Post 291

Glad I took this one the other day we now have the rain and cooler weather.
Background, journal spot and butterflies from DDE. Whate paper - Vinne Pearce. Frame mask
from Sweet Shop.
This is all I have time for today. Got to run.

He Loves Me

I've been wanting to do one of these layouts ever since Bill started mowing for me. I was really thinking I might have to hire it done cause he hates walking behind the mower with a passion. He doesn't really have the time to do it either...what with working 12 hour days and 6 days a week and then to catch it between rain storms, when he is off, is almost impossible. But, he's doing it and I love him for it. Makes me realize that I'm more blessed then I know.
This is all from the Summer Splash kit from Scrappers Guide EXCEPT for the postage stamp frames...how did I do? I know they aren't perfect but I'll get better! I still can't figure out that danged antique like look.

Spring Flowers

Got these last weekend when I rode around on the golf cart. I have too many of the yellow ones! I complain about them, spray for them and dig them up...my mom says they are God's flowers and I should leave them alone. I say he is planting way too many! LOL

Indiana Gavin is 8

I'm finally getting around to working up a layout for Gavin's birthday. I had taken my camera and a friend of Jerri Ann's was super nice and took the pictures for me. There was no way I could go with the crutches but I wanted pictures. She took a ton of them and I can't thank her enough. I've always wanted to do this faded into the background look but I've worked on this most of the afternoon and its' still not to my liking but couldn't figure out a better way to do it. I love this one of him by the tree and the bridge in the background. Really gives the photo a story! His theme was Indiana Jones and he did dress the part. He was so cute and so excited at the party.
Background is by ShabbyMissJenn. Brush paint spot is by Nancie Rowe Janitz of ScrapArtist. Frame is from Something Blue Studios.

Post 290

A shot from yesterday.
Used a brush by Brenda.

Spring Daisies

I had to pick these up when we went to the grocery store last Saturday...they are so refreshing on the table.
The quote and buttons are by Vinnie Pearce. The Frame is by Amanda Taylor. The background is from the Sweet Country Kit from Digital Scrapbooking2 with IMG in the file name. And the swirl is by Paislee Press.

Spring Rains 2009

As you can see..its been raining here again. We've got almost 3 inches this weekend. Bill did get the front yard mowed last evening between the two rain storms. He was beginning to think he wasn't going to get it done and we would have had to bale it by next weekend. I hate the drab days but it means Bill gets to come home early. He needed a break from the 12 hour days so I'm glad. I think I will fix some pork chops for supper.
Everything from Gina Cabrera's Snap Shot of Spring kit. I love this one!

Grape Hyacinth

Had this started yesterday but didn't really like it....finished it this afternoon. All the elements are by Gina Cabrera from her Twiggy kit except for the frame and it is by Katie Pertiet. The word art is by GC from her Forever Grateful kit and the background is by GC from her Snapshots of Spring kit.

Post 289

Another shot of the Lilacs.
Background Fei-Fei's stuff. Tag template NRJ-ScrapArtist the rest of the tag by me. Word art
on the tag-TaylorMade. Flower-DDE. The gem in center of flower and stitching -SP.

Post 288

My attempt at Raw. I metered off of the white background and took the shot then took a shot with the gray card to set the white balance. Since I metered off of the white my setting were pretty close. I did some more tweaking in PS to get it the way I wanted it. I wish both white pieces of paper that I used when taking the photo looked the same, but they don't.

The staple is from Shabby Princess. The background is from week 1 of 52 week inspiration by Sue Cummings-OScraps and the color block and word art brush work from week 13. I'm starting to like the inspiration kits the more I look at them. The frame I did.

Time Train

I debated and debated about even posting this. I hated to move your beautiful layout down. This is just some more of my musing...I'm afraid of what goes on in my mind, sometimes.
The background is from Becky Vosburg and Daniella Young. The post card is from Blyth Evans and the stick pin, file strap and tag are from Dana Zarling. The flower and button are from Katie Pertiet.

Post 287

I have been working on this layout for several days and have stopped and started dozens of times. It's a shot of Jessi that Vickie took when they were here for Easter.
Background paper from DDE. The green & white dot paper I made and added a texture overlay from Scrap Orchard. The word art from TaylorMade. The frame from Scrapbook Graphics. The flower stamp from DDE's new kit Spring Bloomers. The journal date from The Digi Chick. The ladybug is a brush that I drew. I used a brush from Fei-Fei's stuff to fill in the pink on the it and the flower. I have looked and looked for the stitching and can't find it in my files I know it's there someplace but where I don't know. I will find it someday and correct this. I will learn someday to name layers as I go. I did change the color of it.
I don't think I forgot anything.
Found the stitching......It's by TaylorMade.

