For those of you in the Raleigh, NC area I have tons of goodies that I am getting rid of. Tons of brand new stamps from my days as a TAC demonstrator (The Angel Company), papers, lots of stickers, and even a few tools. I'm still in the process ( and this may take a few days) of photographing everything and putting it into a flickr photostream that you can see here:

If you click on show info at the top of the slideshow, it will give you price info for that item. If you see something you want, send me an email. If you aren't local to me, I can mail stuff and will let you know exact shipping charges.

YAY! I actually scrapped a page today. This hasn't happened for so long, and it feels so good. Not only did I scrap but I scrapped on paper! Well sorta. :)
I used Jen Caputo's Photo Grids to layout my photos in photoshop, and I used her new awesome text paths for my journaling. And she has a great video tutorial on using them up at Digital Scrapbooking TV, check it out HERE.
Anyway it felt good to pull stuff out of my stash and actually use it. For instance the paper the journaling was printed on was stuff I know I bought back in '98, both of the yellow circles behind the photos were cut with my lighthouse cutter (which hasn't seen light outside of it's pretty purple case since we left Colorado back in 2001) the little splash label was cut from some who knows how old patterned paper (same line as the stripe paper in the background) and then UTEEd, ooo and I used some Making Memories Rub-On letters that I bought just before I started digi-scrapping 2 years ago so they had never been opened, and the buttons are a couple years old and tied with same aged scrappers floss. In fact the only thing recent in this whole layout is the vintage cream twill ribbon from my most recent PTI purchase. I'm so excited that I'm using things up finally. I don't know why I've just kept amassing stuff instead of actually using it. Ah maybe next time I will break open some vintage club scrap kits circa 2002-2006. ;)

I also tried a project I'd seen HERE using toilet paper tubes to make a cute basket.

Hmmm mine is no where near as cute as Nichole's, but it was fun to do and everything I used was from my scrap pile. See Tricia, I do use those scraps. I think the next one I do I will use a border punch along the handle instead of my cloud scissors. I think the scallop they make is just too big for this small scale. Maybe I'll go pick up a Martha Stewart punch with my 50% off coupon I got the other day.

So I've gotten some time to scrap lately so I thought I'd just pop on here to show them.

This first one is for SSD's Cookie Decorating challenge and uses the new Songbird Avenue kit:


Credits

And this one uses Miriam's new Lolly Pop papers:

Credits

And this one shows off my little Ruthie:


Credits

Well I guess that's all for now. So I'm off to chase Ruthie some more and maybe get a little housecleaning done.

Look at me blogging twice on the same day. :) I completely forgot to add in my previous post about Sweet Shoppe's Blog to Blog challenge so here I am doing it in a new post because it really is an interesting one.

This week's was to blog about our favorite designer, kit, product, etc. Now it would be super easy to blog about the incredible Miriam Lima. She is just such a wonderful person as well as a talented designer, but since I'm on her CT I feel like that may be cheating a bit. So I decided to choose another designer to blog about. But of course that was so difficult because, well if you've been in the digi community even a short while you will realize that almost everyone you interact with is super incredible!

So I've chosen 2 designers to spotlight. :)
First is Meredith Fenwick. She was the first designer that I actually purchased from. And now I think I have almost all of her stuff. Plus she is half of the creative genius that is behind Songbird Avenue (see past blog entries) and I love the whole focus on charity that they have created there. Plus I just love her designs. I don't really "know" her and I'm sure she has no clue who I am but I'd love to be a guest CT for her.

Here's a LO I did with some of her designs (By the way, this super cute little girl is Sarah the daughter of Erica Webster (pne123) who is an amazing scrapper!)

