Tuesday June 30th

Feeling patriotic? I hope so, my new blog background is definitely sets the mood. I love the colors. I've not heard anymore from my interviews last week...bummer. I still have my fingers crossed.

Now for layouts. The first layout is of Mecca from Christmas several years ago. Yes it is the same ball that Cole climbed into for the layout a few days ago. She always complains she takes bad pictures, but I think this one turned out quite well. (hehehe...love ya Mecca)

The next one is a little odd. It was a speed scrap and they had you take a picture of your purse and all of it's contents. I know I carry a lot of junk, but laying it all out to take the picture makes me really realize it. It was a fun scrap and so just to show something different I included it here.

The third layout is photos of Callie's room at the old house. I had been thinking for quite a while on scrapping the photos and had even worked up the word art myself. It's not exactly what I wanted, but close. I may modify it at some time in the future.

The next layout is of Sharla, Donalee and Me. If you know me you'll know that I have one sister, but in the layout it looks like I have two. Well Donalee went to the same church as us and people kept confusing her and Sharla. Sharla and I were having our photos take for a church directory and Donalee was there getting her pictures done with her kids. We asked the photographer if they would do one with the three of us. It does look like she and Sharla could be sisters.

The last one for today is of Callie singing in the shower. No not a real shower, well the shower is real, but it is not complete. The photo was taken when we were having the house built. We visited just about every day to see the progress. She was with us and was really cutting up that day.

That is all for now, later....

Thursday June 25th

For those of you interested I think the phone interview went well yesterday. We'll see if they call me back for the third and final interview. I also had a mini interview today at another company. They had me fill out an application, told me the training schedule and then ask about 10 questions. I think they were trying to see who was still intersted in the positions.

Ok on to my layouts. The first one is Callie and Tom at Christmas a couple of years ago. Callie had a thing about getting everyone to "throw the deuces" with her and she got her dad to do it for the camera.

So now onto Cole. This layout has him playing with one of those expandable balls. We got it for him for Christmas years ago, but last summer we had a cookout at Tom and Mecca's house and he pulled it out to entertain a little girl that was there. I love how he climbed inside of it.
This next layout is very simple because it was a homework for my officer's training (the next step after bootcamp). I was showing off my extraction skills. I still liked how it turned out. But then I like simple layouts.

And my last layout I did last night as part of a speed scrap. I had to have on photo per child or pet that I had. I used photos taken Friday after the babies were bathed and groomed. I think I used Cooper's and Zoey's before, but I cropped them different. It was a very straightforward layout and I think it came out well.

Ok that is it for today. Later.....

Wednesday June 24th

I'm going to keep it fairly short today. I have to get everything done this morning before 11:00 because I have the second interview with the company I interviewed with on Monday. Keep me in your prayers, because I think this would be a great job for me. I don't have too many layouts because I didn't get to scrap last night, bummer because there were 2 different speed scraps. But in all my wisdom yesterday I was moving files around and ended up deleting all of my May and June photos. I got WinUndelete and got them back, but it took time and machine power.

But I have some I did this weekend and on Monday. The first one was a template challenge and it is a very busy template. But I love the kit I used. The kit was a participation prize for a speed scrap and a freebie, it is called Funkytown Revisited by Scraps by Andrea. I want to purchase the full kit soon.

The next layout is another challenge, and the basis is it had to be based on something summerish. I picked Cole in the pool at Malcolm's house. He was having so much fun.

The next layout is of Callie on her birthday a couple of years ago. She asked for a small digital camera that she could easily carry everywhere. You can see by her face, she was happy with the one we chose.

That is it for today. Hopefully I will have more tomorrow.

Monday June 22nd

Well the week has started off well. I had an interview this morning and it went well. I was told I would be moving on to the next step (it is a 3 step interview process). If all goes well, maybe this will be the one.

Now I did get several layouts done this weekend. I did 5 different speed scraps and two challenges, so that means I got 7 different layouts done. The first one is one of my favorites. It is Tom and Callie on the night of her high school graduation. I love the photo, and it is definitely the focus of the layout.

The second layout is Cooper on Friday after his bath and grooming appointment. He is wearing a clean shirt, unfortunately you can't see the the back of the shirt, it says "Rebel". He is so funny, he loves to wear shirts, even in the summer.

The next layout is of Zoey after her bath and grooming on Friday. I am not in love with this layout, I love the idea of blending, but I couldn't find a paper that I liked how it blended. I'm sure if I had more time I could have found something, but I was running behind.

