MammaJamma Blabba

the party's over

2012-02-01T22:14:00.000-08:00

CHA Winter '12 is a wrap and my head is swimming and brimming with thoughts, ideas, inspirations, things to share, plans to make.

I can't wait to post some of my pics here in the next few days. For now, here is a booth pic with some of the Pink Paislee/Heidi Swapp team. (It just wasn't possible to get all of us together at one time.)

the happiest place on earth

2012-01-28T09:22:00.000-08:00

Today, I'm in Anaheim at the happiest place on earth. No, not Disneyland. I'm at the Convention Center for the Craft and Hobby Association's annual winter trade show.

You don't have to be a paper crafter to love this one. It is every craft, ALL crafts - fine art, needle art, kids crafts, and more. The show floor opens on Sunday and for two days I'll be working the Pink Paislee booth. This is my third year working with them and I'm thrilled. The booth is always fabulous, the people are terrific and I always have a fabulous time.

I was able to preview what they have in store for us about two weeks ago and have had to keep my lips sealed all this time. That wasn't easy! You're going to love what's coming and I can't wait to share photos with you!

The Pink Paislee team, CHAW '11

On Tuesday and Wednesday I'll be walking the show floor and taking lots and lots of photos. As usual, I'll be posting my pics at Flickr. You can view photos from last year's show here.

I'll do my best to be a good set of "eyes and ears" for those of you who can't be there!

what... me excited?

2012-01-27T10:36:00.000-08:00

You betcha I'm excited! Tomorrow the Craft & Hobby Associations Winter Trade Show begins. Saturday is the start of the education program and I can't wait!

I remember when I was a kid that if we knew we would be going somewhere exciting the next day (like Disneyland, for example) being so giddy with anticipating that it seemed impossible to go to sleep. Not expecting to have trouble with the sleeping tonight but still planning on having a great time.

Anaheim Convention Center, here I come!

perfect motifs

2012-01-25T22:44:00.000-08:00

I love this time of the year. The CHA sneaks are coming fast and furious, and anticipation is building. Here's something cool to look forward to. "Perfect Motifs" from Websters Pages...

By: Webster's Pages
Do you love all our motifs but don't always want to fussy cut? Problem solved! Introducing Webster's Pages Perfect Motifs PaperPad!

Looks like something I would love to work with!

wanna win some twine?

2012-01-24T14:58:00.000-08:00

Want to win some fabulous baker's twine? Head over to the Itsy Bitsy Paper by Lindy blog to see how you can win a Sampler Pack from The Twinery!

a new issue of "ready, set, create" is just days away

2012-01-23T09:00:00.000-08:00

Just a little sneaky peek into the next issue of Ready, Set, Create ezine. The paper team was challenged to create three projects from this supply of fun frills. With all this goodness, how's a girl to choose?

So many lovely trims

I will let you in one one of my choices...

I <3 my trusty Heidi iron!

Somehow the cute pink & white polka dot fabric above didn't end up in the photo of all the goodies, but as you can see it's adorable. I pulled out my trusty Heidi Swapp iron and pressed it into perfect pleats for a lovely "love" card. (That damask bag in the background was from the dollar bins at Michael's a couple of years ago and the perfect tote for my mini iron.)

The creative team had some fun challenges for the new issue of Ready, Set, Create. Be sure to check it out -- it will debut on February 1st.

take twelve in 2012

2012-01-21T22:28:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, I decided to do the "Take Twelve" photography/scrapbooking challenge at Ella Publishing. Have you heard about it? It encourages scrapbookers worldwide to take 12 photos featuring their everyday life on the 12th of every month, for 12 months, during the year 2012. Sounds pretty do-able to me.

In fact, it's actually a great challenge for me because it isn't overly ambitious given my available time. Plus knowing me (as I do), I don't think it's possible for me to find a way to attach a bunch of (self-imposed) guilt to this project. Like I said - do-able.

I know we're already past the 12th of January. In fact, I joined on the 15th - a few days late. However if you follow the link above they tell you ways to participate even if you're getting a late start. So, why don't you come out and play? There is a photo pool at Flickr which is fun to look through too.

Anyone else up for the Take Twelve project?

back in love again

2012-01-19T16:43:00.000-08:00

In December as part of my annual JUG ("Just Us Girls") event, we made "junk journals" (aka DIY "smash" books). It was one of the funnest projects I've worked on for awhile and one of the things that I loved about it was that I used so many of my stamps. In fact, it made me fall back in love with stamping.

So much so that even though we haven't yet gotten to the organize-your-stamps section of the "Resolve to Get Organized" seminar, I had to do a little something to make my most useful stamps easier to get to. In one of the previous "Get Organized" sessions someone suggested using acrylic shadow box frames as stacking trays for stamps. Genius!

I had been haunting the organization aisles of Target, Walmart and Bed, Bath & Beyond looking for some sort of stacking tray that was just the right dimensions to fit in my IKEA Expedit drawers. Everything I found measured wrong in some direction or another. But the acrylic frames are PERFECT! Plus I can layer them three deep, so that lots and lots of stamps fit yet are easy to go through quickly. So happy with these!

really good goodies

2012-01-18T13:35:00.000-08:00

Don't let the plain brown wrapper fool you

One of the good (or maybe bad?) things about networking with other crafters online is that you get wind of some very good deals. The kind that cannot be passed up. That's how I found myself placing an order at My Scraps and More a couple of weeks ago.

Their label is so cute!

A fellow "willow" started a thread with a hard to resist subject line: 65% off. Wow!

So, here are the goodies I found myself drawn to. Thankfully, I found the sale after others had mostly cleaned the shelves (or at least taken lots of other stuff I was attracted to). But I'm super pleased with what I was able to pick up for just over $13 (that's including S&H people!)

I love a good deal. Sigh.

scrap space right now

2012-01-17T16:01:00.000-08:00

I should clarify that this is my "working" space. I also have a storage space that is not at all a pretty sight and which I will also be working on during the "Resolve to Get Organized" series. Maybe (just maybe) I'll talk about that space in another post.

So this is what you might call the "far end" of my rectangular living room. I believe it is meant to serve as a formal dining space. Last summer, after repainting the living room, I decided it was time to upgrade this end of the room so that it wasn't so out of place with the rest of the living space. As you can see, it still looks like a workspace and a crafty one at that, but it isn't quite as cluttered looking as it used to be back when mis-matched furniture lining the walls. I couldn't find a "before" photo to share, so you'll have to take my word for this.

I love my big IKEA "Expedit" unit which now serves as the main storage area for my supplies. It's taken awhile to get used to which supplies are in what cubby, but I've got that down finally. The area is a mess in this picture (and it usually is), but that table to the left in front of my sliding glass doors is not usually there. Those are leftover kits & class supplies from my JUG event in December. That's the first target for my organizational effort!

The floating shelves you see at the right in the pic above and close-up below hold some supplies too, as does the sideboard below them. Mostly tools and generic supplies like adhesives, mists, tapes and glitters.

But the big IKEA unit is the backbone of my supplies where there are bins dedicated to my rainbow section of my stash. Each of the boxes on the fourth shelf houses two colors of the rainbow, with another box holding 'rainbow/mixed' supplies. Those damask paperholders on the second shelf hold my cardstock and the other shelves hold assorted often-used tools and supplies. In the drawers are stamping supplies and punches, with larger tools and liquids in the two end cabinets.

The only thing I haven't yet figured out how or rather where to store is my "themed" supplies. Fortunately, I don't have many of these because they aren't something I use much. But I do have some and would really like to get a ScrapRack Travel Pack and a few extra spinders for those supplies.

I'll be posting more photos as I trudge through the organization course, so stay tuned!

gotta lotta

2012-01-16T15:46:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow is the first session of "Resolve to Get Organized" a scrapbook organization webinar by Tiffany Spaulding of The ScrapRack. I took the Fall and Winter sessions of the class and was able to get a wee bit done with regard to my organization (or should I say lack of). But this time I'm going all in.

Besides finding the time to go through stuff and the just making myself do it, my biggest challenge will be purging. I'm what Tiffany calls a "Gotta Lotta" (as you probably noticed during the rubons challenge post below). I really do like what I've bought/acquired and usually have some kind of plan for most of it. So letting go is not easy. But that is what is NEEDED and is way, way overdue.

A peek at what awaits me - class materials

I expect I'll need another pass or two through my stuff before it is lean and mean, but at this point any changes for the good will be a big improvement. Tomorrow I'll show you what my scrap space looks like and I'll try to be good about posting update pics throughout the process.

Until then!

PS I think you can still sign up for the seminar and you don't have to be a ScrapRack user to attend and benefit.

stash challenge

2012-01-15T15:25:00.000-08:00

One of the assignments for the "Ready, Set, Create" creative team for the next ezine is a stash challenge. All the team members chose one (or two) stash items to create with. It was tempting to pick an item I already am using a lot and go from there, but I stopped myself and thought why not actually challenge myself. As I looked at the list, I realized that "rubons" were the perfect choice for me because at one time they were my absolute favorite embellishment. I loved them so much that I built up quite a stockpile that now sits neglected.

I have more than a few rubons

So after signing up for them, I hauled out my stash. This is most of what I have in that department (except for the odd sheet tucked away in a kit or packed with my rolling crop bag). That box in the back of the pic above holds my alphabet rubons and it's about 18" wide, 15" tall & deep. That's a whole LOTTA alphas, my friends!

The other two accordian files are maybe 15" in length (or width, I guess), about 12" tall and 4" or 5" deep when full expanded. One holds shapes & designs and the other holds words & sayings.

Funny thing about rubons is that when I bought my first few packages, I wouldn't use them. My very illogical reasoning was that if I used them then I wouldn't have them any more because they'd be used up. How dumb is that, right? (I've done this with other products too, sadly.) I thought got over that at some point and went to town with rubons, but somewhere along the line I just sorta stopped using them. Not absolutely, but mostly. (Maybe I never really did get over my issue with not wanting to use them up?) Anyway, whatever the issue it's a shame really because (not only do I have a ton but) when I finally use them, they look GREAT! And they're easy to use and so versatile too. That's why I fell in love with them to begin with.

You can use them on silk flowers, or ribbon/twill. They look great used directly on photos (I especially like to use white rubons on dark areas of photos) and on acrylic or acetate. I can't wait to use them on my RSC projects and hopefully inspire some of our readers to try them if they haven't before. Or, if they're like me and have neglected them, they can pull them out and re-discover them.

So what are you hoarding in your stash that you need to challenge yourself to use?

pink mat love

2012-01-13T15:15:00.000-08:00

I love my big pink Tattered Angels mat!

So I finally broke down and got myself the huge pink Tattered Angels work mat. It is something I've wanted for the longest time because as much as I loved and used my Ranger mat sometimes it just didn't cover enough of my desk. And now that I have a nice, new desk (table) from IKEA I'd like to do my best to keep it protected.

The big surprise has been that it has other bonuses besides its larger size. One is that it's such a light shade that I tend to lose less of the little stuff on it. Everything just shows up so well because of the contrast against that light pink color. The other plus is that the pink makes me feel cheerful. Not a necessary quality in a work mat, of course, but one that I'll appreciate anyway.

The thing that made me finally 'pony up' and get one is that they seem to be getting harder to find (or is that just my perception?) Anyway, that helped give me a kick in the seat of the pants and just buy one. And I'm so happy I did.

happy mail

2012-01-11T15:10:00.000-08:00

This week I had not one, but two very happy packages hit my doorstep. One was some washi tape I ordered from Etsy store "Chickydoddle". It was SOoooooo hard to choose tapes to buy because they have lots and lots to choose from. Last month, during my annual "JUG" event ("Just Us Girls") we made junk journals (aka DIY "smash" books) and the washi tape will be the perfect thing to use in my new journal.