Credits

Second is Jen Caputo. She is the template guru! I absolutely love her stuff! I knew of Jen from her days with The Angel Company (I'm also a demonstrator for TAC) and her amazing Caputo kits. So when I first started playing around with digi and I saw Jen in the forums and later found her great templates, actions, etc. I have become an even bigger fan. Not only are her templates amazing but she is also a fantastic scrapper. I'm always inspired when I look through her gallery or on her blog. And when I am really looking for some honest feedback and critique I know I can count on Jen to be real with me. Thanks Jen! And anytime you need a guest CT member I'd be thrilled to scrap for you. :) And here are some pages I've scrapped with Jen's fab templates:

I can't believe it is already June! Lately I've been so busy that I feel like my life is just in fast forward. I hate it because I feel like I'm missing so much just because there isn't enough time for it all. It's like that movie Click, except I don't have any control over any of it. Which is probably why it bothers me so much. :)

Anyways, it is a new month and that means a new Songbird Avenue kit is available. I blogged a few entries ago about this awesome collab. project. Last month they donated almost $3500 to the March of Dimes! How phenomenal is that! Well this month, all proceeds will go to The American Diabetes Association. Of course I've already bought mine and hope to get a page done with it today. :)



Speaking of getting pages done. I went to Archivers last night with my friend Anne for a crop. Of course I was the only one there scrappin' digi style and I only finished one page, but it was so fun to catch up with Anne.

Here's the page:


Credits

I've been scrapping a lot of Ella's pics lately so I thought it was time to do some of Ruthie's. Ok now I'm off to get some stuff done today before Jamie & I go out on our date tonight. :)

So yesterday (well, I realize that it is now technically very early on Monday, but I haven't gone to bed yet so I'm still considering this Sunday, but at any rate yesterday here is referring to Saturday) was National Scrapbook Day and for a scrapper this is truly a wonderful event. I have celebrated NSD in the past as a traditional scrapper, but this was my first year celebrating as a digi-scrapper and I must say this year totally blew all of the others out of the water! I mean there were tons of sales online and seriously good deals to be had and I got the products immediately! Now those of you who know me know that I'm not a patient person, especially when I'm waiting for goodies to arrive so this was a huge plus to my shopping experience. :) Now add to the shopping bliss an entire day of chatting & cropping with the wonderful ladies at the Sweet Shoppe and it was perfect. So how much scrapping did I get done, weeellllllll not a lot, but I did do this LO that I'm really happy with for a speed scrap challenge:

Credits can be found here: http://www.sweetshoppedesigns.com/inspiration/showphoto.php?photo=5632

Also there is a cool lil survey on the SSD blog so here are my answers for that:

Q1: If you could vacation anywhere in the world where would you go and why?

Oh man, I so don't want to give just one answer here. I'd love to travel everywhere! But if I were to pick just one area it would have to be the vacation that Jamie & I are planning now for next August. We will be going to Scotland & Ireland if all goes according to plan. :)

Q2: What cartoons do you absolutely detest & refuse to allow anyone to watch {be it child, spouse- haha, nieces/nephews.. etc just plain don’t want it viewed on your television)?

I have always detested Barney. I don't know what it is about the stupid looking dinosaur but I just don't like things/people that are so damn happy all the time and that laugh is like nails on a chalkboard to me.

Q3: You just woke up, you’re a mess, haven’t showered, there are dishes in the sink.. There’s a knock at the door, what do you do?

Hmmmm. Am I wearing a bra? If so then no problem I just answer the door and hopefully just scare off whoever it is. If it is as it often is at my house when this occurs and I'm not wearing that much needed supporting device then I go into covert hiding mode and wait for them to leave.

Q4:When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thought that ran through your mind?

"I wonder what it will take to bribe the girls to go back to sleep for just 30 more minutes?"

Q5. Tell me a story about your Dad..

Oh I love my dad! He basically raised me by himself, well there was a stepmom in the house but she was pretty useless on most accounts. My dad is an auctioneer and so he'd take me with him every Fri & Sat night to the auctions and let me help him out. Sometimes he'd give me the item to show off to the crowds and sometimes he'd just hand me the mic and say "Show me how to sell this, Mandy." I loved those little moments when it was just the 2 of us.

Q6: You open your drawer, find 1 pink polka dotted sock and 1 black sock with reindeer on it.. Do you wear them together and hope no one sees them or go without socks today & hope your feet don’t get sweaty?

This is exactly why I have sandals! :) I'd much rather go without socks than go mismatched.

