Flashback Friday - 6th Grade Graduation

We got hit with a yucky sick bug at our house this week - the older girls missed a couple of days of school and we haven't done much this week.  For some reason (named Valerie) I got the urge to go through some old pictures so I pulled the box out of my closet and started my trip down memory lane.  For my friends on Facebook, sorry if you're sick of all the old pics I've been posting ;-)  Anyway, it also got me in the mood to start scrapping again - like hands on scrapping, not just digital.  Since moving here I have hardly printed any new pictures, which is a good thing, I guess, since I do have a lot already printed!  In R-ton I lived a block away from Walgreens so I would go online, order the pictures I wanted to scrap, pick them up in less than an hour, and do a page or two.  Here we don't have good local photo printing options - I have to take a memory card or jump drive to the hardware store, sort through and order my pics on a dinky little kiosk, which is just no fun, especially with kids.  Plus I've never been pleased with the prints, the colors always seem off, and it takes forever for just a couple of prints.  Now I know I could always order them online and have them shipped but I am just never that prepared in advance to know which pictures and what sizes I want to order a large quantity of pics to make it worth the shipping cost. Thankfully Studio J has kept me scrapping recent pictures, so I can't complain!  If I want to get some hands on scrappin' done I will turn to my box of already printed pages - it's a good way to accomplish that goal anyway!

Anyway, didn't mean to ramble - what I really came here for today is to share some pages that I finished up yesterday.  I used some Fancy Kewl papers from Fancy Pants Designs that I've had in my stash for a few years now.  I picked this paper because of the teal color (which matches my dress) and notebook lined papers (which goes along with my school theme).  I only had one page of the teal pattern I wanted to use, and only a few inches left of the lined paper, so I had to stretch it as much as I could.  I will show you how I did below.  I used a sketch from the PageMaps 2 book.

You can see that I used the patterned paper along the top of both pages.  Then I got the idea to use my Cricut and the CTMH Art Philosophy cartridge to add some leaf shapes to the bottom white space and tie in the pattern above.  Then I got the idea to use my spray pen (mixed with water, re-inker, and pearl paint) to mask some designs with the shapes that I had just cut out.  I am really pleased with how it turned out.

I used the Field Trip Alphabet and Classmate Alphabet stamps for my title.  I used the CTMH ink colors Ocean (retired), and Tulip as they matched well.  I think Lagoon would have worked as well, but Ocean was the first color that came to my mind.

But wait, that's not all - I also wanted to fit more pictures without adding more pages, so I used the handy Flip Flaps (I used one 4x12 and one 8x12) and now the entire right page opens up to reveal more.  Here you can see how I stretched the last 4x12 piece of teal flowered paper - the top piece is actually the back of the pattern from the front page - I was going to cover it or fill it up with something but decided to leave it as is.

Here is how it looks in the page protectors/Flip Flaps all put together (except the top flap is closed in this picture).

This scrapbook is the very first scrapbook I ever received - my grandparents gave it to me years ago and ultimately (along with some help from my aunt) got me started in scrapbooking.  This one is full of just my childhood pages and is about 4 inches thick, but I think it's time to divide it up!

Thanks for looking and joining me on my flashback!

December SOTM Blog Hop!

Welcome to another fun Stamp of the Month Blog Hop! I look forward to seeing all of the wonderful inspiration that is going to be shared along the hop - I hope you'll join us!

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When you're done here, the next stop is Helen's Blog, so don't forget to keep hopping!
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The first creation I am sharing today using this stamp set is a fun circle card - the pattern came from Wishes and it's called Center Circles. This is also a *very* small peek at the beautiful Felicity papers that will be available starting December 15th! This card uses a stamping technique that is so simple yet makes the stamps so versatile - I curved the stamp on my block to fit around the edge of the circle card - let's see you try that with wood mounted stamps! The sentiment is stamped inside a fun Dimensional Element shape from the On Target set. I covered the chipboard with Bamboo paper and sanded the edges with the Finishing Files to give it a finished look.

Now on to my next two projects using this stamp set. I thought this was a fun stamp set that paired up well with the Notebook paper pack and Good Works stamp set so I used them all together to scrapbook my girls' school pictures that were taken this fall. I used the same 2 paper patterns on both of these layouts, I just used the back of the paper to give two completely different looks. I LOVE that feature of CTMH papers!

Brianna's layout used the following sketch #40 from The Scrappiest:

I embossed the clip on a transparency and cut out - I did half in Cocoa EP and half in Silver EP...

...I also used the dashed lines from the stamp set for the years...

Kaylee's layout used sketch #39 from 52 Sketches, I just added an extra row of squares:

I used the same stamps from Notice the Details on this layout as the last one, but this time I used a foam square to give it extra dimension...

If you would like to see one more page that I created using part of this stamp set, just click here.

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Thanks for visiting - don't forget to leave a comment and keep hopping along to Helen's Blog and all the rest of this month's participants to see all of their fabulous creations! Enjoy!

A little late, but...

... I hope you had a Happy Valentine's Day! Since I was such a procrastinator this year - big surprise ;-P - we didn't get these Valentine's done until the last minute, and then I forgot to take pictures of the ones the girls made for their classmates! But here are the ones I made for their teachers at school.

School Pictures

I got this year's school pictures scrapped already - here they are...sorry for the glare on the pics, I couldn't get a decent pic without the flash.

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I did this one yesterday - I used Erin's Sketch Challenge posted on her blog - as soon as I saw her sketch I knew what I was going to use it for, it just took me a few weeks to get around to it ;-) I used the Stylin' papers and Stickease (retired), and the letter K from the Black Dazzling Die-Cuts, along with the Classmates Alphabet and Sparkles.

I did this one last week - and my creativity was really lacking. Here is the first end result and I just didn't like it...

...something was missing, plus I hated my spacing on the word 'for' - I don't know what I was thinking! So I let it sit for a few days and then I found these fun sparkly flourishes at WalMart and knew they would be just perfect! It's still not one of my favorite layouts, but I'm much happier with it now. I used the B from the Crystal Blue Dazzling Die-Cuts, stamped with the Spot On Background, and the frame and hearts came from the Watermelon Dazzling Die-Cuts, also stamped with Spot On. I also used the Classmates Alphabet, Sparkles, and paper from the Notebook pack.

Thanks for looking!