Footprint Fun

I have a fun Halloween craft you can do with your kids to share today and a "spooky" way to dress it up when you are finished. Creating animals and other creatures using footprints and handprints make for wonderful keepsakes capturing a moment in time when your children are little.

I had a great time creating these spooky ghosts with my girls. Take a look....

And here we are crafting away...I simply cut black cardstock to 8 x 10 so it could fit in a frame and then painted my girls' feet with white acrylic paint. Just stamp their feet and allow the project to dry. (This is also a great project to duplicate for grandparents and other family members).

 

When the ghosts were dry, we added googly eyes using glue dots and then I drew around the edge of the cardstock with a white gel pen and added the date. I also labeled each ghost with little alphabet stickers.

I then took a plain wooden frame and painted it black, then added crackle medium and went over it with white paint. I added "Boo" with a couple different Thicker fonts and adhered a border sticker at the top of the frame.

Then I cut a couple pieces of cheesecloth and glued with a hot glue gun. One of the pieces I tied off with a piece of twine and then added a patterned paper "curtain" of sorts. To distress the cheesecloth, I cut it up a little bit and then rubbed black ink on it.

 

A super fun, quick, easy project...the girls love looking at their ghosts too! Try making a ghost family with your entire family!

Apple of My Eye Tag Mini Album

I have another project for Emma's Paperie to share with you today. For the month of October, our focus project was tags and I made a little tag mini album using the Farmhouse collection by Crate Paper and a Maya Road mini tag album. My girls just love looking through this little album of our trip to the apple orchard.

I kept the design really simple and journaled our experience on the first page of the album. The rest of the album is photos.

The complete supply list can be seen at Emma's Paperie here. We have a very busy day today - Tiny Tumblers, the library and then we are trick or treating at a local mall. Should be a great time! 

Have a great day! :) 

Spooktacular Blog Hop!

Welcome to the Noel Mignon Spooktacular Blog Hop! This will be a two day event, so be sure to join us both Saturday and Sunday to join in on all the fun.

Each member of the design team has created a fabulous tag with a letter featured prominently on it; collect a letter from each blog and unscramble them to discover a word.

The first stop on the hop is the NoelMignon LO/Project blog. So if you are stopping here first, please head back over there and start over to be sure you collect all the letters.

Be sure to leave comments along the way.... once you've collected all the letters and think you've unscrambled the word, email Virginia at 2blackflipflops at gmail dot com with your entry. We'll draw one random name from the correct entries for a fun My Mind's Eye Halloween prize pack!  
Here is my tag that I created using the "Something Wicked" kit:

The November "Hudson Valley" kit goes up for sale bright and early Tuesday morning! Get your order in early, as this one has the lines that have been getting a lot of attention since they debuted at CHA, and it won't last long! 

Your next stop on the Spooktacular Blog Hop is our fabulously talented guest designer this month, Miss Kimberly Neddo!

Trick or Treat Decor & Gathering!

Hello friends! Today I have a couple projects to share with you. The first of which uses the Glowing collection by Authentique Paper and Glue Arts adhesives. I created a spooky piece of home decor using a paper mache hat I picked up at a craft store. I covered the hat in patterned paper and used the Glue Glider Pro Perma Tac to adhere.

To decorate the hat, I chose a tag from the Glowing Headlines and adhered it with U-Cut-It foam by Glue Arts. I also added a spooky spider, black glitter tulle, a spooky flower and a silver glitter floral spray.

Supplies:
Authentique Paper: (Glowing Patterned Paper - Orange Brocade, Black Script); Headline 2 Back
Glue Arts: Glue Glider Pro Perma Tac, U-Cut-It Foam
Pink Paislee glitter trim, Making Memories flower, paper mache hat, floral spray, black glitter tulle, spider


My second project for today uses the (just-hitting-retailers) "Gathering" collection by Authentique Paper. I am just in LOVE with the rich, warm colors that were perfect for these photos of my girls with their grandparents at the pumpkin patch.

 

I created a grid design and then placed several of the patterned papers in between and embellished with Icons die-cuts. 

 

I cut that gorgeous flower design from one of the patterned papers in the collection.

A couple of punched leaves from various patterned papers gave pops of gorgeous color to the layout.

 

Supplies:

Authentique Paper: (Gathering Patterned Paper: Grow, Harmony, Reminisce, Flourish, Together, Bloom); Icons; Classic Type; Tabloids; Expressions; Noteables; Headlines; Petite Type Square

Melissa Frances pearls, Maya Road stick pin, American Crafts chipboard alphabet, EK Success punch, Tattered Angels mist

Thanks for looking!

