ScrapStuffz

I came across a sad announcement on Monday...after two years, ScrapSuffz "Inspired By" Challenges will be closing its doors. As a previous owner of a challenge blog, I totally understand the difficulties that can be associated with running one, but I will still will be sorry to see this one go.

I'm glad I had the opportunity to play along with them this month, and there were actually two challenges available. I was totally inspired by the below photo as well it's verbal prompt "Let it go."

And this is what I came up with...

As many girls are, Paolina is obsessed with the movie Frozen. Over the summer, I had the opportunity to download the soundtrack from iTunes for only $5, so as I'm sure you can imagine we now hear a lot of Frozen music around our house, in the car, and pretty much anywhere she has access to it from my phone. Of course the boys get pretty tired of hearing "Let It Go" over and over, so I let her use my ear buds when everyone starts moaning and groaning about the Frozen soundtrack being played. Again.

And in case you wondered, yes, she is dressing up as Elsa for Halloween today. Hopefully there will be some adorable photos and a fun layout to follow. Happy Halloween!!

Product List:

Authentique Abroad patterned paper

Echo Park Everyday Eclectic patterned paper

Simple Stories Summer Paradise patterned paper

KI Memories Love Elsie patterned paper

Dream Street Papers patterned paper

Scenic Route journaling card

Chatter Box artsy.licious button

KI Memories felt stickers

Sassafras Lass layered button flower

My Mind's Eye enamel dots

The Crafter's Workshop template

Paper Secrets

Happy Thursday! Everyone at our house (except Noé) is giddy with excitement about Halloween tomorrow. Last year we took the kids to trick-or-treat with some friends who live in a neighborhood near ours, but this year we have been invited to a Halloween party for both adults & kids, and we will take the kids to trick-or-treat there. I'm super excited about doing this as I enjoy wearing a costume myself and it always seems like I'm among the minority of parents who are in costume on Halloween, so it will be nice to be somewhere where other adults are dressed up as well.

But onto scrappy stuff. This layout I did for the Paper Secrets October 1st challenge.

I followed the sketch as well as the requirement to use items, colors,etc with the first letters of the word TRICK. T - (washi) Tape; R - Resin (flower); I - Ink; C - Chevron (mask); K - Kodak (camera diecut).

Thanks for looking!

Product List:

American Crafts Amy Tangerine Yes Please patterned paper

Simple Stories Summer Paradise patterned paper

Bo Bunny Modern Miss patterned paper

Echo Park Everyday Eclectic patterned paper

KI Memories Love Elsie patterned paper

Bo Bunny washi tape

American Crafts Thickers

Jillibean Soup wood sprinkles

The Crafters Workshop template

Sketches4all Halloween/Fall Blog Hop

Welcome to the Sketches4all Halloween/Fall Blog Hop!!

I’m so glad you could join us on the first day of our Halloween/Fall blog hop!  You will have 3 days to hop around and comment on all the awesome projects our Design Team made with gorgeous fall digi’s from The Cutting Cafe!

We hope hopping around will inspire you to then come to Sketches4all and join in on our Halloween/Fall Blog Hop Card Challenge!  You will have from October 27^th – October 31^{st at midnight (PST)}  to complete the challenge and upload your project at Sketches4all to qualify to win the Grand prize. (this contest is open to everyone)

The Hop starts today, October 27th and ends on October 29th at midnight (PST).  Winners will be announced on November 3rd in the Winner's Circle at Sketches4all.  There will be two prizes awarded.

The 1^st place winner will receive one set of Cutting Cafe Images and also this fun fall 12 x 12 chipboard sheet.

And what is the Grand Prize you ask?!  How about all of this yummy goodness?

This prize includes 9 double sided 12 x12 sheets of My Minds Eye - Joyous patterned paper, 11 - MME gift label stickers, 1 - 12 x12 Pink Paislee Alpha Stickers sheet, 1 Pink Paislee chipboard word sticker sheet, 1 foral embellishment from Petaloo, 4 lengths of ribbon (1 yard each), 5 yards of green bakers twine, 5 yards of red bakers twine, 1 set of Pink Paislee holiday stamps, 3 crocheted flowers, 1 pkg of green enamel dots from Teresa Collins, 1 pkg of Ivory Chevrons bling, 1 small sheet of random colored bling, some random buttons and some holiday themed wooden embellishments.

WOW!!!!  I know you have to be excited now! 

So how do you participate??

1.  Hop around to all of the blogs of our design team members.  Follow them and leave a comment.  

Right away that will get your name in the hat to win a prize!!  

2.  Join the Halloween/Fall Blog Hop Challenge at Sketches4all.  

This challenge will be posted in the Forum under Special Events.  (HERE)  This will get your name thrown in the hat to win the Grand prize. You have to do the hop and the challenge to qualify to win the Grand Prize.

