I'm BAAAACK!!!!

A six month blog break is MORE than enough.

I thought briefly that maybe I am just done with my blog... but then I went to scrap some pics and dug back into my blog to find the details of something.... Holy moly! I NEED my blog!

My kids went back to school on August 1st.

*Muppet Boy is off to 8th grade. I can't believe we're almost out of Middle School! CRAZY. Note his Deadpool shirt and socks. He's a FANATIC.
*Little Guy started 4th Grade. He was quite excited.
It's still bizarre to only post pics of these two while Oldest is off having his own life... :(  So here he is waterskiing (stole this pic from his Facebook page... and no I'm still not on Facebook).

I've got a little time on my hands with work not quite started and the kiddos off at school. So, Right now I'm working on a bunch of things that are motivating the heck out of me!
1) I'm doing the Super Stashbusters Club at Big Picture Scrapbooks. I am loving the projects we're doing over there.

2) I'm doing the More Bright Ideas Class at Studio Calico... but I haven' managed to tackle the first assignment over there.
and

3) I'm participating in the 4th Anniversary Celebration at Scraptastic Kit Club site. I am not a subscriber -- a kit club is NOT in my budget, but I love the DT over there and their kits are FAB! And I am always really motivated by an online crop!

Here's a couple of pages I've done for these classes/crop.

Here's a layout of the Great Sand Dunes National Monument back in 2012. I did this one with a BINGO challenge off at Scraptastic -- I used Stamping (title, stars), Multi photos, Die Cuts (from Basic Grey), A bow, and a border punch (on the red)... I am pretty happy with this one (used 6x6 Hey Boy! again here).

And here's one of the Little Guy, asleep on the couch (old couch!) with his beloved Devotional. I used some of the Faith PL cards on this page.

Stashbusting with CTMH Lucky

I decided to keep going with partial collections that I already had on hand. Another Close to My Heart collection I pulled out was the Lucky Collection from 2011. I love the colors of these papers, in fact if you're a regular visitor here, you're probably going to notice that I love Orange. Very boy friendly!

This first layout of the Spruce Tree House at Mesa Verde National Park in Southern Colorado.

The second is one of the endless Scout layouts I always seem to be doing! This one is the Little Guy as a Wolf visiting the local Police Station.

And another Scout layout, but this one is for Muppet Boy, heading out to Summer Camp.

And here's one from the ILs visit to Colo in 2011, we took them for a visit to the US Mint in Denver. No photos are allowed on the tour of the Mint. But this one is from outside.

And here's one from Oldest's collection of wrestling photos.

And finally, one from a long ago trip to Silver Dollar City in Southern Missouri. 

As you can see this collection was super versatile and fun, and now I've used it up and put another stack of layouts into my albums!

Stashbusting - Halloween 2012

Moving forward with my stashbusting I grabbed a group of photos from Halloween 2012, and my storage box full of Halloween goodies.

These two use American Crafts Halloween and Boo papers

And this one is Close to My Heart's Mischief papers

Stashbusting - CTMH Typeset

Moving forward from The Perfect Collection and Return to the Collection classes, I wanted to pull out and tackle some older partial collections in my stash.

For several years, I was a member of a monthly Close To My Heart club so I acquired a lot of CTMH paper packs and workshops on the go. I pulled out Close To My Heart's Typeset line... and whipped out four layout bases based on the ideas of Perfect Collection.

These photos are from a 2009 Business trip that DH took to Washington DC.

And these are from a 2012's Homecoming Dance for Oldest and TGF

 

These photos are from my 2012 choir retreat. A whole weekend dedicated to the Messiah!

And these are from a visit from our nephews to the Colorado State Capitol building in 2011.

It's great to be turning out some fun layouts and getting through old papers and photos!

Return to the Collection 5 & 6

With Video 5 we were working on a 2 pager as a 12x24 palette. Shimelle took an approach that wasn't for me. But I still got a lot out of it.
I stuck with my beloved Swiss Dot Salt Bazzill -- where am I gonna get my stock with Archiver's going out???
These photos are from a trip out on the Gulf on my InLaws boat. That white blob in the photo on the left hand side  is a mother and baby manatee swimming alongside us!

