Make a Wish for SRM/OWH

Don't forget to scroll down for my giveaway :)



SRM Stickers and Operation Write Home are teaming up this week as part of OWH's birthday celebration.

I just happen to have some SRM stickers in my stash, so I thought I'd play along with the birthday sketch they have posted.

The sentiment isn't overtly birthday, but I think it works.  I chose to use this adorable little gingerbread girl from Neat and Tangled stamps because with her eyes shut it looks like she just might be making a wish.

The papers are that I used for piecing her dress/bow, and the bottom panel are from CTMH's La Belle Vie collection, and that great lavender doily is from the Curtsey Boutique Etsy store.



I love layering my trim, and I'm using some May Arts Pom Pom trim, crocheted lace from Hydrangea Hippo, and Grape Fizz Trendy Twine that I wove through the crocheted lace.

Is it Friday yet?

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock:  CTMH - La Belle Vie papers, White Daisy bulk card base, Desert Sand cardstock
Stamps:  Neat and Tangled - Hey Cookie
Ink:  CTMH - Black

 

 

Other:  SRM Stickers - Make a Wish Sentiment; Curtsey Boutique - Lavender Doily; May Arts - Pom Pom Trim; Hydrange Hippo - White Crochet Trim; Trendy Twine - Grape Fizz twine; Helmar - Quick Dry 450 Adhesive; Tombow - Mono Adhesive

Cuckoo for You!

I haven't had a chance to participate in The Craft's Meow's sketch challenge in a while and I was determined to do it this month.

AND, I was the very lucky winner of Nina Brackett's new Vintage Clocks set in this last release.  I just love these images, and was keeping my fingers crossed that it would get to me before month's end.  As luck would have it, it was waiting for me when I got home today!

My favorite image from the set is this cuckoo clock.  I wanted it to look like it extended past the tag, so I stamped the top of the clock on the tag and then stamped the bottom on a scrap piece of paper and fussy cut it out to attach it to the tag. 



I've paired it with my Pemberley papers.  They are so pretty, and have that vintage look to them, so I thought they would be perfect together.  That blue piece is from the zip strip on one of the papers.  I added some crocheted lace from Hydrangea Hippo and some sheer gold ribbon I received in a grab bag a while back.

This one was just so much fun to put together!  Hope you are having a wonderful evening!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock - CTMH - Pemberley papers, Colonial White cardstock
Stamps:  The Craft's Meow - Vintage Clocks
Ink:  CTMH - Cocoa
Other:  Hydrangea Hippo - Off white crocheted lace; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; 3L - Large Dodz Adhesive; Unknown - Sheer gold ribbon

Love @ First Sight

Another layout today (this has been a layout heavy month for me!) for my other current favorite place for sketches, Elle's Studio.

I've scrapped lots of photos of Carina's birth/first few days for Carina, but I was convicted recently that I haven't done any pages for Ellie.  And the fact is, Carina's arrival probably affected her more than anyone else.

We have been so blessed to have two girls who really love each other.  Of course we have normal sibling rivalry issues, but Ellie truly relishes the role of big sister and has since that first day.  She's always been protective of Carina.  I remember going to a birthday party for one of Ellie's friends when Carina was 2 months old.  One of the other moms offered to hold her for a while, and I was more than willing to oblige.  Ellie came over and wanted to know why someone else was holding Carina, and then went over and stood next to this woman until she gave her back....

Anyway, I had all my Elle's tags out and was planning to use a lot of them on this layout and create more layers, but after fussing over it for a while, I felt like the pictures just really told the story themselves.  I love the kind of CAS, soft look to this layout. 

Thanks for coming by, and don't forget to scroll down for a chance to win some candy.

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock:  My Mind's Eye - The Sweetest Thing (pale polka dot paper); Teresa Collins - Tell Your Story (darker polka dot paper); Misc peach cardstock; CTMH - White Daisy cardstock
Other:  Elle's Studio - The Sweet Life Cutouts; American Crafts - Amy Tangerine Muse Thickers; Pilot - Envelope Address Writing Gel Ink Pen - Fine; Tombow - Mono Adhesive

Puzzled and some Candy

 

 

One of my favorite sketch challenges to participate in these days is over at Pretty Little Studio.  The layouts are simple, balanced, and leave plenty of room for interpretation.

