Purple toned snow

I admit it. I'm jealous of all my friends who've had snow, especially when a good portion of them live just across the Chesapeake Bay. All I want to is throw a snowball and make a snowman in December. Just once.

I made this layout expressing my yearning for the magic rain that falls from the sky using MSA's December Art Social (which you can grab for $1.99 with the awesome coupon).



Two things to note about this page:

1) Look at those purple tones I managed to use.
2) I grabbed a screen shot of our forecast for the week and used it here.

I let the paper and the screen shot dictate the design. The paper allowed for an obvious foreground and background and it made sense to me to use the screen shot as part of the scene. I used a blending mode (luminance I think) to get it to match the paper. The deer worked perfectly in the design and I built on the sweet curved line their antlers make by using the snowflakes.

This may be my trick for using purple in 2014: lean hard on things other than color.

In the end, I really like the page. I think it's cool to preserve the week's weather while expressing my dissatisfaction with it. It's going to be 60+ degrees today, which is 5 days before Christmas. When did I move to the Southern Hemisphere? Oh well. The day after I created this page, I woke up to this:

It melted by 10 am, but I'm glad I was able to see it. Asked and answered, right?

♥ Carrie

Pinterest: Not everything is a good idea

I love Pinterest and if you know me you know that random fact. Love it. Need to figure dinner? Pinterest. Need a gift idea? Pinterest. Want to know how to do something? Pinterest. It's the path of least resistance where I can find what I need quickly.

Pinterest has a dark side. All those photos of perfection can be demoralizing, of course, but what I'm taking about is how quickly impractical and bad ideas can spread. And some of those pins are downright dangerous DIYs. After seeing yet another pin that made think someone was gonna get themselves killed, I decided it was time to write this post.

I'm starting with the impractical. What do I think an impractical pin is? A pin that looks great in theory, might even be easy to make and proudly display in your home. But when it comes time to get back into the doldrums of daily life, that really neat crafty pin quickly becomes a big, crafty pain in the rump.

What a charming chandelier for your bathroom. Let me be clear: bathroom chandelier. Whomever made this either has staff to clean their home, gets paid to come up with crafts that are pinworthy, or doesn't actually have a bathroom. Also, they have never cleaned a chandelier in any other room where less mess happens. It's an arduous task to clean one. So, yes, pretty, practical, absolutely not.

A penny floor, huh? It's neat and creative. What's it like to mop? What happens when my kid runs through the house at thirty miles per hour in his socks? What happens when I drop a glass and it shatters? What if my house is struck by lightning? Doesn't copper conduct electricity? Frankly, that floor scares me. Thanks, but I'll deal with my linoleum for now.

This mason jar project may be somewhere between impractical and dangerous, unless you are using those electronic tea lights. Firstly, have you ever put tea light in a mason jar? Most tea lights leave a nice black coating of soot around the flame inside the jar. Secondly, if you note the angle of the photo it's probably taken that way because a tea light in a mason jar doesn't make much actual light (or any tea for that matter). I learned this when our power went out in September. I had mason jars and tea lights. I went with votive candles instead. And I don't know how flammable glitter and glue are, but I don't want to find out. How do you clean that DIY? You don't. You throw the jars away when they are icky.  

I am not wasting my time, money and energy on any DIY that I can't easily clean (and will have to throw away 6 months from now cause of the eww) and that possibly has hidden dangers. 

Now for the pins I think are not just impractical, but could possibly harm your home, someone in your home, or worse. I wouldn't make these projects for my enemies even.

Here you are taking Post-It tabs in pretty colors and affixing it to some sort of glass globe over some sort of light (whose wattage is probably 10 or 15). When I was a child, I learned that light bulbs created heat. I learned that glass around a light bulb absorbs heat. I learned not to put flammable things near heat because they catch fire. I also learned that things that were sticky contained some sort of chemical compound that was most likely flammable. What could go wrong when you've created this trendy light? Oh, surely nothing that has to do with the laws of physics. It was on Pinterest, so it's perfectly safe.  

