Man, I need this...

Looking through pictures to add to my blog I came across this one. Man, I miss this. This was Summer 2006. My BFF since grade school and I left our kids with our husbands and headed to the beach. It was Wonderful. No responsibility, no fighting, no bickering, just us, the beach, and a few adult beverages. Man, that was the life. I long for that again...

Photo of the day

Okay, I've been working on updating my blog. I'm gonna try to update it more often. (Hope you like the music option I just added). I'm trying to add a daily photo log, but I'm having a hard time finding one to use for blogger. Hmmm. I'll have to keep looking into that one. Until then, here's a photo I wanted to share... I was doing laundry and when I came back into the living room, what did I find? Samantha sitting on the hamper with Benjamin trapped inside. Don't worry, he was enjoying it as much as Samantha, I think.

6 layouts in 1 night!

Wow! I can't remember the last time I was so productive in 1 evening, AND they were all done before midnight. Woo Hoo for me. Basically I'm now all caught up on Halloween. I completed 3 layouts for Benjamin's book and 3 for Samantha's book for Halloween 2005, 2006, and 2007. The layouts are even in their books. Finis. Here's a couple of them.

3rd Birthday - Layout time!!!

Okay, John and I were talking the other day about how fast Benjamin is growing up. We just registered him for prek next year. Our little boy is going to be 4 in April. Amazing. That got me to thinking... I haven't scrapbooked any of his birthdays yet. Not even his 1st birthday. Isn't that horrible?! So, it got me motivated. I went in my room and got his 3 birthday pics together and picked one to scrap. Figured I start with the most recent and go backwards. So, here's his 3rd birthday layout. Sorry for the bad scan. One of these days I'll get better at photographing my layouts (that or I'll have John start scanning and stitching them again). Probably didn't help that I reverted back to my old standing on a chair ways and getting on top of the layout. It's been very rainy and gloomy (and cold) here, so I couldn't go outside to take it in natural light.

Heath Ledger

Oh no. how very very sad. i Love this guy. he's handsome and so sexy. love the voice, the smile, the hair. he was such a tall drink of water. I first saw him in 10 things I hate about you and couldn't think of I thing I didn't love about this guy. i can't believe I'll never see him in another movie. hopefully they still release the dark knight, although I'm not sure I want to see the movie that troubled him so much he couldn't get it out of his head. he'll be so missed. I know I will. God Bless.

Nooooo

Okay, this may sound silly, but I'm so upset. Yesterday I was feeling very sluggish and just down right exhausted, (and cold). I went to make a cup of something warm to drink. I grabbed the cappuccino to see if it had caffeine and OMG, what did I see? My fricking cappuccino has trans fat!! WTF? How did that happen?! i LOVE this stuff. It's not supposed to have fricking trans fat. What am I supposed to drink now?! Silly, I know, but this totally bummed out my whole day. I guess I'll have to switch back to my hot tea, and international coffees. Oh, and it's not just a little trans fat (family doctor says no such thing). It has 1.5g of trans fat. Heart disease is just too prevalent in my family to allow for any trans fat. I can't tell you how many of these canisters I've gone through. Now I'm off to mourn my favorite cappuccino.

You make Me... SO Very Happy.

I really love how this layout came out. Completely out of my comfort zone with this one. I painted a blue sheet of paper with blue and green paints and kind of blended them all together. This is my first painted background layout. This is also my first layout journaling directly on a photo. Also used Heidi Swapp chipboard letters. The page is 12x12 although it's cut slightly on the left hand side to hide blocks holding page down. The photos are also a bit curled up causing the black shadow, but I wanted to get this page copied and blogged as soon as I could. I believe this is also the 1st layout I've ever done for my husband. Lots of firsts on this one. Guess that's why I'm loving it.

Graffiti Stamping in Paint

Okay, I love love love how this came out. Used multiple colors of paint with acrylic stamps.

I never would have thought to use paint on my acrylic stamps. Especially a stamp like this that had a lot of detail. Background is dry brushed, then acrylic stamped (Technique Tuesday) with purple, pink, then orange colored paint. I so badly wanted to put a picture on it and call it a layout. LOL. But, this is for my 6x6 Art Journal. I can see me duplicating it for a layout when I come across the right photo.

6x12 layouts

I've recently started playing around with 6x12 page sizes. I like the smaller work canvas. It's much more doable for me. It was hard for me to get started so the first 2 layouts were basically a 12x12 that I split in half. Not sure why the color in the 1st layout is off. The colors should match the 2nd layout. The 3rd layout is a layout I did for Emily's Got Paint class using Graffiti-stamping with multiple stamps. It's also an ACOT January challenge layout (write a letter and use note paper).

Got Paint?

I'm taking Emily Falconbridge's BPS Got Paint class and I'm really liking it. I've never really painted before, except to paint chipboard, and I'm really liking it. I even went out and bought a nice assortment of brushes. Here's a photo of 4 of my favorite techniques.

Blue is color wash, pink is acrylic glaze, white is gesso with circles, and orange is etched. I really getting out of my box and loving it.