Kiwi Lane Designs Blog Hop

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog! If you are looking for the Kiwi Lane Designs Blog Hop you are at the right spot :)

I am so excited to once again be part of the Kiwi Lane Designs Blog Hop! I always have so much fun working with my designer templates and I had been itching to get my hands on the Chevron ones that came out towards the later part of last year.

My family and I went to Las Vegas in November and saw my alma mater Utah State take on the UNLV Rebels. It was really fun to see the Aggies win and I was able to capture some great family photos with my phone.

I love this Utah State paper with the "U State" logo on it and I thought it would be fun use with the Chevron template.

I actually took two of the Chevron templates and layered the same paper with it. Usually I would do two different papers, but I thought it would be something different with the same design. I actually ended up loving it!

I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE my Kiwi Lane templates and I think you should have some in your scrapbook supply collection as well.

If you would like to win the Tiny Wildflower set of templates you have to follow my blog and leave a comment below. I will pick a random winner on Monday and send them out ASAP.

Good luck! Make sure to leave a comment and then follow along with the rest of the blog hop. 

Remember a random winner from ONE of the participating blogs (including the Kiwi Lane blog) will be given a $25 gift certificate to the Kiwi Lane Shop for leaving a comment. The winner will be announced on the Kiwi Lane blog on Thursday, January 9th. So what are you waiting for?! Go hop along and enjoy all of the awesomness that is Kiwi Lane Designs.

Kiwi Lane http://kiwilane.com/here/blog/

Jill Cornelius http://brought-to-you-by-the-letter-j.blogspot.com/

Julie Ann Cordero www.ourlifeinscraps.blogspot.com -- YOU ARE HERE!

Melissa Dehne http://abitofscrappygoodness.blogspot.com/-- GO HERE NEXT!

Stephanie Umpleby http://sucw.blogspot.com/

Leslie Prinkki www.http://scrapsofmine.blogspot.com

Jennifer Nicholes http://craftingmoments.wordpress.com/

Jennifer Budge http://www.thingsthaticreate.wordpress.com/

Staci Jones http://scrapbookingischeaperthantherapy.blogspot.com/

Pool Kids

I haven't participated in the ScrapbookSteals.com mid week mojo recently so I thought I would give it a shot. I really like the sketch and I like how my layout turned out, but I feel like it might be missing something.

It is done now, though, and another layout completed in my album. I'm sure I'm just being overly critical of my own work. :)

Anyway -- here is the sketch for aquamarine 4:

And here is my interpretation: 

Kiwi Lane Design Team Call

Well ... I did it!

I have never applied to be a member of a design team before, but I decided to put myself out there an submit my work to be part of the Kiwi Lane Design Team. I would absolutely be an honor to be selected, but I know that if I don't get it this time around there are other opportunities in the future. But I REALLY REALLY want it!

I have posted some layouts on here that I have done using my Kiwi Lane templates, but I thought I would show you another project that I came up with -- a clothes pin wreath with a ghost (a KL template).

I bought the clothes pins at Dollar Tree (it takes about 48 clothes pins) and I spray painted them the three different colors. They are really easy to paint because I just leave them on the paper that they come on. Once they are all dry I clipped them onto an embroidery hoop (super cheap with a coupon at Michael's). I just used white cardstock to trace my KL ghost template. I wanted to jazz it up a little so I inked the edges and then put glitter and then created two little eyes with black glitter. I have this hanging on my front door so I wanted to make it a little sturdier so I ran it through my laminator once the eyes were dry. I added some tulle to the top and I think it's pretty darn cute! :)

Thanks for stopping by!

DT Doodles -- Week 28

How fun to participate in another week of Kiwi Lane's DT Doodles! I really love the layout I was able to create and I am so grateful for the inspiration that the ladies over at Kiwi Lane provide on a regular basis.

Here is the sketch for this week. It was to design a card, but I didn't have the right templates and I had the idea to turn it into a layout for each of the kids' birthday albums. I absolutely love it!

And here is my interpretation:

This is an 8x8 layout and I used the following templates:

*the arrow from Adventure

*ring 2 from Rings

*Tags

*Strips

I had a splat looking shape, but it just didn't work out for this layout. 

There is also journaling on the tag behind the photo.

I messed up my blog!

So in an effort to clean up my photos in my Google+ I decided to delete a few albums that I thought I didn't need -- one of them being the album associated with my blog.

