July 4, 2018

Scrappy Monday and do I have the *perfect* layout to share ON July 4th!

Pics are from when Ryan was nearly a year and a half old; we set up a sprinkler in the backyard and he had a ball playing in the water.  I had a ball taking pictures of him, so I'm glad I was able to squish LOTS of the photos on my layout!  In the evening, we set off some small fireworks we'd bought and that scared poor lil Ryan, that's why he's unhappy in the pic with me.  But then he ate some of Dad's apple pie and that made it all better : )  And that's why I used the apple pattern from the old, old Summer Picnic DSP on this page--American as apple pie!

Today's color palette:  Brilliant Blue (I don't have much cardstock left in this color, I've gone into hoarding mode), Real Red, Coastal Cabana, and Whisper White.

If you're celebrating for the 4th, I hope you have a happy and safe celebration, and I recommend that it include apple pie.  And maybe a sprinkler to play in when you're done eating pie.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps: Red White & Blue, Simply Stars, One Smart Cookie, Tart & Tangy
Ink:  Brilliant Blue, Real Red, Garden Green, Early Espresso
Paper:  Brilliant Blue textured, Coastal Cabana, Thick Whisper White, Summer Picnic DSP
Accessories:  star punch, 1 3/8" square punch, hexagon punch 

Apple Pie

Not last weekend but the one before, we went apple picking (ignoring the fact that we have TWO apple trees in our own yard).  I have since made apple cinnamon bread, apple pie, and apple crumb cake, and we *still* have a giant bag of apples on the counter!  Next up I think I'll try brown butter apple blondies, and maybe homemade applesauce.  I'll probably still have apples left to experiment with.

Apples have also invaded my craft room and I'm not mad at it.  Loved the inspo list for the current Festive Friday challenge:

I used apples (obviously), red, green, circles if you count the rhinestones, baking, and that DSP reminds me of basket weave.  Or a woven lattice pie crust.  The teeny apples on the background are from the long-retired One Smart Cookie stamp set, but I wanted to make it obvious that this is an APPLE pie, which is my hubs' favorite.  Oh, I also printed out a recipe for apple cranberry pie (I've made cranberry apple almond pie before and it is AMAZEBALLS but I don't think I can find the almond paste here).  I've never made pie crust from scratch before, but I think this might be the year to try it.

What's your favorite apple recipe?

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sweets & Treats, One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Old Olive, Real Red, Stampin' Blends in Cinnamon Cider & Real Red
Paper:  Real Red, Thick Basic White, Gingerbread & Peppermint DSP Stack
Accessories:  Stitched So Sweetly dies, Dimensionals, Noble Peacock rhinestones

Bear Book: September

Happy Saturday, y'all!  Ready for another bear book layout?  This one is one of my favorites!!

I tend to do apples for September baby book layouts because...back to school, even though babies don't go to school, it's still a thing in my brain.  So apples, along with this cutie:

This is Cadbury, I love him :)

And some wee baby apples for the journaling block...

And bigger apples on both the patterned paper and stamped accents.  It's kind of funny how many apple stamps I have, really.

Today's colors:  Early Espresso, Real Red, Old Olive, So Saffron, and Whisper White.  Yup, one of my favorite layouts from this book.

Cheers, y'all!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Cadbury from Whipper Snapper, Tart & Tangy, One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Basic Black, Real Red, Early Espresso, Old Olive
Paper:  Early Espresso, Real Red, So Saffron, Thick Whisper White, Summer Picnic DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix alphabet, circle & scalloped circle punches, Prismacolor Pencils

A-Team Baby Book: September

Happy Saturday, y'all!  Any fun plans for the weekend?

Here's the September layout for my niece.  Her mama (my SIL) works for the school district so of course apples (for teachers!) are a natural choice for September.  And I had this super cute image from The Greeting Farm:

Isn't she darling?!  For some reason my camera doesn't like Marina Mist cardstock, but trust me, it's blue and not gray.

And there's a few more apples.

Today's color combo:  Marina Mist, Real Red, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip, and Whisper White.  That's all she wrote today, have a great weekend!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Tart & Tangy, One Smart Cookie, Lottie from The Greeting Farm (all retired)
Ink:  Basic Black, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Old Olive
Paper:  Marina Mist, Old Olive, Chocolate chip, PTI White, Summer Picnic DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix alphabet, Prismacolor Pencils, Ovals & Lots of Labels Framelits, circle & scalloped circle punches

Friday Flashback: Perfectly Preserved

Hey, kids!  How's your Friday the 13th going?  No bad luck, I hope.  Today's retired stamp set is Perfectly Preserved, which I totally love, so without further ado let's get to the Flashback!

