"The Quilter" card to remember a friend's mother

On Saturday I traveled to my hometown of Westernport, Md. to attend a memorial service for my friend's mother. My friend, Tom, delivered a sermon, he called a "sermeulogy" titled "The Quilter". This is posted on his personal blog, The Sermon Closet.

Tom says his mother, Goldie, "saw her quilts as a legacy, because each piece carried a piece of her life. That legacy extended far beyond the small scraps of fabric.

She took pieces of her life and wove it into others.

She brought the greatest gift a mother could bring. She took the good pieces of their lives and stitched it together."

I'm hoping my scrapbook pages carry a similar legacy.

To make the card, I first scanned the Teresa Collins paper "Notations" and sized it to my envelope. (The paper as is was too big to fit) I added the words digitally and a brown, thick "stroke". I printed that on cream cardstock. The colored pieces were cut from a piece of Circa 1934 Cosmo Cricket paper and adhered to the front. I added stitches to each of the large brown patterns.

Liebster Award

Last week I received an award from my scrappy friend Lynn at "Scrappyhappymom". Lynn makes beautiful creations in a romantic style with lots of pretty colors and always displays gratitude. To her I say thank you!

With this award, I am charged to pass it forward to 5 other bloggers. The first person is Marek at "Scrapden", who does beautiful work in layouts, books and mixed media, at which she is a true artist.

Anna at "Pictures N Papers" takes beautiful photos and designs to perfection.

Sue at "Suecraftstuff" makes layouts about her family and pet and also has talents in wood crafting which she says she inherited from her Dad.

My friend Carmen at "Scrap Joy" is just that. Shes takes great joy in her husband of many years, her son & fiance, her friends and siblings and her travels. Her layouts are fun.

My friend Mika at "This is Me!" says scrapping is the best thing that ever happened to her. On her blog, you'll find pages featuring her darling children, pretty cards and pretty Mika!

Finally, I'm featuring a picture of me Friday at work. I was exhausted that morning, arriving at work bright and early and trying to do a million things before traveling off site to a job fair. It was pouring down the rain and the wind was blowing, so I parked by the building, went into our kitchen, checked the serving area, conducted a production meeting, sorted and planned for use of leftovers, made nutrition labels--all in the course of barely an hour. When I went to my car, I had a ticket, so I found the officer doing our money run and pleaded with him to help me out. When I got to the job fair, I chugged an awful cup of coffee and did my thing. Bob's boss took this picture of me, knowing that pictures of family members of the newspapers' employees can't run in the paper, and printed it for me. While I'm not the governor of Arizona (pointing my finger) and I'm certainly not a queen, you make me feel that way with the comments you leave on my layouts.

Thank you my scrappy friends!

Rotten Girl Scouts

I was a 10 year Girl Scout. I have lots of fond memories. Camp Tioga, a 2 week overnight summer camp, was not one of them. The girls in the group shot took themselves way too seriously. My friends and I, on the other hand, toughened it out and tried to have some fun. We were the rotten scouts, life-long friends who turned out alright. These were the most memorable! It was 1965--I was 12 years old.

My Mother, on the other hand had lots of fun at Girl Scout Camp. The best thing about girl scout camp for her was that the boy scout camp was located just above it! Here's the layout I made in 2010 of my Mother and friends at Girl Scout Camp, 1941.

Blue Monday

"January 23, 2012 It's called 'Blue Monday', the most depressing day of the year. But here in Morgantown, the sun came out, the ice and snow melted and it felt almost like Spring. It felt so good with my loved one and beauty around."

Like most of you, I have lots of scrapbook supplies. I love combining these with digital elements to make a layout I absolutely love. For this layout, I scanned the actual basic grey paper so that I could match the tones in the patterns with that of my digital layer. I opened the digital element, a Basic Grey "texture" in Photoshop, gave it a color overlay in the blue tone and a stroke in the brown tone. I added my journaling in the brown tone, then printed it on a 8 1/2 X 11 sheet of cream cardstock.

Here's a detail shot of the printed digital layer.

The only thing that's missing here is the sound of the melting ice. It was an absolutely lovely day!

Wingter

Winter Sundays after Bob goes to work, I take the opportunity to open the kitchen window and photograph the birds at our feeders. I don my winter coat, sit on the stove away from the window and wait. It is peaceful (and unusual for me to "sit still").

Because I remove the screen from the window, I have to keep my one eye open to watch that my cat doesn't try to sneak outside:

Here's the window view from my camera (the other eye):

Enjoy your Sunday!

