Top 10 Products of 2013

I'm not sure where 2013 has gone. December whirled by so fast I didn't have time to think. I've barely had time to step into my scrap room. I was too busy cooking and enjoying time with friends and family.

I do like to look back on my favorite new products or things I discovered each year. I don't do these in any particular order, just a combo of all my new fav's that have joined the scrap loft this year.

1: Modeling Paste:

I love this stuff from Liquitex. It is a staple in my craft room. I love the dimension it adds to pages. I'm getting more into altering things to make them my own. This is one of the pages I created with modeling paste:

2: Gelatos: I'm just starting to get into Gelatos. They have a wide variety of options of what you can make. I'm in the early stages of experimentation, but they are pretty fun!

3: Heidi Swapp Color Shine Mist: This stuff has become a staple on my pages. It is vivid and vibrant, which is the majority of the pages. You can pull the cap off and use a paint brush for a more subtle effect as well.

4: Masks: I've found masks to be the perfect partners with mists, gelatos, and modeling pastes...or a combo of all of these. I really like the coordinating masks from Heidi Swapp and also the ones from The Crafters Workshop. I've only found the Crafters Workshop at a specialty art store with the paints.

5: Wood Veneers: again I'm getting more and more dimensional with my pages. I've always been into wood grain, both in scrapping and in decorating. These are so fun both plain and decorated with distress ink, alcohol ink, stickles, glitter marker, and more!

6: My Favorite Paper Companies: I continue to love My Minds Eye's Papers. They always seem to fit my color palettes of what I scrap. I've also started to enjoy Studio Calico! They had lots of travel themed papers this year, which is right up my alley.

7: Little Stamp Rollers: These things are so cute! I loved stamping the date in my December Daily with these. And they have cute little sayings. I see more of these appearing in my craft room. They are so cute and chic.


8: Canon Rebel: I got my other baby right at the end of 2012. I had no idea what I was doing back then with it, but I learned lots this year! I took a class at my local camera store on the features, and have taken some really cool shots over the past year!

9: Silhouette: My new baby of all my tools. I am just exploring all the functions, but I'm using the Designer Edition to cut SVG files. It has opened up a whole new world of scrapping but also for classroom things as well.

This was a lot harder than the past few years. I've really redirected my spending over the past year. I'm working on using my scrap stash more but also looking towards the future. I'm enjoying re-purposing things to fit and make it work instead of buying new. I've tried to simplify what is important to me and spend less time shopping. I'm definitely happier and don't feel like I need to keep up with people or their stuff. 

10: MY RUNNING GROOVE!!!!

As many of you know I started running in 2013 and I absolutely love it. I know it sucks scrappy time up, but I feel so good getting a run in and even did my first race in 2013. Now I don't scrap unless I've gotten a good workout in. I feel so good having a plethora of things I enjoy with my scrappy friends.

Happy New Year to all! May you be blessed with good health, happiness and lots of creativity!

Bridal Shower

I'm slowly working my way through all my spring pictures. Normally I'm not this far behind, but it was a busy fall, and I didn't spend much time playing in my scrap loft. Back at the start of April, I helped throw a bridal shower for my cousin's fiancee.

 This paper was from the MME line Miss Caroline. I love the turquoise with the chevrons and hexagons. I seem to love everything MME comes out with lately.

 I used the CK Ali's Handwriting font with my Silhouette to cut the title.The welding feature is pretty cool, but you have to be careful picking it up, since I ripped it a bunch.

 I got these cute little three down page protectors at Joanns. They are from We R Memory Keepers, and they are the perfect addition when you don't want to do a whole 12x12 series. They fit right in the middle of my two pages in the album!

 I experimented around with adding ink to my Studio Calico Veneers. They match the page really well.

 These mini cheesecakes are a work of art in themselves. I made all the little chocolate flowers and piped the chocolate onto each individual cheesecake.

 I made two of my own journaling cards to go with the page. I realized I only had one picture of the bride when I finished the page. The cute little girls dressing up like the bride stole the show.

And we had a random beautiful sunset on a frigid Sunday!

Flyover Pictures

Since I live in Titletown the Packers sometimes have flyovers for their football games! Normally its some super fast bombers, but a few weeks ago they brought out a retired World War II Bomber for the flyover. I didn't go to the game-which was fine because it was super cold. When I realized I should be on the flight pattern, I pulled out my zoom lens and headed out to my deck. The plane came over my building and then turned around!

And I got some really neat shots. I had to crop them, but I still have a high resolution camera and I got some really good details!

Welcoming a New Cousin

Back in March we went down to Madison to celebrate a baby shower for my cousins! Of course the shutter bug named me snapped a few pictures. My cousin's didn't know if it was a boy or girl, so I tried to stay gender neutral with this page. I used the My Girl paper line from My Minds Eye. The pink chevron ribbon is from American Crafts and I hand cut the big blue chevrons from the opposite side of the crazy patterned paper.

 Big surprise-I used modeling paste on this page. Surprisingly I left it plain white. Normally I mist it while it dries. I decided to bling it up a bit with some iRock gems. 

 

I have a new tool in the family. I finally got a Silhouette! I'm just learning the software, but I'm looking forward to the opportunity to dive in more. Especially with bilingual materials! 