This is an incredibly popular pin that I see in my feed over and over again. I want to SCREAM every single time I see it. The creator of this hack probably failed science... or should have. Rule number one of living in a home where electrical current is present: Do NOT put anything between a plug and a socket. NEVER EVER do this. I would hope you understand why. Actually, the only time you should ever do anything with electricity is when you are a certified electrician. Wanna hang a cell phone holder near the outlet? Get some sort of device that allows you to do so... like a hook that attaches to the wall... otherwise, one day you will find out what happens to your phone when it touches fire.

The best thing to do in a emergency is to not set stuff on fire. In a pinch, a candle, in safe spot in an appropriate and secure place is less than ideal. (Do you have any idea how many fires are started by candles during emergencies? Too many.) Wax does burn, but there's a reason we don't set it on fire and use a wick instead. Have you ever seen a wax fire? For one, it's stinky. Really stinky. It also burns much hotter than a flame on a wick. If you drop this crayon, say good-bye to stuff you like. And the mess that burning crayons would cause if you happened to do it without setting yourself on fire? Not worth it.

Pinterest if full of good ideas, but that doesn't mean bad ideas are absent. Pin responsibly. And remember: pretty doesn't always equal good. Sometimes pretty can be downright deadly.

♥ Carrie

Gingerbread & Snow

I am super jealous of everyone with snow. Please send me some... or just some snowballs will do. Thanks. :)

The one great things about doing a Photo a Day is that there are always interesting photos to scrap. I have already used two of last weeks photos to get two pages done:

This first one is using Jaimee's December Storyteller 2013 (which she's giving away to her newsletter subscribers, so check here for details). The paper has such nice texture and lighting that mimics the lighting in the photo, which was a happy accident.  

I'd like to say I kept the page simple, but really I just didn't use a lot of embellishments. (not that I ever use a lot) Even though it looks simple, there's a lot of texture and contrast. And when you don't use a lot of ingredients on page, you have to really understand how those few elements work together and what function they serve on the page.

The next page is my homage to anticipation using bits from the December Storyteller and Artsy Papers Volume 1:




I put the title right on the photo because that vellum ampersand reminded me of an ever so fine dusting of snow. I used the sequins to build a faux shelf to hold up the photo and used the thread to solidify that idea while giving myself a place (and reason) to put the tag with my journaling.

Tip: I am in love with date stamps. Earlier this year, since I couldn't find the ones I wanted in the stores, I made my own contact sheet of stamped months, days and years. It was simple to do- I used the font MS Mincho and created a vector layer for each month, day and year. After typing out each month, day (01- 31), and year I wanted, I converted them all to raster layers then useing the smudge brush and eraser tool, made each one looking stamped. I made the background layer transparent, merged visible and saved as png file. Now I just lasso what I need and go.

That's all from me. (please send snow)

♥ Carrie

December Photo a Day: Holiday Song Edition

We've dusted off the Photo a Day prompts and you're welcome to play along on the forum. I've been busy, but managed to get the first seven prompts done. I cheated and took them out of order... thank goodness that's allowed!

1. Pretty Paper (coming soon)

2. Baby It’s Cold Outside



Or it's cold inside. He hates to wear clothes, but I took away his blanket to wash... and haven't washed it yet. (bad mom)


3. A Marshmallow World



I call Butters a marshmallow because he's white, fluffy and cylindrical. The cats commandeered the garland before I could hang it. It's now their nest of cuteness. What's better than a decorated marshmallow? One that absolutely melts into you when he's feeling affectionate.

4. Frosty the Snowman



We have a set of 3 snowman ornaments that seem to be a papa, mama and baby. This is the baby snowman. I can't remember which mom gave the set to us, only that one of them did.  These glass ornaments have to hang high on the tree because James the cat is tall and slowly taking off the ornaments on the bottom half of the tree.

