I finally finished this year’s Holloween layout of my granddaughter. Kyra had been saying for months and months that she wanted to be a princess for Holloween this year . . . I don’t know what happened when she went shopping with mom for her costume but she couldn’t wait to show me that she was going to be SUPERGIRL this year . . . well needless to say that began my search for the right shade of colors to go with such a bright costume . . . who knew that there were so many different shades of basic blue, red and yellow . . . sooooooooo . . . at this time I would like to present SUPERGIRL KYRA . . .

These pictures were taken at a church Harvest Festival on October 31st. They had 4 bounce houses and my daughter was able to get plenty of pictures to be able to tell a story. By the way . . . after I made my selection of pictures and laid them out . . . I had my granddaughter them me in her own words what was happening . . . my favorite is when she says “Hmmmm . . should I help them or do the dishes?” . . . makes you wonder and appreciate a child’s imagination

Oh . . . one more thing . . . all of the paper was basic card stock . . . I stamped the plain blue cardstock using Technique Tuesday’s “spin cycle” clear stamp and VersaMark and put little dots of Stickles “Golden Rod” down the middle of each title letter to add a little sparkle . . . the giant letter “S” I was able to purchase from Dillon’s Laser Designs (www.dillonlaserdesigns.com) at the Scrapbook Expo that was held in Sacramento, CA in October (it was the perfect find and worth the 1-1/2 hour drive to Sacramento) . . .

Well that’s all for now . . . I can’t wait to share with you some of the projects I completed last Saturday at a Holiday Workshop at PSB in Paradise . . . thanks for stopping by . . .

It’s been a while since I last wrote on my blog . . . it was a very busy summer and fall is almost over and has been just as busy (with a couple of illnesses thrown into the mix) . . . I do want to say something right up front . . . I am not an ORIGINAL designer . . . I cannot look at paper and know exactly what to do with it . . . I take classes, buy kits and get ideas from layouts I see on the internet, magazines, where ever . . . I don’t always follow the examples I am given or see but they are close enough so that I do not claim them as my “original . . .

So that being said I would like to share some of the layouts I have done since my last blog (way back when) . . .

When my mother-in-law passed on I was told to choose one item that had very special meaning to me . . . it was a very hard thing to do as I had known this women for over 46 years and considered her to be the mother I never had and always wanted . . . there were so many memories wrapped up in “things” around the house . . . I choose the wooden duck sewing box that her father made for her shortly after she was married . . . my mother-in-law hated to sew and when she found out that I did sew . . . well every time I was over at her house she always needed something hemmed or a seam fixed or even a button sewn on . . . . sometimes she even called me to get me over to do a little project and I was only just dating her son . . . so it seemed very natural for me to choose this duck as my special memory of her . . .

Now I knew that I would be doing a layout about this little box . . . but I kept on putting it off . . . that is until I saw a layout that Robbie Herring did with the July 2009 Limited Edition kit from My Creative Scrapbook club (Robbie is on the MCS design team) . . . I just fell in love with the layout she did using Graphic 45 Fashionista Collection paper . . . so here is the layout for the “sewing box” . . .

The next layout I am sharing is of pictures of my daughter and granddaughter from their annual “mommy & me” beach trip to Santa Cruz, California . . . this layout was from a kit I purchased at Magic Moments & Keepsakes in Chico and was designed by Stephanie Southam who also happens to be a Close to my Heart consultant . . . as is usual I didn’t follow her design exactly . . . instead of using beige paper for the “turf” on the beach I used regular old sandpaper from my husband’s workshop . . . I think it makes the beach look more sandy, don’t you . . .

Layout number 3 is about my granddaughter getting ready for her 1st day of preschool . . . she was sooooooo excited (can you remember how excited you were very year . . . how you couldn’t sleep the night before and then you were up at the crack of dawn making sure that you looked perfect and that you would not be late . . . I sure do!!!!) . . . well Kyra has followed in her mother’s and YaYa’s footsteps . . . so being the good little YaYa I look pictures of her getting ready . . .

Inspiration for making the owls for this layout came from the paper itself . . . the owl below that was used on the layout came from a kit I purchased at Magic Memories & Keepsakes way back in May 2008 (only made the owl & used the strip of owl paper from that kit) and it had to be pieced together . . . and yes I did actually sew a running stitch around the edge of the owl . . . I decided to make a couple of baby owls for the second page of the layout – with one of them taking flight . . .

Inspiration for this layout came from a challenge from Inspired Blueprints using one of their drawings (www.inspiredblueprints.typepad.com) which I meant to enter . . . but I got very sick and missed the entry time . . .

Okay sooooooooo only one more layout to share . . . and this is a very special one to me . . . my friend Christie taught her last class in Paradise (before moving to Idaho at PSB) using Graphic 45 “Baby to Bride” paper . . . she designed 3 beautiful projects – a single page layout, a card and this wall hanging (which hangs above my computer at work and every time I look up I see my smiling/happy granddaughter and all it bright & sunny in the world) . . . thank you Christie . . .

Well that’s all for now . . . thanks for stopping by . . . hopefully my next blog will not be soooooo long and wordy . . . til next time . . . hugs and kisses . . .