Grow...With Love!

Trysten is 8 months old today! He is growing up too fast - he is crawling everywhere, climbing over obstacles, and pulling up on everything! He likes to play 'So Big' and he loves to clap his hands so he enjoys 'Patty Cake'. I took these pictures last week and couldn't wait to scrap them. When I saw the weekend sketch contest at Practical Scrappers on Saturday, I knew I wanted to do something fun with the tree where the circle element was on the page. Then once this week's sketch over at 52 Sketches posted, I knew they would be perfect together and it would give me a chance to use all (or most) of the pictures that I took. I was going to use my Grown With Love stamp set, but the felt was funner to play with ;-)

I had this poem that I had saved and knew it was a perfect fit. The original poem is by Diane Woolley, but I changed a few parts to make it work better. Here is what it says:

At first you didn't lift your head, you didn't know to smile. The time before you knew my voice seemed such a long, long while. I couldn't wait for you to roll, and then to sit and clap. And now you're off and crawling, not helpless in my lap. How could I forget, how fast a baby grows? That every little baby stage soon comes, but sooner goes.So I'll enjoy the fleeting time before you learn to walk. And treasure every tiny noise before you learn to talk. For soon you'll learn to walk then run, and talk and sing a song. A little boy you will become, the baby will be gone. Little Trysten, please take a bit more time to grow into a little boy, for while you're small, you're mine!

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This is the sketch from Practical Scrappers - even though I didn't get mine done on time for their contest, I still had fun playing along!

Here is the sketch from 52 Sketches

CTMH Products Used: Animal Cookies paper pack and stickease, Heartfelt Wonder felt pieces (brackets, tree trunk, circles), Circle Coluzzle, 1/4" circle punch, Vellum, Font CD

Other Products Used: 1/2" circle punch, 3/4" circle punch

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Are you ready for more trees? Here are a couple of cards I made last week. I LOVED this Grown With Love stamp set when it came out and got it right away, but this was the first time I've finally used it - now I have so many more ideas running through my head, I can't wait to play with it some more!

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This was the card I made for my SIL Hannah - using the beautiful Grace papers I made this fun Tri-fold card. I started one of these fun folding cards back in June - it's super easy, I just never got around to 'decorating' it until now. I will definitely be doing more of these. You can find the instructions HERE.

Here is the card closed...

And open...

Then this one was the first card I made with this stamp set - I tried something different by turning the circle in the pattern of the card (from Wishes - Bullseye) into the tree top by stamping the leaves all over. I used Jeanette Lynton's color combo from last week's Color Me Monday. Maybe it's just the colors or the circle behind the tree like that, but it seems really 'Halloween-y' to me - if that were a word ;-)

So after that card - I had to play with the Halloween idea, using the Enchanted paper back with some Black Textured CS. I think it turned out cute! The cute little bats came from the retired Fall stamp set and they are popped up with pop dots. I used the same Bullseye pattern from Wishes, but this time I turned the circle into a moon.

Wow, I didn't expect this to be such a long post, but there's no turning back now! If you've stuck with me this long, thanks for looking!