The Adventures of the Hall Boys... Vol. 1

Have you ever felt like your life is right out of a comic book? Yesterday was one of those days for me, so I decided to scrap it. Of course I had to put it in a comic book format. It took a good bit of time, but I had fun doing it, and am rather pleased with how it turned out. (Be sure to notice the stuff under the couch in the strip.) The journaling reads - Don’t get me wrong, I love my boys to death, but I was really annoyed at them today. The basic story is outlined in the comic strip that I created (because it seemed just like it came from a comic strip!) And then they wondered why they were in trouble. To make it even worse when they “cleaned up” that mess, half of it went back under the couch! Under the strip itself is a partial listing of what I found. Among the found items were 18 (dirty) socks! And they couldn't figure out why their sock drawers were empty even after laundry days? Come on guys! I used Charlie's new kit Seabreeze. Love the colors in the kit, great for masculine pages as well as seaside ones. Credits: Word Art and comic strip by me, everything else - Sea Breeze by Charlies Digiscraps

Sorry I've been gone most of the week. Haven't been feeling too hot. I did get a few layouts done this week though. I used another of the DSO kits (April Showers) for all 3 of the layouts. One of each boy and one of my niece. I guess we will go ladies first...


I just loved this paper so much when I saw it and wanted to keep the layout fairly simple. It actually ended up a little more involved than I had intended, but I liked the butterfly path too much to not use it! Credits: April showers - DSO April 09 Collab, font - Arial Narrow


Next up is my Bug. He is such a character. This is what I saw one afternoon last April as I sat on the porch and waited for them to come up our little dead end road from the bus. Fortunately I had just enough time to dash inside and get the camera! Yes it was raining at the time. Don't ask me why he was carrying the umbrella over his head like that. I honestly have no idea. Credits: April showers - DSO April 09 Collab, font - Arial Narrow


And last but not least we have Bryce. he got invited to a kickball game last weekend at the town park by one of his former classmates. About a dozen kids showed up. Not too bad for half a weeks notice in the middle of the summer! The part that just tickled me to death was that after lacksadaisically keeping score for a couple of innings all of the kids agreed that they really didn't care what the score was, they just wanted to play and have fun. That was such a refreshing attitude and I thought it was quite impressive. Credits: Kickball - internet search picture, base - PSE default shape, template - SM-0818temp by Linz, title font - Shark Random Funnyness, everything else - April Showers - DSO April 09 Collab

An old photo

I was looking at the My Little Monkey kit by LP&3Dogs Designs again and thought back to an old photo of me. When I dug it out it worked even better than I figured it might. The colors match up with the kit very well. I had fun making this layout. I think my favorite part is all of the monkeys peeking out from behind papers and photos.

Anyone for a game of checkers?

I have some news! I made it onto the DSO Creative Team! I am so very excited about that. I got my first kit today and already have one project completed to share with you all. Is anyone up for a game of checkers? If so have a fun one for you. The first kit that I chose to work with is My Little Monkey by LPand3dogs Designs. This is such a darling kit. The monkeys are just adorable, the papers are all very fun.

I made up the checkerboard in PSE and printed it out. Then I adhered it to some chipboard and covered it with clear contact paper to make it more kid friendly. For the checker pieces I used the kit's 2 flairs and created backs on my own to match. I used the PSE default crown shape so they had their king's... as easy as a flip of the chip. They were all punched out using a 1 inch circle paper punch and run through my mini xyron so I could easily put them together. These were also mounted to punched out chipboard circles to make them more sturdy. I added an envelope to the back of the board to hold all of the pieces when they are not playing with the game. The boys have been having fun playing it on this nice and rainy afternoon.

I have so many more ideas for ways to use this kit so I am sure that you will be seeing more of it in the future.

2 in a row!

I'm back again. Be sure to stop on over at the Dream Team blog and check out the desktop wallpaper that I made for August.

