Decorative circles

Well... it's official... our house is sold!! Closing was today and everything went great! Since I can't get into my new home until next Friday, I am just hanging out at my parents house spending some time with them before we leave for Texas! And I have to confess, since it has been soooooo many years since I have lived with my parents, I am loving having my moms home cooking every night!! The food tastes so much better when I am not the one cooking it!!

So enough of about me... on to the challenges!! This week at Frosted Designs, we are encouraging you to make a project using a circle with some sort of decorative edge! This can be a scalloped edge, ric rak, and any other thing you can think of! Be creative!! And to help you out a little more, Sketches in Thyme has the perfect sketch for this challenge!! I used it to make my LO this week!! So... use the sketch and enter two challenges!! Gotta love that!!  I would love to stick around and chat but I have waaaaaay too many errands to run before I can leave Indiana!! I better get busy!! Happy scrapping and be sure to check out what the design teams did on both challenge blogs!! Be sure to link up your projects in both places for a chance to win some great prizes!! Thanks for stopping by! Barb  :)

Back to School!

It's Friday!! Yipee!! My kids started back to school yesterday (even though they will only be there less than 10 school days!) and I know kids all over the country are starting back!! That is why our lovely host this week,  Jessica, picked the Back to School theme this week at Frosted Designs!! All you have to do is create something that has to do with Back to School!! And if you link up your project at Frosted Designs, you will be entered for a chance to will a Lucky Girl Craft Kit!! Which is what I used to make this LO!!

Everything on this LO came from the kit except for the background paper! How do you like my doodling?! That is something new for me but I have to admit, I had soooooo much fun!! I felt like a kid again!! These pictures were taken back in 2007... the last year I had all of them home for a first day of school photo!! My oldest, Courtney, was a senior and little Lauren was in kindergarten! I miss those days of having all the kids home!!

Now, I would love to see what you can do with our Back to School Theme! Stop over at Frosted Designs and look at what the Design Team did... so many fun projects!!
Thanks again for stopping by!! Enjoy your weekend!!

Meet Greg!

I am so blessed to have the most amazing brother in the entire world!! And when I say that, I really do mean it!! Greg is about 4 years older than me and is the strongest, sweetest person anyone could ever meet!! He has a heart of gold!!

A few weeks ago, my mom threw a party for me and my older sister Cindy and our families. She wanted to share one last time of having the family together because it will be a long time before it happens again! My sister and her family have taken a job that will have them living in Japan for the next two years! And as most of you already know, I am moving to Texas in the next few weeks!! Anyway... these pictures were taken at that party and when I saw them, I knew that I had to scrap them!!

Back to my brother.... If you ever met him, you would fall in love with him instantly!! Everyone does! Greg does not drive a car but used to drive a moped. He went everywhere on this moped and people were always telling us all the places they saw Greg!! That was all great until the day he pulled out in front of a car. Fortunately he was wearing his helmet, unfortunately, his left leg took the biggest part of the impact and they were not able to save the bottom portion of his leg. Now... I don't know about you , but I am pretty sure I would be one very grumpy patient if that was me lying in the hospital in such extreme pain! Not my brother... he spent his time apologizing to the nurses whenever he asked for something or if they had to come in to take care of something for him!! Like somehow he was putting them out!! But, that's Greg!! always thinking of others first! As difficult as it was seeing him in so much pain for so many days, I enjoyed hearing all the fabulous stories everyone shared about him when they came to visit him in the hospital!! And boy did he have visitors!! Greg is such an amazing person.... I am so blessed to call him my brother!!

Now, enough of the sappy stuff and on to business!! It is Thursday so that means a new sketch at Sketches in Thyme! The Design Team did some truly amazing LOs this week... be sure to stop over and see them!! And then take the sketch and do your own thing with it!! We would love to see you link up your project at Sketches in Thyme!!

I will be home later tonight... I have spent the last 3 days in Dallas finalizing things for our move! It is coming up quickly!! I will try my best to visit everyone's blogs, but please forgive me if I don't get around to comment as much these next few days.... so much is going on right now!! As always, thanks for stopping by and leaving me the nice comments all of you always do!!

