enabling for free…

I think I have my Christmas cards figured out…woot woot! I just need to do a little tweaking and printing and then assemble. SIMPLE. SIMPLE. SIMPLE. Yay me!

And I just found these…(via this blog—Celeste always shares the best free printables!)

(click on the picture or here)

and this one…my favorite…

(again, click on the picture to get to the download)

And I think she has a third one on the way. She does the CUTEST set of three frames in her dining room…see here…for the holidays. I just discovered her blog and you can be sure I’ll be wasting some free time there soon.

I’m thinking I  might not do the large 8x10 but rather take a three holed 4x6 frame and set them on the entry way table. Hmmmm…we’ll see…

Kristen

inspired…

…at the grocery store?

My Christmas cards have been in the back of my mind for a few weeks. A lot of you already have them planned, executed and ready to mail. Whatever. Overachievers. :)

I’ve been handmaking our cards for over 10 years. Every year I wonder why I got myself into it. But 12 months later I’m planning the torture again. LOL. I can’t NOT do it.

So last year I attempted to simplify—and my simple design had way too many time consuming details. I couldn’t help myself.

  (front)

I spent way too many evenings assembling them—while I could hear my family playing in the other room. It’s not how I wanted to spend my time during an already crazy, busy season. So I said NO MORE. I even blogged about it…saying I would order photo cards instead…gasp! (Not that there is anything wrong with photo cards. Photos are my favorite part of Christmas cards…but there is something in MY crazy head that says the cards coming from me just have to be a bit more. I know, get over it!)

(back)

After the craziness passed I knew I’d still do it in 2010. But I promised myself SIMPLE!

• No stitching (a signature detail in the past several years)
• No rhyming (I gave up on that several years back)
• No detailed letter (does anyone really have time to hear all of that?)
• No over the top cutting, piecing, piercing or hand drawn details.

So here I am…2010. My cards need to go out in the  next couple of weeks. I’ve had ideas floating in my head…but I’ve vetoed them…not simple enough.

Then today, I’m pulling my groceries out of the car and the side of the paper bag caught my eye.

(if you’re local, these are the holiday bags from Raley’s/Bel Air)

Now, I still don’t have a design in my head…but these green dots got me excited.

I love kraft (as evidenced by last year’s card). And the simple green dots on the kraft? Yum.

So I cut the side panels off my bags and they are sitting on my desk for inspiration.

I’m happy because…

1. My color scheme is chosen.
2. They were ‘free’.
3. They are being re-used…how very green of me.
4. Re-using them makes up (a tiny bit) for the fact that I keep forgetting my re-usable bags in the car…grrrrrrr

I know they are going to have to be distressed somehow (probably crumpled) since there are creases and dents in them already.

But today I was inspired…at the grocery store!

Kristen

framed

By request…

A few years back, Kelly at the store wanted a few of us to make sample frames for the store.  I had mine sit on my desk for a while…just couldn’t come up with an idea.

Finally I decided to just play around with my acrylic paints and Crackle Medium. It took me a while, but I loved how it turned out.

It was on display for a while and when she had to close earlier this year, I was able to put it in my living room! Now that she’s re-opened, she can’t get the frames anymore…so it stays on my wall. Yay me! :)

Here’s how I did it. I wish I had photographed the steps…but I didn’t think about it at the time…sorry.

The frame was pressed board…flat, no wood grain to it at all.

I painted the whole thing a dark chocolate brown…just using regular Apple Barrel or similar acrylic paint. Let it dry completely.

Then slather a layer of Crackle Medium. It’s in the same area of the store (JoAnn’s, Michael’s) as the acrylic craft paints. Let that dry completely.

Then I painted over it with a cream colored acrylic paint. Again, Apple Barrel or the like.

I wasn’t thrilled with it…so I did another layer of Crackle Medium and Cream.

Told you this took forever. You have to let each layer completely dry or the new layer starts peeling up the tacky layer.

Anyway, I still wasn’t thrilled it. So I took a hammer to it and started making dents and scratches to make it even more distressed. Still not what I thought in my head.

