I am scrapping, I promise!

I know pretty much everyone who follows my blog does so because they know me from scrapping. Well, I promise I am working! I just cannot post ANYTHING! I made a new design team. Well, actually, 2! But one is a secret and I can't spill till next month! So here's the good news.

I made the DT over at www.spunkyscrappers.ning.com ! I am so stoked. This is a challenge blog with weekly challenges as well as a whole ning community. I am on the "B" team as we are split into two groups. We do a challenge every week, so we split so that there isn't quite so much work. So I have been working on upcoming challenges. Check this week's out, it's all about the word FREE. There will be another one up in a couple days and the layout I am working on is SO ME! Spunky Scrappers is a group of girls like me- no filter. Well, i don't think any of them are as bad as I am, but it's kind of a "gloves are coming off" kind of group. We scrap anything and everything. I will tell you that my layout on my desk right now for this week doesn't contain pictures because we would have to change to a R rating! It's way fun, we just got new sketch artists too, so there is a LOT coming up. Go check it out!

Plus, I have been working on getting stuff going over at www.TheEverydayScrapper.com with some new contributors. Also, the new team, which of course you don't get to know about yet. But lets just say my profile picture for it is freaking HOT!

Add this to the PILE of Christmas presents I am working on. I am B_R_O_K_E this year. Having 2 houses and having moved etc has just taken the budget down to NIL. So I am making as many as I can. Which really just works out well because I am so awesome, everyone wants my gifts anyway... right? Yeah, maybe not. But I am working on cool stuff. I will post some when I get them finished.

OK, in-laws coming in LATE tonight. I am not feeling well. I have been having constant dizziness for 3 days now. It's something with my eyes, not an inner ear infection. I think it must have something to do with my optic nerve or something. My lips tingle when i move my eyes. It SUCKS. BAD. I am going to try to get to the doc tomorrow cause I cannot do anything like this!

Till later this week, have a great time! Enjoy the fall, enjoy your families! And Getcha SOME!

Almost My Favorite Holiday!

It's Saturday. That means like 5 days until Thanksgiving. I LOVE Thanksgiving. I LOVE everything about it. I love the house full of people. I love the colors. I love the chill in the air, the smell of hot cider and roasting turkey and candles burning. Yes, there are no presents, but I am ok with that! So much less stress leading up to it than Christmas. No mass shopping expeditions, no stress about finding the perfect "IT", no crowds. Just a warm house and great food.

I am blessed. Really, we all say that right? Sometimes it's harder than others to see the blessings. Especially when the bills have piled 6 inches high and there is no more money to pay them. When relationships are stressed and tensions mount. When my attitude is gone and I don't see it coming back any time soon. I have to step back and look at what I do have. A husband who loves me. 2 healthy kids. A great family and network of friends nationwide. A roof over my head, and (almost bald) tires under my butt when I need to get out. I live in a free country run by officials I pretend to have a say in electing. I get to stay at home every day, be here when my kids get on the bus and when they get off. I don't have to pay someone else to raise them. Luke lets me scrap to my hearts content, although I am sure at many times he is gritting his teeth at the lack of housework getting done. I have food, clean water, access to medical care, and no one waiting to beat, rape, torture me. No war in my backyard, no armed men at my door. And do I deserve any of it? Not especially. I haven't really done anything spectacular or worthy. So I guess it all comes down to the fact that God is good.

Yep, I seep into sap every once in a while. I don't like to let it happen often because it's of little use, all the blubbering and whatnot! So now that we have that all out of the way, I am off to finish putting together the guest room. Steve and Gayle are coming tomorrow very late to spend the week with us. I need to scrub the kids' bathroom since they will be sharing and the kids make a nasty mess out of it daily! I finally locked them out of it yesterday because they refuse to clean up after themselves.

So i am off, I need to get some design team blog posts ready too at some point today. Right, I just dont see that happening! Have a great weekend.

I want my cake.

I found myself Friday evening hanging out on Facebook for the Maya Road crop and chat. So much fun those girls! The design team amazes me. And the owners are sooooo sweet. I didn't know anything about the company before then.

One of the challenges was to make a tag using MR stuff. I pulled out my stash and came up with this little girl. Lots of chip pieces, a trinket pin, rubons, and a cupcake topped wtih dimensional elements, pixie stix, and smooch.

No idea what i will do with it, for now I think I will just look at it and think about making some cupcakes. I do have some cherry frosting in the pantry!

Coupons!!!!!

It's getting on Christmas time. That means using using up lots of scrappy supplies making gifts and less money to buy new stuff! So the ladies over at http://www.savvynsassy.com/ are hooking us up. But you have to go check out http://www.theeverydayscrapper.com/ to get the codes! So RUN to the blog, get your codes, and get shoping. They have the awesomest (is that a word even) ribbon! I love this months' finds!

A new photo I love

I got a new kitten. Her name is Tan. As in the drink "Black and Tan" which is, if you don't know, a guiness and bass ale. Our other kitten, if you didn't figure it out is black! So anyway.... She was in my craft room playing while I was working the other day. When I scrap, ALL of the animals come in there and pile around my table. Tan was rolling around in a pile of wadded up light pink tulle I had on the floor. She ended up all in it. Luckily I had my camera on my desk next to me. I got a few really good shots of her. She is quite photogenic.

I am changing the name of my blog...