Q7: Are there any strange stains on your carpet, floor, walls, ceiling or couch? Do you know how they got there?

Well our living room carpet is pretty much just one big stain. LOL There is a particularly bad red one over by the girls' train table and this comes from my need for a nap one afternoon. Ella asks me if she & Ruthie can have a snack in the living room right as I was about to lay down for a quick nap on the sofa, so I said sure, just get something. Well when I woke up they had been eating red jello and totally spilled it everywhere. I can't believe how quiet they are when they are being destructive!

Q8: Are you neighbors annoying???

Hmmmm, not really. They pretty much stay to themselves. The family across the street though has 2 teenage boys that are a bit wild, but they don't bother us like they do other neighbors because we are the cool people on the street, Oh yeah! LOL

Q9: Are you a phone person.. if I called you right now would you chat with me? lol

Oh you bet! I love chatting as long as it isn't while I'm watching my Thursday night TV, that is the only night I watch TV and I hate getting interrupted.

Q10: What colour popsicle would you like.. Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow, Green, Pink or Blue?

I'm not really a popsicle kinda gal. I'm more of a soft serve type. But if it has to be a popsicle I think orange would be the yummiest. I love citrus flavors!

So there you have it! My answers to Lauren's cool little survey. Now I'm off to bed.

Today is a glorious rainy day! I know that I am among a very small group of individuals who actually love rainy days, but seriously I can't be the only one. Now don't get me wrong, I like sunny days too. But this week has been unbelievably hot, I mean we got into the low 90s one day, and it is only the beginning of May. So to have a nice rainy day where the temp is in the upper 50s, is pure delight for me. Plus since it is rainy and "cold" the girls haven't wanted to go play outside which means I've been able to stay in and get some stuff done. I was going to try to scrap some, but there were too many interruptions and I've needed to organize my EHD files for so long so that is what I've been doing. I'm trying to get everything sorted before all the awesome NSD sales tomorrow. But even before NSD starts you can get this awesome new kit:


It is from Songbird Avenue and was created by Meredith Fenwick, Jan Crowley, and Shabby Princess. And boy is it awesome! Not only that, but 100% of the profits go to a different charity each month. This month they are donating to the March of Dimes. So of course I had to support them and applaud their efforts, seeing as how I know first hand how wonderful this charity is. :) Hopefully I'll get some layouts done using this awesome kit this weekend and I'll post them next week here.

Oh how I love a good deal. Speaking of deals here are some blogs you should definitely check out if you want some super cool freebies:

First since it is Friday, Sharon Kenealy has her weekly mini kit available at:

http://artisticmusings.typepad.com/

Then make sure you sign up for the new Little Dreamer Designs newsletter, because you get this awesome kit free when you do.

So to get it just go to: http://www.littledreamerdesigns.com/newsletter.html and sign up.

Next Dani Mogstad has these adorable little flowers available on her blog:

http://www.designbydani.com/blog/

Then Jenna has a new doodle available on her blog:


http://dancinglines.blogspot.com/

And Rachael Giallongo is giving away a cool template for NSD on her blog

http://www.rachaelgiallongo.com/blog/

And if you hurry you might be able to catch a couple of freebies still up on Jennilyn's blog at:

http://www.jennilyndesigns.com/journal/


Now that you've checked out some super cool designs, I'll chat about the other happy parts of my day. :)

First, we got digital cable today! OMG, I'm so excited and goofy about this. Which is just funny to me that it makes me so happy. We really don't watch much TV, usually just a few shows on Thursday night, but the cool thing about the digi cable is that it comes with a DVR, so I no longer have to hush my brother when he calls long distance and I'm watching Survivor (yes I did this last week - sorry about that Dean) and we can record 2 shows at once. This is so revolutionary to me because even though we really only watch TV on Thurs nights, we like so many shows that come on at the same time, so now we can just DVR them. Oh I can't wait to give it a try. :) Jamie of course is all excited about all of the music channels we get.

