Our fallen friend

A few pages to remember our fallen friend and co-worker, Jim Reams.

Management by Walking Around "Jim's gone MBWA"

if you look closely, you'll see Jim, our great leader, sticking out his tongue

Jim, our beloved city manager unexpectedly passed away last fall. Jim was a hero to all of us here at the city, his passing has left us with heavy hearts.

This is a project I have been working on for the last 5-6 months. As hard as it has been, as busy as I have been, I am still glad that I took it on. It's the least I could do in remembrance of this great man.

It took a mass appeal for any and all photos that anyone may have taken in the last decade, of a very reluctant subject no less, before we managed to gather a fair collection. In no way am I aiming to scrapbook every photo, but there were are some gems.

This is addicting...

I feel very grateful and humbled to have been selected as the Rusty Pickle Sketch winner again.

(Rusty Pickle Blog Sept. announcement) (click here to see the October ideas!!!)

I see the other talent out there and I feel so lucky to have been picked.

So, THANK YOU. This means a lot to me - especially this week.

..... I'm a little scatter-brained right now

Those of you that know me IRL, will know that my sister-in-law (my husband's only sister) died tragically yesterday. We are holding on, holding it in and trying to get through the next few days. For some reason we think that if we can keep it together long enough for the funeral to be taken care of, then maybe we'll be able to keep holding on afterwards. It's a tough situation and one that I would not wish on anyone.

I might add that this brings me to one of my main reasons to scrap - to hold onto memories, to capture the feelings and keep them close and visible. When my boys were teenagers I thought they would be the death of me. It was really tough, raising 2 incredible, but still very challenging boys along with a 2 year old. I tell ya, you get NO sleep between the Teen schedule and the Toddler schedule. Scrapping those feelings, frustrations and hopes was what saved me.

My main regret with Becky is that I don't have those memories for her. We seemed to have drifted apart, got busy with our lives and just taken a lot for granted. I thought we had years still. Now we don't. Now she's gone.

Sorry to go on and on. I guess I just want to say to everyone - hug your loved ones, call someone you've not talked to for a while, mend fences and if you like to scrap - well - keep the memories alive with your art.

Another Sketch Challenge from Rusty Pickle

Oh, how late it is! I just kept going until all of a sudden... it was almost midnight! Yikes.

I decided to challenge myself with the September Rusty Pickle Sketch Challenge.









My brain started going all it's different ways and before I knew it I was creating a layered mini Acrylic album from the sketch!

(find the sketch here )


The idea that is behind this mini book is an old memory I have, hence the 70's-looking papers and the worn and distressed look. Ha, it's not just the age of the memory I'm bringing out with the papers, it's also a little pun on wrinkling and aging! I never can resist some little tidbit that if someone really looks closely at my pages they will see that there is nothing done by chance...

ANYWAY... When I was seven and riding the bus to school every day, I would sit there and think my seven year old thoughts to myself. One day I was thinking that if everyone had to get wrinkles when they got old, I'd make sure that mine were LAUGH LINES, and that would be okay.

Silly seven year old! Anyway - the photos are of me at age 7, 25 and 40.


Supplies used:

Rusty Pickle Candy Land
Rusty Pickle Rock Star
Rusty Pickle Pashima alpha stickers
Zig Markers
Scrapworks Acrylic Album
misc. ribbon and bling
... oh, almost forgot I painted with some Tim Holtz Daubers

More old pages finally finished...

Git'r Done

...my pre-expo motto! Can't have old projects laying around if I want to add to it all at the expo :)

I'm floored!

I think I should let contests inspire me more often!

Check this out:

http://rustypickle.typepad.com/picklelicious/2009/08/august-sketch-winner.html

 (a bigger photo than what I posted earlier...)

p.s. Rusty Pickle has LONG been a favorite paper line of mine, I know I'll drool over every last item they create - They just do it right ya know? I'm excited to be going to the Expo in another week, oops, that's probably 2 weeks from today - yikes, I'm ants-in-the-pants-itching to spend some creative time again and it's rather disappointing to realize it's still 2 weeks away :(

Rusty Pickle August Challenge

Time to get back to 'playing' - well, now that I've got time while Lex is in school -



- I always did feel the creative bug bite around the same time the kids started school each year!

Cleaning up...

Whatever do you do with OLD pages that you just never quite finished...

And when I say old, I'm talking at least 5 to 10 years since I started them. Hey, there weren't any such thing as rub-ons, bling or glitter paper back when I did some of these.

With the ever useful-can't-waste-a-single-thing attitude that I inherited from my Depression Era grandparents I've decided I need to match up some of those half-finished pages with photos that have been sitting oh-so-lonely-and-unappreciated in my files - and here they are:








Of COURSE I had to add a little to them, play with them and in general just spiff them up enough to pass the mustard. I don't think they'll make my 'Cream of the Crop' list, but hey, they are done, they are in albums and I've got a few less projects in my to-do stack.

