More nostalgia...

I think, until recently, I had only ever scrapped one photo of myself as a baby, and that was comparing my baby photo with Chloe's. But I recently found the photo I scrapped the other day, along with this one, and I was inspired to scrap some baby me layouts. This photo has actually always been my favorite baby photo of myself - there's just something about it that I love. And my uncle took it, which I think is cool :-) Anyway, I used the awesome July AMM kit for this one, too.
I cut out a bunch of the clouds and then popped them up for some dimension.

Oh, and the journaling says, "oblivious to the world, my hand in a box of food. Yep... still me!" Tee hee.

Busy week here with Noah's swim lessons every day and he's now taking a boys hip-hop class one night a week too. We've been doing lots of playdates lately, too, to keep ourselves busy. Tomorrow I have an ultrasound in the morning, my ob appt, and then lunch with my hubby. :-) Did I mention that at my last ob appt two weeks ago, I was measuring 4 weeks ahead?! I've always measured ahead with my other babies (usually by about two weeks), but never by this much! My ob thinks this is going to be another biiiiig baby. I'm still not quite sure how Tony and I, two very average sized people, make such big babies!! Anyway, tomorrow is another u/s to just make sure it's a big baby and that there's not excess fluid or something like that. I'll keep you all posted ;-)

Happy hump day, friends!

Do you use sketches?

I will admit, it took me a long time to warm up to using sketches. I think my problem was that I like to come up with my own designs, and I almost felt like it was cheating to design something based on what someone else created. Although I still don't use them a lot, I have come to really enjoy using them because I now realize that I can still make a layout totally my own, even with a sketch. I usually find an aspect of the sketch that inspires me, and I use that as a starting point to go out on my own.

This month's sketch at AMM is by Tonya Dirk, and you can see the elements that I ran with.

I loved the verticle design on the left, but instead of using a bunch of small photos, I chose to use my journaling cards as embellishments in those spots, and I used just one photo in the spot where the title was designed to go. Instead of using three circles, I enlarged one and used it as my title block.

It's become a challenge for me to figure out how to take elements of a sketch and turn them into my own creation :-)

Btw, that photo is from last summer - I don't think Noah looks that different, but Chloe looks like such a baby to me!!

Anyway, i'm having a blast with the kit, and I knocked on another two layouts today (well, aaaaalmost two lol). At this rate, i'll have lots of blogging material (but I still don't think I can keep up with Doris).

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

AMM July kit!

Oooh, this month's kit is so fun and summery - I love it! I found this photo of me as a baby chilling on the beach, and this kit was perfect to scrap it :-)
I added some handstitching to the fun sun sticker, placed a BG jelly in the middle and then popped it up for some dimension.I can't get the July AMM kit photo to upload straight for some reason (it keeps turning 90 degrees - weird!), but you can check it out and buy it here.

Hope everyone is having a good week! It's still sweltering here - been around 100 most of the week (today we got a break - it was only in the low 90's lol), and i'm just trying to stay as cool as possible! Happy Friday, friends!

Happy (belated) 4th of July (and a layout :-)

Before I show you some of my favorite pics from 4th of July yesterday, I wanted to share this layout using (mostly) the "Wishful Thinking" line by Fancy Pants. These pics are from Chloe modeling her new leotard this past fall :-)
Now, onto the 4th. We celebrated our nation's birthday with our friends and neighbors yesterday. The kids had a bike parade, and then we enjoyed a fun party before checking out the fireworks. It was a great day (despite the nearly 100 degree temps!) :-)

Here are just a few of my fav pics that I took:



I hope that the rest of you who celebrate the 4th had a wonderful day full of good food and good company!

AMM Blog Hop!

Welcome to the Blog Hop! The hop starts today, Friday July 2nd through Sunday July 4th. Each blog will be showcasing a different project inspired by summer and all of its glory! Hop through each blog to check out the instructions for creating each project, then choose a project to recreate. Post your project in the AMM gallery and in this thread. You will have until Friday July 9th at midnight to post your project to be eligible to win an Echo Park Collection pack! More than one project created earns you another chance in the random drawing. Please be sure that projects are created especially for this contest. Good luck!

For my project today, I am going to show you all how to make a pinwheel. I made mine for our annual 4th of July parade that is held in our neighborhood, as I figured my kids would love to hold it (and hopefully it will be a windy day lol).