Finally I went and bought some water based walnut stain. I painted it all over the frame and rubbed the excess off with a rag. It was getting better…

The last step did it for me…STEEL WOOL! I rubbed the frame (after the stain was completely dry). It took off the look of the brush marks, smoothed out the roughness of the distressing and really polished it up.

Finally…

 

I have gotten so many complements on this frame! Just for the record, I don’t think I needed that second application of Crackle Medium and cream paint. It was the stain and steel wool that did what I wanted it to.

These are all old supplies: Jenni Bowlin stickers and polka paper, Teresa Collins notebook paper, October Afternoon stripes, American Crafts Thickers, spiral notebook and file tab punches.

The House Rules were from a friend of mine…here is the full list:

House Rules

Always be honest Proverbs 12:22

Count your blessings Psalms 34:1-3

Bear each other’s burdens Galatians 6:2

Forgive and forget Micah 7:18

Be kind and tender hearted Ephesians 4:32

Comfort one another I Thessalonians 4:18

Keep your promises Romans 4:21

Be supportive of one another Acts 20:35

Be true to each other Revelations 15:3

Look after each other Deuteronomy 15:11

Treat each other like you treat your friends Matthew 7:12But most important, love one another deeply from the heart I Peter 1:22

Don’t you love it?

Kristen

June is gone? Say what?

How did that happen? June is over!!!

Six months of the year 2010 is over. I’m so floored by this.

Here’s what has happened in our world in June:

The last day of Kindergarten for T-man…

The last day of second grade for the J-boy

A week long visit from grandma…with overnight adventures for each big boy in San Francisco and a day trip for the little one in SacTown.

A 6th birthday…fun at Fairy Tale Town with cousins…party fun to happen in July since Mommy flaked out on sending invites for a June party…oopsie…

Three weeks of summer school down…one to go…J-boy did a great job this year but I’m seriously considering not having him go next year. He’s earned a year off after 4 straight years of  summer school, don’t you think? (p.s. He LOVES the schedule and seeing his friends…but he gets annoyed at waking up early each day…and so do I :)

Breakaway at Bayside…I can’t say enough about it. The little boys and I went each morning (I led a group of first graders, including T-man) and then J-boy went each night (probably what was contributing to his annoyance at waking up each morning).

Father’s Day celebrated with a BBQ at our house. It’s so cool having family close by again to celebrate these days!

My birthday…and the countdown begins to the big 4-0! My friend had an extra Project Life to sell me so I didn’t have to wait to order it from Amazon. Yay! (thanks, deb!) Of course, I was so excited that I stayed up til 2 in the morning last Sunday to open it up and put it all away.

I  lost 3 pounds…5 if I catch it on a good day. This doesn’t seem like a lot, but the thing is I’ve been really concentrating on my running and not on the weight loss, so it’s kind of a great side effect! Also, I’ve lost a total of 6.5” inches. That’s the number that’s causing me to throw clothing in the donate pile…things are starting to get too big. Woot Woot!

I only ran 45.91 miles this month and at a bit slower pace than last month. I was looking at that and trying to figure out why. Then I realized that I really stuck to my training schedule in June (rather than in May I let my over-excitement take over and wasn’t being purposeful in how my miles were adding up). I’m looking forward to longer runs in July as I build up my miles. And I think my mid-week miles need to up’d just a bit. This mornings run was great…at my 5k pace with the first part of the run up hill. I felt great! If that’s any indicator to my July, I’m very happy!

In June, I finished Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide by Hal Higdon, an oldie but goodie. It helped me solidify some thoughts on my training…being a newbie it’s easy to get caught up in all the experienced runner’s stuff. I feel more confident in how I approaching my training now. And, no, I’m not looking to train for a marathon anytime soon…but I don’t say never these days.

Now I’m reading I Run Therefore I am NUTS by Bob Schwartz…very tongue in cheek and quite funny. (Thanks Mandy!) I also picked up The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephenie Meyer at Costco. I LOVED the Twilight books and it is fun to slip back into that world just a bit. I’ve got a girlfriends date to see Eclipse this upcoming week…woot woot!

