Have you taken a moment to see what this months guest designer has available in the MyPicTales design center? I hope you have, but if not I’ll give you a little peek. JennCK has this lovely kit called Wish!

If you think that’s cute, just take a few minutes to browse the JennCK store at Sunshine Studio Scraps! She has some really great kits available and I think this one, called Shimmer, is gorgeous. I love the color palette and the metal embellishments are perfect. Plus it’s got glitter, which I just love!

I also want to share with you today a great layout I found in the gallery at Stuff to Scrap! I think it’s a really clever way to crop a picture and it makes the journaling quite powerful. This is In My Daughter’s Eyes by Beth:

Hi everyone,

Well I’ve been thinking about basketball lately and sort of missing it.  My son was a starter on the high school basketball team and before that he has played  on an organized team since he was in 2nd grade.  But he graduated from high school last year and this winter has been quiet.  I hadn’t realized how much of hubby and my social winter calender was built around those games until this winter when I began to feel that something was missing.  It seemed as though there was something I forgot to do or a meeting that I was supposed to attend.  I finally understood why I had that feeling.  For the past decade, every winter was filled with games to attend and a team to cheer on. 

I had scrapped most of my pictures of those games, except for the exhibition game between the seniors (both boys and girls) and the teachers (from both middle and highschool).  Did I say exhibition?  Well that would imply a relaxed atomosphere.  Ha!!  Those teachers were thirsty for a win and nothing was going to stop them - except for the senior class of 2009.  The game was fun but intense, fouls were made and not called, teachers were sweating their little black socks off and seniors had something to prove.  All in all, it was one for the scrapbook.

Here’s a layout made with my son,  Joe #15, aiming for the basket :)  Notice the score on the bottom right, the seniors won by 1 point!!

Sometimes one page doesn’t tell the whole story.  Here’s a few more with a bit of journaling so that in the years to come, we can look back on the game and remember the details.

And a few “before the game starts” shots. I always love to get a picture of the boys while they’re waiting for the Star Spangled Banner to start.  They look so restless, but respectful at the same time.

I’ll be uploading these to MyPicTales as singles to be printed.  Notice that I left a little space around the edges of the layout for bleed.  After I get these printed, I’ll simply put them in a photo album that I have here at home that includes the rest of the basketball memory book layouts, but I could just as easily have MyPicTales make the photo album for me.  They’re fantastic at creating custom memory books that would make any basketball starter proud

Now for a little shameless, self advertising.  If you’d like the basketball kit you can buy it here or here, it’s on sale for the next few weeks.

Hugs,

Snackpackgu

Well, I’m posting a couple days later than my usually Thursday spot this week! I’ve been super busy, and sick too, so I completely lost track of the days. We’ve been looking to buy a mini-van to accommodate our expanding family, and finally found one we loved yesterday. Buying a car when you’re sick is not fun! Sounds like the makings for a great digital scrapbook page to chronicle our adventure!

Lately, my free time for scrapbooking has been practically non-existent. During those times, I find it extremely helpful, and a big time-saver, to use a template. If you’re not familiar with templates, they are a great tool to jump-start your creative process. I have lots of favorite places to get them, but one of my favorite template designers is Chrissy W. and she sells at Elemental Scraps. She often has a free one available in her store, but she also has bundles at a great price. I took a quick look through her store, and thought these would work great to make a brag book to get printed at MyPicTales. Don’t forgot there is free shipping on any order over $50.00 right now!

If you haven’t used a template before, it’s really easy and you should have any trouble finding a tutorial on it! You can also rotate them to get different looks too! They are very versatile, and are just a starting place, so don’t be afraid to put your own twist on it.

And now for the Layout of the Day! I took a quick look at the recently uploaded layouts in the Elemental Scraps Gallery and this one immediately caught my eye! I love everything about it. The title is fabulous, it tells a great story, and the kit used is perfect! Plus there is a lot of great clustering, which I love. This is Kisses from a Bee by kim21673:

I hope you have a great Sunday! Thanks for reading,

My Internet connection failed me again!  We’ve been offline for most of 4 days (woe!).  One more week and this snowbird flies (well actually drives) home to family (and my own DSL).  I treasure the friendships from our Florida winters, but love home most.

WOW, free shipping until April 15th — what a great time to get your projects sent in!  My favorite layouts are of my grandchildren, but a close second place would be heritage layouts.  I’m fortunate to have old photos to scan and share with family.  So I’m thrilled with this month’s Digital Scrapbook Artisan Guild kit, Origins.

What’s not to love about this layout — give her some love here.  Gather your photos and create photo gifts for yourself or family — scrapbooks, baby photo albums, memory books — head to the PicTales design center for ideas, then upload!  Free shipping!

As Ever,
Pam

Hello Everyone,

Well I’m counting down the days until Spring Break … which is next week.  I’m an assistant librarian at a very large middle school and starting next Monday, I’ll be off for an entire week.  Yahooo!  And as an added bonus, my two younest (who are in college this year) will also be off.  And to make it even sweeter and more rare, my husband is also off.  He’s a professor and his university usually takes their break at a different time than the public school system, but not this year.  So we’re all going to be together.  Not sure what we’re going to do as it’s too cold to go anywhere and we can’t take an extended trip without our dog and our 5th wheel, but we’ll think of something, I’m sure.

