Sunday, September 10, 2017

My musings on Irma

I often joke that I live under a rock, but of course we've been paying attention to Irma.  Max​ has worked tirelessly this week at Martin's planning production and deliveries of bread for those in the path of this mighty storm.  I was supposed to attend a women's retreat with ladies at my church, but plans got changed last minute due to this crazy hurricane.  I may need to rename of of my favorite LuLaRoe tops after this week.  ;) 

Today, we're doing some last-minute prepping in case we experience a long-term power outage.  I've got Bethel worship playing this afternoon as I work in the kitchen (and seriously, play the "You Make Me Brave" album if you need some peace in the midst of this literal storm...it's free for Amazon Prime members).

As I was listening to my favorite song from the album, I was reminded of Matthew 8:27:

The men were amazed and asked, “What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey him!”

Our God is so much bigger than this storm, but yet so many of us deny He even exists.  He could snap His fingers and Irma would instantly disappear.  But sometimes we need great reminders that we are not the Creators of this world, and that there is a God in heaven who desires our complete, whole-hearted worship of Him.  He loves us with an unfailing, undying love, and we ignore Him.  He paid the ultimate price so we could be with Him forever.  That kind of love is almost beyond our comprehension.  And we don't have to do a thing to earn that love.  It doesn't make sense from a human perspective.  That's the great mystery of our God.  He loves us so much, and all He wants is for us to rightly worship Him as the King that He is.  

Monday, May 4, 2015

I've Been on a Roll

I made it a mission to work through the entire "It Takes Two" kit, and I think I've done a pretty good job.  I have a few scraps and some bits and pieces left - and I may try to squeeze one more page out of them - or I may just put them in a bin for my husband.  (He likes to make cards for me, and it's easier for him to have his own stash of supplies.)

Warning: the remainder of this post is going to be really photo-heavy.  With that being said, here are the rest of the pages I've created with this kit:


Up first is an 8.5 x 11 layout.  I love the "forever" acrylic piece that came with the kit!


I've been trying to work on my layering skills, and you can see my little cluster of embellishments on this corner of the page:


This second page is also 8.5 x 11, and it features an older picture of my three guys.


I think this piece was my favorite on the entire chipboard sheet:


On this layout, I traded out my enamel dots for sequins.  :) 


Here's a 12 x 12 layout of my hubby and me.  I have trouble with word stickers, but I thought they worked well for the journaling on this page:


The little hearts on this page were cut using an old Stampin' Up! punch.  I'm trying to incorporate more older product and tools...it's not doing any good sitting on a shelf!


Two accordion-folded hearts came in the kit, and I only managed to use this one.  Sometimes larger embellishments are very difficult for me to place on a page...does anyone else have that problem?


This photo is from 2008!  I've had it on my desk forever, and finally got around to scrapping it.


The die-cut heart tag came with the kit, and I added a little hand-stitching at the top to tie in with the red on the rest of the layout.


Anyone else keep little strips of scraps in case they might use it on another layout?  Most of this page is made up of wee scraps.  :)


And here is the last page:


Once again, I'm working on my embellishment clusters:


This tag had a die-cut heart.  I backed it with a little piece of gold-foiled vellum:


I loved the arrows that came with the Crate Paper "Kiss, Kiss" collection.  On this layout, I used both a chipboard and layered sticker arrow.  They make me happy.  :)


You know what else makes me happy?  Sitting down and scrapbooking. 

Thursday, April 9, 2015

Another Layout with the "It Takes Two" Kit

I really stretched the Scraptastic "It Takes Two" kit.  Today I've got another video where you can really see my process in creating a layout.

Unfortunately, my camera battery died so I wasn't able to capture the end of the layout on video, but I think you can get a good idea of how I place my paper layers.




You'll notice some background noise in the voiceover.  My husband and boys were playing Mario Party across the house and my microphone is apparently VERY sensitive.  :)

Here's the finished page:



How do you create your layouts?  Do you measure all your papers, or just eyeball it like me?

Saturday, April 4, 2015

Thursday, April 2, 2015

And we're back!

Hi Nesters!  I'm so glad to be back sharing with you.  :)

My original game plan was to take a break for a few weeks to deal with the start of school (we homeschool + I've been teaching part-time at a local college) and a Disney vacation.  Then life just sorta got crazy so it turned into a multi-month break.  


