Halloween 2015

Halloween was down right busy this year and I have so much to share! Plus I haven't shared this type of post in a really long time and I have actually really missed it. Lets start with the day before Halloween when Simone got busy carving her pumpkin. This year she was determined to do it all by herself and she did. She just needed a little help getting the guts out and cleaning up the cuts at the very end. Her pumpkin came out super cute and its so totally 2015.

Heart eyes all around for this kid and this pumpkin. I love it so much I wish we could save this.

The festivities continued that night with an adult only costume party at our friends house. Larry and I got the ideas for our costumes a few months back it just took a little time for me to find just the right one and and for him to find an authentic traditional outfit on eBay.

Ziggy Zaggy, Ziggy Zaggy, Oi Oi Oi! This ended up being a really fun couples costume and the bonus was I didn't have to wear a wig or alter myself too much.

Of course photo bomb!

The next morning is when things really got busy. Simone had a super early soccer game and then a birthday party to go to and then it was time for Trick or Treating. The great thing was this year she had a friend join us and it was such a blast for the girls.

Simone dressed up as Evie from the Descendants, I think she liked the blue clip in hair extensions the best.

Simone and her friend, two pretty Disney girls.

Larry did such a good job with the webbing again this year, and at the last minute he had me pick up these black spiders to hang up. It was just the right amount of decorations for us. Simple but festive.

Our neighbors however, do an amazing job of decorating and setting the scene at their house, its always amazing and so much fun to see. Darren always dresses up and he scared the beejezus out of the girls, but then gave them a ton of candy so it all worked out. We went back again when it was darker and the projections they have on the front of the house are the coolest thing I have ever seen. Their house was the best in our area for sure.

I couldn't wait to scrapbook the cute girls so I made this quick layout using the Be Scary Halloween Set from Color Cast Designs.  I just loved the black bats and love how they look layered on the black background.

The mirrored Oct 31st piece is just so cool, it really shines and sparkles off the page. The little veneer sayings were just the right touch to add to my little bit of journaling.

I hope you had a great Halloween too! We are already so excited for the holidays that are coming up. I'm sure I'll be back soon sharing more of that too.

Hello November

OMG, its November!! There is so much good stuff to look forward to this month like Starbucks Red cups and Holiday Drinks showing up, going to see Elf the Musical, my husbands birthday, my Mom and Step dad coming for a visit and of course STUFFING! All of these things were added to my November planner yesterday and I'm so excited to see that this month is filling up already.

All of the stamps I used to create this calendar in this May Designs planner are from Kelly Purkey. I love the new wood set that just came out, especially the Santa, the turkey, and of course the pie slice! Here are links to the specific sets that I used and that are shown here so you can find them easily. 

Holiday Planner Icons // Holiday Planner Clips // Food Planner // School Planner // TV Planner // Travel Planner // Work Planner // Special Occasion Planner

One other thing I wanted to mention to those of you that participate in Ali Edward's December Daily® is that Kelly Purkey has put together an E Course for creating foundation pages for your album. I was thrilled when she asked me to share some foundation pages too and between her, myself and my friend Nicole Reaves the E Course is filled with amazing inspiration. The cool thing about the E Course is we all ended up doing different sized albums so there is a lot of variety shared and we all used Kelly's Mini Kit that she designed for Ali Edwards. Its a super fun and vibrant kit filled with lots of yummy colors. Here's a little sneak of my pages so you can get an idea.

Here is a link to the E Course so you can read more about it and sign up to receive it.

I hope you all have a wonderful month, I'm sure I'll be back sharing something very soon.

Featuring Kelly Purkey │ October Release

Hello everyone, I cannot believe we are days away from Halloween! Its so busy right now but I wanted to share that Kelly's October release went live today and I managed to get two layouts done yesterday.

This first layout is something I have had on my mind for years. I was just waiting for the right moment and the right kit to make it happen. Luckily for me when I saw Kelly's Dream Come True mini kit this month I knew it could finally happen.

Years and years ago I found this old Disneyland ticket book in a parking lot and it brought back so many memories of our early trips to the park when it was all about the E Tickets. I dug thru my old family photos for just the right picture to pair with the tickets and with the stamps and cards from this kit. This image of my and my brother on our very first trip to the park was a clear winner.

I love the 6x4 postcard journaling cards that come in the kit and it was the perfect focal point for the layout. 

I was also super partial to the outline ears stamp, super, super cute. The rest of the layout was made by just layering my favorite cards to help frame the 6x4 postcard. Layering journaling cards is one of my favorite ways to start a layout. Once I have the layers in the look I like the rest always seems to fall into place.

The second layout that I made came together really quickly. I used one of the 6x4 cards from the Dream Come True kit and paired it with stamps from the Made with Love stamp set. Its and 8 1/2 x 11 layout, which is something I don't typically do but because it was going to be just one photo and one journaling card I thought the smaller size was a better choice.

I love how versatile this stamp set is. I wanted to share an image of the full stamp set because I think its so cool. I think it would be so cool to document a favorite family recipe by typing it up and adding the stamps and pairing it with a picture.  I know in my family we have some very specific family favorites that this would be perfect for.

The ink colors I used are all Hero Arts Shadow inks and I used Pumpkin Pie and Cup of Joe.

I think the spatula and whisk stamps are my favorite in this set.

There was also a really cute alpha stamp set in this release called Henry. Its super whimsical and would pair wonderfully with the Dream Comes True set.

I hope you found lots of new favorites in this release, I know that I did.

See you soon,

December Memories featuring Color Cast Designs

Its release day over at Color Cast Designs and I wanted to share a layout I made with some of the latest kits. This release is huge and its full of Christmas items but also still covers Thanksgiving and Halloween. I adore the red and aqua color combos of some of the Christmas items so I made a layout featuring some of my favorite photos from last Christmas.

I knew I wanted my layout to feature a lot of photos but since I've done a few grid style layouts lately I wanted to do something different. I took a look thru my digital templates for inspiration and found one that featured this strip of photos. I cut just the photo strip element from that digital template on my Silhouette Cameo and went from there. I printed my photos out onto one 4x6 piece of photo paper and placed them under the photo strip piece. Then I had fun mixing in the fun elements from the Merry & Bright set, the Wonky Hearts set with a few of the silver stars from the Silver Glitter Accents to add some sparkle. This layout went together really quickly, I think it really helps when elements just work so cohesively together like these sets do.

I adore the newer style of hearts that Jessica made for the Wonky Hearts set. They nest inside each other if you want that look but I love how they look open, especially that tiny little red heart.

Here are some images of the sets so you can see what comes with each set, they are all really full sets. Jessica really packs in the elements which makes them all such great values.

Merry & Bright

Wonky Hearts

Silver Glitter Accents

There are also a few sets that are pink and aqua so if you are looking for some pink there are a few options for you. I just love the Twinkling Lights set and cannot wait to use this for my upcoming December Daily® album.

Twinkling Lights

I also wanted to share the items Jessica made for Halloween and Thanksgiving. I adore the black bats of the Halloween set and the turkey in the Grateful set is super, super cute.

Be Scary

Grateful

One other item I wanted to share with you that are making a December Daily® album, there is a really great set of half circle numbers that are perfect for numbering your album.

Number It

You can see all of the other items in the release right here, there are many more than I have shown so I hope you check them out. Remember to use the code 'barbara' (in lower case without the quotes) for 10% off your order. 

Take care,