The Paper Variety - Week 17

I loved this sketch from this week's challenge at The Paper Variety!! I had about a dozen different themes and pictures to choose from. But of course, nothing seemed to come together easily. I couldn't think of papers or anything else I wanted to use.

I settled on these fun pictures of my daughter when we went to go see the Tall Ships at Navy Pier.

I wanted a wood grain scalloped circle...so I had to trace one and cut it by hand. :)

The sand dollars and the cute bird, are from a punch out set I bought a loooong time ago. The wood pilings were cut by hand. I added a pewter brad to each one and TRIED to thread jute through each one...that didn't work at all! So I settled for just wrapping it around the brad. The title is from punch out letters I think I bought from QVC about 10 years ago. And the cute little anchor is a wooden accent piece from Michael's.

I had a lot of fun with this one! :)

Frosted Friday Challenge!

Well, here we are with yet ANOTHER frigid weekend! Luckily, I have nothing to do AGAIN, but sit inside, nice and warm and scrap.

I've been trying to catch up on a few things around the house that need to be taken care of. But then....I saw these challenges and they needed to be taken care of too!

The sketch is from My Sketch World. This is the January 17th sketch. Be sure to check out the forum for more fun sketches!

Frosted Designs has Fabulous Friday Challenges. This week's challenge was to use vellum, transparencies, or acrylic on your layout or project.

I used a piece of vellum text paper that says "Let it Snow". This was actually a leftover piece...gotta use those scraps! The patterned paper is from Heidi Grace. I cut the circle piece and used a little Glimmer Mist on it. The title are letters from Maya Road Sheer Alphas. I thought this would look good for the challenge too. Scattered around the page are lots of vellum snowflake stickers. The slide mounts are from a swap I was in a million years ago. The center of the slide is a sheer mesh with a silver snowflake stamped right on it. In the corners of each slide are acrylic snowflakes. :)

I searched my whole stash and just couldn't find a transparency that would work for this page. :(

Once the temperatures reach above zero, I might venture out to stock up on new stuff. :)

Bling on 2011 Challenges!

Are you playing along?? Sketches 4 All is having a great time with Bling on 2011 challenges! If you like BLING and winning prizes, this is the place to be! Hurry, the fun ends this weekend!!

Here are a few of the fun challenges we are having:

Pre-challenge: use sequins to make a fun page!

Challenge #1 - Use the sketch provided and the colors Pink and Green. Don't forget the sparkle!
Challenge #2 - Use metallics. Who doesn't have any metallic paper or embellishments?? Let's put them to use!
Challenge #3 - A fun recipe challenge! Doilies, flowers, rhinestones, glitter, crowns...pull out that stash and see what you got!
Challenge #4 - use 3 different kinds of bling!
Challenge #5 - NO patterned paper and use glimmer mist!
Challenge #6 - Glitter, Glimmer and Purple!!
And the fun is not over!! There are still a few more challenges! Don't miss out!

Get your entries in by this weekend to win some fun prizes!! And if you play along with all of them, you can win the Grand Prize!

Making Valentine's

Making an attempt at the Guest Designer Spot for Sketchy Thursdays. Here is the sketch we had to use.

We also had to use a Valentine theme - red or pink and a heart and do some journaling.

This is my little buddy with his animal friends making Valentine cards. :)

Frosted Fun...

Still working on the zillions of snow and winter pictures I took this year...so far....

It keeps coming down, so I'm sure there will be many many more!

I used another great picture of my two little ones at the Nature Preserve.

This sketch from Sketches in Thyme worked perfectly. Along with a few papers from Echo Park and a bunch of scraps.

Along the bottom of the page I added some white flocked paper to look like snow. The "let it snow" vellum has been in my stash forEVER!

The bling swirls are from Prima and the snowflake bling was found in the dollar section at Joann's.

I used this page for Lucinda's ABC Challenge at Sketches 4 All. For the letter "F" I used the title "Frosted Fun", Fiskars corner punches, and snowflake brads for fasteners. :)

Dreaming of warm weather....

Christy at Sketches 4 All had a great challenge! She used her trip to the Bahamas as an inspirational challenge. You could use the layout she used, the colors, pictures...anything that inspired you about her trip to the Bahamas.

I used some postcards that I had collected from our trip last year. I love collecting them because I know no matter how hard I try, I will never get such beautiful shots.

As I keep looking out at the snow....afraid to go out because it's only 18 degrees outside...I decided it was time to keep warm with thoughts of vacation.

I used a great multi-photo sketch from this week's challenge at Sketchy Thursdays. I almost passed on this one. I'm running out of the smaller pictures and didn't think I would be able to find anything. That's where the postcards came in handy.

I was also challenged at Scrap Fit this week. We had to use our stash and use lots of strips of papers. I pulled the huge box of scraps and started pulling pieces. I took me a while to narrow it down to just a few choices. I really need to pull that box out more...

We also had to add a row of embellishments. I, of course, went to my favorite...BUTTONS!

The title was made from vinyl Thickers letters. I couldn't believe I had enough a's to complete the title!

Happy Sunday!!!

More Snowflakes...

I LOVE looking at the snow, and I LOVE playing in the snow. But here in Chicago....almost as soon as the snow hits the ground, the temperatures drop to the teens.

My thoughts are to get out as soon as possible, take lots of pics and then hibernate in the house. I usually have my pictures, my scrap stash, hot cocoa and popcorn. That could keep me busy until Spring!

We have a beautiful nature preserve very near our home. Between the frozen lake, gardens, waterfalls and trees, my winter pictures are usually just one stop.

Here is one of my favorite pictures this season.

I used a fun sketch from Frosted Designs. I had originally planned on working with a Christmas picture and hanging ornaments, but couldn't find just the right one.

I pulled out the stash of OLD Heidi Grace papers called Snowflake Park. My inspiration here was from Scrap Our Stash. Our challenge was to "pagerize" this week's layout. I couldn't believe it when I saw these papers. I have had these forever and totally forgot about them! I was so excited to use up more of the stash! :)

At These are a Few of My Favorite Things, the challenge was to use a quote on our project. I dusted off my book of quotes and found the perfect one for this page.

I think I'm addicted to Stickles now. I am pretty sure I have used them on every page I did this week! Is that a bad thing??

Thanks for looking!!! :)