Recently, however, I made the conscious decision to start scrapbooking again.  I don't know if you're anything like me, but when life gets busy, my hobby ends up being the first thing crossed off my to-do list.  And for a brief time, this may be necessary, and a good thing.  But I've found that when I go weeks (or more realistically, months) without taking any time for myself, I really start getting worn down.  And that's no good for anyone.  So after talking with my husband, I decided to start crafting again.  I still have a long to-do list, but I'm finding that I'm more relaxed when I take small breaks to play and get my mind off the craziness of life.


And that brings us to today.  :)


I pulled out a small pile of pictures and my February "It Takes Two" Scraptastic kit.  Using just a few extra items, I've scrapped 7 layouts in the past couple weeks.  


Here's a little video I made that walks through the kit and the first layout I created with it:




Here's a photo of that layout:



I'll be back shortly with more of the pages I finished, and also one more video.  Until then, here's the  stack of pages I created with the kit:


It makes me happy.  :)

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Summer Scrapbooking

Happy August, Nesters!  Today I have some layouts to share.  I subscribe to the Scraptastic kit club, and this month marks their 4-year anniversary.  To celebrate, they hosted a crop the weekend before last.  And amazingly, I finished four pages!  (I'm such a pokey scrapper.)

I used past kits to create each of the layouts, and honestly, that helps the process go so much quicker for me.  

The first page was part of a Bingo challenge; you had to include everything from a row, column, or diagonal of a Bingo card on your page.  I chose a diagonal (so I could use the free space in the middle!), and had to incorporate mist, multiple fonts, a border punch, and an older kit (this one was from last summer):



I even heat-embossed my title.  Fancy.  ;)


For the next page, I had to use at least four patterned papers.  I actually used five.  Yay for plain-ish patterned paper!


On this next layout, I had to choose a title from one of the Top 100 songs from 2010.  "Smile" is by Uncle Kracker, though I live under a rock and had never heard it before.  True story.


The last page had to be created using a certain color scheme.  This is the photo that we were given for inspiration:


And here's my page:


I have a feeling the color swatches were based on that patterned paper, because it was a perfect match.  


Before I go, I want to share a behind-the-scenes picture.  This is what I deal with every time I try to photograph layouts:


 It's a good thing he's so cute.  :)



Thursday, July 24, 2014

My Disney Album (Part 1)

Hi, Nesters!  I'm sorry I've been quiet for a couple weeks (I've been dealing with some side effects from my hypothyroidism), but I'm here tonight to share the first several pages in a vacation album I'm creating.

In the spring, we went to Disney World (it was a very generous Christmas present from my in-laws).  While I've traditionally scrapbooked several layouts from our trip (you can see a few of them here), I still had quite a few photos left over (some of which will probably never make it to a 12 x 12 page).  I decided to use a Simple Stories Snap album to scrapbook the rest of these pictures.  I purchased most of the Say Cheese line of products to use in this album - and aside from a couple sheets of older Jenni Bowlin alphabet stickers, that is all I'm using for this project.

This is the album:




It's the faux leather finish (I actually bought this half-price during an after-Christmas sale), and it reminds me of the We R Memory Keepers albums.

For the first page, I used one of the die-cut pages from the line:


For this page, I backed the die-cut card with a second 3 x 4 card for the first space.  The second space on top is another 3 x 4 card.  I backed my photo with a 4 x 6 card to fill the bottom (you'll see this throughout the album as I had most of my photos printed at the digital size).


For this spread, I added a few stickers on the left.  The bottom photo on the right-hand page has a transparency (from the Say Cheese line) on top of the photo.


The card with the 'H" has a small brad in the middle for a bit of dimension. 


On the left-hand side of this spread, I used several stickers (the alpha on top is from Jenni Bowlin).  On the right, I used a die-cut page from the collection and added the white doodling.


Here you can see the back of the die-cut page.  The opposite side has space for 4 x 4 photos (I trimmed mine, but this would be perfect for Instagram pics).


The blank page on the right will eventually hold a pocket with some tickets and receipts from our trip.


On the left, I adhered the photo to the page and doodled a small border around it.  The right-hand side has a few more stickers from the line.


In the top-left corner, I added a brad to the middle of a 3 x 4 card.  I kept the rest of this spread pretty simple.


And here's my last spread (for now!):


As you can see, I'm really trying to keep things simple here.  We're going back to Disney in September, so my goal is to get this finished before then.  

I also filmed a short video walking through the album.  The narration on the video is how I would talk through this album to a friend, so you get a slightly different perspective on the pages.  (And please excuse my voice - my allergies are acting up.)



snap disney album from Dawn Hopkins on Vimeo.
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