I also finally picked up a Serious supply of baker's twine from The Twinery. They have so many yummy colors that it is great to be able to try out several in the variety mix.

Now all that's left is finding the time to play...

Twine and tape - can you see the possibilities?

opera party

2011-09-01T16:54:00.000-07:00

Guest of Honor/Hostess

Thought I'd share a few pics from my daughter's 8th grade promotion party a couple of weekends ago. She *hearts* Phantom of the Opera so way back when (before school was even done) she had decided she wanted a theme party. At first it was going to be a Phantom themed party, but in the end we went with a general opera them.

As the girls arrived we were playing a variety of mostly well known opera music in the background. All the girls were encouraged to wear formals. After the guests were greeted, they received a "playbill" outlining the evening for them (we had lots of stuff for them to do --never a dull moment!)

The first thing they saw as they entered the foyer was this guy (who my daughter insists looks more Leonardio Di Caprio, than Gerard Butler).

The Phantom (inspiration, decoration & victim for "pin the mask on the phantom")

Souvenir Program

After a few ice-breaking activities, the girls had dinner. A buffet style tea table ("with too many sweet things" I heard later).

Buffet table

A few of my friends (the moms of our guests) helped me with the finishing touches. I was thrilled that my friend Allison remembered fancy napkin folding from her younger days when she did a stint waitressing at a 5-star restaurant.

Dining table

Group pic

After dinner conversation

Celina checks to see what is coming up next

After good food and good friends, the girls slipped into comfy clothes and spent the rest of the night rocking "Dance Central" on the x-box.

tsk, tsk, tsk

2011-08-17T20:35:00.000-07:00

Three months is a kind of a long time to be absent from my blog.

But happily it doesn't mean I've been absent from life. So much going on that I forget not only to blog about it, but sometimes I don't even turn on my computer. (Eeek!) That is not the girl I once was. But actually I'm kind of proud of being less of a... um, chair potato.

So, you must know that once I *did* get my summer garden planted (which I did since the last post), it starts to beg time from me. It needs watering, and some occasional pruning and then of course the best part is the harvesting. If the weather is very warm (and it has been lately), the garden is a regular/daily part of my morning routine. Plus the veggies aren't the only area that I'm "in charge" of, so summer does increase my yard duties for sure.

Here's a recent pic of the garden in it's crazy overgrown August state. My sunflowers just started blooming since I planted them sort of late in the spring.

The sunflowers are in the overcrowded zuchinni/cucumber bed and the whole crazy mess is blocking the view of the other beds. It's so different from last year's garden but wonderful in its own way. Loving have lots of cucumbers all the time. The basil and the rest of the herbs as well as the peppers are all doing great. The tomatoes aren't doing as well, sadly. The plants are gorgeous but they aren't producing near as many fruits as I had last year. Still, what we are getting is absolutely delicious!

In other summer happenings - my son's graduation party is now history. It was such a fun event that went by much too quickly. I wish I could have just slowed down time for that one day. Here are some of my favorite photos from the party.

We took most of the bulky furniture out of our living room (moved it to the garage) to create a nice big dance floor for the party. Before the party was even over it dawned on me how easy it would be to paint the room while the furniture was still out in the garage, so guess what my next project was? And it morphed into something a little bigger than just a paint job. While I was at it, I decide to re-do my scrap area. It's something I've been wanting to do and this just seemed like the perfect time to give the whole room an upgrade.

I can't wait to share photos of the area soon. It's still a work-in-progress because I've had to put it on hold several times while other important things took priority, but I'm SO close to finishing it that I can almost taste it. (Can you "taste" finishing a project?)

One thing helping me get back to the scrap area project is that I'm now in the throes of pulling of another party. This one is for my daughter to celebrate her promotion from middle school to high school. It's just three days away and there is lots to do. Not the least of which is clearing out the scrap area (yay!)

There will be lots of fun photos to take this weekend between the party and finishing the scrap area. I can't wait to share!

building borders... of flowers, that is

2011-05-16T23:07:00.000-07:00

Nasturtiums in last year's veggie garden

So far this year there hasn't been a whole lot of time for gardening. It's killing me. The raised vegetable beds are nearly empty except for a couple of old peppers from last spring and a couple of solitary onion/garlic plants. The beds keep calling me.

The front yard, on the other hand, is getting some attention. It's one of the things on my very long To Do list as I try to get everything spruced up for the graduation party. The Big Day is rapidly approaching and there is SO much to do. Besides designing and making invitations, ordering rentals and food, and deciding on and pre-recording music, there are so many little projects to be done around the house and yard.

Thought I'd share a couple of 'before' and 'after' pics of one area I've been working on. I call it the "office bed" because it's under the office window. This first pic was taken right before the house was painted in Fall, 2009.


November, 2009

And another from the same time frame (right after painting) and before I started working on the bed.

November, 2009 - after the house was painted

And then last summer, the work began. First, some pretty plants came home with me and waited for their permanent spots in the bed.

June 2010, plants in pots waiting to be transplated

Then the job of amending the soil, which I don't enjoy much but it's gotta be done...

June, 2010 - bed finally reworked about a year ago

This is how the "office bed" was looking last summer.

July, 2010 - filled in with a few more shrubs

Fast forward to this month. I guess, this last pic isn't quite an 'after' pic since this is a work-in-progress, but it's certainly showing improvement.

May, 2011

Now, let's hope it fills in the way I'd like it to.

quietly crafting (among other things)

2011-04-23T17:44:00.000-07:00

At California Adventure with the kiddoes

So even thought I've been pretty busy this year, it's been a fairly quiet year for me as far as teaching classes. Fact is, other than the classes I've done at my home, I haven't done any other teaching. It wasn't that I haven't wanted to, but before this year even started I knew I had a big, busy spring in store. I guess I've really just been too distracted to throw myself into the throes of class design & prep (as much as I wanted to).

At CHA Winter Show with Tammy, Genine & Michelle

As I mentioned in my last post, I haven't been on hiatus from my creative/crafty life. Besides attending and working the CHA Winter show in January and the Anaheim Scrapbook Expo in February, I also kept busy creating projects for Ready, Set, Create ezine so I've been plenty crafty.

Scrapbook Expo Anaheim - Working with PK Glitz

This month I've been busy getting ready to be a vendor at an NSD crop in Orange County (more on that at my other blog).

Getting my vendor table ready for NSD crop

But the Big Thing that has really got my attention is party planning. My son graduates high school in just a little over a month. And in just a couple of weeks after that we are having a graduating party for him. Seems like there is so much (too much) to do in just 8 weeks.

Trying to remember to take it one step at a time. Oh, yeah... and to breathe.

get your craft on!

2011-03-10T22:03:00.000-08:00

In case you don't already know it, March is National Craft Month. That means it's a great time to...

discover and explore a new craft (or re-discover an old craft)
expand your crafty horizons by trying a new technique
add your handmade flair to something that is otherwise ordinary (the link will take you to a blog with LOTS of ideas, if you are up to the challenge)

For me, March has been very crafty. In fact, so far all of 2011 has been one big crafty event. First, there was the Craft & Hobby Association Winter Trade Show aka "CHA" (what? you're saying I haven't posted my pics? eeek! I better take care of that, right?). Then, no sooner was I back from CHA and dove straight into designing/prepping some cards for my monthly crop group using some of the new techniques I'd picked up at the show.

After the crop was history we squeezed in a weekend trip to Disney (not crafty, but very inspirational I'd say). We had a great time and less than a week later I was back in Anaheim for Scrapbook Expo.

That was just about two weeks ago, and since returning I've been deep in crafty-land getting my projects done for the next edition of Ready, Set, Create. I've been in a lovely glittery, inky mess of delight since then.

I will leave you with this sneaky peek at some of my RSC projects, and be sure to look for the new issue when it debuts the first of April (no fooling!)

new maya road to love

2011-01-25T00:18:00.000-08:00

Maya Road just posted the last of their sneaks and it is YUMMY! The thing I'm really digging is the canvas and especially the canvas dress form. Isn't this too cute? Take a look at these projects from their blog using the dress form:

To see the entire sneak, be sure to visit the Maya Road blog (did I mention there's a giveaway involved?)

super productive day

2011-01-17T21:57:00.000-08:00

Some of the buttons from today's discovery

I got so much done today ... now, why can't every day be so fruitful?

First I did my 30 minute walk. I've been trying for daily on this but haven't managed more than three successive days. Gonna keep at it though. It's gotten easier, that's for sure. I'm walking faster and working my legs more so there's a plus. Next my morning bible reading, which I'm doing better at consistency-wise. I think I've missed two days this month (but made up the reading so that I stay on schedule). So, yay me.

From there it was on to garage/patio cleanup & organization. Just made a wee dent in all that there is to do, but any start is a good one. I was able to find a clothes rack in the garage that I'd promised to loan to my mom and in the process get some of the storage boxes labelled and tidied. The patio had created its own little project for me - a box had tipped over (the cat may have had a paw in this!) The contents had spilled out blocking the path to my scrapbook storage area, so it had to be dealt with.

On the plus side here, I found a treasure trove of buttons to put into my stash. They were those extra buttons that come with new clothes and I'd saved them for 30 years or so. I used to keep them in my old dresser but I guess when I got the new one, they got packed up and forgotten. Still not sure how they ended up in the particular box they were found in, but oh well.

With access to my storage restored, I went about putting away supplies from the Just Us Girls event last month. They've been hanging around my living room for a few weeks too many since I've been super busy with creating for the upcoming issue of Ready, Set, Create magazine. The new issue will hit the streets in less than two weeks (yahoo!)

I also had some new goodies to put into inventory as a result of some recent shopping binges (insert red-faced, eyes downcast smiley here). Actually, truth told I'm not really embarrassed or regretful of my purchases because I was able to snag some awesome deals on unique items that will make great additions to future classes. Yay!

In the late afternoon, I tackled some unruly plants that needed to be tamed. I trimmed an old lantana that has been left unattended for far too long and has gotten very leggy and woody. I didn't have the energy to prune it into complete submission, but it does look better than when it started. I also took the Mexican sage down with a good, serious sheer leaving only a handful of very tender new growth. I also have a perennial salvia that was looking very tired, so took that down to the ground and noticed that it is already sending up some new growth. These are all beautiful plants and I can't wait for them to come back around.

Now, I'm all about preparing my PaperCraft Princess retail sales tax return so I can focus on getting ready for CHA! It will all come together... it always does.

yummy stuff

2011-01-14T17:57:00.000-08:00

Look for these projects in Feb/Mar issue

I've had a busy week creating projects for the Feb/Mar edition of Ready, Set, Create ezine. We have some awesome sponsors for this issue (as always). This is a sneak of just a few of the things I've created.

I'm also very excited about a special feature that I'm doing for this issue, "Scrapbooking Off the Page" -- with some great ideas and samples of projects for displaying your special memories.

Everyone on the creative team has been super busy creating lots of exciting projects to inspire and motivate the RSC readers. Be sure to look for the new issue on February 1st!

cha is approaching quickly

2011-01-12T18:09:00.000-08:00

At the Pink Paislee booth, CHA Winter 2010

At the end of the month designers/instructors/retailers/manufacturers/sales reps all will descend on the City of Angels (L.A. Convention Center to be specific) for the Craft and Hobby Association's winter trade show. I'm looking forward to being there again and for the second year I'll be working in the Pink Paislee booth for a couple of days.

