Choosing Your Name

I had a fun time doing a few challenges for a crop over at My Scrapbook Nook last weekend and when I saw the challenge to do a LO about a name I knew it was perfect for something that is STILL driving me crazy. 

This sweet little boy is STILL nameless.  Now...I know, I know...we've got time, but goodness it's hard for me to let it go!  lol.  Our kids have always had a name by the time we found out if it was a boy or girl...but not this little dude.  

So I wanted to record some of the names we've talked about...it should be really interesting to look back at in a few years and see what we were thinking of and what we ultimately ended up naming him.   

I dry brushed some white acrylic paint to the background so that my journaling would show up and then used some tiny alphas from MLS for the actual names.  

The cardstock behind "your name" is from Pink Paislee and it's got a nice glaze over parts of it that I wanted to utilize so I sprayed it with a few different colors of glimmer mist and then wiped off the glazed parts which resisted the misting.  

I also laid some stars down on my canvas and misted over them to use for the mat of the photo.  

So...do you have any names you'd like to suggest?  I'm all ears!!!  lol

ETA - I've realized that if I CAN talk Tim into naming this little dude Alistair I spelled it wrong on this LO!  lol.  Oops.

Proof Of Life pt.2

This book is supposed to be a "field journal" of sorts.  I plan to keep it with me as I go throughout each day and jot things down in it...things the kids say, quotes, what we had for breakfast, just general things about the day.  

I also want to fill it with ephemera.  Transitory things that represent the here and now.  Things like this scrap of fabric from a doll hoodie I made, or this produce price tag I found on my 1 year old's jammies.  These the some of the snippets of life that I plan to save.  

The quote at the bottom of the page I stumbled across last night as I was researching curriculum for school for my daughter next year.  

I love the way the transparencies look...not sure if I'll leave them as is or do something with them yet.

This page I wrote on yesterday with the first thing I could find...which happened to be a marker the same color as the page.  But it's up there.  A reminder of how God protected us yesterday when the space heater caught on fire...and burned itself out...with none of us knowing about it.  

Then today I added in the masking tape cross and story of what my kids were doing (which I'm praying they won't be struck down for!  lol)  

So that's what I've got so far...just a tiny sample of what I'm hoping to do with this little book.  Feel free to ask if you've got any questions!

Proof Of Life

Today marked the beginning of an on-line class I'm taking called Proof of Life.  My dear friend Virginia is teaching it (which honestly is the biggest reason I wanted to take it.  She is soooo talented and sooo real!)  

We spent the first day of "class" just getting our albums ready.  The purpose of this little book is to be a "scrapbook" in the truest sense of the word.  To jot down thoughts, quotes, glue in wrappers and doodles, to become a part of my everyday so that by putting all those "snippets" together we might have a more rounded picture of the life we live.  

I've been wanting to try out this flower for a while so I did it on a small scale with burlap for the cover.  I used some turquoise ink to stamp on the burlap first and then swiped some on the edges as well.  

and staples...because they're cool AND functional.  Don't have to worry about those chipboard letters falling off now!

I'm super excited about this class and plan to blog through it as well, so be sure to stop back tomorrow to see what else we're doing with these little pretties!  (and when I say little I mean LITTLE.  The pages I cut for inside are 5.25" x 3.25"!)

Baseball Dreams

(sorry about the crummy picture, still working on where to take them indoors)

I've been hoarding this picture of my son for almost a year...which is not like me at all.  I know there are a TON of things technically wrong with the photo, but it's one of those that just speaks to my heart.  His tousled little boy hair,  his taggie, the way he's sleeping on his arms, and of course...the baseball.  

I wanted this LO to be simple and focus on the picture and the feeling behind it.  I mean, to me, America, little boys, and baseball just go together.  What little boy doesn't dream of hitting a home run or winning the game?

 I also thought it was rather fitting that he had one red, white and blue jammies in the picture so I went with those colors for the base of my LO, kind of underscoring the whole "America's Favorite Pastime" without being too patriotic feeling.  