And we wrapped it up with Video 6. I didn't have much of my collection left! So I  this is what I came up with -- Muppet Boy and his BFF.

I have to say I LOVED This paper pack and had a great time with this class!

Return to the Collection 3 & 4

Continuing with Return to the Collection.

For Video 3 - Shimelle was working with a larger photo and a centered approach.
This is a bit of a challenge - among other things because I generally pre-print all my photos and don't often have larger prints available. And that centered orientation is rough!
I decided to work with two smaller photos and mat them together to mimic the larger photo idea. These pics of the Little Guy as a Tiger Cub worked great with these fun papers!

For Video 4 -- we were using a mixed protector approach -- a 12x2 layout with a divided protector for the other side... Instead of going for  two pager, I stretched on to three.
I don't use true 4x6 photos, instead usually printing Snapfish's True Digital 4x5.3 size, so 4x6 pockets require a little adjustment. Also I don't have project life product in my stash... so I used the papers from the line to fill in. I grabbed a bunch of Spring Break photos from 2012 and tackled it.

I had a lot of fun with this one and was really glad to get so many pics tied together in my album.

Return to the Collection -- layout #1 & #2

After completing a run through of The Perfect Collection (TPC) we moved on to the actual Return to the Collection (RttC) class.

This class was also focused on using a single collection to create multiple layouts. Unlike TPC, we weren't working to use up the whole collection (though I came very close!) but to take some different approaches.  For this class I chose Echo Park's All About a Boy collection.  

This class was video based. Shimelle recorded 6 awesome videos walking through making one layout each. She used Glitz's Wild and Free collection -- so lots of bold, bright patterns.

For the first layout, I started with photos of the Atlanta Puppetry Museum -- forbidden photos! FIL snapped a few before the docent informed him that photos weren't allowed. As you can imagine Muppet Boy was delighted by the Jim Henson exhibit and I wanted to reflect that joy in the layout!

For the second layout I wanted to play off of the colorful whimsy of these papers to do a layout from Disneyland's Roger Rabbit CarToon Spin. I had a lot of fun stamping on this one.

Perfect Collection part 2

This is sort of layout overload... But I really completed a lot with Perfect Collection.

#7 - Palm Sunday 2012   -- I really loved how this popped against the black background

#8 --this is one of my favorites of the whole batch! Solar Eclipse of 2012

#9 -- 17th birthday for Oldest! I love how this came together.

#10 -- Colorado Springs Pioneer Museum

#11 -- Taking Flight-- Oldest taking a flying lesson in that tiny plane!

#12 -- Sweet Dreams -- the Little Guy excited about his "new" loft bed!

#13 and finally a two pager  from a daytrip into Cripple Creek, CO in Oct 2012

The Perfect Collection with Shimelle

Way back in 2012, as part of True Scrap 3, Shimelle offered a video based class called The Perfect Collection, that focused on taking a paper collection and churning out layouts 'til it was all gone. "The Perfect Collection, is all about taking one collection pack and using it until it’s all gone"

The Perfect Collection class is available for purchase still and is a great one!

I did this class along with other early birds for the follow up class "Return to the Collection"

 Over the course of a few days I completed 13 layouts (2 of which were two pagers) using a Basic Grey Fiction Paper Pad.

I played down the florals and added solid cardstock (Bazzill Swiss Dot in white, black and kraft colors) and misc embellishments.

The first step in this process is... not picking pics or planning but CUTTING PAPER! Crazy, right? Then I put together layout bases. Then chose photos.

Then I turned each of these bases into a layout with journalling, titles and embellishments.

First layout was a Cub Scout layout for the LittleGuy dealing with the popular skit "The Invisible Bench" #1

And then on to a two pager! For our 2012 getaway weekend trip to Glenwood Springs, CO  #2

And here's an Easter layout (I love how this paper pack can be so versatile!) The Muppet Boy and Little Guy coloring Easter Eggs. #3

Layout #4 was a Thanksgiving Layout -- gotta love pics of the Kid's table!

And another! #5 - was another Easter layout of sorts. Our church hosts an event called "Journey to Jerusalem" with a marketplace filled with crafts, foods, arts and stories of Holy Week Jerusalem.

#6 -- "Blast Off! Another Scout layout -- Little Guy's Rocket Derby