Everlasting Love

Here is some more Prima work for you (winter CHA 2011). I told you I had lots to share and there is lots more to come! This is a picture of Larissa & Min last fall. Just a day or two after this photo, Min fell very ill and we thought we were going to lose her. She is 14 years old and she refused to move, eat or drink. We said our goodbyes and took her to the vet for what we thought was the last time. I was rather hysterical. Imagine how happy I was to leave with a bottle of antibiotics, a $50 vet bill and the promise of healthy dog real soon. After a little tlc, like giving her water by syringe, we had our ole Min back in just a day or two. So our beloved Min, although 14 years old is still running around and extremely healthy. She really is the perfect family pet.

I stitched this inner circle and then used blue Stickles in between each stitch.

I just love using these funky metallic leaves on my pages.

And lastly, here is a set of altered jars that I made using some old ice tea bottles.

Thanks for visiting!

take time...

This is another layout that I created for Prima Marketing (winter CHA). Time take to smell the flowers - this is not really advice I need to give to Larissa. She is always taking time to smell the flowers (and weeds) and pick just about anything that grows. I just love that she gets so excited about it. She loves to point out when the cherry trees or weigela are in bloom. My kitchen table is almost always adorned with a plastic princess cups filled with weeds or flowers of some sort.

Here are some detail shots for you :)
Thanks for the visit!

Lupin Lane

This is where I live. {Prince Edward Island} I'm pretty convinced that I live in one of the most wonderful little spots in the entire world. Then again, I've never really left to see the rest of the world so what do I know? I don't really care to leave...at least not for more than a week or two at a time. In June the lupins come out to bloom. They fill up the ditches and the edges of fields. They overlook the cliffs and dunes at the ocean and they just make this Island that much prettier. A dear friend once told me that as she and her family crossed the Confederation Bridge and entered PEI, they could smell this smell.... I piped up "Was it pesticide sprays from the fields? Was it smell of deep frying french fries from the processing plant? Was it manure on fields?" No, she told me it was a beautiful fragrant, flower smell that was everywhere. It was lupins. It's funny how sometimes when we are surrounded by great beauty all the time we need to have it pointed out to us by someone who is discovering it for the first time. Lupins come in a several colours,. Here we mainly see pink, white and lots and lots of shades of purple. So, here I am again, showing you a purple page even though I avoid it like the plague in scrapbooking. I think it works for this page though ;)

This is Larissa in front of our house this time last year. I would love to get some new lupin shots this year but we had a torrential downpour yesterday and most of the lupins were flattened. They'll be back up and spry in a few days again so I'll wander out with my camera and get new photos. This time with my baby boy in there too :)

I created this layout for Prima Marketing. The purple fabric trim is one of the prettiest scrapbook embellishments I have ever worked with (even if it is purple! LOL) There were so many pretty little bits that I loved from Prima's winter CHA release, some of which are metal/glass trinkets and crochet flower centres. I'd link 'em up to Prima for you but that portion of their site doesn't seem to be working at this time.

Thanks for taking the time to stop by and peek in on my work.

Prima-licious

I have lots of Prima work to show you this week. My term with Prima Marketing is over but I did lots of work for CHA Summer 2010 and Winter 2011 and because of my sadly neglected blog during my pregnancy, I have lots to share. Here is one of my favourites from CHA winter.

Greatest Treasure: I just love this picture of Larissa from last fall. Most of the goodies on this page are from Prima's Reflections Collection. Of course there's lots of fussy cutting and Stickles too.

Thanks for stopping by today!

My Big Strong Boy!

My Big Strong Boy: My boy is strong indeed. One of the first things I noticed the day he born was that he was putting weight on his legs when I held him against my chest. So it comes as no surprise that at the ripe ole age of 3 months he is just raring to go. He loves to stand upright and just holds a finger or two for balance. I have a feeling this 'little' man will be walking sooner than later.

I really enjoyed working on this 'real boy' layout. I know I have done other pages of my boy but this is the first one where I have picked/bought my own supplies instead of working for a DT. I really love these colours from My Minds Eye Alphabet Soup and I see a lot more MME in my (and my boys) future. I really loved the little monster chipboard that came with this line. I think the little blue monster looking an awful lot like Hudson LOL

Little Tip: One thing you may have noticed is that if you look closely you will find in a number on most of my pages. It may be the date, the number of people in the layout, the age of the person in my layout etc. If the number is on something like this ruler, I like to accentuate it by circling it, underlining it or drawing attention to it in some way. In this layout, I used an off set circle to draw attention to the 3 and wrote the word 'months' on the circle.

Thanks for stopping by again! Have a wonderful day!

a small but useful project

I was recently spring cleaning my daughter's bedroom while she was at school. There are lots of baskets, containers and toy boxes in her bedroom but there was a need for small containers for storing her more 'precious' items. Precious things like her Pez collection, magic wands, silly bandz, lip gloss, body glitter etc. I wracked my brain and then I remembered some little containers that I had tucked aside some time ago. I pulled out some old Betty Crocker (or Duncan Hines) icing containers that used to look like this before all the yummy contents were gobbled up.