Barb  :)

Back to School!

Okay... I know what you all are thinking... I really should be working on the house instead of scrapping!! but I have a good excuse (at least that is what I told my husband!) Lauren was having a slumber party and no one was sleeping!! I couldn't go to bed with a house full of girls that were still awake so I might as well scrap!! I think that sounds good... don't you?!!! lol!!


So.... one of my bestest bloggy buddies did this amazing sketch... you may know her.... LEAH!! We see Leah's work each week over at Stuck On U Sketches (which is one of my favorite challenge sites... if you haven't been there yet, you really need to go!!) She does some amazing layouts and has so much personality... you just can't help but love her!! Anyway... She personally designed the sketch for their current challenge and I knew I had to play along!! AND one of my other super good bloggy friends, KIM issued the current challenge over at The Sisterhood of Crafters!! Their challenge is Back to School!!! How could I say no to these challenges?!!

I found some photos of my daughter with me and her friend Abby at Literacy Night last September. They had the best evening for the families. When the kids arrived, they each got to pick out a brand new book and of course the girls had to get the same one!! Then we went to a different part of the school where they had all these tents set up with little campfires and flashlights!! That is where these photos were taken! There were many other activities throughout the school... so much fun!!

And because I was on a major roll... and the girls still were not ready for bed, I whipped out a card for the teacher for the first day!!

I know what you must be thinking right now... what a show off!! No seriously... I am not a card maker so I was pretty thrilled with how it turned out! And it was so simple to do!! Thank you Leah and Kim for the challenges!!

AND... I have some pretty fantastic news!! Are you ready?!! We finally bought a house!! I am not going to have to be homeless!! We are so excited that our move to Texas is really getting close....less than 2 weeks now!! Thanks for all your encouraging and kind words over the past several weeks!! You guys rock!! Thanks for stopping by!!
Barb  :)

More Chicago pictures!!

Wow... is it really Friday already?!! Where did the week go?! Well... we have a new challenge for you over at Frosted Designs! Our very own Debbie created this one and you won't want to miss it!! Debbie would like you to pick 5 of the 10 items on her list and add them to your project!! I have to tell you... this was so much fun!! I couldn't believe how quickly I was able to get 5 items on and it came to no surprise to me when I ended up with 8 items!!

Here is your list:

(Remember, you only need to use 5 items!!)

1. Punch or punches

2. Felt

3. Ribbon

4. Pink, blue or purple

5. Flowers

6. Banner

7. Bird

8. Buttons

9. Butterflies

10.Glitter

The only two items I did not include were the bird and buttons!!  And check out this banner.... isn't it tooo cute?! I love all the flowers on it!!

Now it is your turn!! Head over to Frosted Designs and see what the Design Team did for you.. they are all pretty amazing!! And then we would love to see what you can do!! Remember, each time you enter, you earn a chance to win the Lucky Girl kit!! I have this kit and I can tell you... it has some pretty serious yummy stuff in it!! I am also entering this into two other challenges....

Practical Scrappers (summer theme)

Wee Memories (Butterflies)

I also need to finish up some past business!! Getting ready for this move is starting to really get in the way of my blogging!!

(As for the update, right now we have exactly 2 weeks to be completely out of our house and have not officially purchased one yet! We do have an offer on one finally so say a prayer that it will be accepted so we can move forward with our move!!)

A few weeks ago, I hosted the challenge at Frosted Designs asking you to use an arrow in your project. AND I had a side challenge on my blog for those that entered a project and left me a message on my blog!! So.... if

Karen B

and

Luv-To-Scrap

would contact me at barbcraft@comcast.net and give me their addresses, I will be sending them an American Crafts scrapbooking kit!!

Thanks for stopping by today! Have a great weekend!!

Barb  :)

*My friend Dawn has a card that she has created for the Pink Stamper! It is gorgeous and she would be so thankful if you would take the time to vote for her! But you have to hurry... the voting ends soon!! Click HERE to find Dawn's blog and see the gorgeous card... directions are there as well!! Good luck Dawn!!