Thus, I need to go back through and upload all of the photos.

Please bear with me as I go through that process. I'm going to start with the most recent and work my way backwards.

Thanks :)

Friend Making Monday

I didn't realize I was hungry until I started answering these questions! 

"If you’ve taken part in Friend Making Monday then you know the rules. If you’re new, please take a moment to answer this week’s question on your own blog then add your link in the comments section at: www.alltheweigh.com so we can all see your FMM questions and answers. Please invite your blog readers to add their links here too so everyone has to opportunity to be seen. The idea is to connect with other awesome bloggers so take a moment to post your own FMM post and comment on a couple of other posts. Now it’s time for this week’s topic!"

Foodie Questions

1. Do you make grocery lists?  Yes and I’m getting much better at sticking to it.

2.  Do you have a routine when shopping in your favorite grocery store?  I usually head to the non-perishable side of the store first and then I hit up the milk at the back of the store all the way up to the front to the produce.

3.  What is your favorite seasoning?  I don’t add a lot of seasoning to things so I guess I would just say traditional salt and pepper.

4.  What is the healthiest food in your fridge right now?  I just went to the store yesterday so I have lots of yummy healthy food like strawberries and grapes and lettuce and so on.

5.  What is the most unhealthy food in your fridge now?  I have a thing of cookie dough that is pushed all the way to the back. I bought it as part of a school fundraiser last October. It’s probably time to dump it.

6. What is the most exotic produce you’ve ever had? I’m not into too exotic of foods – I guess I would say a pluout. It’s a cross of a plum and an apricot.

*this is a stock photo from the web*

7. Tell us about your favorite local restaurant.  I really love a Japanese steakhouse that is local. I always get the chicken and the steak with fried rice. I give all of my mushrooms to my husband and I steal a lot of his onions. I love their salad and the dressing is delicious. It is very similar to Benihanas.

8.  What kind of pasta do you prefer (regular, whole wheat, etc.?)  I usually mix regular and whole wheat. I don’t have a preference. The type of pasta that I like is Penne.

9. If you could make one food calorie-free for an entire week, which food would you choose?  Kit Kat bars. I can’t get enough of them lately and I realize that they are 6 Weight Watchers points – more than I should be spending on candy.

10.  If you had to choose would you rather give up french fries or chocolate?  Oh goodness! I’m not obsessed with either of them so I don’t know which to pick. 

First night in a big girl bed

I know a lot of people transition their children out of their cribs for various reasons and at various stages. EM had just turned three and I was kind of tired of her being in her crib because we had everything to put together her big her bed so I just wanted to move her over. She had never tried to climb out of the crib (although she climbed into it often) and she slept just fine -- I really just wanted her to be in a big girl bed.

I took the initial and moved everything around in her bedroom (creating a massive mess!) and was able to set up the box springs and mattress just on the floor. The tricky part came trying to get the crib out of the bedroom. It was too wide for the doors so I had to have DC take it apart so we could move it out.

EM has slept like a champ in her big girl bed and we haven't had any problems. In fact, she will often just lay in bed awake in the morning just waiting for us to come get her. The funny thing is she doesn't get out of the bed -- at all. I say that now, but she really doesn't. There have been mornings where I hear her crying and I go in her room and she is holding herself because she has to go potty so bad. I want to just tell her to go open the door, but I figure she will understand that she can get out of the bed soon enough -- I don't want to speed up the process. I thought for sure when she figured out how to open doors a couple of weeks ago life as we knew it was going to change, but for now she still just stays in her bed like a good girl. I love her to death!

This is seriously one of my favorite layouts I have ever done. I love the sketch, I love the papers, I love the photos -- I just love how it all came together. I am definitely proud of it!

I used the left side of this Kiwi Lane sketch and then just changed it up slightly to make it my own.

The templates that I used were: 

Scallops mini 1A, 2A and 3A

Rings 3

The others were just strips that I cut. The photos were printed on a 5x7 and I cut them in half. 

The paper is the Freestyle line from Teresa Collins. It worked out perfectly for this layout and I have a ton of it still left so I'm sure you'll see it more in the future!

The two gold candies on the embellishment and from Pebbles in my Pocket and the large brads are from American Crafts.

The small alphas are from Making Memories and the larger alphas are from American Crafts. 

Seriously -- one of my favorite layouts ever!!!! Thanks for stopping  by :)