Romans 4:9-17

I brought up some of the rest of my Smash brand stuff this weekend to work on my Bible study notes while Natalie was having some good playtime.

I used a pocket for my original notes in case I messed up something and needed clarification. I have most of the Smash writing pads that are out, but hardly ever use them, ugh! So I pulled out one that had some space for writing and covered the title/prompt (I think it said Today's Playlist or something) with a label so I could write the title of the sermon on it instead.

Some highlights of this message:
* One of the great tactics of the enemy is to cause us or make us unsure of our salvation, but once saved (truly saved), always saved = the blessed assurance
* Your salvation is solely based on the Lord

Romans 2

Here are the past few weeks of Bible study notes - all of Romans Chapter 2! Yesterday, on my day off, I spent the afternoon and evening catching up and doing all these pages! The downside to this was that this morning Chris said he really missed me since we didn't hang out much last night. On the upside though, I got to rediscover Chapter 2 all in one shot and really brought it together for me! So maybe husband will just have to miss me for one day a month or so hehe! Here we go:

---

Romans 2:1-4

Oh man, if this chapter doesn't convict you and make you look at your own heart, I don't know what will!

I was playing with the Silhouette so cut some simple shapes here, added some stamps and washi tape and mostly used the space for my notes!

Some points to think about:
* When we pass judgment, we think we have the ability to recognize the flaw in someone else
* Who are we to judge when we just want mercy
* We can only judge based on our perception, we don't know the heart

---

Romans 2:5-16

I looked at my notes for this sermon and realized it would be a TON of writing... and since I still had 3 sermons to cover, I printed some of it out.

The other side I kept real simple and just added some stamps from the Sock Hop kit by Studio Calico so I could get the rest written down.

* A God of love gives His ONLY son to die in our place
* He doesn't send anyone to hell, man sends himself

---

Romans 2:17-24

I guess I had Christmas subconsciously in my brain when I made these pages? Perhaps just a little? Oh well, we can't celebrate Christmas enough!

Chris randomly found me a typewriter on major clearance last week! I had been asking for one for awhile and he found a great deal!! I decided again, instead of writing all those verses out to try out my trusty new typewriter - I used the print feature, which just types as you type, so there were a few typos I had to white out - no wonder white out was so huge back in the day! I never knew I can't bring my fingers to type the word "thou" without turning it into the word "though" haha :)

* Knowledge isn't supposed to puff you up to look down at others, it's supposed to make you want to serve!
* Are you practicing what you preach?

---

Romans 2:17-24 con't, Romans 2:25-29

So for message this past weekend on Romans 2:25-29, I missed the teaching because I was at the scrapbook retreat. In other words, to get notes for this message I went to the CC Westside website here and listened to it and typed it up instead of hand writing them, wherefore thou seeist my typed notes instead of wherein thou might seeist handwritten notes ;)

On the left side I stamped those pinked circles which was great because we were given all those examples in the Bible where people were judging others.

* You're professing more than you possess
* Man will judge God according to your behavior
* Christian, get before the Lord and ask God if there is any area in my life that I'm a stumbling block to? Is my witness a joke?

---

Romans 2:25-29 con't

I clearly missed out on a great message, but there was so much content I'm glad I was able to listen back and type it out - and catch more than if I was handwriting furiously without a pause button to help me!

I kept this super simple with some washi tape on the left side and a Tim Holtz stamp on the right side since the page was already decorated.

* You have ordinances without obedience, you have rituals without reality
* Circumcise your hearts - the Lord is looking at the inward, He wants a true commitment
* Go in your prayer closet, get on your face, humble yourself before the Lord, pray to him to show your heart and brace for it, confess your sin
* Remove the deception that you're OK because you're religious

---

There it is - all of Romans Chapter 2!! Have a nice day :)

Romans 1:1-7

Yesterday's message was about God's Beloved, the children of Christ and the call for them, and of course, grace!

I threw together the left side in the rush after getting home from church and grocery shopping, before the football game started (but geesh, being Bills fans here is pretty tough - so I dozed after the first quarter while Chris could only watch till halftime before he had to turn it off). I used elements from the latest kit, Central High.

Then I finished up the right side last night, after celebrating my sister-in-law's birthday! Still went for the minimal decoration route for this!

Some important notes:
* Called to be saints - He does not call us because we're saints, we're saints because he called us
* It was God's idea to save man and make the sinner a saint
* The only difference between these is the Savior

HOW-TO:

• For the left side I used the Central High kit by Studio Calico
• I had that leftover square piece of paper called "Charmed" from the newest Amy Tangerine collection Ready Set Go by American Crafts
• The 2 is a die cut number tag from Pretty Little Studio
• The speech bubble die cut is an exclusive from Studio Calico
• The washi tape is from My Mind's Eye
• The note taking card on the right is from the Blank Smashpad by EK Success
• The die cut floral on the bottom right is also from the Ready Set Go collection by American Crafts

Romans 1:1

Our Pastor, Pastor Dave (at Calvary Chapel Westside) finally revealed to us which book he was starting on Sundays, after we finished up Acts last week! This is exciting since it took about a year and a half to get through Acts, so starting a new book of the Bible isn't an everyday occurrence around here! Romans is such a great book, aka the Gospel of Grace!