5. The Most Wonderful Time of the Year



Yeah, he totally loves Christmas. I still can't get over his new found merriness.

6. Do You Hear What I Hear



This guy is motion activated and pretty much drives us all crazy, including the cats who attack him. For some reason I still keep it on. It might just be because it's kinda funny to watch everyone jump when he starts talking.

7. Winter Wonderland



It snowed! Big, fat, flakes of pure winter awesome. Too bad it turned into slushy, icky, icy nastiness later in the day. Now I have to live vicariously through my friends who actually have snow... lots of snow. Maybe my snow loving neighbor and I need to rent a snow machine one of these days. I'd say we'd do a snow dance, but the last time we did that, we had a blizzard and 3 feet of snow and no mail for weeks.

That wraps things up nicely. Hope you enjoyed my photos. Perhaps you'll stop by and play a long with us!!

♥ Carrie

Christmas Exploded

First, I want to say that I thought today was Friday, but alas it's Saturday. I don't know how I lost a day, but I did. Perhaps it was because I've been busy doing scrappy, cleany, holiday stuff all week? That or I'm finally losing my mind.

Moving on...

December is in full swing around digi land. The stores and galleries are all a buzz with holiday wonder. I've been festive myself between the kits I've collected, CT work and Your December Story (which I believe you can still register for if you like, but not for much longer). I thought I'd take a moment to share some pretties and you'll notice that I'm kinda in love with gold lately:

First is my homage to my gnomes. This page was my first ever Gallery Standout on the GSO blog. Yay gnomes. Pixels and Co. was our Featured Sponsor last month at MSA, so I got to test drive some product. I fell in love with Creashen's Tomte kit because no one has done gnomes thanks to Elf on the Shelf, which a total rip-off on the ancient gnome thing. My gnome could kick your elf's tail.



Then came (sorta) my page for GIS: Same Print Mixing. I used some photo outtakes to tell the story of our yearly kid-photo-op. It's a tradition and one of the rare times my kid lets me take a lot of snapshots of him. It was a challenge using stripes because I'm not a huge pattern paper (or even paper) user. I like to push the limits, so I found this great golden stripe in my stash and paired it with a diagonal charcoal paper. I also got out the super old alpha I love. You can read my thoughts about working with same prints HERE.




Still with me? Good. Another tree page. Jaimee's contribution to the Dec BYOC included some amazing freaking papers, but no elements besides tape (with the paper), an alpha and tags. I challenged myself to stick (mostly) to her BYOC products. The blue tape is from Merry & Bright. Here's the result:



Really, my hubby kept telling me the fake tree needed to settle before we put lights on it. Gotta love brain damage! It can be hilarious at times.

On now to MSA's yearly holiday kit, Holiday Hoopla: Merry & Bright, which is helpful in stretching the stash and the budget. It's only $5 so if you want it, go get it!  Once it's gone, it's gone for good. The kit has a great mix of artsy and traditional elements and papers, along with a ton of alphas. It's huge a versatile and general enough for daily winter scrapping. Also, I love those lights and the felt ornament. This is another tree page. I have thing for Christmas trees:



Last one, I promise! This was created from Lesson 2 of Your December Story. My son has really been into the holidays like never before, so I'm relishing every moment. Since he's an Asperger's kid, normally the upheaval Christmas didn't interest him prior to this year. Forget watching Christmas movies, baking cookies and decorating the tree. He had to bribed or lost interest after 15 minutes because his obsessive interest du jour was calling. Other than presents, he didn't want to participate. Also, the idea of an Santa always watching him caused him great anxiety. The idea is really creepy when you think literally like my son.

For whatever reason, my kiddo is filled with the holiday spirit this year and he STILL believes in Santa, despite the lack of evidence and naysayers. He also is interested in the traditions and stories of Christmas in our family. He practically decorated our tree this year himself! This page is about that belief and I will do a more in-depth page of text to accompany it later:




This may be one of my favorite pages ever. He's such a cutie in this photo. I need to look at it this page next he tells me I suck.