Here is this week's sketch:

I'm using My Little Shoebox's Up in the Trees collection.  Sometimes when you're pressed for time, it's great to just pull out a collection and use it exclusively.  Even with limited time, when I'm not off mixing and matching products, I can add some extra touches to make it special.

Here I did some fussy cutting to incorporate two of the patterned papers - the paper with the banners that I used at the top of the page, and one with kind of vertical strings of hearts and dots which I cut for the vertical element.



Add some great photos, cardstock stickers and journaling, and that's all she wrote.



And, I did mention some candy, right?  Some great things are coming, and since I can't share about them quite yet, I thought maybe I would share a little blog candy.  Here's what you could win:



It includes stamps from Pink Paislee, We R Memory Keepers, Inkadinkadoo, Unity, and some Webster's Pages embellishments. 

All you have to do is leave a comment.  If you're a follower (which is not required) leave an extra comment.  I'll draw a winner Sunday night and post it on Monday.

Hope your week is off to a great start!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock/Stickers:  My Little Shoebox - Up in the Trees Collection
Other:  Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Pigma - Black Micron Pen

Runners Take Your Marks

This is for Fancy Pants Designs sketch challenge.

I'm mostly using Fancy Pants' It's the Little Things line, but there are some AC Thickers, and that arrow at the bottom of the page is one of my carved stamps.  There's something SO satisfying about being able to use my own stamps on a project, even if it is just a little arrow.

I really love the Fancy Pants embellishments, they have a great texture to them, and I used a bunch of them as well as a couple rub ons.  The border is one of their patterns with a faux miter.  I cut 1/2" strips of paper, and then on one end cut it at a diagonal.  This end goes on top of the plain/squared end on the next piece, so it looks like a mitre, but you don't actually have to match anything up.

Have a great start to your week!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock:  Fancy Pants Designs - It's the Little Things Collection; CTMH - White Daisy cardstock
Stamps:  Arrow handcarved by moi
Ink:  Ranger - Archival Black

 

Other:  Fancy Pants Designs - It's The Little Things Rub Ons, Journal Embellishments, Design Embellishments, Alpha Stickers; American Crafts - Black Amy Tangerine Sketchbook Journal Foam Thickers; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Pilot - Envelop Address Writing Gel Ink Pen - Fine

Lil' Inker Designs CASE

A last minute card for a CASE challenge they are running over at Lil' Inker Designs. 
Here's the original card by Debby Hughes.



I wanted to keep the card CAS, and added a little extra humor with my Pigma Micron pen.

The clouds were cut with the Cricut Artiste cartridge, and the hill with my CM custom cutting circles.



Hope you are having a great weekend.  We've been busy, but I've been able to get not only some housework done, but also a fair amount of crafting.  Good stuff, hoping to get a few more things done before bed....

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock:  CTMH - Gray Flannel and Black cardstock, Lucky and Flirty papers, White Daisy bulk card base
Stamps:  LID - Sentiment Flag Additions
Ink:  CTMH - Black

 

Other:  LID - Sentiment Flag Additions Dies; CTMH - Dimensional Foam Tape; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Pigma Micron Pen

Guest Designing at Trendy Twine

I'm excited to be guest designing for Trendy Twine today, using their color of the month, Chocolate Sprinkles.

I'm a big fan of twine, and I have lots of it.  What I love most about Trendy Twine is their color combinations. It's great to have so many multi-color choices. Some of my favorites are the twines that use cream rather than white as the contrasting color. Yes, I'm one of those people who don't believe that you should mix silver and gold, or cream and white, so it's great to have a twine option for my off-white/cream based layouts/cards. And, as you can see with Chocolate Sprinkles, they have several choices that don't have a white/cream at all. Just a whole lot of color fun.

Anyway, on to my projects for today.



For some reason when I saw that I would be working with Chocolate Sprinkles, I thought of embroidery, so I pulled out some of my old sample books and decided to embroider the sentiment with the twine. For the word friend, I actually pulled out the brown portion of the twine so I could get a perfect match.



I used the twine to accent the buttons, and on a couple of them used just the plain blue that I had left when I pulled the brown thread out.

This second card just came to me while I was working on the first. I love how the twine looks with these buttons, so I thought I would combine them some more.