Here is the order of the hop so you don't get lost along the way:

Stacy - http://scrapwithstacy.blogspot.com

Cheryl -http://cherylndesignscreate.blogspot.com

Giorgia -  http://joyblonde.blogspot.it/

Pat – http://ascrappinnana.blogspot.com

Jenessa – Guest Designer for October (you are here)

Fia - http://myhappyscrap.blogspot.com

Here is a card I have made to help inspire you...

Now it is time to hop on over to see Fia. 

Have fun hopping along!  I hope to see you participating in the challenge at Sketches4all!!

Let's Get Sketchy October Week 4

Happy Monday! What a fun-filled weekend we had. Our city had a Halloween Festival on Saturday evening and then on Sunday our church had it's annual Harvest Festival. I'm pretty sure Santiago & Paolina got their fix for bounce houses & carnival games. I do wish I could say that the entire weekend was perfect, but unfortunately we also had an incident on Saturday morning that had me absolutely livid. You'll have to read on, as I ended up journaling about it on the below layout for this week's reveal at Let's Get Sketchy. Here's the sketch (by yours truly)...

And this is what I did with it...

Literally 10 minutes after photographing this page, we had several unpleasant occurrences around our house, I was so furious with Santiago that I told Noé that he needed to get him out of the house in order for me to cool off. So as any good husband would do they went to Wal-Mart to pick up my list of cleaning supplies to attempt to fix the damage done, and to give me some time to collect myself. In the mean time, I needed to get the photo of this layout uploaded to the Let's Get Sketchy blog, and as I looked at Santiago's sweet bedtime face on the page, I immediately knew that I needed to journal about that morning's events and to hide them behind the photo. Here is what I wrote:

"As I am doing the journaling for this layout, I am utterly furious with Santiago. Today he drew on our Room & Board sofa, and then I discovered that he had left a crayon in the pocket of his pants that I had washed and dried. For the second time this year. So a total of two loads of laundry destroyed. But even though I have been so angry with him today, I still love him. No matter what he does...what either of my kids do...I will always love them with all of my heart. This doesn't mean they will not suffer consequences for their behavior, but not one single thing that they ever do can change my love for them. This photo reminds me of that. We may have a really bad day that's filled with disobedience, punishments, tantrums and tears. But each time we lay this little man down to sleep, and he wraps his still small arms around my neck with a sweet little kiss and a whisper of 'I love you, Mami', I am reminded of my unconditional, neverending love for my sweet boy."

For those people who just don't understand why so many of us are passionate about scrapbooking, they must not see that not only does it preserve so many of our memories in a beautiful way but it can also serve as a catharsis. I felt so at peace after writing those words and slipping them behind the photo, that I was not angry when the boys came home. Not to say that Santiago was not punished...he helped Noé clean the crayon out of the dryer drum, but journaling that morning's events was such a sweet reminder of the unconditional, neverending love that our Heavenly Father has for us, his utterly imperfect children, and it really helped me to move past the damage done to some mere material things.

Thanks for taking the time to look and read. Now please head over to the Let's Get Sketchy blog for a bunch more inspiration!!

Product List:

Fancy Pants Nautical patterned paper and cardstock stickers

Dream Street Papers patterned paper

Bazzill cardstock

Jillibean Soup Wood Sprinkles

American Crafts Thickers

Pink Paislee Hey Kid Ephemera

Scenic Route diecut arrow

My Mind's Eye enamel dots

The Crafters Workshop templates

Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist

My Scraps and More Sketches

Hey everyone! I'm so excited it's Friday. Not only is it the kickoff to the weekend, but there's a new sketch up at My Scraps and More Sketches. While some people find more time to scrap over the weekend, this is actually when I have the least, as our family is usually out-and-about. If you're anything like me, have no worries...you have until October 31st to link up your page for the chance to win a fabulous prize. So without further ado, here is Sketch #92...

I rotated the sketch and came up with this...

I had already done a layout with some of the photos I took of Paolina on her 4th birthday, but two of them didn't make it on to that page. They were sitting on my desk, and when I saw this sketch I couldn't resist using them for it. As I mentioned before I rotated the sketch...if you head over to the My Scraps and More Sketches blog you can see all the other amazing interpretations that the rest of our talented design team came up with.

