Not exactly sad to see you go!
Talk about a speed week!!!! Work got crazy, as it does at the end of the semester...then we had a MAJOR Blizzard - a record 26 inches of snow the Saturday before Christmas, which put me waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay behind. I am proud to say though, that I did get everything done - cooked, cleaned, wrapped and ready for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - usually I just do a big buffet bash - my entire family - all my kids, my grandkids, my sister and her family and my niece and her family...all jammed into my tiny house - and no one seems to mind at all! It is always a great, fun time and this year was no different - lots of good food and some tasty cocktails - the hit of the evening were these little candy mice that I made. I could not resist posing them with a mouse trap and featured on the very front of the plate are the Three Blind Mice, which had the kids howling in laughter!
I bought crazy hats for the kids and we did our annual song fest. I hope someone got a better photo than this one though. The hats were Santa heads and Snowman heads and really cute but I think maybe too big for most of these little heads!
Altered Clip Board – a Great Gift for Teachers and Coaches
I make a few of these every year for teachers and coaches and they are always a big hit!
Supplies:
Clip Board for an Office Supply Store
Mod Podge Matte
Foam Brushes
Patterned Paper of your choice (you need at least 2 full sheets – one each for front and back and a bit for the inch that the paper doesn’t cover)
Embellishments
A few notes before you start – Sometimes when using Mod Podge, air bubbles can occur under the paper – in order to avoid that, I seal the clip board with a coat of Mod Podge, and then when it is dry I paint the Mod Podge on again and then adhere the paper making sure to press down hard. The heavier double sided papers seem to work the best and automatically coordinate.
Steps:
AC Bailey Designs Jingle Bell (Blog) Hop!
November 20th thru 22nd
With the holidays literally around the corner, the AC Bailey Design Team has decided to help Santa (and you!) out this year with some fun and easy projects to help make the Holiday gift giving season a bit easier!
Just like Santa, we've gotten some extra help this year and asked some of our "local" ACB Elves to help out and share some of their favorite Christmas Projects and Gifts, too! AND... we've arranged for some early Black Friday sales just in case you need some products to get your projects completed ;)
So, come on over, meet our Elves and check out their fun and easy Christmas project tutorials.
Leave a comment on their blogs and be eligible for a prize - upload some of your completed projects from any of the tutorials and be eligible for another prize! (all comments and uploads must be posted by 12am EST 11/23)
November 20th thru the 27th
Enjoy Black Friday ALL week!!
Take 40% off ALL
American Crafts
Cosmo Cricket
Kaiser
Staz on inks
Bulk Buttons and Ribbons
and EVERYTHING in the While Supplies Last Section!
*Offer not valid for Albums.*In stock items only.*One coupon per customer, cannot be combined with any other coupons.*
Discount will be taken from the price shown in your cart.
Use code BLACK to get your discount.AND...
Buy a Gift Certificate and get another for half the amount FREE!
Buy a $10 GC and get a $5 one, FREE!
Buy a $100 GC and get a $50 one, FREE!
*Limit 1 per customer*
Free GC cannot be used until after DEC. 1st*Additional GC Code will be sent separately to the Buyers email address provided with the order.
Time to stock up!!! I love a good sale-see ya there!!!!!
I used the ACBailey October Goodies KOTM - there are a few left - and today is FREE SHIPPING! Just click on my link and it will take you right to the store!
Since I have no school age kids I need to wait to get some photos of the grandkid's first day of school. Shane started Kindergarten this year and he was so excited to be able to go on the BIG yellow bus! He loves his teacher "pretty much" but thinks there is too much work and not enough play. Shane is perpetual motion and on the go every waking minute. My daughter Jami is starting to "think like a scrapbooker" and thought to take a picture of the bus as it pulled away! I love how the Jenni Bowlin Bingo card looks as a frame for the photo of the bus. One of these days I will really stitch on layouts instead of using a pen. I used crackle Paint on the Chipboard apple and also used a White Signo pen to outline the Jillibean Soup alphas for the title.
Aidan started second grade and just looking at his picture I am amazed how grown up he looks - he is getting so tall and what a smile - that chin! I got him a few Tony Hawk shirts and he loves them and wore one on the first day of school. He really likes his teacher this year and I have the feeling this will be the year where he will shine. Loved the little Chipboard stuff with this kit - I covered the bus with paper and make windows with Rock Candy Stickles - on the pencil I used my trusty Crackle Paint...jeez I love that stuff. ACBailey is getting ready to have another event....can't spill the beans, but stay tuned ;)
Oh My! This kit is so adorable I am wishing October away just to get some new Halloween photos of the grandkids!!! I absolutely cannot wait to start working with this kit, so I think maybe I'll do some Fall layouts first. These kits go fast... if you want one, click HERE
) The idea is to make your blog represent you and your style. The Design team will post a few links to tips and tutorials for blogs during this time.
