Warning! ... My son cracks me up (and drives me crazy sometimes too!) LOL!

My son makes me laugh sometimes! He can be such a goodball!

Credits:

April Coordinates Vol. 1 by Simply Tiffany Studios (Pixels & Co.)
Feelin Peppy by Just Jaimee (Pixels & Co.)
It's a Guy Thing by Design by Dani (Jessica Sprague)

Digi Scrapping with Friends (& a new kit at P&Co!)

Isn't life grand? I've met a bunch of really great people through digi scrapping websites, including at www.JessicaSprague.com. I got to know these awesome women through the forums and galleries and then eventually a bunch of us met in real life (IRL) at Spraguefest this past September. It turns out several of us live really close to each other and we've now starting to schedule IRL scrapping days at each other's houses. How fun is that?

One of the women in this picture (Lisa) and I were both on the creative team (CT) at Jessica Sprague but this past fall J*S disbanded their CTs. That was a sad day, but we're back together again on the CT at the awesome new digi site ... www.PixelsandCompany.com. It's such a great opportunity. There's so much talent (and so many cool people) hanging out over at P&Co! 

So ... back to scrapping details! Karen  Funk (@ P&Co) has an awesome kit coming out on Friday . It's called These are the Days and it's full of wonderful warm colors and fun elements. I used that kit (and a few others from P&Co) to create this page last night. (see list below) 

Credits:

These are the Days | Karen Funk

Storyboard 1 | Karla Dudley

Teenage Dreams (# tags) | Erica Coombs

In Good Company (rubberband tie) | Agnes Biro

Clear Essentials (staples) | Karla Dudley

December 2012 | Monthly Recap

I just thought I'd share with you my December 2012 Month Recap pages. I'm not sure why I jumped ahead a month, but now I've just got November 2012 left! I really do love looking back at all these random photos!

Credits:
Chill Out | Design by Dani
I Love Snow | Design by Dani
Torn Bits No. 2 | Creashens
Frame Essentials Insta Love | Karla Dudley
@ the Office Supplies (staples) | Splendid Fiins
2012 Calendar Cards | Splendid Fiins
Digi Essentials (Stitches) | Karla Dudley

Digi friends: Spraguefest

Spraguefest - held at Open Book in Minneapolis this past September - was a wonderful opportunity for me to meet IRL (in real life) digi scrapping friends who I had gotten to know through Jessica Sprague! SpragueLand friends come from around the world and for this gathering came from around the U.S. It was a wonderful couple of days. Ann Marie and Lisa (in this photo) and others who I met at Open Book live very near me. How wonderful for me! Now we get together on occasion and scrap in real life!

Credits:

Muse paper packs and elements | Karla Dudley

Painted Edges | Karla Dudley

Photocentric v. 2 | Crystal Livesay

In Stitches Neutral Basics | Robyn Meierotto

A New Beginning (lace) | Gennifer Bursett

Hanging with the Cousins/Siblings

I just realized I forgot to post this page. I started scrapping it ages ago. (A couple months at least.) I never finished it and completely forgot about it. I ran across it the other day and added just a couple of finishing touches and called it done. Just thought I'd share - it was an afternoon/evening spent at my sister's house hanging out with the cousins/siblings. A good time!

For this page I used:
Simply Tiffany Studios: Barely There Brushes
LivE Designs: Creasers
Splendid Fiins: Splendid Template 5, Very Krafty Mixed Bag, Very Krafty Neutrals, Evidence Date Stamps, Delicious Berry Blue, Brilliant Full Collection and Keaton's Closet Alpha.

Hmmm ... looks like a lot of product by Splendid Fiins. I LOVE her designs!

Evidence of Everyday Life ... the good stuff

Evidence of Everyday Life ... 

This is the good stuff.

Digi Stuff: 

Splendid Fiins: Evidence Date Stamps and Hot Mess

How Does Your Garden Grow? (Our 1st time ever container vegetable garden)

At my daughter's urging we had a container vegetable garden this past summer. It was our first try. She's wanted to have a vegetable garden F-O-R-E-V-E-R, but for those of you who know our house and our neighborhood ... that is just not an option. We have WAAAAY too many trees and too much shade. So ... we tried a container garden this year. We could just put the pots where we had sun. It was awesome! We had so much fun with it.

