Dumb People

Ok, I need to vent. I was just googling weight watchers blogs, and came upon one that was TOTALLY anti weight watchers. They are acctually taking time out of their lives to PRINT out flyers stating that Weight Watchers sucks and doesn't work, and it's all a big sceme to get our money. OK DuMB PEOPLE who wrote that blog. I am walking talking proof that weight watchers works! I have lost almost 70 lbs since last AUGUST on weight watchers, and if you think that I'm a huge gym rat that works out 7 times a week and pops weight loss pills ON TOP of weight watchers to lose that much weight, you are SADLY mistaken. Geez, it really made me mad! If you DO WEIGHT WATCHERS right, it WILL work...if you're a slacker and you DON'T follow the program, you're NOT going to drop the weight! DUH!
THe only way you are allowed to post COMMENTS on that blog is if you register or log in..both of which I wasn't going to waste my time on, so I'm just venting here. Sorry guys, but it was totally rediculous!
ok...jumping off the soap box now!
have a great WEIGHT WATCHIN DAY!

ps-moments later I was on a POSITIVE weight watchers blog that had THIS quote...

The road to success is not straight. There is a curve called Failure, a loop called Confusion, speed bumps called Friends, red lights called Enemies, caution lights called Family. You will have flats called Jobs. But, if you have a spare called Determination, an engine called Perseverance, & insurance called Faith, you will make it to a place called Success

as my hubby would say.... "BOOYAH!"

My first challenge accepted~

Awesome Abby accepted my scrap challenge! ***can i hear a WOOT WOOT???***

Here is her beautiful layout!!




Some things I love about this layout.
#1-Abby used her own handwriting! (something I don't do often cause I hate my writing!)
#2-she used red with blue..which is think is soooo awesome!
#3-she used playing cards!
#4-the journalling (that I chose) is awesome!
#5-she got it done quickly!!! =)

Abby I hope you enjoyed your challenge!!!

If anyone wants to be the subject of my next challenge, leave me comment, otherwise I'll pick someone myself!

Relay for Life

The relay for life was a great experience. Jacob hugged me on the way home and told me how shocked he was that I was able to walk for 4 1/2 hours straight, and how proud he was of me. It was definitely a bonding moment for us! I enjoyed being able to walk around the track with two of my great friends, Darci and Tammy!
It took me 2 hours to find the luminaries that Jason bought in honor of his maternal grandparents Robert and Dolores Hartson, but when I found them, I was so excited!
Crazy me, I forgot my camera at home, so all I have to show for this event is pictures from my phone!!

Here are some pics...

Packing Tape Transfers

So because of the cool things I always find through my daily newsletters I get from Scrapscene.com, I came across how to make packing tape transfers. I must admit I tried this in the past with pictures, and didn't realize that you couldn't use "kodak" or other type pictures, but what works best are pictures/words that are printed out with toner based inks. I was sitting here reading Helen's blog (on my blogroll to the right) and saw how she was doing cool transfers with acrylic paints, and gel, etc, and I decided to try the packing tape transfer once again. I didn't have any pictures, but I had just gotten a new paper stack at Michaels by Me And My Big Ideas. It has a TON Of really cool black and white papers, so I thought I'd give it a try, thinking there's no way it would work! I tore a piece of paper out of the pack, put it face down on some packing tape, rubbed it on there real good so there were no "bubbles", and then filled the sink with water, and stuck the packing tape and paper in the water for 10 minutes. When the 10 minutes were up, I took the tape out, and began rubbing the backing of the paper off. I was so excited when I saw the deep clear lines of the black ink had stayed on the tape! No smearing, nothing missing, it was a perfect transfer! OMG I couldn't wait to take a picture of it! My first thought was....acrylic albums! These clear transfers are so crisp and perfect, you can put them on a clear album and it'll show perfectly through both sides..and the best part is that when it dries, it's still sticky!
Here is a pic of my first attempt...I have since put packing tape on several other pieces from that same stack, but I havn't peeled them yet...lol

Picture Collages

I made a few picture collages from my day on Friday.

The first one is of Jordyn and Jadyn in their sundresses....



The second one is of Jadyn just being too darn cute!



oh, and Bella Bella Boo wanted her own picture collage too...she is so spoiled!

My blogroll

I'm totally excited about my scrappers blogroll, not only is it a long list, but it's a long list of totally freakin TALENTED people that I now have at my disposal to drool over their blogs (and find easily) any time I want! I have found a lot of blogs through other blogs, etc etc etc, and I am blown away at the talent I have found and cant wait to scraplift some amazing ideas!