The American Crafts Letterman Thickers were PERFECT for this LO, but the white was just too stark a contrast for the feel I was going for, so, I did what I always do...to everything!  lol, I swiped them with some Close to Cocoa ink and then they looked nice and dirty and were a perfect fit!  

Baby it's COLD Outside!!!!

I don't know about you, but when it gets cold all I want to do is hunker down and get all snuggly inside...and what better thing to do when you're all snuggly than come crop with us at A Walk Down Memory Lane!!!!

We know its cold outside so let warm up this place with a crop  



Jan 21st to Jan 23rd

We will be starting on Jan 21st posting challenges and all weekend the DT will be posting games. You have till the 23rd to upload your creations.

We will have RAK's to give a way and one person will win a prize from AWDML by random drawing.

So the more you do , the more enteries you get for the prize!!!  :) 

Summer Wonder

so....I'm officially addicted to masking tape!  I was looking through my photos the other day, while freezing my tushy off because it's COLD, and this picture totally drew me in.  

I tucked some hidden journaling behind one of the photos, and yes, I'm not over my Martha butterfly punches yet either.  :)  

and I had to use up every last scrap of this October Afternoon paper!  I fussy cut it and then inked the edges and popped them up for a little corner border.  

and the masking tape...like I said...in love.  I do think it need to be on  a darker background so it stands out more though.  The stamp around "Summer" is a Love, Elsie stamp.  

ROAR!

We had a simple Dino party for my son's 3rd birthday.  Family and a few friends came over and we had homemade pizza, dinosaur cake and of course ice cream!

I used this recipe for the cake and then changed up a few things (like using plastic dinosaurs so he could keep them and play with them and using pretzels for the tree trunks.)  

Then taking a cue from Virginia I used my new Silhouette to cut out some dinosaurs from vinyl and put them on some "grab and go" sippies.  (I even added bows to the dinos for the girls!  lol)  

and then because I'm addicted to my new toy I made a little banner too.  

I just *love* when they learn to do this (please note the sarcastic tone with which that was typed!)

There!  That's better.  We kept his birthday shirt simple this year because I found this perfect dino shirt that already fit him.  I figured, why mess with a good thing?  So I just slapped a three on there and he's one happy boy!  (except when it's in the laundry!  lol)

Yup, he's got the whole "CHEEEEESSSSSSSSSSEEEEEEEE" thing down!  lol

*trying* to blow out the candles...(and yes, that would be my preggo belly back there!  lol, not sure who took this picture)

   Yup, I think this picture is proof positive that I done good!  ;)  

2011 Word

Thanks to Ali Edwards I've been thinking of and focusing on a "word" each year for the past few years.  This year picking a new word for the year happen to coinside with my reading of Ann Voskamp's new book One Thousand Gifts.  (also, if you read her blog, I just want to mention that I picked my word AND made this LO before I saw this post.)

This is definitely something that's going in my book of "gifts."  Sitting down and scrapping again was something I'm so grateful for.  Something I will continue to give thanks for.  

Eucharisteo.  Thanksgiving.  That's my word for the year.  I was struck as I was reading One Thousand Gifts how ungrateful I am.  How most of my sins, my bad attitudes, my whining and even things that most people would say are "justified" all stem from not seeing everything as a gift from The Giver.  

Just cutting and pop dots...love!

Chara...Joy.  We can't know true deep chara without experiencing, living, really KNOWING eucharisteo.  So, thanks to conviction from the Holy Spirit and proding from One Thousand Gifts this year I will choose to "fight feeling with feeling."  I will choose to be thankful.   

I cut out the title with my new Silhouette (*swoon*  LOVE!!!  Thanks so much mom!!!) and then backed it with a darker paper to make it stand out more.  The ruffles are made with masking tape and all the papers are October Afternoon (minus the two that are from an old book.)  I used some of the scraps from the background paper to fussy cut some shapes and pop them up for some dimension.  The journaling type rub on behind "chara" is an OLD Fancy Pants one and the "Joy" is a Pink Paislee rub on.  So....I'm ready to scrap some more!  

