Card For Hubby

Well as you can see it has been a while since I have been on here. Hubbs is still gone so getting any crafting done is almost impossible. I have been playing with my Photoshop Elements 9 and love it. Learning how to create stunning photos and maybe a scrapbook page in the future. I took a 3 day Boot camp back in October and learned so much. I will post about that later. As for now I have a card that I made my hubby for Christmas and his troops. Also made this card after reading Cooking with Cricut blog post Day 14. She is doing a 25 day give-a-way and on day 14 she has a challenge to make a Christmas Card. I thought why not enter I have to make hubby one anyway.Not my best work, but hey I only took about 3 to 4 minutes to make it so not bad. Please excuse the photos I only had my cell phone at the time so they are not that great. Enjoy!

 It is very hard to see but the base is a dark green. I used stamps by The Stamps of Life and papers from SU and some from Michaels.

Blessings this Christmas Season! Remember the true Reason for the Season!

Whitney

Mojo Monday Challenge #209

Well I have not been crafty lately so I thought why not enter a contest. I entered Mojo Monday Challenge # 209 and here is the sketch we had to follow. I hope that this gets my creative juices flowing! I had a blast creating this and it only took me about 30 minutes.

Here is my version:

 For this card I used some stamps from The Stamps of Life. I also used my circle punch to punch a border for the right side.

Inside the card I also used the Stamps of Life stamps and added a strip of paper to the top and white so that you could write a small note. I had to add the ghosts to the sides to cover up what my stamp block had left behind.

Here are the two stamp sets that I used. I just love Stephanie Barnard's line called the Stamps of Life. The first set is called Spooks2Scare and the second one is called Thanks2Fall.

Hope that you enjoyed it!

Finding a Routine

Whew! I don't know about you, but my house has been chaos all summer. I have 4 very active boys and they keep me on my toes. Living in Texas now, much of this summer has been too hot for the kids to stay outside very long. Most of the time they are inside wrestling or fighting or making boy noises. Come on those of you that have boys know what I am talking about. Boy noises are all the low rumble car noises or the constant whistling or the fire truck sirens going off all over the house. LOL! After a while my mind starts to explode over all the noise.

Well I have been looking for a way to keep my house up and play with the boys. Needless to say I have been failing on the keeping of the house part. I have been searching for a way to become organized. I can organize my scrap stuff all day, but I guess that is because I am the only one who uses it so if it is out of place it is on me. The house is a different story. I will sweep and mop the kitchen and then the kids will come in with dirty shoes or the dog with dirty paws. I can pick up the living room and vacuum to only have the 4 tornadoes come behind me an mess it all back up. I have been very frustrated this summer to say the least. My wonderful DH had suggested that I develop a routine for myself and the kids to see if that helped. At first I was like how dare you tell me how to take care of my kids and my house and then I thought you may have a good point.

That is when I started to scour the internet for ways to help me. I am not an organized person. My mom has always tried to help me, but it has just never caught on. I was in the USAF and while I was in there I learned discipline and some organization. I thought I should try to incorporate some of that into my daily life. Then I came across a website that may change my life and the life of my family. I want to introduce you to FlYLady! She has a site that teaches you how to develop a routine. Sounds simple and I wonder why I didn't think of it before. FlyLady  uses a phrase which I can so relate to called SHE which stands for Side Tracked Home Executive. She tells us that we have to drop our perfectionism and just start doing. Kids are use to a routine at school. They have math class at the same time each day or have gym at the same time. Why shouldn't I try to have cleaning time or lunch time or playtime at the same time each day? So I have started to develop a routine for each person in our house each day.

FlyLady tells us that you should have a Morning Routine, an Afternoon Routine, and  a Bedtime Routine. Sounds simple huh? I have always read to my kids before bed so I thought that was a routine, but not like she wants you to to. I have only been working on my routines for a couple of weeks now, but I can say that I am loving this. I wake every morning and look at what is called my Control Journal to see what I need to do that day. I am still tweaking my routines so things are still changing daily. Each day there is a particular room that I work on to clean. She also picks certain Zones each week for you to focus on. This week we are working on the bathroom and the office or desk area. You are sent e-mails with your assignment that day Monday through Friday. Saturday is family day and Sunday is for resting and worship.

She even has routines outlined for your kids on how to keep their rooms clean and how to get their chores done on time without being asked. She even has an afternoon routine to help your kids get their homework done without burning them out. Like I said I am still working on our routines so things seem to change daily. I am so excited to see where we will be in a month after school starts on Monday.

