In Loving Memory of Nita

Nita was my Hubby's Grandmother, grand indeed. She was loving, caring and selfless. She lived her life according to God's word and seemed to always know what to say and how to handle things. Every time I saw her she always had a beautiful smile and peaceful heart. I only had the pleasure of knowing her for about five years and I sadly did not have a lot of opportunities to spend with her. The time I did spend with her she always was a good example of how I would want to live my life. She will always be remembered for many things and will always live in the hearts of her family.
Nita passed away a couple of years ago this past March. Last Christmas I created this as a shadow box for my Mother-in-law. The picture is of Nita in front of her house holding my daughter Trinity when she was 5 months old. It is one of the most beautiful pictures I have of Nita and I love the reminder, within the content of this photo, that life goes on.
Though this was created in December of last year I have not blogged about it yet. It still is one of my favorite pages. It just recently was published in Scrapbook News and Review. This is the Layout that led to me becoming a staff member for that wonderful E-zine. Now for the Details... if I can remember them...lol.

Details:
Upper Left: I this shot you can see the many layers that I used to create this shadowbox. Every thing is pop dotted the piece is about 1" thick. The background is simply a sage tone on tone paper that I cut large 1" scallops around. I lightly distressed the edges with versa mark and chalk. Within each scallop I too and punched out of scraps little flowers and glued them down. The next layer is the light purple. On this layer I printed Nita's favorite Hymn. You can see this better in the over all pic.
The hardware I used in this layout is an antique brass. This door plate was filled with a cream cardstock with a stamped image that has been heat embossed with an antique gold embossing powder. This same technique is found in the hand drawn and cut flourishes you can see here and throughout this page. The fabric flowers are all prima and the paper ones were all hand made. I used a lot of pearls to accent this layout and the flower clusters are no acception for this. On top of the purple paper is the photo backed with a cream card sock slightly distressed. The photo has an overlay on it creating that scalloped edge around the photo. The buttons here are just glued on however I love details and every button on this page had gold thread laced though them to make them appear that they have been sewn on. The last thing in this upper left detail shot would be the woven ribbon that I have used. It is a simple cotton crocheted ribbon that has a brown grosgrain ribbon woven though it every couple of inches.
Bottom Left: There is not much new here accept that one of the flowers I used in this large flower stack is a distressed chipboard flower.
Bottom Right: Here is the title of the layout. I used these wonderful letters from Joann's in an antique brass. The letters are stuck on with tacky tape. All of this title is popped up about 1/2" from the backing. It is sported with several layers of card stock. The only new element here is the ear ring. This is a vintage clip on earring that I broke off the clip part. I love how this is a suspended element on this page. The ribbons are the same type that go up the left side of the layout, however they are not woven together.
Not shown in the detail pics: There is a circular elements. The lighter patterned paper has Nita's favorite scripture. The edges have been distressed on this piece and little flowers were added around the edge. The darker brown circle was cut with fiskars decorative scissors. Inked with a cream pigment ink and doodled on. Then pearls were added.

Thanks for taking the time to look through the details with me. I hope that you too can find ways to honor those in your life that mean the most to you. Treasure all the moments you have with each and every one of your loved ones and let them know how much you care. If the events of these past two years have thought me anything it is that we need to be careful of how we live our lives and how our lives touch others.
An Inspirational Poem
Live…laugh…and Love
By John McLeod

Live well dear friends
In all you do,
Tho' paths be old
Or paths be new,
But to yourself
Be ever true,

Live well!

Laugh often friends
Tho' passing years
Bring, sometimes, smiles
And, sometimes, tears,
For mirth forever
Warms and cheers

Laugh often!

Love much dear friends
For love will bring
The healing joy
And hope of Spring,
Where pain and fear may never dwell
Nor anguish touch….

And so Live well,
Laugh often too,
And more, dear friends,

Love much!

From This Day Forward

Okay I finally broke down and forced myself to open my box of wedding photos and pic out one of the precious moments from that day and scrap it.... yes I put sticky glue all over the picture, front and back! I know some of you are gasping... Oh my!!! But to calm your nerves and mine... lol. I used a duplicate and I have the negatives. This is one reason I chose the photo I did. Now, the anxiety I had about beginning this project stems from the importance of this event. It was one of the happiest days of my life and I still seven years later tear up as I look through these pictures. I did not plan this but I finished this layout the morning of our seventh year anniversary. The date on the LO though is for our formal wedding in September not the Justice of the Peace one we had in March. Technically we have said our I Dos three times and I joke with my hubby that we should renew our vows in every state we live so we can collect the licenses... hehe if they would issue them to us that is. Lol. Well with out much further adieu here is the layout that begins a very large project for me and opens up my scrapbooking world to the elegant, romantic and sophisticated side instead of the playful, childlike youth side.