I'm done now. You deserve to get a prize for reading, but you're not gonna. But, here, have a cyber high five: **HIGH FIVE**

♥ Carrie

I ♥ coffee & words

I do. I love coffee. It doesn't like me so much so I can only drink decaf or half-caf, but it's still my daily beverage of choice besides water (from the tap because I am a rebel).

I have no shortage of coffee themed layouts. Okay, I only have 3, but it seemed like a lot in my head.



The pages above I did back in May. The one below is my latest homage to coffee. For this latest layout I decided to to play a little since I'd already jotted down my love of coffee and my excitement trying new blends, beans and brands. Since I've been listening to WOTE's cover of Lordes song Royals I thought it would be apt to to twist the lyrics into my title and subtitle. My journaling is about my hubby being my dedicated and loving barista. And when I asked him if he'd call me ruler without missing a beat he said okay. Yeah, he's awesome.

I really, really liked the colorful photo of my coffee cup and I loved the rhythmic, wordy paper. Together they'd just be too overwhelming, so I used the creamy covered newsprint to calm things down. Because of my song lyric inspiration, I used words like embellishments. I'm kinda in love with typography lately.

Anything I put on that bold, wordy paper might have gotten lost. That was a problem solved by the paper's design itself. I just aligned my photo and journaling card with the stars on the paper. Doing that tricks you into thinking it's more word art in the vertical column than word pattern paper.

I did use a few small embellishments to fill in the holes on my page and polished up the page with staples and paint splatters (because I always need a bit of mess on page).

This is a really great kit and I wanted to USE ALL THE THINGS!!! But using less things worked a lot better. Oh, and the kit is on sale this weekend. BUY ALL THE THINGS! :)

♥ Carrie

November Storyteller and Your December Story just met

It's time for another Storyteller Collection! While I'm woefully behind on my month pages, November is pretty much done. It's going to be included in my December Story album, too. Two birds, one stone.

I haven't put journaling on these pages yet, but I plan to. If I don't, then the title really does say it all. This is a glimpse into our daily life before the holiday as prompted by YDS Lesson 1.

I used a template for this page, which I rarely do, but I know myself. If I didn't jump on the inspiration, I might not make the page. The template did the heavy lifting. Thank goodness for Crtl + G.




I used almost every part of the collection. I decided I'd make a title with the alphas to sum up our challenges this time of year. I wanted to be real, but not depressing, wanted to make sure it was our collective challenges, but not to general. Yet, I didn't want it to be depressing either. Here's what I came up with:



I'm really loving fonts and alphas lately. I have too many fonts, so I use Wordmark to sort through them when I'm creating something like this. You can type in the text you want to write, select the size and style, hit enter and Wordmark displays the fonts on your computer. It's a gem! You can also sort your fonts in lists, which Wordmark will save for you. For instance, I have a list of scripty fonts and typewriter fonts. It saves me a ton of time. Also, it's 100% free.

Overall, I'm happy with the pages and if I don't get to the journaling, I'm not stressing over it. Success!

♥ Carrie

We have a winner: Your December Story Blog Hop

Before I announce the lucky winner I want to take a moment to say some things:

Reading your comments was really enjoyable. I loved hearing about your goals, your holidays, your thoughts and feelings on the holidays. Thank you to everyone for sharing.

I wish I could  have scooped you all up and plopped in you in the class with  me. Everyone deserved to win, but alas, there can be only one.

Now for the winning: I numbered the comments in chronological order and excluded to two Get It Scrapped team members that commented. There were 51 eligible entrants. I used random.org to pick a winning number:

 And the winner is:

Courtney, I have sent you an email with all the info you need to sign up for the class!! Can't wait to see you there!

There's still a little bit of time to grab the class with the special $10 Gift Certificate. The special runs until 12pm EDT tonight. Click here to view more details Offer expired, but you can still click HERE for more great classes!

