Grow - Two Page Scrapbook Layout

Are you enjoying your summer? It seems to be flying by a little quickly for me. 

One of my non-crafting hobbies is house plants. I do like to dabble with planting outside flowers. Mainly in pots on the front porch. Nothing like a full garden of flowers. That's too much of a time and attention commitment for me. Unfortunately, this year, we haven't even gotten around to filling our outside planters. It's kind of embarrassing! I just haven't carved out time for it. We hope to get to it once we get back from our upcoming work trip. Hopefully there will still be a decent selection of flowers left at the greenhouses, but I'm not holding my breath.

In years past, we've planted fairy gardens with our grands!! We didn't even get that done yet! I'm hoping it can still happen this season. I don't know if they've missed it, but we have!

 These are pics of our fairy and pirate gardens from 2020. Didn't the kids do a great job?? They look pretty proud of their creations. Every year, I cave in and buy her another fairy. I mean, can you really have too many fairies in one garden? 😍 Some of her fairies have migrated into our house and enjoying my house plants. They seem to be content, for now.

Our grandson used pirate toys and two different colors of pebbles to cover the potting soil. So fun! 

The paper is BoBunny's "Zip A Dee Doodle" and American Crafts "Lucky Charm". I am crushing on green and blue lately. 

I used a tiny bit of my Mom's old yellow measuring tape for a pop of yellow.💗 If you zoom in on it, you will see that is made of fabric and has stitching on it. They don't make it like that any more. I still miss her so much!! She was a master seamstress and sewing was one of her happy places! For more yellow, I added some SU washi tape at the top of a pic and a yellow button on the watering can. 

Hope you are feeling inspired today. Have a scrappy week!

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "The Big Adventure"

Two years ago, we were blessed beyond belief to be invited to attend a work trip to Israel. One of the favorite parts of my job is helping to plan and organize agent incentive and training trips that we offer every two years. I typically am invited on the domestic trips only, but in 2017, I was giddy with the surprise invitation for my husband and I to join the group in Israel for our company's centennial year! Wow!!! 

I finished the album about 6 months ago, but haven't shared any of the layouts yet. It always takes me a while to photograph each page, then crop and edit them. So, now is the time! I will space them out a little with other family layouts, so that it doesn't get too boring. I was afraid all of the layouts might look the same, but I think they all have their own look and feel. So...here we go!! I'll share them in the same chronological order as our trip, because that is how my brain works.

What a long couple of flights! We broke it up a bit by laying over in Paris, so that I wouldn't get too sore from sitting. I have arthritis and sciatic issues, so getting out and moving was very helpful, even though it meant taking longer to get there.

From the moment we were picked up at the airport and ushered quickly through security, we were pampered and spoiled. The travel company took great care of us and we could relax and enjoy. It was such a joy to see the trip that we'd been planning for more than two years, playout in real life!

From the moment we started the commute from airport to hotel, it was obvious that we were not in the US. We knew this would be a great adventure and a trip of a lifetime for us!!

Even if you are not interested in Israel, these simple layouts can be used for any type of travel, or as a template for any two page layout, really. Just switch out the paper and embellishments and make it your own!

Thanks for stopping by today!

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "Friends Always"

Did you ever sing the song, "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other's gold."? We are blessed to have some "gold" friends! I met Nancy when we were 4 or 5 years old. Eh hem....I think that makes us friends for five decades!!! That's right, a semi-century friendship! We were backyard neighbors. We spent a lot of time going back and forth to each others house. Even after we moved to other homes, we kept in touch at school. Later, we were roomies in an apartment, and stood up in each others weddings. They later moved to Traverse City, MI and my husband and I moved to Fort Wayne, IN. We still visit each other as often as possible for our kids graduations, weddings, parents' funerals, and  just to hang out and spend time together.

 Our husbands became friends as teens before Nancy and I knew them. We all met up at my church playing volleyball with the youth. Our youth played VB every weekend. It didn't take that long for Mark and I to become interested in each other and shortly after Gary and Nancy started dating. Oh my goodness...there is so much more to the story than I have room to share here. 😍

 I love the colors in this layout. I'm not sure what possessed me to go so feminine with it, but it was close to Easter when they came to visit us last year, so the paper and embellishments fit the décor. I do love how it turned out. There is something about using black embellishments to set off a page.

We had so much fun getting caught up with each other, playing games and just hanging out. We felt so blessed to share our new home (and guestroom) with them. Prior to this visit, in our old home, they had to sleep on the pull out couch in the living room. No fun, I'm sure! Maybe they'll come more often now!! 

Have a great week!!

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "Jungle Fever"

We had the privilege of going to San Juan for a business trip a few years back. This was before Hurricane Maria tore through in October, 2017. We rented a car and took a drive into the El Yunque rain forest to see the sights.

It is the only tropical rainforest in the US national forest system.

 Beautiful view from up in the forest looking down at the ocean below.

We had a fun day seeing the sights after a very stressful few days of meeting planning.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "Oh Boy - 6 Months"

This little guy melts our heart. Here's the layout of his 6 month pictures for his scrapbook. I typically make two layouts of the mile marker portraits... one for his book and one for ours.

