100

I reached my goal of 100 layouts (actually 101) with just stash* this weekend. Here's three of those pages:

This page didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. Still, I scrapped a charming memory, so job complete.

This one is for the hybrid class I'm doing at Big Picture Scrapbooking. The title accent with a circle? I did that in Word. Then I added a Thicker and sticker letters.

This next one is for this week's Sketchy Thursdays challenge. I've had the page idea in mind for a while, so I paired the school photo of me with some photos of my room. (By the way, torture for me is having to get a school picture of me taken every year for as long as I am employed. When you were in school, did you hate having school pictures taken like I did? Bleh.)

*I allowed myself Studio Calico's main kit every month and cardstock when needed. Plus adhesive. I still have another week to go--I gave up until Lent is over, which for the purpose for the Studio Calico reveal will be this Saturday. Skycoaster add-on kit, you will be mine...

Lent

Hey, Grace! Thanks for the comment--good to hear you got the box, and I'm glad you got CK working again.

Lent is here. Even though I'm Lutheran, I like the idea of giving something up and dedicating that sacrifice toward something else. Charity, for instance. Last year I gave up scrap shopping...which I am currently doing. But I have to admit, I gave up shopping in January, my birthday month. It took me the month to spend the three gift cards to Archiver's I got, and then my husband gets me another one for Valentine's day! So my sacrifice feels a bit insincere. I want to give up scrap shopping for Lent, but I just got a GC to Studio calico for a layout I had published in Scrapbook Trends magazine last month. Can I use the GC and not have it count? How about the birthday money I got from my grandmother?

Here's the layout published in Scrapbook Trends:


The universe obviously wants me to scrap shop, so I'll use the GC, give up shopping until Easter (which matters--I just reached my 60th layout today, so by the middle of March I should be done with 100 layouts), and give the birthday money to charity.*

And here's the latest LOs:


Another vacation layout. I am loving making this album. My son told his pesky brother last summer, "Let sleeping boys lie." I had totally forgotten that until I made this page!


I got the idea for this layout from Diana, The Lonely Scrapbooker. Every child needs a Just Because page.



These two were for this week's Ella sketch. Fun!

* Minus $20 I'll spend to get a lovely die cut. I'm so bad...

This and That

1. Woke up Saturday morning to get the most perfect looking winter landscape. I'll replace my banner photo when I get the photo tweaked. ETA: I changed the banner photo. Isn't it gorgeous?

2. The Olympics are here! We leave the TV on all day, and the boys have become enamored with snowboarding (hasn't been on yet, but OK) and Nordic skiing. I'll post photos later of how they're demonstrating their love. ETA: Here's my athletes. Check out the sign at the end of the kitchen (I'm trying to ignore the fact that Rowan tacked it to the wall. My beautifully painted wall.):


3. Speaking of love, Derick took me to Hell's Kitchen in Minneapolis for Valentine's Day. Wonderful menu. We're going back sometime, though without the boys again; the art is kind of creepy. It is Hell, though. What can you expect? ETA: Here we are at the restaurant:


4. My mom is here visiting. The boys are having much fun producing paper art for her and providing her with many photo ops. Dominic also loved her glasses. He insists he now needs some. He keeps putting on her glasses, then leaving them somewhere else. No wonder she keeps losing them. ETA: Here is Dominic, looking dapper in reading glasses.


5. Friday night Derick and I went to a Minnesota Wild game, our first hockey game. Tons of fun. We were very close to a goal, so saw some nice action. Alas, the Wild lost. Two dates sans kids in one weekend for us, though, so Derick and I won. Thanks, Mom, for babysitting!

6. I've made more than 50 layouts on my road to completing 100 without new product (except adhesive and basic cardstock, both of which I need to replenish). LOAD is helping a lot. I'll post layouts here later. ETA: Here's the layouts from the last few days:

This last one is based off this week's Sketchy Thursday sketch.

7. Why not post now? We are in the midst of changing computers. My old PC was so full of photos, it w o r k e d s o s l o w l y . . . So we replaced it with a Mac. After leading me through many Socratic dialogues to help me understand how he was right, Derick has purchased software to migrate our old files onto the new computer. The problem may be Windows: the newest form (the only one we can buy) may now work with PSE 7, which I'd just bought last year. We just tried installing the old PSE on the Mac, so I'll see later today if it works.

What this means for me...I'm using the new computer for writing and surfing and posting, but I'm using the old computer for editing. Twice the process means twice the time. Ergo, I will post photos to accompany this post later today!

