To See My World Before My Eyes

   This was one of those incredible photos that just begged to be scrapped in a special way. It captured my son as he beheld the beauty of the mountains around him, something that a kid raised at sea level could really be amazed by. I feel very lucky that I got this shot. I would like to say it was intentional. However, it's one of those pictures that are discovered and coveted, hidden like a treasure amidst the photos on the camera's memory card.
  So now, with this awesome photo in hand, came the job of figuring out just how to scrap it. I wanted it to stand out from others in my album. While I love the myriad assortment of winter themed papers and embellishments in my stash, they did not quite capture the spirit of the photo. This then, leaves me with an argument I find myself facing all too often lately...why buy such themed papers? I guess I will address that later. After all, I rarely let go of anything in my stash. I was drawn to it, and so, I eventually find a use for everything. Anyway, back to the photo...
  I have long been drawn to winter themed paper kits with unusual colour palettes. Sadly, I have none in my current supplies. Given a colour challenge at Club CK to use orange, brown and pink, I chose to reach for my Crate Paper Pink Plum collection. I figured that I could use my Martha Stewart snowflake punch as a way to theme the papers as needed. I also had some word art in mind for the page. The only problem...it was yellow and orange. The yellow completely clashed with everything else I wanted to use.

Original Marcella K chipboard word art before I altered it.

In the past, I would have sighed and put the word art away. I would have kept it for another day when I found the right paper to go with it.Now that I have figured out there are no rules with my stash, I grabbed some pink paint and a detail brush. Three coats later, the word art is looking more like it belongs with the papers I chose. The paint was a little dull and the orange was lost in the pink. So I used a woodsy brown bic mark it to edge the letters and then covered the whole thing in a coat of glossy accents.
  The page itself took form quickly thanks to the kit and a Sassy lil Sketch. Inspiration from Scrappin to the Music's challenge #178 shaped the title. I ended up with a page I loved. One with a variety of texture and tone which perfectly match the story I wanted to tell.

Sassy Lil Sketch 8-16-11
Crate paper pink plum collection-papers, brad, die cut and sticker
Making memories ribbon and trims
Martha Stewart snowflake punch
colorbox chestnut roan ink
American crafts rub on alphas
Acrylic paint-baby pink
clossy accents
Marcella K chipboard title

The warm, vibrant colours match my son's snow suit as well as conveying a bright happiness. The texture of the trims remind me of my son bundled into the snow suit. Snow flake embellishments remind me that we were in the snowy mountains. Best of all, despite the pink in the colour palette, I don't find the page to be feminine. I love when I get to use pink on a boy page!

Quite the Trip!

    I will start off with a confession. I have an addiction to travel themed papers. This means that I have several travel theme paper collections, in their entirety, waiting to be used in my stash. I think I have more travel paper than I have trips to take. So either I need to take more trips or I need to find a way to use this paper up.( The same can be said for Halloween themed papers and pet papers, but that's a whole other post or two) So, now that I have that out of the way, I am happy to say that I have two travel themed pages to show you today. Two is a start in using stash up, right?
  I am very lucky, in that, when my husband travels he takes us along with us whenever he can. Earlier this year, he had a business conference in Aspen, Colorado. My son and I were very excited at the opportunity to see snow. Living in a warm climate means that snow is a wonderful, rare thing and not the hassle those who live with it know it to be. So I booked the tickets, knowing full well that travelling from where we lived to Colorado would take four connecting flights and an entire day of travel.

map by Little Yellow Bicycle
Arrows and patterened paper by Best Creation
7 gypsies brads
DMC floss
black alphas- Americna Crafts thickers
Making memories rub ons and rub on alphas
Prima e-line pearls
We R Memory keepers chipboard tag

I have had this wonderful map paper by little yellow bicycle for awhile now. I had the great idea of using brads and hand stitching to document our flights. This is one of those pages I just made. By that, I mean that there was not a big plan. I had a sort of idea and then just began putting stuff onto the page. It may not be perfect, but it's a page done. The process of doing a page like this is also very freeing. I find that when I am stuck and can not get myself inspired to scrap, making a page in this manner sort of opens the creative flood gates.
  Now that the creative flood gates were open, page two was completed in a snap. I saw this Sassy lil Sketch and the elements I wanted to use came together quickly and easily from my July Counterfeit Kit.

