Life and May Basket

It has been a busy last 2 months.  That seems to be an understatement!!!!
Lots of stress but then along comes a friend who makes my day, week and month!!!!

I belong to a couple online boards.  It is online but many of us have met IRL, some several times.  We try to get as many as possible together once a year.  I am also very lucky that one of the board members live right here in my city and two others live close to my daughters or on the way.

Well, we exchanged May Baskets this year and did the opening online together.  Suzy, whom I got to hang with for a whole day a couple months ago while on the East Coast was my May Basket Buddy.  It was so fun to shop and create for her!!!  But......what she sent me was so exciting and the best gifts ever.   Even with my busy days I am still finding time to create and have all ready started to use many of the things. 


Been wanting this Cricut cart mainly for the font on it.   It is such a cute font!!!!

Also another Cricut Cart and several sets of Close to My Heart Stamps~~ I love to journal and a couple of these are date stamps.  I am so thrilled to get them.  Another adorable one has boarders and  looks like someone stitched it.  Suzy, is a CTMH consultant and was so generous with her product

More wonderful items and kits.  The last picture shows a Little Yellow Bicycle album and a pad of papers with the cute edges all ready to punch out and apply to the acyrlic and chipboard pages.  Love that the edge is there and ready for me to add personal touches.   Thanks Suzy, you have made my day!!!!!

What a great idea!!!

During vacation to Washington DC we spent time with our Air Force Friends and their sweet babies.  Yes, the ones in the pictures.  I learned a lot while there.  Military life takes adjustments and often creative ideas/living.

Here is one I thought was an amazing idea.  A girl our friends know is pregnant with her first child.  Her husband could not be with her when they did the test to find out the sex of the baby.  She came up with the best idea so they could experience this time together.

She had a blue boy item and a pink girl item and a small box in a sack.  She took this with her and had the tech doing the test put the correct item in the box.  She did not look in either the sack or the box until she and her hubby were together.,  How wonderful to be connectd by video phone or skype and find out together!!!!  Or just wait until they were together to discover what they were having.  

Mailboxes for Easter

Mailboxes for Easter

I had made Valentine Mailboxes for my older 4 Grandkids and still had a bunch of mailboxes left.  I thought why not an Easter Mailbox instead of a small Easter Basket from Grandma and Grandpa for my younger 2 Grandkids. 

I cut the base pattern paper to fit the mailbox width wise and then marked the rivet holding the flag on the paper.   A small slit and a hole punch made the perfect shape cut out to fit under the flag rivet. I slid the paper under the rivet and started gluing from there.  The 12 inch paper was 3/4 of an inch to short to go all the way around but I made sure that the opening was in an area where it would be covered by the grass cut out.  I used Aleene's tacky glue and a paint brush to apply the glue to the mailbox, working in sections, starting at the rivet area.  I then  smoothed out the paper with a makeup sponge.





   I decided these needed a bow since they were Easter Mailboxes.  I really liked the look of the bow on these mixed with the pink  braid edging that I have had for years.  

I used Celebrate with a Flourish and just cut it apart to make the scene on the mailbox above.  Added Grass from Plantin Schoolbook and eggs from Doodlecharms and A Child's Year.

This end Grasson this one is cut from Mickey and Friends

and the font on both of these mailboxes if from A Child's Year. 

This scene cut in brown glitter paper  is also from A Child's Life with a few extra eggs from added.  These are going to be filled with chocolate covered peeps that I found while on vacation at THE PEEP STORE.  There is only one store and I was there.  How fun was that!!!

I had so much fun doing this layout.  I love using the 12 by 12 photos.  I order them from our Costco online and in one hour plus the time of the drive they are in my hands. 
Now saying that, when I enlarge them  they are not all ways the greatest photo since the smaller version was not a very good photo.  Which is one of the points of this post. Do not let those poor quality photos stop you!!  Use them!

 For me it is all about the story and the moment in time in which the picture was taken.  I scrap for my Grand kids so they can remember the moments in their lives

Everyone of the pictures on this layout is either of  poor color, poor focus or fast movement that came out blurry.  On the second page I over lapped a picture to cover up a blurry hand.  But there is a story here and I so wanted my Grandson to remember the fun we had.

