Everyone has a story to tell, here's mine sprinkled with some creative projects along the way.
Thank you for stopping by and I hope you come back again.



Friday, December 28, 2018

2018 Top 10 (Favorite Project) You Tube Hop

Hello friends. I hope you had a great Christmas and looking forward to the New Year. I was invited to join some great YouTubers in a video hop that shares our "Top Ten" projects for this year. It was hard for me to narrow it down to just 10 projects but here it is...


And here are the projects again, in no particular order....

Project #1

Project #2

Project #3

Project #4

Project #5

Project #6

Project #7

Project #8

Project #9

Project #10

Thank you so much for stopping by and I wish you a Happy and Healthy New Year. 

till next time,
Grace

Monday, December 24, 2018

"Christmas Card Set" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Are you ready for Christmas tomorrow? Well I'm here to share with you one last share using my latest Flavors of the month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. 

Products used: Echo Park “Celebrate Christmas” + December Embellishment Kit
Stash items used: White A2 Card bases; Twine; Nuvo Drops (Gold)
Notes:
I wanted to use up the fun ephemera from Pebbles found in the embellishment kit. I used them as my card sentiments and these cards took little time to put together. 


Merry Christmas friends.

Till next time,
Grace

Friday, December 21, 2018

"Christmas Fancy" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Do you have special traditions for the Christmas season? Mine would be to dress up on the Sunday before Christmas. I love looking at my kids in their fancy clothes. This page showcases my youngest in his fancy suit. It is also a page that I created using scraps from the latest Flavors of the Month kit from the ScrapRoom kit club. 

Products used: Echo Park “Celebrate Christmas” + December Embellishment Kit
Stash items used: Silhouette Cameo; Black Cardstock; Light Blue Cardstock; Green Corrugated Thickers Alpha
Notes:
This page took very little time to put together since I had four 3x5 photos.
I didn’t add too many stickers because I didn’t want to take the focus on the photos but the adorable images in the sticker sheet did help to emphasize the season of the page. 


Thank you for stopping by.

Till next time,
Grace

Wednesday, December 19, 2018

"Santa Card Set" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Handmade cards are a must during this season. Here are some cards that I created using some scraps from my latest Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. 

Products used: Carta Bella “Santa’s Workshop” + Echo Park Celebrate Christmas sticker sheet
Stash items used: White A2 Card bases; Red twine; Nuvo Drops (Gold); Circle Punch (Creative Memories)
Notes:
I adored the paper with the snowman so I wanted to highlight that. I love that the images face both left and right so I can line them up where Santa seemed to be moving his head from one side to the other.
I added some stickers from the Echo Park sticker sheet to create my easy card sentiments.


Do you make handmade cards?

Till next time,
Grace

Monday, December 17, 2018

"Noel Delight" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Here's one of my extra project for this month's Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. 

Products used: Pebbles “Cozy and Bright” + December Embellishment Kit
Stash items used: Silhouette Cameo; Black Cardstock
Notes:
The photos of our gingerbread house were already pretty colorful so it wasn’t hard to use the black cardstock found in one of the FOTM mini kits as my base for this layout.
I grounded the page by creating a thin border using the striped paper within the kit. 




Thank you for stopping by.

Till next time,
Grace

Wednesday, December 12, 2018

"Christmas Train" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Hello friends. Here's another layout that I created with my latest Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. And it is also my "recipe" assignment, so if you are a subscriber, you will get a "how to" instructions to recreate page. 

Stash items used: Border Punch, Circle Punch ( 1 ½), Silhouette Cameo; Black Cardstock
Notes:
Since I had wanted to use these products for a double page layout, I did a simple design where I can spread strips of papers going across on both pages. Adding photos in a row also helps me stretch the papers.
I layered the title letters (grey and black) so I can create a slight shadow underneath the light colored letters. 




Thank you for stopping by.

Till next time,
Grace

Friday, December 7, 2018

"The Truth About Santa" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Here's my third layout using the latest Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. And this one didn't have any photos but an important memory that I wanted to document. 

Products used: Echo Park “Celebrate Christmas”
Stash items used: White Pen; Nuvo Drops (white); Circle cutter (Creative Memories); Small letter stickers (Cosmo Cricket); Black Cardstock
Notes:
This page is my take on this month’s Freaky Fast Friday challenge. I had wanted to create a visual triangle with the circles but since the challenge only has two circles in it, I cut the smaller one in half so I can place two halves in two different places. I then used the larger circle to house my title.
This page does not have a photo but a very meaningful (and long) story about how we ended up telling our children that Santa wasn’t real. It was a sad year for us financially and with the demands that the children were wanting for their Christmas gifts, we had to break their hearts and let them know that we were the Santa in our family. I had wanted to document this special story in my family’s life and this collection fit the bill, even down to the sticker that said, “Dear Santa, I can explain.” 

Here's what was written in the journaling...

You know that time when you have believed something all of your life only to be told by your parents that it has all been a lie?

I'm picturing one of my children saying that to someone in the future as they talk about the day that their parents broke their little hearts when mom and dad finally fessed up and gave them the sad news that Santa is not real!

I know, it's harsh but bear with me as I tell you how it all went down.