..and one that I never quite liked and had to change up a bit...



Sheesh - this has made me want to create some NEW pages, something up-to-date-less-embarrassing-and-a-little-bit-more-hip!

and a few more layouts

I got in TOO much of a hurry and some of the photos of the pages are not-so-good. But hey, I DID finally get some pages done after ages and ages of not getting anything finished :)

Hugs!

THANK YOU!

Just wanted to send out a great big THANKS to everyone who has visited me and been there for me (online and IRL) while I have been recuperating :)

Making Cards...

I just had to do a little something, and I have a lot of July Birthdays
~no peeking you July Birthday people, you know who you are '-)





So, just some quick cards, one more thing to cross of my major list of things to do before Wednesday!

Congrats to Rachael & Tracy

I just have to give a BIG SHOUT OUT to my awesome incredibly talented friends:

Rachael Chamberlain (pgs. 62 & 7 2)
and
Tracy Polacheck (pg. 99)
(I didn't miss any pages- did I?)
who are BOTH published in the August 2008 issue of
Memory Makers!

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!

Chipboard Family Album!

I'm rushing to post this in as few minutes as possible ;) break time goes FAST!

We had such major winds all day yesterday that it knocked out my Internet! I think my son's got it up and going again, but I'm not trusting to have Internet back for sure tonight and I'm just loving this little album I've been working on.

I used the Imaginesce line of papers that I used for my last layout. I love using up all my scraps! Nothing bad about being frugal, right?!


NEW PICTURES, and I just could not stop adding bits and embellies ;)





(alright, so I've not found the photo I'm REALLY going to use for this page... but at least I found pictures from the same session)


okay now, don't you just LOVE the 80's hair!


1988 to 2003 - Holy cow! But then it DID take 15 years to get our little Lex.


Then the TWO weddings in just over 2 weeks!


and now, even though we are scattered all around the world, we are still together.



I love that it's a whole mini book of family photos from each period of major change through the years of our marriage. Don't you think it's a great idea? I'm loving it!

It's funny, but even in the last hour since I took the photos, I have already gone through and added even MORE rubons - yes ALREADY I've changed things - just dates and more journaling though :)

The quote is "Life is a Series of Beautiful Moments that over time add up to Precious Memories"

_______________
p.s. There is journaling underneath the flip-up photos, I'm still a rather private journaler ;).

TFL!

I'm baaaack!

What a break - holy cow! From blogging, from scrapping, from creating.. well, from just about everything but work and Dr. visits.

Yes, I mentioned the ever dreaded Dr. visits. I do try so hard to not let my physical problems interfere with my life the way I want to live it. Lately, it's been unavoidable. I have a tally of how much time (for insurance purposes) I have spent in Dr.'s offices etc. over the last few years since my car accident, but I don't even want to begin to scroll down in that excel file to see the total. I refuse.

All I will say right now, before I upload my actual-for-goodness-it's-about-time-I-did-something-creative LO is that, yes; I'm scheduled for ankle surgery #3 and I am currently being urged to have a spinal fusion. I'm fence-sitting (and reading everything I can get my hands on about it) for a while.

Now, for suffering through the reading... here you have

Party Girl! Hugs & Kisses!

p.s. this LO is actually VERY sparkly, the background paper, the striped paper, the transparency, the bling hearts and all ;)

Blocking it...

Okay, this is me, keeping busy...

My Minds Eye Decorative Blocks Kits


The set I'm working on today...


~Weddings~











And the older stuff I did a while back...


(Family)


Family is Forever



Outdoor Leader


Creative


Visionary



Caring


Adorable


...and that's what I've been up to. Oh, crud, I can see some bubbles coming up! Argh, I'll be fixing that soon now ;)

I think I need a VACATION! LOL

Digging Out

Okay, I'm ready!

Time to dig myself out of my scrapping slump, get organized again and start CREATING!!

Time me...

I've just snapped the BEFORE photos (don't know if I'll have the courage to actually post them!)

oh, okay, I will...



I've got the music cranked

I've got the dinner cooking and almost ready to serve.

I'm just about ready to sequester myself for a good old cleaning session!

...stay posted

~and soon - cross your fingers - I'll finally have some new work to post :)
____________________

Update:

Although I have not finished the WHOLE room, I did do the hard part - cleaning up the closet :)



It's hard to snap a photo of the whole thing, but it IS straightened up and the countertop is once again available for cutting paper, doing diecuts and working on projects that are require tools, heat or paint.
______________________

Oh, and since you were all so patient - I'll post more of an idea I've been working on for a bit ... a mini clear album:

The cover


Inside pages