The Turkey Poem

I had to share this little giggle for all my blog friends:

The Turkey Poem
Author Unknown

My New Parrot
Recently I received a parrot as a gift.
The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse vocabulary.
Every word out of the bird's mouth was rude,
obnoxious and laced with profanity,
I tried and tried to change the bird's attitude by consistently,
saying only polite words,
playing soft music and anything else I could think of to "clean up" the bird's vocabulary.
Finally, I was fed up and I yelled at the parrot.
The parrot yelled back.
I shook the parrot and the parrot got angrier and even ruder.
So, in desperation, I threw up my hands, grabbed the bird and put him in the freezer.
For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed.
Then suddenly there was total quiet.
Not a peep was heard for over a minute,
Fearing that I'd hurt the parrot,
I quickly opened the door to the freezer.
The parrot calmly stepped out onto my outstretched arms and said
"I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions.
I'm sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct my rude and unforgivable behavior."
I was stunned at the change in the bird's attitude.
As I was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic change in his behavior, the bird continued,
"May I ask what the turkey did?"


HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Everyone have a wonderful day of family and loved ones! 

Peek in my Craft Loft

This post is well overdue. I moved back in August. I'm finally getting around to showing off my scrap loft. I actually took these pics a month ago, and then re-took a few on Sunday after I got stir crazy watching that four hour football game. I gave in and let myself decorate ONE thing to hold myself through until after Thanksgiving. My dad won't bring my tree over, its the only reason it's not up already. Supposedly I won't be getting it up the stairs myself.

 I'm loving my rail of my loft that overlooks my living room!

 My desk (also overlooks the living room) and has a great view outside.

The rest of these were taken a few weeks ago during the day. I've got nice storage and a washer/dryer upstairs. I also kept my old TV for doing workout DVD's. My complex is super quiet but also has some rules about noise.

 The view from my desk. Can't wait to watch it snow up there.

I ripped apart that old TV hutch this summer and transformed it into scrappy storage! And I got my Expedit while I was in Atlanta.

So this is my scrap space/work out space/laundry space. It's multipurpose but I love it!

On The Ice

When we were up in Door County for my birthday in March we decided to walk on the Bay of Green Bay. I will admit, I get really leery of walking on ice, when I know how deep the water is underneath (aka 20 feet). I hung closer to the shore, but we got some cool shots. This beach is super crowded in the summer time, so it was really weird to see how deserted it can be in the off season.

 This layout comes from the new Bo Bunny winter collection. I really liked the grey paper with the pops of blue. My silly bright coat makes it hard to pick paper that goes well. I'm still into the chevron trend, and spend way too much time cutting up all these little strips.

 

 I gave my Cricut a good workout on this page. I changed the blade as I decided to put it up on Craigslist. I forgot the nice cuts it makes with a clean blade in. So I had a bunch of fun snowflakes. The snowflake in the top left corner was a big mess. First I did modeling paste, but that didn't work out so well, even with the mist. So I cut another one, misted it, and placed it in the groves. The original plan didn't look like anything besides a mess.

 My thicker stash is low, and I am trying to cut back on my spending. It always works to cut letters and put your own fake stitching on there.

We woke up to snow the other day, and it was really exciting. Now three days later and its just plain cold. I'm already over this cold stuff.

But we had a pretty sunrise recently-

Colors of Fall

It wouldn't be fall if I didn't share the pictures of the turning leaves in Door County. My dad and I drove up with weekend after Atlanta, realizing it would probably be the last chance we had. We had a fun father daughter day.

Beautiful farm field (taken through the window as we were driving)

Another car shot. Too many beautiful leaves

Minions at the grocery store

Taking a bike ride. Turns out I was biking on my bum foot with bad tires

On our favorite bluff

Looking over Ephriam. If you look at the top of the picture you can see Lake Michigan on the horizon

These DC pictures will have to hold everyone over until I get back to scrapping. I'm looking forward to the Deer Widow Crop at my LSS this weekend!

Fall Blog Hop

Thanks for coming along today on our Fall Blog Hop.  You should have made it here from Amanda's blog.

My page is from the Newport Resort in Egg Harbor, Wisconsin. Every fall they do a cool pumpkin display on their front lawn. This year they did a fairy garden. We stay at this condo association regularly throughout the year.

 This was such a fun page for me to make. I didn't use any patterned paper on this page. The majority of the circles on the page are paint, stamped with a Dr. Pepper can.

 I also used a variety of stencils with modeling paste and mists to make dimensional circles as well.

 I have a love hate relationship with my Cricut. I love how people weld on their Silhouette's, so I've been doing it with my Gypsy. So I cut my title with two different fonts.

Lastly I sewed some circles to add another medium to my pages. Mixed media is one of my favorite things to do on my scrapbook pages. The colors on this page were so much fun!

The display was so much fun to check out and photograph this year:

Here are some pictures at Newport through the past few years.

2013

2011: Apple Patch

2010: Charlie Brown

Your next stop on the blog hop is Robyn:


Here are all the participants in order:

Mandi - mjskraze.blogspot.com/ Amanda - www.lovejoypaper.com
Megan -  creativitybymeg.blogspot.com/ 
Robyn- cozienookhomestead.wordpress.com 
Devra - www.mycreativeview.blogspot.com/
Laurie -  tulip-scrapper.blogspot.com/
Cassie - allsmilesandsunshine.blogspot.com/
Christy - myscrapbookevolution.blogspot.com/