Scrapping Out Loud...

It's that wonderful time of year in Minnesota where the heat is off, the windows are open and the air conditioner isn't necessary yet! I appreciate every day of this short season we call spring. I am looking out my scraproom window and there are two dogs running that joyful run, like they've been holding back all winter and now they are just BUSTING into action! Huge circles around the yard - over and over as fast as their legs will take them. I love it.

I discovered a new challenge blog thru Marit called Scrapping Out Loud, and decided to play along with them this week! The challenge is to use paint on a page, which is right up my alley! The subject matter was inspired by Angie Backen's daily inspiration post for April 14 at SiSTV... I used my new Drama Queen collection, which I am totally in love with! The soft colors are so yummy! I painted the entire background with pink acrylic paint; then used a magazine image, which I highlighted with dark pink oil crayon. The quote is from the book Simple Abundance.

Michael is still working on the entryway. Three coats so far and its looking like it will need one more to cover completely. WE are LOVING the orange!

I hope you have a fantabulous Thursday evening! I will be back tomorrow with another update!

Project 365 - Week Fifteen...

Here we go with photos from the week!

Monday, April 6: This is the view of my beloved Minneapolis skyline from the 35W bridge over the Mississippi river. This is the bridge that collapsed in August of 2007. It's a main thoroughfare for me, and I still get chills everytime I go over it. I took this on my way into town for a meeting.

Tuesday, April 7: Outside Home Depot when we were picking up a new washtub to go with our new washer. I love Michael's new glasses!

Wednesday, April 8: The washer wasn't worth fixing - so we got a new one. Here she is in all her glory!

Thursday, April 9: I was feeling fancy in one of my new spring outfits! (the colors are really much brighter than what they show here - the sunlight washed them out)

Friday, April 10: My first order of MOO cards...

Saturday, April 11: Johnny gets comfy...

Sunday, April 12: The light orange primer is on, and Michael is starting on the real wall color! I can hardly wait to see what it looks like when it's done!

This will be the journaling spot for Sunday...

and here is how the finished layout turned out. You can see a lot more detail by clicking on the image...

This week, along with the kit contents, I used the brand new, fun embellishment stickers by Me and My Big Ideas that I got in the RAK from Lauren Gick. The alpha stamps are the Newsprint font from Stampin Up.

For more detailed info about Project 365 check out this post.

How are your projects going this year? I'd love to hear! Take care and I will see you tomorrow!

G is for Growth...

The entryway is not quite done yet. We got caught up in the end of the Masters Golf Tournament this afternoon, and then decided it was a beautiful day for a walk. Great choice - the walk was lovely and it felt so good to get out and get some fresh air and exercise. Now it's looking like it will be Wednesday when the project is finished.

I did finish my art journal page tho! It's entitled "G is for Growth," and it's the next "Year In the Life of an Art Journal" page...
The journaling reads: "I heard Karen (Kaiser Clark) speak these words many years ago at a conference for work. They really had an impact on me. There's no use in trying to hold on to things the way they are - life is too fluid for that. We do get to choose how we look at things tho, and whether we learn as we go. That is where we can make our own magic."

Materials used include Peerless Watercolors, Lettuce Green Adirondack Spray Ink, a magazine image, hand-drawn dandelions, colored pencil, SiSTV gaffer tape, Prima Felt Letters, Pink Paislee clear alpha stamps (Vintage Pop), white sharpie, a paint chip and acrylic paint on corrugated cardboard.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend! I will be back tomorrow with the next installment of Project 365.

I LOVE ORANGE

The weekend is going well. The primer is on in the entryway, and Michael has started with the "festive orange" coat. The cats are finding this whole project very interesting. Johnny is sneaking a peek at Dad on his ladder - check out his little ears peeking around the corner... We are hoping that it only takes one coat of the orange. If so, it should be done today and I can post pics tonite. Last night we kept looking at it - just in the primer stage - and saying to each other WOW ITS ORANGE. LOL. Even the primer is pretty bright, but the final color is going to be INTENSE. And why not!?! We love color and I think it's going to go great with the deep red of the kitchen.

As for me, I had a blast finishing a layout for Scrapping The Music. I can't share for another week tho. Drat. I got to use my Night Owl Collection from SiStv which went with my mood for the weekend cuz it has lots of ORANGE in it!

Speaking of Scrapping The Music, the slideshow for "Dream On" is up and it is totally rockin! Thanks to everyone who contributed - your work is awesome! Check it out here. The new song will go up tonight, so don't forget to check that out too.

If you are looking for some new ideas to try this weekend, check out Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's current blog post. She has links to some fun tutorials!

Alrighty then, I am off to work on an art journal page. I will see you tomorrow with another update! Take care my scrapparific friends!

