Gwen

My new favorite thing

I've been sick again all weekend... I don't know why.  Possibly tons of stress, lack of sleep and going in and out of freezing cold weather?  Maybe.  But I don't exactly have time to be sick so I'm knocking back the Robitussin and trying to get everything done anyway.  Today I spent about 5-6 hours working on the write-up for my team's marketing project... still plenty left to do.  I also made good progress on Banana Frog projects, made a cough syrup run and even started my laundry!  I decided while I was at it to stay up a bit longer and do a few things just for fun.

So this is my new favorite thing... I can thank Marah for helping me see the beauty in die cutting cardboard, but tonight I really played with it.  When I opened the drawer to pull out the plates for my Cuttlebug, I glanced at my embossing folders and thought to myself, "self, what would happen if you tried to emboss cardboard?"  As it turns out, embossed cardboard is SWEET.  I diecut a bunch of circles and embossed them and then tried inking and painting them.  I ended up making a whole bunch of them to make a wreath in my Christmas journal inspired by this cool one on the Maya Road blog.  I inserted it before day 4... where you can see some bleed through from Careless Copic Use on Day 5.  Oh well, adds character, right?

 

And a close-up, though it's still a little hard to see the effect of the embossing in the photo (the smallest circles are chipboard - I painted them, stamped on them and heat embossed):

And now day 5... I did this earlier this week and just got around to taking pictures.  I was actually really glad to be so far behind when I did this one since I had just seen this awesome technique from Tim Holtz that seemed perfect for a page about advent calendars.

And the obligatory close-up... for my version I just used chipboard numbers and tin foil instead of grungeboard and metal tape.  I also used Copics instead of alcohol ink in those pens... pretty much the same thing, right?

 

That envelope in between the pages is from my company's holiday party - it has the schedule of events during the party so I added it in since that was also on the 5th.  Here's the view of the advent calendar I included... Nicole found this in the store and she and Brian mailed it to me - she thought it would be a fun way to remember when we had these as kids.  I love it!  I open my little door every day.

 

I decided to skip day 6 - that day's prompt just didn't resonate with me... I didn't really have anything for it and decided that since I was so far behind I'd just skip it rather than doing an alternate prompt.  So here's day 7:

So, um, yeah.  A lot of un-checked items.  lol.  I did die-cut the other 7 check marks since I absolutely intend to do everything on that list!  I also did some more diecut and embossed cardboard here.  For these, I brushed PanPastels over the raised areas for some subtle color.

And finally, as if there weren't already enough pictures in this post, one more fun thing I discovered with the cardboard tonight.  I decided that since I was embossing it, I should try letterpressing my cardboard with ink and an embossing folder.  It actually turned out kind of awesome!  It's like grunge letterpress... considering it's cardboard, that's probably appropriate... lol.  I can't wait to use this on something.

Kind of hard to see the debossing in a photo, but it's cool!  The one in back is the first one I tried with gold ink.  That doesn's show up too well on this color, but it's shimmery if you look close :)  Okay.  done now.  Time for cough syrup and sleep.

Muse!

via www.ticketmaster.com

Can I get a woohoo? Tickets to see Muse in SLC just went on sale 8 minutes ago and I scored some pretty good seats... I'm so glad Steph is moving to Utah - I have a concert buddy again! It's not even on a school night... I'm psyched. And dude... it's MUSE. Have I mentioned lately that Matt Bellamy is insanely talented? Because he is.

Peanut Envy

Today after work I headed over to Brent's house for another group session working on our Marketing project.  I probably haven't mentioned, but each of the teams came up with a name for themselves at the beginning of the year.  We have groups named "The Four-Eyed Five" and "Summit Rising" but we're "The Peanut Gallery."  It fits.  We also sit in the back row and occasionally make snarky comments to each other during class.  Given our name, it's probably not a stretch to imagine that we have a small reputation among our classmates so tonight when we were talking about other people in the class trying to milk us for what we've worked on for other projects, someone (I think it was Rick, and I wouldn't be surprised) said "they have peanut envy."  And then all six of us giggled like 10 year-olds.  So yeah.  Have I mentioned that I like my group?

Anyway, we decided that it set a bad precedent for the week if we pulled an all-nighter on Monday, so we set a hard stop of 10pm.  I'm sure the nights will get progressively longer... lol.  But after I navigated the iced over roads to get to the freeway and drive home (snow is the devil's rain!!!), I realized I had a little play time so I did another page for my Christmas Journal (I'm getting SOOOO behind!)  This is for journaling from 12/4 about my perfect Christmas 2009 (the bow is poofed up with it isn't on a scanner bed).

