Party Decor

First of all, let me just say that I have been a very bad blogger for the past few months. And that's because...

WE'RE HAVING A BABY!!!! We found out on Christmas that we were expecting Ryden Baby #2! We are due on September 1st. Up until this week (week 13) I have felt really tired and really sick! But if I can get over this cold I have, I will be back to 100%! Can't wait!

We had Brooke's 2nd birthday party over the weekend and I just wanted to show you a fun idea for decor!

I used my two 12x12 shadow box frames to showcase a fun little layout of my baby girl.

Here it is up close. I didn't take it out of the glass so there is some glare on the pages...just ignore it! Ha ha!

The pictures on this layout were taken when Brooke was 18 months old...hints the 18 on this little tag!

And here is the other side. Journaling reads, "I (heart) these pictures! We were part of Jessica Strom's "Summer of Love" series. She took Brooke's pictures in a cornfield. They turned out so CUTE!"

And here is a close up on this little tag cluster. I love this layout so much! Probably because I love these pictures SO MUCH! Brooke most recent pictures are currently on Jessica's blog in this post if you want to check them out!

Happy Valentine's Day!

My cute little girl with her Valentine's Day present from Mommy and Daddy...16 heart shaped bracelets! YAY! She loves them! Got them on Clearance last year after Valentine's Day at Target...they were only 50 cents! And her cute outfit...also a clearance find at Target last year...only $2.50 for the shirt and leggings!

Here is the card I woke up to this morning! My hubby usually makes me a valentine! This one says, "I Pick You!" on the inside! Isn't he clever?! :) Gotta love him!

Card Kits

I know Christmas is over but I just came across this picture and I wanted to share what I made for my sister-in-law. She is a card maker but I'm not sure how much she likes to get out supplies and actually spend 30 minutes to an hour creating a card (like I do)! So I created card kits that require some assembly!

Each card kit had: cardstock bases, patterned paper, and an embellished, stamped scallop. Dimensionals were even applied to the scallops so all she has to do it match up the colors that she wants, stick the patterned paper down, and adhere the scallops! I tried to do a variety of card types because I know there are a lot of occasions throughout the year. And some could even be masculine!

I created a sample of each card set so that she could see what they should look like. But I didn't get a very good picture of those! I was too excited and packaged them all up way too fast!

Do you have someone in your life that would love this as a gift?! You should try it!

Sale-a-Bration

Well it's that time of year again! To learn more about Stampin Up's great promotion click here.

This year one of the FREE Sale-a-Bration rewards is a CD full of digital papers, ribbons, embellishments, and stamps! This was first on my list because I love to create using My Digital Studio!

I sat down today and made this card quickly to showcase a few of the free rewards you could be earning!

New items used: So Happy for You stamp set, Ice Cream Parlor Paper and Accents pack, and Ice Cream Parlor Ribbon and Button Pack. So many fun items to earn for free now through March 31st!

Finished 2011 Calendar

Well I finally finished it. I'm posting the full calendar because I changed a few things on all of the pages before I sent it off to be printed. I think it's really silly that I left January 2011 in there (since I sent it to the printer around 11pm on January 31st! Ha ha!)! But I have a plan to get it done on this this next year!

I plan to complete it throughout the year as the months are completed. So I need to get on creating for January already!

Anyway...here is the calendar. Hope you enjoy!

Cover Page: One thing I love about My Digital Studio is that you have unlimited use to old colors that you can no longer purchase from SU! This page is Melon Mambo (current color) and Kiwi Kiss! Remember that old In Color?!

I also love the ribbon bows! I can never get mine to look that perfect but I don't have to worry about it with MDS! It's always perfect!

January: I love the stamped images that SU provides with MDS. The texture in the background is a stamp! You can change it to whatever color you want, make it lighter, darker...anything! I think it just adds to the depth of the page!

February: Can you believe my baby is going to be 2 this month! WOW! Just 15 more days and we will be having her Abby Cadabby birthday party!

This page is pretty plain...just some DSP, buttons, and a ribbon with a bow!

These pictures were taken at Brooke's 1st birthday party by Jessica Strom. If you are in the Kansas City area, she would love to photograph your child's birthday too!

March: This month marks our 7th anniversary! WOW! I love this picture of us both!

When creating a page in MDS it is VERY EASY to stamp on your pictures! Not so in real life! This stamp on our picture comes from the stamp set, Define Your Life. Love the little definitions for picture embellishments!

April: One of the other great things about MDS is that you get all of the punches and you can size them to any size that you want and make them any color you want without ruining a full piece of cardstock! WOO HOO!

Isn't my little girl cute? These are pictures of her presents from Easter. My family went a little crazy this year!

May: This page was changed a little from it's original form that you can see here. I just felt like the heart got a little lost on the first page. But you can see it now!