Sassy lil Sketch 7-14-11
Scrapfit workout #49-put a banner on it
We R Memory keepers papers and stickers
Making memories rub on planes

I wanted to document how light we chose to travel. So the suitcase paper worked well. I cut the subtitle from the name of the paper. I always check out the paper edges for small sections of pattern paper or words that can be used on pages.  This was one of those rare pages in which the only card stock used was to matte one of the photos. As a time saver, I cut the two wallet photos directly from the printed sheet leaving white edges from the photo paper for the matte.
  Traveling light had been an essential part of this trip. With four connecting flights between two airlines, our suitcases would have never made it safely to our destination. Our return trip was not much easier. We had three connecting flights with a ten hour layover in one airport and an overnight red eye. It was important for me to document how good a travel companion my son can be despite hard circumstances like that. He actually was a lot less cranky than I was. I had initially wanted to take photos of him at each airport. However, in some instances we were so busy scrambling to grab a meal or get to the next flight that this was not feasible. So I simply made sure to journal about our experience. Photos are not always necessary to tell the story.
  The next time you are feeling stuck or overwhelmed by the prospect of scrapping, relax and just begin putting stuff down on the page. You may end up loving what you create. You may learn a little more about the process you use when you scrap.Most of all, you will find your creative streak again.

Lunar Eclipse

  Sometimes we experience a wonderful moment in our lives but don't have a photo to document it. Last December, my son and I went outside in our Pj's, all wrapped up in blankets just so that we could witness the Lunar eclipse. The Eclipse itself was gorgeous. Unfortunately, I lack the skills and the camera equipment to properly photograph it. The next morning, my son drew a picture of the event so that I could still scrapbook about it. In some ways, the drawing is almost better than a photo. Not only does it preserve the moment, but it also shows how considerate my son is.

papers and brads from my June counterfeit kit:
pink paislee 365 degrees paper, making memroies poolside brads,
Maya road ribbon, brackets-American crafts forest thickers
items not from counterfeit kit: vellum, star brads ( doodlebug ?),
Making Memories noteworthy alphas, moon button, blue button
and ephemera from October Afternoon
Sassy lil Sketch 6-14-11

0001110101

   I have no clue as to what I may have said in the title's sequence of numbers. If you are not familiar with these types of number sequences, they are the language of computers. My son is sure getting curious as to how he might translate the way a computer speaks. So to that end, I bought a homeschool computer programming course for him last fall. I say it's for him, but truth be told, it's for both of us. This is all so new to me that I have to learn right alongside him. This has caused quite a few challenges for us in a short time( I am not very savvy with computer programming), though I do enjoy learning something new. It's nice that my son can see, first hand, that even adults learn new things. Learning should be something that does not ever end.
  As boring as programming may seem, I was stoked when my son programmed his first text box which proclaimed " hello world" as it popped up onto the screen. I took a lot of photos of the text box and my son working diligently at his computer. Now I needed an interesting way to document photos that, while a huge milestone for us, were in reality quite mundane. Page one was completed last fall.
                                                       

Sassy Lil' Sketch made for Sketches for All's Fall Sketch-a-thon
DCWV Tech generation Stack paper
Bazzill Silver CS
Pink Paislee alphas
DMC floss
MISC. ribbons stamped with colorbox white or black inks
Basic Grey Brads
Black magic glimmer mist

  DCWV had made this wonderful computer language paper in its' tech generation stack. Paired with the Metallic silver card stock, it perfectly symbolized computers and technology.I used some chipboard numbers to create a mask for some black magic glimmer mist. I carried the number patterns off the patterned paper using DMC floss to sew little ones and zeroes onto the page. I stamped more ones and zeroes onto ribbon. It varied the embellishments a little while at the same time, continuing the theme of computer progamming. In the end, I had a layout I loved. However, I still had enough photos and paper scraps for one more page.

  Those leftover photos and paper scraps sat waiting  until recently when I saw the Pagerize This #10 challenge at Scrap Our Stash. I decided to make a page which highlighted my son's dreams of becoming a video game programmer. In place of Lea's block of rub-on's, I used the chipboard numbers to once again make a mask. I chose to use 3 photos rather than just one. I had just enough white space on a photo of the computer screen to place my journaling.

 Scraps of paper and ribbon from the first page were arranged around the photos in such a way that they gave the appearance of creating a background of data strips behind the photos.