ETA 8. Rowan lost another tooth randomly yesterday. So this is what he looks like now, post-haircut:

Time to relax

So the busy week is done. I did fit some scrapping in, but in bits and pieces: selecting products one day, trimming and laying it all out, adhering/unadhering, and adding and subtracting elements. Here's what I did:

This one was for Inspiration Defined at BPS. I took inspiration from a favorite wall in my house:

Next time I use this design, I'll print smaller photos to make it really dramatic.

This next one I took inspiration from the picture at the upper left of the wall. I added a few embellishments.

Then I did this one for a sketch challenge (Sadly, I made this one for my father-in-law's birthday next week, but I selfishly can't give it up. I'm making him another one. The guilt!):

Here's the sketch:

Finally, this layout celebrates my son's first day at school this year. I used some scraps. The stars are a stamped image I punched out and adhered with brads.

So for tonight, to get ready for a weekend crop and for LOAD, I will finish editing October and November photos and send them in for printing.

ETA: The sketch comes from Studio Calico. They post a new sketch every Sunday for a challenge and a GC. I did use their January kit for the page.

A few more

Here's some more layouts:


This one I used maps from the excursions, using photos that didn't make it onto other pages and other memorabilia. I played around with a little randomness.


Back to my comfort zone here. Phew! I think rock star hair is a phase all boys go through, BTW.


Here's my birthday sledding layout. So much fun to make.


A sketch challenge at Studio Calico. I used their kits on these previous two layouts.


I love this layout. I think every parent can understand it. And I'm proud of that photo--I finally achieved blurred background without blurring the foreground too. Unfortunately, the photo is of chipmunk toys. Rats.

A little Hooray

If you can take a peek at a couple scrapbooking magazines this month, you will see my layouts: I have a layout published in both Creating Keepsakes January issue and also in Scrapbook Trends. The latter is one of my all-time favorites; it's in the stitching section.

I've posted before on how the publishing calls give me ideas and help stretch my creativity. This is true. As an example, if I can brag a little, I just got notice that three of my layouts will be published in June Scrapbook Trends! All were layouts where I got inspiration from the posts or other online challenges, so hooray.

On my journey still to create 100 layouts without new supplies. Here's the latest three:

Inspiration from the BPS class and my son's words. Making this LO made me realize how little purple I have.

Scrapping my minor medical scare from last week.

87 more to go!

Some milestone pages

Oddly, I seem to be running out of photos. I need to finish editing my vacation photos so I can start that book, and I'd like to print some photos from October to scrap. Here's a few pages I did yesterday:

I used mostly October Afternoon Report Card for this. I didn't want to do separate pages for open house and day 1, so to include the shots I wanted, I had to merge the two on one layout, no pun intended.

The inspiration for this layout came after I ran across a few old school photos from preschool. Look how much he's grown! Again with the Report Card.

This one I used my January Studio Calico kit on, with perhaps my favorite photo from last year. I hope you can read the story.

And yes, I am keeping my subscription as I scrap 100 pages. I don't want to stop it. I am still using us my stash; I get about 6-12 layouts per kit, which still leaves a ton of stash pages to do.

By the way, I got a diagnosis for my numb arm last week: the ulnar nerve on my elbow has been receiving too much pressure. What kinds of things have been putting pressure on my left elbow? Things like this:

I think I can deal with being a little numb.

2 more

Here's two more layouts, on my way to 100 before buying new supplies:

I used this sketch from Studio Calico. I plan on giving this to my cousin and her new husband. It was such a gorgeous picture, I wanted to scrap it.

My last Studio Calico kit had more pink than I could use, so I paired that paper with this list of what I love about winter to do a layout for myself. It's sort of a pep talk to myself to make it through the next few months. Frankly, after today's weather, I needed a pep talk.

95 more to go! Thank goodness, because Archiver's just got this boy's line from Little Yellow Bicycle. Be still my heart.

100 layouts, numbers 1-3

I've challenged myself to create 100 layouts without buying new supplies (excluding adhesive, neutral cardstock I run out of, and my Studio Calico kit, which I don't want to unsubscribe to). This weekend I got started on the first few:

I'm proud of the origami crane I stitched. To do it, I took a crane my son folded, traced it on the page, punched holes not too close together, then stitched. I erased as I went; I can never get the stitches to fully cover the pencil lines otherwise. And I'm also proud of my rediscovery of these Doodlebug letter stickers: I think their angles look vaguely Asian. Finally, I don't have tiny number stamps, so I used letters o and g to make "09."

This is my layout for my New Year's goals. I used the list from a previous post to generate ideas. The flowers are from a new Canadian company, Harmonie. Aren't they gorgeous colors? And I added some Stickles to the rubon flowers--hard to see.


Finally, some father-son bonding time over technology, in this case the iPhone playing cowbell. If you've never seen the SNL skit, go here to get the joke. It's funny...but IMO, men find it funnier.