Many, many thanks...

This is a thank you card that I made for the woman who led our Bible study. We had our last class on Monday and she threw us a "princess party" in celebration of our completion of the class. The inside of the card reads "I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way - in all your speaking and in all your knowledge - 1 Corinthians 1: 4-5" . The card has a little pocket on the front for a gift card...Leslie happens to LOVE Starbucks so along with a basket of Scentsy goodies we pitched in to get her a gift card to Starbucks.

The study was incredible it was Captivating, Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul by John and Stasi Eldredge. I would highly recommend this study to all the women in my life. I learned so much about myself and about how very much God loves me just the way I am. I was truly blessed by the wonderful group of women who I was fortunate enough to share this study with.

Okay, I'm off to run the kids around to soccer...have a blessed day!

It HAS arrived!!!

Just checked the mail and it arrived...my box of delicious goodies from Your Scrapbook Stash that I won on Danielle's blog. I am absolutely thrilled. I recently found the chipboard stickers to go with the Cosmo Cricket Earth Love collection at a great price and have been using papers that I already have but I really wanted to get some of the Earth Love papers to go with it and then I couldn't resist the ribbons too! Check out the super cute cloud paper from the My Mind's Eye Quite Contrary collection and of course some super yummy Jillibean Soup. Can't wait until I can play around with these.

Seriously...snow???

So we woke up yesterday to a blizzard - yes, you read that right, a blizzard! Lots and lots of sloppy wet snow. And today, it's snowing again. Poor Zach, his soccer games have been cancelled for two weeks in a row now...he's had lots of practices but no games so far. I tell you our weather is so wacky. Tuesday and Wednesday were warm and I was so loving seeing my tulips poke their heads out of the ground to show off their gorgeous yellow and red colors, Thursday was cooler with some rain off and on and then Friday BAM big snow! Oh well, we need the moisture so I guess I'll just hope my sweet flowers can survive all that heavy, wet snow.

Another thing this snow has done is delay my package of goodies from Your Scrapbook Stash that I ordered as a result of winning a RAK on the For the Love of Paper blog. You should check it out, Danielle is SUPER talented and always has great inspiration. We didn't get mail delivered yesterday because of the weather and my package was scheduled to arrive...hopefully today.

I finished the above layout on Wednesday and it's based on a layout I saw in an online magazine but I can't remember which one - I really need to be better about recording those kinds of details when I print out my inspiration. I'm learning...give me some time. This layout shows you how far behind I am in my scrapping (if I were going chronologically - which I'm not, so I'm not going to stress about it). This was Tyler's first day at preschool and he's just now finishing up and getting ready to graduate to kindergarten. So hard to believe all of our boys are growing up as fast as they are. Our "adopted" 18 year old Taylor will be graduating in a few short weeks, Andrew will become a junior, Zach a 2nd grader and Tyler will be in kindergarten. Slow down boys - I don't want to miss it all!

Wishing you a blessed weekend...see you again next week!

I can't believe I forgot...

Seriously, how could I forget to share with you all that I have my first official scrapbook layout publication coming up in the June issue of Scrapbooking.com Magazine. I was contacted yesterday by the editor asking if I would compose a write-up and product list for the layout that I did for Andrew's 15th birthday celebration. Not only do I absolutely LOVE that layout but it's one that is very dear to me as I'm rarely in the photos I scrapbook and my wonderful husband happened to have the camera at just the right time on this occasion. So I'm absolutely thrilled...I've been submitting more and more of my work to magazines and design team calls hoping for a break-through. Maybe, just maybe this is it!

My Calling...

So I finally got started on this 8 x 8 album that I received as a gift a couple of years ago. I decided quite some time back that the album would contain pages about me...things that are important to me as well any other information that I want passed on to future generations. My motivation for doing this came when I realized that most of my pages were about other people and that someday when I am no longer here, I want my family and friends to know what things were important to me. A little morbid I know but there is so much that makes up a person and so few of us document what makes us tick. So there you have it...