A Chicago Trip and a tutorial!

*I WILL GO AHEAD AND WARN YOU NOW.. THIS IS A VERY LONG POST BECAUSE I AM POSTING FOR TWO DESIGN TEAMS AND ONE IS A TUTORIAL!!!

Good morning everyone! It is Thursday and I have so much to share with you!! First of all, Sketches in Thyme has a new sketch for you!!

I decided to do some pictures from my recent trip to Chicago! I know... I should have been home packing, after all, the movers are coming in 15 days!! But, it was Emmy's (my neice's) 5th birthday and we wanted to celebrate it right! So, my sister and I drove to Chicago with Lauren and Emmy! We stayed right on Magnificent Mile and had a blast!! Unfortunately we did not get much grown up shopping done.... it was all geared toward the girls! We did go to the American Girl Store and had lunch in their cafe, went to Navy Pier(had to ride the ferris wheel!) , rode in taxi (major highlight for the girls!), ate at Rainforest Cafe, and hit the Lego and Disney stores!

I do have another LO that goes with this one (can't show it until tomorrow!) so all of my journaling is on that one! This one I kept pretty simple! Here is a close up of the flowers....

They were made from vellum and I just folded them over and inked them! I thought they added a unique feature to the page!!

And here is the sketch I started with....

The sketch is by Helen Croft at scrapalittlesketches.com

Do you want to see what you are playing for? If you submit a project during the month of August, you will be put into a drawing to win this prize:

Our lovely Maven Fern was so generous to donate this!! Wouldn't you like to win?! Well, you have to play along!! Stop by the Sketches In Thyme blog and see what the rest of the Design Team did for you.... truely amazing!!

SHE'S A SASSY LADY POST!!
I am also guest Designer at She's a Sassy Lady today!! Sheila is so sweet to let me post on her blog once a month!!  This time I am going to show you a tutorial on how to make the circle flowers on this layout! This is a picture of me with my two sisters. I will go ahead and apologize now for the lighting on these pictures! The reds really do match better IRL than they are showing up in this photo!

I started out by picking 4 coordinating pieces of cardstock and cutting them into 6 in. x 6 in. squares and placing them on my Cricut mat.

Next, I used my Gypsy and the Mini Monograms cartridges to make some circles. The sizes I used were 3 in, 2 1/4 in, 1 1/2 in. and 3/4 inch. I layered the circles on top of each other and I was not really careful about getting each one perfectly centered because I kind of liked that they were not perfect circles!

Here are the circles once they were cut.....

I took each circle and distressed it with my Tim Holtz distresser. If you don't have one, you could use scissors instead. I was very messy with this process and tried to bend and "wear down" the paper as I went. I did not want it to be perfect and stiff.

After they were all distressed, I inked them with a red ink.

I started with one of the larger circles, a piece of white cardstock and a glue gun. I glued the first circle to the cardstock, making sure to bend and fold as I went. I like using the circle rings instead of solid circles because I think they bend better when doing this part.

For the next layer, I decided to use ribbon instead of paper.

You continue the process until you have completed the flower.

Once the flower is complete, I used my scissors to cut flower off the card stock leaving a white cardstock circle as the base....

You can see the white cardstock circle base in this photo. To add another layer and make a lacey edge on the flower, I used my hot glue gun to glue the lace to the back of the flower.

When I flipped it over, this is what I had. (And yes, this is a different flower from the one I started with at the beginning of the tutorial. I made several of them, but this is the one I added lace to the back of!)

I added a pearl button to the center of the larger flower and just a pearl sticker to the smaller flower. I also used some Prima roses to add to the flower "bunch".

And that is everything! How simple were those to make?! And here it is again on the final layout!

Thanks for stopping by and reading this very long post with a lot of photos!! Please stop by She's a Sassy Lady and check it out! Sheila has a whole team of designers who keep the fresh ideas coming!! I am always learning something new there!! Have a great Thursday and thank you for taking the time to comment! I really do appreciate hearing what you have to say!!

Livin' Life!

