January LOAD #43 & #44 - Every Picture has a Story

Another week over and a new week just beginning! It's cold here in Dallas, so we spent most of the day indoors. It did allow me to finish another layout for my January LOAD (LayOut A Day). I am participating in this event over at Let's Scrap. This is #43 and #44 (#12 and 13 traditional) so I am officially caught up! Yeah! 

I played along with the Inspired Challenge over at Colorful Creations. I was inspired by the vertical neutral wood background. I used a lighter color background on my layout and then added vertical ribbon and a second pattern paper to mimic the wood slats.  The round plate, bowl, egg, mcmuffin and juice glass inspired me to play with round photos and lots of them. Finally, the layering of the food on the croissant inspired me to layer journaling tags in the corner.

I used the sketch from the January Challenge over at Sketches with a Twist. The twist was to use a chevron. I used a chevron in my title and even used chevron paper on the chevron! 

Here is a closeup of my chevron:

Finally, I played along with the Studio Challenges current challenge: New Beginnings. This was the first time that we took Maddie into the deep end of the pool and taught her to go under water. Juan dunked her three times by counting: one, two, three.... and then quickly submerging them both. Each time Maddie came up sputtering, but didn't shriek or cry. Hopefully, this is the beginning of a great little swimmer! Here's the journaling I included saying just that!

Here is one more closeup:

Materials Used: paper - Creative Imaginations, Pebbles, and Antique Paperie; title card - Pebbles (Family); stickers - Antique Paperie; foil journal pad - Antique Paperie; button - CTMH; ribbon - unknown.

I hope you had a creative weekend! It's not too late to play along with the challenges above!

Hugs!
Jessica

Project Life - Week 1

Welcome to Project Life 2013! If you are new to my blog, welcome! I hope you will stay a while. I'm Jessica, wife to Juan, mommy to 1 year old Maddie. I am also an electrical engineer by day and I am participating in Project Life, a different way to record our lives by taking one photo a day. This was inspired by the fabulous Becky Higgins who has put together a wonderful kit to make this challenge easier.

I am using the digital kit on shutterfly (hopefully olive once it has been released), find more info at http://www.beckyhiggins.com/blog. This digital version uses Shutterfly and is SUPER easy to use! See my completed pages for 2012 using the Shutterfly Cobalt kit HERE.

Each Monday/Tuesday, I will post my pictures/journaling from the previous week. Project Life Tuesday was created by Jessica Turner over at The Mom Creative and she is hosting a linky for readers to link up their pictures. So if you want to join in or want to see others POTW, just click the buttons at the bottom of this post.

First, I finally uploaded vidoes of Maddie last night on New Year's Eve. She loved the blow horns but didn't really care for the poppers. See the videos HERE, HERE, and HERE.

And finally, my POTW (pictures of the week):

Tuesday - Maddie has become a pro at climbing our stairs, she even tries to climb them one foot per stair while holding the rail, but she can't quite reach the rail yet. I, on the other hand, have apparently forgot the simple task of climbing stairs and fell down them tonight. It was quite a fiasco as a seriously bruised my tailbone and could not even walk the rest of the week. Also, the past couple of weeks, Maddie has figured out where the snacks are kept, in the refrigerator. She goes to the refrigerator door and starts wailing and trying to pull on the door to tell us she wants a snack (fruit, go-gurts, water, etc.).

Wednesday - Maddie absolutely LOVES books! She loves the seek and find type where we ask her to find an object and she points to it. Maddie has become a little chatter box. Tonight when I put her to sleep and was walking out the door I said, "Night, night Maddie; Momma loves you." and she replied, "Night".

Thursday - Maddie loves Go-gurts as an afternoon snack. Within the past couple of weeks, Maddie has figured out where the snacks are kept, in the refrigerator. She goes to the refrigerator door and starts wailing and trying to pull on the door to tell us she wants a snack (fruit, go-gurts, water, etc.) Each night at dinner time we move her high chair into the dining room so she can eat with us at the table. Usually we put her in it first and give her a train ride saying "choo, choo". Tonight, I was late getting dinner on the table and Maddie was obviously hungry as she went over to the high chair and started pushing it into the dining room herself saying, "choo choo". I think she was telling us she was ready to eat!

