FM75: Back to School

I'm attempting to get back in the swing of things with my design teams, so here goes!    Holly has a perfect challenge for this time of year at the Friday Mashup this week.   I think just about everyone is back to school now, so why not make a fun card or project to celebrate?!   

So here is the "Mashup" Challenge:

1. Make a "Back to School" themed project.
2. Or Make a project with "Sewing".
3. Or "Mash it Up" and create a "Back to School project with Sewing". 

I didn't mash it up this week as sewing is a bad word in my house.  :)  I wanted to make up some teacher thank yous for the local shop so this challenge was just perfect.  I LOVE the colors so much!   That Color Coach is great at suggesting combinations that rock!   

Stamps:  Greeting Card Kids, Perfectly Preserved, A to Z (retired), Thank You Kindly (retired)

Ink:  Midnight Muse, Cherry Cobbler, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip, Daffodil Delight, Blush Blossom marker

Paper:  Midnight Muse, Bashful Blue, Cherry Cobbler, Whisper White

Tools/Accessories:  Big Shot, Cannery framelits, Window Frame framelits, Festive Paper-Piercing pack, Paper-piercing tool, Stampin' Pierce Mat, blender pen

My girl is learning to hold things! 

Another MDS page!

Yeah, still playing along with digital scrapbooking!  I finished another page and changed up the previous ones a bit too.  I like to go back and add stuff as I learn new things.  :)  First the new page:  

I'm still not sure on the picture alignment of this one but I got tired of messing with them for now.   I need to go back and fuss with those and the layers a bit more but I like where it is going at least.  It was based off a sketch I found on Pinterest.  Gotta love that website! 

I discovered the cool feature that lets you make a mirror copy of your pages so that you can do two page layouts like this.  That was so easy!  Design once and have 2 completed pages!  

Finally, a bit of stitching, an overlay, and a banner/flag added to this page.   

I hope some of you guys will get inspired to try your own digital pages soon!  Remember you can download the free trial and try it out for 30 days!  

Fab Friday Evergreen

Isn't this an awesome sketch?  My friend Mindy just started a stamping challenge blog!  With both her and my buddy Marla on the design team, I just had to go play along!   It was tough to give My Digital Studio the night off, but it was fun to go pull out real paper and stamps too.  :)   

I love non-traditional colors for Christmas and was inspired by the Festival of Prints stack to use Island Indigo and Early Espresso.   There's a hint of Baja Breeze in there too course.   I will admit that the amount of white space stresses me out but I'm leaving it alone.  I'm not sure why it's so hard for me to leave paper unstamped!   I think I'm a bit crazy.  Ha!    I hope you'll find time to go play along in their very first challenge.  The design team is AWESOME and have made a ton of great samples for inspiration!  

Stamps:  Evergreen, Teeny Tiny Wishes, All Holidays (retired)

Ink:  Island Indigo, Early Espresso

Paper:  Island Indigo, Early Espresso, Baja Breeze, Whisper White, Festival of Prints DSP, Silver Glimmer paper

Tools/Accessories:  Big Shot, Finishing Touches Edgelits, Holiday Collection Framelits, 2011-2013 In Color Polka Dot brads, glue pen, Dazzling Diamonds

She just keeps growing!  They need to make a special bouncy set for girls with long legs. :)  

Back to Spool Special

Yay for free ribbon!!!  Or is that just me that likes free stuff?   :)  I'm so excited about this promotion.  I haven't had the budget to get this gorgeous ribbon yet but now I'll be able to play with it for FREE!  How awesome is that?!   I just love Stampin' Up!   They just spoil us so much with these great deals.   Choosing a color(s) is going to be hard, but I'm betting you'll see some Midnight Muse ribbon on my cards soon.   I just adore that color!  What's your favorite?

Want more details:

For the month of September, get a FREE package of 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon-an $8.95 value-for every $40 you spend!