One of the most exciting things about CHA is the new product releases and the samples. For any of you crafty types who aren't able to be at the show, surfing the web for sneak peeks at the new releases is the next best thing. Nancy Nally of Scrapbook Update has added a nice resource for finding the latest sneaks at her blog. Check it out!

The other thing I will recommend to my fellow crafters is to surf the manufacturer websites over the next couple of weeks. Most manufacturers not only leak sneaky peeks at their soon-to-be-released products, but they also post lots of wonderful projects using the new lines which means lots of great inspiration to get your creative juices flowing! Some of them also post contests with giveaways (I've added a link to one at the end of this post), so be sure to visit the manufacturer blogs (if you're on Facebook keep an eye out for release updates and links to manufacturer blogs - you'll need to "like" the company first in order for the updates to show up in your news feed).

Have fun!

ETA on 1/14/10 - click below to enter to win a new, unreleased Core'dinations assorted pack:
Core'dinations- win a paper pack

a little change is always good

2011-01-03T19:38:00.000-08:00

So, the last time I tried to update the design of this blog I totally jacked it up and had to revert back to my hum drum layout. But tonight, I am happy to say, there are no scary unexpected results from my little tweaks. Yay! (sigh of relief).

Maybe this little refurbishing will be just what is needed to get me back on the old blog wagon. I've certainly been an absentee owner these past 3 months (eek!) Truth told, tho, it isn't just the blog that I've neglected but I have kind of turned my back on the computer completely. You see, it has a way of sucking time out of my day so I've found that when I have a lot to do (and the "to do" list doesn't include computer work), it's better to just leave it turned off.

So, should I or shouldn't I do a re-cap for the lost months of September to now? I think maybe I will since this blog has turned out to be a good archive of what happened when for me (this is especially handy when it comes to journaling scrapbook pages for events long past).

So, in a nutshell...

August
August was vacation month last year as it has been for the past few years. With my son in summer school, this really is the first and only chance we have to all get away together. So for 2010, our summer vacation was a week of camping at Carpinteria State Beach, followed by a week home, followed by a week in Vegas. (I'll add a few pics later). ETA: to say that the pics are slow in coming because of the Great Computer Crash of '10 --I have to find where I saved pics to while my desktop computer was out of service.

September
When we got back a couple of not so great things happened. First I got pretty sick (ugh) and second (actually simultaneously) my desktop computer crashed in a major way and had to be partially rebuilt. I had managed to back up most (but not all) of my data. Before the rebuild, my techie staff (DH & DS) tried re-formatting the hard drive. So before it got better it got bad again. Meaning, I had started re-installing software and re-loading data when the darn thing crashed (again). In the end, it took several weeks to get back in business and I still haven't finished reloading all my data. Sigh.

October
Being sick was miserable, but had an "up" side because I needed to work on our taxes for 2009 (we had filed an extension). So that was what I spent most of September into October working on. Such a relief to have it done at last (though not a relief to find out how much was owed to Uncle Sam -ouch!)

November
November was a much more crafty month. I started the month out with finishing my projects for Ready, Set Create December/January issue. After those were done, I was all about getting ready for my week-long crafting event, "Just Us Girls". This is a week of back-to-back classes that I host in my home the first week of winter break and there is lots to do to get ready for that. In the midst of putting that together, the fam and I ducked out for a quick trip to NoCal to see family and while there I got hooked on Rock Band and the xbox Kinect's 'Dance Central'. We came home with a plan to get our hands on our first game console.

December
December was all about finalizing my event plans, kitting the classes and making sure I was ready (pictures soon!) And we squeezed in some Dance Central where we could (it's so fun - we're hooked!) Winter break was here before I could believe it and even though that first week was a very soggy one, I had a great turnout for my event. This is the third year doing "Just Us Girls" and I have to say it feels like it was the best year yet. The week really flew by and once it was over we moved on to doing more fun family things like having my sisters and their kids over for ... you guessed it "Dance Central" and "Rock Band". We also had some of the kids' friends over for movies and xbox.

And here we are at January and a new year. Where does the time go?

i blog...

2010-10-07T16:21:00.000-07:00

... therefore I am.

(and yes this applies even if I only blog infrequently.)

it's august already? really?

2010-08-02T22:56:00.000-07:00

Wow, how did that happen? Seems like one day you're welcoming the end of school and summer's start and then you blink your eyes and the school clothes & supplies are nearly sold out.

My kids actually have about a month of freedom left. Summer school is finished and we have a couple of weeks "to kill" until the end of August when we will enjoy two weeks of very welcome R&R. So until those vacation weeks creep up on us, we'll busy ourselves with school shopping and then trying to soak in some fun from the lazy hours when we're not.

Fun at a family bbq

We had notice from Southern California Edison that tomorrow is finally "the day" - they will be coming into the neighborhood to replace old equipment and the power may be out as long as 10 hours. Sure hope that is a "worse case scenario" time frame and that it doesn't really take all day.

Formerly a garden path, now zucchini extension

I'm also hoping the contractors don't trample the garden too much. When I placed it way back in the corner by the phone/power pole I thought that I was leaving plenty of room for access to the pole. But being the newbie gardener that I am, I didn't anticipate how much the plants would overflow their beds and how much bulging they would do into the walkways. The zucchini in particular has completely overtaken one of the paths (the one, in fact, that is the direct route to the pole). Hopefully the workers will tread lightly, or navigate up the other (open) path. But I'm not counting on it. Sigh. Well, at least the zucchini was already showing signs of slowing down. That makes me feel less bad about it taken a possible beating.

Speaking of the garden (I don't need much invitation to launch into that topic), July was an awesome month. Finally after weeks of carefully tending and waiting on my plants, they were finally rewarding me with goodness to cook & eat. I haven't had to buy tomatoes in a full month. And my tomatoes are oh so yummy - often (tho not always) better than what I can buy at the market. I've had beans and cucumbers and eggplant and peppers and herbs. I couldn't be happier.

Slim pickings!

I'm wiser this side of my gardening venture, too. I learned that for the joy of a wider variety of plants, I sacrificed volume. So, my little harvests are actually a little funny if you see them on a daily basis. They might consist of a couple of tomatoes, a handful green beans, and a cucumber or two. Never enough to be considered a "bounty". That's also due in part to my small beds. I've got two 4' x 4' beds and one 18" x 6' bed. After I finished setting up my garden I read that a small garden should include about one 4' x 4' bed per person in the family. So, mine is actually less than "small" I guess. It was a good way to find out what was manageable for me, however.

Sunflowers!

An exciting garden development in the past week include the blooming of all my sunflower plants. I find it so amazing that these towering giants started as small seeds a relatively few weeks ago. Wow.

Cornstalk tassels!

I'm also excited to see tassels on my corn stalks. Corn was an afterthought and I planted it kind of late in the season. The oh-so-sunny spot I picked in spring has become very shady as the surrounding plants have filled out (especially the heirloom tomatoes and the adjacent orange tree). Perhaps the corn is suffering from lack of sun. Some stalks are stunted and overall the corn has been very slow to grow. At this point I'm not too hopeful for abundance and will settle for a sweet delicious ear or two.

The sound of the gal working on the chain gang

My summer garden has at any rate given me the confidence (despite my war with the aphids and the battle against powdery mildew) to expand it a little bit. I'm working on clearing a very nasty patch of thatchy weeds posing as grass near my trashcan and compost service area near my garage. I posted on Facebook that I feel like I'm on a chain gang or working for a quarry because this patch is embedded with large stones that seem to be everywhere! Just when I think I've removed the last one, I find more. They're not too easy to get out of the ground. Years of sitting there untouched has allowed them to sink very stubbornly into the clay like soil and the thatchy weedy grass growing over them hasn't helped either. I'm not sure how many hours of hard physical labor I'll have to put into this patch before it is suitable for planting. Hopefully, my little squash seedlings can stay alive until I'm done.

Mystery bulbs

The last to post about is mystery bulbs. I just planted lots of them into pots after finding several different types in the oddest places in our yard. I think I know what most of them are (paperwhites and lilies), but not 100% sure. So now they're in pots and I'm hoping I can keep them in good shape until it is time for them to bloom. Once I'm sure of what is what, I can put them into permanent homes around the yard. I like what one of my friends posted on my Facebook wall: "Mysteries are often the best thing! Once I found a bulb in my yard, in a house we bought that only bloomed now and then. What a treat when it did!" I'm looking forward to my mystery bulb treat.

teaching this weekend

2010-07-19T15:16:00.000-07:00

Hey, guess what?!?

I've got a class coming up this weekend - my second time teaching at Scrap N' Yap in Monrovia. The class was originally scheduled for May, but due to circumstances at the store outside of everyone's control my class had to be postponed.

So, while this was originally envisioned as a "spring" theme class, thanks to the breezy, fresh appeal of the Dear Lizzy line (American Crafts), this book really would work for summer photos too. The "You Make Me Smile" album is a mini book (6x6), with chipboard covers and eight interior cardstock pages. I've used lots and LOTS of die cuts and other cute accents to give it a whimsical, fun feel. Plus, I'll be teaching students how to do a "perfect binding" which is a great technique to use in future projects.

If you're local to SoCal and you're looking for a good excuse to beat the heat this weekend, come on down to Monrovia and join me!

Here are some peeks at the inside of the book:

This mini banner is really easy and fun to make!

This is a cd envelope so that you can store more photos right inside the book.

Hope I see you there!

lazy days of summer

2010-07-19T14:55:00.000-07:00

After lots of uncharacteristically cool summer days, our real summer finally hit town this past week -- with a vengeance. The weather reports on the nightly news warned of monsoon effect and hot, hot days but I'm not sure any amount of words could have prepared me for what was on our way. Muggy, muggy, muggy. And hot.

And as if the sudden blast of extreme heat with no buildup wasn't enough, we had an extreme power outage on Friday. Yeah, well the power grid can only take so much, I guess. This is the part that makes me scratch my head... we were doing our part to keep the utility usage low. Trying to get by w/o any a/c and using just a couple of electric fans. Come to find out that one of the neighbors had gone out of town and left the central air on for the dog. Well, in the end we all suffered like dogs. Power was out for eight hours. We finally escaped the miserable sauna usually known as our house at around 5pm (up until then I was held captive with a flat tire). When DH got home we hopped in the car and took off for places well-cooled.

When we got home after 10pm, power was still off (it ended up being off for about 8 hrs --came back on after 1am). We brushed teeth by candlelight, opened all the windows, threw all the covers off the beds, and tried to get some shut-eye.

Things are a little cooler today. We're in the high 90s and feeling comfortable.

the unofficial start of summer

2010-06-07T18:45:00.000-07:00

Well, school is nearly out here where we live. The kids have less than two weeks to go until the glorious start of summer vacation.

There is something so invigorating about the change of seasons. I'm already excited about our summer plans which will include a couple of mini "real" vacations (ie time away from home), but also other events that make summer what it is (Hollywood Bowl, the beach, etc.).

One of the things I'm really looking forward to is seeing my first real vegetable garden grow and mature. (That was what the change from winter to spring did to me - inspired the start of a garden!) Today my square foot garden is a month old.

I've grown a few vegetables in the past, mostly herbs and peppers in pots, and of course the obligatory tomatoes. I've done a large floral cutting garden and tended fruit trees, but raised bed vegetables is a totally new adventure. It's been a lot of work, but totally worth the time and effort. So far, we've enjoyed sprouts from thinned salad greens & radishes, a few herbs, and then baby greens and then some radishes. I think the next thing that'll make it to the table will the tomatoes. We've got a few beauties that are just getting bigger and more enticing with every passing week. The zuchini, yellow squash and eggplants all have had blossoms on them so hoping to see some fruit growing on those plants soon too.

