Scrap Our Stash Challenge

I had a first last week...I won my first challenge from Scrap Our Stash blog and now I get to be a guest designer for the month of October!!  I won it with my layout, My Favorite Flowers that I posted in an earlier post.  You can see it by clicking here.  I thought this was cool and I am very honored.  I can't wait to find out what the challenge is and get started.  In the meantime, check out that blog!!  I'll be keeping ya'll posted as I find out more news.  Now, I am off to scrap...it has been a while since I've had the chance and I am SOOOO motivated today!!  Hope you are, too!! 

Summer Camp

Well, here in Texas, we are starting back to school tomorrow.  I have been back to work since Monday, which is part of the reason I haven't posted much.  That, and the fact that I am just getting used to this "blog thing"!  So far, so fun!!!

Before I got back to work, I was able to finish two layouts on two of my sons experience at Summer Camp.  One has become a Camp King!!  This was his third year at this camp and he has been very successful.  Although he is known as my stubborn wildcat around here, he evidently is an ideal camper at camp.  I'd sure like to know what secret the counselors use to get him to be such an obedient boy!  HA!  My youngest son started his camp career this year.  He had a great time as well and is already looking forward to going back again next year. 

HSYC, Yr. 3

 Patrick was awarded Best Camper in his cabin!  I scanned his award and printed it in a smaller version so it would fit on my layout.  I also used his wristband in the top right hand corner as an embellishment.   All papers and embellishments are from Close to My Heart.

HSYC, Yr. 1

This was Ryan's first year at HSYC.  His album is 81/2 x 11.  So to save space, I tucked a journal card behind the pictures on the right hand side.  The cardstock and stamps are CTMH, but the letters are from Autumn Leaves and the patterned papers are from Echo Park, Sweet Summertime line.  I just got them from my LSS, Keepsake Kottage.  I LOVE the letters!!!

Let me know what you think of these layouts and feel free to post your own layouts about your kids' summer camp experiences!!  I'd love to see them!!

More Layouts

Here is a layout I just finished today.  It is based on a sketch from PageMap Blog and I am entering it in my first challenge with her.  I was excited about how it turned out.  I tried a few different techniques.  First I heat embossed the title, date, and the chipboard corner accents.  I had never tried heat embossing chipboard before and I really like how it turned out.  Second, before I embossed I mixed my colors.  I used CTMH's Outdoor Denim embossing powder but I didn't want it quite so dark, so I added some Metalic Silver to it.  I thought it matched wonderfully.  What do you think?

This second layout is about my son learning to ski and quickly becoming very good.  We are pretty proud of him.  I scraplifted a layout from an issue of Scrapbooking Etc.  I haven't decided if I like this layout or not.  I have a lot going on and I usually do not have that sort of look on my layouts.  I wanted it to have a wet look and I was inspired by the water sprays in the pictures.  I crumpled and inked the blue background paper and I also used puff paint around the edges of the swirl and paper edges.  I also heat embossed the letters to keep a wet, shiny look.  I may send this to Scrapbooks, Etc. for the Make it Yours call if I decide I like it.

And on a personal note, I am excited to have two of my boys back from camp this morning!  They went to two camps, back to back, for the past two weeks.  I had them home only for about a day and half last week, before sending them off to the next one.  I am not used to so much down time in my life!!  It was very nice, but I think I prefer chaos!!  They both had a great time but I think they, too, are very glad to be home.  I'll do a layout on their camp experience, hopefully real soon!!!

Have a great weekend!!!

First Post EVER!!

Well, they say learning something new keeps you young.  Not that I am old, but there are some days!!  My name is Marilyn Graff.  I am a working mother of three boys, who are growing like WEEDS!!  They are the light of my life as well as my reason for buying Clairol!  They are now 14, 11, and 9 years old and they are every bit the American boy.  I am also married to my husband of 16 years.  He's a great man and I am looking forward to many more years as his wife!!  From August through May, I adopt about 10-12 more kids as a 5th grade Special Education teacher.  I've been teaching since my oldest was born and I really love it.  Many...I have to be honest because I can't say "all", but many crawl into my hearts and stay there forever, no matter what grade they move on to.

The other big part of my life is scrapping.  Of course, my favorite subjects are my boys and believe me, they give me LOTS to scrap about.  Over this past summer, I've realized that a big part of scrapping is also sharing your thoughts, ideas, and inspirations with the ever-growing online community.  I have never held a blog before, so I hope you can bear with me as I learn.  I do love technology.  I love using it in my classroom (technology can do some AMAZING stuff for my students!!!) as well as a part of my scrapping.  Although, I am a avid, devoted traditional scrapper.  I just haven't been able to get into the digital world of scrapping...yet.  We'll see...like I started with, learning something new keeps you young, right?!!

I use mostly Close to My Heart products right now.  Mainly because I was/am a consultant and I have TONS of their products.  But really, they have some awesome products.  I love just choosing a paper packet, then all of my coordinating colors fall right into place.  It takes the guess work out of the picture for me.  However, once I get to a new scrapbook store again ( I live in a small town and getting to a scrapbook store alone can be a task...preteen and teen boys are not good to take to a scrapbook store!!), I want to get my hands on some of the really pretty papers I've been seeing online all summer long!!

Anyway, this is my first attempt at writing on a blog.  I hope to use it to share my ideas and hopefully inspire you.  Most everything I hope to include on this will be about scrapping, but as my school year starts, don't be surprised to see a post or two about my "other life".  I hope to have followers share their inspirations, too.  In time, I may even start some challenges.  We will just see where the wind takes us.  For now, I want to share some of the work that I have done this summer.  I hope you enjoy and follow me as I trek down this new road of discovery in the world of blogging and scrapping!!!  Have a great day!! 

These are my boys and at the moment, this is one of my favorite layouts.  I hardly ever get to use flowers and pink but this one just screamed it!!  I had to laugh at my husband though (who is your typical Texas manly man!!).  Every time he walked by and saw my work, he made comments about adding too much "froo froo" (his terms).  But I think this layout turned out real cute!  I am a girl, after all!!!

This is my rock...I love these pictures because I can RARELY get him to smile in pictures and he almost NEVER does the PDA thing (a.k.a. public displays of affection).   And here I got them both on one layout!!  LOL!  You will notice quickly that I LOVE all things from Close to My Heart.  These papers come from their collection called "Grace".  The only thing that is not CTMH are the letters for 'Love'.  I'm not sure who that manufacturer is...I've had those letters for forever!!

I also have a gallery at Scrapbook.com and Scrapbookchallenges,com.  I will post links as soon as I learn how!!  LOL!!  Thank you for your patience.  Just wait, you'll see that I will get this going...I hope!!!