Spring is in the Air!

I can't tell you how thrilled I am that the days are getting sunnier and warmer. I am so very ready for spring, and so are my fellow DT members over at Scraptiv!ty. We're having a Spring Fling Contest that will last from now until May 1st (National Scrapbooking Day) and includes 6 challenges. The prize is a guest Design Team spot for 2 months. That means you get 2 Scraptiv!ty kits to play with! You can check out all of the details here.
The other great thing about sunny days is that they bring great natural light for me to photograph my pages. This weekend I was at my local scrap store. I was dropping off some DT work and then going to pick up a Birthday present for my Mother-in-law. I was not going to buy anything for myself (I know, I can hear you laughing). Well, I just happened to walk past the new Studio Calico papers and FabRips embellishments. Of course, I had to buy some. Here's a page I made with Studio Calico's Homefront line.
What I love about this finished project, is a few of the unexpected details. Check out the journaling a little closer:
I embossed a piece of paper with the Quickutz Retro Square embossing folder. It goes so well with the feel of the Studio Calico papers.
The title was cut using my Silhouette. Man, I love that machine!
And, of course, I couldn't help adding a few brads from Basic Grey and a grommet from We R Memory Keepers.
Now I'm going to go out and enjoy the sun!

Thinking Highly

I can't believe the weekend's gone already! I hope you all had a crafty weekend. I had a fun time teaching a class at my LSS on Saturday. Sunday we went to see Playhouse Disney Live. I took some great photos of my boys that I can't wait to scrap. Today I thought I'd play along with Moxie Fab World's Tuesday Trigger. Here's the picture they posted to get your creative juices flowing:Here's what I came up with:As you can see, I was inspired by the colors of this week's Trigger. I had some leftover 7 Gypsies paper from my November Scraptiv!ty kit that was just perfect. I also had some Core'dinations paper left over from that same kit. I ran it through my Big Shot with a Quickutz embossing folder, and then sanded the design to make it pop. The stamp is from Lizzie Anne Designs. I just picked it up from A Walk Down Memory Lane last week. Any excuse to use a new stamp, right?
If you want to play along with the Trigger too, you have today still to play.

A Final Noel

Well, here it is on the last day, my 5th and final entry for Moxie Fab World's "Stretch Your Style" challenge. Today's style is Fun and Cute. I've been planning this as my last project all week, so it's great to finally have it done.

This was a lot of fun, and not so hard to do. I found my local scrapbook store owner unpacking the great new Mistletoe Line from Making Memories on Friday. I snatched up the paper immediately for use on this project. All of the letters and images (star, Holy Family, Christmas ornament, etc.) were cut on Quickutz vinyl using my Silhouette. In the middle of the star is an American Craft's rhinestone brad. You can't see it in the picture but the Christmas ornament has some sparkly detailing. I used Stickles for that. Finally green ribbon is from American Crafts and my red ribbon is from Stampin' Up! Thanks for having a little early Christmas fun with me this week!
***I forgot to mention that these are on wooden blocks. I know you can pick these up at a lot of scrapbook and craft stores. I cheated (or maybe I was recycling). I had some blocks that spelled "BELIEVE" that I no longer liked. I papered over the BELIEVE to change the blocks into something I wanted to use again. The best part was that they were already painted a nice deep red!