I also have more of those layouts to share today. I think that for today it will be one of Dehlia and one of Colin. We were all sitting at the table eating ice cream the one evening and I just had to run and grab the camera. I got some cute shots of D with a messy ice cream face and used them to make this layout. I had a ball making the D to go on the paper. It is the letter D of a font called VTKS Deja Vu. I made it HUGE, put a bevel on it and then created 3 layers underneath it to "color" it in with the airbrush feature at a low opacity. I was really pleased with how it turned out so I will probably do it again in the future. Credits: Sweet Summertime - S. Neparko of Desert Designs, Fonts - Lizzielongstocking and VTKS Deja Vu

I also did a layout of Colin. In a weeks time he lost all four front top teeth. It left him with a big time gap. So of course I had to get pictures. There was also a quote challenge for July at DSO about toothless grins... Could it possibly have been more perfect? I played around with this one last night and this is what I came up with. All of the smaller type behind the quote is actually just more of the quote, repeated many times and occasionally in red. I have seen that done on other layouts and really liked it so I decided to give it a try. Credits: fonts used : Alder, Courier New and Impact, alphabeads - alphabeads by Ziggle Designs, twill tag - Gunhild Storeide, word art by me, everything else - Apple Delight by Sweet Blossom Designs

I guess...

that I am a bad blogger again. To my defense I have been out of state for over a third of the month. Then there was the prep for and recovery from the trip to deal with. So anyhow, I finally sat down and "played" with some of my pictures from the trip. I have gotten 4 layouts done so far, and will share 2 of them today. I found that most of the pictures that I took while we were gone were either "texture" pictures or flowers / bugs. I did get a few pictures of kids too and will share those another day soon. On the pink layout all of the pictures except for one were taken in Murfreesboro and Nashville TN. Credits: background paper - Vintage Blush by Creative Dreams, debossing and bows- Lily's Garden by A Work in Progress, date stamp - Shel Belle Scraps, Alpha - Grape Crush by A Work in Progress.


I am really liking the mostly black and white one. I think I am going to make a small photobook with some of my nature shots sometime in the near future. I think I will use similar style across the entire book. As I get more pages for it done I will share them here. Pretty much just the photo, plain black background, and simple type on it. I want the focus of that book to be the photos so keeping things simple.


I'll have more to share soon so be sure to check back.

Boys will be boys

I am sooo loving this next LO. I originally made it with a picture of my Dad, but he requested that I please not post it so I did the next best thing. I made it up with a picture of Bryce.

It was my first attempt at scene building and I had a blast doing it. It helped that I found a perfect kit to do it with during the DigiScrapAddict SYTYCD (so you think you can design) contest. The kit's maker took second place out of about 60? (sorry I don't remember how many were in the first round) designers over the 5 week contest. Credits:Jady Day Studio - National Park Fun fonts used - Yugly, Microsoft Sans Serif and Bradley Hand ITC

Photobook

I have a photobook on the way! I am sooo excited. That is what I was working on most of the last week. Right now it has been in Groveport for 2 days... what's the holdup? Get it on a truck headed here already!!! Don't you know how crazy I am going waiting for it to get here?

This is one of the layouts I had to make to finish it up. It The picture just cracks me up. Dozer lays down right with them. He is about the most agreeable dogs I have ever seen. I wanted to carry the number theme throughout the layout. Credits: Numb3rs - Sweet Blossom Designs

Keep it spinnin' Momma!

OK, so today is the first day of summer break. I have been working out daily for the past few weeks on the Wii with Wii Fit and My Fitness Coach. The boys had seen me doing a little bit of it on the weekends but had missed most of it because I did it while they were at school. Well... today I had a very enthusiastic audience since it is rainy out. I'll just show you the layout that I did about it now. Pretty cute! Bryce took the pictures for me while I was keeping it spinning for him. Kit used Game on by mlg scraps

I'm working on a project right now, but should be back again soon. Have a great day all!

teacher gifts

Well, the end of the school year has come. I have one that is tickled to death that it is summer break, and the other is so bummed that you would think it was the end of the world!

Here is what the boys took to school today for their teachers. You can read Bryce's pretty well there. For Colin's I used a font called Penmanship Print that I thought was perfect for a Kindergartner. His is a poem that says...

When I first started Kindergarten

I couldn't have felt smaller

But I've been growing, growing-

And not just growing taller!

I've learned to write my name;

I've learned my numbers too.

And there are many other things

That I have learned to do.

Kindergarten is over now

But I am not afraid,

Because of the great foundation

to me that you gave.

~author unknown

Both boys then used my Wacom tablet to sign their own names to it. (That only took about 20 min each to get one that looked halfway decent! Finally I had them put each letter of their name on a different layer and moved them together afterwards. Otherwise we might still be working on it!)

The boys said that both teachers really liked them, and the one even had note cards with her at school and wrote him a thank you note.