I'm back!!!

I really didn't disappear or stop scrapping or crafting since my last post. Some of the things I can't post since they are gifts.

A friend of mine sent me this information from her friend and I wanted to pass it along here. . Her friend, Michelle, and owner of A Million Memories has sent out and request. It's such a worthy cause for all of our "I'm going to get around to that someday" supplies in our drawers and closets. I hope you will be able to contribute anything at all and send them to some kids who love to craft and need a little fun in their days!

Read her story below:

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When my daughter Chloe was 4 years old, she was diagnosed with Leukemia. She spent several months in the hospital when she first began chemotherapy. For several weeks during this time in the beginning, she was unable to walk, she would hardly talk and was basically a little zombie. The ONLY THING that brought her any sense of joy at this period in her life, was doing craft projects. She was sometimes unable to leave her room and the social workers and play room attendants would bring projects to her room for her to work on. It was a really dark place in her life (and ours), but doing little art projects gave her a purpose every day.

I'm telling you all of this because doing arts and crafts means a lot to children who are stuck in the hospital ~ especially during the holiday season when they cannot be home with their families. What I would like to do is do a scrapbook drive (same as last year, if you were involved in that), where what you do is basically clean out your scraproom and throw into a box the items that you know that you will not use. We are just donating this stuff to kids, so they don't mind the old Jolees and Suzy's Zoo stickers or the ancient Debbie Mumm papers that you never threw away. THEY actually appreciate them. LOL. So, if you would like to participate, please box up your stuff and send it to us.

Chloe is scheduled for her next hospital procedure in early - mid December (probably about 12/7). When we go in, I would like for her to be able to take the donations with her.

All donations can be sent here:

Chloe Quinn Scrapbook Drive
2378 Charlemagne
Long Beach, CA 90815

Thanks so much! If you do this, believe that you are doing something special for a sick child that will truly appreciate it!!

Day 13 - Collage + Brush

Whew! This one required concentration. But it's a lot of fun.

The Final Project Challenge:
Leave all the photos except one black & white and add some text.

I liked the way this looked I thought I'd do another one. Plus I needed the practice!

Our family went apple picking on Monday. Of course you can't go apple picking and NOT take pictures :D

The Challenge:

So now that this class is over I'm going to take a Basic Photo-Editing class. Something I've wanted to do for YEARS!

Having fun with Photoshop again!

Yesterday our family went over to the local Airplane Museum to go see the WWII airplanes. So I just played with some of the techniques I learned in my recent Jessica Spraque class. Let me know what you think!

Original photo ~ WWII Fighter Plane - Hog Wild Gunner


Used Photoshopp to create a vintage look


Original photo - WWII Bomber Plane


Played with Photoshop to create an overexposed old picture

A few scrapbooking pages

The 1st three are ScrapJammies kits but with my own little twist added to them.

For this layout I replaced the kits swirly chipboard with some bling from my stash. This is one of my favorites from my daughter's wedding. The left page on the sketch was a smaller picture with some journaling but I thought this 8 x 10 pic was perfect!


Another one where I added the bling words to describe my kiddos.


Cut this one down to 8.5 x 11

This layout is from Lickey Split Scrapbooks
I'm usually not much of a paper-piecing style. But this was a fun kids to put together.

Day 12 - Storyboards

Wow!! All these techniques that impress me, I can't believe how easy they are accomplished!!

Janice, let me answer your questions. Yes! Absolutely, I would LOVE to teach you how to do these things. It will help me to remember them too. Since you're working, let me know what works for you. I haven't yet sent them to Costco to be printed. That's on my "to do" list soon. I'll let you know when I do. And thanks for the compliment. I'll let Rob know that my "elixirs" (aka moisturizers) are worth the $$. ;D

Day 11 - Selective/Spot Recoloring

This is super, dee duper easy!! And LOTS of fun to do too. This is a photo of our adorable Granddaughter. It is SO her ~ she LOVES flowers. So much so that she actually pulled one out of the ground, roots and all! Oops!!! We promptly replanted it. :D

Day 10 - Project Start to Finish

Boy, this one was F.U.N.!!! I am learning so much! And one of my favorite pictures of my 2 oldest children.

Day 9 - Edge Burn

I think I need to work on this technique some more. Or pick a different picture.

Day 8 - Type

Ooooo, I LOVE this technique. I can so see myself using this a lot!

Day 7 - Self-check

Aka-POP QUIZ!!!!! I really wanted to test my knowledge so I wrote the answers down and I was happy to learn I got 100%!! So the "old dog" can learn "new tricks".

1. What do you call the special type of file that supports transparency and that can be layered over other images? .png file
   
2. Which Photoshop tool do you use to both paint and stamp images? brush tool
   
3. How can you add an effect to your photo (such as desaturation or a sepia tone) without affecting your photo layer itself? adjustment layer
   
4. When you use a shape that causes another layer to conform itself to that shape, what's it called? clipping mask
   
5. What are the steps to accomplish #4? point the curser on the line of the layers and hold the alt key and click
   
6. What do you call any image file that you add as an overlay to your photo to give it added depth?texture
7. If you want to decrease the effect of an adjustment layer on your image or item, which do you do? A. decrease the opacity of the adjustment layer B. duplicate the adjustment layer C. change the blending mode to multiply. A
   
8. Which adjustment layer do you use to reduce the color in a photo? hue saturation
   
9. Name one blending mode that adds contrast to darker colors and lightens up lighter colors. Soft light or Overlay
   
10. Name the blending mode that hides all WHITE areas of a layer, and increases the darkness of dark areas. Multiply

Day 6-TTV

I liked this technique. It give you a worn, faded look that looks like looking through the viewfinder of an old camera. This day she challenged me because there was no step0by-step video. It was written but also testing our memory of learning from the previous lessons.