MOO Cards MOO Cards La La La...

OOOOH I love MOO cards! Okay, so one of the SiSversary swaps I've signed up for is a Moo card swap. Moo Cards are like tiny business cards, which I thought sounded like fun! I just received my order today and I LOVE THEM! OMG they are so tiny and fun! They are really easy to make too. You just go to the site, upload whatever photos you want to use, crop them to the right proportions and place your order. It's awesome! You get a box of 100, which can be all one design, 100 different designs or anything in between. I ordered 7 designs, all based on photos of my artwork. Here's how they turned out:and here's what's on the back (sorry for the blurry photo - it was as good as I could get)...

They also have lots of different cute little holders you can buy. Here's the one I got...I can tell I am going to be a Moo card girl from now on! If you want to check out Moo cards, click here for more info.

So, how are your weekend plans shaping up? Michael and I are looking forward to a project weekend together. I am going to do some major scrapping, and Michael is painting a couple accent walls in our entryway - I am so excited because they are going to be my favorite color - ORANGE! Here's how the entryway looks right now:

I will post an "after" photo when it's all done!

Have a great Friday my friends! I will be back tomorrow!

Fun with ATCs...

I finished my Project 52 ATCs for the last two weeks! For last week, what I wanted to convey was my love of the traveling portion of my new job. I happened to already have an ATC made that fit perfectly, so I decided to use it! This was an ATC that I made awhile ago with a Crop Suey kit. The papers are from the Cosmo Cricket Happy Camper line, plus a piece of a map that came with the kit. I used three miscellaneous word stamps...here's the journaling on the back...


And for this week I was just feeling like playing! I made this with gesso, acrylic paint, my crop-a-dile, miscellaneous eyelets and brads, a sharpie and an epoxy sticker from the RAK I recently received from Lauren - thank you Lauren!
I had to keep the journaling to a minimum because I didn't want to cover up any of the holes...

So now I am all caught up with Project 52, and my display ribbon is starting to fill up!


If you are interested in joining in on Project 52, just click on the blinkie in the right hand column and it will bring you to more info about the project!

Have a happy happy day and I will see you tomorrow!

Project 365 Week Fourteen...

And here we go with another week's photos...

Monday, March 30: My new "Drama Queen" collection arrived from SiSTV today, and the boys approve. They are especially fond of all the trims!

Tuesday, March 31: Johnny shares my amazement at the morning snowstorm. You can't really see it here, but the snowflakes were HUGE!

Wednesday, April 1: More snow this morning. Just enough to make my road trip to Cambridge pretty!

Thursday, April 2: I never get tired of photos like this. Their friendship warms my heart!

Friday, April 3: The grass is not green yet, but Mr. Squirrel is looking handsome!

Saturday, April 4: Our Becca girl stops by to visit!

Sunday, April 5: Drat! There is never a good time for the washer to break. Aargh.

And here's how the layout turned out. Super simple this week - no extra embellies. I just let the photos do the talking...(click to see more detail)

I will be back tomorrow with more to share! Take care my scrappy friends!

Balancing Your Energy...

I was reminded yesterday of something one of my college art teachers once said. He said that in order to be the best artist you can be, you must have as many experiences in life as you can. More important than the classes you take is the life you live. Do lots of things - volunteer to plow farm fields, ride rollercoasters, travel, meet people, etc. Then, when it comes time to create art - you will have a rich background of memories and experiences to pull from. I love this concept and believe in it wholeheartedly. I've always considered myself a student of life. And yet, yesterday I was sitting at my scraptable for the second day in a row; wanting to scrap and having absolutely no inspiration. I think I have been so busy scrapping lately, that my life has gotten a bit out of balance. The words of my art teacher came flooding back to me and I said "Michelle - you need to go out into the world and start having more experiences!!!"

If you've ever read the Artist's Way, you know that author Julia Cameron has a similar philosophy. She talks about balancing your incoming energy with your outgoing energy. She suggests doing this by taking weekly "artist dates." Artist dates are chunks of time that you devote to taking your "artist self" on a date, so to speak. This provides for the incoming energy. The Artist's Way was truly a life-changing book for me. If you haven't read it and are interested, go here for more info.

So, anyways, I've decided to start going on artist dates again. I'm going to make a list of ideas - heck I could even scrapbook about my artist date ideas! Yeay! I'm getting inspired already...

Okay, I'm off to create my Project 365 layout. I will be back later to post the results.

Thanks again for stopping by and for your comments - I love to hear from you!

Weekend Update...