Happy Friday everyone!! Are these weeks just flying by for all of you?! I can't believe we are so close to heading back to school already!! So... I guess this is a good week to slow down and join us in the Frosted Designs challenge!! Our lovely and very talented Kim is hosting the challenge this week!! In honor of her grandmothers birthday, she picked the theme.... Celebrate Life!! How great is that?!! Happy Birthday Kim's grandma!!

A few years ago, my parents invited my husband and I to Cabo for a vacation! We had soooo much fun!! We kept pretty busy while there.... we spent one day driving ATVs on the beach!! I was cracking up as my parents were flying down the beach shooting sand everywhere from their tires!! We swam with dolphins... which I must admit was sooooo much fun!! And we also did a dinner cruise at sunset!! That is where this picture was taken!! We were having such a blast on the boat and this picture reflects that!! I threw in the Lucky card behind the photo to remind me how lucky I am to have two healthy, active parents. About 13 years ago, my father had a severe heart attack and we almost lost him. I think it was a wake up call for my family and now we all tend to slow down and enjoy the moments we have with each other!!

All of the scrappy goodness for this LO came from my June and August Lucky Girl Kits which also happens to be our sponsor for the month of August at Frosted Designs!! Let us know how you Celebrate Life by linking up a project!! By doing that, you will be entered to win a Lucky Girl Kit for yourself!!

Thanks for coming by today! I am in Chicago where I survived a trip to the American Girl store yesterday and now today we are just going to hang out and do a little shopping!! Thank you for all you comments!!

Best of Times

Good morning!! It is Thursday which means that we have a new sketch for you at Sketches in Thyme!!

My Daughter, Kristin, has been working on some room decorations for her college dorm this summer. She had these pictures of her and her high school friends that she wanted me to put in a LO that she could frame for her room! She picked all the elements like the papers, ribbons, and flowers!! I just put it together!! We decided that the photos needed something to make them stand out a bit but didn't want to double mat them. We decided to add some white paint to the edges and then we did the same thing with all the edges of the layout! She loves it and can't wait to display it in her room!! And since the challenge at Creative Belli blog right now is paint... I thought I would enter it there!!

Here is the sketch for this weeks challenge! We would love to have you play along!! This was a really easy sketch to work with... and you could win a prize!! Everyone who enters a project at Sketches in Thyme during the month of August will be elegible for the prize at the end of the month!! So come play along with us!!

Thanks for stopping by today!! And as always, thank you for your sweet comments!!  Barb  :)

Some new news, some awards and a new LO/challenge

Hello everyone!! I have missed all of you soooooooo much!! The past two weeks have been very crazy for me! It started off with a much needed 10 day vacation in Myrtle Beach, then we were home for one day and left again for Dallas to start our house hunting trip. While we were in Dallas (in fact it was 30 minutes before we were meeting with our realtor) we got a call from our Indiana realtor with an offer on our home that we finally accepted. (we were back and forth with the buyers since Monday night!!) Soooooo... the good news is, our house is sold.... the bad news is, we have not purchased a new home yet!! YIKES!!  But don't worry, we did find one we liked and are working on making an offer. My husband is back in Texas now and is getting some final paperwork completed!! I will keep you posted if we get it or not!! In the meantime, I am going to be very busy getting things ready to move here.... we have to be out of our house by Aug. 27th!! Boy is the month of August going to fly by for me!! So please forgive me if I am not as active in blog land as I have been in the past!! I am trying my best to balance EVERYTHING!!!!  LOL!!!

So..... I was so excited to return from vacation to 3 new awards!! How great is that?!! You guys really are too good to me!! I feel honored that these three lovely ladies thought enough of me to send them to me!! So now I would like to pass them on to some wonderful friends who continued to stop by my blog while I was away and leave me so many nice comments!!

The first award is the Versatile Blogger Award! I actually received this award from 2 different gals.... the first one was Brenda! I don't know if you have been over to her blog, Rose Blossom Legacies or not, but you must stop by and check it out!! She is on several design teams and once you see her work, you will know why!! Pretty amazing stuff!! Thank you so much Brenda!! And Brenda, I have to admit, I loved reading the 7 things about you... we have a lot in common!!! lol!!!