♥ Carrie

Your December Story Sneak Peak Blog Hop & Giveaway!

Last Christmas was pretty traumatic for our family because we I lost our kitten and then he died. I'm hoping this year we have a better December and I've devised a plan to make that happen:

Step 1: Don't lose or kill any kittens.

Step 2: Tell our Christmas story to rekindle the holiday magic.

I'm doing really well with step 1 and I've gotten to start on step 2, which really has me excited. I feel like I need to buy some glitter.

Growing up in multicultural house means my traditions aren't quite the standard American kinds. I also married into a family that still practices some Old World holiday customs, too. The stories of our Decembers, old and new, are simply worth recording.

When Debbie gave us a sneak peak of the class, I knew I had to do this. I had an idea from her Story Coach lessons what to expect, so I was excited to get started.

A brief description of class:

Many of the most-loved and best remembered stories play out in a story form described by Joseph Campbell as "the hero's journey." This class has prompts and page ideas for visual storytelling that have you telling Your December Journey, from the heralds, to the challenges, mentors, special tools and the return to the known world and what you take forward.

I opened Lesson 1 and printed out the hand-out:

I immediately jumped into the prompts after the reading the written material. Debbie has a talent for asking thought provoking questions. Somehow she reaches right into your mind, yanks and tugs until the relevant stuff is down on the page in an organized fashion (something I need help with constantly). I'm not saying she's magic, but she's magic. I filled out 7 pages of prompts in under 20 minutes. Out of that, I have a few pages I know I need to make to tell our story. 

The first page I decided to make was the "call to action" page. Since I becoming a part of my husband's family, I am given an amaryllis at the start of the holiday season each year. My mother in law has a phallic nickname for the plant that I won't get into, but is riot to hear her, a very proper lady, say. It usually doesn't bloom until Christmas, making it a natural advent calendar. 

Supplies: Mommyish: Hipster Holiday; CD Muckosky: Winter With You;
Fonts: Cassidy by Audacious Designs

Now for the fun part: I'm giving away a seat in the class!! (If you already purchased the class, you'll get a $24 gift card good for any other GIS/MSD classes.)

When you purchase "Your December Story" by midnight PT, Wednesday, November 20, you also get a $10 gift card that you can use for Get It Scrapped and Masterful Scrapbook Design classes.  Just click on the link to grab the deal!  

Offer expired, but you can still click HERE for more great classes!


How to enter: Simply leave a comment telling me why you want to tell your December story. I will draw the winner on Thursday, November 21, 2014.

Want more chances to win? Follow the links for the blog hop:

Anna Aspnes

Betsy Sammarco

Christy Strickler

Marie-Pierre Capistran

Katrina Kennedy

Carrie Arick <-- You are here

Doris Sander

Melissa Shanhun

Michelle Houghton

Sue Althouse

Terry Billman

Kiki Kougioumtzi

Susanne Brauer

Sian Fair

Jana Morton

Paula Gilarde

Kristin Tweedale

Katie Scott

Amy Kingsford

Tami Taylor

Stefanie Semple

Katie Nelson

Your December Story: $15 Gift with early bird registration

Register before November 11th to get a $15 gift code good on classes at Get It Scrapped or Masterful Scrapbook Design

(Regular registration will open on November 11th)

I am super excited about this 6 week class created by Debbie Hodge. She is a master of storytelling and the ease at which she helps you put them on your pages is astounding. This class will focus on the hero's journey: it's a quest to document holiday magic without any monsters or mountain climbing and more glitter. Every Monday for 6 weeks — answer the prompts, view the ideas, and open yourself to new and inspired ways to tell your December story.

Here's the class breakdown:


6 weekly lessons describe a step of the hero’s journey, provide detailed prompts that you can enter into digital worksheets or printables, and ideas for visual and written stories.