On another vampire note, hubby and I started watching True Blood on HBO. Hmmmm…the jury’s still out. Not sure if I like it. At first I was intrigued. Then it’s nothing like the Twilight series, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But it’s odd. And a bit too dark. And while I’m starting to get into the vampire story line, I have to say that the Maryann story line is totally turning me OFF. We didn’t watch the first two seasons…but we did watch the ‘catch me up’ at the beginning of this season. So tell me, True Blood fans…do I need to watch the other seasons to appreciate the Maryann stuff? Because if that will help, I’ll think about it. Otherwise I’m thinking this show isn’t going on my must watch lists.

Alrighty…that’s my random rambling for today. Happy July 1st. I can’t wait for Sunday…my first 10k AND my favorite holiday of the year!! I’ll tell you more about that later…

Kristen

40th year/365

  birthday flowers from my sister-in-law…gorgeous, huh?

 Project Life or 365 has always enticed me. I tried it once and didn’t follow through. But I still love the idea of it. And I love Becky Higgin’s kit too.

After my week in the life project this year it came to mind again. Only this time it’s coming with a very selfish bent. It’s all about me after all, right? :)

For the last several years I’ve been telling myself (and others) that I’m coming up on 40. Anyone that knows me has heard me say that often. Some people even laugh at me. But really, I keep saying it because I’m hoping when the day comes, it will be no big deal because mentally I’m prepared for it.

So…I’m ready to ramp up my mental training! I’m going to order Becky’s Project Life as a gift to myself for my 39th birthday. My birthday was yesterday…but the kit is still waiting to be re-stocked at Amazon so I’m going to start with the photos and order it as soon as it’s in. I’m going to document the last year of my thirties from my point of view. It’s all about me and my life right now.

At this stage in her life, my mom was in her career, having graduated from college later in life (post-children). I was a senior in high school, my brother a freshman. She was facing an empty nest after being married for twenty years.

Her mother (my maternal grandmother) had just married off her oldest daughter (my mom), faced the death of her middle daughter and was dealing with the end of high school angst of her youngest. She had been married 22 years already.

My paternal grandmother had already been married for 24 years. She married off her oldest (my father) and was celebrating the graduation of both her middle and youngest boys. She would become a grandmother the next year (I was born before her 41st birthday).

Totally different life stages. I wonder how they felt about this milestone year? In my 40th year I’ll have a 9 year old, a 6 year old and a 4 year old.  We’ll celebrate our 14th wedding anniversary. I had an 8 year teaching career before quitting to stay home with our (then 1, now 3) boys. I will most likely go back to it eventually…but for now I’m staying at home and enjoying helping them grow into Godly young men.

I want to document all of that. I want to be able to hand this album to my daughters in law and granddaughters as they approach their 40th year. (My sons can look at it if they want to…but I have a feeling it will have more meaning to the women in their lives).

I want to be reminded that life is good. No, great!

I’ve never felt better than I do right now…approaching 40. And I want to remember that.

So…I’m commencing Project Life…365 days of me. Selfish, huh?

Kristen

questions answered

I know you have been holding your breath, waiting for the answers to the questions I posted on Monday. Sorry about that…three kids and a mother in law in town messes with my blog groove. LOL

So without further adieu and with a few pictures, too (I rhymed!)

1. What is the first thing you see in the morning?

My fancy (not) alarm clock. Seriously, I think I paid $10 for it at Target about 10 years ago and I have yet to replace the battery! I am a sound sleeper and just need a really annoying alarm to get me up. This picture was from yesterday when I hopped out of bed for an early morning run. By the way…not only am I a SOUND sleeper…I also really, really, really enjoy sleeping. This running thing has gotten me out of bed early. Some days I am baffled at who I am becoming…but I like it!

2. The biggest thing to happen to you recently/soon?

Um…duh. I’m sure you are tired of hearing it…but the biggest thing that has been happening to me lately is the fact that I’m accomplishing something I never though possible. And I’m really enjoying it.