There are a lot of moving parts when you are putting a card like this together.  To make things easier, I anchored one end on the back of the card, then threaded the buttons onto the twine pieces. Once I was happy with where they were, I adhered the buttons with Dodz adhesives, and then wrapped the other end of the twine around the back of the base piece and secured it.



Hope you enjoyed the cards. For a couple examples of how I used Trendy Twine in my layouts, check out this post and this post.  Thanks so much to Lesley for the invitation!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: CTMH - Dakota papers, Colonial White and Cocoa cardstock; CM - blue cardstock (not sure what the name is)
Stamps:  CTMH - It's Your Day
Ink:  CTMH - Cocoa
Other: Trendy Twine - Chocolate Sprinkles: 3L - Large and Small Dodz adhesives; Helmar - Craft Glue; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Cream 14 ct Aida cloth; CTMH - Burlap ribbon, Kraft Buttons, Dimensional Foam Tape

Skateboard Girl

Another layout for BPC's Big Idea festival.

This one was for Day #11 - to create a bold layout.

I'm mostly using Amy Tangerine's skeetchbook collection. I thought of it immediately because there are such bright bold colors in the collection.

I also wanted to use some of my handcarved stamps (those black and white strips) because they fit so well with this collection, and I think it's adds a lot of boldness.

And a little bit of sparkle from the glitter tape and thickers.



Oh, and I just happen to love these photos. :)

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: American Crafts - Amy Tangerine Sketchbook; CTMH - White Daisy cardstock
Stamps: American Crafts - Amy Tangerine Draft; Handcarved stamps by yours truly
Ink: Ranger Archival Jet Black
Other: American Crafts - Glitter Tape, Amy Tangerine Sketchbook Remarks stickers, Amy Tangerine Muse and Scene Thickers; Tombow - Mono Adhesive

11 Questions on the First Day of Kindergarten

I LOVED putting this layout together!

It's for BPC's Big Idea Festival challenge to scrap something that brought you joy in the last two weeks.

As most of you know, Ellie started Kindergarten two weeks ago. I did a little 'interview' with her before I dropped her off. It was supposed to be 10 questions, but I added one in on a whim when I was conducting the interview.

Ellie has been SO excited about kindergarten for so long. She was excited that day, but she was definitely feeling nervous about it too. I have several photos with worried looks from that morning (which you'll see soon).

I knew she was going to be fine though, and sure enough, her first words when I picked her up were "School is GREAT!"

She had also indicated (last question) that she wanted me to pray that she would find some new friends, and when I asked if she had made any friends, she said "Yes! So you don't have to pray about that anymore." Not to worry, I have assured her that it's something that we'll still pray about. :)

This layout uses mostly Echo Park's This & That Graceful collection, but I used a variety of alphas in the title. I really like the look of the varied alphas. The numbers were hand cut.



We had a great birthday celebration for Carina yesterday, I'll close with a couple photos.

This is actually an excited face (who knew), and Ellie was in charge of writing Carina's name on the cake.



And yes, she eats ice cream cake (along with everything else) with her hands....perhaps this will change by the time she is three...



Have a wonderful evening!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: Echo Park - This & That Graceful papers; CTMH - White Daisy cardstock
Other: Echo Park - This & That Graceful Brads and Chipboard and collection stickers; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; My Little Shoebox - Up in the Trees Cardstock Stickers; American Crafts - Thickers and Gardenia Remarks Sticker Book Oyster Font/Camilla; My Little Shoebox - Hello Spring Jewel Stickers; Pigma - Micron Pen

Pagemaps Card Sketch

One more card for tonight.

This is a really CAS take on the current Pagemaps card sketch.



I'm using Lawn Fawn's Check This Out stamps set.

Instead of using patterned paper, I stamped the library card three times.

Then some fussy cutting/dimensional tape to create the four window elements.

That great coral seam binding was actually used to package some products that I received a while back It's just the right zing of color, don't you think?



Anyway, that's it for me. Big week ahead. Carina turns TWO tomorrow, we have back to school nights for both girls this week, a five year old check-up, hockey playoffs for my roller team, you get the idea.

