Weekend Project

Every since I saw the Robot project that the uber talented Jennifer Beason made, I have been dying to make one of my on to hang on my son's door. He LOVES robots and was super excited to see this one come to life!

This is made out of several differnet Maya Road Chip pieces cut and formed to make the body parts. The paper is Cosmo Cricket Joy Ride collection.

Altered Composition Books

Right after school starts every year I stock up on those black and white composition notebooks. Target and Walmart will usually mark them down to .10 each! They are great to alter and give as a simple gift. I have given them to teachers, as journals for military personelle, teens, and to friends as recipe books. They are super easy to alter and are very multifunctional.

Here is the latest one I made. This one is VERY simple. I didnt alter it much at all becuase the cover paper is all it needs. This paper was a specialty one that I found at Hobby Lobby on clearance. It has the greatest texture and was perfect for this badge I had!

Here is one more, again same kind of paper, so I felt that it didnt need anything else.

Beautiful and Easy Peasey!

New Layout

I Made this layout as part of a sketch challenge. I have never used cardboard on my layouts and have been wanting to try it out. Now that I got my geet wet, I have some ideas for a couple of future layouts I would like to do. I also used papers from Crate Paper Brook, I really like this line!

These pictures are from our trip to Petit Jean Mountain last year. I am TERRIBLE about including pictures of myslef in the kids albums, but I am trying really hard to use more lately. We had a great time and are looking forward to a half way cool day that we can go this year (it has been HOT HOT HOT this week!) It is about an hours drive so we take a picnic lunch and spend the entire day.

Easy Strawberry Jam

I made several jars of this Jam with our strawberries we picked. It turned out SO yummy! I will be making cards for each of the kids teachers for their end of the year gift to post soon. They will each get a jar of this along with the card.

(Disclaimer: This is how I personally make my Jam, there are many variations and many techniques people use. I am a novice canner and tend to do make changes so that my children can participate)

Step 1: After washing jars and lids, place in sink full of boiling water. Let stand in hot water until ready to use.

Step 2: Prepare a large pot with enough water to cover your jars later. Put on stove and bring to boil.

Step 3: Place in large pot: 4 cups crushed strawberries (Let the kids crush them with a potato masher),7 cups sugar, and 1/2 teaspoon butter (This is to keep your jam from getting too foamy). Bring mixture to a full rolling boil on high heat stirring constantly.(This is where the kids need to step back and let Mom or Dad take over as it could be dangerous for little ones)

Step 4: Stir in 1 pouch liquid pectin. Return to full rolling boil and boil exactly 1 minute, stir constantly.

Step 5: Remove from heat and ladle quickly into prepared jars, filling to within 1/8th" of top. Wipe jar rims, and cover with 2 piece lids. Screw bands tightly. Place jars in prepared boiling water. Water needs to cover jars by around 1"; add boiling water if needed. (I like to keep my tea pot full of boiling water at all times while canning).Cover, bring to gentle boil. Leave 10 minutes.

Step 6: Remove from water onto hand towel and let stand at room temperature 24 hours. Store in cool, dark, dry, dark place up to 1 year. Refrigerate opened jars up to 3 weeks (In my house 1 small jar only lasts about a week!)

Throw a decorative bow around the rim and it makes a great gift! We will be using these as our end of the year teacher gifts. And, because the kids helped in the process, it makes it a much more personal gift.

Strawberry Pickin...

Last Friday we had the chance to visit a local farm for the first time this year. We love to go out there every summer and pick fresh fruit and vegetables. The kids enjoy watching the bees and chasing the dog and of course-EATING the goodies! The farmer teased that he was going to have to weigh Aiden when I paid for our strawberries becuase he ate so many!

I ended up with twice as many strawberries as I intended to get. With 5 kids and 4 adults picking it didnt take long to fill our "little pails" as Kylie called them. So, Saturday morning I set off to make starwberry jam. This was my first attempt at jelly so I was a little nervous, but OH DID IT TURN OUT YUMMY! It is to die for! This will definatly be added to my list of yearly to-dos!

I needed to share my labors with my dear friend who went and helped pick, so along with her jars of jam I made her this card. The Cosmo Cricket Garden Variety papers were perfect for this card.

I simply did a search for a strawberry pattern, printed it out and traced it onto my cardstock (folded in half to make the fold in the card). After that I covered it in patterned paper and dressed it up a bit. I used a button made by London Tierney on the top. I just LOVE her buttons-she is amazing! The inside reads "for being a sweet friend" using the Cosmo Cricket Tiny Type Alphas.

Papercrafts happens to be holding a call for their Gallery Idol 2010 contest. You are asked to submit a thank you card, so I posted this one to the gallery. There is a lot of amazing talent over there, but I can hope huh?

A Couple Layouts

This Friday night I went to a crop that was being held to raise money for an organization that is very dear to my heart. The CALL- Children of Arkansas Loved for a Lifetime. Their mission is to educate, equip and encourage the Christian community to provide a future and a hope for the children in foster care. It is a wonderful program that is doing great things in Arkansas and the foster care system.

It amazes me how much I get done in a 6 hour scrap-fest...NOT! I really enjoyed myself though and met a lot of great ladies that I hope to keep in touch with.

Here are thw two layouts I finished-Yes, I said two!

Bazzill Cardstock, Crate Paper Brook Paper, Crate Paper Brook Sparkle Chip, My Mind's Eye Diecut, handmade button from London Tierney etsy shop, Twine

Ocotber Afternoon Farm Fresh Papers and Journal Tag

These flowers are so easy to make and make a big impact on your layouts. I will have to post a short tutorial on those later.

A Time for New Beginings....

My heart is very heavy and sad this morning. With much thought, prayer, and discussion I have decided to close SBKC. My life is so crazy hectic right now and I have never been more behind on my scrapbooking then ever before. I know that sounds funny doesnt it? How could someone who owns a scrapbook business be so behind? Well, it is because all of my extra time was spent searching for products, coordinating kits, running a message board, contacting the design team, etc.

In other news, I have 2 extra houseguests this weekend and Aiden is in Heaven! My sister got the chance to go to HAWAII with her oldest 2 daughters to celebrate their upcoming graduations. I am so jealous! So, for the next 2 weeks I get the honor of keeping her youngest 2 little boys. They are 6 and 5 and Aiden is loving every minute of it! He needs boys his age to play with and 2 weeks staright of non stop fun is right up his alley!

Fabric Album

Hi Everyone! I know, I am TERRIBLE with keeping up with my blog, so I am going to make a promise right now to do better-so you all need to hold me to it-OKIE DOKE!

Today I was very fortunate and was able to take a class with Donna Downey. I have to admit here that I was very spectical of paying a bunch of money for a class, but I thought-Hey, when will you ever have this opportunity again? Boy, was I surprised! Not only did I enjoy every minute of it, but I learned a ton! I never would have tried any of this on my own. I plan to utilize everything I learned both in my personal projects and maybe a few things in the SBKC kits as well!

I will post the completed album later, but here is a sneak of a couple of the pages I have finished. (Sorry for the not so great pics, I'm trying to post this in a hurry!)