3. Your best mirror shot

I could have done a photo of my favorite outfit, a good hair day or a funny face or something…but this morning as I was dressing I noticed something. A side effect of my recent obsession. I’ve lost 6 pounds and 2 inches in my belly my friends. New jeans are on my to do list soon…

4. The person that you see the most in a week

  I’d love to say that I see my husband the most…or even dear friends. But honestly, most of my days are spent with this sweet face. S man is heading to preschool two days a week in August…that’s going to be weird for me. He’s my shopping buddy, my cleaning buddy, my gym buddy and recently my running buddy (he’s good for about an hour in the jogger but that’s his limit).

5. Your favorite shoes

 Um, I can’t answer that question. That would be like choosing your favorite child. Come on now. I LOVE shoes my friends. It’s an illness. One that I never want to recover from. (and, yes, I love my label maker).

But if I had to choose…it might include some animal prints…then again…

Lately, these scream my name more often than not. And I am a huge ASICS fan for running. I’ve fiddled around with others and the ones that fit my foot and body type the best are Asics. Hands down. Or should that be feet down?

6. Your favorite meal

Well, it shouldn’t be…but if I’m being honest it’s pizza. Plain old pepperoni please. I love it, my kids love it. My parents love it. My husband could do without it. I married him anyway. It’s a Saturday night tradition in our house…it’s been that way in my family for 3 generations! Hubby goes with it because he kind of likes us all.

 

But lately, Braeburn or Fuji apples with almond butter have become my go to snack. If I want it for lunch, I also make a bowl of tuna with walnuts. Yum.

And wouldn’t you know it…I went to have this snack and take a picture of it and my three year old had eaten the last apple. Grrrr…he has a habit of going in the refrigerator and taking fruit. Not a bad habit unless you are a hungry mommy. :)

7. The color of your eyes

 Blue. And this is them sans makeup, straight from the shower following a 3.7 mile run. That would explain the rosy complexion. They (my eyes) change color with what I am wearing…turquoise makes them bright blue and darker colors make them deeper. Bright sunshine can make them lighter. My middle and little guys got my eyes and coloring. I find that weird…I am a big recessive gene in my family and of my three kids, two of them are too!

8. Your favorite place to be on a Friday night

 

Would it be boring if I said laying on my couch watching tv with my hubby? That’s what I’m usually doing…and I like it. We chit chat about our weeks and the upcoming weekend, we watch mindless television and just chill. When Green Tangerines re-opens I’ll be glad to get back to my once a month crop with the girls on Friday nights. And yes, I enjoy date nights, girls’ nights out and late night shopping trips. But mostly we are home enjoying each other’s company and I like that. Plus, my spot on the couch is super comfy.

(by the way…do you see my recent reads? Marathon by Hal Higdon and the newest issue of Runner’s World and Self. I’m obesssed I tell ya! I read during commercial breaks or if hubby is watching something I don’t care for. We’re in the same room so it still counts as together time…hee hee)

 

What about you? How did you answer the questions?

And did you guess my answers right?

Look for a layout using these pictures and answers soon…gotta document this time in my life so years…

Kristen

in a rut…part two…

My lack of creativity lately has me in a reflective mood.

Then I went back and read a few of my recent posts…uh, repeat much? Gosh, the last two were nearly identical, save for my book recommendation (which, by the way, did you notice that the authors commented on that post? After reading the book, I feel like Dimity and Sarah are my friends and now they are commenting on my blog…I was so excited!)

So back to my reflections…

When I started this blog nearly 11 months ago, I intended it to be a place to share my scrapbooking and creative stuff…and not much more. It evolved into sharing a bit more about me and the fam but I try to stick to creative endeavors and results. Then this running thing hit by brain. Now I think about it a lot. So when I sit down to blog, if I don’t have something specific to share, my thoughts drift to whatever is on my brain that day. Um…lately that is running.