Also features Sweet Essentials

I love the Orchard Harvest DSP, such fun colors.  Anyway, before I got this set, I was talking to my friend Missy and she mentioned some really old stamp set that was like the first one she ever got and it had a jar, and she *never* used it.  And then we said we wouldn't buy Perfectly Preserved because we'd never use the jar.  And then a week later I bowed to the power of Stampin' Up! psychic resonance and I bought it.  So I made Missy this card.  With the jar, obviously.

Also features Perfectly Penned

I do love these apples :)

Also features Pursuit of Happiness

You've seen this one recently, the only time I've used the corn stamp.  But you never know when you might need a corn stamp, so it's a good thing I held onto it ;)

Also features One Smart Cookie

The Friday Flashback for One Smart Cookie wasn't that long ago so you've seen this recently too.

Yay more apples.  I haven't checked back on my Raspberry Ripple ink pad to see how it's doing now after I tried to wash all the gold sheen off.  But I now know that my Bravo Burgundy ink pad has it even worse.  I should take a picture of it so you can see what I mean.

Also features A Word For You

I love a good pun:  you're a perfect pear.

Also features Fall Fest, My Paper Pumpkin

I love that "there's no such thing as too much pie" stamp from one of last year's My Paper Pumpkin kits, I just kinda wish it was in a more easily readable font.  Picky picky.

So there's the Flashback, wasn't that fun?  I have to tell you I'm a little late getting this post up because I've been doing a lot of work on scrapbook pages, and for some reason I find it difficult sometimes to move from scrapbooking to card making.  It's like they're parallel tracks in my brain but it's hard to cross from one to the other.  But then I did and I got TWO cards done for today, plus another one you'll see next week.  So here's the new creations:

I had to use the jar, just to prove I *can* use the jar, and I really wanted to use the flowers since I'd never done that before.  And it took forever for me to find a sentiment for this card, but in the end I went with Perfectly Penned because a.) it's awesome and b.) it's right next to Perfectly Preserved in my stamp cabinet.

The sketch is courtesy of TGIF Challenges:

And since I had the other half of that piece of thick Whisper White cardstock on my table, I figured I might as well make another card with it:

Same sketch, just horizontal.  And I pulled out One Smart Cookie again because it's cute with these apples.  The colors are from Colour Me...!

Red and green might say "Christmas" to you, but like Mary I am quite contrary so I like my red and green apples.

I hope you have a lovely weekend, peeps!  I'm back to working on those scrapbook pages if I can get my train of thought onto the other track.  Cheers!

Supplies, flower thank you card:
Stamps:  Perfectly Preserved, Perfectly Penned
Ink:  Wisteria Wonder, Marina Mist, Smoky Slate, Pear Pizzazz
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Berry Blossoms DSP
Accessories:  white baker's twine

Supplies, sweeter than pie card:
Stamps:  Perfectly Preserved, One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Real Red, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Old Olive DSP
Accessories:  Real Red taffeta

Friday Flashback: One Smart Cookie

Happy Friday, peeps!  This weeks stamp set du jour is a cute little set called One Smart Cookie, which has teeny tiny little images and punny phrases to go with.  So let's flash back!

Also features Tart & Tangy

Here you see what I mean about the punny phrases.

Also features Fruit & Flowers

I admit:  I bought One Smart Cookie for the wee apple, which I used on baby books (look in the corner of the journaling square).

Also features Perfectly Preserved

So the larger apple images might have changed a little bit...

Also features Tart & Tangy

But that tiny apple stayed the same.

Also features Tart & Tangy

I'm very proud to say that the baby books I'm close to finishing right now have September pages that are completely different, with nary an apple in sight.  But I didn't want One Smart Cookie to feel left out, so I made a couple of cards for today's Friday Flashback.