I also received this award from my friend Lisa!! Who of course is extremely talented as well!! One of the things I like best about visiting her blog, Lisa's Craft Room, is that she has plenty of fun creative ideas besides just layouts and cards!! Lisa... thank you for sharing your talent with us, and thanks for this award!! You are such a total sweetheart!!

Now this is what you have to do:

1. Thank the person who gave it to you.

2. Tell seven things about yourself.
3. Pass the award on to five bloggers whom you think are fantastic.

7 things about myself....

1. I am going to be living in Texas in less than a month!

2. I am one of those weird people who actually enjoy house hunting!!

3. I am definitely a pool person... have to have one!!

4. I am not organized at all and am totally freaking out about everything I have to get done in the next few weeks!

5. I am totally excited that the company is moving us and I don't have to do all the packing... I wouldn't even know where to start!! LOL!!

6. I am pretty excited about only seeing snow when I choose to... no more shoveling walks and driveways!! (If it snows in Texas, I will just wait 30 minutes and it will melt... no need to shovel!!)

7. Everyone keeps telling how hot Texas is... I guess they really don't know me at all or they would know that I LOVE hot weather!!

Now... for the 5 bloggers I am to pass this on to (x2 since I received it twice!!) I apologize if you have received this award already... since I haven't been hopping around blog land lately, I am not sure who has already received it and who hasn't!! 

Angi - Cokie Pop Paper

Li-bee-ti - Creations with Love

Sandi - Soft Side of Sandi

Beatriz - Amazing Grace

Fern - Fern's Creations

Lidia - Breaking Barriers

Kim - Memories In Thyme

Tanya - Random Acts of Krafting

Dawn -Dawn's Craft Place

Carri - Double Click Connections

I was also fortunate enough to receive the Cherry on Top Award from my Sassy scrappin' friend Sheila!!! Sheila runs the She's A Sassy Lady Blog where she allows me to be a guest designer once a month. The best thing about her blog is that you will learn something new each time you visit!! Sheila encourages her designers to give detailed, step by step directions for all of the projects that are presented!! I have learned so many new tips and tricks from reading the posts!! If you are not already a follower, you need to become one!! Click here to see her blog!! Thank you Sheila for this cheerful award!!

Here are the rules for this award:

1. Thank the person who gave this award to you.
2. Copy the award and put it on your blog.
3. List three things which you love about yourself.
4. Post a picture you love.
5. Tag five people you wish to pass this award on to.
Three things I love about myself:
1. I think I am a good wife, mother, sister, and daughter!
2. I have a tender heart... I try to help those in need and lighten the load of those around me when possible!
3. I am a Christian!

I love this picture of Greg and I in Maui... this is "our" place and love to "get away" here!! Looking at the sunset I bet you can see why!!

I would like to pass this award on to:

Leah - Beeing Creative and Feeling Cherry

Diana - All The Day's of our Lifes

Pat - A Scrappin' Nana

Joni - Joni's Stuff

Debbie - Love Life's Little Pleasures

Thanks again to Brenda, Lisa and Sheila for not only giving me these awards, but for your patience while I got them posted!!

Finally.... we have a new challenge for you!! This is my last official post as a design team member for Practical Scrappers!! I decided to step down from the team due to the big move!! I knew I couldn't keep up with all my projects but I will really miss working with the team! I guess now I can play along with everyone else!!

Practical Scrappers is celebrating their ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY this week!! Cogratulations PS!! So, this week is unique because they are doing a new challenge each day.. all having to do with the number one!! For today, the challenge is to use one photo!! That is so seriously simple that all of you should be playing along!! Be sure to link up your projects... we would love to see what you can do!!

This LO is of my daughter and her best friend Abby!! They are so much alike and can play hours together!! In fact, Abby had a sleep over at our house last night!! We are trying to get as much play time in before we leave in a few weeks!!  The LO was made with American Crafts Papers. This LO also qualifies for the challenge at Stuck On U Sketches - Summer Theme!!

Thank you for stopping by and reading this VERY long post!! I love your comments!!

Barb  :)