Monthly Moments: November...

Today I'd like to share with you the newest Monthly Moments collection for November, which will be available on Nov. 15th at 10pm EST at Papertrey Ink. Evidently, I jumped the gun making a "thankful" mini album last time, because this month's kit was perfect for scrapping family, food, and thankfulness! So here is another one, just an album filled with photos from last Thanksgiving.

As I looked through the journal cards, stamps and dies, I knew immediately what I wanted to do with them. Last Thanksgiving, my side of the family and my grandmother came to visit, and it was our first Thanksgiving together in 13 years. We all got together and took some family photos up by Daniel's Park here in Colorado, so I put together a little book of photos to give to my mom when she comes this year. I used the new tag die, Monthly Moments: Journal Card 6 to trim the journal cards and some of the photos. I used the stamp set on some of these also before I started putting it all together. Also incorporated a few other dies by Papertrey Ink, which I'll list in the supplies.

Here is the first inside page, just a kraft tag stamped with the Monthly Moments: November stamps.

Another super quick page, stamped with the stamps again. I cut a cork heart from the Tremendous Tags dies.  I didn't add journaling to my book yet...wasn't sure if I wanted to write in it from my perspective, since I wanted to give it away to my mom.

Pic of my mom and dad... cut with the same tag die as above, trimmed from 4x6" photos.

This "Give Thanks" paper from the Journal Card Collection was so cute, had to use it. It's larger than some of the others I used (others were cut in half), but I think adding different sizes into the book makes it more interesting. I added washi tape, a felt heart cut with Tremendous Tags dies, little paper clip and a pearl.

Even though the pictures didn't exactly match the papers (with the pink in our scarves), I decided to use them in color anyway. I don't think anyone will mind when they look at these 10 years from now! It's fun to see them in color rather than black and white, don't you agree? Too often I see black and white pics being used. This is my mom and dad in the middle, my brother and his family on the left, and me and my family on the right.

The leaves were cut with Leave It Be with some burlap, cut the "November" with the Monthly Moments: November die and added some stamping and washi tape. The washi tapes are fabric ones from Michaels..so in love with them!

Picture of my mother and her mother... it was vest and scarf season. :)

Here is a picture of me, my hubby and 2 girls. Funny to see this now, as my girls have slimmed down a lot since last Thanksgiving!  I cut a Wonderful Words: Together die and stapled it onto the pic, added more washi tape and another cork heart.

"Gobble, gobble" stamped tag for journaling...

Photo of my girls...

Little bit of layering of journaling cards and tags, and another felt piece cut with Tremendous Tags.

There are more pics, but I will spare you! :) Anyway, you get the gist of the cute journal cards and stamps, I hope. I'll be back tomorrow with more projects!

Thankful, Family Traditions Mini Album:
(All supplies by Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted.)
STAMPS: Monthly Moments: November
INK: Dark Chocolate, Classic Kraft inks
PAPER: Monthly Moments: November Journal Card Collection, Dark Chocolate and Canyon Clay cardstock, Dark Chocolate Pattern Pack
DIES: Monthly Moments: November, Monthly Moments: Journal Card 6 die, Rustic Wreath, Tremendous Tags, Wonderful Words: Together, Phrase Play #7, 
Polkadot Parade #6 (mini leaves on front cover)

OTHER: twine, seam binding, pearls, paper clips, 
Canyon Clay felt, kraft tags, washi tapes, cork, burlap, machine stitching.

______

Visit the the PTI team to see more with these new products:

Ashley Cannon Newell
Betsy Veldman
Dawn McVey
Erin Lincoln
Laura Bassen
Lauri Willison
Maile Belles
Melissa Phillips
Nichole Heady

A little belated, but

I'm a little belated in sending Easter wishes, but I hope you all had a great holiday! We had a very nice day with my husband's family and all of the little cousins.

My daughter Kati is having her tonsils and adenoids out in 2 days, so I've been frantically trying to get all of my Papertrey Ink projects for the month done before Thursday, so I can spend time with her and be there for her as much as she needs me. She's had swollen tonsils since last fall...and the Ear, Nose and Throat doctor thinks she had mononucleosis, which is what caused the tonsils to become so enlarged. They are so swollen that they are almost touching. As a worried mom, I'm little bit nervous of her being put under because of her congenital heart condition. Please pray that everything goes well. xo I love her to pieces!

I will have some new projects set to post again starting in 2 days for the Papertrey Ink countdown! I wanted to share some pictures from our Easter, but I just haven't had time yet. Here are two that I really liked. We have this big tree that we try to take pictures by each year in front of our house, kind of a tradition! We have an egg hunt each year with all of the cousins, Easter dinner and a bonfire, so my girls don't really dress up that much for Easter. :) The older they get, the less they want to wear dresses!

Thank you for stopping by. I'll be back soon with lots of new Papertrey Ink things to show you!

Scrapkit Studio...

I have been working on this little mini album the past week or so, coming back to it here and there and adding more when I have time! That seems to be the trick for me, as I usually like things more on the simpler side, but when I leave a project and come back to it, I can see better where something might need to be added in or where it feels empty!

This mini album was made with a kit by ScrapKit Studio. When I received this kit in the mail, I was pleasantly surprised...it's like no other kit I've ever tried! EACH piece is already pre-cut for you! I didn't cut a thing in this little album.
You can either follow the directions provided to you to complete the album, or go more on your own and complete it how you'd like. I decided to just wing it, and do what feels natural to me. The only thing I really added to this kit was the black houndstooth tape by Pink Paislee, some white paint and machine stitching.