Well, at least my banner title. I had a lovely chat last night over at serendipity scrapbooks with Becky Fleck. She is a KICK in the pants! I'm not a big sketch fan, but do admire her work with BG. We all know what a BG whore I am. Evidently Nook and Pantry hasn't been the big hit they were hoping for, but I am in LOVE! I got to play with some via my DT connections at scrapgal.com. So I chose this eggbeater page, not knowing what the HELL I was going to do with it. I just loved it so much. Yesterday i was scrapping when I kept thinking naughty thoughts about Nook and Pantry. Nooky and Panty kept coming into my head and running around. So after I finished my layout, I took the scraps and made this card! Becky got to hear about it last night, but since it is MY brand of humor, I opted not to post it in the gallery with my layout. So here it is!

Spunky Scrappers GDT!

So i found this fabulous little blog, as you have already seen me post about. It's called Spunky Scrappers. Spunk is something I have plenty of. I am in love! A group of girls that will tolerate, even encourage my particular brand of cheeky, obnoxious, shocking, honest scrapping! So I am GDT this week. Head over here and check out this weeks' challenge. It's all about scrapping a random though. Here is my layout. There are some really fabulous layouts up with me this week!

Trusty ol' Random.org

Says #4 and 6, so that's Mara and carolyn! Email me your addy's for your magnet/pin sets! I will have them sent out to you! THanks everyone for stopping by! I will be looking for some more etsy finds soon! It's lots of fun! I hope you girls all head that way and do some christmas shopping homemade, even if it's someone else's homemade.

The Coolest Chipboard EVER!

I was hanging out over at the Crop Addict today and someone shared this company with me. So I thought I would pass it on because it's the coolest thing ever! It's called riff Raff Designs and they do laser cut chip. Such cool designs. I really really love their stuff. Did I mention that? Oh, cause I really love their stuff! They have everything from flourishes to pregnant body outlines to guitars and angel wings!

Just click on the photo to get to their website! I'm hoping someone who reads this will decide to carry their entire line because I WANT IT!

Because Jaybird did one...

Well, not really, but kinda! I have been planning on altering an older copy of "Bridges of Madison County." It's my favorite book in the world. But it got a grease spot on the front. My bff Jason got me a new copy for christmas, so I am going to ffix this one up good! In the meantime, it's been sitting around for months and months because I don't know exactly where I want to go with it and I only get one shot since the book is important for me to keep.

My girl Jaybird altered this awesome book (check it out at http://www.thegalblog.com/) and I figured "Know what, what the hell!" Kelly sent me this super cute little pink address book. Well, I don't use them. I use my trusty palm pilot or a spreadsheet. But it was SOOOOOO cute I knew I HAD to use it. So, voila! I modge podged the crap out of it, cut my hole, and trimmed it out. I wanted to obscure it a bit, so I used some sheer swiss dot fabric.

Mostly this was a way to blow off some steam for an afternoon. Over at the Gal, we are having an "Attitude of Gratitude" contest. One of the challenges is to make a gratitude journal, which I intend to do. But I started thinking about the old "Daily Affirmations" sketch on SNL. So right now, I am affirming away. And this little pinky is here to remind me.

New blog!

Hey gals and pals. Just thought I would give a little shout out to a fab little place called Spunky Scrappers! It's a super cool challenge blog/site and they just put up a new blogspot blog to go along with it. So head over and check it out. They are having a dt call too, so if you're interested....

www.spunkyscrapper.blogspot.com

You can check out the ning community too at www.spunkyscrappers.ning.com

Happy Haunting

My friend Ana and I took our kids to this very old cemetery by my house. I live out of town in a rural area. Up on the side of this random little raised wooded area is a very small cemetery. We're talking maybe 25 graves, all from the same 3 or 4 families. The earliest in tact grave marker is a death date of 1899 and the latest is sometime in the 30's. It's not marked, I can't find out anything about it. But it's there and occasionally someone comes up there and mows over the grass overgrowth. We got all the kids ready to go to the Halloween Party at the Calvary Chapel. we made a stop up there on the way to town.

These are a few of the photos I took with my Olympus E-500. Sometimes it gives me fits and makes me crazy, but right now it's working ok! They were pretty much all shot at 1/30 or 1/40 and F4.3. No flash on my standard lens.

Hailey dressed up as a vampire. By the time we got out of the truck, she was over her vampire teeth and didn't wear them the whole day! So much for being a vampire! Henry was a skeleton. Nuf said. Trent was the white ninja from the new G.I. Joe movie. He's the bad guy, aparantly. We haven't seen it but Lindsey told me he was. So Trent had to tell EVERYONE that he was the white ninja from GI Joe and he was a bad guy not a good guy. Julia was a Zebra. So cute! She had a bit of a cold though and wasn't feeling so excited. Of course I had to take a photo of Napoleon in his super cute bumblebee costume! He didn't fight it, he did fight the leash, so we couldn't take him with us. Bummer. Next year though. I will work on the leash thing. He's just used to being in my purse of my carrying him.

Isn't the flare and the sun streaks on Hailey's photo FREAKY? Seriously! I had one that came out perfectly, really crisp and clean. But the other 3 I took had obvious streaking and this odd flare. I zoomed in on it and it looked like a flame from a bunsen burner! TOO CREEPY. It's sun flare, I was shooting into the sunset. But still. In a graveyard on Halloween....