For the pinwheel, you will need:
a square piece of patterned paper or cardstock (mine is 6x6)
a thin dowel rod
2-3 large beads
thick beading wire
small circle punch
scrap piece of paper

Ok, the first thing you will do is fold your square piece of paper in half. Then fold it in half the other way. Now fold it along both diagonals. You are doing this to make your cut lines easy to follow. You will now cut from each corner edge towards the center, coming about 1/3 of an inch away from the center. It will then look like 4 triangles connected at the center.
I then flipped my patterned paper over. Whichever side you want to see the most of should be facing up. Now, stick a little bit of adhesive in the center (Tip - do not use a glue dot. I tried that first and it made the wire part that we will get to later very difficult. A little bit of a tape runner will do the trick.) Fold one side of each triangle towards the center, sticking it down on the adhesive. It does not matter which side of the triangle you fold in, as long as it is the same side for all four traingles.
Next, punch a small circle and adhere it to the center of your pinwheel to cover the spot where all the folded triangles are joined together.
Now you will need your dowel rod. I cut mine down to about 12 inches (it was thin enough that I could cut it with my scissors). I decided to ink mine up with blue for the red/white/blue effect, but you could leave yours as is, or decorate it with paint, glitter, etc.
Now, take your thick craft wire and wrap it around your dowel rod for a couple of inches. Once you get to the top, string one of your beads onto the wire. Depending on the thickness of the beads, you may need two. These will act as spacers and allow your pinwheel to spin.
Now push your wired dowel rod through the center of the pinwheel (tip: I poked a hole in the center first to make this step easier).
Next, place another bead on top of your punched circle. At this point, I cut my wire down, leaving just a short stem.
Using beading pliers, a scissor or your hands, fold the wire down to secure the bead in place. Voila, your pinwheel is complete!
For your very last step, you will need an adorable little girl to act as your pinwheel model.
She should get very excited when a gust of wind comes along and starts blowing the pinwheel ;-)
I hope you guys have enjoyed this project. It was easy to make, and I think it will make a great addition to our 4th of July parade.

Ok, blog hoppers, go on ahead now to the blog of the fabulously talented Tonya Dirk. Have fun!!

I'm back (and burnt!) :-)

Got back from the beach, and we had such a great time! My only complaint is that the trip wasn't long enough ;-) Saturday was our only full day there, so the girls and I hit the beach and stayed the entire day. It was THE perfect beach day! The temp was in the 80's, the water was cold at first touch but warmed up, and the company was perfect :-) I wasn't planning to get my pregnant self all the way out past the breaking waves, but I couldn't resist... and i'm so glad I did! That night, the girls and I saw SITC2. I wasn't expecting a quality movie, and it definitely wasn't, but it was entertaining.

Here's a layout I made shortly before I left - just for fun! Haven't done one of those in awhile! The papers are mostly Crate Paper, the letters are Sass, Doodlebug and Heidi Swapp, and the frame is MM. I also had fun with my new Martha Stewart border punch.
Chloe started camp today at her dance school. It's princess camp every morning this week. Noah is going this week, Tues-Fri mornings, so we got to have a mommy/son date this morning, which was long overdue. We went bowling, and I have to say, I think I did better with my 7 month pregnant belly than I normally do lol. We then played some arcade games and hit the store before picking up Chloe.... great morning!

Oh, btw, we're having a blog hop this Friday morning at AMM - it should be lots of fun!

I'm pretty exhausted these days, so i'm going to go relax a bit before we start bedtime for the kids. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Two days in a row!

Wow, I can't believe i'm blogging two days in a row! I think that's a record... at least as of the last few months lol. It helps that i'm trying to compete with Doris's blogging momentum - keeps me motivated lol.

I did this layout with Fancy Pants' About a Girl line, and I printed the "Hello my name is" stickers off of the internet. I did this layout for a challenge over at the awesome Cartwheels blog to do a layout introducing yourself. I had SO much fun with this! It had been awhile since i'd done a "me" layout, and i'm really glad I did :-) The pictures were taken by Cheryl during our blinddate last week, so a big thanks to her for her awesome photography!

The (very long) journaling reads:

i am 35 years old. i still feel like i'm about 25. i am 28 weeks pregnant with my third child. i still can't believe i'm going to be a mommy to 3! i've been married for 8 years, and in two years, tony and i plan to renew our vows in vegas with elvis. i have a round dark birthmark on my inside right calf about the size of a large pea. i was in a baton twirling league as a kid, as well as cheerleading. i also played softball for years, basketball for one season, and i danced for 8 years. i'm still horribly un-athletic. i dropped out of a bowling league when i was a kid b/c it interfered with my saturday morning smurfs cartoon. i am horribly disorganized. i wanted to be a vet when i was little. although i loved swimming as a kid and was very good at it, i'm a very timid swimmer now. i always had the feeling that i would have twins. i used to write poetry when i was younger. i love chocolate, belly laughs, spring breezes, family bike rides, nursing my babies, sand in my toes, scrapbooking, playing rockband (especially the beatles version), and reading (to name a few). i worry more than i should. i love spending time with family. i am incredibly thankful that my parents and brother are nearby, and i am so very lucky to have them. being a wife and mother are the most important, difficult, fantastic and fulfilling roles i've ever had. my husband and my children make me blissfully happy.

Last up, I have another Fancy Pants layout using the new Like Father, Like son line. I handstitched the star and then misted around it. I probably will not blog again before I leave for the beach tomorrow, so don't get too used to this daily happening lol. I'll be back early next week, though!

Have a fantastic weekend, my friends!