Sleepy Baby

My baby makes such funny faces - I love this one that she did right away on her first day of life, her little yawn face! And she has such a nice, full content face after she's eaten.

I got the idea for this layout from the Stashbusters Anonymous class I'm taking at Big Picture Classes with Aly Dosdall. I punched out pinked circles from patterned paper and built a background, then added my pictures on top, along with the sticker that was stuck to Natalie's bassinet.

I used paper from the Valley High kit by Studio Calico, but the wood veneer letters from Marks & Co. kit. I added the ribbon by adding adhesive to the back of the length of the ribbon, then creating the ruffles and adhering each ruffle separately with a glue dot.

This layout was fun to put together and didn't take long at all, so for me a very satisfying layout!

Introducing my daughter Natalie!!

Wow, what a whirlwind the last 12 days have been, 12 days ago I started going into labor and 11 days ago my daughter arrived - all 7lbs 15oz of her, Natalie Jordan! By day 2 till about day 7, I thought, I will NEVER EVER have time to scrapbook again! (Chris also thought this about taking bike rides.) But day 9 came and just to feel normal again, I ventured into my space while Natalie napped and Chris biked, and I scrapped my first page of my daughter - something I've always wanted to do, even before we decided to have any children! It felt great, and then yesterday I scrapped another layout - and today here I am posting them... just have to be better with your time!

Onto this first layout, I had some memorabilia from the hospital - her little footprints as well as our hospital bands. I put this together really quickly, because I was so scared she was going to wake up and I'd not get another chance to scrap for awhile! I used the Marks & Co. kit from Studio Calico and stamped and embossed in silver.

The only part that didn't come in the kit were the Journal letter thickers from Amy Tan's sketchbook line. The long white letters filled that space perfectly!

---

For this next layout, I wanted to complete the other side with a couple more from the same group of pictures - my little one getting weighed and measured and cleaned off. She was so good for them, and didn't fuss or cry after that initial cry out the gate. That seems to be her personality so far too, she's not fussy and only cries if she's hungry. She's so amazing!

OK so anyway, I got the layout idea from Challenge 7 of the Stashbusters Anonymous class I signed up for at Big Picture Classes with Aly Dosdall. I cut the letter background at the top with my Silhouette - purchased from the Silhouette store.

I used paper from the Marks & Co. kit again but added in paper and embellishments from Amy Tan's Yes, Please line.

Some simple and quick layouts but I am excited to get a good start on Natalie's baby album!

Pie Perfection

OK, this is the last of the Naples/Canandaigua trip, and the actual reason we decided to make this trip in the first place - Monica's Pies!! Chris had heard about this place, famous for her (concord) grape pies and even having been featured on the Food Network before! So we packed a cooler and took home a grape pie... except, it was so delicious, we ended up driving the hour and a half back the following weekend just to pick up 2 more pies, this time the frozen ones, to have for dessert with my out of town family after my baby shower! It was the perfect dessert to share with them!

This layout isn't my favorite... I guess I tend to really like layouts that look nice but come together quickly. It took me awhile to make the pie charts, and in the end I think it would've looked better on a different layout with more contrasting papers and brighter patterns, but oh well! I made the pie charts using this tutorial by Nicole Nowosad! Her method made it pretty simple to make them.

I knew I wanted different colored labels for the pie flavors so I made my own custom labels by typing them on my typewriter, cutting them out into rectangles, putting the corners to the edge of my circle punch, inking the outer edges with Hero Arts ink, and then using a pen to draw the inner line!

I used papers from the Marks & Co Studio Calico kit and embellishments from past kits. My due date is this Saturday, so let's see how many more layouts I get done before our daughter is born!!

Love This Place

Another layout from our road/day trip to Canandaigua and Naples, NY - this time we headed to Naples and found this awesome place, the Arbor Hill Grapery & Winery! We ended up hauling home a bunch of wine jellies (amazing!), sparkling grape juice (the best!), sauces, and even some concord grape gummy bears and licorice!

This layout came together quickly again! I got my inspiration this time from this great layout by Amy Tan! I had some random ephemera from Arbor Hill to include, so it was easy to see how that layout could work for what I had too.

The hardest part for me was cutting up that gray chevron type paper backing the stitched "Love" word... I cut into a whole new 12x12 piece of paper just to get that! OK, breathe...

I used the newest kit, Marks & Co. by Studio Calico, except the washi tape was from last month's kit. The main portion I am proud of is the little reddish-orange asterisk at the top! The pack of asterisks only came in blue, gray, and yellow... so I stripped the front off one of the asterisks, then first painted it with white watercolor paint (like a primer, as Chris so nicely pointed out)! Thinking in those terms I could've used some gesso, but the watercolor worked fine. Waited for it to dry, then added that reddish-orange watercolor on top, waited for it to dry. Then I wanted it to look shiny like the others, so I added some glossy accents and let dry! Now it looks like it came just like that!