• November 25th: The Call to Adventure
• December 2nd: Entering the Magical World
• December 9th: Mentors
• December 16th: Tests, Tools, and Magical Objects
• December 23rd: The Reward
• December 30th: The Road Back and the Return with the Elixir

Debbie created this class so it can be used as a companion to your December Daily albums or as it's own stand alone project. Give yourself this wonderful gift for the holidays and craft a treasure for you and your family. Just use my affiliate link above to sign up before Nov. 11 so you can get the cool bonuses. 

Naturally, there will be a gallery to share your work and you can chat about the class in the forum. We'll be there to help you in your quest: heroes don't go it alone! 

♥ Carrie 

Digital Scrapbooking Day Fun!

This is the sort of perfect storm weekend for digi scrap. Here's what I'm doing this weekend:

It's the beginning of the month which means new Digi Files. It's also the weekend so there's a new Digi Show. (Did you hear the girls discuss Get It Scrapped's gallery on last weeks show?)

It's The (dash) Lilypad BYOC time again. Since it's DSD, there is a lot going on over there and you can win stuff in the forums.

Debbie Hodge is hosting a live crop until 5pm today. I plan on stopping by soon, once I can escape skyping boys. See this post on the GIS forums for details.

My Scrapbook Art has started off the month of November with an awesome, exclusive kit from Maya De Groot. If you have a Featured Presentation Pass, don't forget to pick it up, otherwise it's only $4.00. Check out the post for more details AND get a great coupon to Maya's store.

Also, don't forget to upload your pages (I know you are making them) to the MSA gallery. I'm doing the GSOs Monday and will be searching out eye candy all weekend long.

Here's what I've created for this weekend:

Using Jaimee's DSD grab bag I made a pocket style page with some bits from my dad's baby book along with an old and new photo:



For the BYOC, I used Jaimee's contribution to highlight my boys' photo antics. I really love that alpha!!



I got to play with some of Maya's product. I loved the artsy style and I paired with a lift from Karen Poirier-Brode's XXX's & OOO's. (I'm linking to Karen's blog. Her page is in the MSD gallery, so if you have a subscription, check it out)




That's it for me. I'm off to play in digi land!!

♥ Carrie

Scary, Pretty, Free and Perhaps Futuristic

Hello Interwebz!

We had a nice Indian Summer, but that's over now. It's officially cold here; Perfect weather for Halloween. Halloween to me is about a lot more than dressing up and trick-or-treating. For me, it's about stories... the stories we overlook, the stories that are forgotten, stories of our past, of our ancestors. I think that's why I like scary movies so much- the stories often focus people and events lost to time or details forgotten.

I was super happy when Just Jaimee came out with this scary movie kit called Happy Haunt. I decided it was perfect to document my love of the stories in horror movies:




I really love a black background paper. It's one of my favorite neutrals. I didn't want a pretty page. I wanted discomfort and controlled chaos. I think the tight Z flow and the large gutters between the embellishments accomplish that.

I haven't abandoned pretty. The (dash) Lilypad has a freebie collab you can pick up through a Facebook hop called Capturing Fall. (Start HERE to pick it up while it lasts) I made this page to highlight this amazing bush we have dividing our yard from our neighbors. I learned it's called a Burning Bush (no lie) and it is from Asia. It's also incredibly invasive leading many states to ban them.



Invasive but absolutely stunning foliage this time of year.

The photo isn't the best, so I kept it small and used huge flower elements in saturated color to trick you into missing the photo's poor quality. What you do notice is the dramatic color of the leaf in the photo. And you say, "Wow. That's a cool leaf."

I also got to play with Just Jaimee's mobile ready fonts. I don't have a smart phone, so I was thrilled that I could grab just the PNG files. It was fun to play with them, but also quick and easy.




Is this the future of memory keeping? Perhaps it will draw new generation of scrapbookers.

♥ Carrie

October Storyteller Collection

It's here! The latest Storyteller from Just Jaimee is now available at The (dash) Lilypad. It is full of great colors for fall and there's a bit of Halloween goodness (as requested by the CT because we all love Halloween).





