Hip Hop Thursday!

It's Hip Hop Thursday again! Is it just me or did this week just fly by?!? I can't believe it's Thursday ALREADY! Be sure to check out the Unity website for the newest releases and latest happenings.

I was really excited to work with Unity's newest release Beach Days & Sun Rays (UK-359A) this week. Of course our weather here in New Jersey right now is the complete OPPOSITE of these beach layouts but I am just counting the days until winter is over. I am so DONE with cold weather! Brrrr ....

My first layout uses the adorable sandcastle, sun, and "day at the beach" images from the kit.


Every year my family rents a house down in Ocean City, NJ for a week so that we can all be together and enjoy the beautiful Jersey shore. My boys really loved the beach this year and they are finally getting old enough where they can entertain themselves a bit playing in the sand while mommy ... wait for it ... RELAXES! *gasp*


I also used the adorable tag stamp from the Amazing Me (UK-154A) kit for a little hidden journaling behind my photo as well as the "pull" stamp from Our Life, Our Stories (UK-343A).



A few more detail shots of these adorable stamps!

My second layout uses the sweet umbrella and starfish stamp from the kit as well as an image from the January KOM.


This is my sweet little niece Una 2 years ago during one of our Ocean City vacations - isn't she just a doll? I found this awesome new collection of papers from Making Memories called Chloe's Closet at my local Michael's store the other day and thought they were perfect for this layout.


Tell me that umbrella stamp is not the cutest thing you've ever seen! I LOVE it!


I used one of Unity's newest alphabets Just My Type for part of my title - I LOVE the versatility of this alphabet - such a classic font!

Well that's a wrap for me today. Now head on over to my gal Renee's awesome blog for even more Hip Hop eye candy!

Hip Hop Thursday!

Welcome back everyone for another round of hip hopping! It's exciting times at Unity with lots of changes and big things planned for the upcoming Winter CHA event. If you haven't checked out the website definitely head on over and take a look. Unity is making lots of big changes that we're all really excited about. And the "coming soon" section is completely drool-worthy so make sure you have a tissue handy and don't say I didn't warn you! Hee hee!

This week I played with a few of Unity's past Kit of the Month sets. Do you belong to the Unity KOM? If you don't you need to check it out here - talk about HAPPY mail! The current kit is absolutely adorable but there's no need to fret if you've missed out on past kits as they are all available for purchase here. I only have two past kits to buy until my collection is complete and I am up to date - ahhh!

My first layout uses the adorable cupcake border from the December KOM (this kit will be available for purchase in February if you missed it the first time around!).


I had a lot of fun with these pictures of my little guy Brandon. He is a sweets fanatic like his mommy and cupcakes are his absolute favorite dessert (or "bessert" as he says). For this layout I thought it would be fun to manipulate the photos a bit in photoshop to focus the center of attention on the cupcake (turned them black and white and then used selective colorization for just the cupcake). I then just took off with my color scheme from there - those cupcakes had this bright pink frosting and I am definitely not the type to shy away from pink on boy layouts so .... black, white, and pink it is!



A few detail pics of the cupcake border and the single cupcake I fussy cut and pop dotted on a deeper pink heart I cut from the patterned paper I was using. Oh and of course I added some stickles on the cute cherry on top!


For the journaling I hand cut a heart shape and backed it with some white cardstock that I then trimmed with my fabric pinking shears. I stitched around the shape a few times and added my journaling strips and a cluster of hearts in the corner and voila! One of the hearts is stamped using part of an image from the August KOM as well.

My next layout uses two images from the August KOM - love these "wish" flowers! Totally sweet but as you can see below can definitely still be used on more "masculine" layouts as well.


I used my two favorite things on this layout - my Unity stamps and Basic Grey papers! Oh and since that's my hubby there I guess you could say I've got THREE of my favorites on this page (and don't ask me to put them in order of most to least important hee hee!).