(In hindsight - as I scrapped this page - it sure would have been nice had I taken a picture of the full garden at the END of the season when everything had grown big instead of early on when everything was just a baby plant. Hmmm ... next year! LOL!)

For this page I used:
Simply Tiffany Studios Artistic Photo Masks (Pixels & Co.)
Gennifer Bursett's Mo Awesome Papers (Pixels & Co)
Katie Pertiet's: Collagable LT No. 10 and Summer Words (Designer Digitals)
Jodi Lee's Vintage Floral Texture Set 4 (Jessica Sprague)

Cousins make the best Friends

I created another page today using Splendid Fiins' product. It was a super quick page ... I just wanted to show off a fun photo I took of the cousins this past Thanksgiving weekend. I sure do love these kids!

For this page I used:

Splendid Fiins' Mixed Bag Epoxy Stickers, @ the Office paper pack 2, Evidence label stickers, Brilliant full paper collection and Classic Album Set

I also used Katie Pertiet's awesome word art from a Bracketed Sentiments kit

Digi scrapping IRL with some local J*S friends

I spent the day today scrapping IRL with some local friends I met from Jessica Sprague. It was great fun - and it was productive too! Love it!

This is the first page I completed today. It was about my daughter getting ready to start middle school. It was fun for her. She sure does LOVE middle school!

I used a bunch of Splendid Fiin's stuff to create this page. I've gotta tell ya - I love Splendid Fiins' digi designs!

I created this page using:
Splendid Fiin's:
Evidence Date Stamps; Evidence Polaroids; @ the Office paper packs 2 and 3; Go Big Template
The fonts I used were Rough Typewriter and Adler

New Christmas Themed Timeline for Facebook

I made a quick new timeline image for my Facebook account. I seldom change my timeline so I thought it would be fun for a change to have a seasonal cover. Merry Christmas!

The digi supplies I used were:
Design by Dani: A Lot Like Christmas
Nancie Rowe Janitz: Holiday Magic
Karla Dudley: 25 Days of Christmas (wordart)

Proof: Grownups can go out sometimes too!

Yup. It's true. Grownups can go out sometimes too. Going out is not just for the kids anymore! Maybe not so much when the kids were little, but as they get older we go out sometimes. How weird is that?! Ha!

Thanksgiving. A family weekend. We had no plans Friday night (my sister and her family were coming Saturday) so we decided we, the Johnsons & Oma would go to a movie. Since the adults & kids couldn't agree on a movie the kids were happy to stay home and we adults went to see Life of Pi in 3D. We’d planned on going to a 6:30 show but could only get tickets for 9:30 so we had appetizers and drinks at Toby Keith’s then Oma, Michelle & I shopped until movie time. Sunday night Karen & Oma were staying over so they, along with Lauren, joined Scott & me for drinks at JJ’S Wine & Coffee Bar (our Sunday night tradition). What a great weekend!

My digi supplies:
Jessica Sprague: Template 9
Echo Park Hybrids: Orchard Lane paper packs
Katie Pertiet: Buttoned Up
Michelle Coleman: Cinco De Mayo

Merry Christmas! ... Our Christmas Card is ready to print!

I did it. Yay!  I designed our Christmas card tonight. Over Thanksgiving weekend I made a card for my in-laws to send out and then I designed a card for my Mom. It made me think ... hmmm, maybe I should get going and make one to send out for my family too. So I did!

FYI, I always print our cards at Costco. They're great - and quick! I'll  even be able to pick 'em up tomorrow and send 'em out. Awesome!

Another FYI, Dani Mogstad (Design by Dani) came out with an awesome Christmas kit this week. It's called "A Lot Like Christmas." It's in large part what I used for my card. Dani has actually got a several great Christmas kits if you want to check 'em out over at JessicaSprague.com.

Merry Christmas!

List of credits:
Design by Dani: A Lot Like Christmas
Lori Whitlock: Christmas Eve
Katie Pertiet: Loosely Labeled Dates
Karla Dudley: Digi Essentials (stitches); 25 Days Titles (Merry Christmas wordart)

gooey. greasy. grimey. pumpkin guts.