I am making a conscious effort to scrap my older photos occasionally, so being October, I went hunting for some old Halloween photos. I found these gems of my guy as a solider a few years ago.

I went with a structured but loose look for the page because he's small and cute, but super serious about it.  I always love the brushes in Jaimee's kit, but the word art blew me away. Words and pain. Awesome. Also, that alpha! I didn't align it perfectly to gave the page more a hand-made feel.

Grab this kit while you can. If you are a newsletter subscriber, you've got an awesome coupon code in your inbox where you can pick the whole collection up for an insanely low price.  

♥ Carrie

Masterful Scrapbook Design: Office Hours Rock!

The other morning I created a page, but something felt out of balance. I couldn't exactly figure out what my eyes were seeing that disrupted the visual harmony. There was a disconnect on the page somewhere that I couldn't put my finger on. Thank goodness I'd signed up for MSD Office Hours with Anna Aspnes.


I uploaded my page into the MSD gallery to get feedback from Debbie, Anna and my fellow scrappers who were in attendance. Here's the original page in question:

I loved the big, bold title, the bold circles and swashy black lines. I just have an affinity for copious amounts of black media on a page with pops of color. Still something was bugging the heck out me.

It turned out that the collective eyes and brains in the webinar were able to pick out what the issue I only felt was and how I could fix it. The flower didn't fit the theme and the circle that surrounded it was unnecessary. I realized that I had no particular reason to have that flower there anyway. (except that I thought I ought to try using a flower) If I take away those elements, then the turquoise swashes need to be changed and Anna suggested using a blue in the photo. That's exactly what I ended up doing:

Supplies: Just Jaimee: Doodled Line + Circle Brushes Bundle, Storyteller Collection- September 

(also available a la carte); Font: SimSun (on of my faves)

Now the page has a bit more of an Americana feel to it, which supports the story. It also feels more balanced and the parts feel connected. I am really glad I had the page workshopped (as we call it at MSD) because it made all the difference in the world. I really love the instant feedback!

If you want to check out MSD and see what the fuss is all about, you can now get a 10 day trail FREE! Use my affiliate link to sign up: Visit Masterful Scrapbook Design

And here's a little sneak peak of the live webinars (which are also posted as recordings you can access anytime and/or download):



♥ Carrie

P.S. Katie Scott did an amazing lift of my revised layout- check it out!

My Scrapbook Art

Hello Interwebz!

I have exciting news!! I am officially a contributor to My Scrapbook Art. I was so honored to be chosen after being a faithful reader for years, as well as a lover of their Feature Presentation Pass and Art Social. I'm so honored to be working with some of my favorite scrappers in digi-land.

Here are some fun things I love about MSA:

The Gallery: Post your pages and get some pin-worthy inspo
Monday Morning Standouts- MSA's gallery standouts
Hung Up On - Trends and obsessions
Forums- A clearinghouse of resources, challenges, fun and games
Journaling Challenge- Quotes, ideas and inspo to help get your stories told
Who's That Girl- Get to know designers and scrappers through these compelling interviews

and there is so much more!! 

Also, if you aren't following them on Pinterest, you should be: Follow HERE

Here is the first page I've created for Word Wednesday's Journaling Challenge on the blog:

♥ Carrie

Just Jaimee Moved!

Did you hear? Jaimee is now at The (dash) Lilypad! Yippee! I've been super busy playing with her products as a member of her awesome CT. Here are some of the goodies I've made since she moved her shop:

October BYOC:

SOSN 10/9:


(Halloween Ephemera Brushes)



(Fun Frame Templates)



And now she's working on the October Storyteller Collection. I am having such a blast creating in her world of color, I hope you get a chance to pick up some of her goodies soon. :)

♥ Carrie

September Photo a Day: The Final Half

Hello Interwebz!

I finally finished my Photo a Day, brought to you by Get It Scrapped. Enjoy! 

Backtracking to a prompt from the beginning of the month:

3. The Joy Luck Club

These are my guys in their natural state. They're probably agreeing to plot against me in this photo.