In reality, as you can see from the  picture above, the scraps are just sort of tucked in underneath the photo. This method is both a wonderful way to use scraps and a paper saver. I use this with papers of all sizes. It has allowed me to really stretch my stash just that much farther. From the photo, you can also see a close up of the stamped ribbon. Stamping on plain ribbon is another way to optimize the theme on your page. Plain ribbon can often be found in large rolls at the fabric store and is much less expensive than printed or fancier ribbon. It's something I plan to add more of to my stash in the future.

  From the original page down to a wonderful scraplift made with, well quite literally, scraps, I have two wonderful pages documenting my son's dreams and one of the milestones he reached in getting there. There is still time to pagerize Lea's wonderful page. Pop on over to Scrap Our Stash to check out Lea's page and to submit your work. We'd love for you to share it with us!

                                                            

Summer is here!

 What can I say...summer temperatures are definitely here. It brings with it trips to the beach, time at the pool, and afternoon thunderstorms with cooling rain. I think it's time to break out the squirt guns and get some great summer photos. It all sounded so wonderful...until I realized I still had last year's summer photos to finish scrapping. Not only that...I still had last year's summer themed papers to use up! Time to pull out those summer albums and finish up the last few pages. 

   The page I am going to share with you today is actually page two of a layout I did last summer. I scrap in an odd pattern sometimes. While my albums are chronologically organized, I scrap the photos that I feel like here and there. Sometimes, I will complete a full  two page spread in one sitting, while other times, I will do one side of the two pages. I save the photos and papers I use right there inside the page protector. It's nicely organized and things don't get lost. The only disadvantage to this method is that, as my style and skill become more defined, there is sometimes a different look to the 2nd half of the page if I wait too long to scrap it.

  Anyhow, here I sat with scraps from page one...papers and embellishments from the Fancy Pants Rusted Sun collection. I had 4 photos all 3 1/2 x 5 in size. I think part of the reason I had not gone back to this page is that I had been struggling with how I wanted to place these photos onto the page. For whatever reason, I wanted something more than a usual grid with 4 photos. I just didn't know what I wanted to do exactly, until I came upon a wonderful sketch from Sassy Lil Sketches. I saw the circular element on the page and instantly knew I wanted to cut one of the photos in a circular shape.

Sassy Lil Sketch 5-21-11

  Once the photo was cut, I realized the page needed a little something more. I wanted to continue with the sun and beach theme, but did not have the lovely yellow paper from the rusted sun collection. I chose to use a Martha Stewart plaid style stamp and some orange ink on yellow paper. It closely resembled the pattern found on the suns in paper I had already chosen to use. I then decided to add some detail with white opaque marker and brown pen. I remember using pens and markers more often in my early days of scrapbooking. I have happily found them once again. They are such an inexpensive and quick way to add just the right something to many a page.

  Since the two sun shapes seemed to be such a large attention grabber, I chose not to add a lot of other design elements to the page. I am rather pleased with the way it brings your focus right to the photo of my son. Now…I must go and try to finish off some of those other albums. It seems I have several that need just a few pages here or there to be called finished

Not Yet! Then I Should!

  As I was flipping through photos yesterday, I came to realize that I have yet to scrap a page about my Dad. He's sort of not the kind of person that likes to get his photo taken( kind of like me). So the two photos I found of him are quite the rare treasure.

Sassy lil' Sketch 5-14-11

  I had specific reasons for choosing the elements I used for this page.Take the camouflage flap for example. Ever since I was little, my Dad has a camouflage hat on his head every time we go outside. ALWAYS. I think it might be weird if he didn't. He has had one ever since he was in the Marines. The Camou flap reminded me of that. I had just salvaged the flap from my son's canvas backpack( the bottom of which was ripped up beyond repair). I chose the blue plaid paper by Fancy pants because it reminded me of the shirts my Dad liked to wear when I was a kid. Embellishments and trim from the Making memories Just Chillin' line added a nice masculine touch to the page. The journal spot was made on a whim by me. I have always wanted to use my mists and a mask to create one. I just got some new masks by Tattered Angels from their Heidi Swap collection. So I was quite happy to use one here with some sapphire glimmer mist.
  Though a lot of people looking at this page would not know the meaning behind some of the elements chosen, the page in and of itself is a nice tribute to my Dad. I invite you to consider choosing page elements that may have significance to you. Without realizing it, the tone or feeling behind those choices may well translate into the page itself, giving the viewer a deeper feel for the page's subject.