On this first page spread, I decided to leave one of the chipboard pages blank with no patterned paper and instead added some paint around the edges, then journaled over the top.

I've included some pictures of our family that we took of us at Thanksgiving. We were trying to get a family photo for our Christmas picture (which I never sent out because I ran out of time!)

There are chipboard shapes included with paper shapes to match, so I covered the chipboard frame here with the blue paper and stitched around it. I also added some messy stitching to the red heart. The white and black alphas are in the kit - as well as every punched shape you see! Yes, everything! The owner of this kit club works so hard to pre-cut everything you will need to create the album.

Here I used the white letters on white cardstock. I love the tone-on-tone effect! Another thing I like to do is tie twine or ribbons around the rings in between pages. You can also add more photos on the rings! Simply punch holes and add the photos in between pages.

This little pocket came in the kit also. All you do is fold the pocket and adhere the sides. I decided to do a little zig zig stitching on the sides of my pocket. I added the banner and felt word over the top from the kit. I used the red ribbon to twirl around into a little rose and attached a pin through it.

Here is another chipboard piece that I painted instead of adding paper to it...love how that looks.

A couple of little embellishments add to the page and photos, but don't completely take it over like this page below.

Some of our pictures were blurry from that day, but I scrapped them anyway...we were having fun together in the pics being silly!

And another peek at the cover!

Don't be afraid to mix and match colors when making a mini album - as long as you have a reoccurring color scheme throughout the book, it will keep it looking cohesive. All of the Basic Grey Picadilly papers are double sided, so you could end up with a book looking totally different than mine if you chose the other sides! Many options with this kit, yet what I loved was not so many decisions on what shapes to cut, etc. It was fast and super easy.

Here is the link to the Live Love Laugh kit. Hope you enjoyed my take on this little album! :)

our trip to the Black Hills...

Hey there! I'm back from vacation and I have so much to tell you! Sorry for my blog absence. It was nice to get away, take a break from everything and just spent time with family. We visited my family in South Dakota for about 10 days and then had a couple days home and left again for Maine with my husband's family to the beach. So many great memories made once again! I LOVE summer!!

I wanted to share a few pics from our trips and I'll post more on Facebook soon! Many of you know I'm originally from the Black Hills in South Dakota and lived there for almost 30 years. There is just nothing like it there...if you ever get a chance to visit the area and love to be outdoors, you need to hike Harney Peak. It's amazing. A brochure I read there said it's the highest peak between the Colorado Rockies and the Swiss Alps. It's 6 miles round trip and SO BEAUTIFUL! This is me and my daughter Taylor on our way to the top. It takes about 3-4 hours to get to the top and is quite a grueling hike (well for me. ha), but so worth the views. Coming back down only took about an hour. I was surprised she wanted to go, but she actually did better than I did! :) I wish I had as much energy as her again.

Here we are getting ready for the hike. My aunt and uncle from Minnesota came with their kids, my brother and his family and us.

The path was simple at first (and a little misleading), but it turned very rocky. We saw gorgeous wildflowers everywhere we looked in differing colors, shapes and sizes...

My guy and my brother in the background checking out the views...

My brother and his cute family. He has two boys, so they love to do this hike every year.

Here's a view from the top. You can see for miles!

I loved how the trees looked from above...

At the top...

See the little people in the middle (below)? That was our clan. We sat on the rock, rested and had our snacks to re-fuel.

There is an old tower at the top that they used to use for a fire look-out. Last year when we hiked it, a storm hit right when we got to the top, and we had to hang out in the tower until it passed. The clouds were literally right over our heads!

My mom's side of the family had a reunion while we were there in the Black Hills, so we all stayed in two cabins in the hills together for 4 nights.

We ate lots of good food, played cards, went horse back riding, swimming, mini golfing, visited the Flintstones Village, Storybook Island, Wind Cave, Reptile Gardens, saw buffalo and the cutest little prairie dogs.

We traveled around and did lots of sight-seeing, Mt. Rushmore, etc.

I am really going to miss everyone... and just being there in South Dakota. It's tough coming back to New York, but I look forward to next time I get to see everyone. It's so different there, so peaceful and beautiful. I've seen it a million times, but I will never tire of the beauty of it.

I think I'll have to come back with a separate post with some beach pics! :) Thanks for swinging by today,

All that I am....

Happy Wednesday! It's almost here...National Scrapbooking Day. What do you have planned? I've been busy, busy working on my classes for NSD that I'll be teaching at Right at Home on May 2nd for this fun scrapping holiday. Wanted to post a couple tiny sneaks of a frame project....I promise, you will LOVE this class! I wanted to create something that people will actually hang up in their house or feel good about giving as a gift. More info to come soon... (sorry for the glare).
That day I will also going to be doing a card class with a combination of the new Pink Paislee lines, so I will be posting information on that one soon as well. Stay tuned!

Over at Emma's Paperie, there is a cute sketch posted today by Jessica Witty! Check out the yummy inspiration over there.
This is what I did with the sketch. Papers are Cosmo Cricket's Ever After, Melissa Frances rub ons, Bo Bunny chipboard (swirl) and SEI coaster tag (Oasis)... all supplies that you can find at Emma's.
Isn't this saying so cute? My mom always tells me we are not raising children. We are raising adults. So true. Enjoy your day and thanks so much for stopping by,