But I really don’t want this to become a running blog. I don’t feel ‘experienced’ enough for that. I’m fine with sharing my thoughts as I train and become a new runner, but other than that, I don’t have much to add. And really, scrapbooking is my first love in the hobby department.

All that to say that in my over sharing, I’m afraid some of you who come here to be inspired by my creative stuff are bored with my tales of the trails. So…this is what I’ve come up with:

* I’m going to blog about running on Wednesdays. I decided to start keeping a journal where I can reflect on my training stuff. I’ll share any enlightening thoughts once a week. If something terribly exciting comes up, I’ll add it to another post…but I’ll try to keep my running to Wednesdays. That way you creative types can skip those posts…or read them to get motivated for your own fitness journey.

* The rest of the week I’ll try to keep it to scrap related stuff.

I reserve the right to change it up if I get bored…but for now I think that puts my blog and my brain back in the mind frame I had intended it to be in originally…and where I’d like it to stay for now.

And the picture above? I just threw it in…because a blog post without a picture is boring.

This is the last Thursday in May…it is POURING rain with thunderstorms right now. My boys thought it would be fun to run outside shirtless right as the storm started…they ran in and put their shirts on almost immediately…Hello? Where is Spring? Isn’t summer supposed to be on the horizon? Bizarre? My boys need the sun…they are looking very non-Californian right now. :)

Thankfully, this storm is on it’s way out and it’s supposed to be gorgeous this weekend. Perfect for my 4 miler tomorrow AND for my 2nd 5k on Monday! Woot Woot!

Kristen

in a rut

I’ll start by apologizing…if you come here for scrapping inspiration, I don’t have it today. Ugh. The creative mojo is seriously lacking around here…even with a box of goodies calling my name, I can’t get it together to print some pictures and play.

What do you do when your mojo is on vacation?

I know it’s the busyness of life right now that has pushed me into this rut. And I’m all about riding it out. I’ve been here before, I know it will come back.

But it’s still a bit annoying.

There’s hope though…school is almost out. Then again, that means my maniacs are around more which means better planning on my part to get my creative time in.

Then there is my new obsession with pounding the pavement. To make matters ‘worse’ hubby came home with new kicks for me last night. Ran 4 miles with them this morning. Sigh. I never, ever thought running would make me feel like this. Nor did I ever think I would consider myself a ‘runner’. It’s crazy to me that I feel myself moving in that direction!

We’re running our second 5k this weekend. Can’t wait to smoke my time from last month. Seriously…I’m hoping to knock off at least 2 1/2 minutes.

Are you a runner or thinking about it? I’d highly recommend the book: Run Like a Mother by Dimity McDowell and Sarah Bowen Shea.

Experienced runners will enjoy ‘seeing’ themselves throughout the book. New runners will learn so much about their new obsession. Wanna-be runners will be motivated to get out there and run. I actually bought the Kindle version and read it on my iPhone…have you checked out the kindle app by amazon? So cool! But…the book was so good that I think I might buy the paper version to hold in my hands and re-read…it was that interesting to me.

Anyone have any good running book recommendations? I’m looking for another one to read…

I’ll check in later this week…maybe my creative juices will be ready to flow once more?

Kristen

a week in MY life…final thoughts

So I finally put it all together. I so glad I participated in this project last minute.

I didn’t do it full throttle…but I’m happy with the results and I would definitely recommend it to anyone. Even those of you out there who aren’t ‘scrapbookers’. I know this will be a cherished look into our life in a few years.

I’ve already shared Sunday-Tuesday, so here is Wednesday – Saturday.

I stuck with my goal and didn’t spend any money on putting this together. (Well, of course I paid for picture printing, which ended up being less than $20)

Most of the journaling cards are October Afternoon…different lines. I didn’t worry about coordinating the whole project, just facing pages. The “Day” number stickers are Little Yellow Bicycle.

These journaling cards are actually from Cosmo Cricket…trimmed down from a full sheet of add-ons. Can’t remember which line. The day sticker here is 7Gypsies.

