Hello Kitty's Home for the Holidays

I pieced together my first Hello Kitty from my newest Cricut cartridge, Hello Kitty Greetings. She has made herself at home at my daughter's gingerbread house. Hmm, I suppose I should mention to her that her house is very temporary. Do you think she has noticed that some young girl has taken a bite out of the roof?? Oh, well, HK herself is not staying long in my house either. I'll be placing her on a Christmas card front this month. Enjoy it while you can, Kitty!!

Getting Ready for Christmas (Photos)

I just finished a mini album made from one sheet of 12x12 paper, cut and scored so that when folded closed is tied with a ribbon, and when stood open has a multitude of photo frames to fill. I will try to find a tutorial for this, as I made the album awhile ago, and just recovered it for Christmas.
Now for a confession: I did not go out for Black Friday shopping. Which doesn't preclude killer prices on a select few items I bought this weekend:
I hit Michael's on the way home from Thanksgiving dinner at my sister's, and picked up a few 12x12 albums, some photo storage boxes and a Gingerbread house (for my daughter). Total spent: $33.
I let my fingers do the shopping at Amazon on T-Day and picked up two TV series DVD collections, one for each of my boys, for half price. Total spent: $31.
I just got back from Michael's. I used my 50% off coupon, combined with a clearance item and The Hello Kitty Cricut cartridge on sale. Instead of taking 50% off the stamp set I picked up, it took off half of the already reduced price of the Cricut cartridge!!! Total spent: $33.
So this weekend I got killer deals, spent less than $100, and got to spend more time in my craft room than in lines. I call that a very successful Black Friday!

Older photos

I probably mentioned already how a flood destroyed many, many of my old photos. Here are a few that we managed to save, and I finally scrapped at the November crop. That little girl is my now 14 year old, but better late than never, right?

I haven't been scrapping for too long, so I have years and years and years of photos to scrap still. So if I had a year to myself, I would spend each of the next 365 days organizing photos, journaling memories, and recording it all in my scrapbooks.

But I have a life, a family, a job and friends, and there are only 24 hours in a day. So I'll steal my moments to scrap and remember and record when I can.

Girlfriend's Birthday card

I won't be able to give my girlfriend this card until Saturday, when i meet her for breakfast before going to work. She only lives two blocks away, but between our jobs and families, we rarely see each other now. I felt tired but not enough to go to sleep, and I knew if I started making cards, my brain would stay awake for hours, so I just sat in my craft room and colored some stamped images. Although this image is leans more toward Thanksgiving, Chrtistmas or an invitation, I thought Sue would get a kick out of Bella. Sue does not cook, nor does she eat meat! But she will love this card for its play on her talents and passions. Do you like the flower eyelet? It's one of those setter-less eyelets,. You use a pencil to set it-it was very easy to use, and looks great on this card. It's called a QuickLet and it's put out by Eyelet Outlet.

For the sentiment inside, I used a new stamp I bought from Archiver's. Love this, and Sue is always counting calories!!

Hopefully, if you like this card, you will forgive me for the previous card. Oh, my, it looks like I lobbed my pumpkin into the sea, and it sank down to the sandy bottom! Darn that patterned paper. And the ribbon almost looks like seaweed! Oh, well, live and learn.

Besides this card, I made 13 ATC Christmas cards for my co-workers. I made them last year and they were a hit, so of course I need to keep up my standards! Haha! But in doing these cards, I have now SURPASSED MY HANDMADES 2009 GOAL. Whoopee, bells ring, champagne cork popping! All I need now is some time to scrap a couple more pages and I will feel that 2009 was a prosperous year. You can too, since I will offer up some nice Blog Candy when I reach my goal. I haev a crop in December, so unless a miracle happens and I get some much-needed time off, my goal will have to wait until then!

Magnolia-licious Highlites Blog Hop Accessory Challenge Card

Here is my attempt at making a card with just a Magnolia Accessory stamped image. It is the Pumpkin and Leaves stamp, which can be seen/purchased at the Magnoli Store. They have a great new page for viewing and ordering stamps--so easy to lose myself there!
I colored the pumpkin with Copics YR07, 04 & 02. The leaves with E13, 08 & Y11 (for dimension) and the vine with G94 & YG03.
The pp is from the Bohemia collection by My Mind's Eye, the cs from The Paper Company.
I made my own frost/snow by rubbing two white styrofoam balls together over parts of the card that I had dabbed with Stickles and/or Liquid Glass.
The trim is by We R Memory Keepers, "White Off Promenade".
I used kraft paper I has torn to create some dimension in the field of brown, frosted grass?! and a clear acrylic wing inked with white for a cloud.
I also used a metallic gel pen to draw in some subtle gusts of wind, and tiny jewels for snow/sleet.'
I might have made a mistake using the pp--it almost looks like it's underwater instead of out in a field, but (haha) it's too late now!

Birthday pages

Well, at least I am up to date on Bella's layouts. Of course, she's only two, and I've been scrapbooking before she was born. That helps.

I have done a decent job on Wendy's layouts as well. I have all her birthdays, some major milestones, and her own personal bests book. I did all our Christmas pages together as a family since having my first child, and Chase is 24 next month! I also have some of his first school pages when he was in preschool.

So I'm not doing too badly, unless you add in the fact that I've been married for 33 years, been around the world in my travels, headed up girl scouts and cub scouts, chaperoned field trips, was in the Army, and spend some quality time with my sisters and my mom. The amount of photos I have yet to scrap seemsinsurmountable. And yet I managed to scrap almost 100 pages this year, and I organized a bunch of paper photos from eons ago.

All I need is time. And I still have that.

Scrapped Halloween with Bella

I didn't get to edit the photos, but wanted everyone to see what I did with Donna's PIF of the Halloween PBA Kit I received from her. The orange bags really made the bag album easier than ever. They make frames of the patterned paper on each page.

I had a couple Halloween journaling boxes that I incorporated into the album. I'm not showing all the pages, but they all show off a nice photo of our first Halloween with my granddaughter, as well as tags with the journaling to remember in years to come. Thanks again, Donna. It was a great project, wonderfully put together!