Friday - Maddie is definitely a little soccer protege'. She can dribble the ball all around the house already, usually hollering, "gol". Check out the adorable video HERE. Tonight while we were in Maddie's playroom she wanted me to read her Baby Bear Bible. She loves the last page with Jesus and all of the children. When we got to that page, I started singing, "Jesus loves the little children." She was enthralled and wanted me to sing it over and over. Then tonight at bedtime, she grabbed that book and when I got to the last page and was reading she scruntched up her little nose and said, "sig, sig, sig." I realized she was saying sing. I started singing, "Jesus loves the little children" and that was the end of reading other books. She just wanted me to continue to sing that song over and over. Looks like I'll be doing more singing than reading at night-night time in the future.

Saturday - The green belt across from our house isn't so green right now. Today was GORGEOUS, and Maddie was itching to be outside, so Juan took her across the street to the green belt. Maddie is definitely going to be a tomboy as the first thing she did was find a stick to carry around. I love the picture of their shadows together. This afternoon Maddie grabbed my ear and said "Errrr". I thought she was trying to grab my earring, until I realized that I wasn't wearing earrings and that she had grabbed both my ears simultaneously.  She was saying "ear". I then asked her where my teeth, nose, tongue, eyes, and hair was and she found them all.  She is also saying "eye". She is such a smart little thing!

Sunday - I'm not sure where she heard it, but lately every time Maddie drops something or spills something she says, "oooooohhhhhh noooooo". Obviously it is a major catastrophe in her eyes. She loves playing legos with Daddy and I have posted the video of it HERE.

Monday - Maddie is a whiz at the IPad and constantly wants to play with it. We are really trying to limit her use of "screen time" to a total of one hour a day (this includes TV time). Regardless, she is amazing on it. She loves the "Bubble Guppie School Day" app and can play the entire thing alone without help. She also loves "Elmo's ABc's" and can almost trace the letters alone. She can even pick out all of the animals correctly on the "Preschool Farm animals" app. She is also getting better at her hand-eye coordination on her batteries not included toys. She can stack 5 wooden blocks on top of one another, and can put all of her shapes in the shape sorter if we show her where each shape goes. She is getting better at her wooden puzzles, but often struggles with aligning the pieces perfectly. 


Thanks for visiting this week!

Featured Photo at Colorful Creations

I'm so excited! My latest layout "Home Bound" was just featured over at Colorful Creations.  Check it out here. See my original post here.

Happy Scrapping!

SYTYCS Round 2 & January LOAD #42 - Home Bound

Well it's been pouring rain here all day in Dallas! We tried to go to the new Perot Museum but it was sold out at 9:45am, and they didn't even open until 10am! We took Maddie to the Aquarium instead. This evening, I found some time to do another layout for the January LOAD (LayOut A Day) challenge over at Let's Scrap. This is #42 (#11 traditional) for me, so I am almost caught up!

This is for the last page of our Aruba album and is about the long travel day home. I am participating in the SYTYCS (So You Think You Can Scrap) challenge over at Colorful Creations. This is my submission for week #2. There are 42 players remaining. This challenge was to use the following sketch and three of the following: Ribbon, Beads, Chipboard, Glass, Layering, Wood, Pin, Banner, Flowers

I used ribbon (the airplane ribbon vertically along the right side), chipboard (title letters, arrow, and tag), 2 pins, a banner, and layering! 