You also need to check out an online calendar that she offers called Cozi You can also use this on your phone. In here you can put all the members of your family and all their appointments. I have even put in the dates from the school calendar so that I know when they have an early release or are out of school. You can make To Do list on it along with Shopping list. I have used this alot just like last night when I went school supply shopping. I didn't have to carry a paper list, because it was all on my phone and I could check off the items as I put them in the basket. There is also an option to have a reminder sent to your phone for appintments. I have the reminder sent to mine if it is for me and the kids and have it sent to my DH's phone if it involves him so that he can't say, "Well I didn't know about it."

I have never been a routine person, but I think I just may becoming one!

Online Classes

I just had to pass along the info. As you know I have been wild about Photoshop Elements 9 for a while now. Many of you are like I was in the beginning. You are SCARED TO DEATH to open the program. Well put your fears aside and FEAR NO MORE The Digital Scrapbook Teacher is now gonna offer online classes! I am so excited. Her first class that she is gonna offer is a photo editing class. This is so worth taking. She will teach you many of the editing procedures that you have always wanted to know. So if you want to take this 1st class in her series of online classes just click on the link on the left of my blog. When you get to her page click on the link at the top that says blog and you can sign up there. Can't wait to see what ya'll create!

• Week 1- Getting Started (Even if you've used Photoshop Elements in the past you will learn new stuff in this lesson!)
• Week 2-Lightening and Darkening a Photo: Which method is the best?
• Week 3-Color: How to Fix It, Change it, and Remove it.
• Week 4-Straightening, Cropping, and Getting Artistic.

Photoshop Elements

I have been busy learning so much about Photoshop Elements. I am having a blast! I have been going through Patty Debowski's book Photoshop Elements Basics and Beyond. I am reading the section on organizing. Wow I so needed this! She explains how to use tags to find just the right photo. As someone who takes a ton of photos this is gonna come in handy.

You can see in this screen shot of the organizer in PSE9 that I have already tagged these 2 photos. Patty explains that it is easier to add more tags than not enough. I have tagged these with sunny, Texas, June, 2011, and cell phone. I also tagged the 1st photo with my nieces Megan and Kaitlyn and the 2nd photo with my son Dylan. So now that these are tagged lets say I wanted to find a photo taken in 2011 of my nieces in a sunny location. All I have to do is click on these 3 tags and walla you would bring up this photo. Sounds simple doesn't it?

It will take me a while to get all my photos tagged, but in the end I believe that it will help me so much. I have always used the organizer, but had not used the tags. She also tells you how to create multiple catalogs so that you can have 1 for photos and 1 for digital scrapbook supplies. I will next tackle tagging the scrapbook supplies, but as with the photos this will take me some time. To learn more of these great tips go to Patty's site located on the left side of my page and check it out. I never thought that I would learn how to do this stuff!

Have a wonderful day!!

The Digital Scrapbook Teacher

All of the classes that I took at GASC were digital scrapping classes. I did this cause I already know how to paper scrap for the most part and wanted to learn something new. The first class that I took was from Story Tellers. In this class we learned some of the basic techniques for digital scrapping. Here is what we made.

She taught us how to add a shadow, how to duplicate an element, and how to add a photo to a template. All this sounds so simple, but it is not.

The next 2 classes were taught by The Digital Scrapbook Teacher, Patty Debowski. I was in such awe of how well she taught us. As Patty will tell you she is not a techie. She now teaches, because when she tried to learn PSE there were not alot of great tutorials out there. She taught herself how to do many of the wonderful techniques with trial and error. She tries to tell all of her students how to do it the easy way to save us a headache.  I love how she can teach how to do something without getting so technical.

I ended up taking the class #6 Stamping, Distressing, and Making your own with PSE. This class was so much fun! We learned how to use brushes which are like stamps to us that are familiar with paper scrapping. She also told us to push every button and play with everything that is how you learn. If you make a mistake oh well there is always an edit button. She explained that some brushes are created to act a certain way. Look at the photo below.

Here we used the grass and leaf brush. As you can see as you click and drag the image changes colors and blends wonderful. How cool! She also taught us how to make our own digital papers.

The other class that I took was #7 Creating Montages with PSE. In this class we were taught how to take a picture and and add a person to the photo in different locations. Here take a look.

This is the same boy on the slide just in different locations. She took 3 pictures and taught us the Eraser Method and the Masking Method to create this photo. Pretty cool huh?

I also bought her new book Photoshop Elements Basics and Beyond. I am going chapter by chapter to learn new techniques on how to organize my photos and my digital scrapbooking elements. Patty has created a disk that has 3200 digital items already tagged and separated into categories. This saves hours of time!

Here is another picture of all the template disks that I also bought from her. I am so excited to learn how to do some of these amazing techniques with PSE.