Ok so last Monday as a Family Home Evening activity, we all wrote our letters to Santa. My kids have loved this tradition and this year's activity didn't seem any different from the past ones. After all the letters were written, we had each one read out loud what they had wished for. Oh before I continue, we also make our kids write down the most important gift they want as the first thing on their list, that way if Santa can't get everything on their list, at least he got the most important one.

Anyways, Marcus wanted a 3DS and a game to come with it. Maddie also wrote a 3DS in her list but it was the last one on her letter. So that night, after the kids had gone to bed, I went online and started checking the prices of the things on their list. We have not had a very good year financially and so the budget was very tight.

After some research I have found that the coveted 3DS was not in the budget. Stress started creeping in. How can we make this a good Christmas for the kids and not put ourselves into debt? Having the kids believe that Santa gives them the things on their list would be hard to get around with. They would be crushed if, on Christmas day, they discovered that Santa gave them something else, something that was not on the top of their list.

So I consulted with hubby and we came to the conclusion that we needed to come out clean and let the kids know that mom and dad are Santa.

All throughout Thanksgiving day, as we passed by the stores all they talked about was their gifts and what Santa will bring them. Finally on the drive to the movie theater, we told them the hard news. They were shocked and of course confused and sad.

The funny thing was as Marcus was processing this news he said..."So that's why Caleb's (his friend) parents told him that Santa was not real. I just thought that they said that to him because he was on the naughty list!"

I'm telling you that kid is hilarious sometimes.

So now that the kids are in on the secret, we told them to not tell anyone, especially their friends. We told them to keep this our secret. We shall see if they can keep this info to themselves.

After our little talk, Maddie would come up to me once in a while during the rest of the week and ask me quesions like...
"if you were Santa, who was eating the cookies and drinking the milk that we put out for Santa?"
"If you were Santa, howcome you got me the wrong size of shoes last year?" (that girl's feet grew fast that by the time Christmas came, the shoes I got her was too small)
"If you are Santa, does this mean we don't have to write our lists?"

and many more. You can tell that this bit of info really threw the kids' world in a spin.

Finally Maddie said to me that she still wants to believe in Santa. That poor girl can't let it go. I said she may do so but know that she's not getting the $180 gift this year cause mama can't afford it.

Oh the things we put our kids through for the sake of Holiday traditions!



Thank you for stopping by.

Till next time,
Grace

Thursday, December 6, 2018

"Ready for Christmas" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Here's my second page using the latest Flavors of the month kit from the ScrapRoom kit club. This specific Christmas line was very vintage and totally out of my comfort zone, but I plugged along and I really liked how it all turned out. 

Products used: Simple Stories “Simple Christmas Vintage”
Stash items used: Red Ink Pad; Small letter stickers ( My Mind’s Eye); Silhouette Cameo; Black Cardstock
Notes:
I really liked the paper that had the leaves and berries on the sides but also wanted to use the back side so I cut out the center of the paper and covered it with another paper so you wouldn’t know that I’ve gutted that piece.
I also inked the edges red so I can distinguish the papers between each layers.
Instead of adding a title or a photo in the frame, I used it to highlight my journaling strips.





Thank you for stopping by.

Till next time,
Grace

Wednesday, December 5, 2018

"Christmas Cheer" The ScrapRoom kit club December Flavor of the month kit

Hello friends. Today I'm sharing my first layout using the latest Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. If you are looking for a group of products to make a ton of holiday themed pages/projects, this kit is for you. :)

Products used: Pebbles “Cozy and Bright”
Stash items used: Green Corrugated Thickers Letters; Silhouette Cameo, Border Punch; Black Cardstock
Notes:
I really liked the Holiday floral paper, it was so festive. So I decided to emphasize that on my page, making it the biggest parts within my layout. I used the other papers but only in smaller doses.
To make the cute stickers stand out against the busy background, I added most of them with some pop up adhesives. 

And here are some more close up pictures....


Thank you for stopping by

Till next time,
Grace

Monday, November 26, 2018

"Love" The ScrapRoom kit club November Flavor of the month kit

As a scrapbooker you almost, always match outfits to papers. Or vice versa. In this page, I was so happy to know that these photos and these papers matched each other. Although the outfits on the photo wasn't intentionally planned to match the products, I'm still glad that they serendipitously go together. 

This page is one of my latest pages using this month's Flavors of the Month kit from The ScrapRoom kit club. 
Products used: My Mind’s Eye “Well, Hello” + November Embellishment Kit
Stash items used: Date stamp (Studio Calico); Ink (Black, My Favorite Things); Blue Cardstock, Border punch (Fiskars); Black Pen
Notes:
I love the colors in this collection. I also loved the flowers so I cut some of them out and then added them to the bottom right side of the page. They created a fun cluster or bouquet of flowers. 


Till next time,
Grace

Friday, November 23, 2018

10 Handmade cards, 1 Homemade kit *November 2018 edition* (Process Video #2 + Extra cards)

Here we are again with my last "1 homemade kit, 10 handmade card" series blog post. In this post I am sharing the last 5 cards created with my latest homemade kit. 
Watch this video for the process:

And here are the close ups...

Card #6
 Card #7
Card #8

 Card #9

 Card #10

Extra Cards


I hope you've enjoyed this series. If you wanna check out my past card sets in this series, you can check out my You Tube channel (link on the sidebar of this blog) and check out the play list entitled "1 homemade kit, 10 handmade cards". 

Till next time,
Grace