I also took the layering challenge to the next level to meet the challenge posted at Scrap Fit for their Step Class #12. The challenge is Layered Embellishment, use at least 4 (FOUR) different elements on your embellishment.  I did multiple layered embellishments: for the title I used layered patterned paper, with chipboard letters, a paper twine banner, chipboard tags/arrow, rub-on text on top of the chipboard, ribbon, and a pin.  For the lower right corner embellishment  I used:  Patterned Paper, a 3D paper sticker, ribbon, chipboard letters, a rub-on, and a pin. A great challenge!  Here are close-up pictures of my layering:

Materials Used:  paper - Creative Imaginations & TPC Studio; ribbon - TPC studio; chipboard & rub-ons - TPC Studio; chipboard letters - Thickers; doily - Wilton; pins - jillibean soup; 3D stickers - TPC Studio; banner - Colorbok Antique Paperie; ribbon - unknown.

Thanks for visiting! Click on the challenge links above to play along!

January LOAD #40 & 41 - Jump

Happy Friday! I hope you have a fantastic weekend planned. I finished another LOAD layout. I am participating in the January LOAD (LayOut A Day) over at Let's Scrap.  I am trying to catch up on traditional layouts, this is #9 &10 so I am only a couple behind.

My bestie, Shannon, got me an adorable paper pack "Sunny Side" from Pebbles for my birthday. I've been dying to use it, but hadn't found the right pictures. Then I saw the January color challenge from Scrap Much and knew instantly I wanted to use it. Here is the color palette to play with:

 On the left side I used the sketch from Page Maps "Love Notes" Sketch Contest. Here is the sketch: 

I rotated my pictures and used faux stitching in lieu of actual stitching.

For the right side I used the sketch from Memorable Seasons Friday 1/4 Sketch. I rotated the sketch, so I could show the progression of DD jumping into the pool from top to bottom.

I'm also playing along with Practical Scrappers "right here, right now" challenge.  I am frantically trying to finish our Aruba album right now. Lots of beach and water baby pages, LOL! They are making me long for the sunny days of summer.

Finally, I'm playing along with the Paper Girls Challenge #23, to visibly use ledger, graph, or notebook paper. I used quite a bit of blue ledger paper on each page.

Here are a couple of close up photos:

Materials Used:  paper - Pebbles (Sunny Side); 3D stickers - MME (Fine and Dandy); office tab - BasicGrey; letter stickers - Thickers; circle cutter - Creative Memories; Paper punch - Stampin Up; border - Queen & Co.; ink - CTMH.

Thanks for visiting! Come on over and play along with these fun challenges! There is still time. Happy weekend!

January LOAD #38 & #39 - Nap Time

Happy Tuesday my creative friends! I am participating in the January LOAD (LayOut A Day) over at Let's Scrap. I did a bunch of digital layouts (32), but I am trying to keep up with traditional layouts as well. This will be #6 & 7 in traditional form so I am only one day behind! 

We took an island tour of Aruba and Maddie zonked out right before our lunch destination and then slept in my arms throughout the entire lunch. She was exhausted from such a busy morning. I used sketch 9-8-10 from Let's Scrap.  Here is the sketch:

I played along with Really Reasonable Ribbon's Ramblings Challenge #63 My New Toys & Ribbon Theme.  The challenge was to Show what new goodies you received over the holidays (or what new goodies you purchased for yourself!). I played with a bunch of new Ribbon that I bought for myself over the holidays. I just LOVE ribbon and I used a lot of it on this page. there is pink ribbon horizontally along the bottom, blue ribbon vertically along the right side and green ribbon vertically along the left side. I even used blue ribbon on the tags in the pocket journal. 

Finally, I played along with Scrap Our Stash Challenge for January, to create a layout using tags and you. These are pictures of me and my DD. The tags are from Creative Memories and I stuck them into a pocket I made out of a journaling block. I added a bit of ribbon to the tags.

Here are a couple of detailed pictures: 

Materials Used:  paper - MME (Stella & Rose); journaling pad - Creative Imaginations; title stickers - Creative Imaginations; tags - Creative Memories; ribbon - Wrights and CTMH; circle cutter - Creative Memories; chipboard - Maya Road; brads - CTMH; bling - unknown.

Thanks for visiting! Come over and play along with these challenges if you need a bit of inspiration!

January LOAD #36 & #37 - Baby Beach

We had a great lazy Saturday and I was able to finish another two-page layout for the January LOAD (LayOut A Day) for January over at Let's Scrap!