What a fun time!! Some wonderful challenges and even a chat with Jenni Bowlin! Although it was a busy weekend for me because of "other stuff" too, I was able to complete a bunch of challenges along with the challenges my own and if I am lucky, since it is cold and rainy today, I may be able to do a few more. One of my challenges was to create a layout using labels that you love. This idea had been in my head for a bit and I was pulling labels off stuff whenever I bought anything - so they were all ready to go. I used October Afternoon paper and die cuts, and Thickers for the title (as usual) and a funky Prima flower. The second layout I did was from a fabulous sketch that Connie posted
. I reall struggle with primary colors, so that in itself is a challenge for me. Shane's yellow soccer shirt left me no options, so I went with Basic Grey June Bug and offset it with some white Bazzill scalloped cardstock. Since no layout for me is complete without a button or a flower, added both and a few brads for good measure - and of course, a Thickers title. And no, I did not stitch on my layout - although I do love the look, I used a white signo pen and went over the dashes a few times so that they would look like real stitches. One of these days I may find a sewing machine at a garage sale and really sew on my layouts, but I don't see that happening in the near future. I am happy when I can get a layout done! If you have some time, hop on over the the ACBailey forum and check out the crop challenges - you have til tomorrow at noon to get them done and be eligible for the great prizes! We're having an online crop over at ACBailey!!! Tell your Friends!!!!
Join us the weekend of September 25th - 28th for a fun filled online crop! We will have Jenni Bowlin on for a quick Q&A on Saturday morning and Tracy Weinzapfel of Helmar and Clear Scraps doing a product Q&A on Sunday. Of course there will be online games, challenges from our Design Team and LOTS of goodies given away. (You could even win one of the new Cricut Cartridges!)
Visit the Forum today to take part in some of the fun already started with a Scrap Quest game and "And she told..." referral contest. (You must be a registered member to play)
ad, Prima, fabulous ribbons...Take a look..............These papers are so cute - and so colorful I can't wait for some more photos of the kids. There is a paper with ice cream cones that will be perfect for doing a layout of the huge Ice Cream sundae I shared with my friend Gail when I was up in New Hampshire last week. Coming soon....photos are being printed at Costco as I type ;)
This summer sure went quickly. I feel like I just finished up last semester and I am ready to start a new one again. Classes start Monday and another bunch of Freshman will be starting - it's fun though watching these tentative teenagers come in as freshman and in a quick four years, leave as mature adults and it's humbling to be part of the process. I guess that's one of the things that fueled the scrapbooking frenzy of the last few days. I think I was afraid I would not get back into my room for a while. I have plans to make a mini album of the photos from CHA, but I could not resist doing a little layout of myself and T!m and him teaching the Make & Take, which I photographed and cut out.......My friend Gail took the photo and it's all blurry - I am not sure whether she shook the camera or was all a-twitter being around T!m :) This is layout was done with the Pink Paislee Captivating Line - just love the toasty browns and blue. I added a Jenni Bowlin Bingo Card and used Puffed Thickers for the title, which I outlined with a brown Sharpie and inked up a bit with Staz-On to make them stand out more - they are white with tiny blue polka dots and look really good in real life.
carried the swirled dots on the journaling tag off the tag and onto the page using Dimensional Pearls. Thickers, as usual for the title. I absolutely love those things.
Woo Hoo! Off to Orlando for CHA! Cannot wait to see the new stuff up close and personal!! Have you seen any sneak peeks??? I am in LOVE with the new Jenni Bowlin and the new Maya Road embellie type stuff - forget the papers, I like just about everything!! Love the new Basic Grey though - what a surprise!! See you in a few!!
Wishing you a wonderful and safe day with Family and Friends! Thanks to those who sacrifice to keep America the "Land of the Free"
Wow! What a beautiful weekend! It's been a long time since we saw this much sun here! Was in PA for a few days - sunny and HOT there...drove into a wicked storm on the way home late Friday afternoon.Jackie and I were on the Verrazano Bridge , stuck in traffic and watched the two storms converge - scarily awesome! Here's a picture I took out the car window from the Belt Parkway by Sheepshead Bay and of the one storm merging with the other. Try as I might, I could not get any lightning photos. The rain came down in buckets and the lightning crackled from one side of the island to the other - north to south then south to north - very weird.