Choose from the following ribbons:

• Gumball Green 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon
• Midnight Muse 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon
• Primrose Petals 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon
• Raspberry Ripple 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon
• Summer Starfruit 3/8" Stitched Satin Ribbon

In addition to that awesome promotion, they have also extended the two promotions from August!   You can still get the cool Halloween tray for signing up as demonstrator until September 16th AND the My Digital Studio 31% deals are going to continue until September 14th.  Be sure to visit my website to check out all the details!   

Now I'm off to do some digital scrapbooking while Miss Laila is napping.  :)   Have a wonderful weekend!

I'm on a roll!

I finished up my third digital page this morning!  It's really becoming super fun for me.   I pinned a bunch of scrapbook sketches yesterday and am finding them fun to do.  It's a bit like all the challenges that I'm addicted to.  This page is loosely based on this layout.  I am still using the free trial of the program, but I'm totally putting the upgrade to MDS2 on my next order.  It is AWESOME!  I love recoloring the stamps!  I need to visit the SU YouTube page and watch the videos so that I can learn more tips and tricks.   I am more of a click and see what it does kinda girl, but I need to expand my horizons and learn from others.  :)   

I'll try to make a card this weekend so that you aren't missing that part of my sharing too much. Ha!  I've been working on some cards for my design teams since I hope to go back to them soon.   I almost have all the cards made for September for Friday Mashup and will be starting some for Freshly Made Sketches soon.  Busy, busy, busy!   

Laila's 2nd MDS Page

Okay...being honest here, I suck at scrapbooking.  I actually started paper crafting by scapping my wedding photos, but once I discovered card making I totally quit trying to do scrapbook pages.  I had good intentions of doing a book for Eli but with him being sick it just didn't happen.  I want to do better for Laila, but I know myself and I know I'm not going to do a paper version.   That leaves digital and well, I haven't used MDS as much as I should have to know all the features and tricks.  I can get by, but I'm a novice for sure!   To remedy that, I decided I'd try.   I'm totally intimated with scrapbooking and never know where to start.  My friend Mindy has a Pinterest board with lots of page maps, so I went there today and found this one from  Sketchy Thursdays.  I still wasn't sure about it, but I figured I'd give it a go...

It's not perfect, but I made it all by myself!   I'm a bit proud of it because I normally won't attempt things that I think I'm bad at.  :)   I stuck with the colors and size from yesterday's page in hopes that I might end up with enough pages to make a book!   I'd love to have something to print for both us and my parents for Christmas.   

So anyway, yay me.   I swear if I can do it, you can do it!   Go download that free trial and give it a shot!

Laila MDS style!

I just downloaded the trial version of MDS2 and have been playing around with it. I found this really cute template and I love how easy it was to just drag and drop my picture and add text.   I can totally scrapbook when it's THAT easy.  :)  If you think you'd like to know more about it, you can try it out free for 30 days to see if it would work for you!   Just go to my website, click on shop, look for MDS2 free trial, and download it to your computer.  Stampin' Up! even has a ton of new training videos to help us learn how to use it too!  

Many Mini Trees

I really wanted to find time to play along with my ladies over at Freshly Made Sketches last week but time just got away from me and I didn't get my card made in time.  I had the idea for one in my head so I sat down last night to make it anyway.  :)    

White space tends to stress me out, but I'm trying to learn to embrace it and use it like any other color.  I think I actually like this one!  The embossing distracts me and I forget that it's SO white!  :)   I used the fun new Merry Minis punch pack that I received as a gift from my sweet friend Mindy.   They are just adorable!   I'm not sure I love the sentiment on the banner, but I wasn't sure what else to do with it.  Any ideas?

Stamps:  Bright Hopes (retired)

Ink:  Real Red

Paper:  Whisper White, Lucky Limeade

Tools/Accessories:  Big Shot, Lace Brocade embossing folder, Merry Minis punch pack

Here's another image from Laila's Hope Calendar photo shoot.  I just love how peaceful and sweet she looks!