Next is a layout with Cole and Mom. I used the technique I learned Friday, putting the photos in a hole. I like the results of this one. I love the colors and pictures.

The last one for today is my favorite I did all weekend. The speed scrap was based on pictures of a dad, so of course I picked my Daddy. The picture was taken several years ago and I was testing a new camera and wanted a picture of him. He wasn't thrilled, but he turned and smiled for me. I could tell he wanted to roll his eyes, but he didn't. I missed him yesterday, but then I miss him every day.

That is it for now, the other two I did I will post tomorrow or Wednesday.

Saturday June 20th

Normally I'm excited about Saturdays, but since being laid off they aren't quite the great thing they were before. Not that they are bad, just not as exciting as before. My goal is to do at least 5 layouts this weekend. Since there are a couple of speed scraps today and a couple tomorrow, I should be in good shape. Don't tell Sharla but I copied her old scanned photos yesterday, so hopefully I will be able to do some layouts with older photos. Also yesterday was grooming day for the dogs so hopefully I'll get some good pictures of the "pretty" babies.

Ok my first layout is one I did for a scraplift challenge at GingerScraps . The photo is of Callie and I really liked this one. I copied a layout from plumdumpling, don't you just love that name. The kit I used was called I Scream You Scream by Flower Scraps and Every Ever After Moment.

The next layout I did also is of Callie (must be a Callie day). For several years, Callie, Sharla and I went together to get our haircut and Callie really liked it if she got her hair straightened after the cut. She looks very cute with straight hair, but I love her curly hair. I learned a very cool technique during this speed scrap that I'm going to have to use more in the future. It put the pictures in a "hole".

The next photo is of Tucker yesterday right after his bath. He looks so cute and CLEAN. We use a mobile groomer and she comes in and gets one dog at a time. Tucker knows the routine, Cooper goes first. So yesterday he was all excited until Lori brought Cooper back and then the took off to Sharla's room to hide behind a foot stool. Unfortunately for him, I found him. But he looks good and smells nice (for a day or so).

Ok back to the subject of the day, Callie. Yes I did another page with her. She must have really been on my mind yesterday. This speed scrap called for a Warhol effect photo group. I didn't do it myself, I used www.bighugelabs.com and it's ok. There is a tutorial on how to do it yourself and I may re-do this layout and do the colorization myself, or maybe not. The picture is again of Callie after a hair cut, hmmmm must have been really into Callie hair cut photos yesterday. Or maybe I'm psychic and just know she needs a hair cut.

Ok the last one is a layout that I saved into the wrong folder, so I never posted it here. It is Mom with Tom, Callie, and Cole after our Mother's Day dinner, outside the restaurant. As always they were goofing off. I really like the one where Cole has his tongue out almost touching Callie with it.

Ok that is it for now.

Thursday June 18th

It is the middle of the night, but I'm still claiming it as Thursday. I had just dozed off, when mom woke me and said Cooper was going nuts, after trying to calm him for two hours, he is snoring away and I'm wide awake.

I was going to post these earlier, but got busy and forgot. My first layout is one I did of Callie and Cole just after her high school graduation ceramony. They actually let us get a few good shots without being silly.

The next layout is of one of my most favorite people in the whole world. My aunt Sallie. The picture was taken a couple of years ago when she and her daughter Cathy came to visit. Cathy's grandchildren were over as well and they had walked over to the part accross the street. I love that she climb onto the swing and just had a good time. I hope that I have her energy and agility when I'm her age.

The next one is one I did of Cole and Daddy. It was the last Christmas we had with Daddy, and we had brought him home from the rehab facility for the day. The kids were always able to get him to do anything and they were into making silly faces that day. I did this page for a letter challenge where I had to use the letter G.

The next one is for the June recipe challenge and the theme is breakfast/brunch recipes. I decided to do sweet potato biscuits, because I love them any time of day.

Well now that Cooper is snoring away, I think I'll try to go back to bed and get some rest myself. Later......

Tuesday June 16th

So how do you like my new blog background and header? I'm not thrilled with it, but I like it better than the previous one. I'm sure I will be changing it again soon because I become bored easily. I'm really into the pink and brown, but haven't found the right kit to use. I used a kit called Life is Like a Box of Chocolate by Digi Designs by Nicole. So now on to layouts, which I'm almost caught up again, of course we know that won't last.

The first layout today is one I did of Bodie Lighthouse. The speed scrap required you have a panoramic picture. I didn't have one, so they said a tall and narrow or wide and narrow. I really like this photo of Bodie, so I picked it.