Hope you had a great weekend!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: CTMH - Colonial White and chocolate cardstock
Stamps: Lawn Fawn - Check This Out
Ink: CTMH - Chocolate
Other: CTMH - Dimensional Foam Tape, Kraft Buttons, Cocoa Grosgrain Ribbon; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Misc Coral Seam Binding; 3L - Small Dodz Adhesive

Market Street Stamps Sept Block Party

Got to be a little crafty tonight. :)

This is my first of two posts, so they're both going to be a bit short so I can go to bed.

I was lucky enough to win one of Brenda Weaver's new MSS sets, Hit the Mark, last month. It's such a versatile set that is great for cards as well as scrapbooking. I was also so excited to see how BIG the stamps are.

Anyway, I pulled together this simple card. I really love the triangle/arrow border stamp which I stamped in second generation.



The log/target/leaves/arrow were all pieced. I just love these images, they make a great impact.

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: CTMH - Colonial White, Olive, and Desert Sand cardstock
Stamps: MSS - Hit the Mark
Ink: CTMH - Chocolate and Cranberry
Other: Tombow - Mono Adhesive; 3L - Small Dodz

Sweet Thoughts

Just a quick post to share this card for Sweet Stamp Shop's weekly challenge.

This week was a photo inspiration challenge - here's the inspiration photo.



I got the Jars of Sweets set a while back and (shame on me) haven't gotten to ink it up until now. The sentiment is from Sentimental Birds.

I really like how this turned out, and I got to work on my coloring a little more too.

Anyway, it's been a LOOOONG week (Carina is now outspokenly opposed to sleeping past 5), so I'm headed to bed. Have a great end of your week!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: Bazzill - Card Shoppe Licorice Twist; CTMH - White Daisy; Basic Grey - Paper Cottage 6x6 pad
Stamps: SSS - Jars of Sweets, Sentimental Birds
Ink: Memento - Tuxedo Black
Other: Spectrum Noir markers - BT1, BT4, BT7; Tombow - Mono Adhesive

The Car Cart

I had so much fun with this layout. This is actually the first layout I've ever done with an iphone picture - time that I joined the real world, right?

I'm using this week's Elle's Studio sketch. I really liked the layout of it, and have adapted it a little to suit my needs, but not too much.

The little file folder elements were cut with the Cricut Artiste cartridge and the tags with the Cricut Art Philosophy cartridge. I thought about putting the journaling on a tag, but decided I wanted to have it out in the open.

I also used a bunch of Posy Trendy Twine - I love that you can get it with a cream color as I think the white would have been too white for this layout. It's on the tags, the washi tape banner and also accents the top and bottom of the page.



There I actually stitched across the page twice, and then added the twine in between.



I'm also going to link this up with ScrapFIT's Warm-Up #31 which is to use patterned paper as the background.

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: MME - Love Me "Doilies" paper; CTMH - Colonial White and Bamboo cardstock; Creative Memories - rose cardstock, it's a retired color and I'm not sure what the official name is.
Ink: Jenni Bowlin - Quick Dry Fluid Chalk Ink Vintage Pink
Other: Elle's Studio - Vintage Label Cutouts, The Sweet Life Cutouts, Pink Pennants; CTMH - Cricut Artiste and Art Philosophy cartridges; Trendy Twine - Posy Twine; Helmar - Quick Dry 450 Adhesive; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Creative Memories - Photo Splits; Amy Tangerine - Muse Thickers and Mixtape; Pigma - Micron pen; Target - Washi Tape; Misc Washi tape (thin starburst pattern)

Liebster Award

I was so honored to have been given the Liebster blog award recently from my blog friend Caroline of Caroline's Creations. It was a big pick-me-up and encouragement, and I'm so grateful for the virtual high five. Thanks SO much Caroline!

ABOUT THE AWARD

Liebster is a German word meaning "Beloved," "Favorite," or "Dearest." This award is a peer to peer award in which fellow bloggers present the award to their favorite bloggers with less than 200 followers. The origins of this award is unclear, but is believed to have originated by a German blogger. This award was designed to be a blog award in the pay it forward fashion to share your dearest and most beloved blogs that have less than 200 followers.

RULES FOR ACCEPTANCE
Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to their blog. Post the award onto your blog.Give the award to five bloggers who you appreciate that have less than 200 followers. Leave a comment on their blog letting them know that you have given them this awesome award!

PAY IT FORWARD
It was REALLY hard to choose just five folks to receive the award. I follow and am a fan of so many blogs, but here are five ladies (in no particular order) that inspire me frequently and have also been a big encouragement to me. Please go check them out, they are so worth following!