I used a Let's Scrap sketch for this one, 1-12-11. Here is the sketch:


I also played along with the January Challenge over at WW1 (White With 1). Their challenge was to use the following color scheme with White and a summer photo.  These are our photos from our summer vacation in Aruba.


Another challenge I played with was Scrap for Help's January challenge below. I used string to help create the life preserver that I created with my cricut.  It is the first time I've played along with Scrap for Help. You should head over and check it out!

I combined a lot of challenges for this layout. Another one was the challenge over at Let's Get Sketchy. Their  challenge for January week 5 was to a create a layout using a picture that you never thought you would use because its blurred, too dark, head half cut off, red eye....etc. I loved these photos of my DH getting ready to snorkel for his first time, but I didn't realize the lens was all fogged up. All three photos that I used of DH snorkeling (on the right) are blurry and the two larger ones on the right are zoomed too far out.  I really wanted to document how much fun DH had during his first snorkeling adventure, so I am glad I used these photos. It was a great challenge that got me to scrap photos I normally would not.

Finally, I played along with Quick Quotes - Friday Challenge 23: to include a banner. I created my banner using Maya Road chip board, covering it with pattern paper, sanding the edges, and then adding ric rack and glitter letter stickers.

Here's an up close look at my journaling:

Materials used:  paper - Far and Away & Echo Park (This&That); brads - MME; chipboard - Maya Road, letter stickers - the Paper Studio; quickutz - Mini Khaki; ric rack - Wrights; journaling cards - unknown; life preserver - Cricut (Life's a Beach); and string - Darice Inc.

I hope to have a lazy scrappy Sunday and get another layout completed today! I hope you've had a scrappy weekend!  Thanks for visiting!

January Load 34 & 35 - Splish Splash

Here is my LOAD (Layout A Day) #34 & #35 for the January Load challenge over at Let's Scrap. It's not too late to participate! Yet another layout from Aruba.....I am almost done with this album...YEAH!

I used a sketch from Pagemaps May 2012 and the fabulous color palette from Scrap Friends - Colour Palette #8. Here is the color palette:

and here is the sketch



Here are a couple of up-close photos:

If you didn't notice, I forgot the L's in Splish Splash. I added them back in after I took the photo above.

Materials Used: Paper - Prima; border strip - K&Company; 3D stickers - Colorbok Antique Paperie & Me&MyBigIdeas Soft Spoken; rick rack - unknown; ribbon - unknown; journaling pad - Making Memories; thread - DMC floss; stitching - Bazzill In Stitches; flip flops -  JoAnn Craft Essentials; tiles - American Crafts Thickers.

Thanks for visiting!

SYTYCS Round 1 & January LOAD 33

I am participating in two big events in January. SYTYCS (So You Think You Can Scrap) over at Colorful Creations and the January LOAD challenge over at Let's Scrap. This is my layout for challenge #1 at SYTYCS and layout #33 for the LOAD challenge.

SYTYCS challenge was to use the following sketch and three of the following items:

2 + papers
Misting
Doily
Flag
Ric rack
Journaling strip
Matting
Ticket
Date strip

I used 2 pattern papers and 1 solid, a flag, and ric rack. I used two photos, but cut one in half to make it look like 3 photos. I replaced the doily for a journaling transparancy.

I also am submitting this for Frosted Designs - Friday Recipe Challenge
To pick at least 4 things from this list and use it on a card, layout or off the page project:

rubons
transparency
brads
eyelets
misting/masking
punches
stamping
stickers

I used a transparancy, brads, a border punch and multiple stickers.

Here are a couple of close-up pictures:

Materials Used:  paper - ScrapYourTrip.com, DCWV; flag - Basic Grey; transparancy - Basic Grey; title layered sticker - Basic Grey; tag - Making Memories; woven labels - Me&MyBigIdeas; stickers - Me&MyBigIdeas; brads - CTMH; ric rack - Wrights; border punch - Martha Stewart.

Thanks for visiting!