I am also trying to butter up my dear hubby to let me attend one of Patty's Boot Camps. This is where for 2 days for 8 hours each day Patty teaches you all the ins and outs of the program. I so want to go. She is having a Boot Camp in Irving, Texas this year on October 22 and 23. I wouldn't have to pay for a hotel, because my parents live not too far from there. Hope that it works out for me.

If you want to find out more information about The Digital Scrapbook Teacher just click on my link on the left side of the page and it will take you to her site to check out all the wonderful products that she has to teach you with.

I want to wish everyone a glorious July 4th weekend and hope that you are spending it with the people you love!

Mouse, Paper, Scissors Hybrid Layout

Just realized that I never posted my hybrid layout that we created in Jessica Sprague and Heidi Swapp's class. This is one amazing class. It teaches you so much stuff that my brain hurt after taking it. I have reviewed the class many times so that I can get better at the techniques that Jessica teaches you in PSE. Heidi then explains how to put it all together. What a terrific team!

Here is one of my Twins Dylan riding his new scooter. As you can tell my printer is not so good on printing pictures. I am on the look out for a new one that does better.

This picture showes the titile and the 3 gems that I added.

This one shows some of the frames that we used around the pictures. I love this technique!

Here is the little element that we created. Jessica showed us how to use a brush to stamp the leaves and how to change the opacity so that you can see the lighter color. She also showed us how to add the words.

 

Here we used another brush stamp to stamp the circle for the journaling. Then Heidi showed us how to use tissue paper to create the white pleated look. As you can tell I need lots of practice on this part.

This is another view of the frames that we used on the photos.

Here again is the final product. All of the patterned paper is digital that Jessica showed us how to print out to use on this layout. Isn't that cool? Think of how many layouts you can create with these digital papers and you can use them over and over and never run out.

Hope that everyone has a wonderful Friday!

More from GASC

I know that it has been almost a month since my last post. With the kids off of school it is well lets say chaos at our house. I barely have time to breath. Four active boys is most days hard to keep up with. We have been so hot here in Abilene that most of the day we have to stay indoors. With temps reaching up to 110 being outside is difficult. I do have to say thank heavens for Netflix! We have been watching a ton of movies and reading books everyday. I have learned how to play cars and my boys are teaching mom how to make boy noises. LOL!

Now on to more of the wonderful GASC. While I was there I was able to meet the wonderful Stephanie Barnard from The Stamps of Life.

I have been a club member with Stephanie for about a year and a half now. I love her stamps. They are clear stamps so you can see what you are stamping. She has many stamps that I use all the time. One of my favorite stamps is her Stamped4You. This is a set that you use on the back of your projects to sign your name. I also adore her YouAre2Kind. This is a set of wonderful words that you can combine and create your own phrase. Stephanie has so many sets that I use all the time. She has Christmas sets, Halloween sets, Easter sets, Butterfly sets, sets for boys and girls, and many sets with sentiments for the inside of cards. Please check out her site here.

I of course had to purchase some more of her stamps which my dear hubby just can't understand. He says,"Don't you have enough stamps to play with? How many do you need?" My Reply to him was, "A girl can never have too many stamps to play with. Look at how many tools you have to fix the car with, or how many fishing lures do you need to catch 1 fish?"( I do have to say that I love all the fishing stuff he has, because I admit I love to fish!) Here are the new sets that I bought.

Another wonderful thing about Stephanie's stamps is that she creates new sets to work with other sets. The Cone2Dish set that is shown here works also with her Scream4IceCream set. How cool is that? Can't wait to see what she creates for next month!

Great American Scrapbook Convention

WOW is all I can say! I have never been to anything like this in my life. The Great American Scrapbook Convention came to Arlington, TX June 2-4. I was like a little kid in a toy store. I wanted everything I saw. There we so many wonderful people that I met and I do have to say that scrappers are some of the nicest people. I had to attend this by myself which at first I didn't like that. When I got there and realized that there were others just like me who did go alone it made me feel better.

Right from the beginning when I walked in I was overwhelmed with awe. Booth after booth full of bright shinny things and colorful things and a multitude of amazing paper. Of course I had to go up and down every row to see all the new great things that I knew I had to have. My poor husband was gonna be in for a shock when he saw the money that was spent on the 2 days that I attended. There were lots of scrapbooking clubs there that offered supplies once a month sent to your house. How tempting that was, but I did not do any of those so that I would use what I already have.