So after the cable guy left Fed Ex shows up. I thought this was just my order with some aquarium supplies I'd ordered because they were tracked to arrive today, but no it was our new cell phones! WhooHoo! We haven't had new phones since we started our cell plan back in 2001, so these were definitely needed. This is what I got:
It is a Sony Ericsson W300i and is so sweet! I can't wait to get it all set up. Then on top of all of these fun new toys and what not, Jamie & I went out on a date tonight. We actually hired a babysitter (the inlaws are out of town) and let her put the girls to bed so that we could go out to dinner and then hang out together at the bookstore/coffee shop without having to rush home. Ahh it has been a fabulous Friday, now I'm off to bed so I can scrap all day tomorrow - I hope. :)

So I decided to take a stab at another Creative Team. I know this sounds like a really foolish idea considering the list of songs that sum up my week from yesterday, but I'm such a sucker for templates. And Teresa Ferguson is looking for a few new people for her team. I just recently found her templates at the Sweet Shoppe and I am so hooked. That site has some awesome talent and I'd love to challenge myself in using templates. I so LOVE templates, but usually when I scrap with them I just plop in papers & photos and call it done. I think that if I were on a creative team for a template designer, I'd stretch myself to twist them up a bit. But they really are a great spring board for getting creative juices flowing. Just look, I started using one of Teresa's templates to make my CT application: Credits: Template: Teresa Ferguson (Smarties- Snack Pack3); Papers, ric rac, letter U, file tab, journal box, and brads: Suzy Nunes' Peppermint Tea (From SSD Quarterly Assortment); flower, leaves, and jewel brad on flower: Robin Carlton (Collaged Floral Alpha); Backwards Staples: Jenn Patrick; Photo Filter: Newspaper effect from Virtual Photographer; RubOn Action & Linen Textureplate: Atomic Cupcake; Drop Shadow Actions: Traci Murphy; Fonts: MA Sexy, juiceITC, jr!hand

And in the process of making it, I realized that although I love being on a CT, I really scrapbook and create for my family and myself. So I also did this layout:
Credits: Template: Teresa Ferguson (Smarties- Snack Pack3); Papers, ric rac, letter U, and journal box: Suzy Nunes' Peppermint Tea (From SSD Quarterly Assortment); flower, leaves, and jewel brad on flower: Robin Carlton (Collaged Floral Alpha); Photo Filter: Newspaper effect from Virtual Photographer; RubOn Action & Linen Textureplate: Atomic Cupcake; Drop Shadow Actions: Traci Murphy;Fonts: MA Sexy, juiceITC, jr!hand

I love the way it turned out. And I can't believe how quickly they went. I finished both layouts (shadowing and all) in under 30 min. :)

I just can't believe that November was the last time I blogged. Ugh. I know I compose little blog entries all the time in my head. I just never manage to get them out and on the computer. So when I finally sat down 8 hours ago to compose a blog entry I discover that blogger has in fact changed a bunch of stuff and I needed to update my template. So instead of just choosing one of their templates, I had to create my own. :) Well sort of. Actually, Jamie had helped me write most of the code for this that you see now months ago. I just never finished tweaking it until today. I'll probably change the header though. Other than that I'm pretty happy with it. Hopefully I'll be able to change out my photobucket slideshows over there on the left each week. This of course will mean that I have to actually scrap 10 new pages for each slide show, each week! That is 20 pages each week. Oh I will be so excited if that actually happens.

Speaking of the slideshows, all of the layouts featured in the top one are using Miriam Lima's fabulous designs. Wow, her newest collection August Shadow totally rocks! Beautiful colors, beautiful brushwork, it is just perfect. And it even has matching elements.

Well I am finally on a CT. YAY! It's funny that once I decided this was something I wanted to do it seemed so difficult. I'd applied to 3 independent designer's CTs and the CT at the Digi shoppe, and was still not accepted anywhere. Then Miriam Lima says she has an opening and would like for me to join her team. WHOOOHOOO! I had wanted to apply for Miriam's team but missed her latest CT call deadline. But now I'm a LIMABEAN! And I couldn't be happier. Miriam is a designer at TDS and she has such incredible stuff. Check her out HERE . And this is what I created with her Finding Amy kit: