I'm a Gecko Gal

I bet that title made you wonder, didn't it?  Do I love geckos now?  Um,  I guess so. I know I love Gecko Galz.

Alright.  No more suspense.  I am a member of the 2014 Gecko Galz Design Team!  I am very excited for this opportunity.  Gecko Galz is a digital treasure trove of wonderful goodness!  I am a huge fan.  The digital image sheets are incredibly beautiful and very reasonably priced.  

Let me show you:

The mermaid image in the tag above is from one of the mermaid sheets.  

This card is one of my favorites.  I purchased the bird images and selected just this one to size for the card.  I printed it twice and fussy cut the bird and the butterfly.  They were then pop dotted on the top of the same image to add depth.

As you can see the images are perfect for whatever you have in mind when you craft.  There are a variety of different types of images.  They also have digital stamps, papers, collage sheets for dominoes and so much more.  

Go check out Gecko Galz .  You might find something you simply can't live without!

Be inspired and inspire someone today.

Ahh. Happiness!

Yep.  Feeling some happiness right now.  I will admit.  I love it when things are in their right place.  And I especially love it when I was able to re-purpose something that I really, really loved!

And here is what I am feeling so good about:

And a top view!

When my grandparents moved from their family home to a more manageable apartment me and all the cousins and aunts and uncles had a garage sale.  But before we could actually get to that point we had some cleaning out to do.  And some serious stashing to do!  One of my uncles had the courage to go up into the attic and he pulled down some treasures.  Well, I say treasures.  One of them was this ancient soda box.  It had seen better days (and had an ENORMOUS scary spider living in it!!!).  But I saw past all of the ick and brought it home.  After some serious cleaning ( the spider was done away with IMMEDIATELY), it has had a claim on the top shelf in the craft room.

Until today.  I love my Faber Castell Design Memory Craft stuff; ya'll know that.  So, I decided it would be perfect to hold it all.  And boy was I right!  I added some chipboard to the bottoms of each bottle area so that the pencils and pens would not fall through.  The biggest addition was layers upon layers of chipboard to bring the bottom up high enough that the Gelatos would not fall down or be difficult to get out.

I am Sooooooo in love with this.  It is super easy to just grab and set on the desk when I work.  All my fun in one nice, neat place.  How cool is that?

Inspired?  Go on, now you have the "excuse" to go buy one of those fun soda boxes.  Maybe add some of your own touch to it......I may need a second one!!!!

Home is where the heart is

Woohoo!!!  Today is my first post on the Faber-Castell Design Memory Craft blog.  Part of the Summer 2014 Design Team, I am tasked with creating several projects that will appear on their blog.

Want to see?

This is a mixed media canvas I created using their Gelatos, Whipped Spackle, Pitt Pens, and so much more of their yummy products.  

Want to know how to make one for yourself?  Head on over to their blog at:  Faber-Castell Design Memory Craft Blog.  You will find a step by step tutorial as well as the supply list.

More to come......stay tuned and inspire someone today!

itty bitty goodness

Summer.  Aagh.  Finally.  I love summer because it is usually the time that all my children are home.  We are more relaxed and take time to play and enjoy each other's company.  I look forward to it each year.  This year is a bit different as I have 2 older children that are not home for the summer.  Absolutely tearful about that!!!  However, the sun is still shining and I have a game plan for fun with the younger ones.

I'm sure most of you are picture takers like me.  I mean, really, have you met a scrapbooker that isn't?  Yeh, me neither!  So, what do you do with all of yours?  My answer?  Mini albums.

Today I want to share an itty bitty mini album I made recently.  I joined a swap at Mini Album Swaps and the theme for it was travel.

The mini was made using the 7 Gypsies travel paper.  A very vintage feel.

The mini measures 3 x 3 and is full of tags and pockets throughout.

Fun embellishments too!

Even a hinged surprise page.

Even though it is tiny I think it will hold some treasured memories.  I mailed it off a few weeks ago.   Now I am patiently waiting for mine to arrive at the house.  Getting anxious to see it!  Love these minis for a short summer trip.  We have already made 1 of those quick trips!  And I have a few fun pics to put in my itty bitty mini!

Have a great summer day everyone!

Great package!!!

Hello all.  I have some wonderful news to share with you.  If you follow my blog you will have probably guessed by now, but.......  I am part of the Faber Castell Design Memory Craft 2014 Summer Guest Design Team!  Woohoo!!!  I can tell you that the morning I found out there was some seriously happy hollering happening in my house!  Everyone was still asleep so I danced with the cats.  Twirled with the dog.  Did my little happy dance in the mirror.  It was incredulous!  I cannot even begin to describe the feeling I had in words.  I feel so blessed.

Fast forward a few weeks.  The other day my package from Faber Castell arrived.  I knew it was coming and spent the whole (yes, the whole) day waiting for it!  And you know what happened?  It didn't arrive until I took a child on an errand!  However, it was awaiting my arrival.  There it was just basking in the lovely afternoon sunshine; waiting to be opened.  (ok, so it seems a little surreal here.  But I was sooooo excited!)

Want to know what was in the box?  Here you go:

So excited.  Oh, sorry, I already said that.  The package was full of fun stuff:  double scoop gelattos, mixed media books, Mix & Match pastel pencils and crafter's crayons, jars of gesso, gel bead glitter gel, whipped spackle (my new personal fav), and glaze.  I opened everything and grabbed my journal.  Just a few quick swipes of everything.

Ya'll know this is my kind of thing!  Messy fingers here I come.  Look for some fun posts coming soon.  I teach a mixed media class tomorrow (come on in if you can) at Scrapp n' Savvy.  I will have some good pics to share with you afterwards.

Meanwhile, take a gander at the Faber Castell blog.  Each and every day there is something new and fun.  It is fun to look at but really makes you want to try it out!  I will be posting to their blog this summer with links from here.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I will!

A mini gift

I have the best 2 friends that anyone could wish for.  We met a bunch of years ago when our children went to school together.  We have shared good times.  We have shared bad times.  These are the ladies I know will be there no matter what.  We always celebrate our birthdays together.  Recently, while away celebrating a birthday, our waiter asked about a picture on one of our phones that was on the table.  We told him it was one of our kids.  Then he asked the ever "so, how many kids do you have?" question.  There was a pause.  You see, we each have quite a few kids.  Then my one friend responded that we had 15 kids between the 3 of us.  I think we all gasped!!!

So it is no wonder that this year, like the several years prior, we celebrated a variety of graduations.  So,  I thought I would share with you a mini gift that I made for one of my friends' daughters.  Just to let you know, green is her favorite color (in case you can't tell!).  Sorry for the poor lighting in the pics.  We were having a tremendous rain storm and the light box was in the car!

The mini is small....6 x 6.

Pages flip.  There are tags.  Pockets for extra fun stuff.

There are also a pull out or two.

I like the page below.  It is the paper and how the pocket opening is defined.  It holds a mini accordian album with a magnetic belly band.

I used papers from my stash; no particular paper line.  Since I was trying to stay within a color scheme I was able to pick and choose papers I liked for her.  I also pulled a variety of small embellishments I had leftover (like the wiggly eyes brads).  I tried to keep it relatively simple so she can add her own flair.

Hope you enjoyed.  I will post a fun itsy bitsy mini later this week.  Check back in.......