Here is a little week-by-week peek at how the garden goes and grows over the first month...

Spot chosen, raised bed kit ready to be assembled

Week 1
The site I chose was a mostly bare spot in the northwest corner of the yard. Last fall, we had removed some "pretend" trees (they were those volunteer/suckers that come up without rhyme or reason, but these had been let go long enough that they'd grown into something of a forest). What I like best about this spot is that it is a pretty sunny spot, and there was very little grass to be removed. The bonus: a garden would help disguise that eyesore of a phone pole. I decided to use the two existing orange trees as my boundary markers.

Beds in place, grass removed

Building the kits was a snap - no sweat! That was because I handed the job off to the fellas. They even made some noise about removing the grass in my little plot too. In fact, DH made a half-hearted start at the job, but after he lost interest in the project, I took over. It wasn't much grass, but oy! That was a lot of physical labor for an out-of-shape gal like me. (See the piles of grass to the right of the sprinkler - not much, but it felt like a mountain when I was done!)

Plants in beds - hooray!

Next came the dirt and getting the poor little plants into the beds. I had made the (mostly bad) decision to buy small plants before the beds were completed thinking it would motivate us all to get it done. It took real effort to keep those little babies alive while they waited for their new home, but I guess they did do their job of keeping me busy at getting the beds done. By the time I took the pic above I'd placed most of the tomatoes (heirlooms in big pots at back, Romas & Beefsteak in bed at left). I'd also transplanted the peppers (hot ones in bed at left, sweet ones in bed at right) and the squash and a honeydew (bed at right).

The garden is a week old!

Week 2
Not much changed in the first week, except that I added some marigolds after learning that they help with bug control. Oh, and a trellis for the melons to grow up. At this point, I'd sowed some salad greens, radishes, beans, green onions, carrots, and watermelon from seed directly into the bed, as well as starting some seeds into a seed "nursery". Even though I knew the seeds in this bed would sprout in time and the other seedlings from the "nursery" would need to be transplanted to these beds, it was very difficult to resist the urge to go out and buy more plants to make my little beds look more ... gardenish. I'll be the first to admit it - I'm not a very patient girl. I was really eager to see my garden in a more flourishing state. But it took all my self-discipline to not give in to the urge and instead I directed my energies to other things that needed doing, like getting the other pots & planters filled and finishing the mulch walkway.

The seed "nursery"

Here are some of the plants I started from seed. Using an egg carton to start seeds in was a *BIG* mistake. Not only was it next to impossible to keep moist, it was a bear to get the plants out of. The little cells are just too short and are an awkward shape. Plus some of the seedlings had embedded their roots right into the fiber of the carton. I was so worried I was killing the delicate little plants as I pulled them out.

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers (mine aren't)

This is about 2 weeks after the beds went in - finally, some gratification! (You can see the little pepper blossom getting ready to enter the world, can't you?) And below the first of the tomatoes.

Heirloom tomato twins - can't wait to have a taste

These are from a plants found at Costco. They were in a three-pack and were reasonably priced and all of them larger than any of the other tomato plants I'd picked up at Home Dept. Plus they were HEIRLOOMS - how could I pass them up? Wish, I'd done more research on these 'maters before planting them, though. As far as I can tell, I planted the most vigorous grower of the group in the smallest of my three big pots.

The garden at 2 weeks old

Week 3
Another week passes and week 3 begins. The seed-sown-directly-in-beds has emerged. The surfaces of the beds look a bit greener, don't they? By this time, I'd gotten a little further on my mulching too. My hubby has added some of that plastic lawn edging to keep the lawn out of the beds. Hopefully between, that and the mulch I won't have much to yank from the ground. We ran out of edging and mulch around the same time, so that was a work-in-progress.

The garden is 3 weeks old now

Week 4
By the start of week 4, I've nearly finished the mulch walkways (still waiting on hubby to finish the last of the edging.). The walkways are covered in rubber mulch and I just LOOoooove the way they feel under my shoes - nice and cooshey. Very comfortable to walk and work on. I've also picked up a couple of arched trellises (or is that trelli? or is it trololo?) When I drew up my garden plan, I'd always planned to do flower beds against the two block walls. My first plan was to just plant directly into the ground with some bender board to separate the "beds" from the walkways. But I changed my mind (woman's prerogative, ya know), and decided on raised beds. There aren't kits for the sizes I wanted so it was time to put the boys to work again. (Phase I: convincing them to help!)

During the interval between these last two pics, I'd also picked up a dwarf lime tree (so I now have two fruit trees waiting to be transplanted since I'd also picked up a dwarf pear at Costco when I got those tomatoes). Also, I've added the last of the tomato plants to some planters. I put cherry tomatoes in one of the red planters and "Early Girl" in the other. The wooden planter has two "Better Boys" with some basil. Oh, and I transplanted herbs and started some more salad greens in plastic planters.

The garden is a month old! Look how big the heirlooms are

Week 5
This is the most recent pic of the garden. Notice the new beds along the block walls? They are taller than my veggie beds and thank goodness because I had forgotten how deeply one needs to plant gladiola bulbs. I had just enough room. The guys did an awesome job on my new beds - I love them!

Also, I didn't go with all flowers. My friend Allison started a garden recently too, and after seeing what all she'd planted, I decided to devote one of the new beds to corn. I have to admit I was a little afraid of growing corn and it wasn't even something I'd considered early on. (I wanted to start with easy stuff that I could be sure to succeed with.) But why not be a little adventurous? What's the worse that can happen? I'm out a few seeds (not even a dollar's worth) and the cost of water and I come out wiser (hopefully) on the other side. Today, I noticed that lots of the corn is peeking up through the soil so that's a good start, I guess.

Here are some close ups of the month old garden space:

Hangin' with my gnomie

The start of a honeydew (I hope)

Ichiban eggplant blossom

Long flower bed for hollyhocks, coneflower, cosmos & glads

Small flowerbed for fragrant flowers & cosmos

Corn, beans, cucumbers & squash - 3 sisters and a stepsister

Looking out from the inside

Well, in the words of the immortal Porky Pig, that's all folks. Hope ya'll have a great summer! (that last part is all me.)

Scrapbooking Boutique Flea Market!

2010-03-18T00:44:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendars because some of my crafty friends and I are having a SALE you won't want to miss! As you might know I've been teaching scrapbooking and papercraft classes for four years now (wow! I can't believe it's been that long!) Being a teacher means I buy and use stuff in BULK QUANTITY. I usually try to cull the inventory a few times a year, but it's been awhile since I've given it a good thinning so I decided to host a flea market!

I've got some other crafty peeps & teachers selling at this event, so I'm expecting a good variety of stuff. Some of it will be new in package, some nearly new or gently used. There will be kits, tools, alterables, and who knows what else. There may be some newer releases in the mix along with older lines (who knows, we may just have that now hard-to-find item you've been searching for), but everything we sell will be in good, usable condition.

So, here are the deets...

What      Scrapbooking & Papercraft Boutique Flea Market
              where one crafter's trash is another crafter's treasure

When     Friday 3/26 and Saturday 3/27 - 9am until 1pm
              (Come early for the best selection!)

Where    My home (if you don't know or remember where I live, shoot me an email)

Hope to see you there and be sure to tell your crafty friends!

more from CHA

2010-03-01T00:13:00.000-08:00

Here are some more pics of things that "jumped out" at me at this year's show:

Canvas! Not new, but I kept noticing (and loving) canvas creations.

First there was this beautiful display at the Pink Paislee booth showcasing the new Queen Bee line.

I also loved the canvas over at Maya Road (but then, what didn't I love in their booth?)

Donna Downey was at the Prima booth and did her make-n-take using canvas, but sorry no pics of Prima. There were lots of signs all over the booth requesting "no pics" so I respect.

Butterflies! Maybe it was just me, but I spotted them everywhere. These are just a few of the pics I took with butterflies in them.

At Making Memories

At Anna Griffin

At GCD

At My Little Shoebox

At Maya Road

At Pink Paislee (butterflies *and* canvas - sweet!)

And at DCWV a whole pad devoted to las mariposas!

That's all for now.

spotted at CHA

2010-02-04T22:45:00.000-08:00

As I walked about the CHA floor, I noticed some recurring themes. I'm not sure if these qualify as actual "trends" but in any case these items popped up repeatedly in my field of vision.

Can we talk buttons?

Okay, maybe it's because I am seriously in love with buttons that I kept noticing these. I'm especially delighted by the ones with lots of detail in the form of cuts or layers or texture or dimension. You know what I mean... the kind that were in grandma's big old button collection. You know those *real* vintage buttons can be pretty pricey (guess I'm not the only one who loves them). So what's the next best thing? Why reproductions, of course! And what's better than repros done up to match SB paper lines? Brilliant!

Here are some of the ones you can start stalking at your local scrapbook store
(and don't forget to click on the pictures for an enlarged view - you don't want to miss the detail on these babies!)

From AC's Dear Lizzy Line:

From Cosmo Cricket:

From GCD Studios:

From Jenni Bowlin:

From Little Yellow Bicycle:

(yes, I realize these aren't *real* buttons, but they're just too darn cute to not include)

From Nikki Sivils:

stay tuned for more....

CHA continued...

2010-02-03T22:17:00.000-08:00

So by now, you're probably getting an idea of what I like and what I love and what intrigues me. But just to make my preferences abundantly clear, today I'm going to do a big, pictureful, random post about lines I love.

Once again, you can click on any of the images to see them larger.

Now, to start with even though they've been around forever and are not on the new, up-and-coming list, I will start by telling you I have always loved Making Memories and K & Company. They've just been a steady, you-can-always-count-on-them-for-goodness, reliable companies. That said, for some reason I didn't get as many pics in their booths as I usually do.

However, here are some pics of the new "Handmade" line by K & Co. Be sure to check out Craft Critique for a thorough review of this line.

Again, I'm a bit thin on pics of the paper lines & embellies at Making Memories. I snapped some pics of some new Slice stuff (I've decided I need a Slice too - love the portability).

Transparencies - I'm loving these

A new pink Slice!

And a cute baby line

And a cute travel line

But the newest offering at Making Memories (in case you haven't heard already) -they are now doing jewelry! Oh yum! The make-n-take at their booth was a cute little charm necklace. The product displays for the new line were thrift shop chic all the way. Take a look...

So, what about some of the other lines I'm loving? Well, I'm glad you asked!

Pink Paislee
I had the pleasure of working the Pink Paislee booth the first day of CHA. I am so in love with all their new lines. The new canvas albums are so fabulous - especially the natural album. The brilliant designers at PP had the great idea to make the press-ons for the three new lines the exact same size as the cover of the natural canvas album so that users can customize their albums to match the line they are using. Stroke of genius!

May I take your order?

Here are the press ons (rub-ons) -

above is 365 degrees line, below is Queen Bee line

And did I mention the pleated ribbon? There are four different duos that match the new lines perfectly (the Bayberry Cottage line has two different duos-- the neutral set of cream & black will match all the lines). And it is stitched twill. I *love* twill!

The new artisan tapes are very cool too. I've seen tapes in the scrapbooking market before, but these are a little sturdier, opaque and yet the rolls fit onto a standard tape dispenser. What I really love is all the awesome ideas the creative team had for working with tape. The dimension they created opened my eyes and my world.