They were already washed up with the labels removed just waiting to be put to good use. I pulled out some scrap paper and went to work on this simple little project. I used Crate Paper's Paper Doll Collection. It was an easy choice with the little dolls, purses and matching patterns. All I did was use one simple band of paper wrapped around each container. I used Fabri-tac to adhere the pattern paper to the container. At the top of each container I adhered a simple piece of lace, again with the Fabri-tac and voila - instant gratification and instant organization! When Larissa came home from school she was absolutely thrilled with her new little containers. They made finding her most important little treasures so much easier instead of digging through larger baskets or bins. I also love any project that reduces, re-uses & recycles...go green!!

I think they'll be lots more of these little containers popping up around the house, especially in Larissa's art corner!

My Creative Scrapbook - June Limited Edition Kit

I have SIX layouts that I want to share with you that I created using this kit! I even created some cards with the leftovers but I didn't get them photographed before I gave them away. Actually, that's a lie... I did photograph them but the photos are too awful too use and since the cards are gone...

This kit featured Crate Paper's Portrait line which is a wedding theme but that doesn't limit you to wedding layouts. You can use it for just about anything. I just love this eclectic mix of colours and patterns. Right now, I'm feeling much love for Crate Paper and that much love had me not wanting to put this kit away until I used up every little scrap!

Happy Day: This was indeed a happy day. We have had a very sad little spring here on PEI...cold, RAINY and rainy. Did I mention it was rainy? Yes, well 27 days of rain in May. Gross eh? So when the sun finally graced us with her appearance we took full advantage of the free vitamin D and hung outside for a while and that's when I snapped this sweet photo.

Nanny's boy: Little Hudson and his Nanny (not Nanny as in live-in caretaker, Nanny as in Grandmother) I loved all these pattern so much that I cut up little 3x3 squares and arranged them on a circle and 'quilted them' in a very rough fashion. The circle looks a little wonky and egg shaped here but that's just my bad photography skills of the day. I swear it's round and pretty in real life!

Family of 4: YAY!!!!!!!! I am so so happy to scrap this photo. I (we actually) waited for this moment for so many years. This photo is so precious to me. The journaling reads "They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This picture says happy a thousand times" When I was thinking about scrapping this photo, I just knew I wanted a big 4 on it. 4, 4, 4!!! There are 4 of us now in our little family and it makes me so happy :D

Big Little Girls: Kind of a strange title eh? I should explain. This is Larissa and her little cousin. They look so grown up in these photos and as I was thinking that I realized that in a very short time I will be looking at these same photos and thinking 'wow, they are so little'. Time just goes by so fast!

Wishes for you... happiness. That's what I want for my little boy :) I love this picture of him cuddled up in my arms and his hands in his mouth (a constant these days)

3 months: Just a simple layout to keep track of Hudson's accomplishments at this age. I just loved this piece of calendar pattern paper and thought it was the perfect setting for page about age :)

Thanks for stopping by again! Have a wonderful day.

My Creative Scrapbook - June Main Kit

Hi everyone! I wanted to share another kit with you today. This is June's Main Kit from My Creative Scrapbook. I was so happy to get this kit. I had been wanting Basic Grey's Sweet Threads for some time so I was excited to finally get to work with it. I find all the patterns in this line are fairly similar so I used white cardstock to balance things out a little bit. My fellow design team members came up with some gorgeous designs with this kit (as usual!). You can check 'em out here!

Sweet Words: "Baby Hudson is very very cute" Larissa certainly loved her brother and was convinced he was cute even before he was born. She had written this note on her little magnetic doodle about a week before he arrived.

Tender Kiss: Little Baby Hudson has had no shortage of kisses. Larissa peppers him with her love daily...many times a day actually. She doesn't even mind when he is crying. I am continuously surprised at how patient and kind she is with him. He couldn't ask for a better sister.

Little Sprout: I just love this die cut that came with the kit that says "little sprout". It's the perfect title for my little sprout hard at work planting her seeds. This girl has a true passion for gardening. Her favourite Easter present was some child sized gardening gloves (found at Michaels...that is the Easter bunny found them there of course). She received some little seed kids in her Easter basket: sunflowers, green beans and birdhouse gourds. After totally gorging on her Easter treats the first thing she wanted to do was get to work with the planting. I really liked the flowers/greenery stickers in this kit and used dimensional adhesive (pop dots) to lift them off the page so they would stand out more. The offset circle in the large scallop die cut were easily made using two circle punches.

My Beautiful Sunshine: It was so beautiful to get a day in the sun after 27 days of rain (ACK!!) To celebrate we basked in the sun and pranced about in a field of dandelions behind our house when I snapped this photo of my little ray of sunshine :)

And I will leave you with a few quick cards that I whipped up with some of my kit leftovers :)