Scrap That Baby blog hop winner!!

Normally I'm old fashioned and actually draw a name from a 'hat' but today I'm running short on time. So I used old-faithful, random.org.



And according to random.org, our winner is.............

REBEKAH!!!!!

Rebekah, please send your address to tdsmith22@gmail.com and I will get your prize out to you ASAP!

Thanks everyone for playing along and following my blog! =)

Summer has arrived... briefly

Oh gosh y'all.. the high today is supposed to be 86!! A whole 86 whopping degrees?!!! Yes please! Hahaha.. I know that that's not REALLY hot, but considering that the highest temperature before the past 2 days was only about 72, I'd say it's worth blogging about! Too bad it's only brief and will be back down to a high of 59 on Saturday. Talk about depressing.

So since it's been so nice out, I haven't done any scrapping for the past few days. I have taken plenty of pictures for scrapping though! I'll share just one of my little man enjoying his water table!



Well I hope y'all are enjoying your week so far! Don't forget about the DT Call at Scrap For Therapy!

Design Team Call at Scrap For Therapy.

We are looking for 4 new designers to join us as we continue to work at getting Scrap For Therapy started! This is our second ever DT call, and we will be making many changes this term. Scrap For Therapy is a scrapbooking forum, and we will be incorporating our brand new blog into it starting this term. The DT term will be 3 months, starting October 1, and running through December 31.

Requirements: Each DT member will be required to complete a layout every other week based on the sketches given to you. Sketches are posted all at once a few weeks before they are due, giving you plenty of time to finish them. Also, DT members will post challenges, tutorials, and participate in any events that we may have going on. We understand that sometimes life gets in the way, we just ask that you communicate with us and we will be understanding.

We are unable to compensate you at this time. Our blog and forum is just for the love of the craft!

To submit, send the following to scrapfortherapy@gmail.com:
1) Name
2) Links to blogs and galleries
3) A brief bio
4) Design team experience (none is required!)
5) Why you would love to be apart of this team
6) At least 3 projects showing your current style and ability.

Please note: Preference will be given to those who create an account on the forum and are active so that we can get to know you better.

Forum
Blog

Boooo.. it's Monday, but yay for sketches!

Wow this weekend flew by!! We had a great weekend full of lots and lots of family time! We shopped pretty much all day on Saturday for some new clothes (yay!). By the way, the clearance section at Old Navy is a MUST right now! They actually had shorts for $1.97! And then yesterday was absolutely BEAUTIFUL! It was warmer, though the wind was still a little chilly. We spent a lot of time outside playing with the little man though. The one thing about Monterey is that the parks here are amazing. We took Jonah to the Dennis the Menace park today, which we go to a lot. It's an awesome park, so if you have kids and ever visit the Monterey area, it should definitely be added to your agenda! Oh and I got a haircut! =) I like it a lot! My hair hasn't been this short since before Jonah.

Enough about that though. It's Monday. That means sketches! First up, we have Sketch 214 from Scrapbook Challenges.

And here's my take:


Next up, we have sketch 13 from Scrap For Therapy. SFT is a brand new forum that I've been helping out with in the past few months. I've been trying my hand at designing sketches. Though I'm still not very good at it, I'm designing SFT's sketches. Head to the forum and check it out and try out the sketches to be entered into the drawing for the monthly prize!

And here is what one of our wonderful DT member Katie Tennis did with it:


I sure do hope you all enjoyed the Scrap That Baby blog hop! (Winners will be announced on the 25th!) I REALLLLY hope you all enjoyed it.... because there will be 2 more coming your way here soon, within days of each other. Keep a look out for those at the beginning of September!

Who doesn't love a good blog hop??

I told you all that Wednesday would be fun!! =) BTW, I'm scheduling my post 15 minutes before the hop starts. It officially starts at 8am EST.

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Welcome to the Scrap that Baby's Sweet Summertime blog hop!!

Thank you so much for hopping along on our first ever blog hop!

If you didn't come from Maya's blog or you popped upon this blog and didn't realize we were blog hopping you need to go to Scrap That Baby and start the HOP! You will need to comment on ALL of the blogs to be eligible for the grand prizes listed on the main site! Plus so many of our awesome designers are giving away a prize on their blogs as well. You will not want to miss out. There are MANY MANY chances to win!

Our theme for this blog hop is SWEET SUMMERTIME!! The members of our design team will all be sharing fantastic summer projects, stories, tips or ideas for keeping cool and having fun in the summer with a baby along.

Here are a few ideas by Dani (That's me! lol):

This layout is from a trip to the beach back in April. It was actually warm then!


The format for this hop said that we could insert stories. I just want to say that I don't have any summer stories including little Mr. Jonah man. Why? Well because, being Southern, my idea of summer includes intense heat, humidity, and spending time by the lake. Here, on the central coast of California, we've barely reached 70 degrees, and those days are rare. Soo our summer this year has just consisted of hikes and doing things indoors. But next year we'll be in Texas in the summertime!

I do have some tips though. Some of you may know, my other hobby is couponing. I'm always looking out for good deals. Throughout the summer, you can find coupons for general summertime items like sunscreen and bug spray, as well as even some apparel coupons like from target.com. A lot of times the coupons won't expire for months, so hang onto them until summer is winding down and products go on clearance. Use this opportunity to stock up for next year! Same goes with summer toys and clothes for the kiddos!

And lastly, I want to share a recipe for one of my favorite summer foods. Sadly, I don't have a picture.. but trust me, it's delicious and my little man likes it too!

Spaghetti Salad
1 lb spaghetti
1 bottle Italian dressing
1 large tomato
1 bunch of green onions
1 large cucumber
vegetable seasoning
garlic powder
onion powder
celery seed

Cook spaghetti according to directions on package. Meanwhile, chop tomato, green onions, and cucumber. Once the spaghetti is drained and cooled, mix in the veggies, Italian dressing, and spices. Mix well. Refrigerate. Serve cold.