15. Divergenet
























I don't think I've served a hot dog in 3 years, which makes these chili cheese dogs a huge treat.

16. Outliers


















One of Thor's favorite activities is looking at the world outside. I'm pretty sure he'll be harness trained, but for now, he'll just have to chase the bugs and birds in his dreams.

17. Happy at Home


















The view from what I have affectionately dubbed 'The Jungle', which is actually my garden. It looks large in this photo. It's not. It's tiny, but it's one of my favorite things about our home. And because it's so loved, we have the largest crape myrtle and oriental grass on the block.

18. “May the wind under your wings bear you where the sun sails and the moon walks.” from The Hobbit























A photo taken by my hubby at 6 am. Here are some less talked about things about autism:
a) kids with autism don't sleep well
b) kids with autism often have ADD or ADHD or some other co-occurring issues
c) the medications to treat those co-occurring issues coupled with lack of sleep often cause midnight snacking

d) midnight snacking is, at times, extremely messy

19. Snugglepot and Cuddlepie


















I like to call this a 'kitten pile'. All the kitties love each other, so we see cuddling quite often.  

20. The Scarlet Letter























Not exactly a letter, but certainly scarlet. A magnetic shape. We keep them on our dishwasher so when the kitties are bored, they have an exciting activity. Really.   

21. Orange is the New Black























My son has two orange shirts and I'm pretty sure he's worn them almost exclusively for the past 6 months. A green or red shirt may be thrown into the mix occasionally, but not often.

22. The Perks of Being a Wallflower


















Butter's is a shy cat and not nearly as aggressive when he plays with the other kitties. He copes with this by playing in paper bags. James, his brother kitty, always rips some leg holes in the corners of the bags for Butters. It's very entertaining.


23. Fifty Shades of Grey























A car hit a telephone poll and split in the 3 pieces, which cut of power to our entire town for over 12 hours. Thankfully it was a cool day and I had some ice packs in the freezer that kept the fridge cool. Also, votive candles and lots of baby food jars (from transition the kitten from formula to solids). We played board games and read ghost stories and the kid camped out in the living room. He loves power outages as long as they aren't too often.

24. Great Expectations























I was trying to get the kitties to look at me so I could get their faces in the photo, except James thought I was calling him to give him some utterly wonderful cat reward. Boy, was he disappointed!

25. Rot & Ruin
















I call this #failcake and it seems to be my specialty. While I am a proficient cook, I suck at baking (except cookies- I can rock out some cookies) and this is why. I have a ton of photos of #failcakes. Since this one did not land on the floor, it's edible.

26. Twilight


















My dad always liked to be in bed when the sun went down. Apparently it's hereditary, but skipped a generation. Also, my son has 50 pillows, but only one seems to ever have a pillowcase on it no matter how many pillows I put them on. They are magic pillows.

27. Little House in the Big Woods


















This would be a gorgeous photo of the field next to our house, except for that dumpster. I really hate that dumpster.

28. Miss Perigrine’s Home for Peculiar Children






















I have strange cats and I am kinda obsessed with them. I'm sure you can't tell at all. We joke that our house looks like kitten preschool, so I probably don't need to explain the relevance of this prompt to the photo.


29. The Birds



















The little seed pods on the oriental grass have opened up. Soon they'll drop and the birds will come. Lots and lots and lots of birds.


30. Reading is a Gift























I created a book from the collection of all the pages I've made about our three cats that have passed.

All 30 prompts finished. Some of the photos from these two months of Photo a Day have already inspired pages given me ideas for even more stories to tell in the future. August and September were very busy, so there wasn't time to do much scrapping, but I have the PAD that captured micro bits of our lives for those months.

Doris has an October challenge up on the forums which I may take a stab at later. Also, I may do a challenge for December, but until then, I'm on a Photo a Day hiatus. Hope you've enjoyed.

 ♥ Carrie