Lo's and a Freebie!!

This has to be quick since we have to leave for church in 30 minutes and I haven't even showered, but I wanted to share some LO's I've done recently and I've made up a freebie for y'all!

This first LO is for the ADSR. The challenge was to do a fairy tale LO.

Credits here.

This next is another one I did with Minna's Branded Papers:

Credits here.

And finally, another one for ADSR. This challenge had to have a large "G" and the word "goal" on it somewhere:

Credits here.

And about that freebie. I thought I would turn some of my LO's into templates for you to use. I think I'll post one a week or so. Here is the first:

I've done two versions, a TIFF one and a PSD. Download whichever one works best for you. Both downloads have the same template, just a different format. They both have a jpg version too.

Links Expired. Watch for it to be for sale soon!

Please let me know what you think of it and link me up to any pages done using it. I'd love to see what you do with it! Thanks and enjoy!

Blatant Advertising

Ok, so here is the post I warned you about. But I've got to earn my keep so here goes.

Scraphead is having an amazing contest. All you have to do is scrap a page with 2 items from their store and a summer themed picture and you could win a digital camera!

Be sure to click the pic to find out all the specifics. They also have a contest this month, where if you scrap with things from their store and put them in the Product gallery you can win a Shutterfly 8x8 book. How cool is that? But it ends soon so hop on it! Check it out here.

Right now they are also having a 40% off sale on all their paper packs. Check out the info here.

Now I don't know how she does it, but Minna keeps coming out with awesome stuff! See what I mean:


I love these papers. Each paper has a little tag hanging off one of the sides with a word on it. So cool! I did this LO using one:

Credits here.

She also has these super fun date tags. I used the white ones on the LO of Alex I posted about yesterday.


You can snag both the papers and the tags at her store here at Scraphead.

OK, I think that gets through all the official business. There's not much other business to cover since today was a pretty slow normal day.

A plethora of things.

Just a quick side note, I love the word plethora. I learned it in AP English my senior year and have diligently tried to use it in casual conversation since. It rolls quite nicely off the tongue.

Anyways, lots to ramble on about today so you might want to go grab yourself a snack.

OK, you back? Good. About a week ago I finally got my vacation album from Shutterfly. I was really excited about it. All in all it turned out pretty good. Here are a couple of spreads from it:




(Sorry about the cruddy pictures. I took them at night under incandescent lights.) I only have two complaints about my book. First is that, even though I followed their measurements for the cover window, my page still ended up off centered. See:

It's a little bit sad that the cover is the first thing you see and it's wrong. Secondly, they were a little sloppy in aligning the back pages. All of them have some amount of white showing at their top eadges like so:

I've debated on whether or not to complain and get another one, but then I ask myself, in all honesty, who is ever going to look at this book besides me and my family? No one. So I really don't think it's worth the trouble. I just wish it had been as perfect as everone else raves about theirs. But I think I'll get another chance since rumor has it one of my CT's will be giving me a coupon code for a free 8X8. That'll be fun.

In addition to my book from Shutterfly I also had a bunch of free 4x6 prints to use, so use them I did. I printed out a bunch of B&W photos to finally complete this project in Ella's room:


Glad that one is finally done. It's been sitting around in various pieces for 2 years. I have one more project to finish and I'll consider her room as decorated as it's going to get until I buy her real furniture.

We went to see Rattatoille last night (pretty sure I spelled that wrong, but too lazy to look it up.) It was pretty good. We made the mistake of going to a 6:50 showing which means the movie ran into kids bedtimes. Oops. The movie was cute but I don't think it's one I'll ever buy on DVD. One of those "You've seen it once..." types.

Anton flew puke free today. That is good and bad. Good because hey, who likes to puke? Bad because it just prolongs the inevitable spin chair. We'd really like for him to get to it and get it over with. We know the meds they have him on are only a temporary solution and he really needs to just do the chair and see if it works or not so we can get on with our lives. Sigh. You would think I'd have learned patience by now with all the waiting the military puts of through. But alas, no such luck.

I finished reading Harry Potter #7 tonight. It ended well. I won't spoil it for anyone. There are a whole slew of books I'd like to read and my library has none of them. Grrr. Small town libraries are not my friends.

I've done a couple of LO's the past few days. The first has two renditions. It was for challenge #2 of the Amazing Digi Scrapping Race. I didn't like the version that completed the race challenge, so after posting the first version I redid it to one I liked. Once we are good and past the first wee of the race I'll replace the one in my gallery with the better one. But here they are:


Credits for #1 here. I'm not sure on some of the stuff from #2 since I haven't posted it anywhere yet.

Today I did this fun one of Alex's vanity:

Credits here.

Alex knows he is a cutie and stikes that adorable pose everytime we tell him so. Sigh. What a sweet baby!

But I think I have gone on long enough. My next post will probably be all scrapping related, since I have some "business" I need to do for my CT's. But don't let that scare you off, one is a contest with a camera for a prize, so be sure to check back!! Have a great day!

Another photo shoot.

My family have been my photo guinea pigs. I have more pictures of my kids playing in the backyard than I can ever possibly need. But I just can't bring myself to delete them. My kids are just too cute. They love to get right up in the lens while I'm shooting, like this:


What a goof ball. Ella also loves to use her sidewalk chalk when I'm brave enough to let us venture out into the heat. We have to be careful though, 'cause Alex likes to eat it.


