A Pinterest Inspired Layout with Practical Scrappers

 

Do you love Pinterest? You do?! Well, so do I! That's why I was more than happy to jump into this Practical Scrappers' challenge to create something scrapalicious using some of my Pinspiration. And boy howdy do I have a lot of it! Don't believe me? Check it out HERE! To see what my pinspiration was for this layout, check out today's post at PRACTICAL SCRAPPERS.

 

Of course, I could not resist using papers and embellishments found in CRATE PAPER'S 14 Collection. Here are a few close-ups so you can see just how delicious this collection is:

 

Love all the hearts that came with this collection.  I layered them and sewed on them until they were juuussst right.

Check out the bottom of my layout.  I cut the bottom of my paper pink paper along the zig zag and created a space between the two pieces of paper.  I placed these fussy cut hearts into the open space and sewed several lines across each one.  I left my threads uncut - a technique I've seen my friends AUDREY, HEATHER, and LISA use and that I've decided I like.

Sweet little alpha stickers make up the title of my layout.

That's it for me today. But before I go, did you hear the good news? I am so excited and happy to tell you that, in addition to playing with Practical Scrappers, I am now also on the design team for (insert drumroll here) PRETTY LITTLE STUDIO!!! Whoo-Hoo!!! To find out more info, check out the post right above this one!

Happy Wednesday, and Happy Scrapping!

Getting Ready for Halloween (and a non-related rant)

This morning the weather here in Tejas is a breezy, beautiful 63 degrees with a high expected of 75. Brrrr!!!!! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating as to the "coldness" of our cold front (that's right, the weather man is calling this a cold front for us), but it sure does feel incredibly wonderful and fall-like for the first time this year!

My thoughts are currently focused on Halloween which, to me, is the kick-off to the holiday season! The Hubs and I are both big kids-at-heart and love to dress up and put out Halloween decorations and tell ghost stories.

Apparently, my Goblin-and-Ghoul-Loving Gene was passed down to my second daughter (in the layout above), which should come as no surprise since she was born less than 5 hours before Halloween! I am not ashamed to admit that I am always stalking her Facebook page for photos, and when I found ones of her fiance and her playing with the masks in the store, I immediately saved them to my computer just in case she were to wise up and take them down. I'm pretty sneaky like that!

I used my Fancy Pants Oct 31st collection that I am working with this month for Let's Capture Our Memories and a sketch I found on Pinterest - which is quickly becoming my go-to site for anything and everything.

I am a HUGE fan of Fancy Pants Designs, and their Halloween collection certainly does not disappoint! The papers are beautifully detailed and range from vintage to little kid cute, allowing the creative freedom to scrap just about any Halloween-themed thing you can imagine. And the rub-ons and stickers included in the collection really let me layer my layout to my heart's desire! See?

Of course, I also had to make a couple of Halloween cards. I am on a handrwritten correspondence kick these days (an art that seems to be quickly dying out), and what better way to send a handwritten note or letter than inside a pretty handmade card, right? Right!

And that wraps it up for my Halloween projects for the moment. Now, on to my rant...

I NEVER thought I would hear myself saying, "In my day we just didn't do things like that..." but here I am getting ready to do exactly that! I guess that phrase comes along with crow's feet and hairs that keep wanting to turn gray...sigh.

Yesterday, I was at the grocery store picking up a couple of items for dinner. As I went through the check-out lane, the cashier made absolutely no eye-contact with me and said not one word during our entire transaction. Nothing. Nada. Now, I know she wasn't mute and was capable of speaking English based on a question that she answered for the customer ahead of me. But when it was my turn in line, there was no friendly smile, no "how are you," not even a "did you find everything." There was NOTHING. And this was not an isolated incident. I am encountering this same lack of...anything...from the store employee at more and more stores.

Now I worked in a grocery store throughout high school so that I could earn enough money to buy a car (and clothes, and make-up, and cassette tapes). I actually had to ring up grocery items and memorize the correct department keys, not run bar codes across a scanner. And, I certainly had to speak with and be friendly towards every customer whom I checked out; I would have been fired if I had not.

Don't get me wrong, I certainly don't expect to engage in a long conversation with the cashier. But is it too much to expect a "hello" and a friendly smile? Is courtesy no longer part of the job description?! Should I say something, or should I let it go and simply mourn the passing of time and standards? What would YOU do?

A Reveal and a Possible Theft

I love to take photos and scrapbook about the big events in life such as holidays, birthdays, weddings, etc. But, what I most enjoy doing is capturing everyday moments - because I believe those little moments are the ones that really define who we are and our relationships with each other. And when I am old and senile, it is much more important to me that I remember not what Christmas gift was given to whom but what event occurred that touched my heart. And those events are almost always associated with the smallest things - the things that really aren't so small after all!

I used my Birds of a Feather October Kit to create the layout of my youngest daughter, who was singing and be-bopping around the kitchen while helping me to put the groceries away. Of course, after I made a mad dash for the camera, she decided to become slightly self-conscious and STOPPED what she was doing. But when I look at this layout and these pictures, I am immediately transported back to that exact moment in time and the feeling that all was right with my world.

I love the rich fall colors included in this month's kit and the abundance of coordinated embellies Amy always includes. And the chipboard images (from the Crate Paper Farmhouse Collection) are PERFECT for layouts about those everyday moments that I prefer to record. See?

Speaking of everyday moments, I was compelled to do a layout about this little restaurant I had breakfast at every stinking day during my recent California trip.

I figured if the 800 - 2000 calorie breakfasts (yes, they had the nerve to print the calorie count in the menus...as if that would stop me from eating them)were good enough to make me go off my somewhat sensible diet and risk food coma before 10 a.m., then it was scrapworthy. So I did.