June: MDS gives you access to a bunch of kits, just like Simply Scrappin Kits in the catalog. You get papers, border stickers, stamp sets picked out to get with them, and other stickers for embellishing! They all coordinate!

And you can even stitch and staple without the tools needed to do so!

July: With MDS you get a lot of embellishments too! I have glimmer brads, rhinestone jewels, and regular brads all on this page! So fun!

August: Pictures again by Jessica Strom! Isn't she great!

September: Using an old color again. Who misses Really Rust? It goes really well with More Mustard for a great fall look!

Pictures by Jessica Strom again!

October: Another thing I like about MDS is that you can easily copy a layout to use in another project. This is a page that I made for my Mom's 2011 calendar (she gets one every year for Christmas). I love it so much I copied and pasted in my calendar too! So EASY and no extra supplies needed!

November: I love all of the DSP that you get with MDS...and you never run out of it! There's always more! And whenever SU comes out with a great new paper that sells well, they often offer it to MDS users for approx. $4! Love it!

December: You also get the chance to use old papers and kits still when you have MDS. This kit was from a few Christmas' ago but I just LOVE it!

If you are interested in purchasing MDS, you can find it here on my website! The cost is $79.95 USD. With the Sale-a-Bration Special going on right now you would also get to choose a free item! And there just happens to be a MDS CD with all of the SAB stamp sets and papers that you can choose! (That was the first one I got!) Please let me know if you have any questions: demokimsu@yahoo.com.

18 Months

Here is my layout to showcase Brooke at 18 months old! She was so stinkin cute during this mini photo shoot!

All of the cute papers came from American Crafts. I just love their papers!

I also loved matting all of the pictures in a different color to match the designer paper! This is what scraps are great for!

You can read the journaling in this blog post on our family blog.

17 Months

Wow! It's been a long time since I've blogged. SORRY!

But I have a cute layout for you all today and hopefully that makes up for it a little bit...maybe!

This layout is to highlight all Brooke was doing at 17 Months. You can read all of the journaling if you click on the picture to enlarge it or you can go here to read my blog post on my family blog.

The things I love most about this layout are the tickets and the bingo number!

The little birdie paper from American Crafts is another favorite of mine! So cute!

Coming back tomorrow to catch you up on her 18 Month layout!

Goal #4...

Create Something for Myself weekly and blog about it! If you haven't checked out all of my goals for the year, you can find them here.

This project is from last week and this week. I am creating a calendar for our family using My Digital Studio. I love how it's turning out so far but I still have 7 months to go!

I am making most of the layouts pretty simple! I'm just trying to get it done and printed so I can hang January on my fridge for at least a few days!

When I create my calendar I use pictures from 2010. So this year I decided to challenge myself to create my 2012 calendar, one month at a time DURING the year. This means that once January 2011 is over, I can start working on my January 2012 calendar page!

Won't it be nice to just hit print after I add Christmas pictures in after Christmas 2011!

Hope you all are enjoying the calendar pages I have so far!

I will post the remaining months as I get them finished.

Bleaching Backgrounds

This month in my stamp club we focused on bleaching. I have never done this before...probably because I don't have any in the house and I'm afraid of ruining all of my clothes! Ha ha! But I got over that to learn a little and create a few projects for my club members.

This is the card we made using bleaching. I think the best way to use this technique is to make a background. That way it doesn't have to be perfect and it still looks awesome!

Each cardstock color will turn out a little different when bleach is added to it. Old Olive gives off a yellow color, kinda like Daffodil Delight.

I just love the texture that bleach adds to a background. Don't you??

Valentine Defined

Well Christmas is officially over. The decorations are down (even if it only happened 2 days ago), the presents are being played with, and the food has helped me to gain a few pounds. What a great Christmas it was!

Now that Christmas is over it time to start talking about Valentine's Day! It's the second biggest holiday for card making and I love it! Stampin Up has a lot of new goodies that just came out in the Occsasions Mini that you will just LOVE!

This is a card that I created for a demonstrator swap that I will be attending tomorrow morning! I'm so excited to go and can't wait to show you all of the other creations I will be making. But back to this card...

It features a ton of new products like:

*Valentine Defined Stamp Set (WM #121941 $26.95, CM #123057 $18.95)

*Love Impressions DSP (#121780 $11.95)

*Glimmer Paper: Real Red (#121790 $3.95)

*Seam Binding: Crumb Cake (#122332 $6.95)

WOW! Don't you just love all of the new stuff??!!!

I love all of the different textures that this card shows off. I started with just the DSP and just kept adding layers upon layers until I was satisfied! I hope you all like it!

Along with the new Valentine Defined stamp set I also used the I {Heart} Hearts stamp set. This has been a favorite since last year! I think this woodgrain heart if my favorite of them all!

What are you doing to get ready for Valentine's Day??