Product List:

Basic Grey Soleil patterned paper

SEI Jocelyn patterned paper

K&Co Jubilee patterned paper

My Mind's Eye Kaleidoscope patterned paper

My Mind's Eye So Sophie diecut

Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist

The Crafters Workshop template

Martha Stewart paper punch

Let's Get Sketchy October Week 2

Happy Monday! And Happy Columbus Day! Santiago is off school today, and as usual I have a love-hate relationship with days like these. I hate that I'm all thrown off schedule. I grow accustomed to having certain days to myself and I have perfected a schedule that balances chores, going to the gym and even scrapbooking, in order to actually spend time with the kids when they're not at school. So today I won't be able to go to the gym and most of the chores I normally do on Monday will now need to be squeezed into Wednesday & Friday, and I will not get to scrapbook at all. On the other hand I love having Santiago all to myself for the day. He and his sister are not bickering or being too loud as they play together. I can sit down and play games with him that are too advanced for Paolina (like Chess or Monopoly) or maybe we can share a special treat that has egg as an ingredient. I try to treasure these days in my heart because I know that all too soon both kids will prefer to spend all their free time with their friends and certainly not with me!

Anyhow, it's time for a new sketch at Let's Get Sketchy...

I stayed pretty true to the design and came up with this...

In a prior post, I shared a layout of Santiago riding on a carousel during a visit to Dallas back in 2011. This is the adjoining page featuring Miss Paolina (and her abuelito) on the same carousel.

I hope you will take the time to visit the Let's Get Sketchy blog for much more inspiration from the rest of Team B!

Product List:

My Mind's Eye Oxford Lane patterned paper & chipboard stickers

Echo Park For the Record 2 patterned paper & stickers

Basic Grey Boxer patterned paper

Kaisercraft template

Sketchabilities

Happy Saturday everyone! As usual we are busy busy. So this is going to be a quick post, as I only have about an hour of down-time between our commitments for the day. Speaking of time, I didn't have as much as I would have liked this past week to scrapbook. I worked on two layouts but only got the following one completed. As usual, a sketch came to my rescue, eliminating any extra moments figuring out how the general design of my page will go. I used the current sketch over at Sketchablities

to come up with this...

I created my own background by first using some Gelatos for a watercolor effect, then applying both acrylic paint and Glimmer Mist to a template from The Craftrers Workshop and next splattering a little additional Glimmer Mist. For a final touch I did some doodling with my Sharpie. The scraps of paper are all from the Maggie Holmes Styleboard collection. I couldn't resist using the pink horse patterned paper, as Santiago's school mascot is a Stallion.

Thanks so much for looking and please enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Sketches4All Guest Designer

I'm honored to announce that I was asked to be a Guest Designer over at Sketches4All for the month of October. They have such a warm & friendly community as well as fun challenges each month so I really encourage you to head over and check out their site here.

As a Guest Designer I was given the opportunity to host my own challenge for the month, which is to use the below sketch to create a layout. There's also a bit of a twist...but you will have to go to Sketches4All to get all the details!

And here's my sample page...

We really get our money's worth out of our kids Halloween costumes...they love to use them as dress-up. In fact, Santiago (who is 6) still has the costume he wore when he was 3. It doesn't fit by any stretch of the imagination, but he loves to squeeze himself into it and play lol! I took these photos of Paolina over the summer when she was playing dress-up in last year's Rapunzel costume.

Do you like the sketch? Are you wondering what the twist is? I hope you take the time to head over to Sketches4All and join along!

My Scraps and More Sketches Blog Hop

Hello and welcome to the My Scraps & More Sketch Blog Hop!! Today, each design team member has created a CARD sketch to celebrate World Card Making Day. That’s TEN different sketches!!!

You should have come here from Tracy F's blog, in which case you are in the right place. If not then please start from the beginning at My Scraps & More Sketches and to get the full details of the hop and the prizes.

There will be TWO prizes given out for the blog hop: 

1. One person will win a $10 gift certificate to the store just for commenting on one of the designers blog posts. So make sure that you that you complete the hop by visiting EACH blog and commenting and following EACH blog!

2. Another winner will be chosen from all the card sketch entries uploaded to the In Linkz on the My Scraps & More Sketch Blog. For each card sketch, create a DIFFERENT link up. So if you complete all 11 sketches, you will need to do 11 link-ups! (On your card link please be sure to mention whose sketch you used and link back to the My Scraps & More Sketch blog. If you’d like you can also leave the DT member a comment with a link to your card so they can see what you did with their sketch.)


Here is the prize for the card sketch blog hop:



All comments and card sketches for the Blog Hop must be linked up by Monday, October 6th at 12 pm EST.

BUT, if you don’t complete all the card sketches by Monday, that’s OK….you can still upload them through the end of the month for the monthly prize drawing on the sketch blog! The more sketches you do, the more chances you have to win!

Here is the monthly blog prize:




Here is my sketch and the card I created with it...

*****Next up on the blog hop is Missy W*****


Thanks for hopping along with us!!