Day 5 - Textures

WOW!! This was such an incredible class. Great techniques.

I'm not 100% such if I like this technique used on this picture. But I think it gives it a very spooky kind of feel.
That's the drop on the attraction, Splash Mountain at Disneyland

This was our Super Duper Bonus Challenge Round. Using both the frame + texture. This was fun!! And I really like how it turned out!

Day 4 - Clipping Masks

I just love the scuffed up edges!

Day 3 - Vintage Hand-tinted look

Having just returned from vacation I have a few days of classes to catch up on. Today's class was fun. I just had to do 2!

My husband just LOVED this photo. He said it reminded him of 1960's pictures of Disneyland. Even though I just took this in May. I'd say mission accomplished!!!

The example in the class was one using people so I thought I should give that a shot too since the look was different.

This class is SO much fun!!!

Day 2 - Brushes

The last day of school is truly something to celebrate!!!

Jessica Sprague Class Day 1

Fun and Easy!!! Here's my end product from her tutorial. I'm SO excited and can't wait to learn more.

Free Photo Editing Class

Photoshop for some reason makes me nervous!! For the past year or more I've wanted to take a Photoshop class at our local college. Every time the schedule comes out I look and more times than not, the time the class is offered just does not work with our family schedule. So as all Mom's do, it gets put on the back burner.

Well NOT THIS TIME!!!! I've signed up to take this class!!!

And you know the price isn't too bad either. Can't beat free and self-paced and on-line. Go sign-up NOW. Yes, right NOW!!! Before you forget or the Sunday deadline has passed you by. Go to JessicaSprague.com for all the instructions to sign-up.

Layout update

Life has been pretty busy with trips and end of school year activities. I've been able to sneak in a few minutes here and there scrapping. LOVE IT!!!

Here's what I've done since April.

This is a kit from K.I.S.S. Scrapbooks called Summer Blast. Just a few of the things we did in our summer of 2008. I added the title letters from my stash of Thickers letters. The green flowers I took from my stash as well as the flowers they sent with the kit were blue and I didn't care for the look.


Another one from K.I.S.S. Scrapbooks called Everyday Smile. I do LOVE this layout because it's about my sweet little Grandbaby. But I was disappointed with assembly of the kit. There was not enough ribbon included to complete the layout as pictured in their directions. (This is the 2nd time this has happened to me with their kits) The white ribbon with brown dots and stripe is from my stash. I'm glad I had the perfect colors for this layout.


This layout is from EZLaser Designs. I'm stuck on this one because I want to add journaling but not sure exactly how to do it. I'm open for suggestions so please leave comments.


As you can tell we went to the Portland Zoo. I used this kit called Giraffe from Lickey Split Scrapbooks.


Now this kit was one of those Pre-Made Page Spread from just Jinger. I bought it (of all places) at Michael's!! The half-circle on the left page opens up to reveal journaling.


Here's a retired kit from ScrapJammies called Dad on Seasons.

Happy Summer Scrapping!!!!

Some layouts over the past month

Yes, I have been silent but I'm still scrapping :D Here's soem of the thinks I've done.

These are retired Scrap Jammies kits

Girls from church having an activity at the Clay Estates (formerly the Randy Bachman, BTO fame, mansion)

Wedding reception funtimes

Lizzie's cabinet

Our visit to tour the Lady Washington tall ship that was used in Pirates-Curse of the Black Pearl as the Interceptor

Our sweet little bug-a-boo

This layout overlay is from http://ezlaserdesigns.com/

A few more from the week/weekend

Yes, I've been a little heavy on the Elizabeth layouts. She's such an inspiration :D

Authentic - Scrap Jammies kit January 2009


With Love - Scrap Jammies kit February 2009


Gentle Soul kit by Shabby Pink Designs

Grabbing an hour here and there

I've had a few moments to myself or during a movie to just grab a kit that I've already matched pictures to. Here a few kits I've done lately.

Scrap Jammies Aspire Kit - TakingLizzie to the park :D


Scrap Jammies Exubrant Kit - This was a fun morning with just me & Lizze. She kept her Mom up off and on all night. So Mom went back to bed. We had a great time!!

Some new kits!

When I went to CKC in November I stumbled across this kit and fell in LOVE with it. At the time I didn't know what photos I was going to use. That is until Jessica took these incredible pictures of Elizabeth while they were here visiting. I think this is my favorite layout!!

Girly Girl kit from K.I.S.S. Scrapbooks

Here's another one of our little sweet princess.

This is the Ellen kit from Shabby Pink Designs

Bad scrapping blogger :(

Sorry it's been almost 2 months since I've blogged over here. It doesn't mean that I haven't been scrapping. I have a little bit. I'll have to gather the photos to post here. But I have to share some good news. I won a Valentine's prize package over at Shabby Pink Designs. They have some cute, cute kits!! I can't wait to put them together. Go check them out! Their layouts are wonderful!

Here's what I won!

Thanks so much Lisa!!!