The day stickers is from the same pack of Little Yellow Bicycle chipboard stickers (their travel line from last year) and I through in a shipping tag or two to mix it up.

The circle chipboard is also Little Yellow Bicycle. The April calendar is Jenni Bowlin.

You can see that I slowed down on picture taking the last few days.

  The back of the last page so I would have something pretty to look at in my album. This is all just going to slip into my 2010 album, in between other layouts.

Final Thoughts…

*If I do this again…well, WHEN I do this again…I will probably buy a separate album to start keeping them in to make it easy to compare year to year. I don’t know if I’ll do it in 2011, but I’ll do it again for sure.

*I wish I had labeled some of the pictures with text in Photoshop. I still may go back and create journaling strips to go on some of the pictures that might need further explanation.

*I wish I had taken more pictures of US…the people in the week.

*Camera phone pictures are better than nothing. And since I was printing them smaller, you can’t even tell.

*I ‘cheated’ and through in some pictures I had already taken. Like the train picture. I didn’t take it when Sam and I were tootling around looking at trains…I had taken it sometime last year. Sssh…don’t tell. :)

*Next time around I want to include more time line/detailed journaling. Check out Autumn and Ali’s links below to see what I’m thinking about.

*Next time I’d like to mix up the divided protectors to be able to include different orientation of photos. Forcing myself to stay vertical was hard sometimes. Then again, I love how it turned out.

*I’m sure I’ll think of more things I’d like to do differently…overall this was an amazing project!

 

Check out some other versions of this project as seen through the eyes of:

Autumn

Ali

Christine

 

Want to share your vision of a week in the life? Link up here and we’ll come check it out!

Thanks for joining me on this journey…

Kristen

teacher gifts

Today is Teacher Appreciation Day…do you celebrate at your school? Even when I was teaching (I taught elementary aged kiddos in East Los Angeles for nearly 8 years prior to being a stay at home mommy) I thought it was odd that there was an appreciation day well before the end of school. Most parents liked to show their appreciation the last week of school. Oh well.

The school my kiddos attend is celebrating it this week. So I decided to whip up a cute little wall hanging for them using stuff I had on hand.

Cosmo Cricket goodies that I picked up at Green Tangerines before they closed. The Boyfriend line has some cute school-themed papers that I knew I’d put to good use.

I pulled out the ones that I was most interested in. Sorry about the blurry photo…not sure what I did there.

I pulled some chipboard out of my stash…first initial of the teachers’ last names. I spread some glue on the front of the chipboard letter, adhered the patterned paper, then used a craft knife to trim around the end. Finally I took an emery board and distressed the edges for fun.

Then I pulled it all together…adding a cute phrase with the letter stickers. When I was teaching one of my cutie students brought me a plaque that said “Home Sweet Classroom”. Her dad had carved it out and then she helped paint it and her mom sealed it. It held a prominent place in my classroom and is now packed away. I should pull it out and post it here so you can see how darn cute it was.

Originally I was going to get a little frame to distress for this 6x6 gift…but then I passed 6x6 canvas and I liked that idea better. So I ModPodged the paper to the canvas and painted the edges in a coordinating color. I figure they can hang it on the wall or prop it up on their desk.

The boys helped with little thank you cards that I attached to the top of the cellophane bag.

They are all slightly different. I love how they turned out!

Want some other ideas? Here are some links I found while looking for inspiration. Any of them would be super cute and easy…

Wooden Monograms

Crayon Jars (I’ve done this before and filled it with jelly beans and a gift card)

Note Card Sets (from Valentine’s day this year)

Soup in a Jar (a Christmas idea)

Note Pads (pricier, but just a click away….I did these one year in a time crunch)

Colored Pencil Monograms (this has been in my idea file for a while…some day I’ll do it!)

Pencil Sharpeners (just found this a few weeks ago…so cute!)

Fun website with tutorials…givers log (you will not be disappointed in this site, I promise!)

 

So…what did you do for your teachers this year? Quite honestly, as a teacher I can say that the things that have meant the most to me over the years cost the least.