How do you like them oranges?  All of the stamps in One Smart Cookie are tiny, so I was a little worried about what I was going to do until I saw the sketch at Create with Connie and Mary:

I thought it worked out so well on the orange card that I made another one:

I used my Color Coach (why did this retire again?!) to come up with the color combo on here--Soft Sky, Rich Razzleberry, and Old Olive.  This card will go to my hubs' cousin, who had us over for dinner last week.  That means that this also qualifies for The Male Room challenge to use fruit:

Actually I think the orange card will go to a little boy, so they both count (Mom, I will put that card in a pile for you to send to your little penpal).  So that's it for me this week, peeps.  The hubs is off work today so I think we're going to drive out to Monticello, but I need to go get cleaned up first.  Cheers!

Supplies, orange card:
Stamps:  One Smart Cookie, Tart & Tangy
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie
Paper:  So Saffron, Old Olive, Whisper White
Accessories:  Brights Candy Dot, hexagon punch

Supplies, grape card:
Stamps:  One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Soft Suede
Paper:  Soft Sky, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Whisper White
Accessories:  1" and 3/4" circle punches, 7/8" scallop circle punch, hexagon punch, Dimensional

Washington Apples

Just when I thought I might actually get some of my own personal scrapbooking done, one of my friends announced that she's pregnant.

With TWINS.

So I'm back to doing baby books instead of scrapbooks for me and hubs...I'm so far behind.  I haven't even gotten halfway through our time in Japan, China will be an album by itself, and I haven't printed off hardly any pictures from after we moved to England.  So yeah, I will never be bored when it comes to scrapping.

But anyway, let's get back to the baby books.  I'm doing two books, one for each twin (both boys), and I always do baby books in multiples but this is the first time I've made books for twins.  These two books will put me at 13 baby books made total--always in pairs except one time I did three.

I usually start with whatever layout I have the first idea for, and yes at this point I copy myself quite a bit.  I go back to the older baby book pics and sketch out all the layouts and notate what stamps I might want to use.  This one is very much like an earlier September layout I did in 2010, but this time I used Perfectly Preserved and the Orchard Harvest DSP from last year's holiday catalog.  Is it weird that I have three different stamp sets with apples about that same size?  (Tart & Tangy, Fruit & Flowers, and Perfectly Preserved, if you're curious.)  And then for the journaling block, I used the teeny apple from One Smart Cookie and I totally bought that stamp set JUST for this purpose, luckily right before it retired.  And this layout is doubly appropriate since the mommy-to-be hails from Washington State.

While I was sticking down the letters on one of the layouts, I dropped the R and it landed adhesive side up (so, not stuck to the paper) and as that is a violation of the laws of physics I expect there's a rip in the space/time continuum now.  Because if you drop something with adhesive on it, there's a law that says it has to land adhesive side down.

Have a great Monday, and if you see that rip on the space/time continuum, report it to the nearest temporal police officer.  :D

Supplies:
Stamps:  Perfectly Preserved, One Smart Cookie (retired)
Ink:  Real Red, Lucky Limeade, Chocolate Chip
Paper:  Bashful Blue, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  Cannery Collection Framelits, old Sizzix alphabet

Friday Flashback: Tart & Tangy

Welcome to another Friday Flashback!  Today's stamp set is Tart & Tangy, which is a fun little set with four fruit images.  First up, let's open up the archives (I still giggle at the thought of me having archives):

Lots of polka dots on this one!  I thought that sentiment was pretty cute with the strawberries.

I used Iridescent Ice embossing powder on this one to make the oranges sparkly, and the brads were silver ones colored in with an orange Sharpie.

One year for Father's Day we sent my dad a gift card to Sonic (terribly mean that they sell Sonic gift cards here when there's an entire ocean between me and the closest one), and I made this card because my whole family is utterly addicted to cherry vanilla Cokes at Sonic.

This is one of several similar baby book layouts I did with the apple image from Tart & Tangy, it's always been one of my favorites.

And here's my new card!  It might look black, but the dark color is actually Elegant Eggplant.  Call me crazy, I like orange and purple together (and it was an old SCS color challenge).  The layout is based on the latest sketch at Freshly Made Sketches:

I wasn't quite sure what to make of the sketch when I first saw it, but I like what I came up with.

Thanks for joining me on another Friday Flashback, and have a fabulous weekend!

Supplies (all SU!):
Stamps:  Tart & Tangy, One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie
Paper:  Pumpkin Pie, Elegant Eggplant, Whisper White, retired Tempting Turquoise DSP
Accessories:  Brights brads, 1 1/2" and 1 3/8" circle punches, Dimensionals