Worth the price of admission...

...oh wait, this is a FREE class over at Jessica Sprague! I don't know if you can still sign up for it, but I'm learning some useful things, like creating this vintage-style, hand-tinted photograph:

From this:

Of course, Tess liked the bright greens of the original, but when I saw this photo in the LCD screen on my camera, the image I had for an eventual LO was more toward the vintage image I finally created. Hey, it's my hobby, after all ;)

Looks like Friday night cropping will continue, thanks to my cropping buddies. Tonight we're all crowded into Kelly's, last week it was Shandra's. Tomorrow I actually crop ALL DAY, the final crop at Scrapbook Memories, a goodbye crop for Patti, the owner. I need to organize some page kits, because it's going to be too crowded for me to bring ALL my crap.

Finished this LO yesterday, after running to the Big M chain with my 50% off coupon so I could nab the last MS butterfly punch. I saw it being used all over the place at SISiversary and just fell in love with little patterned butterflies everywhere. And I'm not a butterfly person, in general (as I'm not a bird-on-a-branch scrapper, or the flourish type, either...)

This is my next-to-the-last birthday LO from 2008-2009. I have been DREADING getting these done, as I do every year, but my goal is to have a decent birthday memory book for each of my kids, as I have NO memories of my own birthday celebrations (such as they were with 4 kids and a working mom in the house). I just need to change up my approach from year to year to keep it fresh.

I am just about done with 2008 overall; the next pages I'm dreading are holiday (Oct-Dec) pages. I've done a couple pages for 2009 already, mostly everyday happenings, which are more interesting for me. Doing Project 365 last year gave me waaaay too many photos to scrap, which is why I am so "far behind" (I'm a bit anal, and *like* to scrap chronologically, so bite me Stacy Julian, LOL). Hopefully my Friday night crops continue, so I can keep up. I'm a happy scrapper when I'm all caught up (and it HAS happened before)!

Worth a listen...

NPR's reading of the Declaration of Independence.

History. It's a good thing to remember now and then.

Sad.

A little sad that this silliness is over:

SISiversary 09 rocked. I'm finally caught up on sleep and can write a little about it. The drive was exhausting, but I was also able to do the first real thinking in about 7 years (yeah, that's right...Tess is 7...you don't even have to do the math)!

The ride home was more tiring than the ride down. Took me 9 hours to get there, and 11 to get home, because I kept stopping at all the little places I saw on the way there...a quilt shop that turned out to be out of business, Elizabethtown (too bad everything in Glendale was closed on Mondays), another store called House of Quilts that was, sadly, all made-up quilts (Made in China), although I did find a cool new houndstooth backpack pretty cheap (my purple one is just sad). Oddly enough, I didn't really stop to eat (aside from a half a chicken wrap in Elizabethtown); I think not sitting down to a hot meal all day made the drive home even harder.

It's not like I didn't get enough shopping done in the SIS onsite boutique. I actually was able to behave better than at Creative Escape (most likely because things in the SIS boutique were not at CE prices...ooo, snap). There were only about 77 women at SISiversary, compared to 700 at CE, so overall the atmosphere was more friendly and laidback, although I have FINALLY learned (I hope) not to jam back-to-back classes on my schedule, and forget about things like oh, say, lunch (the slight time change messed with me all weekend).

Okay, more photos to make me happy again:

Angela Spangela (aka Professor H.L. and roomie extraordinaire), and Jamie BoBamie, who had the cutest little New Joisey accent...you only heard it on certain words and then BAM it was straight on into a brief Sopranos or RHNJ episode...hee...just for a flash...

Aimee was my late lunch buddy on Friday (and NOT a roomie, which I finally remembered by oh, say...Sunday) and Saturday dinner buddy (fried pickles? really?!) and all around good for a gut-busting giggle at any given moment.

Wendy (spelled it wrong for a reason!), another great, totally laidback & relaxed roomie, she even got up as a karoke virgin and sang Friday night. That's when I knew she'd be game for anything. Sorry I made you mess up a page with my concoction Saturday night. You got me back on video, so we're even...

Oh, just go to my Flickr site and you will see so many happy moments. I'm definitely signing up for next year!

Finally, I am most sad that my Friday night crops seem to be over. Scrapbook Memories is closing for good on July 11th at 5p and will be closed for most of the holiday weekend (including tomorrow). There is a final goodbye crop for Patti (owner) on the 11th, but that's a Saturday, so I think I'll have to skip Friday the 10th. Basically, that means...no more scrappin with my peeps on Friday nights. Sniff.

Gettin Digi Wit' It

Armed with CK's Computer Tricks for Scrapbooking 3, a load of online digital freebies, and my rudimentary knowledge of Adobe programs (Pagemaker...heard of it?), I've been spending a LOT of time on my computer creating 8x8 digital LOs (since I don't have a wide-format printer...I like my LOs in my hands, thanks!)

I'm still working on the concept of brushes (I can't get them to show up as a layer, and I can't seem to bring them forward off my background so that they can be seen...seems I have to add them to a layer -- say, patterned paper, or a photograph -- before I layer that piece onto my background...), but at least I can load brushes, and see them -- bonus!

My LSS is closing, by the end of July, if not earlier. She's selling to a liquidator mid-June, which means after that she can just walk away and choose not to hold late-night crops, or even have the store open. There are plans in the works among us Friday night regulars to keep getting together at least once a month, but I am really going to miss scrapping with Real Live People (and, moreover, friends) on a weekly basis. Which is why digital scrapping is not taking over my life just yet.

Full swing

Well, now that Memorial Day is over (early!), summer is in full swing. More so when Tess gets out of school in a couple of weeks (!)...just wanted to update you so you know I'm still alive...busy, but alive!

Happy Mother's Day!

Still a favorite...

Scrapping challenges

I've taken to carrying around one of my (MILLION of) blank journals, to make notes & doodles about scrapbooking layouts that are in my head. I even brainstormed in church on Sunday, for this leftover SIStv challenge:

We had to use a certain page design, the color orange, bling (my suggestion to the list), the word "joy," stamping, and tape. I hope I'm forgiven, since I *was* scrapping a Psalm!

The next sketch in my notebook was for the first challenge over at the new KiddieLit blog. The theme was Wizard of Oz, and I used the following from their element list: HOME for my topic, a quote from the book/movie, the color yellow, blue gingham (hand cut letters), red sequins, rainbows, and twisted ribbon.


I did 5 more challenges at SIS for NSD, although I managed to get 4 challenges into one LO, so I really only did 2 more pages. I thought I was tapped out for inspiration, but having a notebook along for the Boring Mom Bits (church, storytime at the library, etc.) really helped keep me inspired.

Hopefully keeping track of due dates, like the one for this challenge, will help me enter more of these challenges and keep me scrapping during the week, not just on Friday nights.