Welcome to the CMK blog hop!

Welcome to Create My Keepsake's July Kit blog hop reveal!

Be sure to check out the CMK blog for the links to all the design team's blogs so you can see them all.

I love October Afternoon and was thrilled with how much of it there was in the kit this month! I was inspired to scrapbook these sweet pictures that I took of Sage at the Teddy Bear Picnic at the Morden Park two weeks ago.

Here's are some sneaks:





And my layout:



And a closer shot so you can read the journaling (you can also click on the photos to make them bigger.)



Thanks for stopping by and for your sweet comments!

Cosmo Cricket

I definitely have a thing for Cosmo Cricket.

I became a huge fan last year when they released their Mr. Campy line...















I even used it on my favourite page of Sage's counting book.


(Seriously, who could resist those little cars and trailers?)

And when my church's Women's Retreat Committee asked me to make the display board for their fall retreat, this was the line that I immediate thought of and knew would be perfect.

Love it! ♥

Then, they released Girl Friday, and I fell in love all over again.







And then, I got some Early Bird. Oooh, so nice!







I thought it was so pretty for layouts and also discovered how much I liked using it for cards, too.
I made some end of the year teacher cards for my boys' teachers (they attend a French immersion school). For one of them, we're giving her a gift certificate for a restaurant...



and the other one is getting a gift certificate to a nursery.



And a third one, just for fun.



Thanks for looking!

A couple of things to share....

With school winding up and getting ready for our family vacation, things have been a little busy around here lately.

In addition to our field trip outings, Austin and I entered the Manitoba Open this past Saturday. Competitors came from Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan and the States to participate in this huge tournament at the MTS Centre.

(click on the photo to see it bigger)



Austin and I both competed in patterns and sparring. In patterns, neither of us placed in the top three and in sparring, we both got bronze medals. I definitely felt I could have done better in the sparring (that's me in the blue hogo in the bottom right hand picture), but it was a really good learning experience. And it was fun to make some new friends. :)

Here are a couple of layouts that I made with the June CMK kit.






Thanks for looking!

Bad blogger

Wow, I can't believe I haven't blogged in a week & a half!

Lots of stuff has been going on, so I thought I'd share a bit of a recap.

We had our volunteer appreciation for R.O.X. (our church's grade 1 to 6 Sunday school program) last Friday evening. We went to the Meadows in Winkler, where we played human foosball and mini-golf. Other volunteers also rode go-karts and we roasted marshmallows. It was a really fun evening. (You can click on the photo to see it larger.)



Last Wednesday, Sage and I went along with Jonah's class on their field trip to the zoo...



And to Fort Whyte Alive:





June is definitely a busy month. I'm hoping to have some scrappy stuff to share soon, too.

Thanks for looking!

Playing hooky

Austin's class went to a GoldEyes game yesterday in Wpg. Because he didn't want to go (he thought it would be boring), I decided to take my kids along with my MIL to Morning Sound Farm to enjoy the petting zoo and activities they had there.

I had more photos to upload, but Blogger isn't cooperating, so I'll share just a few of them.

The farm is actually owned and run by Chuck Lawrenson, who was in my youth group when I was a teenager! I didn't know this until the day before we went. Small world!

My kids really enjoyed all of the activities: touring the farm, petting the animals, the hay ride, the pony rides. When we were on the hay ride, our driver, Mr. Kim, told us that once the ride was done the kids would get pony rides and could go up in the hay loft of the barn and pet the puppies and hold the bunnies that were up there. Jonah leaned over to me and said: "This is the best day of my life!" :)

Jonah also took a real shine to this pony colt, Storm:



Here are some pictures from the pony rides:





A couple of group shots on the fence:

Some individual pictures of my kids:

And lastly, here are a couple of pictures of our cows that I took after dropping my mother-in-law off at home.

Thanks for looking!

For a good cause...

After Sage was born, I decided that I was going to grow my hair long. I'd had short hair for about four years and wanted a change.

When my friend, Val's, son was diagnosed with leukemia in September 2006, I decided to grow it long enough to be able to donate it for Angel Hair.

This spring, I figured that it was long enough...



So, this morning, I went to the hairdresser and went from this:



to this:



She cut over 10 inches off! It feels so different, but I'm getting used to it.



What do you think?

Saturday stuff...

It's a cold weekend here.... perfect for scrapping!

The Inspired Scrapper posted a new challenge on their site yesterday, in honour of World Environment Day. Here's the layout that I created for the challenge, using scrappy packaging on my layout and journaling about our efforts to "be green."



My Scrap Shoppe is having an online crop this weekend. You can click on that link to find a whole bunch of great challenges from our DT and our Guest DT this month, Nicole. Here are a few layouts that I made during the crop:



For the challenges to have everything on an angle, to use 3+ manufacturers and to add texture to your page:


(This was super hard for me, by the way. I love straight lines!!)


For the challenges to add texture, to use no adhesive and to create with a manufacturer's line and use the name of that line in your title (I used Pink Paislee's Enchanting line):




And for the sketch challenge, the inspiration challenge, more than three manufacturers and to add texture to your layout:




Hope you're having a great weekend!

Thanks for stopping by!

CMK April Card kit

Can I let you in on a secret?

I've never purchased a kit before.... until now.

When Dani posted the amazing cards that she made with the CMK April "Garden Gate" Card kit, I knew I had to purchase it. And I'm so glad I did!

At first I wasn't sure if it would be worth the price, but I ended up creating four layouts with it and five cards!

Here's what I made:

I also used a couple of stamps from my stash, but otherwise, everything was from the kit!

By the way, if you're looking at this post and are local and interested in buying one of these cards, they're for sale at Morden's Heartland. :)

Thanks for looking!