This layout focuses on my part-time job but it's really my calling. It is what God has gifted me to do for this season of my life. The photo is of one of the babies that I had the honor of watching from the time she was 8 weeks old. She has since graduated to the next classroom and I miss her cuddles and smiles so much. The journaling reads "It is the babies in our church that have touched my heart in such an incredible way that I know it is exactly where the Lord wants me to be right now. Caring for these precious little hearts so their parents can attend services or classes. Through children, like sweet Selah, I see God's perfection so precisely. They bless me so much!
Jeremiah 29:11 says "For I know the plans that I have for you, to prosper you, and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope."

I absolutely love being the classroom coordinator in the "angelfish room" (ages 6 weeks to 12 months) at my church. It doesn't matter how stressful a week I've had, I can go in that room, play with babies, feed babies, snuggle babies, and comfort babies - I walk out of there a changed person so incredibly blessed by those precious gifts from God. I am so blessed that this is where God has put me.

Dream Big...

So I was wandering around the wonderful web looking to be inspired and came across the My Mind's Eye blog and their Challenge #10 Dream Big. They provide a great sketch and the lyrics to the song Dream Big by Ryan Shupe and the RubberBand. It was just the inspiration I was looking for. I've had these pictures of our oldest son for over a year now and have been trying to figure out what context I was going to put them in. This song was perfect!!! I love the My Mind's Eye 29th Street Market collection papers too - they are just grungy enough and have just the right colors to work well with these photos. All of the items I used with the exception of the chipboard star and the silver brads come from My Mind's Eye - not all the same collection and some I've had in my supply for ages but they all pulled together really well to create this layout.

On another note, Paul and I just celebrated our 8th anniversary...that's 11 years together and 8 married. WOW, I know to some of you that doesn't seem like a long time but for us, it's hard to believe it's been that many years. They do seem to pass more quickly as time goes on and as our kids' and our own hobbies and sports make our lives busier and busier. Fast or slow, we're blessed and are so grateful that God is continuing to help us grow in our relationship together.

It's been a bit since I've posted but that's not to say that I haven't been crafting like a mad woman. I spent much of last week making cards - not sure what got into me but one afternoon I made a dozen cards! I'll get some new photos into the card gallery for you to take a peek at real soon. My kids laugh at me when I'm photographing cards because I don't have a good place in my house that has the right sunlight to photograph in. So there's this one section of wall that gets GREAT sun for a very brief period in the late afternoon and there I am being really goofy taping cardstock (that matches the item I'm photographing, of course) to the wall, then tacking up the item I want to photgraph and then scrambling to get that one down and the next one up before the sun shifts and my good lighting is gone. It really was hysterical to watch so I totally get why they laugh at me. We all need a good laugh every once in a while, right?

On what I think is a really cool note, I was contacted by Colorbok about one of my layouts that I had posted to the gallery on the Two Peas in a Bucket website. I had used some of the Friendly Forest collection and they wanted to know if they could post it to their blog and their Facebook site. So flattering...and maybe, just maybe I'm starting to break into this wonderful world of publication - now wouldn't that be exciting! So if you're interested...check it out over at Colorbok's blog it's the Tree Hugger layout that I did of Tyler a while back.

The king of cool...

I had so much fun doing this layout. I really had no idea what I was going to do, I just knew I wanted to scrap these pictures of Zach playing at the park. Lucky for me I was playing around with these felt embellies from Fancy Pants that the team over at Crop Chocolate sent me and noticed that this crown was the perfect size for my picture. Woohoo!!! A few crystals on the crown and some embroidery floss on the felt stars and my handsome boy is the king of cool. No seriously, he really is - the kid is cool!

So if you're into paper crafts you have to stop by Crop Chocolate and check out all they have to offer. Jon and his staff are amazing - some of the BEST customer service around, not to mention all the great product they offer at ridiculously low prices. Trust me, if you're not hooked on checking this site several times a day for the latest deal, then you haven't ever checked it out because once you do I'm sure you'll agree it's the best. And if you're not into paper crafting...might I suggest you start. It's such a rewarding way to preserve your memories.

Weel, oOur snow is melting away from last nights storm and conditions are supposed to be really nice over the weekend. I can't wait until we can get started planting our vegetable gardens but alas, I must be patient. Planting before Mother's Day out here is just asking for trouble. For those of you in the warmer climes, get out there and dig in the dirt and thank God for all that he has provided.