Errant Scraps: Renewed Challenge

Things have been crazy at work and the Scientist is really needing to finish up his PhD which led me to make a tough family choice - continuing being a huge stress ball and rarely see my hubby -or- make a change. Considering we couldn't afford for me to quit, I chose to demote myself within the company and work fewer hours so he can work more. While not common, this does happen at times (IMO, more people just quit but benefits are good). For the first time in over 6 years I am no longer a manager of any kind. I worked three shifts as just an employee last week and it was so weird, novel, refreshing. I'm sure at some point the joys of it will unnerve me, but for now I'll revel in it's glory.

I'm not already reveling in is the $$$ part. Demotion = pay cut = less money for scrappy fun.

The bonus of "less money for scrappy fun" = a new challenge. There just isn't money to buy a lot of gifts and things so I'm going to be making as many Christmas presents, home decor items, birthday party decorations (you get the idea), the big challenge being that I need to figure out how to customize it to the individual/event from my current stash.

I've known for a month that this was coming and sort of loaded up while I could! LOL. The only thing I didn't buy that I know I need is some black vinyl for redecorating the boys' room. Their Christmas and birthday from us (unless grandparents chip in!) is a bunk bed, bedding, and theme change. Right now it is mostly decorated with leftover decorations from Squirrel's Cars party last year, some of those will stay as I'm switching it to a Toy Themed room (sort of Toy Story-esque, but less focus on just those guys and more just on toys). Hence the vinyl, I want to do large silhouettes of some recognizable toys to hang on the wall. Hoping to see some on SS before November so I can whip them up in time for a birthday party with the same theme (and just relocate as I did last year).

For this challenge the rules are:

Goal Completion Date of Dec. 31, 2012
Spend no more than $15 per boy birthday party on decorations/flair (August and December birthdays), excluding vinyl
Spend no more than $20 per month on other crafty fun, not including adhesive
Spend no more than $40 while at Scrapbooksteals warehouse while there in October
Create 100 projects: Pages = 1, Cards = 1, duplicated cards of 3 or more = 2 per set
Continue creating cards for OWH

Notice I'm not trying to spend "no money until ## done." That didn't work so well, and this is really about correcting a spending habit as much as about using up hoarded materials. :)

To get the crafting party started off right, here's my first set of projects. These are the last of the cards I could make before needing to ship off a box for the We Are Memory Keepers card drive for Operation Write Home. All of these cards feature American Crafts Campy Trail papers and Ranger Ink Distress Inks - Walnut Stain and/or Broken China, additional products used are in captions.