A Scrapper's Tale

On Falling in Love with Paper

Have you ever just fallen in love with a scrapping product? A product that encourages you to stretch your design skills in new directions? I'm that way with Maya's Street Smarts collection at Scrapbookgraphics.

I downloaded one six-sheet paper pack, and quickly polished off three layouts. Two, I'm submitting to magazines, but here's the third, On Naming Cats.

That's my 17-year-old cat, Princess, who is without doubt, one of the most demanding and contrary cats you ever hope to meet.

The copy reads: In his poem, "The Naming of Cats," T. S. Eliot claims that all cats have three names: the name the family uses daily, a dignified name, and a secret name "that no human research can discover– But The Cat Himself Knows, and will never confess." Once upon a time, our cat had a serious and dignified name, but no one in the family can recall what it was. With her demanding ways and regal walk, our cat soon became known as "The Princess," and that is the name that has stuck. As for her secret name, that we do not know. She’s not the kind of cat to share affection or secrets.

Background paper is from Maya’s Street Smarts Backpack 4 ; frame from Sausan’s Bittersweet; envelopes from Trish Jones’ Journal Stuff; bow from ON Designs’ Bowset No. 3; alpha is ON Design’s Alpha No. 7; and fastener is from Meredith Fenwick’s Pieces of Me: Quirky Elements. Font is Jane Austen.

Re: Shutterfly Albums and Deadlines

Three months ago, I received an offer for a free Shutterfly classic album. In order to take advantage of the offer, it has to be completed by Nov. 15. So here I sit, on this gray and rainy Kentucky morning, with exacly FOUR pages completed out of 20.

It's going to be a gift for my grandson -- a story book about his visits to our house. Here's the title page. The book has a peek-a-boo cover so only Max's face will show when the book is closed. Wish me luck on meeting the deadline. :-)

Everything here is from the Scrapbookgraphics collaboration kit, Gratitude.

Getting in the Halloween Spirit

We never did much for Halloween when I was a kid. I grew up in a rural area, and it just wasn't that big of a deal. We looked forward to candy corn and candied applies, but I don't remember ever having trick-or-treaters coming to a door. It's quite a different story today.

I have one of those neighborhoods where folks literally truck their kids in for Halloween. Our streets are big and well-lit and everybody decorates their homes with pumpkins, lights and even caskets. Last year, we had about 200 kids at the door in a three-hour time span. This year, I'll be having a party for family and friends. As soon as I saw Sausan's Oogelie Googelie kit at Scrapbookgraphics, I knew it would be the inspiration for this year's decorations. Aren't her hand-drawn characters just charming?

The first thing I did was make my grandson a treat bag. I saw a bag similar to this in the Rachel Ray magazine and realized how easy it would be to do using digi supplies. And, it's cheap, too. You can catch the bags on sale for about $2 at your local craft store. I made this one using Jen Caputo’s Shapes Collection No. 1 and Sausan’s Oogelie Googelie. I simply created the design on a letter-sized sheet, reversed the image, and printed it off on iron-on transfer paper. A little ironing and I had a personalized treat bag.

My second project was to make some treat bag toppers for the party. This was another amazingly easy project. Using a 5x3 layout, I created the Treats side on the bottom half, flipped the image and created the Tricks side on the top half. I printed these out on matte paper, cut them out, topped the bags, punched some holes, and threaded the ribbon through. I'll be filling them up with cookies for the neighbors on Halloween night.

So all I have left to do is the shopping, the cooking, and oh yeah, inviting the guests. Guess I'd better get started.