But wait, there's more! In addition to the prize you can win from the main blog, I am also hosting my own giveaway! Become a follower of my blog and comment that you did, and you will be entered to win 10 various KI Memories papers and some KI Memories embellishments.


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Our blog hop run from today, August 18th until August 22nd . Invite your
friends to play for extra entries. You must comment on all the blogs for a chance at the main prize
The Scrap that Baby blog will be drawing for prizes on Wednesday August 25th! .

The next stop on the blog hop is........ BRANDI!

Habitat for Humanity warehouse sale.

Daniel and I were driving to the post thrift store the other day (which we found out is only open 2 days a week for only 5 hours..lol), and we saw a sign for a warehouse sale. Curious, we followed the signs and saw that it was a Habitat for Humanity sale. Apparently, they take the stuff that they take out of old houses and sale it at their warehouse. AWESOME, right?! I figured that this would be the perfect place to find shelves for my scraproom or even some things that I could turn in to craft projects! I was sooo excited! Turns out, we made it just in time because they were about to close. That made it even better, because everyone that goes to these types of sales knows that at the end of the day the seller is wayyy more likely to bargain with you. And EVEN BETTER than that is that they have this sale once a month! WOO!!

Anyways, in the first little section we found a desk (well, actually 2 exactly alike). The moment I saw it, I knew it was perfect. If life were a movie, the desk would be glowing and angels would be singing! LOL! It was originally priced at $75, but had been marked down through the day. When we got there, it was $30. I sent Daniel, the alpha male, to bargain with the guy and we ended up taking it home for $20! I know that it needs a new paint job and some TLC, but for now I'm using it. I figured that when we get to our next duty station (where we will be buying a house!!!!!), I will finally get to decorate my scraproom the way I want, and will paint it then.

So here's my new and improved scrapping area!


And here's the other side, still a little cluttered from all of the rearranging I've been doing.


Not to be outdone, Jonah just HAD to have his own little desk too ;)


So I encourage you all to see if your local Habitat for Humanity chapter has these awesome warehouse sales!!

Getting back into the swing of things...

I think I'm finally, finally, FINALLY getting back into the swing of things, though it hasn't helped that we've been without internet service for 3 days. I've been scrapping though.. and it has been SOOO much fun! I actually did a layout today, but I will be sharing it on Wednesday. Why Wednesday, you ask... well check back in on Wednesday and find out. ;) I promise you won't be disappointed.

A new prompt was posted at Scrap That Baby yesterday!! The prompt, Step By Step, is to scrap baby walking, crawling, rolling, or any other way they can be 'on the move'! This prompt was actually ALMOST perfect for me, as Jonah just took off and started walking the other day. He had had first steps already and would walk a few at a time, but he's walking at least 8-10 steps at a time now. Anyways, I didn't have pictures printed of that in time, so my layout is of him crawling in the sand on a trip to the beach back in April.


And since today is Monday, a new sketch was posted at Scrapbook Challenges! I really wanted to do this one REALLY badly, but since the internet was out, I couldn't get online to get the sketch, or to post it for that matter. I know this is definitely one I will go back and do in the future because it definitely fits my style! =)


And last but not least, my project was featured on Momenta's blog today. It's just a sweet and simple layout featuring the Family Ties collection, which happens to be my favorite Momenta collection!

Don't forget to check back in Wednesday for some FUN! =)
-Dani

My Scrapbook Expo experience.

Well first off, I decided that it was a good idea to take Daniel's backpack to carry my supplies. BAD idea... sooooo bad. LOL! My back is still sore. But hey, I may have lost a pound or 2 just from carrying that thing around!

Anyways, as I said before, I took 2 workshops. The first, GCD Studios Top Techniques for 2010, was pretty much a waste of time. It was pretty slow and I didn't learn anything new, which wasn't the teacher's fault though. The techniques they did were paper tearing, a little pocket mini album (that we didn't have time to finish, so they are supposed to send us instructions... still waiting), a paper flower, paper weaving, and a ribbon technique. The kit was good though and I won a few sheets of paper and some alphas, so I'm happy. The second class, SEI's Everything About This Class POPS, was pretty good! I'm sad that we didn't get a chance to get to the little album in the box that is pictured in the description, but we got very detailed, photo instructions for it. The teacher was awesome and made the class enjoyable. And we learned some good tips for cards.. which I desperately need because I'm HORRIBLE at cards. AND the kit was very generous and equally awesome! Not to mention, I won an album kit in the class!! Overall, the workshop experience was nice, but next time I will choose more carefully. I definitely recommend SEI classes though. =)

The show floor was awesome too! It was almost scrapbooking overload for me! I enjoyed quite a few make and takes, especially the one at the Tattered Angels booth. I was actually inspired and have decided that I'm going to give the whole 'vintagey' thing a try! Anyways, I spent way too much money, naturally, but I also have gotten that little kick that I was looking for to start scrapping again!! =)

Scrapbook Expo

Tomorrow morning, I'm getting up bright and early, picking up a friend, and heading to Santa Clara for the Scrapbook Expo!! I've never been to a big scrapbooking event, so this will be a first! I'm pretty excited. I'm doing 2 workshops. First I'm doing the Top Techniques for 2010 class from GCD Studios and then taking the Everything About This Class POPS from SEI. I'm hoping to learn some things, and also get inspired to scrap a lot more. I just haven't been feeling it lately. Sooo.. anyone else going to be there?

Also, I have great news!! One of my layouts is in this month's issue of Scrapbook News and Review! Go check it out! It was for the military layouts call. =)