1) Melissa Shea - http://scrapsbymel.blogspot.com - Melissa is SO talented, she's always wowing me with what she creates, and I want to give a big plug for her too. She recently made 60 cards for OWH using one 6x6 paper pad. I can't even fathom how long that took, but it's a great cause, and if you have time you should check it out here.

2) Suz Mannecke - http://livealifeextraordinary.blogspot.com - is more a layout person, and she makes FANTASTIC layouts. Her work is just beautiful and I love to see how she uses her products and embellishments.

3) Barb Kinsale - http://kinsalecreations.blogspot.com - Barb is so sweet, and great encourager, and a great artist. She makes fantastic cards, I love how she mixes and matches stamps sets, her sense of humor when creating, and just her creativity. Some GREAT ideas at her site!

4) JJ Bolton - http://rgcards.blogspot.com - JJ is one of my Gallery Idol buddies. Her stamping and card making is so technically perfect and precise. I'm always drooling over her creations. She's a master of the Cameo and is another lady who's been a big encouragement to me.

5) Sarah - http://www.vintagepearstudio.com - Sarah's work always gets my attention. Lots of layouts, but also some great kids crafts/projects, cards, minis, just a great blend of projects, and all so well done. I always love to see what she creates.

So there you have it. Five of my faves.

Thanks again to Caroline for gifting me with this award!

Hello with Jane's Doodles

So this one is kind of an experiment.

As you may or may not recall, I've been learning to color, so the turtle was colored with my Spectrum Noir markers. My shading is still what I'd terms as textural, but think I'm making progress, and that turtle is very forgiving because he's so cute!

The card base is Bazzill Card Shoppe, and if you haven't tried it yet, I must say that I really love it. It's thick, but folds beautifully. The papers are Cosmo Cricket Social Club. For the word bubble, I just sketched a bubble, cut it out and added the border with my Pigma Micron marker.

I'm planning to link this up to the Simon Says Stamp challenge and they encouraged us to incorporate some washi, so I added that red washi at the top and bottom. It was a little too stark and solid when I first put it together, so I ended up tearing the edge to soften it and create some interest.

You can't tell from the photo above, but the word bubble and turtle are popped out with dimensional foam tape.

Thanks for visiting, I'm hoping to have not one, but two posts tomorrow, so swing on by!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: Bazzill - Card Shoppe Juicy Pear; Cosmo Cricket - Social Club 6x6 pad
Stamps: Jane's Doodles - Garden Friends
Ink: Memento - Tuxedo Black
Other: Spectrum Noir markers: CG1, CG2, DG3; Pigma Micron black pen; CTMH - Dimensional Foam Tape; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Washi Tape - Target

Unscripted vs. Scripted

Sharing a layout for Pretty Little Studio's sketch challenge today.

I wanted to document how quickly we go from photo op to chaos....literally seconds after the first photo, Ellie managed to find and put on a headband, and she's holding onto Carina who is trying to escape while hamming it up at the same time.

As soon as I saw this sketch I knew I wanted to use it since I just happen to have a bunch of homemade chevron stamps in my stash. ;)





I did add a little color to the center of the stamps on the outer rows with a Zig marker, and that arrow is just a doodle.

It's a pretty CAS layout. There's a lot of empty space on the sketch and I wanted to stay true to that. There's also a good mix of products/companies. It's fun to just look through your stash and pull out bits and pieces that work for a particular project

We've started Week 2 of Kindergarten - thanks for all your sweet comments last week. Ellie is LOVING kindergarten, and we're really enjoying our time together after school too. We've done lots of reading, bike riding, cooking dinner together, crafts, gotten haircuts, it's been a great work/life balance change for us!

Hope your week is off to a good start!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: Bella Blvd - Birthday Boy (blue polka dot); Echo Park Happy Days 6x6 pad (black and white pattern); CTMH - White Daisy and Sweet Pea cardstock
Stamps: Custom carved chevron
Ink: Ranger Archival Black
Other: Pretty Little Studio - Monsieur Mr. Connor Bookmark Tags; American Crafts - Black Amy Tangerine Sketchbook Journal Foam Thickers; Nikki Sivlis - Gingerbread House Alpha Stickers; EK Success Zig Blue marker; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; CM - Photo Splits; Sewing Machine; Pigma - Micron Pen

Operation Write Home and Lawn Fawn

Operation Write Home is one of my favorite crafty causes, and they currently have a challenge going on with Lawn Fawn.

