Hello Baby Girl Cards

They're girly and they're soft and they go great with gold. Loved using the Wildflower collection for these hello baby cards.

Two of Matt's friends recently had little girls. So we knew we wanted to send them each a card. 

The sentiments were cut with my Silhouette, painted with watercolor papers and covered with Glossy Accents.

I stamped "baby girl" on both cards with that most awesome Pebbles Roller stamp! The big heavy duty one =) Two peas just got it in stock!

And I also used a teeny tiny stamp from the same Kelly Purkey set I used for the Simply Amazing cards.

They're very simple cards but I think the papers make them beautiful.

And that's the last of the Wildflower projects. Well, at least for now. I still have a lot left from this collection pack, but I'm saving it for the right projects. I'm sure you'll see it cropping up again soon =)

In the meantime, don't forget to comment on this or any of the Wildflower posts for a chance to win the collection pack. Doesn't matter what you comment, just as long as I can get ahold of you if you've won!

cheers & besos,

One Perfect Day

Of all the pages I made with the Wildflower collection, I think this one most captures the spirit of it. The mood, the colors, the lighting. I love it!

I drew inspiration from the Snapshots sheet and used RadLab to create a similar effect in my own photos. It also didn't hurt that Matt managed to capture some real sunbursts. I printed these out on matte photo paper instead of glossy which helped soften the look even more.

The page was really simple and easy to put together. I mainly just clustered everything in the middle of a kraft sheet of cardstock. But to add a bit of visual interest, I ran my Glitz Giant Roller stamp (its on sale right now so you might want to snap it up!) across the background using brown chalk in.

I love that the "positive" icon is becoming so popular. I love the symbolism of it. I think it also helps reinforce a more subtle theme here. It's a reminder to stay positive about this lil guy. He has autism, and while that's difficult, it doesn't have to be negative.

That's also reinforced with the "let go and let's go" journaling card. We never quite know how he's going to react to new places. If he'll feel comfortable or perhaps a bit stressed. Leaving the house isn't something we usually do. But it was such a beautiful day. We couldn't miss out on the opportunity to go to the park. So we let go and went. And we had a fun time.

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I added a few journaling cards, some label stickers and a few buttons as the main dimensional embellishments. But I think what's my favorite is this "Do you know, I love you so?" banner. "You" or "U" is something I use on most of Urijah's scrapbook pages. Since his name starts with a "U" and since I write all of my journaling to "U", it reinforces that.

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I think what I love most about this page, is that's it about me and him. There are actual photos of me and Urijah. These are so incredibly rare, because I'm the one holding the camera most of the time. I'm thankful Matt was around to come with me and to snap some shots.

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I didn't use a lot of the Wildflower collection, just two journaling cards, a snippet of patterned paper and a sticker. But I think these itmes added a lot of impact. 

Mainly though, they helped set the tone of this page and just simply inspired me.

Don't forget to comment for a chance to win this collection pack from Carta Bella!

cheers & besos,

Simply Amazing Cards

I made some quick and easy thank you cards using the scraps from the Wildflower collection, a Two Peas cut and my Silhouette, and an older stamp set by Kelly Purkey.

The insides of these are stamped with a simple "thank you" in gold ink.

They're very simple and I love that about them =)

cheers & besos,

Love you Wild

This page is best viewed in bits and pieces. Maybe not all at once. There's a lot going on here I'll admit.

I had these cute photos of Mac that I wanted to scrapbook but didn't know quite what to say about them other then, "hey! here's a cute kitten." Somehow along the way, I figured out that I wanted to talk about how she's my first baby. The first little thing that I've ever had to take care of on my own (without mom or dad). Hence the title that I created with the help of my Silhouette.

My Silhouette got a lot of action on this page. For some reason, I got it in my head that I wanted to use ovals for this layout. It's a shape I don't normally scrapbook with so I decided to try it out. I searched "oval" in the Silhouette online store and came up with these designs. Cut them out of my favorite white cardstock (white Bazzil orange peel in case anyone is curious) and then layered them over my photos and one of the Wildflower journaling cards.

I really had no intention to include any deer on this page about my kitten, but the sentiment on the journaling card was too good to pass up. I had to include on this page about my wild little kitten whom I do love dearly.

There's yellow in the photos but not much in the collection. So I painted a rough square in the middle with this vibrant yellow color. I like that you can still see the arrowhead design through it.