Get the Ball Rolling

For the Sketches for all blog hop, please click here. Otherwise, please feel free to read the posts below until you get there.

Just a quick hello on this Monday morning...and then I have to get the ball rolling on some housework. I just wanted to share this page I made for the NSD festivities last week. It was a quick page, however, I absolutely love the fun splash of colour and the whimsical doodles. Proof positive that a page need not take hours for it to be special or fun. This page was made in under 30 minutes.

Made with scraps from my May Counterfeit kit
sassy lil sketch 5-7-11
basic grey alphas from Life of the party
candy apple red glimmer mist
fancy pants PP-stripes, Sassafrass-number

I did take some photos of my husband and son bowling, but I had wanted a few unusual photos of our excursion. So I made it a point of capturing the name of the bowling alley on the ball and on the side of my son's shoe. the next time you go out, I invite you to look for opportunities to take photos that are out of your norm, especially if you are going somewhere or doing something you have done before. You may find it will spice up your pages just a bit.

Quickly goes the page...

which one is inspired to make. I know I made a lot of great choices in my counterfeit kit because it was easy to choose photos, supplies and a sketch. The next thing I knew, this page had been made.

Sassy Lil Sketch 4-28-11
stars are recycled notepad cover, embossed with swiss dots
paper-My minds eye,sassafrass, fancy pants
I rock jewels
Sassafrass borders

My son is playing with sticks. Even my husband loves to play with sticks every now and again. Fun lives in simplicity sometimes. I chose the quote because I felt it was pretty apt. It reads: " A treasure to a little boy does not consist of money, gems or jewelry. He will find far greater pleasure in the wonder of a rock, pebble,stick or beetle." Author Unkown.

The Exciting Adventures of Raft Man and Noodle Boy

 Often times, many families have something they enjoy doing together. For us, that's playing in the pool. This also means we end up with photos of the same type of event over and over again. If you are like me ( Obsessed with photos of your family) this may make it hard to narrow down the best photos for scrapping. Often, I just like to scrap them regardless of how many pool layouts end up in my albums. After all, it's about enjoying the process of scrapbooking while telling a story, right? A title like this one helps set this group of photos apart from other similar photos. It makes for a more specific story and highlights the relationship between my husband and my son. I did not come up with the title. My silly son and husband did while they were playing in the pool. I was more than happy to "borrow" it for these pages.

Scraphappy.org February Sketch
SEI papers, chipboard and Alphas
Making Memories brads
Bic Mark It pen in midnight navy

  One would think with as many water themed pages as I make that I would have all of the perfect embellishments to complete a page. Sometimes though, I wish I had a little something different. When I was making the companion page for raft man and noodle boy, I wanted some waves. I don't have any wave stamps which for some reason is what I felt it needed. It's not in my budget to go buy stamps right now and quite frankly, if I did, I would have to order them on-line. I really didn't want to wait for them to be shipped to me. I will admit, that I almost caved and bought a stamp set from K and Co.

  Common sense grabbed a hold of me. Because the image I wanted was fairly simple, I decided to see if I could doodle a wave similar to the stamp I had wanted to purchase. I got a piece of scrap paper, and used a pencil to doodle some waves. I was happy with the overall results and then made the brave step to doodle it on my layout. If you feel less brave than I, try doodling on a scrap piece of paper, then cut it out and use that on your page.White erasers also come in handy. They don't seem to leave marks on your paper.I am not quite sure if the doodle goes well with the page, but I did enjoy the little experiment and plan to try it again in the future.

Sassy Lil Sketch April 7, 2011

If you have any sun themed/ fun in the sun type projects to share, there is still time to submit them to Scrap Our Stash for the April challenge.