The carving of a 52 pound monster pumpkin ... 

This is by far the largest pumpkin we've ever gotten. It was the day before Halloween and we had yet to carve a pumpkin or put up any Halloween decorations. (We were - I should probably say I was - kind of a dud this year I'm sorry to say.) We did buy candy though! It's a tradition that my husband carves pumpkins with the kids every year. My son wasn't interested in carving a pumpkin this year but my daughter definitely was. She's the one who picked out this giant pumpkin. I thought the pumpkin was a bit large, but I told her that as long as she was strong enough to carry it we'd get it. She could barely carry it, but she did manage. {She was pretty excited about it.}

It was funny ... when we got home she was going to carry the pumpkin in the house, but since her brother came out to check it out she let him carry it in. He carried it with ease - didn't struggle even the slightest bit - the way she did. I think she was pretty impressed with him (or else it might have just made her feel weak). I choose to think that she was impressed with her big brother! LOL!

To create this page I used:
Design by Dani's That Old Black Magic kit
Katie Pertiet's Photo Clusters No. 31, Fine Lines Borders 8, Worth Repeating Fall & Stitched Border
Nancie Rowe Janitz's Oct 31 Brush Set
and finally the fonts Very Fine Serif and Marketing Script

Oh ... I said we were duds. That's not completely true. When my daughter got home from school on Halloween she grabbed my husband's roll of "Caution" tape and essentially wrapped up our entire yard with it. It was kind of fun actually. I'll show you a picture of our yard (and the kids). I think all we were missing was a CSI-style outline of a body in the yard. Maybe next year!! LOL!

Halloween - A Randomly Awesome Person

My daughter wasn't planning on going out trick or treating this year. She wanted to hand out candy to the neighbor kids. The night before Halloween she had a change in plans. A friend texted her and asked her to trick or treat with her in her neighborhood. So, last minute, she threw together this fun mish mash outfit and went as (and I quote!) “a randomly awesome person.” What fun!

Here's what I used to create this page:

Nancie Rowe Janitz: Oct 31 Brushset & Paperset; Vintage Hallowe-en; Dreamy Photos & Cowgirl Textures
Jodi Lee: Vintage Photo Textures
Carina Gardner: Spiders Web Stamps
Queen of Quirk: Jeepers Accents (tree)
Michelle Coleman: Halloween Brushes
Katie Pertiet: Halloween wordart freebie 10-31-10
Traci Murphy Designs: Mask Your Pics 1
Gina Cabrera: Wave Stitching
Font: Texas Hero

Hanging with the Family

I made a quick companion page to go with a scrapbook page I created a couple of weeks ago with yet another of the many photos I took when we went up to Bemidji for the weekend to celebrate September family birthdays. It's always fun when pages go together so quickly!

What'd I use on this page? Click here for a full list of credits.

For fun I thought I'd share with you the way the two pages are going to look together...

The shortest person in my family

It's happened. I'm officially the shortest person in my family. It's kinda weird. (OK, I'm not much shorter than my daughter but she is taller than me now.) What's happening? My kids are all supposed to be little. I guess since they're both teenagers, it was bound to happen sooner or later.

I created this layout after I saw a recent page by Linda (Lindsan). I thought ... hmmm ... I should design a similar page for this recent photo of Lauren and me. I love all the talent in the scrapbooking galleries ... there's such awesome inspiration out there1!

What'd I use to create this page?

Splendid Fiins: Teen Add On Papers; Stamped Circle Brushes; Evidence Paper Pack; Make a Mess Spatter Overlays; @ the Office Supplies 1 (date stamps); Kinda Sketchy Template No. 1
Queen of Quirk: word art

Guy Time!

There are two awesome new kits coming out at Jessica Sprague on November 19th. (Well, actually there are a lot more than two kits coming out that day, but this page uses two of them!) For this page I  used LivE Designs' awesome Foto Focus Album set (a set of templates to create an ENTIRE album ... how cool is that?!) and Pink Paislee's Season of Change kit (a kit filled with wonderful warm fall colors and textures ... fabulous!)

