Happy Belated Birthday Mom!

Talk about being really late on a birthday present! My mom's birthday was back in May, but I was so busy around that time, that I didn't get a chance to make anything. If you've been reading my blog, you'll know that my mom only likes home made gifts from me, so I always need to figure out what to make for her presents. Being that Mother's Day is right around her b-day, I sometimes get stumped on making 2 gifts around the same time. Anyway, since Les did the photo shoot with the girls back in July, I thought this would make a nice album for mom for her belated b-day present. Of course Hello Kitty would need to be included somehow on the project, so I added her in on the cover. Since the girls all wore red and white w/a little black accents, I went with those colors for the album. Here's what it looks like when its open. I actually added in their names under their photos for the final product but its not shown here. Here's close ups of the album. I don't know if you can tell but I used mirrored cardstock for the flowers. They were punched using the MS hydrangea and mini hydrangea punches. Love how they coordinate and offer several sizes. I like the effect of using the mirrored cardstock- made the flowers pop off the page in real life. I only added one Hello Kitty to the middle panel. Didn't want to take anything away from the girls. My mom loved it! I finally delivered it to her this past weekend. She then placed her order for a calendar using these photos. Off to do my next project for her! Supplies:

• Cardstock- Bazzil
• DP- Doodlebug
• Hello Kitty- Sizzix
• Large Hello Kitty head- Cricut
• Hydrangea punches- MS Crafts

Happy Belated Birthday Grandma Kat!

Grandma's birthday snuck up on me this year... Guess it was cause I just got back from vacation in Honolulu. Before I knew it, her birthday was like TOMORROW! So, I buckled down and got to work. I solicited help from DH and had him print photos for me of Akemi's recent b-day party at the beach house. He also picked out other family photos from this summer. Since it was a "summer " theme, I went with my new ocean papers. I love all the new ocean papers that came out recently- especially because they all cooridnate so well with each other. These papers also had a coordinating sheet of cardstock stickers. They made the perfect accents to fill in all the holes. I even cut up the wave border and spread it across the bottom of the album. Here's a photo of the album when its open. Here's a close up of the inside cover. The sticker set came with these cute journal stickers! I love the shell one.

Here's the other journal sticker- don't you love the cute crab??

Thanks again for visiting my blog. I'm sure I'll be making a lot more beach layouts since Akemi has been living at the beach this summer. All the more reason to buy more paper!!

Honolulu Class

What is that saying again? I need a vacation from my vacation? Just got back from having a week off in Honolulu with my family visiting from LA.. boy did those girls wipe me out! I slept the whole way home on the plane and can use more rest. I'll share some pictures of the "hams" later.

Just wanted to share some of projects we made at a class I taught for my friend Les and a couple of her friends. They wanted to make Hello Kitty and cutsie stuff, so we stuck with Hello Kitty and Create A Critter.

Being a photographer, Les wanted to make the tri-shutter album, so I re-designed it using a Hello Kitty theme with pink, black and white. Decided to use my HK cartridge this time since I wanted the black piece to be solid (no cut marks like from a sizzix die).

She also wanted to make some simple projects, so I chose this accordion gift card holder.... in Hello Kitty of course!

She also liked the Pop Up Gift Card holder... used the cute bear from Create A Critter...

And this box in a bag....

Had a fun time eating Les' lemon cupcakes (hey! I forgot to take a photo of that!) and crafting. Thanks Les, Kat, and Ann for a fun afternoon!

Happy Mother's Day!

As you already know, my mom EXPECTS HOMEMADE gifts whenever I give her something... Don't get me wrong, she doesn't expect anything, but if we do give her something, she wants it to be homemade... after all, she only has "one body", and her house is full of "junks", so she doesn't want "stuff". Do you feel the pressure??? Anyway, when I first made the Tri-Shutter album I knew I could use it to make a mini album for mom for Mother's day. I love this Bo Bunny paper and decided to use it for her album. I didn't know what to put on the front of the album and wanted it to stay closed, so I added a belly band (used velcro dot closure) and decorated it with a flower that was cut from a Sizzix die. Here is what the card looks like when its open. I decided to use photos from my sister's recent trip home. We got some nice shots of my daughter and Aunty Denise. Also included photos from my Aunty's surprise birthday party. Here's some close ups of the album... On the right side, I had Akemi write "Happy Mother's Day". Its really weird how the white ink on the purple cardstock turned to pink and the white ink on the DP stayed white. I'll have to make a mental note of that in case I have her do this again. Do you like how she made the curly Q's on the letters? She felt they were so fancy. Too bad we couldn't wrap up Akemi and send her with the card- Grandma would have loved that present! To all you crafty moms out there... Happy Mother's Day! Supplies: Cardstock- DCWV DP- Bo Bunny Flower- Sizzix Brad- American Crafts

First Tri-Shutter Album

While looking for a tutorial on the Double Display Card (Thanks Brenda!), I stumbled upon several examples of a tri-shutter album. I really like mini albums since you can actually get them finished in a short amount of time. Decided to try out this technique using some new paper by Basic Grey. Ended up making it a sample for Island Scrapboooking by adding in photos of events over the past year that I've been helping out at the store. The photo at the top of this post is what the album looks like when its closed up. I added a belly band since it would hold it closed better. Since there are multiple folds that the band could get stuck on, I attached it using some velcro dots. Here's what the album looks like when its fully opened. I was able to add 3 vertical photos and 4 small horizontal photos. Here's the first panel... Made that flower using my new large scallop circle nestibilites and just cut slits where each scallop ends so that it looked more like a flower. Here's the middle section of the album. For the smaller panels, I decorated them with dew drops, punched flowers and the new MS flower patch border punch. The two blank panels were left blank so that we could add in "Island Scrapbooking". Needed Michele's help with that, so she's going to see if she can cut it for me. Used butterfly punches to accent photos since they can be placed anywhere and seemed to go with the floral theme. Here's the last panel...

I love this album and am going to make a few more as gifts... so can't post them just yet. I'll probably be teaching a class on them too if anyone is interested in Hilo.

Supplies:

DP- Basic Grey

Cardstock- Bazzil

Dew Drops

Buttefly punches: EK success, MS Crafts

Flower patch border punch- MS Crafts

Leaf punch- MS Crafts

Large scallop circle- Spellbinders

Daisy punch- Family

Brads- American crafts

Large Daisy (cover)- Heidi Swap