The Granola line from Basic Grey is very organic to me and these stamps just paired with the papers beautifully. I stamped the images repeatedly in 3 different colors of brown chalk ink, split my image in three, and matted it on some nice blue paper for contrast.


Some of my journaling describing just how wonderful my hubby is so, yeah, he ranks number one of my list of favorites hands down! And I'm not just sayin' that cuz he reads my blog either! ;)

Okay that's all I've got for you today! Whew that was a long post, eh? Now hop on over to our awesome guest artist Sherry and see what she's got cookin'!

Got Sketch 73

Okay so this SHOULD have been posted this past Wednesday. But it wasn't because I forgot. No other excuse. I just forgot. So, as they say, better late than never! ;)

Here is my take on Sketch 73 from the Got Sketch? blog. We all did either a holiday or New Year's theme and I have to say it felt amazing if not somewhat strange to actually scrapbook photos from only a few weeks ago. Of course that doesn't mean I'm caught up because that will probably never ever happen but it's sometimes nice to scrap something that literally JUST happened while the memories are still fresh in your mind. Hmmm maybe I should do that more often! LOL

Hip Hop Thursday!

Hi everyone! Is it Thursday already?!? It seems like this week has just flown by. Must be because I was shacked up in my craft room playing with all of the amazing new releases from Unity. Yeah that's it! ;)

Here is my first layout for this week's Hip Hop using one of Unity's new alphabet releases Just My Type and lots of gorgeous winter themed singles including Joyous Snowfall (USK-102-1), Snowflake Serenade (USK-102-3) and Snow & Polka Dots (USK-102-4).


I love creating my "own" patterned paper with stamps and you can see how I did that on this layout by omitting some of the snowflakes in the Snowflake Serenade stamp and inking the rest with a soft brown chalk ink and stamping randomly on this really pretty distressed blue paper.


I used a few snowflake chipboard pieces, punches, and of course more stamps and lots and lots of glitter (that's two weeks in a row for me using glitter - I think that's a record!) to give my embellishments that look of glistening snow. This is actually a photo I took of my brother's black lab Sadie while we were playing outside in the snow the day after Christmas. Isn't she a cutie?

For my next layout I created a sweet baby page using another new Unity release called Be "Owl" Mine (UK-347A ).


I am WAY behind on my scrapbooking since I took several years "off" while I had my two boys so I dug into some oldies but goodies for these photos. These pictures are of my youngest Brandon when he was just 4 months old. Will you just look at those chubby cheeks?!? He's going to be 3 years old in just a few months and creating this layout brought back so many sweet memories and reminded me of just how quickly time goes by.


When I saw these stamps I couldn't wait to use them on a layout - LOVE this cute little owl and branch! Just too sweet!

Well that's all I've got folks! Your next stop along the Unity Hip Hop train is the ever so sweet and talented Jennifer Buck! ENJOY!

I hope you're ready ...

It's almost time for another installment of our Got Sketch class series. That's right! Got Sketch 103 is coming very soon! Valerie and Janna have created a brand new workshop to kick off the New Year. We've been chatting about this workshop for some time now and these gals have something special planned that I just know you are all going to love! If you're like me and have LOTS and LOTS of holiday photos just waiting to be scrapped then this is the workshop for you! And of course I'll be there every step of the way with a fun challenge to kick off the class and get everyone ready to create create CREATE!

Registration for the next installment of our Got Sketch class series will begin around mid-January. Stay tuned for more information about the class and registration in the next week. To be up to date with all of the latest information be sure to subscribe to the Got Crafts? blog.

Can't wait to see you all in class! :)

Hip Hop is BACK!

If you're like me you were really missing Hip Hop these last two weeks. Well I am happy to say that not only is Hip Hop back for 2009 but I am now part of the blog hop as one of the new members of the Unity SCRAPBOOKING Design Team! YAY! Make sure you start your hopping with Angela over at the Unity blog and then just follow along!

