Musings

Disappointment. I guess it is a part of life, but lately I feel as if it has been just pouring out onto me. Everywhere I turn, disappointment seems to be lurking, waiting to dash any hopes of happiness.  I haven't even heard back on either of the two jobs that I have applied for and already I am dreading the worst...

Lord, give me strength to face each challenging day with you. You are my Rock and my Fortress.  Help me to cling to you in these times of disappointment and know that Your plans are perfect. With you by my side, I can ride out this valley in my life and one day come out of it, victorious. One day.

Fiskars Lacy Days of Summer Tutorial :)

Tutorial for Fiskars’ “Lacy Days of Summer” Border Punch Photo Mats and Corners


By Janeen Beuchel

*Before you begin, decide about how large you want your photo mat to be and write down the measurements.*



1. Start with a full 12x12 piece of paper In the color that you want your mat to be and a scrap 12” strip of cardstock. This strip will serve as your guide when you cut your mat down to size.
2. Punch along one edge of the scrap strip, making sure to line the edge of the paper up with the edge of the design printed on the punch.

3. Choose one corner of your 12x12 sheet and make one punch on each side of the corner with the edge of the paper lined up with the edge of the design printed on the punch as you did in step 2. It will look like this when this step is completed.

4. Then take your 12x12 sheet and line up what you have punched with the printed design on the punch so that you are punching the design going towards the corner. Only one flower should be showing at the edge of your punch.

Repeat on the second side and when you are finished, it will look like this.

5. Now take your strip that you punched in step two and lay it on top of your 12x 12 page that has been punched and your measurements that you wrote down before you began. In order to get exact photo corners you need to determine how big to cut the paper and the punched strip will help you with this. The sides of your photo mat must be exactly as long as the inverted point exactly between each of the flowers punched. I labeled these points with the arrows in the photos below.

In my layout I wanted my photo mat to be about 10 inches by 10 inches. So to find out my exact cutting measurements I laid out my punched strip and my ruler on my page.

Since I wanted my mat to be about 10 inches long, I went to the point that was next farthest down the ruler from 10 inches, so I will cut my paper to be 10 5/16 inches long, at the mark that I made on the paper in the photo below.

6. Repeat with the other side of your photo mat as described above if the lengths of your photo mat are different sizes. If your photo mats are the same length like mine were, simply measure the length you measured before and cut your paper accordingly. I now have a piece of paper that measures 10 5/16 inches by 10 5/16 inches.
7. Finish punching the rest of your corners by making one punch on each side of each corner with the edge of the paper lined up with the edge of the design printed on the punch as you did in step 3. All 4 corners will look like this when this step is completed.

 

8. Then simply complete the punches between each set of corners. When finished your page will look like this.

 

9. Then take your punched strip and use one of the scallops as a pattern to draw your own scallop in each corner.

 

10. Use your scissors to cut each scallop you drew. When you are finished it will look like this.

 

Now you can use your Lacy Days of Summer photo mat on your layout and embellish as desired. Enjoy!

Scrapping Projects and a Bridal Shower

Well it has been a fabulous weekend! It began with heading to a local bar to hang out with some of my teacher friends on Friday afternoon. My drink of choice? Pepsi, of course. :)  I really enjoyed catching up with everyone and finding out how school was going for all of them and what fun and interesting things everyone was up to this summer. As I was sitting there, I realized that the one thing I miss the most about my job is seeing all of my friends and co-workers on a regular basis.  A job is not just the work you do, it is also the relationships/friendships that you form and the interactions that you have with these people every day that make a job worthwhile. Afterwards I came home and finally finished a layout that I had been struggling with for 2 days. I really love how it turned out. The colors are so bright and fun and I got to use my new blue glittery embossing powder from American Crafts which totally adds to the fun feeling of the page.