Your job, if you choose to accept it, is to create a card that can be sent to a child.

I just received LF's Sunny Skies set from the lovely Tiffany, and was anxious to ink it up. It's a pretty simple design, and if I wasn't trying to keep the card flat, I likely would have popped out the sun and the banner and bird on the bottom, but since the sun and bird are so delicate I didn't want to chance them getting damaged/ripped.

I did add a little definition to the banner (which I cut using the Artiste cartridge at 1 1/4") with a black pen.

Easy peasy. Hope you're having a great weekend!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: My Mind's Eye - Six by Six Happy Day Designer Pad; CTMH - Dotty for You papers, Creme Brulee and Buttercup cardstock and White Daisy bulk card base.
Stamps: Lawn Fawn - Sunny Skies
Ink: CTMH - Black
Other: CTMH - Cricut Artiste Cartridge; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Pigma - Black Micron Pen

Shoveling Ice

This is the companion layout to one I did last month for Carina.

I'm still using Bella Blvd's Winter Wonder papers. Lots of fussy cutting on this one. The row of trees at the top were cut from one of Bella's patterned papers and then I ran them through my Xyron 1".

I also fussy cut the large snowflakes from the Cute Cuts sheet, and incorporated some of the stickers too...the tall one with the shovel was just perfect.



We've got a busy weekend ahead, but I hoping to get some projects done, so stay tuned!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: Bella Blvd - Winter Wonder Collection Papers; CTMH - White Daisy
Other: Bella Blvd - Winter Wonder Collection Alpha and and stickers; Xyron - 1" Sticker Maker; Tombow - Mono Adhesive; Creative Memories - Photo Splits

First Week of School Card

Just a quick little card to share today. I wanted to celebrate Ellie's first week of school, so I'm planning to give her this card when I pick her up tomorrow.

I used the School Rules stamp set and my blending pen to add the color. I love the blending pen because while you can be precise, you can also be a little more organic/messy.



Ellie's favorite color is green, so I wanted to feature it prominately, but when I was taking the pictures I realized that this looks a little Christmasy. Oh well, she'll like it.

Anyway, hope that your week is going well. It's almost the weekend!

Supplies Used
Paper/Cardstock: CTMH - Colonial White, Cranberry, and Topiary cardstock
Stamps: CTMH - School Rules
Ink: Memento - Tuxedo Black; CTMH - Cranberry, Pacifica, Topiary, Honey, Chocolate
Other: CTMH - Dimensional Foam Tape, Red Glitter Gems; Blending Pen; Pink Paislee - Hometown Summer Baubles; Tombow - Mono Adhesive

More Stamp Carving and Some Changes

Wanted to share a couple more carved stamps with you guys. This are for Lessons 5-6 of Julie Balzer's Stamp Carving 101 class. I actually carved these last month on our vacation, but I'm only getting around to posting them now, sigh.

I had meant to post over the weekend, but it was crazy busy here. We had the girls' 5th and 2nd birthday party on Saturday, lots of fun, but you know how birthday parties are - lots of work, even for something as low key as ours was. We rented a pavilion at a local park....we had about 30 kids and probably the same number of adults.

We also took the girls to get their birthday portraits taken - we always go to JCPenney's because they have $4 portrait sheets and we have A LOT of family to supply with photos. Then there were meals with family in town for the party, preparations for school to start, bike riding, walks, sidewalk chalk, it was a FULL weekend.

I've also been busy in the craft room - just can't share those projects quite yet. And, looking forward to some great new creative opportunities. It's going to be a busy fall!

Today Ellie starts Kindergarten and I start working part time. A little excited and anxious about both. Ellie has such a kind, soft heart and I'm pray that big kid school won't change that. On the work side of things, I'm so grateful to have a boss that is allowing me the flexibility to work part time, to be able to drop off and pick Ellie up from school, but financially it will be a stretch for us, and hopefully it won't make work itself more stressful in terms of getting things done. Big changes here, but I really feel like it's what God wants for us, so here we go!

Have a wonderful week all!