If you see your blog listed on my blog and you want it taken OFF, PLEASE tell me! If you dont see your blog, or a really cool blog that you KNOW about on my blog...please ALSO let me know so I can add it!

If I have misspelled your name or your blog site address, please let me know that too!

I have totally enjoyed the HOURS of browsing scrap blogs the past few days! I'm so inspired to create now, I dont know what to start first!

happy scrapping!

My first scrapper challenge

I decided to challenge one person a week. If they accept my challenge their challenge has to be completed within a week so I can move on to the next scrapper. This could be fun, right? I'm going to choose random people for this, so my first person is AWESOME ABBY KEY!

Abby, what I love most about your blog is your "about me" section where you define yourself. I think it's the best one I've ever read!

this is what it says....

I am a mom. A wife. A scrapper. A reader. A quote collector. A lover of baseball. A teacher. A sister. An aunt. A daughter. A Christian. A friend. Taxi cab driver. A girly girl...but I can catch! A worrier. A lover of fast cars...I have a boy's heart in that department! Crafty gal. A chef. Proud of who I am and where I come from...but I'm still under construction!

My challenge for you, Awesome Abby...should you choose to accept it...is to make a layout with the above as your journalling. (hope you have not already done this!)
Once you create your layout, email it to me so I can post it on my blog! If you choose NOT to do this challenge, please email me so I can choose someone else...
ready, set...create! =)

Scrapbooking Blogroll

If you visit my blog often, or if this is your first time here, and you have a cool scrap blog and would like to be on my blogroll for other scrappers to visit your site, please leave me a comment and I'll be glad to add you!

wow, I'm acctually getting requests to be added to my blogroll! This is exciting! (seriously!)
and...no need to ask me if you can add me to your blog, please DO! I love the traffic to my site! Thanks!

Really cool stuff!

Ok I have never heard of organize.com, but i'm sure it'll be one of my favorite places to shop online soon! I just found their website and they have the COOLEST scrap storage stuff! (as well as household storage stuff) If you click on their site, and then click on crafts, you will be saying "ooh, ahhh, oohhh!!!"

And...if you dont want to pay shipping, alot of their stuff is sold at target! Look what I found today!!! These clear stackable boxes are about 13 inches long, and about 9 inches wide, and about 3 inches deep. I am DEFINITELY going to go buy another 2 pack asap!

So here's the story. When I go to crops or host crops, I have my "special stash" of rubons, cardstock stickers, chipboard letters, etc that I always bring with me cause I "can't live without em." I used to have them all in a big clear envelope thingy, and it was getting too full, and things were getting ruined in it. Well, I just transferred everything to my new snap and stack, and it all fit and then some! woo hoo!

Here are some pics of what I'm talking about!

Relay for Life

Dear Family and Friends,

I’ve decided to take action against cancer by participating in the American Cancer Society Relay For Life event right here in my community. Relay For Life® is about celebration, remembrance, and hope. By participating, I am honoring cancer survivors, paying tribute to the lives we've lost to the disease, and raising money to help fight it. My Grandmother in law Dolores Hartson was a breast cancer survivor. I will walk for her. My great aunt IS a breast cancer survivor. I will walk for her. My maternal grandmother and grandfather as well as my paternal grandmother all had cancer. I will walk for them. Two of my great friends have a friend that was dear to them-35 years old, wife and mother of 2 young children. She died of cancer last month. I have chosen to be on the team that supports her. (Shannon's sunshine) I never met her, but I will walk for her.

Please help support me in this important cause by making a donation. (anything will help!) It is faster and easier than ever to support me by making a secure, tax-deductible donation online using the link below.

Whatever you can give will help - it all adds up! I greatly appreciate your support and will keep you posted on my progress.

To make a donation online, visit my personal page.

http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR/RelayForLife/RelayForLifeCaliforniaDivision?px=6285489&pg=personal&fr_id=5416

ps-i can't get the above website to become a "link" so if you copy it and paste it in your browser, you will be directed to the right page. Thanks so much!