Of course there is the journaling,  In this case there was a story leading up to these photos.  A lot of shopping and the fact that this is a tie from a second hand store.  A very old wool tie that still had the tags on it.  For some reason he fell in love with this tie and it was his first tie. 

The main green paper was black and white so I inked it with Tim Holtz inks and the sponge applicator to match the tie..  It makes it so easy to do large areas with this tool.

I used Graphically Speaking and Design Studio to lengthen the journaling block on the first page.  Still learning this fun program for my Cricut and I must give most of the credit for anything I know about DS to Megan.

Graphically Speaking and Going Places were  used  for the arrows.
Going Places cart, which is a fav of mine was used for the little guy and the camera.  The tie on the little guy was hand cut and added.

Lyrical Letters and my old stand by Plaintain Schoolbook was used for the lettering.

This was a fun story to tell and such a fun layout to do even with the less than perfect photos.  Having fun and recording memories is why I love this hobby so much!!!

I having been waitting for this!!!!!

I have been praying for these babies for so long!!!!!  I have prayed for their Mommy and Daddy  for even longer!!!!
And now............  I am here!!!!

These  sweet babies were 2 lbs 13 oz and 3lbs 9 oz when they were born!!!!!!!and now they are 16 and 17 lbs.  What a difference 9 months makes.

I have been playing with them all day.  They both can
crawl and make constant baby sounds.  Big boy makes a whole lot of noise!!!!  Sweet girl is pulling up and laughing out loud.  
Mommy and Daddy wanted to know if there was anything we wanted to do while we are here?  Yes, just hang with these sweet miracle babies!!  
I had to use a picture of the babies with one set of their very proud Grandparents.  Pictures of us with them to come!!!!!

I Cried Yesterday

The mail lady rang my bell yesterday and there was a package from my youngest Grand kids.
 I went up the end of Jan. to babysit them while my Son in law took my daughter away for her birthday.  The kids and I had so much fun going to the library, Mickey Ds, a jumpy place, making cupcakes, cookies, shopping for Mommy's B day presents.  They out did themselves getting mulit colored ear rings, a bright pink bracelets and a glittery key chain.  Aw, the things a 6 year old and a 3 year old pick out are pretty funny.  Now of course Mommy has to wear these things.  Like I told her, suck it up, I did not let them buy the bright pink and orange watch!!!!

When I opened the box this is what I found!

That in itself is so sweet but this book was so cool.  Let me say that the ringtone  on my cell phone is my 3 year old grand daughter's voice singing me " You Are My Sunshine"  I love baby voices and little kids voices.  The way they say things are so cute.  I know some day they will grow up and those voices will be gone forever!!!


SOOOOOOOO

 You see the white case along the bottom of the right hand side.  That is a recorder and their voices are recorded on every page.   The oldest one talks then reads the page, the youngest one talks and then makes the sound of the animals on the left page.  Cute,  I mean so cute!!! 

I so wish you could all hear their voices.  I had no idea it would do this when I opened it so it was a surprise!!!
 And then I cried!!!!  Tears of Joy and tears for how proud I am of my daughters and the way they think of other people, including their Mom and Dad!!!  Also for how they are teaching their children  to value other people.  Yes, I am one proud Mom and Grandmother. 

So today I will listen to this sweet book again.
 And tomorrow,
and the day after!!!!!!   and................

Fun Disney layout

 Maybe I should rename this blog, Disney.  It seems like I have been doing Disney layouts forever but I love how this one turned out.

 Used a combo of several of my favorite things, like brads and the little letters. Love my brads and all ways looking for more.   Doodled with Creative Memory pens is another fun thing I like to do but do not do it often enough.  I cut the rings and arrows on the Circut which is at the top of my fav list.  Then glitter paper.  This is not my fav glitter paper but there is some new glitter paper coming out by American Crafts that I so want to try when I find it.  From a friend Joy, she says  "it cuts like butter" on the Cricut since it looks like glitter but is smooth to the touch.



The second page has the story done on my computer.  Simple block style since I wanted the circles and arrows to be the photo accents.  
Sorry the cropping is not better on this~~  but you get the idea.  Have a great day!!!