 Isn't he such a doll? We're so blessed to have this little man in our life!

 I love this set of little boy paper!! So stinking cute, just like him.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "All Boy"

What a beautiful sunny day! I hope you are enjoying your Easter weekend. I just finished cleaning my house and decided to take a few minutes to post a few layouts before heading out to fight the crowd at the grocery store.

This little guy is so darling! He's our little sweetheart and is growing way too fast! 

 

These pictures were taken by his talented Mommy when he was 6 months old. Now he's just about ready to celebrate 2 years of life!

The paper is We R Memory Keepers "Autumn Splendor" and Little Yellow Bicycle. The ribbon is from Paper Studio. The die cut "All Boy" title is from Cricut's Boys Will be Boys cartridge and the tree is Straight from the Nest cartridge. I used two different sized hole punches to cut out the tree. The twine is from Tim Holz and the wood mustache embellies from BoBunny.

Happy Easter!! Thanks for stopping by my blog today.

Two Page Layout - "Oink Oink"

Halloween 2013

Last year Halloween was pretty rainy and dreary as you can see from my hair in these pictures. We still got out to see the cutest little piggy, EVER!

 This is a super simple layout with six 4x6 pictures going across the page. I love pink and orange together, especially when scrapbooking a furry hot pink piggy! We got her a cute board book and she enjoyed looking through it and hearing Grandma bark like a dog. Who wouldn't, right? The cutesy little pig embellishment was cut with my Cricut and adorned with light pink ball fringe around the collar, and glitter on her cheeks.

 Halloween has now come and gone again. I can't get over how fast time flies. It's totally crazy...I wish I could slow it down sometimes. These years are so precious!

This year (2014) we had fun trick-or-treating with our grandkids in our neighborhood. Scarlet is two and a half years old now. She was an adorable owl!! She went to the door, knocked, said trick or treat, said thank you, and then echoed the homeowner and said "your welcome"....Great fun! Our grandson is 6 months old and he was a tough little pirate, complete with drool, smiles, and lots of wiggles. It was the coldest evening we've had so far, so we only went a block or two, but we made memories! I guess you'll have to come back next year to see the scrapbook pages for 2014 Halloween, but I'll give you a little teaser...

We are blessed to have our sweet grandbabies so close! =)

Two Page Scrapbook Layout - "Sweater Weather"

We got our first taste of Thanksgiving today. Yummy! We have a long-standing tradition at the insurance company where I work, of coming together one week before Thanksgiving for a wonderful turkey lunch with all of the trimmings. Everybody pitches in and it's quite the feast. I'll definitely be ready for it all again next week. It seems that my favorite season is quickly slipping away into winter!

It's definitely time to post another grandbaby layout! This one is from last fall. If I remember right, they had popped over to our house for something, and they looked so cute in their sweaters, I had to break out the camera.

 Everything on this layout is from Close to My Heart. I created the layout at a CTMH class. The paper would work well for Halloween or anything fall related. The owls on the paper in the center are pretty cute. Full credit for the layout design to Shelley Kennerk, CTMH consultant.

 I added the pumpkins as an after thought. I used Stampin Up scalloped oval punch. A small piece of green cord forms the stem.

Have a great rest of the week! Thanks for stopping by my blog today.

Two page layout - "Pentwater Pier"

It's official! Summer is here for real. We have the hot, muggy temps to prove it. My husband and son are out working on the house. Dinner is in the oven so we can all eat something yummy and healthy when they come in. I definitely have time to post a layout before folding the laundry. =)

With summer in mind, here is a layout from a quick weekend getaway last summer. Our first stop when heading up the west coast of Michigan is usually Pentwater or Ludington.

I punched flowers with StampinUp! five petal flower punch. The leaves are punched from Kraft and helped add to the beachy look.




  This burlap ribbon is my favorite. I can't remember where I purchased it. The burlap is held together by a plastic mesh to keep it nice and neat and a little see-through. The patterned paper strips and some of the flower layers are "Down on the Boardwalk" by We R Memory Keepers.

I've scrapped Pentwater pictures before, and they probably look similar to these....What can I say, we really like Pentwater and always take pictures. They're too cute not to scrap, even though the day was a little overcast.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today! Stay cool!

Two Page Layout - "U R Here"

The sunshine today has been beautiful. I just took a quick walk with my dog and it's deceivngly chilly out there still. I have faith that spring is coming, and I'm ready.

We took a trip to Lake Placid, New York, in September 2011. You must go and check it out sometime. I was there on business, but we extended a few days to see all the sights. Unfortunately my husband was behind the camera and I was the focus of attention. I much prefer it the other way around.



I do love the colors in this layout. I splurged on a pack of pretty flowers and went to town with them.

We were actually checking out the ski slopes where the olympics were once held. Gorgeous views!! The title is from Graphically Speaking (Cricut)....One of my favorite "go to" cartridges, especially for a quick title.

You can't see it here, but the lacy border strip is actually fuzzy. Wish you could feel it. =) I broke my own rule and didn't really journal, except for the date and place. The view kind of say it all, and this was one of several layouts from the same area.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today. Have a great weekend!!