Happy Birthday Buddy!!!!!!!!

Well it's Sunday morning and instead of joining together with fellow believers to edify and spur one another one to love and good deeds, Grace and I are chillin' at home with nasty noses...and I'm not sure about her but my head kinda feels like it's trying to implode.

I sat down here in the hopes of sharing some of 'Zekiel's 3rd birthday party, but for unknown reasons my computer isn't reading my memory card.  Sooo....hopefully I'll be back later today with those pictures for you.  In the meantime, enjoy some of my sweet little dude, who today....is THREE.

This little guy joined our family on Jan 2nd, 2008...and just happened to be the first baby of the year in our county!  (he won some fun goodies for that too! :)

With him and his name (Ezekiel) he reminds us of The Strength of God and that He has promised that He "will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from  all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols  I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you  a new heart, and  a new spirit I will put within you.  And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27  And I will put my Spirit within you,  and cause you to walk in my statutes and  be careful to obey my rules." (Ez. 36: 26-27)

He has brought with him bugs, and trucks, and dirt and noise and all things boy.  

He has added more joy, more love, more hugs (he's GOOD at hugs, let me tell you what!), more laughter, and more noise (oh, I already said that one?  Well...it should be in there twice anyway! ;)

He is all boy and is quickly learning to protect and care for his sisters.  We are so thankful and blessed that God added him to our family and has allowed us to enjoy and learn and laugh and play and cry with him for three years.  We pray we have many more years with him and that God will save him at an early age and use him mightily for His glory.  

I love you with all my heart 'Zekiel.

Top 10 LOs of 2010

Yup, it's been MONTHS.  And Yup, I'm back!  I've missed scrapping too much...not to mention I just LOVE doing this post at the end of every year.  It's so much fun to look back over all my LOs from a year and see what's happened, how I've recorded it, how my style has evolved...and hey, picking 10 favorites this year should be easier than normal since I haven't scrapped in so long right?  lol ;)

SO....without further ado...in no particular order...my favorite 10 LOs from 2010 (minus one or two that may or may not be getting publish... *squeak!*)

First up, this picture just kills me.  Melts my heart.  LOVE it.  And Lily Bee?  Um...always a winner in my book!  

These pictures of Zeke are just too sweet...AND he's wearing the first hoodie I ever made him.  This shirt may be partially responsible for my business (and subsequent lack of scrapping due to time management issues! hehe!)

This isn't my typical style, and I also rarely have LOs with all of the kids on one LO but I just love it.  The pictures are from our Christmas card in 2009 and are also some of the first really good pictures I ever took of our kids (well...Kessa and Zeke's anyway!  lol)

Another one of Zeke in a shirt I made him.  This shirt was actually the first thing I sewed really...and it gave me the confidence to know that I really could sew!  I can't remember where I got the idea for the black on black with the stars...I feel like I'm remembering kraft butterflies on a craft card? but I'm not sure.  Either way, LOVE them!

Glimmer mist.  Spatters.  Love.  *sigh*

Oh.my.goodness!  Was my baby really that small such a short time ago?  

Another one of Grace.  The journaling on this one was really special and meant a lot to me.  Also LOVE the papers and the black and white photos.

Another one where the journaling means a lot to me.  I want to remember all of my kids' childhoods, not just the good.  I want to remember how God has used them to sanctify me, and part of that includes scrapping the struggles.  

Post Tenebras Lux - That's what I screen printed on all three of the kids Easter outfits.  After Darkness Light.  Isn't He good?!?!

I wasn't sure what to do with this map paper when I got it, but I knew I loved it and this LO just kinda came together.  

One big thing I noticed when I was going through and picking these out...I love me some neutrals with a few pops of color!  lol.  Seems to be a theme.  

Anyway...I have some fun stuff from Zeke's 3rd birthday party that I'll be sharing tomorrow.  Welcome back!!!