For our Friday night "date" tonight we went on a photo shoot. Actually, I did all the shooting and Anton did the stroller pushing. We walked along a trail that was really pretty in the spring. Tonight it was a little bit blah. But I got a couple of OK shots. Here they are:

Ella loves posing:
OK, this next is not a great picture, I didn't even bother with the Photoshop, but this poor little guy had his head stuck in the fence. Anton rescued him. My hero.


Here are the actual final picks:





I really wanted to make that last one look aged and just ran out of ideas on how to do it. Oh well.

Anton continues to get sick when he's flying, even on medication. So Monday he heads back to the doc again. He's probably going to start the chair spinning method. Fingers crossed that it works. Poor guy is getting really tired of puking.

Alex is cutting his 8th tooth right now, which makes for a crabby baby. When they were out playing last night he got bit a million times by mosquitoes and now he's covered in red swollen welts. Makes me itch just looking at him. He must taste really good because no one else got bit.

I scrapped a couple more pages. This first of our bowling outing:

Credits and journaling here.

Here's one of my b-day:

Credits and journaling here.

This other is my LO for challenge #1 in the Amazing Digi Scrapping Race. We had to do a LO about a museum. I know, the picture is bad, but I wasn't an aspiring photographer back when I took it! Plus it was a film point and shoot. Cut me some slack. :o)

Credits and journaling here.
I guess that's enough for now. Have a good one!

Fickle, fickle me.

So remember how I was so excited about getting my Rebel XT? Well, we were walking through Wal-mart the other day and walked by the camera display. They happened to have a Nikon D40 and I picked it up. My hands said, "Ahh, this is one comfy camera to hold." and I was thrown into a state of indecision. I have to admit, that since playing with my Rebel I had commented a few times about it not being the most comfortable camera to hold. So we took a trip into town to the camera store so I could hold them both and play with them both. I just couldn't decide. The Rebel has more intuitive features, but the Nikon is much more comfortable. I had this same dilemma when buying our minivan. Honda=features, Toyota=comfort. I ended up with the Toyota and have regretted it since. I didn't want to make the same wrong decision. So we came home and I read so much on the internet about the two cameras that my brain about burst. Finally I decided, comfort trumped easier to access features. If I wasn't comfy holding my camera I woudn't enjoy taking pictures as much. So we headed back to the camera store and I am now a proud owner of a Nikon D40x. I went with the X to get the higher megapixels. The one thing I LOVE about the Nikon that the Cannon didn't have it Auto ISO. I won't go into details, but it's fabulous for this indoor picture taking, tripod hating mommy.


So of course I have to show off pictures from my new camera. And here are some (with a little help from Photoshop, of course):



On Saturday, after the camera exchange fiasco we drove down to the beach right as a big storm was rolling past. I shot this photo with my point and shoot since the Nikon's battery was still charging. The clouds looked so cool!


Since there were hail warnings back at home we decided to stay out at the beach. We had dinner at a place called Flounders. It was a little pricey, but you got lots of really good food. Here are my cuties posing outside:


Last night for family night we went bowling. Ella had so much fun. She wouldn't even think about doing it granny style. She had to put her fingers in the holes everytime and try and roll it. Most of the time it was more of a throw and a thunk. She would do a little victory dance everytime. It was soooooo cute! See...


Anton was on a roll, getting strikes left and right:


Another cute one of Ella:


And here are a couple I photoshopped. (Is that a word?) I love Ella's look of dejection in this one:


It needs a re-do since I can see a bit of a halo around her. She is really dark in the original. Oh well. Here's another one I shot and PSed of just the lanes:

I won't even tell you how poorly I bowled. But Ella got a 37 and that was not counting all the points she didn't get because she kept stepping over the line and fouling.

I've also been scrapping a bit, when I could manage to put my camera down. Here are the pages I've done:

You can find credits and leave love here.

Credits and love here.

Could this post be any longer? That's why I should post more often! But I better go grab a shower while baby is still sleeping! Have a good one!

New Toy

It was my birthday a couple of days ago and I got a new toy. My wonderful DH got me a Canon Digital Rebel XT!!! I'm so excited. I've been wanting one for years! Now I just have to learn how to use it. And since I got a new camera Ella decided she could commandeer my point and shoot. Here's a pic she took of me opening my new camera:


Anton got to use my new one to snap the candle blowing out pics:


The birthday festivities were fun. I got to do whatever I wanted all day long. We went to the library in the morning so I could get some books. By lunch time we'd given up waiting on opening the presents and having cake. Anton had a medical appointment so while he was gone I played with my new camera. I filled up an entire 1GB card trying to figure out how to work it. I made us pad thai for dinner. It came out so much better than last time. It was yummy. I meant to take a picture of it, but we ate too fast.

Yesterday we went to the book store where I paid too much for the book Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson. I read it all and now my camera makes so much more sense! If you are struggling to figure out the relationship between all the different settings on your camera, this is a great book! Lots of pictures too.

So this afternoon we braved the 90+ degree heat to go to the park so I could practice my new camera skills. I got some pretty good shots I think. Here they are:










This last one is my favorite I think. Though the one of Ella on the dock is a close second. I played with them in photoshop afterwards of course. Even with a fancy new camera I couldn't get pictures that nice right off the chip.

Now I must ask, can a child be too cute? Because I think my kids are doing a good job of being just that. Of course, they have been my models for all of my photo shoot practice and they don't mind posing one bit. So just to prove that my kids verge on too cute, here you go:

I haven't been doing any scrapbooking because I've been too busy taking pictures! I better get crackin' though, because the end of the month is creeping up and I don't want to have 10 LO's to do in 3 days! Maybe I'll go do one right now. Or maybe I'll be brave and post some of my pictures over at Flickr. We'll see.