I'm excited about day 5 and I wanted to do it tonight, but even with the extra time, I still managed to lose an hour somewhere.  Oh well!  I'll get to it eventually. For now, though, I need to get some sleep... busy day at work tomorrow and a final tomorrow night.

Today was Saturday?

You'd barely know it from my point of view... lol.  I met with my study group from 10am until about 8:20pm when I had to leave to go to my office holiday party.  Yup, 10+ hours!  They were still there working away when I left... and we still have a ton to do on our project.  While doing some Google searches today we found people who had earned master's degrees by doing this same thing as a thesis.  I'm sure theirs were a little more involved and we're doing it as a group, but still... kind of an indicator of how much work it is! We're making progress, though.

My office holiday party was pretty fun.  We had it at Costco this year and there were games, snacks (including a yummy crepe bar!) and a prize giveaway.  Lots of people were also shopping since the store was open to those of us at the party but I managed to refrain... anything I buy there would almost definitely be more than I could use!  Mostly I hung out with different friends from work, met spouses and enjoyed a break from work and studying.

So now, by once again staying up way too late to try and get my other projects done, I squeezed out the page for the Day 3 journaling for my Christmas Journal.  This is based on a prompt from Shimelle and centers on Christmas Cards so I decided to make a few small Christmas cards; the journaling is typed inside each one.  I made matching envelopes from vellum and a JudiKins envelope template and then stamped and colored the fronts, embellished and stuck 'em on!

I've got a ton of homework that must get done tomorrow (today... Sunday... whatever!) but I hope I can really focus and get it done so I can make some progress on Christmas presents and maybe even do a little more on my journal :)  But first... sleep!

I can almost smell the weekend...

Some of my co-workers and I got into this stupid joke at work.  One of them had once made a comment about it smelling like Friday and of course we couldn't let that go.  So someone will come in and pretend to be sniffing the air and say something along the lines of "what's that smell?  It smells awful!"  And naturally we delight in sucking people in so they try and figure out what smells bad.  The answer, of course, is that it smells like Friday!  (Yes, we are all 12 years old.  lol) 

I'd say I'm ready for the weekend because it's been a VERY busy week, but the weekend includes an all-day-into-the-evening work session with my study group to work on our presentation / final paper for our Marketing Management class.  Oy.  It would probably go into the night as well, but my office Christmas party is Saturday night so I have an escape :) Sunday will probably be my relaxing day, but I also have to study for another final on Tuesday.  At least it's wrapping up!

In the meantime, I caught up on the pages to go with days 1 and 2 in my Christmas journal.  I also did a little Christmas art journal piece that I really like that I attached to the backside of my manifesto.  Here's the collage plus day 1:

 

Day 1 is on an envelope and inside is the print-out of the post from my Banana Frog guest appearance on Tuesday :) (with Banana Frog stamps on the outside, of course!) 

And on the back of the envelope is day 2 - a prompt from Shimelle that I paired with a picture I took almost 2 years ago of what the snow looks like here on my street:

 

And because you know I love me some close-ups, here are a few more of the collage so you can get a bit more detail.

 

k, I'm up even more too late than my usual too late (I had to come home and work after class and then ended up playing.  Smart of me, yes?) I'm hoping tomorrow I can spare an hour or so to drop by the American Crafts warehouse sale.  That's always fun, but we'll see what the day brings.

Because I am clearly crazy...

... I decided to over-commit myself again this month.  lol.  Last year I did a December Daily album and this year I thought I'd really like to do that again.  Only this time, I was intrigued by the idea of getting daily prompts and samples from Shimelle's Journal Your Christmas class so I signed up.  My plan is to combine the prompts with the December Daily (when I have stuff) and maybe even a little art journaling to create a really unique record of this month.  So far (2 days... ha!) I'm managing to keep up on the journaling, but putting the pages together is probably going to have to happen when I can get to it... I have finals starting next week so I've got to keep my eye on the ball for now :)

Anyway, I did put together the first page with my journaling manifesto - I decided to make my album 8x12 this year, with odd sized pages/envelopes, etc... thrown in.  (The hat on this cute little guy actually extends above the top of the page.)

Pretty basic, but a good start for me!  I'm planning to wait and bind the whole thing together at the end this time (assuming it doesn't get crazy and I start losing pages or something.)  Last year I didn't guage how big it would end up well enough so doing it at the end should solve that.  Anyway, I'm up too late again so time to crash!

Happy December!

I can't believe it's December, but at the same time I'm really excited.  It means... I'm only two weeks from finishing my first semester of business school... I'm only three weeks from going home for the holidays and... it means that today is Banana Frog day! 