I didn't realize it at the time, but afterwards considered that I had channeled my inner Wilna for this page. Roughly this particular page of hers.

The final bits were adding gold washi as landing for my journaling spots. I printed them on more of that orange peel cardstock and hand sewed them to the page with a few stitches of embroidery floss. I thought they needed some color.

This was another idea I've had floating around in my head. Tacking something down and letting the rest of it float. I'm talking about a lot of envisioning and picturing in this post. I think its the product of being away from my creating desk for so long. I had time to imagine these pages beforehand.

I added another deer at the bottom, anchored by a strip of gold washi tape. If not now, when else would I use it? Along with her name and the date. Viola!

Like I said, a lot to take in and a lil crazy. But I love it all the same. I also love how versatile this collection is. I didn't use many pieces; my background paper, a journaling card and that sticker. And yet it still mixes flawlessly with the rest of my stash.

Don't forget to comment if you wanna win it! Just a flower and your e-mail will do =)

cheers & besos,

Wildflower Central *Giveaway*

Hey there! It's been awhile. I'm happy to see you =)

These last few months have been the busiest craziest most stress filled months. But there's light at the end of the tunnel. It won't be slow, but it will be slower. And that my friends, is the pace I need. So thank you, to anyone who has stuck it out with me.

Finally, I have time to scrapbook! I've been missing my paper crafting time. And completely neglecting my sweet lil blog. Not even checking my e-mails really. So much so, I nearly missed out on a completely fabulous opportunity!

The lovely Jen Gallacher e-mailed to ask if I wanted to play with Carta Bella's latest line, Wildflower by Kaitlin Sheaffer. Just look at the gorgeousness, how could I not want to dive in inky fingers first?! It took all of two seconds of reading her e-mail, for me to respond as enthusiastically as possible begging to play!

I was so excited to see it in person. I loved their last collection, Hello Again, so much I think I reviewed every sheet of it on Two Peas =) Because what you can't tell from these photos, is that it's printed on this lovely textured cardstock. It looks like watercolor paper to me. And that, my friends, makes it that much dreamier in person.

And the colors! I love the color scheme. It's quirky, pink and coral, teals and periwinkle, touches of gold. Can we pause for a second to talk about that periwinkle? It's PERIWINKLE, true and simple. It isn't a color I've seen used very much in scrapbook and I'm absolutely loving it. 

The line has this great outdoorsy/bohemian feel to it. It makes me think of Colorado when I see it. And while I don't have any Colorado photos to scrap about, I did manage to create three pages and eight cards with this feast of fabulousness.

Read more about this page here: Right Now

Read more about this page here: Love you Wild

Read more about this page here: One Perfect Day

Read more about these cards here: Simply Amazing Cards

Read more about these cards here: Hello Baby Girl Cards

I'm writing up separate blog posts to share each project with you, so expect that later and maybe even through out the week. But in case you can't tell from these pages, I had a lot of fun with this collection!

I've had fun. I think you'll have fun with it as well. The awesome Carta Bella team have been so generous to share the collection with me. And they're even more generous because they're letting me share a collection kit with one of you!

To enter to win this brand new collection, just leave a comment below (or on one of the subsequent project posts) and be sure to include an e-mail where I can get ahold of you. That's it! I'm leaving this open until 10:59 CST Thursday, November 7. I'll try to announce the winner that night or first thing Friday morning.

Best of luck! And I'll see you again in a bit

 cheers & besos,

Life with Besties

Happy Friday all! I'm so excited to relax my bum off, this long weekend. Like sooo excited!! Happily, my apartments all clean, so really I have the whole weekend to play with paper, read, watch videos and movies.

I'm planning a Two Peas video marathon and to catch up on my Hello Story and Toolbox classes. It's gonna be good.

But tonight I wanted to share a summer layout I made weeks ago, but just hadn't sat down to blog about it. It's a page using a Toolbox prompt and some of the new(er) Carta Bella, Hello Again collection (it's on sale at Two Peas for a bit, so snatch some up!).

I tried something a bit different and decided to film a quick 90 second video of me talking about the page. Apologies in advance for the quality. I have no idea what happened! But if you listen to the words and check out the photos, you get the picture.

And I'm super pumped that I get to hang out with this girl this weekend. She's visiting the boyfriend who just relocated here. That means more time with besties for me!

Hope yall have a lovely long weekend if you're in the US. Otherwise, I hope you have some awesome relaxing days!

cheers & besos,