can probably run 50 miles before cranking out 25 scrappy projects it might just be the incentive I need to get moving. 

My rules:

• Stash buying exception: adhesive or if SS offers up an eyelet setter (I really want one!)
• Mileage definition: obviously miles are miles, but throwing in a great workout DVD will count for 1 mile since the point is to make me get off my bum a little more!

I don't want to declare that I'll post every day or even every week but I will be keeping track and do a round-up review of where I am on a relatively frequent basis. 

For now, I'll post Project 1: a page I created for SS's Garnet MWM sketch series all about Squirrel's 3rd birthday party. 

Paper and trims: MME Hip-Hooray
Brads: 7-Gypsies
Sew Easy Yellow Twine
Distressing: Colorbox Yellow Citrus and Chestnut; Imaginisce D-stress; Pebbles Chalks

big helper

I did it! Created my first scrapbook page to post to my lil' blog. This one is for The Paper Girls Challenge Blog and is based this fantastic sketch created by Judy.

The Paper Girls Challenge Blog, sketch 1

As soon as I saw the layout I knew which picture I wanted - one of my little Squishy "helping" clean up the milk that he spilled. I like how really open and clean it ended up feeling. A lot of the pages I've been doing have gotten really busy so this Challenge was a nice little change for me! Helped me clean up my craft, so to speak. LOL.

big helper

I've avoided this moment for a very long time. Blogging. But it seems that the crafty world that I LOVE is hyper connected to blogs and Facebook so here I am. Largely this blog will be about whatever craft projects I am working on/linking for all those fantastic challenges - though originally I created it while pregnant with my second child as a way to document that process (uh, only created one post and yes I deleted it). Of course as time goes on maybe I'll delve into some deeper purpose behind all the rumblings, but for now the belly rumbles - time for a snack before I can bust out the scissors, paper and glue 'cuz I have a challenge to work on!