Teresa Collins
Can I say I love, Love, LOVE Teresa Collins! She has the most amazingly gorgeous products - classic and understated at the same time that they are sumptious and rich. Her booth was amazing with this fabulous chandelier that she hand- jewelled. After the show, Teresa donated the chandelier from her booth (kind of hard to see, but it is below her name in the pic below) to Scrapbook Royalty where it was auctioned off with the benefits going to Haiti. She is quite an amazing lady - and was gracious enough to join the Willow Traders for our CHA dinner. We love you, Teresa!

At the Willow Traders dinner, l to r: Chelle, Julie, Me & Teresa

Tattered Angels

It seems like I love Tattered Angels more with every passing year, every passing show. This year they debuted some very yummy products: Glimmer Glaze, Glimmer Glam and Chalkboard Glimmer Mist.

Heidi Swapp has formulated some of the new colors and let me just inject here that her samples and the new tags with the gold foil and "hidden" text/images are beautiful. I caught one of Heidi's demos. For those of you interested in her techniques with the Glimmer mist, check out this video.

KaiserCraft

As usual, Kaiser had plenty of purdiness. I have to admit I have one line that I'm really digging (and hoping to maybe do a class with.... hmmm, we'll see). The samples were fantastic and they have a new wood tree that is so adorable!

Websters Pages

The booth at Websters was way different than what we've seen the last couple of years. Scaled down with few samples and a very to-the-point all business feel. But guess, what? I'm still a huge fan and loving what they brought.

Then bulk trims are yummy and so are the embellies.

Tim Holtz

Mr. H has some new beautiful dies for Sizzix and his very own Sizzix machine which looks like a vintage suitcase - it is so CUTE! . He also designed some embossing folders that fade away at one end for a very distressed look. (Sorry I don't have a pic of any of these things, but trust me - they are must haves!)

Dear Lizzy by American Crafts
Lastly, I'm in love with the charming new "Dear Lizzy" line from American Crafts. This line smacks of fresh laundry and the those lovely days of spring transitioning into summer.

Stay tuned for more from my CHA adventure!

more from CHA - sample mania!

2010-02-03T00:56:00.000-08:00

So for today's CHA recap, I'm just gonna post a whole bunch of beautiful samples. I'm absolutely blown away by the sheer inspiration to be found in the manufacturers' booths. When I see the incredible creations by the various designers, I am made very much aware of why these folks are on these teams (and why we see so many of the same familiar names cropping up time and time again).

Anyway, enjoy the eye candy and be inspired! (And don't forget to support your local scrapbook retail establishment!)

Click on any of these pics to see an enlarged version.

First, a cute little mini album in the AccuCut booth. Isn't this yummy?

Next, some cards in the Core'dinations booth. Love this cardstock!

A lovely wedding layout in the Graphic 45 booth

An altered calendar project using KaiserCraft's new Peachy Keen line

A whole wall full of My Little Shoebox samples - so cute!

A basket in the Melissa Frances booth -

can't wait to play with her new crepe paper!

Maya Road is one of my weaknesses when it comes to CHA samples.

Don't you love this cute house?

From Pink Paislee using one of their new canvas albums

(I'm in love with these too!)

From the 7Gypsies booth -

I just loved how the journaling was done on a piece of driftwood.

A couple of cards seen in the Anna Griffin booth

A layout using the Homespun Chic line at GCD Studios

Possibly my favorite layout of all - so romantic!

by Layle Koncar in the Basic Grey booth

Some Cosmo Cricket to love

At Clear Snaps

A layout at the Crate Paper booth.

Love the curvy movement in the border at the bottom

A mini book in Fancy Pants booth

A beautiful layout by Heidi Swapp at Tattered Angels

From Jenni Bowlin (get a load of that yummy button!)

A layout at KI Memories - love the pinwheels

A cute card from Inkadinkadoo at EK Success

At the Petaloos booth - I'm digging these new clear plastic flowers.

From Teresa Collins - this was the Tuesday make-n-take

A decorative item in the Spellbinders booth

A coat made entirely of Tim Holtz Grungeboard. Every patch & flower was unique -

embossed and colored. Really amazing.

More of my CHA experience later this week, so check back!

CHA W'10 - it's a wrap!

2010-02-01T20:48:00.000-08:00

For the fourth year in a row, I had the pleasure of attending the Craft & Hobby Association Winter Trade Show. It's something I (and many of my fellow crafters) look forward to with eager anticipation. Scrapbook and other craft manufacturers roll out their new product releases from papers to accents to tools along with lots of inspiration in the form of beautifully appointed booths and extraordinary samples showcasing the new lines. This year was no exception.

There is no way to re-capture and feature all the yummy-ness that is CHA in my blog, but here are some of the high points of my trip this year. These are things that caught my eye, made me sigh or oogle, and generally made my fingers itch to create.

Today, I want to highlight some of the vintage (and vintage-inspired) goodness on display at this year's show. What I especially loved about this year's offerings was that there was a greater variety of color and style (because all vintage is not created equal, right?)

Here are just a few of my faves:

First the new line from Advantus by Margie Romney-Aslett, "The Girls Paperie". So feminine and soft and so much to love!

I was also enamored by the new GCD Studios lines designed by Melody Ross. The colors are vibrant and glorious and the detail in the embellishments is classic. These images are from the new Homespun Chic line.

One of my favorite lines for the last three years is Graphic 45. Not only are their papers sublime, their booth is always incredible. I could do a single, very long blog post with all my love for this company, but you'll have to settle for this sweet peek. Their take on vintage is always elegant and sophisticated. The have three new lines this year, "A Proper Gentleman", "Le' Romantique" and "On the Boardwalk". Now I just have to decide which line to feature in an upcoming class. (These pics are from the Le Romantique line.)

Jenni Bowlin is another perennial fave with more vintage goodness. I like the wholesome, Americana feel of the line. I had the opportunity to take a banner class that used a lot of these new Jenni Bowlin products - fun!

7Gypsies never fails to deliver when it comes to vintage. Again, this is a booth with so much retro eye-candy that I could fill pages with the pics I took, but here is a small taste of what was on display.

That's all for today, but I'm planning to post more pics during the coming week so stay tuned!

scrappiness

2010-01-10T21:49:00.000-08:00

I've been working on a couple of layouts this weekend and once again it feels like maybe perhaps this is something that I've never done before. Well, that's not exactly right. Of course, I've scrapped before. But something about picking it back up after a period of not doing any layouts always feels a bit foreign. Not quite sure why that is. In any case, it sure comes easier if I do it more regularly. Wonder if there's anyone else out there who deals with this.

I finished two one-pagers and I'm really happy with both of them. Plus I've got another layout loosely arranged on my work table... we'll have to see whether or not that one comes together, but I'm liking what I've got so far. While I'm on the subject of scrappiness, another thing that has made me really happy about these latest layouts is to actually be working with some products that I've been itching to dig into. Because really... what's the point of storing product? It shouldn't be sitting there like some kind of dusty collection. It needs to be used and find its way onto my pages and into my albums.

I ended up submitting both the finished layouts for publication and I was excited to find out tonight that one of them was picked up for an online magazine, Ready, Set, Create. Cool.

With the recent changes to my SB work world, I decided it was time to work out a new schedule for 2010. I'm hoping the new weekly plan will make me more efficient and productive. I've got Tuesdays & Thursdays set aside as my scrappy biz days - hoping to make the most of those days every week. There will be a lot to cram into those two days every week, but I think having specific days earmarked for working will help my focus. (What would really help would be an extra day per week and an extra week per month -lol!)

Later!

tonight's chow is chowder

2010-01-04T18:02:00.000-08:00

Potato corn chowder, to be precise. A classic comfort sort of soup for the first weekday supper of 2010. I guess browsing soup recipes last week put me in a certain mind set, because I also made soup for dinner last night (one of our favorites - cabbage and kidney bean... I know it doesn't sound especially wonderful, but you'll have to take my word that it is!)

The last three weeks have been crazy busy, but all in a very good way. I did several private papercrafting classes in my home and had a great time visiting with friends I just don't see often enough (like my delightful cousin Leah - hey, girl hope you can come again next month!)

On the heels of the classes, I changed hats, shifted chairs and jumped into producing an e-newsletter for The Enright Company. I've been doing their newsletters for several years now, but for the last few issues I've collaborated with my son who is so much more knowledgeable at html than I am. It's been nice to have his expertise at my disposal.

Now, I'm back on home improvement duty - gotta pick out some paints and get busy re-creating the look of our living room. We've only painted one room in the house since moving in (isn't that awful!). So, I'm thinking with some forethought, organization and self-discipline we should be able to repaint the entire interior over the course of 2010. I'm going to aim for a room a month with a few months off for the worst of summer. Sounds do-able, doesn't it?

We've also got a couple of lingering items to take care of on the house facade for our "curb appeal" project - still need to have a garage door installed, then have that and the new front door painted. And then, there are some landscaping decisions to be made as well.

Isn't it funny how every time you do something to upgrade and improve, it results in having something else to do?

when will i see you again?

2009-12-14T21:55:00.000-08:00

Seems like more often than not my blog post titles are titles of old songs or movies (or lines from old movies).

So, this time my post title (an old 70s song, if I'm not mistaken) is directed to SGT customers: when will I see you again? Hopefully I'll see some of at you soon at either the Tuesday night Quickutz party, or the Thursday night customer appreciation/farewell potluck at SGT. I'm going to pop in to both of them so I hope I will see lots of you there! If I happen to miss you, just remember that you can keep up with me here or at my other blog, or on Twitter, or Facebook or by email. Or maybe I'll just run into you at one of the places we scrapbookers like to haunt (like Expo, or CHA, or ???)

In any case, sending hugs out to all the lovely ladies I've met through my association with the store and wishing you all the best!

(edited to add a pic that was taken at the SGT Employee potluck dinner last week - a fine looking group, if I do say so!)

home improvement

2009-12-06T20:03:00.000-08:00

After the new roof - kinda hard to tell how bad the paint was, tho

We've lived in our house for about 11 years now. The first major anything we did in the way of maintenance/improvement was last fall when we re-roofed and exterminated. I guess you could say we "celebrated" the big 10 year mark with a new hat (roof).

This year we're on "phase 2" of our long-neglected home improvement. Our very dry & thirsty house was begging for a new coat of paint which it finally received last month. Then, last week we had a new front door installed. It's beautiful and solid and it "whooshes" when it closes. I like that.

After new paint - a subtle change, but makes such a diff!

Next week we'll be having our trees trimmed. And can I say that I can't believe that the tree work is going to cost about the same as the paint job. But like I said, it's been 11 years. The work is going to make such a difference.

Oh, and I almost forgot ... a new garage door is also on the list of improvements to be made.

Curb appeal? Yeah... we'll have it.

day 6 - socal shophop '09

2009-12-04T17:36:00.000-08:00

Well, here's the recap of our very last day of Shop Hopping (better late than never!) We did the greater San Diego area as our last stint and had an ambitious plan, but thankfully the stores in that area are fairly close together and thanks to longer hours for the Shop Hop we managed to reach every last store and finish the full Shop Hop.

So our first stop was Scrappin Divas in Temecula. Our timing was perfect --we arrived just as the doors were opening.

Really wanted to loll and stroll up and down the block where the store was located - such a cute little area.

Here's what I left with:

Next it was Pink Pineapple in Vista.

We had the best time at this store. Gloria helped us to find lots of good stuff and gave us great suggestions for using the products we bought. And of course, you just can't beat the ribbons at Pink Pineapple. I went a little ribbon crazy as you can see:

After that we headed to Ever After in Carlsbad. They'd moved since the last time I'd been there (Shop Hop '07). I really like the new store --it's just as cute as the old one.