I have been doing a lousy job keeping up my scrapping of my Wednesday night Bible study notes - we've gone through Genesis and a good way through Exodus, but I am still stuck at like Chapter 38 in Genesis, so I'm obviously way behind there. But hoping I can have a sort of fresh start with Romans!

I'm going to try to keep the "decorating" simple so I can keep up on the important stuff - the notes! One thing I want to try to do is write out every verse, word for word from Romans so I can look back on this notebook and just be able to read it straight through without having to look it up elsewhere... easy to say now since we've only covered 1 verse so far!

Some important notes:
* Every master outside of Jesus is empty and futile, doesn't bring you the contentment you long for
* Everything concerning this life, God has it in his hands
* When you seek Jesus with your heart, he satisfies you in a way that nothing else can

HOW-TO:

• Buy a million SMASH books from EK Success, like every. single. one. Then pick one from your million options to use!
• I used letter stickers by Sassafras to write out the word Romans on the left side
• I glued down the upper right corner piece that is a SMASHcaption, as well as the piece of paper with the outline, which was taken from the Top Ten SMASHpad, both from EK Success
• The yellow key sticker is from the Amy Tangerine sticker book by American Crafts
• The three stamps I used were all from the same set from Studio Calico by Hero Arts
• I stamped using VersaFine ink in Onyx Black by Tsukineko, my favorite black ink!

My Favorite Time

This layout is for a pic we took at the zoo in Atlanta last October, feeding the birds - one of my favorite things to do, especially lately now that Chris let me put a bird feeder in the front yard and I have been attracting all sorts of wild birds (as well as squirrels and chipmunks and we know there's also a couple rabbits that aren't spotted too often, but we have photographic evidence!)

Anyway, the inspiration came from Sketch 6 in my Sketchbook 4 online class, specifically the layout done by Maggie Holmes for it! I loved using so many different pieces of paper, especially since I ordered a lot from the kit I used and it didn't feel so bad cutting into a sheet that I had 3 backup pieces of... in fact, it felt great!

The hardest part was trying to fill in the "space" in the page since I only had one photo, and it's not even a great photo. So I dusted off my Cricut and found some feathers from the "Straight from the nest" cartridge and cut them out in various sizes from Kraft paper. After I had them, they seemed a little bland, but luckily I had my Signo Uniball white pen and drew on them to finish the look! I liked this technique so much I ended up using it also for the word "Favorite" in the title, since the chipboard letters weren't standing out enough on their own. All in all, I am happy with my page!

HOW-TO:

• The main kit I used for this page was the City of Lights kit by Studio Calico
• I cut 2"x5" strips from those papers along the top then hand stitched around them
• Below I added a torn out piece of paper from the "Top 10" Smash pad from EK Sucess
• The tab on the right is also from EK Sucess while the Kraft label is from Maya Road
• The letter stickers are thickers are by American Crafts and the ones for "Favorite" are from the Abroad collection by Studio Calico
• The little birdie fabric brad is from the Pretty Party collection by Crate Paper - I just knew as soon as I got it, that I'd have to include it on this layout somehow!

Smashbook Pages!

Recap: I'm using my Smashbook as a place for stuff and pictures that wouldn't make a full scrapbook page layout or wouldn't fit into any particular scrapbook.

For my wedding and honeymoon pictures, I've put them into an album but had some extra "stuff" that I wanted to keep, so threw them in here as well! The dried flowers in the pocket were the Dendrobium Orchids that were in my hair.

For the next page, I took the photo of me and my husband getting (re)baptized from our church's new website: Calvary Chapel Westside and kept the little announcement of the picnic and baptism from the church program one Sunday. The other side are a couple of pics I took on my iPhone from Fathers Day, walking around my in-law's neighborhood.

For this last page, I had taken just a few snapshots from a random day going to a lakeside restaurant for dinner. I printed out the restaurant menu from their website and threw it in there, which was an added touch because they recently updated the menu which forced me to try something new! My favorite picture of the group is the picture taken when I caught Chris in our kitchen later, finishing our ice cream wedding cake after we had just pigged out on a huge dinner!

SMASH'ed a truck

First of all, if you don't know what a SMASH book is, def watch this video or head to their blog, where they featured my first few pages of my SMASHbook here!

OK, with that out of the way, I'm using my SMASHbook to throw things in that either I don't have enough pictures for a full scrapbook layout OR it doesn't really fit any theme of a particular scrapbook! This little home improvement project (getting a new retaining wall) fits the latter category:

Actually I should say, this was just the delivery of the bricks, but I had to get some pictures because my husband just loves trucks and engines and motors, etc. and I knew he'd ask me to get some pictures anyway (which he did).

SMASHing is so quick and easy, the longest part of putting this together was texting my husband to get the location of the receipt - in the trash! Luckily it was crumpled up and thrown into a new can otherwise I would not go fishing in garbage, yuck!

HOW-TO:

• Gather everything you want to SMASH
• The only extras I added were the old truck stamp at the bottom left (Tim Holtz stamp and Stampendous embossing powder) and the tag was from the Hopscotch Tag Pad by K&Company
• I used my Canon Selphy CP800 to print the pictures, one full 4x6 and the other added 8 pics to one print (love this feature!)
• The rest of the stuff on there, the tab, "makes me happy" sticky, "inspires me" clip, dotted tape are all part of the SMASH line from EK Success