Happy Halloween Memories!

Hello friends! It's Spooktacular Week at Noel Mignon and the design team is sharing a lot of great projects all week and Halloween ideas on the message board. I LOVE scrapbooking Halloween and something I've done every year now is to create a recap layout with my favorite photos. 

First I'll show you my recap layout for 2010 and then what I did the previous year. I used the "Something Wicked" kit for this layout. I printed out 14 photos that are 1.5" squares and then printed a larger photo (about a 3" square) but when I cut it, I left about an inch border on the bottom to make it look like a Polaroid. This larger photo is THE costume photo I sent to family, etc. I decided to place all the photos on black cardstock because I wanted them to just pop off the page. The rub-on in the corner is by Fancy Pants.

I embellished several of the photos with the Authentique Paper word stickers and a Fancy Pants button (with twine) and an American Crafts rosette.

 

The filter circle is by Fancy Pants, American Crafts dimensional felt sticker and Authentique Paper alphabet and word stickers.

 

And here is the Halloween recap layout I did for 2009 using Noel's Halloween kit from last year. You can see I repeated the square grid design but changed it up a little bit. 

 

This type of design would work well for any event or holiday you have a lot of photos from and would be fun to look back on as well from year to year!

I'll be back tomorrow with some projects for Authentique Paper! 

Have a great day! :)

Celebrate 2 Years of Fun!

Happy Wednesday! Today I have a layout to share using photos of the girls' 2nd birthday this spring and the "Life of the Party" collection by BasicGrey. I used a kraft basics sheet for my background and built a grid design from there. The design came together so easy!

Here's a close-up of the title...I love building titles with a variety of alphabets!

 

Short and sweet today but I have a lot to share tomorrow and Friday! :)

Thankful Quilted Canvas

Good morning, friends! I have a home decor project to share with you today that I absolutely LOVE because of the rich, warm colors and homespun feel. I created this project as my first design work for Emma's Paperie using the gorgeous Farmhouse collection by Crate Paper. (For a complete supply list, please visit the Emma's Paperie blog).

I have been very inspired by a lot of the quilt patterns I have come across on Pinterest and decided to take one to paper! I cut out a bunch of diamonds from patterned paper and then arranged them into this star pattern. I machine stitched around the outside and inside of the diamonds and then added a rough running stitch by hand using embroidery floss.

I was going back and forth on framing the piece and then decided it needed a little something extra so I put in on an 11 x 14 canvas. But first, I needed to shabby up the canvas so I painted it cream, then used a crackle medium and then painted it a warm, rich brown.

I misted a paper doily with cream mist and then created a bow using burlap trim by My Mind's Eye.

 

Here's a close-up of the diamonds and stitching...

 

Thanks for looking and enjoy your day! :)

Pebbles: So Heavy & Spooktacular Week

Hello friends! I can't believe how busy the next couple weeks of October are going to be! Lots of fall and Halloween fun and memories to make with my girls! And speaking of fall fun, I have a new layout to share of the girls picking apples at the apple orchard. They had a huge, heavy bag of apples and we got a kick out of them trying to pick it up - pretty cute faces! I used the Fresh Goods collection by Pebbles on this layout and created the layout for a product parade focus on the super cute Toothpick Flags that I selected from three different Pebbles collections. For a complete supply list, please visit the Pebbles blog.

I used alphabet stickers by Pebbles and Bella Blvd. for the title.

 

And here's a look at the Toothpick Flags...I just grouped three of them together with twine and placed them behind a dimensional sticker. 

 

And finally, be sure to join us over at the Noel Mignon message board and blog for Spooktacular Week! The design team is sharing Halloween projects and ideas all week long and we'll even have a blog hop later this week! Please stop by and join us! And Noel, is offering free shipping to U.S. orders over $50 today only!

 

Have a great Monday! :)

Authentique Color Challenge

Happy weekend! My layout today is for the October Color Challenge at Authentique Paper. Be sure to stop by and see the beautiful samples from the design team. My little girls love their cousin, Tatum, or "T-mum" as they call him. The last time he was at our house they were showing him all their favorite things - their cars and Baby Einstein DVDs and also sharing lots of hugs and kisses. For my layout I combined patterned paper and embellishments from the Glowing, Splendid and brand new Free Bird 6 x 6 paper collections.

Here's a look at the color combination: (I did add a few pops of orange and then kraft as a neutral). 

A little close-up of my title work...the tiny alphabet stickers are Authentique Paper and the larger stickers are ones I had in my stash. 