We got a little lost on our way to Jazi Crafts in Oceanside. Somehow the printer had cut off one of the step-by-step instructions in our mapquest and it was a crucial instruction because the wrong turn sent us away from the store. Thank goodness for cell phones and store clerks who can give directions!

Found some more good stuff:

From there we headed to Paper Tales in San Diego. This was the first time any of us had been there and what a treat we were in for. Such a cute little boutique of a store. Lots of adorable stamps and cute little thises and thats.

I was happy to pick up some of the Maya Road velvet flowers that I've been wanting since CHA Winter.

Next stop: Scrapbook Your Life in San Diego. Here I am crouched down by their Shop Hop Display showing off my passport.

My favorite find at this store was the Spell Binders bird die - so cute!

We headed out of San Diego to Cool Scrapbook Stuff in Poway. This store has so much variety. You can find pretty much anything you're looking for.

I'm not sure exactly *what* I was looking for, but here is what I "found":

There was a second store to visit in Poway - Stamping Details. They had a fun make-n-take learning a technique with alcohol ink, and a really grrrrrrrrrrrrrreeat photo opp with a cut-out tiger.

And SOoooooo many stamps! Here's what I found that day:

Our last "official" stop of the day was Now and Then Scrapbooks in Wildomar. Was it ever crowded. My sympathies went to the girl behind the counter.

Voila, we finished Shop Hop '09 with days to spare. Well, we were *almost* finished. We actually had to make another stop to The Scrapping Table in Placentia because during our first visit one of our passports didn't get stamped. But thankfully it was right on our way back home so it worked out fine.

We all turned in our passports and were hopeful for the contests, but even if we didn't win anything we were just glad to have had a summer safari tooling around SoCal and enjoying ourselves.

The Postscript to our adventure is that none of us won any of the big ShopHop prizes. However, someone in our group *did* win an after-the-fact contest sponsored by ShopHop. It was a "make-n-take" contest for anyone who had participed in the Hop this year. And guess who won? It was me! Yup, I'm now the proud owner of a $50 gift certificate to The Scrappin' Table. I can't wait to stop by and see what's new.

day 5 - socal shophop '09

2009-11-09T19:13:00.000-08:00

So... on to the memories of Day 5 of ShopHop. For our little group this was Saturday, August 15th. We didn't have as many stores to get to as we'd had on other days (only 7), but we did have a lot of ground to cover geographically.

Our first stop was Pages From the Heart in Monrovia. There was a class in progress at this store (I think it was a Pinecone Press class being taught by Lorene Yost, but not sure -- in any case it looked like a fun one).

Next, we went to Karen's Hallmark in Alta Dena. Great photo opp with Mr. Elephant here.

A few goodies for the road...

From there, we headed out to points west, stopping at Once Upon a Page in Burbank, the deceptively small-looking store, but wow when you get inside it goes on and on. Evidently, this is the store where I had the brilliant idea to start picking up some animal print papers to scrap the ShopHop photos with.

Here's me:

Here's my stuff:

Then on to Sandpaper Kisses in Tujunga. The girl at the register had made herself a really cute safari hat* just for ShopHop. (*Pith helmut, is that they're called evidently. Learned that from my mom ... thanks, Mom!)

From there it was Treasured Memories in Oak Park, where we ran into Lead Fiskateer Cheryl Waters again. She is such a sweetie!

What I got:

By now we were starting to fall off our time schedule, tho and so we clambered back into the van and raced out to Stamping From the Heart in Los Angeles. We made it before closing and the owner was kind enough to keep the door open a bit past closing so we could finish up our shopping.

Mom was so done with this store:

Here are my goodies:

The last stop for the day was Sonja's Scrap Spot in Los Angeles, and it was a great spot to end the day.

Here's my "take":

All in all another great day of Shop Hopping adventure never mind that my safari tour abandoned me at the elevator! Good-bye, peeps, but don't forget who has the car keys -lol!

The elevator door closes as I snap a pic...

But they didn't get far since no one pushed any buttons. I could hear them laughing inside the elevator car until the door re-opened.

Mom is cracking up here. A funny end to a great day.

PS. Only one more Shop Hopping day to share after this.

day 4 - socal shophop '09

2009-11-03T18:01:00.001-08:00

*ETA: yes, this is *old* news. You can read this post for the whiney, excuse-making post, if you like.

Our 4th day on the Shop Hop started at Collective Journey in Redlands. They always have such cute displays!

What I got:

From there we headed a little south and a little west to Corona where we stopped at Scrapper's Cafe. Sadly, I recently heard that this is another sb store that is closing its doors.

Next, we went to Chino Hills destination "This N That Scrapbooking". Turns out that the "this-n-that" is because this is a multi-purpose store. Not only are there lots of SB supplies, there is also a dry cleaner on site along with a variety of other services.

Here are my findings:

Somewhere in the mess of Corona/Chino freeways we had a near accident when a young female driver in front of us decided to come to a full stop on the freeway (yes, you read that right). Evidently, she had missed her offramp, so she just came to a stop and waited for traffic to clear then swept two lanes to get to the offramp. Crazy!

Our last store for the day was Scraparazzi in Whittier. They were getting ready for move to a new (adjacent) location, so I'd like to go back sometime soon and check out their new digs.

What I left with:

After our ShopHopping, we had a nice relaxing lunch at Penn Park in Whittier. It's a gorgeous place.

End of Day 4, 22 stores down, 17 stores to go!

blog interrupted

2009-11-03T17:43:00.000-08:00

Once again, there was a little bit of that stuff known as life getting in the way of my blogging. It wasn't so much that I was incredibly busy (tho I was *very* busy), but it was more of me being detached from the computer. Hey, what can I say? It happens.

So, where was I....? Oh, yes! I was posting my Shop Hop adventures. And in painstaking detail which is why I wasn't done. You'll have to indulge me because I have the need to finish what I started.

And speaking of Shop Hop, there was some late-breaking prize news in the Scrapbooking Roads newsletter last Friday. Was I ever surprised to find out that I'd won a prize in the Make-n-take contest. Woo hoo! I love prizes - especially scrappy ones.

day 3 - socal shophop '09

2009-08-29T22:42:00.000-07:00

My third day out hopping was Sunday 8/16 - it was a very short little jaunt, just two local stores.

First we headed out to Stamp Your Heart Out in Claremont. The store was jam-packed with customers. Forgot to take any photos, and didn't do much shopping, but I did pick up their cute mk-n-tk and some flair for a "d-i-y" lanyard I was planning to make for my daughter (our official Shop Hop journaler).

Flair and a cute mk-n-tk found at Stampin' From the Heart

After ran to the market with my dad (a new Sunday ritual). And then on to Scrapbook Cafe in La Puente. This store is open afternoons & evenings during the week because the owner holds down a full time job earlier in the day. Not an extremely huge store, but lots of cute stuff (and cute samples, too!)

My goodies from Scrapbook Cafe

Short, but sweet!

this just in

2009-08-27T19:40:00.000-07:00

I'm interrupting my Shop Hop playback to share a layout I did using some of the stuff I got while hopping (click for enlarged view). Used the "Abbey Road" line by My Mind's Eye for this page about my son & nephew back in 1994 when they first met. Oh those cute boys --so sweet and soft and adorable. That was then, but my oh my how times have changed - now they are both big, tall, hairy MEN! Ah well, there is no stopping the passing of time. (And they are both still adorable.)

day 2 - socal shophop '09

2009-08-27T00:07:00.001-07:00

I had hoped to post my shop hopping adventures before now, but this is my first chance to sit down and compose. I wasn't sure how many days it would take to get to all the stores, but in the end I did my stops over the course of 6 days of varying lengths.

Our first "big" day was on Saturday, August 8 - we did 13 stores that day (applause, please!)

First was Scrapbooking Heaven in Westminster. The mk-n-take was ocean/beach themed (using the same paper line I used in my By the Sea class - cool!) Also grabbed a sheet of some distressed grid Hambly transparency and blk & beige flocked paper. The store was offering a 6x6 calendar for ShopHoppers to incorporate some of the S.H. make-n-takes into - great idea!

Next we headed for A to Z Scrapbooking in Torrance. It looked so different from the last time I was there - they'd done some painting and re-done the floor too.

My findings (above) and me hamming it up again (below)

After that we were back in Huntington Beach for three stores...

At The Scrapbook Garden I found some lovely Rouge de Garance papers (not carried too many places, so this made me happy). I also picked up my very first bottle of Maya Rd. Mist and a big ole refill bottle of Un-du. I don't really go thru Un-du that often, but I'm a big old refill bottle kind of gal so there ya go. (We had an Elvis sighting outside the store, too --my second one of the summer 'cause you just *know* I saw him in Vegas.)

Goodies from the Scrapbook Garden (above) and me outside the store (below)

At Perfect Day Scrapbooking, I found some Elvis paper (now how convenient was that?). I also picked up a little metal notepad/pen holder so that I will *always* have paper in my bag on which to jot whatever. Found some "Paris" themed paper by g.c.d. studios --perfect for a class I have in mind.

Outside of Perfect Day Scrapbooking (above) and my purchases (below)

Our last Huntington Beach Store was Once Upon a Memory (where we ran into a trio of SGT gals - Sharon W, Irene B, and Stephanie Z). This was a big store - easy to lose track of time in the larger stores, let me tell you.

Mind you, I was trying to stay away from paper at all the stores
but so many of them had lovely specialty papers like the transparencies
and flocked paper I found here (grabbed some G45 cherries, too).

Next we were off to Oh Scrap in Costa Mesa, a very cute store. Here I am with my mom and my friend Allison:

It's funny how I almost always seem to end up with color coordinated
purchases - it's not planned (must be subliminal)

From there it was Timeless Treasures in Rancho Santa Margarita. It's quite a trek out to this store, but the highway (a toll road) was wide open which is a nice change from the freeway traffic I'm used to. Found me some cute stuff:

Headed back west to Scrappin' in the Hills in Anaheim Hills. They get bonus points for giving us cupcakes!

Goodies above and below!

We were way off schedule by the time we were ready to head up to The Scrappin' Table in Placentia. We had about 30 minutes until closing and called ready to beg Michelle to wait for us, but she's a sweetie and we didn't have to grovel or anything. She had the new G45 in so I was able to stock up on all the gorgeous new papers.

Our expedition team (minus my daughter who is taking the pic)

Look at all that yummy cardstock! And my new G45 below...

We made a quick stop at the Metropolitan Scrapbook Co. in Chino. Some VERY cool Prima product here --not too surprising since MSC and Prima are practically neighbors! The clerk got swarmed with ShopHoppers while we were there, but was a sweetie despite being there by herself and having a bunch of crazy scrappers to wait on.

Allison and I get our "passport-and-sign" pic just as the sun sets above and my goodies below

Followed by another stop, this time at The Scrapping Lounge in Montclair. There was a celebration going on at the Lounge - it's the store's anniversary and they were having a safari crop. We were surprised & delighted to find lead Fiskateer Cheryl Waters there, We knew the Lounge was on her schedule of the 15th, but because we were so off our schedule we thought we'd missed her. So nice to finally meet her. I also met another of my FB scrapping friends that I hadn't met in person, Toni Burks-Grijalva. We "monkeyed" around for a bit but then had to move on.

Rina, me and Debbie

Love the safari spread that Debbie laid out for her croppers

The goods

Our last stop of the day (night) was Scrap n Yap in Monrovia. We were pretty tired by this time (see it in my face?) but being inside the store perked us right up. Lots of cool vintagey & retro delights such as 7 Gypsies, Jenni Bowlin and Melissa Frances. Yum!