On Saturday,  I woke up later than usual (11:00 a.m.) and dad and I headed out to get gas for the mower and lunch too. It is a fun little ritual that we sometimes do to make Saturdays more fun. Then we headed home and I ended up beating him at a game of Skip-Bo pretty badly.  I really thought I was going to lose but all at once I went on a huge streak and played half of my pile of cards in one turn.  :)  Dad and I really love the game and play at least once a week.  We actually wore out our first deck of cards and are now breaking in our new deck. Then Renee came over and she and I ended up going shopping because her car was in the shop and she needed to run some errands. So we ended up in Archivers and I now have an interview on Tuesday morning to work there. I am still not 100% sure that I want to go back to working retail again, but I need a way to pay the bills and sustain my little "scrapping addiction", so here goes. I came home and worked on another layout and had a lot of fun pulling out tons of flowers and embellishments to add to this layout to make it really stand out. I also played with glimmer mist on the chipboard letters and love how it turned out.  The colors are so soothing and the embellishments frame the pictures perfectly too. :)

Then today we had Renee's bridal shower. I can't believe her wedding is just 34 days away! It has come so quickly. Anyways, the shower was fabulous. Maria and Amy put a lot of hard work into making this shower simply fabulous. Everyone said the food was fabulous and everyone felt welcome and at home too. We visited with friends and family, laughed at the trivia about Zach and Renee, and introduced ourselves with silly foods such as jello, dates, and "pam"cakes. :) Renee got a lot of great gifts, including a popcorn popper, kitchen gadgets, and a domino set from me so they can enjoy one of our family's favorite games, Mexican Train Dominoes.

I have also been working on some other scrapbooking projects over the past few weeks. These are some of my favorites. This top one was a quick and easy one for me and I had fun using these beach themed products from Making Memories "Great Escape" line.  The bright colors and bold patterns were perfect for these pictures of Emily and I enjoying the local cuisine in Daytona Beach. I also used a fun technique to create the orange scalloped circle.  See the instructions below to recreate the look on your next layout. :)

I used my medium-sized EK Success corner punch and my Cricut Expression to create this fun look. First I die-cut a circle out of cardstock that was 1/2 inch larger than I wanted the scalloped circle to be.

 I removed the corner guides from my punch and lined up the notches on the punch with the edge of the circle and punched my first scallop.

 I then slid the punch over and lined the left side of the punch and the right side of the punched scallop up and punched again to create the next scallop.

I continued this all the way around the circle to create my scalloped circle.

If your punches don't line up at the end like mine did, just take a pair of scissors and snip the paper in a scallop shape like I did or cover that part of the circle with an embellishment.

I completed the layout below with some of my beach pictures. I really loved the colors in the ride so I found patterned papers and accents that would compliment them. I found this great paper from Deja Views and some fabulous accents from Making Memories and K and Company to accent them.  I created these fun collages and used a variety of word stickers, tags and buttons to complete the look. :) Another fun punching technique I learned was that the border punches from Fiskars line up perfectly and can be overlapped to create fun new borders. Here I used the Effervescence and Scallop Sentiment punches to create this fun border. What other punch combinations can you create?

A Busy and Fun Day

Well today was pretty busy but it was also super fun. Mom, Renee, and I started the day at David's Bridal for Renee's dress fitting. I totally love how she looks in it and the bustle is so elegant! I can't believe we only have 7 weeks until the wedding...it has gone so fast. After that we met Dad for lunch at Logans and I tried the chicken tender salad. It was fabulous! I really enjoyed getting to spend time with all of my family and just hang out with them. After a quick stop at the stamping store, us girls then headed to Walmart to do some shopping. I got a really cute display shelf and I can't wait to put a layout up on it....I just need to find somewhere to put it and Renee and I started trying to find some great makeup for the wedding. After that we all came home and worked on projects for the wedding. And let me tell you, adding a bit of ribbon to something makes it just that much better. We added ribbon to the flower girl's basket, the ring bearer's pillow, the card box, and the bubbles. They all look so much more elegant and put together. I also spent some time working on a special scrapbooking project...I will be able to let you know more about this in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for the details. :)