Inpsired by Jenni Bowlin

About two months ago, I attended a class taught by Jenni Bowlin at the Inspired! workshops in Charlotte, NC. I've put off posting my project because I wanted to show some 'before and after' photos.
Jenni was so much fun to learn from! I love the fact that she doesn't have a step by step plan for creating the entire project. She gave us a bunch of product, showed us what she had created with the same materials, and basically turned us loose. We learned to make the cute little tissue flower you see on the front of the folio, and I got my first opportunity to play with some of her Coredination paper line, and, most interestingly, glass glitter.
It's the glass glitter that I've been waiting on. It was bright and shiny when I first applied it to this chipboard butterfly:

Mmm, so sparkly! But as time goes by, the glitter starts to tarnish and develop this gorgeous patina. With the help of my toasty little apartment, this is what the butterfly now looks like:

See how the edges have started to blacken? (and see the tissue flower I mentioned?) So cool! I think I may need more of this glass glitter. Ha ha ha. I decided to fill the folio with images of my mother and her parents from the late 40's. Here's a couple of photos of the finished project:


I had so much fun at the mini workshops, and I really hope that I'll have the chance to attend even more of this fabulous event next year!

Vintage photos and paper roses

I've been making more of my favorite paper roses! This time, they were for a layout I made for this month's challenge at Webster's Pages Inspire Me site. http://websterspages.ning.com/ (sorry, you'll have to copy and paste) The challenge was to make a layout using vintage photographs. I found that WP's Life's Portrait line was perfect for the soft look I wanted for this photo of my mother's parents on the day of her wedding.
The background was a little too strong for my tastes, so I used a layer of gesso to blur the pattern. And I thought the little chandelier rub-on made a great addition to the upper corner of the photograph. Of course, the flowers are my favorite part:
It's preview time at all my favorite scrapbook companies. Webster's has released a peek at one of their lines already:

Doesn't it look yummy? I can't wait to get my greedy little paws of some!

I'm surrounded

As I'm sitting here trying to beat the heat, my eyes are drawn to my furry little friends. They're sprawled in various locations throughout the apartment, snoozing away until it gets to be a little cooler in here. And, because I feel like it, I thought I'd post about my little rats.

Princess is the first cat that 'adopted' me. She showed up in my backyard one day. And slowly but surely, she started working her way into my heart, then into my house. She's quite fat, and very dignified. Ha ha, she's fun to harass sometimes.

Miss Priss is a rather elusive creature. She's one of several feral cats that I feed on my back porch. She'd lived there since she was a little kitten. On one of the hottest days last summer, I walked out onto my back porch to discover that she was birthin' some babies right there on the corner of my deck! I couldn't bear to think of what was going to happen to them as the day wore on, what with the heat and the stray dogs, so I somehow managed to scoop her and the two kittens she'd just birthed into a kitty carrier and then into my bathroom. I put them in a cardboard box that I just happened to have on hand, and they lived beside my toilet for 6 months. She wouldn't let me touch her, and often threatened to bite me while I was using the bathroom. I figured she'd run outside one day after the kittens were older. She did, but then oddly enough, she came back inside at the end of the day. And she started to rub on my legs, and ask to be petted. Yup, she's a pet now. Who'd have thunk it? Of course, if anyone else comes inside, she's nowhere to be found, and she still freaks out if I try anything crazy, like picking her up. But nonetheless, a pet she is.

Spike is a fearless little creature. If anything is drug out of place in the house, she is ALWAYS to blame. But she's also so darned cute and affectionate. Spike comes from Miss Priss's litter. Her most annoying trick is climbing on top of the curtain rods and surverying the world from up high.

More kitty posting later (yes there are more kitties, sigh!).

Roasting in Robeson County

Boy was it a hot, hot June around here! And the heat seems to have sucked the scrap mojo right out of me. Thankfully, it's been much cooler the past couple of days, and I've gotten a little bit done. I made a card for Dad for Father's Day. Nothing too, too fancy, but it does combine two of his greatest loves: golfing and steam trains.

I also made a second page about Duke's National Basketball championship celebrations. This one is about the people I was able to share the victory with that night.

I also finished a layout about my trip to DC during the Cherry Blossom Festival this year. I'll have to get a photo of that soon. Well, I'm off to enjoy the holiday in NJ with my sweetie. Happy Fourth, everyone!