A worn-out tour tour bus driver

Allison & Lisa

My findings (store owner Elizabeth told us the white Primas
are so popular they just cannot keep them in stock)

Whew! Long, tiring but super FUN day!

day 1 - socal shophop '09

2009-08-16T20:36:00.000-07:00

Photo Opp Stop at Scrappin' Good Times

**ETA: I just posted at the SGT blog inviting other Shop-Hoppers to share their S.H. stories - and I'll be doing a prize drawing from the posts once the ShopHop is over!

Even though I got my first stamp on Friday 8/7, I it didn't quite feel like a *real* day of ShopHopping because I did not "hop" to any other stores. No, in fact, I was already going to be at my home store, Scrappin' Good Times because it was time for our bi-monthly Class Kickoff.

It was, however, the night before our first and longest hopping day so there was that anticipation building up and seeing all my fellow 'hoppers' coming through the store was lots of fun. Here are some pics from the night.

The SGT make-n-take "Wild Things" designed by Lizett - isn't it adorable?

One of my classes "What a Zoo" (October 10th)

My purchases for the night - new Abbey Road by MME!

mk-n-tks

doing the shop hop-hop-hop

2009-08-15T22:34:00.000-07:00

I've been hopping for a week now and boy are my legs sore!

(If you're not familiar with what I'm talking about, you can read up on the SoCal Shop Hop here.)

The first SoCal Shop Hop was two years ago and I had so much fun touring the SoCal landscape visiting lots of scrapbooking and craft stores I'd never been to before. It was a challenge to cover lots of ground while staying within the confines of the varying store hours. It was also challenging for this native Californian to navigate the many unfamiliar terrains that fell outside my regular stomping grounds. But the excitement of racing around the countryside was pretty thrilling - it reminded me of that tv show "The Amazing Race" but without having to eat weird stuff or go bungee jumping or slog through mud or whatever. (Click here to see all my Shop Hop posts - you'll need to scroll down past the new posts to see original 2007 Shop Hop posts.)

This year, I'm older, wiser and more experienced. So what does that mean? Simply that we are getting lost less, covering more ground (& more quickly) and having a rocking time!

30 stores down! Only seven more to catch on our San Diego run this coming week. I can't wait to start on my store-by-store blog posts (including pics of the good stuff I've found!) So, stay tuned!

fantastic friday: class kickoff AND shophop!

2009-08-05T21:36:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty excited to get back home on Friday because not only will we be hosting another mah-velous Class Kickoff at Scrappin' Good Times, but it is ALSO the kickoff day for SoCal ShopHop. I expect things will be pretty hoppin' at the store (word to the wise: if you're thinking of signing up for a class and can make it to kickoff - DO!)

Pics for the SGT classes are starting to pop up on the website, but here are some "extra" sneaky peeks of my classes:

This is the Intro to Scrapbooking class layout

And a close-up of the title

Here is the cover of "You Are My Sunshine

And a sort of interior view (a tease, if you will!)

A cute little birdie

"What a Zoo!" chipboard mini book

...and a close up

A couple of interior pages...

One of two "Fast & Fab" layouts entitled "Fall"

...and some close-ups

The second "Fast & Fab" layout: "Wish Upon a Star"

So, I hope I'll see you on Friday for the Big Night! Be sure and tell me hi if you do stop by. Until then!

viva las vegas

2009-08-04T12:17:00.000-07:00

The landscape is always changing here in Vegas

Here we are again having another Vegas vacation. See, the thing is DH has to come anyway since this is part of his sales territory. He's usually here for 2-3 days every month. And well... we just can't resist tagging along during summer. Something we just can't resist about a stay in a nice hotel with maid service, a/c, cable, a spectacular pool, etc. etc.

We're at the MGM Signature Suites again and would you believe we are in the same exact room as last year? This place is a trio of towers each with over 30 floors and who knows how many rooms on each floor so what are the odds we'd end up in the exact room we occupied last August? (I'm inclined to believe they put us here intentionally.) Anyway, it has made us feel quite "at home".

DH is working today, so the kids and I are kicking back until it gets cool enough to go down to the pool. Might go see a movie today too if there is anything appealing. Yesterday we made our obligatory trek to the Peppermill Restaurant (it's a must-stop for us --we might even have to go again once more before we leave). We kicked around town for awhile before coming back to float around the MGM's lazy river.

Summertime and the living is easy!

not gonna do it

2009-07-10T10:56:00.000-07:00

I'm not very good at taking self-portraits

I was debating about whether I should do one of those long rambly "catch-up" posts that seem to be my m.o. lately, but decided against it. Instead, I'll just post a bunch of photos and give you this short & sweet "readers digest" condensed edition of the past month. One unplanned thing that happened is that our family got hit pretty hard by a flu bug. My daughter missed the whole last week of school and had to be picked up early from her Knott's Berry Farm field trip. How sad was that? Missing all the fun stuff that you wait for all school year!

Being sick also meant that we missed two days of our annual district convention. This was especially disappointing because it was an international convention with delegates coming in from other countries. But, thankfully we were able to make it for Friday & Saturday of the program.

So on to the month in photos (I got a new camera right after our day at Knott's so I've been having fun trying to learn to use it)...

My nephew's promotion ceremony - he's a middle schooler now!

Knotts Berry Farm

My sweetie was so sick - had to leave Knott's early

Me and my sis

Our boys

The Long Beach Arena - get a look at that beautiful blue sky!

Love having the big screen for a better view

My little sweetie feeling much better

A great crowd

Banners in the lobby for each language group

A pair of lovelies

During the lunch break

Me still sick w/bronchitis, but it doesn't show in the pics

A couple of little Korean cuties

The stage in the Japanese convention hall

Loved seeing all the beautiful kimonos

Love the contrast of the beautiful Korean dresses in the middle of this shot

Breakfast at Millie's

Me & Tiffany at the Table

Our squaky new lorakeet neighbors

A bubbies fish

They tried to hide, but there is no escaping my camera!

Surprise!

Grillmeister Steve

Uncle T

Max

Cath

Cari

John

He's not driving yet, but it's looming on the horizon for sure

Group pic

Max & Tim

Totem pole at the San Dimas Nature Center

Woodpecker hanging around San Dimas Canyon Park

Finished this embarrassingly late, but here's my Friendship Soup sample

Lunch with Kris (she's moving to CO - sniff)

Some of my fave pics from the VVDC dress rehearsal on 7/9 (more pics here)
this is Celina warming up for "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friends"

Another shot from Diamonds

Love this pic of the boys - album cover style

Another fun pic from the boys' performance

... and one more - they make me think of ska bands of the 80s here

Well, that's all for now. Just a bunch of pics to remind me what I did over my summer vacation -lol.

two year blog-iversary

2009-06-05T21:13:00.001-07:00

I can hardly believe that my blog hit its two year anniversary milestone this week. That's 24 months, 104 weeks, 730 days of blabba. Okay, so I'm exaggerating a bit there since I've never been one to update daily. But still.... thatsa lotta blabba!

kickoff this week ... here's a sneak peek

2009-05-31T23:05:00.000-07:00

It's that time again! Class Kick-off is on Friday, June 5th 5pm-7pm. I haven't seen all the samples yet, but I *do* get an early preview of the class titles/descriptions from all the teachers and there are some great summer classes on the July and August roster. I get as excited as anyone about seeing the actual samples the night of kickoff.

I'll have two classes on the July-August schedule - one is a family themed chipboard mini album (that's the one in the pic above) using Graphic 45 papers and the other one is a paper bag album using K & Company papers.

Hope to see you at kickoff!

forgot one

2009-05-06T20:08:00.001-07:00

Just realized I didn't include a pic of me and the hubster from Saturday night. This was taken by my cousin Jess and I'm so grateful to him for getting a good one (you know I'll be searching him out at family functions from now on -lol!)

maybe may too

2009-05-03T20:55:00.000-07:00

A little brag book for yesterday's baby shower

Well, I'm hoping not, but maybe May is going to be a busy month too? Spent Friday "catching up" after a week of vertigo and straight into the weekend with a baby shower *and* an anniversary party last night. They were both gorgeous events. Thankfully it didn't rain on the garden setting shower (though I think I may have lost my umbrella there).

Here's some pics from the baby shower. Isn't the cake cute? Love the little monkey:

The anniversary party was a lovely golden 50th for one of my cousins. Her kids did an awesome job putting together a beautiful and memorable event. There was a wonderful slide show of "through the years" and they even had my cousin's wedding dress on display --thought that was a wonderful touch:

Well, however May plays out a full life is a good life!

let's see... what have i been up to again?

2009-04-28T22:51:00.001-07:00

Oh yeah.... a LOT! Brace yourself... this is a LONG one.

April has flown by in a shocking blur of events. Makes my head spin how fast time can run by a person. Gonna try to hit some of the highlights...

There was class kickoff on 4/3 which as USUAL was a blast. We had a great group at the store and the SGT teachers had a whole boatload of awesome classes to add to the roster. Here are a couple of pics of my table:

"By the Sea" mini album - class is on 5/9

These are "mini" displays of the layouts for my 6/27 back-to-back layout classes

The kids started spring break that day too, so that weekend their Dad took them to see Monsters vs. Aliens while I continued to plug away on those darn taxes. It wasn't a usual sort of spring break here at our place --not as relaxing as usual with the tax appointment bearing down on me. We managed a few fun moments --had the cousins over on Monday, did a "girls day" with dd, but I have to admit that I was pretty distracted. The tax appointment seemed to sap all my attention as it always does. Fortunately I pulled it off and made it to my appointment on time and well prepared.

Once the taxes were out of the way, we dove straight into preparations for a costume party that dd was going to over the weekend. I spent an entire day sewing her regal gown (she went as Queen Esther) and we were both happy with the results.

Queen Esther

After the party ended, David & I headed out for an early anniversary getaway. We had heard about a fabulous dance party "Radioactive" put together by our favorite radio station, KCRW and decided to make a special evening of it. We started out with dinner at Engine Co. No. 28 in Los Angeles. From there we headed to the legendary Park Plaza hotel where the event was being staged. I have to admit to being a little nervous about going dancing. For one thing we haven't gone dancing in public in ages. For another neither of us has been very active lately --didn't know how much oomph we had in us for a night of endless dancing. And not the least of my worries was fear of being the "old-fogey" couple.

All my worries for nothing. The crowd was diverse in age and style. The music was fabulous and everyone there was there for one thing: to DANCE! As for my worries about our stamina, like a couple of energizer bunnies we kept on going. Didn't want the night to end. The party was scheduled to go until 2am but we must have left sometime after 1am and then an overnight stay at a hotel nearby. My only regret is that we were so full from dinner that we weren't able to try something from the Kogi truck (didn't know it was going to be there, I guess).

The only pics I have from our little getaway are off my phone so not the greatest quality. There are much better pics from the event here if you're curious.

Dinner at Engine Co. No. 28

Radioactive - Neo-Soul Streetbeat Sound System with Jeremy Sole & Todd Simon

The Grand Voodoo Salon

Breakfast buffet at our hotel next morning

I was sad to see spring break end because it went by in such a flash and I really didn't feel like we did "anything" but then again I guess we did a whole lot. From there I was on to my next busy project --purging the ole scrapbook stash. It's amazing how hard it is to get around to doing that. For whatever reason it just seems to keep getting shoved to the bottom of the list. However, deadlines are always a help in getting to these jobs and that was what got me off my keister again this time. I was signed up for a seller's table at the yard sale at the Lounge and wasn't going to "waste" my table, so for two crazy weeks, I was a purging-pricing maniac. (The yard sale was this past weekend --and totally worth the effort. Most of my boxes came back empty YAAaaaay!)