I found a 31 Gifts booth and bought a bag from them just to carry all of my new goodies. One of the coolest new things that I came across was by Kiwi Lane Designs. They have items to help you design your layouts. The templates are semi-transparent so that you can use them to design your page and then you can use them to cut your items when you are ready. I know that I am not explaining this very well so please visit their site here to watch a full demo of the product. What an amazing product it is. I can't wait to give this a try!

Of Course I came home with some new goodies to play with so here are a few pictures of my stash.

This is from Story Tellers Club. These are 2 page layouts and embellishments. Can't wait to add photos to these.

This is some paper stacks and some acrylic sheets with the glue for them.

Here are some puffy stickers for pages.

And of course more paper, cause who can have too much paper. (I do!)

In this picture are my Tim Holtz folders, some pens, brads and eyelets, buttons, and glue stick.

Well I could write all day about my experience at the show, but that would bore you so I will stop for now. In the days to come I will post about the wonderful person that  I met and also about the digital scrapbooking classes that I took at the show. 

I hope that everyone has one amazing Sunday! I am off to swim with the family and try to stay cool here in this Texas heat. 

Til Later!

Whitney

YUMMY!

I have not done any crafting lately so I figured that I would share a favorite recipe of my families. We just love Chicken Spaghetti. I got this recipe from my mom. It does take some time to make, because you have to go in stages but oh so worth it.

 Boil the chicken and cut it up into small pieces.

 Cook the spaghetti noodles.

This is what the sauce looks like after you have added all the ingredients.

One of the best things about this is that you can make it ahead of time and it freezes great. This is an amazing dish to make to give someone and it feeds so many.

 Just out of the oven and I so love the crackers on top.

And now for the best part eating it!

Well I hope that you have enjoyed this post and I hope to create something this weekend. I am still recovering from my bronchitis so I have to take things slow. I am amazed at how long it is taking me to get over this crud. I thought that I was doing good so I decided to walk over a mile to get my son from school the other day. What a mistake that was.  I was pulling the wagon with the twins in and out of it along the walk and by the time I got to the school my chest was burning so bad. The worse part was that I had to then walk home. I wish that this would go away. My chest still feels like I have an elephant sitting on it. My doctor said that it could take up to 2 months for it to go away and up to 4 or 5 months to get my energy back. Wow that is a long time when I have kids to run after and a house to take car of. Oh well I can do only what my body allows me to do.

Have a wonderful day!

Slowly getting on track

I can't believe that it has been over a month since my last post. Wow time has gotten away from me. I was so blessed to have been able to go on vacation with just my mom and dad. It almost made me feel like I was a kid again. We went to see some family that I had not had the pleasure of seeing for quite sometime. Being military we are told where to live and for how long. This causes most of us to only see our extended family every so often. I was able to visit with my Aunt Norma and Uncle Harold and had a wonderful time. My cousin Michael and his family and my cousin Derek and his family were there also. What a great time!

My dearest Uncle Harold is not feeling so well lately. He has cancer and is fighting with all his might. I know that it is in God's hands and that His will will be done, but it still hurts. Please keep the family in your prayers. I did get an update and the family has moved Harold to Hospice and he seems to be in good spirits. I know that he is a man of God and that God is already with him and the family.

I was also able to head to Missouri to see my Aunt Neda and Uncle Jerry and my cousin Kim and her daughter Myriah, and my other cousin Curtis and his daughter Paige. I had such a great time with them and we played cards most of the night. It seems like every time when our family gets together and we usually play cards and our favorite game is  nerts (not sure of the spelling) which is like double solitary. We also played some dominoes and had a wonderful time just getting caught up. I had the realization that it had been over 15 years since I had been to their house. Wow that is way too long ago. I vow that since we do live in Texas now that it is not gonna be that long again.

So as you can see my mind has not been on crafting lately. My boys have been very busy and they just had their last soccer games of the season yesterday. I on the other hand have been very sick the past week. It started with a headache and developed into the flu and bronchitis. I have been in bed or on the couch all week and today is the first day that I have done anything since last Saturday and I have done some laundry. My hubby has been a dream this week. He has cooked, cleaned, and have taken care of the boys. He even went to work late so that he could take my 8 year old to school in the mornings and then he would pick him up at 3. I did still have the younger 2, but they somehow understood how sick mom was and didn't give me too much problem until Thursday. By that time I was aware of what was going on and could deal a little with them. I am on the mend now, but very weak. I didn't realize that the flu could knock you down this much. Oh well no time to waste hubby leaves Tuesday for a few days. Glad that it is only for a few days and he will be back soon.

Now I have to get my house back in order somehow, but I am not gonna rush it til my strength is back. Remember to give those who mean the world to you a kiss and a hug and tell them what they mean to you. Life is short and time runs away. Pray for those that are dear to you and those that are on your mind today!