So, what's going on in these pictures you ask? Well, my side of the family all got together for an out of town getaway over MEA weekend. We rented a cabin on a lake and in the afternoons and evenings hung out at the cabin. During the days, the women and girls did a bunch of shopping and the guys golfed. Actually, on Friday Scott and Tim golfed and Grant and Mitch came to town with us. They wandered around a bit as we shopped and then went to a movie (an action packed movie of course!). Saturday there was NO WAY they were going to go to town with us again so they went golfing with the dads. Grant has golfed before but this was Mitch's very first time. They both enjoyed it. Yay! Hopefully the guys will golf together more often!!

A big thanks goes to my hubby who took these pictures on his iPhone. After I got a Facebook notification while I was shopping and I saw that Sheldin posted a pic on FB of him and Mitch, it made me think I wanted some photos of Scott and Grant. I called Scott and asked him to take some photos for me. He snapped a couple photos of Grant and had the guys take a pic of the two of them. Yay!

Credits are here.

InstaLove - Modern Masters - Hurricane Sandy

I put this page together tonight while watching the TV coverage about Hurricane Sandy. All I can say is wow. I wonder what long term devastation this storm is going to cause. I wonder how people are holding up right now - as I'm typing this blog post. I wonder what we, in the midwest, can do to help. I wonder what I'll see/read on the news in the morning. As I put the finishing touches on this page we watched David Letterman. Because of the storm he had no studio audience. That was so weird. I wish everyone good luck.

Now ... on a quick scrapping note ... yet another page using Modern Masters. Apparently I'm in the groove. When I saw this template I had an idea what I wanted to do with it. Then, on top of that, Audrey Neal (Audacious Designs) at Design House Digital is having a retirement sale, so this afternoon I did some shopping and purchased her Insta Frames (and the cool Uppity Birdy font I also used on this page). I knew just the pictures I wanted to scrap with these frames ... and that I wanted to use the Modern Masters. I guess I just had to scrap a page tonight.

Now I'm tired and I'm off to bed. Anxious to hear the news in the morning.

Click here for a list of credits.

So much to be thankful for

About two weeks ago, as we were heading out one Sunday morning to go to my nephew's confirmation ceremony, I asked my family REALLY nicely if they'd come outside with me to take a family picture. They're always (ok, almost always) good about that. (I do have teenaged kids though so sometimes they're just-not-in-the-mood to pose for a picture. I can understand that.) We set up the tripod and grabbed the remote shutter clicker (what ARE those things called?) and snapped some pictures. We had some competition over who got to use the clicker thingy (again, what's it called?), but we got a picture of us that I liked. Yay!

I used one of Simply Tiffany's Studio's new Modern Masters templates for this page.  I changed it up up a fair amount to "make it mine" but I love the way the page turned out. Usually, when I use the Modern Masters, I end up with a much more graphic style page. It's kinda fun like this too.  (I LOVE the Masters template series!). I paired my layout with Design by Dani's Softly Falling fall kit and voila ... so much to be thankful for!

For all of you on the East coast. I hope you're staying safe with the storm. We've got the news on now and it's really pretty scary out there. Good luck all!

Click here for a full list of credits for this page.

A weekend at the lake ... Cedar Point Resort

I looked out my window at work today and what did I see? Snow. Yup. Snow. OK, it is the end of October so it's completely reasonable that we'd have snow but I'm JUST NOT READY FOR IT! So ... putting this page together and looking at this random collection of photos that I took one weekend this summer that we spent with the family up north at Cedar Point Resort makes me even less ready for winter. I want just a couple more weeks of summer! That's not asking for too much is it? (FYI, the snow is gone already so it didn't last! I knew it wouldn't. Yay!)

On a scrapping note ... Tiffany Tillman (Simply Tiffany Studios) just came out with another set of awesome Modern Masters Templates. She never ceases to amaze me with these templates. I love this clean blending/masking style. I think I might be drawn to them because so often I use a large photo on the page and I LOVE LOVE LOVE large focal photos.

FYI, talking about Modern Masters ... last year I created an ENTIRE book for our spring break vacation to San Francisco using the first two collections of modern masters and I have to tell you, it might just be my favorite photo book. Anyway ... check out the whole Modern Masters collection at Design House Digital!

A full list of credits can be found here.