This Way To Happy

I am just a little proud of myself! This is the second month in a row (maybe third?) that I have used my scraps and leftover supplies to create a card. If I keep this up, I'll be able to cover all of this year's birthdays, baby showers, weddings, Christmas, etc. OK...well, maybe not Christmas. That's being a bit too ambitious!

Here is the Happy (Birthday) card that I created with papers, stickers, and brads from Scraptastic's Rock Lobster kit:

Now that I've gotten over the fact that all birthday cards don't have to say "Happy Birthday" on the front, I'm trying to develop of list of other appropriate birthday sentiments. If you make cards, what are some that I should add to my repertoire?

Carving A Stamp

Well...that little prototype/draft drawing of a fox that I posted the other day seemed cute at first, but once I began perusing the gallery of hand-carved signature stamps at the Atlas Quest Letterboxing Community, he lost some of his allure. Whew...those people "over there" are uber talented, and have the best designs! So back to the drawing board I went. Actually, I went back to google and looked up images of REAL foxes. Then I took my favorites and altered them with the Photoshop Elements photocopy filter to see what they would look like as a less defined, stamp-like image. I combined my favorites into the sweet design below:

Much better! I'm still a bit intimidated by the talent of long-time letterboxers and stamp carvers, but I'm pretty proud of this cute little fellow. And now that I have my first hand-carved stamp under my belt, I'm anxious to try some more designs!

Here's a great little tutorial, complete with video: How To Carve Your Own Stamps.

Letterboxing-Stamping Meets Geocaching

A recent pin about ways to get your teen and tween-aged kids off the couch caught my eye. I am always looking for ways to engage my 13-year-old in non-electronic activities, especially during these long school-free summer days. He swims at least two hours six days a week, so I'm not concerned about a lack of exercise. I just want him to DO SOMETHING ELSE! It thrilled me to stumble upon this fun looking activity...letterboxing.

A creative precursor to geocaching, letterboxing is similar in that you seek treasures hidden in places far and wide, often times using clues and fun puzzles to find your way. Instead of a little trinket, a letterbox will contain a stamp, usually handcarved, and a log book. Everyone who finds the letterbox will then use the stamp to stamp in their own record book, and then stamp a "signature" stamp in the logbook of the letterbox. How fun! Everything is then furtively put back in place for the next seeker to discover.

What really excites me is the creative aspects of letterboxing. I can't WAIT to try my hand at stamp carving, and have sketched out a simple image to use as my signature stamp:

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Already a little modification will be needed, as I found out there is another letterboxer with the "MadFox" moniker. I might just have to go with "Foxy" for my trail name! Tee-hee! Oh yes, it's a whole other language!  If you're interested, here are two places with information on this family friendly, outdoors activity:

Letterboxing North America

Atlas Quest: A Letterboxing Community

Paradise Found

For my third page created with Scraptastic's Rock Lobster kit, I pulled together all of the softer colors to highlight this picture of my husband and I at the beach. I love the casual look of this photo, taken by my sister. We had already posed for all the requisite face forward shots and then decided to do some silly "model" shots. The goofing around photos turned out to be the most remarkable!

Several patterned paper rectangles and scraps are layered beneath the photo, with stickers, brads, and a die-cut tucked in here and there.

Gold striped washi tape was folded over toothpicks to fashion tiny flags.

Wow...I can hardly believe that pictures taken two weeks ago are already scrapped! That's some kind of record for me. :)

Surf 'N Sand (Washi Tape Tutorial)

Our first day at the beach began with rain, driving rain. But as soon as the skies cleared, Kevin and his cousins hit the beach with their boards. They rode the waves for hours. When I wasn't videoing the boys coming in on a big wave, I was snapping pictures of their rears as they headed back out:

 

This layout, created with Scraptastic's Rock Lobster kit and add-on, features two pretty cool ways that washi tape can be used to embellish a page.

 

First, several pieces of tape folded over a length of bakers twine were cut into flag shapes for a colorful banner.

I also used washi tape with my sewing machine to create the large sun icon underneath the title. A few simple steps can be used to fashion any basic shape (heart, star, etc.) from tape:

1. Lightly draw a shape directly on the background paper in pencil.
2. Layer strips of washi tape to generously cover the penciled in shape. Do not press hard, as the excess tape will need to be removed after stitching.
3. Machine stitch over the pencil lines. Repeat stitching. A tight stitch is recommended. 
4. Carefully peel back the tape pieces outside of the stitching and tear away to reveal the washi tape shape.

Finally, white embossed anchors dress up the flags along the bottom of the page:

I definitely had fun with this page!

Time To Eat

I've been back from the beach for a little over a week, and have amazed myself with all I've done. The Scraptastic kit that landed at my doorstep right before we left for vacation has already inspired me to create four layouts, three with photos from our trip! First up, a photo taken with my phone ends up on this road trip diner page.

The title alludes to the name of the little strip mall eatery where we stopped for lunch on the drive over to our Florida beach vacation. It had an interesting decor...walls covered with clocks of every style, shape, color, and size.

I decided to have a little fun creating my title, die-cutting a place setting from the kit's red cardstock, and adding clock numbers on the plate.

Yep, it was time to eat onion rings, chicken "fangers", and fries. Uh-oh, that's a lot of fried food!

This page was created entirely from Scraptastic's July kit and add-on, Rock Lobster! Such a fun kit!

Making Memories

It's been a while, and this is why:

The Gulf was like a gigantic swimming pool on this particular day!

Sandy toes were the norm.

We even snuck in a few photos of the cousins...

...and let them have fun posing as "models"!

When we left the beach two days early to attend a wedding

Kevin remained behind with his cousins (and aunts, uncles, and grandparents).

They attended a Billabong Surf Camp one day...

...and really took to the waves!

Hang Ten! (Sorry, but that's the only surf slang I know.)

Now that we're home, I'm ready to get busy scrapping the fun, fun times. So check back in a few days when I hope to have some beachy pages created with the new Scraptastic Rock Lobster kit, add-on, and stamps!

Aren't these the cutest?!