True Beauty

I guess the barns will have to wait...LOL....I was doing a tutorial about smoothing skin and picked this image to work on. I'm not sure I did it right but it did smooth the skin out. I don't like it super smooth so I lower the opacity quite a bit.

All stuff by Nitwit Collections except for the circle stitch and that is by Lisa Whitney of Scrap Artist and the word art is by Amanda Taylor of Oscrapes.

Chanticleer Pear

I hope you are feeling better this morning. As you can see, I worked up another layout this morning. I just couldn't resist taking a photo of the pear with the morning light shining on it.
The background is by Stepani Whetsel and the frames and flower are from Something Blue Studios.

Distressing Lesson

Well, as you can see, its not the greatest but at least I made it through the lesson. It would have been easier if I'd had a printer so I could print it out first. I like the technique but not sure I will ever get to where I can do it easily. Maybe with a lot more practice. LOL..I have so many of these pictures to scrap from this outing that I really should get with it.

Post 286

Easter Egg Hunt.......
I used paper from DDE Zoom kit, a mask from Jessica Sprague and resized and then did a bunch of erasing with a distress brush of K. Pertiet. The brads are mine with a color change.

Learning the a700

Can you believe this? Two post in one day? I have been reading my new ebook on using the a700 by Gary Friedman and learned this today and I'm so happy cause I can finally make sense of this metering stuff. You would not believe how hard that was for me to comprehend. And I was really excited to know I had a special button to lock that exposure cause no matter how I tried, I could not hold the AEL button in, half click the shutter button to lock focus AND recompose all at the same time. My fingers just couldn't do that! The only thing I used on this layout was the background from Christy Lyle and the flower stamp by Michelle Shefveland from Cottage Arts.

Post 285

Here it is........One of our cake pops. It's raining here today so it's not the best picture. I bounced my flash off of my reflector to throw the light onto the egg & the Easter grass.
Inked overlay not sure, other overlay and stitching from OScraps, word art by TaylorMade at OScraps, staple from Shabby Princess, the frame tag by me.

Peanut Butter Cookies

I got these images the day before the knee surgery and just now getting around to doing something with them. I've worked on this for over 3 hours...lol...
Everything is from Shabby Shoppe from the Barefoot kit. I really like this kit and will have to do another layout or two with it.

Spring Has Sprung

but I had to bring these inside to get a photo. It's either raining here or windy. Today was rain.
I tried taking these with the north light shining in behind them but it didn't come out quite like I visioned it. I meant to use my external flash to light them from behind but my batteries were all run down and I didn't have any plain ones. This is a bunch of everything. The background is from Lisa Whitney. The frame and safety pin tag are from Katie Pertiet. The butterfly is from Fei Fei.

Post 284

What a week end. It was nonstop chaos from Saturday morning until about 8:00 Sunday evening. We had egg hunts. Yes,that's plural,we had at least 3. Made Easter Egg cake pops from Bakerella's web site. We cooked and ate. Went to my Sisters for Sunday dinner and stopped by to visit Grandma on the way home and the Grands still found time to just play out back. I was so tired I didn't get the kitchen all cleaned up until today.
I probably will not post a photo of the cake pops, they are pretty sad looking.
We had so much fun making then and laughed ourselves silly,but we need a lot more practice. I don't think we will ever get any that look as good as Bakerella's even if we practice for years.
I had some trouble finding all the right supplies,which I think would have made it easier but they do taste good (sweet) and the fun we had made it worth all the mess. I will differently try these again. Maybe the reindeer for Christmas, they are so cute. Oh, what the heck....you will see our sad eggs in the next post. Something for you to look forward to....LOL
Wanted you to see the name photo that I found time to finished for Vick. We really like the way it turned out and she picked all the letters from your photos. I did add a texture to the L's to make them rustic looking to match the rest of the letters and I had to do a different crop and some clone work on the R to get it to print 4 x 6 and not lose the flower in your shot. She loves it and took it home to hang on her wall. I can't wait to make a couple more.

Chinese Fortune

Oh, shoot...lets see...the paper is from Taylor Made. The stitch is from Blythe Evans of Oscapes and the frame is Fei-fei's stuff. There's got to be an easier way to keep track of the stuff we use. I keep thinking I'll put a note in with the file but forget to do it as I'm laying it out.

Post 283

Just playing around. You have seen some of these photos before.
The background overlay from OScraps a couple papers and stitch from Shabby Princes the rest
mine.