I created this for the monochromatic challenge for the Coordinates Collections March Madness Cyber Crop I attended this past weekend. I was shocked when I was done to realize I used only two.. yes TWO pieces of Cardstock. No patterned paper... just cardstock. I did lost of new techniques in this and I will be filling you in on those in a minute. The trick in my opinion with a monochromatic layout is to balance texture, patterns and dimension. I will go over these in a bit. Lets get started on the juicy details.

Background:
Ok this is an easy one... white cardstock... NEXT... just kidding I actually have to type techniques in the area this time. So here it goes. I took a thick cardstock scrap and cut a diamond out of this. I used it as a template to create the cream colored diamonds with Stampin Up Cream Craft ink. I did this about 1/2 of the page leaving the few diamonds in the center of the page to fade into the bottom right half. This is best seen right above the upper left corner of our wedding photo. After waiting for this to dry I took my piercing tool and my hole template and poked holes all along the edges of the diamonds. I threaded cream DMC floss through these holes and added one iridescent bead to each stitch. This took forever! Literally ... about 1 1/2 to two hours. But it looks great and it is so elegant.
Out of the cream cardstock I used the cricut to cut a 4" damask type pattern. I created this three times to back or mat the photo and to add a pattern and texture to the right side of the page. I took my white pen and added some doodling on top of this die cut patterns. I adhered them to the page.
Lastly on the main cardstock I took my Tim Holtz mask and used it along the bottom of this page. Once in place I used a cosmetic sponge (they are cheep at the dollar store) and applied versa mark ink around the mask. Once this step is complete I quickly removed the mask and sprinkled an iridescent glitter embossing powder. Heated it up with my handy dandy heating tool and wow... I love the result.
Embellishments:
Upper right: of the layout I have a journal box that reads "To have and to hold from this day forward." This is from a pre-printed wedding embellishment pack from Creative Memories... it was part of my old stash. I added some dry embossing onto this piece of paper and edged it in gold.. up.. you guessed it ... my gold Zig Painty Pen.. which by the way is dieing and drying out... I don't know what I am going to do. I think I got it from Stampin' Up, I cant find them in the stores. Sorry I just panicked there for a second...lol. Back to the subject. I embellished this box with an American Crafts chipboard shape I edged in gold also and some cricut die cuts from the Home Accent cartridge. The little heart with the DMC floss stitched around it is a punch from Martha Stewart's Valentines line. Last but not least.. a prima flower centered with a pearl, in the corner. I popped this up off the background cardstock due to the thickness of the beading. I used the foam squares to do so.
The Bottom Left: The main focus of this cluster is the large 4" damask pattern behind the embellishments. All of them by the way are the same as the upper left. This pattern is the same as the ones I used behind the photo, however it is cut out of white cardstock. I finished this one with spray adhesive and Stampin' Up's clear micro beads. I lifted this off the page with foam squares cut into little pieces due to the intricacy of this design.
Right side: The rhinestones are prima say it with crystals. After putting the photo on the page over the cream damask pattern I also added the shear ribbon along the right of the page. Placed the crystals over all that and embellished more along the right with the cream velvet ribbon, cardstock hearts and flowers. Some of the hearts are stamped with versa mark with a toile type design from Stampin' Up. I also added the frame embellishment with our wedding date in it. Again this was a cricut die cut shape cut in white cardstock and backed with the cream.

Thanks for looking and sharing in this huge step for my scrapping. I feel better knowing that I can scrap this event and I like the result.