Waiting for the World Record

  Last summer, we enjoyed the opportunity to witness a Guinness world record.That was something I thought we'd never get to do  and quite honestly, not something I thought to ever seek out. However, when a local resort heralded the opportunity to watch Nick Wallenda break his own world record, we decided it would be a nice family outing. We chose to sit at one of the resort's outdoor cafes. We enjoyed a pizza and some virgin frozen daquiris while we waited for the main event. After about a half an hour, Nick Wallenda made his appearance. He first walked across the tight rope about 260 feet in the air without a safety net. After which, He rode a bicycle across, thereby breaking his own world record.
 To commemorate this event, I chose some of Crate paper's restoration line from my Counterfeit kit  challenge March kit.I liked the bright fun colors and the vintage feel. I went on-line to Vintage Printables and found some wonderful vintage style circus posters.

submitted to Artastic Inspiration challenge blog
note the small bear riding a white horse on the vintage poster
also submitted to the Chopped Challenge for week 2 at Challenge Masters

I drew scallops and then filled them with white paint. The white paint with Bic mark it's Fandango pink and Summer melon reminded me of circus clown make up. I hand made the flowers using cardstock scraps, a prima flower and artsylicious brads. The tutorial for those can be found here at the Making Memories blog. Twinery lemondrop twine was stretched across both pages to symbolize the high wire.

Sassy Lil Sketch 3-7-11

Overall, it was a fun page for me to make. The colours are somewhat feminine and ones that I do not normally get to use. Yet here, with both the circus theme and the resort setting, they serve as a fun accent to the story of watching a world record in the making.

Frugal Friday Tip: Tin Can Recycling

  Last November, I got a Sizzix Texture Boutique. While I love what I can do with it, I really have not used it to its fullest potential. When I saw a recent tutorial about using soda cans and punches, I had the idea to dust off the texture Boutique and embossing folders to see what I could come up with. The results were quite wonderful!

Materials: Embossing machine and folders
               soda cans, rinsed out
               old scissors
               a Bic Mark it or other permanent marker
              optional: a child ( My son likes to use my embossing machine. So I cut the soda cans while he worked      
                 the machine.My son thinks this is great fun. )

You will need to carefully cut a slit into the can. Then remove the top and bottom. You are left with a curled piece of aluminium. Then it's just a matter of placing this into an embossing folder and putting it through the machine. I would just advise caution since the can is a little sharp after you cut it.

We experimented with a variety of designs. Some look better than others. You can use some punches to create your own shapes or use the permanent marker to draw a design of your choice.Then use old scissors to cut it out. The marker also comes in handy to draw an inked look to the edges of your cut shape.

I found glue dots to be the best way to adhere the shapes to my page. It's also very easy to punch holes  for brads with your paper piercing tool. You could also conceivably choose to hand stitch on your metal embellishment. I plan to dust off my alcohol inks to see how well they would look on my newly embossed designs.

Sassy Lil Sketches 3-14-11 design
Cream Acrylic paint
MME paper
Maya road Chipboard motif inked in Colorbox black ink
Paper Trunk Carson, black alphas
Black paint stamped with a round lid
DMC floss

All in all...a wonderful and inexpensive way to make your own page embellishments and recycle. If you have a Frugal Friday tip like this one, please share it at Scrap Our Stash.

Closer to Fine

  I don't normally scrap about the bad things. Scrapbooking, to me, is all about the happy memories. There are some times where the less than happy finds its way into my album. This was one of those occasions. Our family cat, Boo, is still quite young. He just turned two. Last fall, he was diagnosed with kidney crystals. We had noticed him begin to act a little odd. He is normally quite playful. On the night I took this photo, all he wanted was for my husband to hold him.I had no idea how sick he was.

Both pages made with items from my March Counterfeit Kit

Sketch Inspiration #212

The next morning,  he was in quite a bit of discomfort, barely able to walk. When I felt his abdomen, I could feel a large lump as though he had a blockage. I rushed him to the vet. The diagnosis seemed a simple fix...medicine and a surgery to remove the crystals. It should have been quite simple, but neither the vet nor I expected we would be embarking on a 4 month long stint of infections, surgical complications and extended care. At times, we were not sure he would make it. By Christmas, my son's big Christmas wish was for Boo to get better.

Sassy Lil Sketch 3-21-11

Through all of it, Boo remained sweet and loving. He was not always capable of keeping himself clean. He always purred when I sponge bathed him. At times, he had no bladder control. So we kept him in a pet diaper. I never thought in a million years I would be diapering a cat. Finally, mid-January, Boo got back his spark of life. He woke up one day, ate a huge meal and then started to play. It was then that we knew he would be just fine. He's back to his old self and has gained back all of the weight he lost. In fact, I truly believe he is even more affectionate than ever.
  During the months of not being sure, I was afraid to scrap about Boo's condition. It's probably silly, but I felt  that I might scrap he was ok and then we would lose him. He is a large part of our family, even if he is a cat. When I saw the current challenge for Scrapping the Music,I thought the song would be the perfect title. Finally, he fought through each day, each complication bringing himself and our family a little "closer to fine".