So without further ado here is my first layout for this week's Hip Hop showcasing one of Unity's newest releases "Shine On!" (UK-339A) - tell me this is not one of the cutest stamp sets EVAH!


I just recently took these pictures of Brandon and just couldn't wait to scrap them. He is starting to lose that "baby-ness" to his face and looking more and more like a big boy these days. But there is no denying that his sweet smile and those big brown eyes light up my life. That's for sure!


So of course I had to use some GLITTER on this layout with these adorable lamps. It's hard to see from this photo but the stream of light under the lamp is covered with yellow stickles and I sprinkled some rhinestones throughout. As a boy mama I hardly ever get to use bling so I jumped all over the opportunity to add some to this layout.


Aren't those glitter alphas out of this world?!? I've had those in my stash for quite some time now and as soon as I saw these adorable lamps I KNEW I had to have the two meet up on a page somehow. So fun!

My next layout uses a stamp set that I've had in my possession for awhile now and have just been dying to use called "Amazing Me!" (UK-154A).


I actually created this layout for a challenge in which you had to use a snapshot from around your house or everyday life and scrap what it says about you. I took this photo of my feet in my favorite pair of sassy patent leather red flats and took off from there.

...

I used that gorgeous large "Amazing Me" stamp for my title. A perfect fit! (pun intended ... shoes ... feet ... hee hee!)

...

I also used this pretty little flower stamp from "Owl Always Love You" (UK-198A) another one of my favorite stamp sets from Unity on this layout as well.

Well that's all folks. Now it's time to hop on over to the super talented Jennifer's blog. Happy Hip Hopping!

Quite a Pair

Just a quick post today. I'm in the process of cleaning up holiday decorations, cleaning up my scrap space AGAIN, and watching football. Kinda disappointed the Dolphins didn't do better today since I'm a Chad Pennington fan from his Jets years. Ah well! Enough about football and on to scrapbooking! LOL I wanted to share this layout that I did a few weeks ago using some Unity stamps. I love these pictures of Salar and Darian! The two of them have the same personalities namely GOOFY! I love when they get together - they are quite a pair!

Send Love Today

One of my goals for the New Year is to simplify my life. Part of this goal is to streamline my routines in my personal and family life and the other part of this goal (for me at least) is to practice moderation. Moderation in the amount of "stuff" that comes into this house. Less stuff means less clutter, less stuff to clean up, less stuff to deal with on a daily basis and ultimately less money spent and more money saved (and who couldn't use more money in their savings?).

I've been in the process of reorganizing my scrap space for the last few days (although it seems like I am ALWAYS reorganizing this space! LOL) and have decided I need to part with some of the supplies that haven't been touched in the past year and that I know I just will not use. I had read about an organization that collects scrapbooking supplies on Kelli Crowe's blog awhile ago called Send Love Today. They are a nonprofit organization that provides support to brain tumor patients and their families in the form of cards and small gifts. I emailed one of the founders, Linda Thomas, and she was more than happy to receive donations. She will even send back a receipt for your taxes if you include an approximate value of your donation with your package.

So my plan is to set out a Priority mail box in the corner of my scrap space and fill it with whatever supplies I have not used or know that I will not use in the near future. Once the box is full I will send it off to Send Love Today and start the process all over again. Not only am I working on my goal to simplify for the New Year but I am helping others at the same time and really what could be better than that? :)

If you'd like to donate to Send Love Today you can mail your donations to:

Send Love Today
PO Box 528
Berea, Ohio 44017

January Kit of Month

Well here it is! The January Kit of the Month from Unity Stamp Company. This has to be one of the cutest kits yet! Lots of adorable Valentine's and love themed stamps in here along with lots of other gorgeous designs. Check out that peacock - isn't he the cutest?!? I can't wait to get mine in the mail and start playing. If you are interested in signing up for Unity's Kit of the Month club just click here to join!