Wanted

Ok, ok, I have titled this post about two things but it worked so well together...lol. This is going to be a long one so take a moment and get a cup of tea or coffee and come settle in for some scrappy goodness, Eye Candy and giveaways.
First off I wan to share with you my new Scrappiest layout I did for Liz over at The Scrappiest Blog. Her sketch inspired me to create an interactive page. It has been a while since I have done one and I do love engineering them ... lol. If I can have the title of "Paper Engineer" I would put it on my ATCs. I love origami and if you all have not seen my Allspark Cube invitations for my son's last birthday party... oh my, you have not! They are 3D allspark cubes and so cool. Well I try to post them up this week. I am digressing now, sorry. Back to the subject. Here is Liz's sketch of the week and my take on it.
WANTED - Two cute kids watching the Fiesta day's Parade. These are my beautiful babies... just give me a moment to be a proud mommy... hehe. Every year we go to the Fiesta Days events here in our Loverly town of Vacaville CA. This is such a major event and we love to attend it... we kinda don't have any choice though. The parade grand stands are about two blocks from our house and people always block us in the driveway. No Worries, though we just walk on over with our drinks, snacks, sunscreen and chairs early to save our spots. This year my Debonair husband was away on deployment protecting our country. Our wonderful landlords took the kids and I under their wings and let us chill with them during the festivities. The adults had Mimosas in the morning and Margaritas in the afternoon over at their house. This day was full of fun colors and Bright Skys. After the parade we head over to the town park where we ride on the Carnaval Rides and enjoy the music and other booths. I could go on for a while about how much fun we have there every year, I will stop for your sake and this long post...lol. On to the Details!!!!
No detail shots today I want to talk about more of the look of this piece rather then the lack of detail... oh wait... you said you came here for details. Well I got plenty of very detailed work I did at the crop this weekend so stay tuned this week for more of those projects. This one is about texture and interaction.
Background: This started with a brown cardstock with a scratched up pattern to it under all the western goodness. I then took a taupe colored cardstock distressed the edges and crumpled it up a few times until it would not lay flat...hehe. I inked this up with my brown ink pad so that the high wrinkles picked up the ink. I then distressed along the top and bottom with my crop-a-dial in both sizes and another standard hole punch. I love the way that turned out.. looks like someone shot a shotgun through it. The red bandanna paper was cut to shape and inked around the edges and adhered with foam adhesive to pop it up away from the BG papers to let the photo pull out set behind it.
The "Wanted" title and poster was from a western patterned paper I had in my stash. I cut it out and inked the edges. I used Ranger's walnut distress stickles on the letters and cut around the horse's head to insert the bottom left corner of the picture.
Embellishments: The Sheriff's badge was from that western patterned paper as well I just cut it out and also used the distressed stickles on it. The flowers are prima, however I inked them with a water soluble brown ink and then placed them into a water mixture of brown ink and water. This aged and discolored them so they would coordinate better with this theme. I folded one in half behind the horse's head and cut the red bandanna flower out of one of my scraps. The other flowers are clustered and layered together in the corner with a cactus and a spur from, yup you guessed it the western patterned paper. I created out of a thin twine one of the flowers in this cluster.
The snaps I have had in my stash for quite some time they are old K & Company. I added a ribbon along the top of them so to help coordinate the ribbons used in the photo pullout.
Journaling: I typed this up on the computer. Printed it on a cream colored cardstock. Inked it directly with my versa mark ink pad and chalked it with two different browns and a rust. I Cut them out and inked the edges. I love the way this style of journaling looks.
Photos: The front photo has a cool effect I thought of late last night. I had these already printed and did not want to photo edit them. However I hated looking at the knees and legs of the people sitting behind my beautiful babies. I cut a piece of vellum the size of my photo and placed it over the top. I traced the outline of my kids lightly with a pencil and then removed the vellum from the picture. Placing it on my self healing cutting mat I used my exacto knife to cut along the line I traced. Placing this back on the photo it created a photo editing look and now my kids and my daughter's monkey are back in front at the center of attention. She is such a Animal Fanatic. I also stamped the design at the top and then cut the mat around the photo. Once the design was dry I took the Ranger walnut stickles and went over the brown cardstock. Leaving the cream ink to show through.
The Photo Pull Out: I saw this angled paper in the back of the sketch and new immediately this was going to be an interactive page. I took the other three photos I loved from the day and matted them with coordinating paper, inked the edges and punched a few corners.I used my crop-a-dial to punch and set the eyelets into the four holes in the top photo for my ribbon pulls and two holes in the bottom and top of the other photos also. Once the eyelets were set I just started adding ribbon. I used my tan stain ribbon to connect the photos together. I added a sentence of journaling on the top photo and folded it up and placed it back into the page.
I hope these how to dos help and inspire some creative thought for you. I love sharing these with you all and I cant wait to share the projects from my first cyber crop with you. I will add them once a day this week.