The next layout is of Tucker. The speed scrap said to use random words instead of a title. I found a very cool word art and used it. The picture was Tucker was taken one Saturday morning a couple of weeks ago. He is our best poser.

It must be a Tucker day, because the next layout is of him as well. The speed scrap required three pictures of the same subject taken at the same time. I found that I don't take series as often as I thought or that if I do, it is normally only two photos. I'm going to start taking larger series, so I will be more prepared in the future.

That is it for now, hopefully I'll have some more tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by and checking out what I've done.

Monday, June 15th

Hello everyone, I hope you had a wonderful weekend. Mine was ok. Saturday we got our fence replaced....yeah, the dogs are very happy about it. Cole was over and he got the yard moved. We had to get up at 4:00 am on Sunday to get Cole to the high school so he could go to ROTC camp. Sharla was a good aunt and even cooked some biscuits for him to take with him, so he wouldn't be "starved" before they stopped for breakfast. After we made sure he was off, we drove around and took some photos and then headed to church. I was so tired when we got home, I changed clothes and took a nap. Yeah I know, I lead an exciting life.

Ok here are some pages I've done recently. The first is my final assignment for Gingerscrap's boot camp. I really love the photos, because this is what happens when ever we get together with family. Laughter is just part of the experience and you can't be with them without having a good time, it just isn't possible. I would say they are my favorite cousins, but it might get me in trouble with other cousins, but I can honestly say they are in the top five (and I have about 25 first cousins).

The next layout I did as an element challenge at Digi Scrapbook Mania. The challenge was to use the element chicken wire. The funny thing was I had just done another layout with chicken wire for the font challenge. It is an element I really like. I did this one of Cole on Christmas morning. I found the word art and it seems to be his phrase lately, so I couldn't resist using it.

Ok this is another challenge at Digi Scrapbook Mania and it is called "Leaving a Legacy". It was hard because you scrap about yourself, and I want to scrap about others. This month the challenge was to do a page with 10 random things about you. And yes I'm in the picture (hehehe). Maybe you'll learn something about me.

This layout was done for a speed scrap and I was in a very simplistic mood. The photos were taken Friday night as we sat on the back porch and watched people through the hole in the fence. Sharla took the photos, and I thought they were just so cute.

This last layout is one I did for a speed scrap, but I have to say it is not one of my favorite ones. I had to use 10 pictures and 13 papers, which to me makes the layout too busy. I prefer layouts with much fewer pictures, but that is just my preference.

Ok that is it for today...more later.

Saturday June 13th

Ok, I got behind this week. For a week where I got very little accomplished it has been very busy. Tom and Cole came over Wednesday night to fix part of our fence. Then a storm blew in and knocked down a big section (not what they fixed). So we've had a hole in the fence for several days. Which means we can't let the dogs out with out them being on leashes. And just let me tell you it is a challenge to take them all at once, they want to go in three different directions and trip me with the leashes. But yeah the fence is being replaced today thanks to Tom finding me someone that could do it right away.

Now for some layouts that I've done. The first one is of Cooper, when we put a reindeer coat on him. He really didn't like it because the hood was too big and kept flopping over his eyes. I stuffed the back of it to stop that problem, but he still wasn't happy.

This layout I did for a speed scrap and it was all based on "summer". I chose a picture from our trip to NC in 2000. Cole and Sharla on the ferry carrying us over to Ocracoke. Cole asked today when we'll be going back, and I told him hopefully next summer.

It must be my week to do Cooper. I did another speed scrap and used him. I love this series of photos because it looks like he is laughing. He and Sharla were laying on the couch and she was "aggravating" him. That is what I call it, she calls it playing with him.

Ok it must be Cole day as well. I did this layout for a font challenge. I had to use the "Disney" font which is the capital letter of the title and the "ginga" font which is on the tag. I really didn't care for either font, but I do like the end results. This is Cole in a play in the 6th (I think) grade.

Ok one that isn't Cooper or Cole, it is Callie....mmmm must be a "C" day. This one was setup to include and old and young picture. Since Callie is still young, it has a very young and young photo. She looks good in pink...at least to me...well she looks good to me in anything.

That's it for today. More later.

Wednesday June 10th

I didn't post anything yesterday because it was a long day. For some reason I couldn't sleep Monday night and then I had to be up and out of the house by 7:00 am to take Mom to her stress test. The cottonwoods are really blooming here and by the time we got home my head was just pounding. I took about an hour nap, but it didn't help. Thankfully I slept well last night, so my head isn't pounding as bad as it was yesterday. So you want to see the pages I've created this week.