I used Sketch 173 from Creative Scrappers.

I dipped my empty bottle of Glossy Accents into a tiny puddle of Acrylic Paint to make the distressed circles on my layout. Yes, that Glossy Accents is even handy when it is completely empty! I have been seeing this technique used on layouts for quite awhile but just got up the nerve to try it. I like the way it turned out, so it is definitely a keeper for me.

Something that didn't turn so well, however, was my flower I tried to make with the wonderful zipper that was included in the kit. I watched a great tutorial a couple of times and it LOOKED easy enough. Sadly, though, what I ended up with was a sticky, warped piece of zipper that refused to stay together and that could not be called a flower by ANY stretch of the imagination. Even my cats didn't want to play with it, and they love ALL THINGS scrapbooky. Luckily, I had two halves of the zipper so I decided to take the safe route and use the other half as a border.

Now, ummmm....if you don't hear from me in the next few days you may need to come bail me out of jail. Please? Pretty Please??? But I figure if I do go to jail, at least I may make new law by establishing the Pinterest Defense. You see, one of the things I found on that holiest-of-holies SITE was a couple of links to make a pallet table, which I thought would look PERFECT on my back porch. See?

Totally cute, right? Well, the other day as I was driving through a neighorhood adjacent to mine that has lots of new houses under construction, what did I see but a HUGE stack of empty pallets just sitting in the front yard of one of the unfinished homes. It was like manna, or in this case pallets, from Heaven!!! So, being a good law-abiding citizen, I waited until dark and then completely innocently drove over there while coincidentally clothed completely in black and loaded three of them into the back of my SUV. And to make sure I wouldn't go to jail alone strain my back, I had the Hubster help me. No seriously, I am ALMOST certain the pallets were left stacked out front for trash pick-up...at least that is what I will tell myself every time I set a cold beverage down on my pallet table while relaxing in my back yard planning my next crime project.

Hope you have a crime-free Pinteresting day!

A Pinterest Do or Don't? You Answer...

After drinking a pot of coffee, I have decided that it really is Monday and I am not just having a bad dream. I had plans, big plans, of getting at least two or three layouts done this weekend. Guess how many I finished?! Can you guess? Drum roll, please....I finished zippity-doo-dah! That's right, I got done a big old goose egg's worth - nada - zilch - nothing - not one thing! And I am pouting a little about it, believe me.

In all fairness, I am working on a mini-album that is due for a reveal on Friday, and I have a few more projects that are - well - at least in the planning stage. Which is better than nothing, I suppose, right? Right?! (please feel free to lie to me here and tell me I'm right)

Okay, enough of my whining and on to the reason for this post. This weekend, I was on PINTEREST, which is pretty much the coolest idea of a site in the world. The ONLY thing that would make it cooler would be if I had thought of it and created it! Seriously. So, like I said, there I was on Pinterest, and I did a search for sketches because I was trying my darnedest to find some inspiration. There were a lot of great sketches posted, or "pinned" to use the correct Pinterest-ese. But, I recognized several sketches that I know were from sites which request that their work not be reposted without express permission (and other legal don't-even-think-about-doing-it jargon) by the sketch creator.

Now, for those of you who are not familiar with Pinterest, you can click on the link to the picture, and you are taken to the website on which it's located; however, you don't really have to do that to see the picture or "pin" of the sketch and, more often than not, no credit is listed in the pin description as to where the sketch originated. Of course, again, you CAN click on the link which will direct you to the original website.

So here's my question - quite simply, is that cool or not? Is it a bad thing or something no one will ever care about? What do you think? I would really like to know.

Fabulous Finds Friday

Happy Friday everybody! Whew! We've made it through another week and have just a few more hours (here in Texas) until the weekend officially commences! I don't know about you, but my plans this weekend are pretty simple: to do a little bit of cleaning, a little bit of cooking and a whole lotta scrapping.

My first layout stars my brand new nephew that my wonderful brother and his wife recently gifted me with - well, not really GIFTED since they won't actually give me the baby (although I've asked, trust me)! This picture was taken by my brother just a few minutes after birth and sent to me. Needless to say, after seeing it,I quickly hopped on a plane and headed out to Cali-for-NI-a so that I could hold and coo over him (my nephew, not my brother)!

I used Creative Scrappers SKETCH 172 (that's right; I'm only two behind) and some delicious Pink Paislee papers that my BESTIE helped me find during a little shopping frenzy that she and I engaged in last month.

Annnnddddd....today it's my turn to reveal what I've been making using my wonderful scrappy products from the Let's Capture Our Memories STORE. Here is the layout, using Kaisercraft papers from the Class of '87 Collection (and once again starring my brand new nephew along with his super-sweet big sis)

Close-ups you say? You want to see close-ups? Well, okay, here you go:

(yes, I made those accordian flowers all by myself)

(got that particular banner idea from Pinterest)

(loving those little resin flowers)

For a list of products used and more details, head on over to the LCOM BLOG.

And now, to celebrate the beginning of Fall (and in a desperate attempt to justify all the hours I have been spending on Pinterest lately), I have included a few links to sites I found with some pretty nifty fall-related crafts and ideas that I think you will like, too!

You can learn how to make a pretty fall pillow HERE
You can get the recipe for pumpkin chocolate chip brownies HERE
You can make an orange cinnamon clove simmer to get your house smelling yummy HERE
You can learn how to carve a pumpkin using Cookie Cutters HERE
You can make layouts like these by Kathy Skou, including her SUH-WEET Halloween layout found HERE

Do you have any favorite Pinterest (or other links you would like to share featuring a fall craft or layout that is a favorite for you? Well then hook a sister up and leave a comment with the link!!!

That's it for me. Hope your Friday is Fabulous and Full of Fun Plans for the Weekend!