Another little papercrafting project I'm part of is a huge bookmark making undertaking. A group of friends are making over 5,000 bookmarks for an international convention that we're going to in June. The bookmarks are gifts for the delegates who will be coming from several other countries. Let me tell you there is a LOT of forethought and planning that goes into an undertaking of this magnitude. We are going strong though - have done all the prep work of cutting, printing and embossing the elements for the bookmarks. Now we are down to two final meetings (hopefully) to assemble the pieces into finished bookmarks. I'll be sure to post some pics later.

This past week I was also busy with another little project. I did an "instant scrapbook" for a baby shower (more info here). It was a lot of work both in prep before the shower, and then the scramble to assemble the book on site but as always totally worth it. The finished book turned out great. Here are some pics of the album before adding the photos:

And some snapshots from the shower --the host did a beautiful job!

The mommy-to-be seeing her finished "instant scrapbook" for the first time

Some of the guest take a look at the album

On a sad note, one of my sweet aunts died this month. She was the sister of my paternal grandma and the dearest, most generous woman you could ever know. I keep seeing all her animated facial expressions in my minds eye. I will miss her so much. Here is one of my favorite photos of Auntie Susie and her mom, my great-grandma Luisa:

The Scrappin' Good Times family is having some sad times --our owner Trish had to say goodbye to her beloved cousin Crystal who lost a very courageous battle with cancer. Another of our designers, Belinda, has had her father in the hospital and he is not doing well. Please keep them both in your thoughts.

Well, that is a whole lot of catching up. Guess I'll have to post more often if I don't want to write an entire tome for my posts.

Later!

blog, blog, blog

2009-04-15T01:47:00.000-07:00

stay tuned for some blabba...

yessiree, it's that time again!

2009-03-31T11:44:00.000-07:00

A page from a "Fast & Fabulous in 40 Minutes" session

Spring has sprung!

I have a little confession... I have a real love/hate attitude about spring. First, I *love* it for its absolute gorgeousness. The clean, crisp feel of the air, the sunshine, the little tweeting birds, the fact that everything is budding and blooming and green. Isn't spring just grand?

But just to temper my wonder and amazement at the glory of the season, I am usually beaten down by allergies and asthma and sinus trouble and (sometimes) vertigo. Bummer, dude. And, of course, there are also the taxes which are no fun for me since I save all my financial entries up all year and then have to scramble to excel-a-tize them before my appointment with the tax specialist. I'm up to my eyeballs in that mind-numbing project right now. Sigh.

On the positive side of the ledger, though, it's also time once again for class kickoff at SGT. I have a whopping four classes on the upcoming session. WOW! I've added a session of "Fast & Fab 40-minute layouts on 4/25 right after Intro to Scrapbooking, then another session of back-to-back "Fast & Fab" layouts on 6/27. On May 9th, I'll be teaching "By the Sea" which is a technique-heavy mini album. If you've been curious about Glimmer Mist and want a chance to try it out, this is the class for you!

"By the Sea" mini album

You can take a peek at all the upcoming classes at the SGT website here. Better still, come to the kickoff this Friday from 5-7pm and see all the samples up close and personal. Hope I see you there!

take a peek

2009-03-15T00:42:00.000-07:00

Here is a little taste of one of the classes I'm working on for the next session at Scrappin' Good Times:

In case you can't tell, I've been having fun playing with Glimmer Mist and Stickles.

we can rebuild him — we have the technology

2009-03-05T12:45:00.000-08:00

Remember that old line from The Six Million Dollar Man? Well, I've been re-building in a sense, anway. Or maybe it would be more appropriate to say I've been "re-working". Yup, ever since the new Graphic 45 papers hit my doorstep, I've been altering stuff. And I've got plans to alter more.

I have not done a whole lot of altering in my crafty life. There have been the occasional cigar box and product package, but honestly I'd rather re-finish a piece of furniture. Not sure why that is, but there you go. Anyway, something about the G45 papers has got me all het up about altering. I'm sure being in the G45 booth at CHA may have had a little to do with that.

Suddently I'm itching to remove all the floral wallpaper from inside my scrapdesk hutch and replace it with G45's Fashionista. That's actually a bit ambitious for me right now considering it *IS* time to work on taxes (again!) But in the meantime, I've done some small projects that were so fun. First I started work on a little caddy. Before the paint was dry enough to add paper to it, I spyed with my little eye this box in my desk hutch. I store vintage stamps in this and it is the perfect container except that I've never really cared for the dark plaid. So, I leafed thru my G45 papers and lo-and-behold there is a nice bright red plaid that would be perfect. What the heck the paint brush was still dirty from the caddy project, so I painted just the edges of the little storage box (in case the box edges weren't absolutely straight --and they never are-- the black would disguise where the paper didn't reach the trim.)

Here is the finished project. I love my little box even more now! The funny thing is I like how this box turned out more than the caddy I was working on -lol. (I'll post a pic of the caddy after I take one.)

partners in crime

2009-02-27T13:24:00.000-08:00

Click on the pic for a larger view

I'm the oldest of five kids. My next youngest sibling is my brother John, who is just about ten months younger than I am (practically twins!) When we were young we were a couple of terrors, always getting into lots of trouble. Usually it was messy trouble (early signs of creativity?) My poor mom!

This page was for the February challenge at the Graphic 45 blog. The challenge rules were to do a page about someone you love using an old photo and cutting out a motif from one of the G45 paper lines. I used the Playtimes Past line - it was perfect for my page. Not only does it have a lovely vintage nursery theme, one of the accent colors in the line was nearly a perfect match to my dress in this photo. The motif I cut was the teapot and girl that you see at the bottom right and edge of my page.

Love that Graphic 45!

kaisercraft, pt. 2

2009-02-21T21:14:00.000-08:00

Just a few more pics from the Kaisercraft booth, CHA Winter 2009. I might have a few more yet...

These papers are so cute:

Can't get enough rhinestones and PEARLS. These dark pearls are gorgeous!

I like these colored snap rings, too:

kaisercraft

2009-02-18T16:53:00.000-08:00

More pics from CHA, this time from the Kaisercraft booth. They had the cutest oversized projects around the booth that I couldn't resist taking photos of. Some would make fabulous home decor projects --esp for those supersized "great rooms" or those airy rooms with cathedral ceilings. Unfortunately, my humble abode boasts neither of those, but I still think I could go for one of these large scale projects for the mantle or on top of the bookcase wall unit.

I liked this first "mini album" a lot because not only was there the eye-catching supersize version (abt 12" or 15" square, I'm guessing)...

...but there was also a baby brother version on the shelf (about 6"?). Cool, huh?...

Here's more oversized samples...

And the regular versions...

And just a couple more (biggies):

This last one is the one I'd like to adapt for my mantle or as a gift perhaps. The photo is at least an 8"x10" (maybe larger) just to give you a sense of the scale. Isn't this too cute?! Even as just a double fold out this would be adorable.

Oh yeah and there was lots of cool product in the booth too, but I'll have to save that for another post since I'm all out of time.

still have some cha pics to post, but...

2009-02-16T23:14:00.000-08:00

I've been busy scrapping, so I'm going to take a break from the CHA pics and post a couple of recent layouts.

I think I mentioned a few posts back that 2009 is the Year of the Layout for me. For the past couple of years I wasn't doing a whole lot of personal scrapping in favor of some more important family/household/personal stuff that needed attention. The only scrapping I was doing was meeting deadlines --finishing store and class samples.

So, for 2009 every time I sit down at my work table, I'm trying to put at least one SB page or layout ahead of the other "required" stuff. I was surprised to find that I've gotten a bit rusty at working with my own with-photos-pages. To try and describe that a bit more specifically - last week when I sat down to scrap, it felt completely alien. As if it was something I'd never done before. I think that is a phenomenon known as losing your "mojo". In any case, I've joined a bunch of online challenges to help me get my SBing groove back.

One of the challenges was a "Use a Kit" challenge at Willow Traders, the idea being to dig in to one of your kits and actually USE it! I chose to work with the December Studio Calico kit that I had won at WT. I really loved working with this kit! It had yummy Crate Paper, Pink Paislee and Making Memories, with other fun stuff from CI's Creative Cafe, Maya Road and of course exclusive Studio Calico products. I added some Thickers and MM alpha stickers for my titles.

Here are a few of my layouts (featuring some pics by the fabulous Shawn from our family session last summer). This first one is based on a layout sketch by a DIFFERENT Shawn, and was featured at The Scrapping Spot (the week 42 sketch).

The second layout was my own design, but those last two are basically from the same sketch - a scraplift of a layout by Sandi Minchuk (at Scrapperie). I didn't realize until after I'd finished that last one that I'd even lifted her title (sorry, Sandi --must have been subliminal, oops!)

This week, I have to switch gears to get my class kits finished for the coming weekend, but I'm also working on a couple of altered projects that I hope I'll be able to finish soon. More on those later. And, btw, if you're local there are just a few open spots in my back-to-back layout classes this Saturday. Call SGT to reserve your spot.

anna griffin

2009-02-08T16:20:00.001-08:00

How could I do anything BUT fall in love with the rich yummy goodness of Anna Griffin products. I especially love her embellishments, but the Peyton and Georgette lines have really got me excited.

Take a look-see...

Some super cute embellies:

Here's Georgette:

And here's Peyton:

Some sample projects:

my, oh maya road!

2009-02-07T15:01:00.000-08:00

The Maya Road booth is always a favorite stop for me. They have the coolest samples and TONS of mini books. Their designers are always top notch. I did a make-n-take using their cool spray (paint?) I love the rich colors of the Maya Road sprays.

Here is some Maya eye candy

Some fun felt shapes..

12x12 masks...

And the masks as framed art - don't they look cool?

Chipboard shaped "key chain" albums

The new sprays (the samples on the let show you how nice and evenly these sprays go on)

I like these stick pins...

Cool little velvet flowers...

graphic 45

2009-02-05T11:51:00.000-08:00

The Graphic 45 was absolutely gorgeous and filled with endless inspiration. Three new lines were released: Communique, Fashionista and Transatlantique. I really love how the booth samples relate to the themes of the new lines and also how the projects extend beyond scrapbook pages. I found myself going back to this booth every day that I was at the show and finding new things to appreciate each time I did.

Somehow I missed getting any pics of Transatlantique, but it is a very cool travel themed line --think Art Deco hotel decals.

Here is some "Fashionista" (I think this was my fave --I certainly took the most pics of this line):

And some "Communique":

Here are a couple of the Good Times Girls at the G45 booth.
Allie on the phone and Barb is holding the door

fantastic february

2009-02-04T20:30:00.000-08:00

Taking a break from my CHA highlights to tell you about some February FUN! Scrapperie is having a month long contest "Fantastic February" that you don't want to miss. There are challenges, games, classes, lots of chatting and PRIZES!

If you're not already a member of Scrapperie, it's super easy to join (and make sure to tell Sandi that Cindy sent ya!) Here's a link that'll give you the low-down: Fantastic February.

Hope I see you there!

my little shoebox

2009-02-04T13:34:00.000-08:00

More from CHA...

My Little Shoebox is a fun company with some delightful designs. For some reason, I think of Hello Kitty. Here are some pics for your viewing enjoyment...

I really liked a lot of their alphabet items. The one used on this project (similar to Pressed Petals) come in a fresh yellow & orange color scheme:

And I really liked the My Little Shoebox versions of mini alphas (very like the ones from Making Memories):

And their version of alpha stickers like the American Crafts "Thickers":

Very cute stuff!