The first one is a baby picture of Cole. Dad is holding him and he is making the cutest face. I guess he was a bit of a clown from the very beginning. I do know that he had a special bond with his Papa from the beginning, maybe because the both liked to make people laugh.

The second one is of Cooper. He was snuggled up to me and Sharla was trying to get some good pictures of him and I couldn't resist doing the bunny ears. I know I know, it's silly, but then that is who I am.

Next is one I did for a Color Challenge, which means I have to use specific colors, this way pink, green, blue, yellow and grey all in babyish tones. Once I found the papers and elements in the right tones, I decided the layout should be Zoey.

The next layout was for a challenged called Scrap This Way, and it wasn't easy. Ok the layout was easy but you had to do this whole numerology thing to get what you were to use. My birth month is a 7 so my main color was to be green, my birth day is a 5 so my accent color was white, the sum of my birth year is 7 so I had to include stitching, the sum of my age is 4 (and that is not mental age) so that meant I had to use the word "Relax" and the sum of my entire birthday was 1 so I had to use 1 photo. See I told you it was hard, I had to do a lot of math for this one. I pick a picture of Cooper and Tucker sleeping on me. It was taken the weekend that Cooper spent in the emergency vet for eating an azalea bloom. The vet wasn't sure if he would make it, and they kept him overnight. I don't think any of us got any sleep that night. When we brought him home he was still very weak and clingy. And his favorite place seemed to be on my chest. Tucker wasn't to be out done, so I spent a lot of time with both of them laying on me.

Next is a Scraplift Challenge I did, where I take another person's layout and copy it to and use my own papers and stuff. I selected a picture from Thanksgiving a couple of years ago. It was Tom and Mecca's first year in their new house and they wanted a family photo. Of course I picked the photo with Callie sticking out her tongue.

The last one for today is of my Mom. The speed scrap set the rules to all the paper and elements except for 3 had to be black, white or grey. It was a challenge to find elements to use, I had to manipulate some of the elements colors to make them work. But I really like how it looks once it was complete.

That's it for now. I have to get up and get Mom moving, she has the second part of her stress test today.

June 8th

Good morning to you. It is Monday morning and it is going to be a busy week. Mom has two different stress tests this week and one of the is at 7:15 am tomorrow. Now since she is rarely up before 10 am, I'm sure she is going to love getting up, dressed and out of the house at 7:00. But other than that, you can tell summer has arrived in Texas, the days are getting hot (yuck). I like summer's long days and bright sunlight, I just don't like the heat.

Ok for some layouts. I have started working on challenges in some of the forums as well as speed scraps. A challenge is normally based around a theme, like a template challenge gives you a template to use on your page, or a font challenge means you have to use a specific font. I've also been doing a scrapbook boot camp which has had homework, so I had to follow some specific requirements. Just letting you know the type of things I'm doing, because some of these might make you wonder, "why did she do that?"

Layout one is one of my boot camp layouts. My assignment was to scrap lift the title off one of the examples. You could lift the exact title or just the tile format. I did the words of the title and used my own fonts. The purpose of this assignment was to get you to use different fonts in your titling and journaling to make them pop on the page better. The picture was taken several years ago in the same field Sharla and I took the dogs to earlier this year to take pictures in the bluebonnets.

The second layout is the second part of the same assignment. We had to create a page with a title using three fonts. I found this quote and just couldn't resist using it, because my dad was my hero.

Now for a fun layout. I took a picture of Cooper the other day at the Sharla's laptop. He is in front of it and she looks like she is pulling him off of it. I was doing a speed scrap using a cool kit called The Office by Stacy Scraps and noticed a bulletin board element that had a note on it. I added the text and the photo of Zoey. I did it to make Sharla laugh. We have joked all weekend about Cooper and Zoey having an internet date. I just thought this one came out very cute.

The next one is one the challenges I did at Digi Scrapbook Mania (a great site by the way... Digi Scrapbook Mania). It is the template challenge, so I'm given the basic layout and I select my photo, papters and element. You can modify it a little, but not too much. I really like the results of this one.

Ok another layout I did this weekend is this one with Tucker. I learned a cool technique on this one. The three pictures are over lapped and I used a large blurry eraser to remove the hard edge between the pictures. I want to see if I can get some sequence shoots to try this technique with, but I couldn't find any in my photo file.

Ok here is the last one for today. It is my June calendar challenge and my desktop for now. I like everything but the calendar, I need to play with making one I like better in the future, but it works for now.

More later.....