Cards...pros and cons

  I have never been much of a person to sit and write(unless you count notes for friends in high school,LOL). Life is just always a thing of motion for me...full and complete, sometimes hectic. Sitting down to write or send a card has always felt so sluggish to me. Couple that, with the way some people regard cards. There are those who cherish a card for always while others say thank you and promptly deposit them in the trash. So card making is, for me, a difficult undertaking. I value my stash and I hate to see it put into the waste bin. I think it is for that reason, that my cards often lack something. When I am making a scrapbook page, it is always tied to an emotion. So it comes easy for me. It is easy to use things I love from my stash. For the cards, it becomes a more..."should I really use that here?" type of thing. Only a few cards have come easily for me...though with practice I am getting better.

   Yes, I am practicing card making. I should say, it might be a bit embarrassing, but it was the allure of the RAKs available that lured me in. As many of us know...scrappy mail and RAK's have an addictive sort of quality. And also, there seems to be a little more purpose behind the cards, which means making them is easier. DH asked for some to use as thank you's at work. He also asked me to make a baby gift card for a co-worker. It seems as if his request has opened the flood gates of creativity. So I guess I'll share a few of my endeavors with you.

This was made using a Sassy Lil' Sketch from the October card Crazy event. It was for the baby gift. I of course had to use my new cute little duckling stamp!

The following were created using sketches from the Sketch-a-thon at Sketches for all. There are monthly and weekly card activities as well as Scrapbook page sketches there...along with lots of chances for the beloved RAK's.

I used Stampin up's paper for these. The papers were so easily matched and easily used. To make the tree trunks, I used a Halloween stamp...but only inked the bottom of the tree. I then fussy cut the trunks and added the tops.

Hidden Messages

  Do you ever leave hidden messages on your pages? I really have not thought to until recently. Earlier this year, I chose to use a pocket for journal tags when I ran out of space on my page. On a more recent LO, I chose to use a hidden tag because I hope someday it will be a nice message for my son. One he'll understand as he grows up. I probably would not have done this had it not been for the recent Project Scrapbook challenge at Challenge Masters. I had to do a page about me...which is not my favorite topic. I would far rather scrap my wonderful son, handsome hubby or quirky cats. However, Given the challenge, I chose to make a page for my son ( and hopefully soon, one about his Dad) which tells him a little about me, my hopes for him and some facts about the time when he was born.

   I have wanted to include more of my son's art work in my pages, so I used this drawing he made of he and I if we were mice. I sewed it into a pocket on the page. I loved the warm cozy feel of the My Mind's Eye Be Loved papers. They reminded me of a quilt, so I used this Sassy Lil' Sketch:

I fussy cut some of the paisleys from the blocks of paper and used 3-d foam to make them pop. From the title block, I cut the word "mom" and then wrote variations of mom on the paper. I covered it with vellum, and once it was stitched on, added the word mom back with 3-d foam. The flowers were hand made from a wonderful tutorial found here. I made mine smaller using some scraps left over from making the blocks. Just remember to keep all of your paper strips the same length and to vary them in width by 1/4 inch. I finished the project with prima trim and K and company border stickers from the poppyseed collection.

If you do make the flowers, pop on over to Sketches for You. DT Member Brenda was the one who offered the tutorial and she has a monthly challenge with a RAK for you.

A Sassy Lil' Sketch

As you know by now from my previous post, Cherie from Sassy lil' Sketches is a guest at Sketches for all. We are so excited to have her there as part of the sketch-a-thon. I thought I would share my take on her sketch with you.

Yes, I rotated the sketch...and you can too. ;)

Since the sketch-a-thon is all about school and Fall,  I decided to do a page about my son learning computer programming. I used paper from DCWV's Tech generation stack. Since computer language is all 1's and 0's, I used them all over the page. I used Black magic glimmer mist and chipboard numbers to create a mask for the background. I stamped numbers on ribbon. I even was crazy enough to stitch them as a border on the page. All in all, I love the effect it made.

There is still a few days left of Cherie's contest. The sketch-a-thon goes on all month and we will soon be visited by Nikki Sivils. So pop on over...you have plenty of time to play!