The GCD STUDIOS CALL part of my title... hehe - Ok, on to the last thing I wanted to chat about with you ... GCD Studios has opened their doors to us all and has decided to hold a Design Team Call. The call ended on Saturday and they are having events on their blog all week as they go though the selection process. I have to admit I was extremely excited when I saw the call the night Heidi posted it up. I put together my best work and a fun cute application and sent it in within the first few hours it was opened. I try not to set my hopes high since there are so many wonderful scrappers out there, (471) to be exact as Heidi posted this morning, that would love this opportunity just as much as I did. WOW, yes 471 it the amount of applicants that sent in for the call and since Heidi loves to shake things up and have fun, just like the papers and products they produce, she is having a give away today and tomorrow being the **dum da da dum** call day even more goodies will be handed out at the event as they call all the new design team members to congratulate them! As you have noticed throughout this post I have random words linked. Well if you go click on them it will take you to the fun and fabulous lines of the GCD Studios. So go check out their blog today and tomorrow and see how GCD is bringing the fun back into scrapbooking!

ALS Graduation

The Scrappiest did it again. Liz always has a way to challenge my creativity. As soon as I saw this wonderful sketch I knew I had just the pics for it... funny thing is I always have a hard time scrapping my Hubby's military moments. Maybe it is the importance of the event or the protocol of the military that keeps me from wanting to scrap these career milestones. These three have been in my "In Progress" file for almost a month now and every time I took them out I just could not do it.
I remember this night vividly. This was my first ever major military event and the beauty of the traditions were just amazing. The ceremony began with the presentation of the colors. The color guard airmen entered from the back of the room. You could hear a pin drop it was so quiet. The intensity of emotion in the room became overwhelming as everyone in attendance filled with pride for our country. The color guard presented the colors at the front of the room and the National Anthem was played. Fallowed by a moment of silence for the fallen heroes. Which they had a table set off to the side in the front of the room reserved for the memory of those who have given their life from every branch of the military. I am getting choked up right now just going through this memory.
We went to the graduation and had no idea he would have been acknowledged for any special award. As they began they did the graduation ceremony.They did the awards next and my hubby received the Distinguished Graduate award for scoring in the top 10% of his class of over 150 students. I was extremely proud. I was the happiest wife in the room. They finished up the awards with three specialty awards given and decided on by their instructors and nominated by their piers. He was only one of two graduates to receive multiple awards. You should have seen me ... beaming ear to ear... I was now the proudest wife on Travis Air Force Base at that moment.

Journaling:
I was able to convince my Hubby to write this journaling. I typed it up and love that he had input on this layout. I typed it up and played with the lettering of the title on Microsoft word. Printed it out and colored it in with coordinating markers.

Details:
Background:
This is a fairly simple LO for me. I started with a chocolate brown cardstock and added some chocolate brown in to it just to create a soft tone on tone texture. I added the stripe rectangle with lighter tones then the rest of the page. The was to create some contrast with out adding to much to the layout. I edged it in my Zig gold ink pen. I hand drew the bracket shape with a few measurements on the back of the navy and star paper. Once this was cut I used it as a template to create the same curves on the red and the white papers. I edged each layer with the gold Zig pen.
Top Left: The detail here is simply the finish on the grungeboard by Tim Holtz. I just took my thyme green colored ink pad and pressed the grungeboard lightly on top of it with no rubbing, just blotting. Then instead of putting brads inside these pre-punched holes I took my large gold paint marker and colored the inside edges of each hole. This created a nice rivet/eyelet look.

Top Right: The detail here is just the printed title and how I colored it in with all the coordinating markers for this layout. Notice the flag though. It is a laser cut die cut and I chalked the white and red pieces to soften them to a more muted color for this page. I have had that for years and never used it...hehe. It is a stash piece.

Bottom Right: This flourish is also a piece of the grungeboard set by Tim Holtz. I did the same finish with the thyme colored ink yet I only doodled the gold dots on it. I added the USA letters in the antique brass and I love the simplicity of it all.

Thanks for viewing this layout and I want to thank everyone who is reading this if you are a military family member, an active duty member or retired... Thank you for serving I am proud to stand next to you as a military spouse and be a part of the entire military family. Salute!