No Purchase Necessary

Chris mans the store, Arrow Gifts, on Sundays for Jenny's Mom, Barb. It's my chance to visit with my busy son, the college freshman. The store has WV memorabilia, unique gifts and cards, and two cats to keep him company. January 2012

Here's a layout I made in 2008 when Chris landed his very first job:

To Find Your Way

My husband is not only a talented photographer, but he's a talented orator. I first noticed when he was a teaching assistant in a class I took in 1973. For more than a decade he was a college instructor (a favorite of the students). He's the person everyone turns to for celebrations and eulogies. And his words aren't lost on prepared speeches. His prose to family would be poetry to many.

In a tearful farewell before Greg's move to Minnesota in 2010, Bob gave him a knife and a flashlight. The flashlight, he said, was to "find his way home." Here they are, together at home, in 2011.

And quoting the words from the song by Sugarland: "I will hold you in my arms until everying's alright. I will shine the light."

Last Rose of Summer

Michelle's Mother sent me lovely pictures of her as a child. I can understand these photos are very dear to her heart and there's much more story to them then I'll ever know. In this layout, the picture on the left is young Michelle with her string instrument. I am guessing the picture was taken in the early 1990s. The picture on the right was one I took in 2003 at her senior recital. I remember at the recital how fun is was for me to hear Greg officially introduced as "Michelle's boyfriend".

Journaling: "The Last Rose of Summer" was one of the numbers Michelle performed at her senior recital in 2003. She still enjoys this, playing the cello in community events."

I always journal on my layouts, though do not use my own handwriting. This beautiful piece of patterned paper from the Simple Stories collection had a perfect journaling spot. To get my type exactly on this spot, I first scanned the paper.

In Photoshop, I added my layers of type.

Then I deleted the layer of scanned patterned paper, loaded the actual piece of paper into the printer and printed it with the journaling.

You do have to take care to load your paper into the printer the way it prints it out (mine is top first, right side up).

I hope you stay warm this cold winter weekend!

Michelle Ma Belle

When I was thinking of a title for this layout of young Michelle, the first thing that came to mind was the Beetles song. I bet her parents sang that to her many a time! "Sont des mots qui vont tres bien ensemble" translates to "these are words that go together well". So here it is "Michelle ma belle"!

30 Years 1000 Words

Creating scrapbook pages helps me to keep my mind off of other things. Today I took our son Greg to the airport and I am sad, so I create and don't fret as much! This page features my nephew Brian at his 30th birthday party last summer. The digital elements, "Snap out of it" (2 Peas in a Bucket) were perfect elements. "A picture is worth 1000 words", and I added a few!

This is a layout I created 3 years ago when I left Greg at the airport. . . "pretty soon I'll be the one that's flying to see you". That will happen our next trip. . . for his marriage to Michelle in May!
I created the background to this one digitally.

Share Warmth

It was great for us to not only see both Greg and his fiance Michelle over the holidays, but it was great for us to see how close they really are. The slogan "Share Warmth" from Panera's restaurant fit the couple and the season.

The couple trivia was gathered from one of the bridal shower games we played Sunday. "1st Date: Harry Potter Chamber of Secrets" "Been a Couple: 9 Years" "The Proposal: New Year's Eve 2010" "Favorite Restaurant: Melting Pot" "Favorite TV Show: Doctor Who"

To make the background, I used a digital template by Betsy Tuma called "Weavers".
I scanned Greg's shirt to get the colors I wanted.

The template had separate layers:

I colored each layer to match his shirt by using the eye dropper tool and the blending mode "color overlay".

I printed this woven background on a light grey cardstock.

January 2012

Shower for Michelle

Michelle was home for 4 days over the holidays so we honored her with a bridal shower on January 1, 2012. Her friends Laura & Allyson attended along with her Godmother Sandra, my Mom, Sister Terry and niece Brittany. Bob took Greg, Chris & nephew Brian to the Mountaineer Brew Pub while we played games, had great food and fun. The boys joined us for cake.

The room was decorated with layouts I have made of Michelle & Greg. I was able to use my scrapping goodies for favors:

The tulip bulb color was "Christmas Dream".

Studio G Stamp on the embossed napkins.

I had game folders from Target in her colors of green and blue each with a die cut featuring their names.

I also made the invitations with digital elements.

This is Allyson's gift to Michelle. She treated her to a pedicure on New Year's Eve. Her toenails were a sparkly teal. The best friends has a delightful time.