Last year I was having a pity party because my friends from work were all flying somewhere warm - Mexico, the Bahamas, etc.  As it turned out, I was incredibly thankful that we didn’t go anywhere.  Not that we could have anyway, hubby was working.  But the week I was off, it started to rain and rain and rain and rain!  The ground was still frozen and the rain started a small lake around my house.  As bad luck would have it, the rain started seeping in the basement windows and within a few hours, we were flooded.  Carpets were ruined and tempers were hot.  It wasn’t pretty.  Since I always try to look on the bright side, as hard as that is sometimes, I viewed the mess as a chance to clean out the bottom floor.  So not only were carpets purged, but so was all of the ‘junk’ that I thought I needed to save because I just knew that someday I might want it.  Gone!  It’s been a year and I haven’t missed any of it yet, lol.

Spring break brings always brings to mind the actual season of spring, be that far away in this northern state.  I found a wonderful layout by my good friend Bernie over at Rakscraps..  It’s simple and sweet and shows that we don’t always need to scrap photos of people.  Sometimes it’s the little things in life that make an impact on us.  She scrapped her favorite tree.  It’s touching and I’ve chosen it as the Layout Of The Day.

Until next week,

Hugs,

Snackpackgu

The warmth is peaking in here in Raleigh, NC.  And I’m beyond overly anxious!  Axious enough that I flipped through last years Digital Scrapbook collection of flowers, grass, and sunshine inspired pages!  I just can’t get enough of the vibrant happy colors or the constant reminder of growth and new beginnings it unfurles!  Would you like to join me in this lovely little garden of happiness?  Check out the layout of the day for some spring inspiring goodness!

Spring by DirtyFeetDesigns

The simplicity is just stunning, and the picture drool worthy!  Fabulous job capturing the beginnings of such a wondrous time of year DirtyFeetDesigns!  Be sure to head over and leave this stunning layout some love!

I’m currently taking classes to reinvent myself, so I’m on a creative kick…not just in the arts department, but in the mundane life as a worker bee department as well.  So when I ran across this kit the name captured my interest, but the colors and quality sold me!  Needless to say it piqued my interest enough to be marked product of the day by little ol’ me!  Check out Free Spirit by Amanda Resende & Kristen Rice:

Free Spirit by Amanda Resende & Kristen Rice

That is all the fabulous digital scrabook goodies I have in store for you all today!  Enjoy your Monday!  See you soon!

Whether working on pages for photo greeting cards, custom photo books, or to create a photo album, I like when the photo (or photos) are the feature and there is journaling to explain or tell a story.  Many scrapbook ideas come from templates and product reviews.  Spend time browsing through online galleries and scrapbooking magazines to find styles that you like.

I find this layout delightful, from the special photo, balance, journaling, white space, and appeal.  It can be found here, share the love.  The kit is called “Light” and is found at Oscraps.  Tell your story in a memory album or in a special page made for framing — I hope you find layout inspiration here, and in the many galleries found online.

Happy Scrapbooking!

As Ever,
Pam

I’ve got a confession. I’m looking forward to spring. Yup. About this time every year the itch starts. The please, let all this snow melt and the days get warmer. The attempts to reason with the kids that, yes you do need to still wear hats and/or gloves is growing old.  The other day, my 7 year old asked me when he can wear shorts to school! As I bit back laughter, I replied not until it’s at least 70 degrees!

So, in my quest for spring I found this semi-fantasy kit from Studio Alana entitled Golden Moments.  This scrapbooking kit can be found at Scrapbookgraphics. 

I’m usually not drawn to fantasy kits, but this one caught my eye. I loved the colors, the sparkle and the angel wings.  I can imagine this kit being used from cards, to calendars and of course, scrapbook layouts!  It even seems to me that it is something that can be used year round.

The layout I’ve chosen is entitled Dear Baby.

This layout is done by Alana from Studio Alana and can be found in her gallery at StudioGraphics. The letter is incredibly touching - it is to her unborn child 5 days before he was born.

So, Happy Friday and What Stories will You Tell this week?

Mary

Ok, so I’m sicker than a dog :(  Needless to say this post is gonna be short but you know what, being sick is yet another memory to scrap about right?  Honestly what memory book would be complete with out a few down sided pages!  Life is after all a roller coaster!  So the product of the day and layout of the day, well they will get you to scraping after that bout of sickness!  Without further ado, enjoy the eye candy!

Layout of the day Sickie You by Nietis

Sickie You by Nietis

And the product of the day is:

Ouchies and Ickies by Jady Day Sudio and Suzy Q Scraps

I’m off to drink a hot cup of tea and scrap

Last week I mentioned that I picked up the pack of 10 best selling fonts by Darcy Baldwin, which are available here at MyPicTales this month! Since then, I’ve decided that DJB Another Mandy is my favorite of the bunch. Don’t get me wrong, they are all great! But this one is just my style. Sometimes a great font is the icing on a great digital scrapbooking layout.

So I went searching for a layout to feature today that showcased my new favorite font. Here is a page I found in the gallery at Sweet Shoppe Designs. It’s by lmccandless and called You lucky Dog. I’m a dog person, so I’m always drawn to pages that show amazing pictures of beautiful canines! The handwriting font DJB Another Mandy just gives the page a handmade feel. It’s perfect! If you’d like more information about what was used to create this page, just click it to visit the gallery for all the details.

Don’t miss out on the great deals here at MyPicTales while Darcy Baldwin is the featured designer this month. Just a few more days to get these great fonts!