Took us forever to get home, but it started to clear up right at sunset. Red Sky at night, sailor's delight :)
What a great day yesterday - the rain stopped and the sun came out and it was glorious! Cara had Brennan's First Birthday Party (his real birthday was May 9th) and what a great party it was! Pirate and Ocean themed decorations - treasure chests and pirate's bootie and a bouncy castle. Wonderful food, good company - Brennan was such a cutie pie - too bad he'll only remember from the pictures - there were TONS of little kids - and half the moms there were pregnant - and fortunately a lot of Nurses, just in case. Layouts to follow, but check out this cake!! A very talented baker replicated a paper plate that had this design on it. It was good too - fresh strawberries in the filling.
I was so lucky to get to work with this month's beautiful kit - the flip sides of these papers are beautiful too - it was hard to decide which to use!! Keeping with the Red, White and Blue of Memorial Day I created this layout of my great niece Lexie. How perfect, that the photo I took of her on Memorial Day showed the star necklace she was wearing and my Jenni Bowlin bingo card said STAR! I traced a big star on the red and white polka dot paper and cut it out -placed that on the Bazzill cardstock, used the flip side of the paper I cut the star from to layer, ruffled a small piece of blue patterned paper, stapled that and then I slid the bingo card in, finished off with some flowers and journaled around the star using my all time Favorite White Signo Pen. I am starting to think that I am addicted to using Distress Crackle paint on all my chipboard alphas - a great way to always have the right color to go with the layout !
This kit was so pretty - and not the usual paper style for me, so I really had some fun with it. I love cutting the designs from papers and using the cutouts as embellishments. This first layout is a picture of Dana and Ken coming off the altar at their wedding. It was in a frame, which was knocked over and the glass broke...it's tough to scrap professional photos and especially an 8x10, but this Marks paper was a perfect combination of elegance and style. I cut the paper an used it as a mat and embellied cut outs around it in the place where the photo was a bit too small. Some Stickles to glitz it up a bit and voila`- perfect!
The June Kit of the Month will be released on the first - the only hint I can give you is to think "the beginning of the summer" and that it will be perfect for the BBQ and parade photos that you'll be taking the next few weeks! You can sneak a peek of it on the ACBailey estore :)
It's also a great design to use for masculine cards because the embellishment can be changed to suit whatever you need. Actually sold a set of cards as well - I never think about selling my cards, but someone requested a set and it was fun to sit and relax doing them.
And Ken was impressed at the speed that I actually did walk - Thank goodness for long legs!! I was glad to see this sign too, just in case!! Although 1 K is not all as far as it sounds.
Just feast your eyes on the ACBailey Goodies Kit of the Month for May and Welcome to AC Bailey's FIRST ever blog hop! Do we have a treat for YOU! This is an awesome opportunity for you to meet all the AC Bailey Design Team members, learn lots of (hopefully) new ideas and techniques, gain some inspiration and maybe even win some prizes along the way! Here is how this works, if you are already on my site via a link you already know this, but for those of you popping in here mid-stream, let me explain.
On the first layout, "Aunt J" I painted the chipboard with pink and when dry I painted them again with yellow - after the paint crackled, you could see the pink though the cracks. The thicker you apply the paint, the more cracks you will get
! A wonderful way to add dimension to your layouts! This is a layout of my daughter Jami with her nieces and nephews.....I used Basic Grey Urban Prairie papers and die cuts, along with some matching chipboard and undressed alphas. I blinged up the butterflies with Stickles and also used the Fiskars Threading Water punch to create a scalloped edge on one of the papers. On the second layout, I used the Distress Crackle Paint as a frame - this is a great way to be able to use patterned paper as a background and give the page dimension too. On the second layout I used paint as part of the background color - 
this can give your page some dimension and interest and is a great way to be able to use a really patterned paper for your background without losing your photo. Sometimes paint can buckle your paper a bit, but all you need to do is mist the back of the paper with plain water and cover with a heavy object and let it dry - paper will come out smooth as the day you bought it. I also used ink over this paint when it dried to really accentuate the cracks. You can use ink that is the same color as the paint or can used a coordinating color and change the look completely!
Triathlon. This layout didn't come out too badly considering I basically tore it to pieces and salvaged it and by adding the circle and a vertical photo, you hardly even know it is virtually the same design!