I've been so anxious for this week's song to go up at the Scrapping The Music blog! It is one I picked - "Dream On" by Aerosmith - I love that song and I'm so glad the design team wanted to do it! Aerosmith was my fave band in high school, and this song has a lot of meaning for me.

The bird is hand-drawn and represents the Phoenix, a mythical bird that is said to have burned in it's nest and then been reborn from the ashes. This lyric from the song has always served as a reminder for me that only through hard times are we able to gain strength to rise above and appreciate the good times fully.

The background is masking tape covered with acrylic paint and spray ink. flames are painted with acrylic on a separate sheet of paper and cut out. the bird is drawn on fancy tissue paper (gift wrap) and glued onto lightweight cardboard which I then colored with colored pencil. He has a rhinestone eye. Come on over and check out the awesome layouts the rest of the design team came up with - I hope you will be inspired to play along!

So, the weekend is coming to an end. They go too fast, don't they? Life in general speeds by at breakneck speed sometimes. I remember being a kid and thinking that it took FOREVER for the school year to end. My mother used to always say "don't wish your life away," and now I know what she meant. Each day is so precious - I just want to capture every moment. My guess is I'm not alone in feeling that way. That's why we scrapbook. That's what I love about art in general - it takes a feeling, a thought, a moment - and turns it into something tangible. I love that.

I will be back tomorrow with a Project 365 update and whatever else I can come up with! Thanks for stopping by my friends!

You Lift Me Up...

This weekend we are playing Angie Backen's "You Lift Me Up" game again at SiSTV. For my turn, I was to scraplift the 3rd layout on the 31st page of the gallery, which was an awesome one called "Funny Picture" by Lililali.

I loved the picture that Lililali used of a little girl and her dog, so I decided to use a picture of me as a little girl (I think I was about nine) with my dog Teak. For my lift, I used the new SiS collection - "The Drama Queen." For the background, I cut squares of the vintage cross-stitch pattern and pasted them onto the green cardstock. Then I used white paint and green oil crayon to create a softened effect. The velvet strip above the photo is cut from the vintage trim in the kit. I added some Thickers and vintage woodgrain contact paper. Thank you so much for the inspiration Lililali and Angie!
The game is going on all weekend and it's a lot of fun! Come on over and play if you have time! Check it out by clicking here!

A RAK, A Book, and A Song...

Awhile ago I won a RAK at Lauren Gick's blog, which was exciting in and of itself, but when it arrived yesterday in the mail, I was totally floored with delight to see that she had included all kinds of extra goodies - look at this wonderful pile of goodness!the picture doesn't even do it justice - there are minibooks, stickers, 3D embellishments, bling - it's all fantastic! I can't wait to start creating with it all! THANK YOU LAUREN - YOU TOTALLY MADE MY DAY!!!

So, is anyone else reading "Life is a Verb?" I'm just getting started with it, but so far I'm loving it! It's all about this woman whose stepfather died just 37 days after being diagnosed with cancer, and how it was a wake-up call for her to appreciate every day she has. The design of it is interesting because its done with stories, and after each story there are exercises to do - one to do immediately, and one to do over time. It involves journaling, which is right up my alley. I'm only on the first chapter, so I will update you as I go, but I'd love to hear if any of you are reading this book too, and what you think of it.

Like I mentioned yesterday, the song Peace Train has been running through my mind lately, so I decided to use it as inspiration for a page in my art journal...
I had so much fun with this. It's not for a challenge or anything - I just did it cuz I was feelin it. The journaling is a lyric from the song. I used an acrylic paint splatter technique for the background. The photo is of my hand, the peace sign people are cut from a magazine ad, the leaves are hand-drawn on SiSTV modsheets, and I used the SiS "Songbird" collection for everything else.

I wish you a fabulous, free-spirited Friday! See you tomorrow my friends!

Oh, the Drama...

Okay, I just have to say that the new Drama Queen collection from SiSTV is absolutely FABULOUS!!! Mine arrived yesterday and I just about fainted from all the jaw-dropping goodness! It might just be my fave collection yet! Here's a pic of the Willmeister checking it out... what I really love about it is the combination of LOTS of fabulous vintage stuff, along with enough cool new stuff to round it out into a funky, shabby, groovy pile of goodness that I can't wait to start creating with! Yeayyyy - SiS does it again!

OMG I've got so much to share - a new book I'm reading, an AWESOME RAK I got in the mail today, and so much more! But alas, it's getting late and I must get some sleep, so it will have to wait til tomorrow's post.

I hope you like the new Cat Stevens video I posted in the sidebar. He is one of my all time faves from way back in high school, and for some reason "Peace Train" has been going thru my mind a lot lately. Just wanted to share the vibe!

Alrighty, I better get going, but I will see you tomorrow - thanks for stopping by!