…Hand written, thoughtful thank you notes

…Drawings from my students…my favorite have been portraits of me…so fun to see how they see me. :)

…An invitation to lunch in their home, or an offer to bring me lunch at school. A home made meal during the school day was awesome!

 

Happy Teacher Appreciation Day!

Kristen

monochromatic fun

mon·o·chro·mat·ic

(According to dictionary.com)

–adjective

1. of or having one color.

2.of, pertaining to, or having tones of one color in addition to the ground hue: monochromatic pottery.

I love color. Sometimes to break things up I focus on one color…the lights, the darks, the in betweens…one color can be fun.

It also helps when you have a layout with too many colors, or a dominate color. Like my February 12th layout here. (Well, that one has a bit of blue in it…but mostly it’s green). And my January 12th layout, too. Hmmmm…I’m sensing a 12 on the 12th = green layouts trend. I also do it on cards a lot.

The other day I stumbled upon this challenge over at Caardvarks and I jumped on it because doing monochromatic projects sometimes help jump start my creative mojo.

So I started by pulling out several colors of Coredinations cardstock and got to work.

After deciding on 5 different colors, I went to my scrap bins and started pulling out fun patterned papers in those same colors. This was a great way to use up some of my scraps! And since my scrap bins are separated by color, it was a snap to find them all.

Then I just sat down at my scrap desk and started playing. Here’s what I came up with.

 

(October Afternoon patterned papers, Coredinations cardstock, Creative Imaginations woodgrain, Making Memories paint, Cosmo Cricket letter stickers)

(Coredinations Cardstock, MyMind’s Eye pattened paper, WeRMemory Keepers jumbo eyelet, Stampin’ Up! Ribbon, unknown flower…it’s really old…anyone remember?)

(Coredinations Cardstock, Daisy D’s patterned paper, Jenni Bowlin patterned paper, Making Memories brad, 7Gypsies sticker)

(Coredinations Cardstock, My Mind’s Eye Patterned paper, Uniball Signo white pen, Prima flowers, bling)

Fun, huh? And, yes, I said five colors. I still have some green and yellow scraps on my desk…I’ll post when I get inspiration from them!

What can you do with one color?

Kristen

a gift to share

Sorry, not a gift for you guys…but rather a gift I put together last week.

Hubby called to say he needed a baby gift for one of his employees. Fine with me, I like to shop. Problem…he needed it that night.

So off I went with the boys to pick up a gift. I love Target. And I love that they are carrying Paul Frank items. Sigh. This kind of stuff makes me want babies again. Almost.



Then my creative juices started flowing. I thought back to the stack of Little Yellow Bicycle papers I had sitting in my stash. I LOVED this line (it’s retired), but the reality is that my boys are getting older and I’m not doing a whole lot of baby pages. So I thought I’d make a cute little brag book for the new family. A quick walk down the scrapbooking aisle in Target (mine isn’t that elaborate) and I walked away with a plain ole plastic photo album for a buck!



I just started cutting up my stash into 4x6 pieces and slid them in the album. Cut a few strips to add as embellishments, add some journaling cards (the orange ones are on the back side of one of the safari papers, the brown ones are by Pebbles, Inc.) and some number journaling spots (by Jillibean Soup) lastly some brown cardstock and Thickers and there you have it…a quick brag book that new mama can throw in her diaper bag.
 

The journaling cards are meant as a place to quickly jot down new milestones or fun notes about the baby at that age. When she has time (ha ha!) she can transfer it to the ‘official’ baby scrapbook…but in the  mean time she has a cute place to store all the things she wants to remember.




Then I had to pretty up a gift bag I had on hand…



  I hand cut the animals out of the paper…quick and cute. This line had some adorable chipboards or stickers or something, but I didn’t have any left…only the paper so I made due.



The whole thing, including the shopping, probably took me about an hour and a half to do. Super simple, but now hubby had a cute gift to give. As soon as I came out of the office with it, hubby just laughed. He knew he’d get much more than a last minute gift!
Kristen