I was lucky enough to be chosen as a guest designer for Banana Frog and had the pleasure of playing with some of their fantastic stamps.  The first of my two guest design posts is up on their blog today... So hop on over (pun intended... couldn't resist!) and check it out :)

My favorite photos

I can finally share a project I've been sitting on for over a month now... since the family officially celebrated Erin's birthday yesterday, she's now seen her present and I can post it :)  This year I made her a mini album of my favorite photos of Adorable-Niece-Eraleigh (and hopefully her favorite photos too).  Since the album is a collection of photos, I didn't do any journaling... just listed events, dates and places for record keeping.

Here's the cover... I posted a sneak of it on my blog after I made it and sent the completed album home with my mom last month and Erin knew she had it and was trying to find out what it was.  She was sure that since the sneak peek was pink that it was about Eraleigh and therefore a gift for her or my mom... she was right, of course!

 

I got several 6x6 acetate album pages and mixed them with 6x6 cardstock and 6x6 photos and used my Bind-it-All to create the album.  On several of the pages that are just 6x6 photos, I put an acetate page in front of it and embellished it, but I somehow missed taking pictures of a few of them with the embellished plastic over top.  Oh well!  Here are the inside pages.  Set 1:

 

And set 2:

And now I'm trying to get back to work on my Christmas projects... I've been nursing a cold for the last week or so and it hasn't been a big deal, but Friday night it got pretty nasty so I've been in bed for the last day and a half.  Not the funnest way to spend a long weekend, but at least I got to enjoy most of it :)  I'm up and back among the living now, but I'm still feeling a little out of it.  At least scrapping doesn't take too much energy, I just need to find some mojo and get to work!

My first wreath

Over the years I've made quite a few wreaths, but I've always been helping my mom make them... I've never actually had a Christmas wreath for my own home.  So this year, I had a bunch of gorgeous flowers left over after decorating my tree and I thought it would be perfect to use them in a wreath.  This morning I braved the Black Friday crowds (which weren't actually that bad!  at least as long as I stayed clear of Kohl's or our new In & Out Burger... lol) and headed to Michael's to use my coupons.  I came home and worked on pulling it all together while I watched a little hockey.  I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  Of course, since it's so windy up here on my little hill I hung it on the inside of my front door... all the better to enjoy it, right?

And of course, no post would be complete without close-ups:

That ribbon is gorgeous, but it left glitter everywhere!  I think it's time to go down and pull out the vaccuum and then settle down with a dvd and some leftovers and enjoy my tree :)

The most wonderful time of the year!

My favorite thing about Thanksgiving is and always has been the fact that it marks the beginning of the Christmas season.  That isn't to say that I don't love spending the day with my family, enjoying each others' company and eating a lot of really good food... that part is great - even when being together is a phone connection instead of physical presence like it was this year.  I also think it's wonderful to take the time to count my blessings and express my gratitude.  (And this year we're SUPER grateful because Rick just got a great job!)  And did I mention the food?  But really, it's all about the fact that this is the day when I can decorate my Christmas tree and pull out my Christmas play list.  I love it.  So last night and today I got my house all decorated and as I pulled out my ornament collection and started hanging it, I enjoyed the time to reflect on where I got each one and what a blessing it's been to have the opportunities I've been given.

Anyway, this post is mostly for my family since while we were on the phone earlier today they were demanding photos.  So here they are... LOTS of photos!

My tree last night after I set it up (all the dark spots are where my giant blue poinsettias are)

 

And this morning after I added all the rest of my stuff... (two views of the living room - I like them both and couldn't pick just one to post)

 

And the part Mom especially wanted to see... close ups of this year's decorations.  When she came to visit, we went to Tai Pan Trading twice and fell in love with some of their ideas like the elves sitting on the oversize balls - I have fairies, though... there are about 5 more similar to this in my tree :).

 

And adding the hummingbirds we found to my poinsettias:

And in my dining area... the centerpiece:

 

And another idea from Tai Pan - these are hanging from the ceiling over my dining room table (there are two of the small fairies and five gold snowflakes plus the big one):

And finally, my staircase and landing:

This year the trees in my landing are covered with birds and butterflies :)

And finally, I did actually celebrate Thanksgiving today as well.  I had offers to go to dinner with friends and co-workers, but I decided I'd rather stay home, relax and decorate and cook our family's traditional favorites (thus providing myself with leftovers for the next week :D)  I even made Mom's butterhorns from scratch!  So this is for Erin, who was taking pictures of food at home... it made me feel closer to my family to know we were eating all the same stuff today (except Nicole and Brian who are now in New Zealand.  Whatever. I'm not jealous or anything.)

So that's it.  There's some pisatcio cream pie with my name on it calling me from the fridge.  Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S.  Happy Birthday Erin!  The family is celebrating on Saturday, but since today is the big day I had to make sure to post.