Vacation Time

I am so excited!!!  I am going on vacation! Being a USAF wife is a very tough job. My husband has deployed many times and leaves for a few weeks here and there for trips. Well this time momma is leaving for a trip without my husband and kids. Yes I did say that no hubby or kids! I know you are saying what? Well I needed a break.

For those of you who live by your family you tend to have people to help you out with your kids every now and then. For us military people we tend to depend on our adopted family, our military friends, to help us with ours. I have to say that some of my dearest friends I have met in the military and miss them once one of us moves.  Every now and then a momma needs her time to recoup and gather her thoughts. That is what this trip I hope will do for me.

I am headed to Arkansas and Missouri with my mom and dad to visit some of my aunts, uncles, and cousins. Growing up we have always been a very close family. I have not had the pleasure of seeing some of them for quite a while now. I miss them so much and am so glad that we have this opportunity to visit. I could have chosen to stay at home for the week or even just stay at my mom and dad's, but I want to be rejuvenated by the love of family. Family is the one who knows the true you and I so need that right now.

I hope to return to my hubby and kids a better woman, wife, and mother after I have relaxed a bit. I will treasure this time with my parents and already miss my kids so much. I have never been away from the twins overnight and only a few times with the other 2. I know that this is a much needed trip!

I will be gone this weekend and most of next week so I will not be posting. I am gonna take this time for myself and reflect on myself and my life. I hope that y'all have a great week and that God blesses you with His Grace!

Mouse, Paper, Scissors Observation Notebook

This assignment was difficult for me.  I don't really like to write about myself or my feelings. Heidi Swapp has had us doing Daily Observations where we are suppose to write about our day and what we thought of in just little snipits. Then she gives us another something to think about. One example she had us do was to think about something that we can't live without.

Here is what I wrote:

What can you NOT LIVE WITHOUT? I have an obsession of love and hate for my computer. I love all that I can do and keep up with others. Boy I sure don’t like it when it does not do what I expect it to do or another words operator error. I like to think I know computers, but the truth is that I know just enough to get into trouble and have no way to get out. I love to look at blogs to get ideas, I read e-mail, search for new items for the house, help the kids with homework, or just keep up with my friends on Facebook. I wonder what my day would be like without my computer?

I do have to say that this Observation thing has been the highlight of my day most days. It seems that to get things out on paper makes me organize my thoughts instead of just having them bounce around in my head. It also makes me think of ideas to solve problems or ideas of things to do with the kids. I have to say I am so surprised that this part of the class has helped me so much.

Heidi also created a tutorial for us on making the cutest Observation Journal!

 

Isn't this just amazing! The paper is so georgus and it is by House of 3 I believe.

 She had us create a few closures like the circle on the above picture and the tab on the one below.

One of the other cool thing that Heidi taught us is to use Tattered Angels glimmer mist. Wow I love that stuff. The ribbon that you see was white. She showed us how to make it this wonderful green color.

This is the inside of the journal. Very sweet!

Heidi also taught us how to cut slits in the back of the paper to insert the back of the paper and the ribbon.

And of course she included elements to print out such as the observation definition. Isn't this just wonderful. I have so many ideas to create some more. Keep your eyes open!

One other thing that I learned from the Amazing Jessica Sprague that has made an amazing difference is how to adjust lighting levels on pictures. Here is an example:

Before

And after

See the difference? Isn't is dramatic? I am sooooo loving this class!!

Mouse, Paper, Scissors Begining

I know that I said that I would post more about this and it has been a while. I am having such a blast playing with PSE 6 that my dear hubby commented the other day that he wants his wife back. I tend to get addicted to new things and right now it is learning to scrapbook with PSE.

In the begining of this course Jessica Sprague does an awesome job of explaining how to get a file into PSE and what most of the buttons are and what they do. She gives you a tour of the program to give you a base to start with. I so loved that! I have had this program for a while now and was so scared to try anything. She makes things look so easy. Let me tell you if I can do this ANYONE can do it.

Our first thing to do was to load a file and to learn how to print from the program. Each printer is different and she wanted us to get familiar with our printers so that we would know how things like printing double sided papers would work. Jessica is such an amazing teacher!

These cards here were ones that were already created and all we had to do was upload and print. Amazing!

The envelopes on the other hand were created somewhat by me. We were given a template made I believe by Heidi Swapp and Jessica taught us how to add a digital paper to the envelope before printing it out. How cool is that? You can make this look so different with other digital papers. Do you see now why I am loving this class. Heidi is doing amazing showing us how to complete the projects once we have printed things out.