Post 282

This is the only cupcake left from last night. It had a 6 inch 2 layer cake in the middle and 9 of these adorable cupcakes around the edge. Since it was to honor Cherryl, our out going president and Girl of the Year, we only ate the cupcakes and let her take the cake home.
The fastener and ribbon is from Shabby Princess and the overlay on the background is from OScraps. The rest is mine.

Post 281

This will probably be my last layout for awhile. Have a full week coming up and won't have time to be lazy.
Found this clematis & birdhouse photo from last summer and played around with Pioneer Woman's actions. From left to right 1- soft & faded 2 - colorized 3 - vintage. Not sure which I like the best, it would just depend on the photo but they are fun to play with.
Frame by TaylorMade mere modesty kit from OScraps.

Early Spring Daffodils

I was standing on one crutch with one foot, trying real hard to hold steady...quite a blurry image but I was afraid if I waited much longer, they would be covered with snow. It looks like it could start up any minute but no flakes yet. We are going down for cake and ice cream at 1:30..sure hope it holds off till I get back home.
Back ground, staple, tag and sequins by Gina Cabrera. Doodles by Candy Sorenson.

Post 280

Did a lot of playing with this one.
First I used Pioneer Woman's soft & faded action on the photo. I really like this look and I will probably use it a lot more. Next I used Fei-Fei's Stuff crazy beauty brush from OScraps to give it that painted look,and her doodle brush just for a little extra. The flower is by Irene Alexeeva from the Birthday Blog train at Scrap Orchard. I changed the color of it to match the reflection of the TV on the glass table in the photo. I also drew the leaf to go behind it and added a dot of color to the center. Used the Linen texture from Atomic Cupcake on the background.

Morning Light

I love mornings, especially sunny ones. I like being up before anyone else. I love the silence and the solitude. A perfect beginning to a wonderful day.
Hello Fall Mega Kit by Gina Cabrera.

Post 279

This is my attempt to save & use this cute shot of Jessi that I almost ruined by punching instead of squeezing the shutter button. Everything is from TaylorMade Designs at OScraps except the little white frames. I did sort of a scraplift from a layout that was entered in TaylorMade Designer Spotlight Challenge at OScraps.

Web Site Makeover

Well, its done and it looks so nice and clean. I followed two tutorials to make this design. The first tutorial was a free one by an absolutely wonderful gal called Amanda. She has a super cool site with a free kit to go along with this tutorial. Check her out! She also has a recipe site that is outstanding. I'm a visual person and having photos of every step in the recipe process is the absolute best. We didn't keep her design because we both like our layouts clean and simple but I hope to use some of her stuff in a layout soon. The second tutorial was one I bought, along with the html code and kits. Melisa was super nice to help me over a snag I was having but it wasn't because her instructions were wrong, it was strickly because I didn't quite get the unzip process done correctly. Once I realized the problem, the instructions talked me through every step in the design. Melisa sells her design and code at Scrap Orchard under PixelGeek Designs and the graphics were created by Kami of Ziggle Design. The only thing we changed was the background image and thanks to Amanda's tutorial, we were able to change it in the code. We wanted a much softer look. We want to take this time to thank too super cool gals for their help and their abilites and their unselfish act of helping two clueless women venture into the world of html code. We couldn't have done it without them.

Post 278

When Zach came in from school today he decided to start his art portfolio. For only being in the 3rd grade I think he is showing amazing talent. What is remarkable is the way he draws most of the time. He may start with an ear or maybe a foot and draws it all from memory.
Of course right now Sonic is his favorite but he may move on to something else next week.
Background by Taylormade, staple from SP and ink spots DDE.

Pure Heaven

Jerri Ann got me started on these and I really look forward to having one. In fact, it was really hard to take a shot of it first. It is so creamy. Gavin loves them too but mommy says they are too expensive to buy for him...she saves them for herself. I got on the scales this am...was really dreading it but I've only gain .4 of a pound. Not bad, considering I don't get off the couch more than 4 times a day and that is only for a trip to the bathroom or to grab one of these..
I finally figured out how to use my gray card. I shot the bar first, then I laid the gray card on top on the bar and shot it again. I opened both of the raw files up in my raw program and used the eye dropper tool to set the white balance on the photo of the gray card. I then copied my settings and then opened the shot of the chocolate bar and copied the settings. Presto....perfect white balance.
The paper and elements are from Nitwit collections.

Post 277

I think these little egg candle cups are so cute had to take a shot. I saw a frame something like this the other day some place ????? I thought I can make that.
The frame by me. Used the same corduroy and overlay as before flower and bow from DDE with a color change.

Post 276

Trying my best to make it feel like spring.
Everyting from SP except I used the same overlay's that I used in the last post.