Butterfly Art

I have noticed how popular butterflies are lately in scrap pages, on pottery, cards, dishes, wall art, etc. I recently saw a really cool butterfly and I can't for the life of me remember WHERE I saw it, but it wasn't very big (i think it was on a card) but it was wayyy cute, and it had fabric stitched on certain part of it, so the edges came up...wayyy cute! (if it was YOURS, please let me know so I can show my inspiration!) ANyways, so I got this wild hair...you know where....and decided to make some butterfly art. I painted an 8x8 canvas lime green, and then cut a butterfly shape (from google images) from heavy chipboard. First I painted it hot pink, then painted over it with Tim Holtz distress crackle paint in Broken China color. You can't see it in the picture, but there is some really cool crackle with pink showing through to give the wings texture!
Then i cut out individual pieces out of chipboard and painted them, and then glued fabric to them. I painted some small dots around the edges, and voila! I used double sided foam tape to make everything POP off the canvas. It's so much better looking IRL (sigh) but at least you get the picture. It was fun and relaxing, and I guess that's all that matters, right? I acctually like the SIDE VIEW pic the best cause you can see the dimension of it all. WHat do you think?



ps-if you click on the picture to make it bigger, you can see the crackle!

April Birthdays at Grandma and Grandpa Brush's

Today we went into the desert to celebrate the End of March and April birthdays in the family. (Jason, Jadyn, Grandpa, and Kelsey) although for some reason it ended up being a Jadyn party...lol She kept saying "no MY birday party!"

Here are some pictures from the party...unfortunately my camera was wiggedy wiggedy whacked during pics with Jadyn and grandpa for some strange reason, and every single one of them turned out blurry! =(







After the party, we drove home and put together the OUTDOOR toys that the kids got as presents. They had a blast playing with them and didn't want to come inside for dinner!













Then Jadyn started posing really cute, so I HAD to take pics of that...=)







and last but not least, we gave the kids baths and showers, and put them to bed. Jadyn got to wear her new jammies!

layout redone

When i looked at the layout I made yesterday, something was wrong. I think it's because the border stamp image around the edges of the paper was too light, and made it look boring. Well, my good friend Klo introduced me to the stickles a few months ago, so I got out my really cool black stickles and outlined the border, and then the journalling, added a title and felt arrow, and did some doodling on the buttons. I dont know if I now dislike it more, or if I like it better....hhmmnpph!

just have to share...

the cutest thing Jordyn said today!

Jordyn "Mom, we have to sing 10 songs a day at school!"
mom" 10 songs, that's a lot!"
Jordyn *sigh* "yeah, even my breath is tired!"

a few minutes later...

Jordyn "one of the songs would make you cry"
mom "which song is it?"
Jordyn "I dont remember but it made Riley cry"
mom "how do you know it would make ME cry?"
Jordyn "duh mom, EVERYTHING makes YOU cry!"



One of my fave scrap designers is Elsie Flannagan. I am reading her 52 Challenges book that I bought last night, so I scraplifted some ideas off of some pages I've viewed so far. Thanks for being so freakin cool Elsie!

Happy Home altered Canvas

This is my first project finished for my Shimelle class. Its not finished the way it's SUPPOSED to be finished, because I took the "make a 3 dimensional frame" to a different level, but I do LOVE the end results! I created this 12x12 canvass this morning, and it only took about 2 hours! Here is a little tutorial on how it was done
I knew instantly that I was going to want to use Basic Grey's "Mellow" line on this project. It is one of my favorites, and went perfectly for what I wanted to create
I chose the paper with the trees as my background paper, and then modge podged it to a 12x12 canvas-both underneath and on top. I like to mod podge the top as well, because #1, it makes it stick better, #2, it gives it texture, and #3, brings out the color! (used matte not gloss!)


see how the colors are brighter?


I then added some cloud paper to the top and inked the edges. I added the hearts (from the mellow punch outs) and drew around them with black pen. The rub on title is American Crafts. I also mod podged over the entire title.


Next, I cut out two house shapes (my own design) onto chipboard


I covered the chipboard houses in the mellow paper, and added the title with the mellow stickers. I once again outlined the stickers with black pen to make them stick out more. I mod podged the houses.


I then added the houses to the canvas and added the chimney. What you can't see in the pics is that I used thick double sided foam tape to add dimension, and on the left and right side I added it triple thick so they are at an angle.


The last picture is of my finished product. I have it hanging in my scrap area above my computer! I added the picture (dont know if you can tell, but they have underwear on their heads! *hence the title "fruit of my womb") I matted the pic on Bazzill black cardstock, and then added the mod podged figures. They also have double sided foam tape behind them and are raised above the pic.
I wish the pics did the colors justice on this project, cause it has been one of my faves to create! Enjoy!