 

I made a little paper ribbon from patterned paper from Free Bird, added a die-cut date from Splendid, punched a star from Free Bird and then added a brad.

 

I love the look of simple punched stars!

 

Well, I better get busy today. I have lots of cleaning and laundry on my agenda as well as hemming two Halloween costumes so we can have a photo shoot! :)

Have a great day! :)

Merry Not Scary

Hello, friends! Today I have a new layout to share with you using the "Something Wicked" kit from Noel Mignon. At our house, Halloween is "Merry, Not Scary" and this layout celebrates that!

 

I punched these circles from patterned paper and cut a few of them in half as well as used a My Mind's Eye layered brad. 

 

I cut the spider from the American Crafts "Night fall" patterned paper and stacked a My Mind's Eye layered brad and We R Memory Keepers chipboard tag.

 

I printed and cut a couple of my photos to look like Polaroids and then tied them off with twine and the girls' initial with Authentique Paper mini stickers. 

 

We've been having a lot of fun making fall and Halloween memories and taking lots of photos at our house lately. I can't wait to scrapbook them all! This is one of my favorite times of year for photo opportunities! And the girls are getting a little better at letting us take photos! :)

I'll be back tomorrow with more! :)

We Did It! and Spooky Cards

I was able to spend some time late last week with the "Something Wicked" kit from Noel Mignon. I love that while this kit has a lot of Halloween themed paper and embellishments that I can create fall layouts and projects from it as well. We recently went to the apple orchard and went through a little hay maze the perfect size for toddlers. 

I created a little banner from the twine in the kit, Lily Bee banner stickers and then paper ribbons I made from patterned paper.

There is also a new challenge up on the Noel Mignon challenge blog to create a project based on the sneak peek photos that Noel posts every month. Here is the sneak peek photo I used from the "Something Wicked" kit: 

and here is my take on the photo using the kit. I did add a little twine but everything I used (with the addition of cardstock) came right from the photo. I made a couple little spooky cards. 

Noel also has a great giveaway going on right now to win the beautiful kit below. Here's the link to see how you can win! :)

 

Have a great day! We're getting ready for Tiny Tumblers this morning! :)

Pebbles: A Double Shower

Thanks so much for all your prayers and well wishes for my girls. They are doing much better now. Asthma attacks are so scary to experience especially when an inhaler or nebulizer isn't working. I know from experience now to just head straight for the ER. We're going back to their allergist and asthma doctor in the next week and a half and we're going to push for further testing. All we are aware of right now is food allergies and they very obviously have environmental triggers for their asthma. I have also been trying to do my part by keeping things clean and dusted around our house and trying to have a better cleaning schedule to maintain. It means some changes for me but I want to do everything I can to keep my girls healthy. It's so hard to balance everything as a mom and sometimes it's all I can do to keep up with the basics around the house but that evidently has to change. I'll keep you posted on what we find out in regards to their allergies and asthma.

And yay, I'm back to sharing projects this week! I have a two-page layout to share today that uses Pebbles' "New Addition" collection and photos from one of our double baby showers when the girls were born. Because adoption is so up in the air, we had our baby showers a few weeks after the girls arrived. Glen's co-workers gave us a beautiful shower with amazing bassinet cakes and super cute diaper cakes along with other much appreciated gifts. I haven't scrapbooked any of our shower photos and decided it was high time I got on them! We had an "It's a Party!" theme at the Pebbles blog last week so I took advantage of a reason to work on these photos. (Please click on the photo to see larger - it's hard to share two-page layouts on a blog).

I chose a variety of pink patterned paper to create my background and then cut some to have ribbon ends. Pebbles also makes these cute double heart dimensional stickers which was perfect for a layout about twins!

 

I'll be back with more soon! We're heading to the pumpkin patch this morning and I'll be hoping and praying we don't have any asthma trouble from this trip! 

Have a great day!

On Hiatus

Hi friends,

Just wanted to let you know I won't be blogging this week as I have two little girls at home recovering from a couple trips to the hospital. Miss Lily went to the ER Saturday afternoon and responded well to treatment so she went home with a pneumonia diagnosis (went in initially for an asthma attack). Miss Nora went to the ER very early Sunday morning (about 2:30 a.m.) and spent two days in the pediatric ICU after having a severe asthma attack. We're all back home now but Nurse Mama is administering lots of medicine and TLC these days. The rest of the week we'll be busy with follow up appointments and making decisions on how to prevent these severe attacks from happening. Thanks for all your prayers and well wishes!

I'll be back soon!
Jill