Welcome to my happy place

Sistah's NYC trip -- Day 1 (Times Square)

2012-01-29T09:27:00.000-08:00

Times Square

In 2007 I took a girl's trip to NYC with my two SIL. Our hotel was close to Times Square so naturally that was our first stop. The LOs, like Times Square, are busy but I suppose it reflects the vibe of the city.

Upclose of the embellishment for the LO above.

This LO is quite busy but it reflects the vibe, the bustle of Times Square.

I had previously posted one of the LOs below. As you can see, I still need to finish journaling.

So after taking in the beautiful lights of Times Square we stopped at Maxie's. We enjoyed a nice deli sandwich and a most delicious chocolate martini. :-) On our way back to the hotel we did a little shopping visiting one of the many vendors whose tables line the streets of Manhattan.

Behind one of the pictures of the LO below I've created a little journaling book.

Our tour of Times Square would not be complete without highlighting at least one billboard ad. For me, it was the M&M billboard that stood at the most. It was fun watching the M&M characters visit some of the famous NYC sites.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing photos of our first day in the city. I am currently working on various LOs of day 2. I hope you stop by again.

Yoli

Sistah's NYC trip -- Day 1

2012-01-26T10:10:00.000-08:00

In 2007 I went on a four day girl's trip to NYC with my both of my SIL. Job responsibilities, growing families and a host of other things have prevented us from doing another sistah's trip like this since then. But we are confident that we will soon have another chance to enjoy another trip like this one.

Day 1 -- we arrive in Manhattan

I wanted to separate this trip from the regular LOs in my album. To do so I used a swinging shutter page protector from Memory Book as my cover page. The design for the front page was inspired by Lauren Bergold's New York travel book. To soften the background paper of the city I used a sheet of vellum.

Up close photo of the embellishment. It's hard to tell on the photo but I used pop dots to give the buildings a 3D like effect.

Upon opening the shutter page you will find two more layouts inside.

The middle LO was inspired by the movie poster from New Year's Eve. I liked the collage design and thought it would be a good way to showcase various landmarks we visited during our trip.

Left side. This page documents the beginning of our journey at the local airport. It is difficult to see in this photo but I used pop dots to give the suitcases a little depth.

The right side. This beautiful picture, taken by my SIL, is one of my favorite photos taken on this trip. The photo captures the vibe of the city with its streets crowded by one of its most famous icons, the yellow cab. Scary sometimes to be a passenger in one of these cabs but beautiful to see them on film. :-)

Next stop . . . Times Square. I promise to post those LOs soon.

In the meantime, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

A good snow day activity

2012-01-23T11:14:00.000-08:00

I've been scrappin' like crazy these last few weeks and loving it! But to my horror last week I found myself without any adhesive in the middle of the biggest snow storm we've had in years! So what's a girl to do? I decided to straighten out my scrapbook room. :-) Here are a few before and after pictures I thought you would enjoy seeing.

Before

In order to make room for my Christmas tree I have to move furniture upstairs to my sb room. Last week the tree finally came down enabling me to move the chair and the lamp back to the living room.

After

With the floor clean I am now able to access my CIU. I still need to put the stamps back on the tree and begin to tear out LOs from the stack of magazines near the front entrance.

Desk before

Desk after

My main scrapbooking desk today

This is were I do most of my work so I expect a little

'creative mess'. :-)

The closet today

I spent time cleaning up, picking up but did not organize the stash. Over the course of the next few weeks I will tackle those boxes a little at a time. A few of the boxes belong to DH so that is an easy fix.

Of course it hasn't been all work. I promise to share a few new layouts with you over the course of the next few days. Until then . . .

thanks for stopping by.

Yoli

An assault on the senses . . .

2012-01-15T15:52:00.000-08:00

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. It was a joyous Christmas celebration for our family but I am eager to get back to a more normal routine. Since our family celebrates the Day of the Epiphany (January 6) my Christmas tree is still up. :-( I hope to do that today but we got our first snowfall of the season and the kiddo wanted to play outside. :-)

My sb room is just a mess! When you first walk in your eyes don't know where to land. You are overwhelmed by the living room furniture, the tons of embellishments spread all over the tables and boxes of supplies that desperately need to be organized. It really is an attack on the senses!
So over the course of the next few weeks I will be re-organizing my room. I will start by moving the living furniture back to the living room. The yellow chair and lamp in the photo below will go downstairs in the living. That box on the chair . . . so sad . . . that's the box I purchased when Pink Paislee had their warehouse sale MONTHS ago! Sigh!

My creative mess. This mess I don't mind as much since its a direct result of working on a few LOs. However, I am running out of desk space so it need to be organized. My ink station, for example, is cluttered by projects I never completed and expensive camera equipment that needs to be properly stored away.

This table is where I do all most of my scrapbooking. I am working on a few LOs of a trip I took to NYC back in 2007. As you can see . . . the table is full of papers and embellishments leaving very little space for my LO.

My 3rd six foot table is no better. Full of accessories that belong in the living room and unorganized supplies. Double sigh!

So over the next few weeks I will be cleaning up and re-organizing my craft room. So that the job doesn't become overwhelming I will tackle as much possible 15 minutes at a time. I have much work ahead of me but I am eager to get it started.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . . Yoli

It is beginning to look at lot like Christmas . . .

2011-12-14T12:25:00.000-08:00

If your life is like mine you are busy getting ready for the holidays. So before things get REALLY crazy I wanted to take a few moments to post my Christmas cards and holiday decorations.

Papers from My Mind's Eye Lost & Found collection

Our Christmas Tree

I generally decorate two trees each year; one is real the other is artificial. This year we only decorated the artificial tree.

Our fireplace

I like the way I decorated the fireplace last year so I recreated it again this year.

Last year I created this little vignette using a mirror as a tray. I liked it so much I recreated it again this year. :-)

Hallway
I created a little vignette in the hallway nook. Wreath look familiar? :-) For info and tutorial on the coffee filter wreath go here. Although I like the picture frame in the background I think next year I may cover it with music sheet or put a mirror in its place instead.

The little tree on the left side was the first little Christmas tree my husband and I shared when we lived in Virginia. We had moved cross-country and our belongings were in storage until our townhouse was built. Not wanting to buy a new tree DH bought me this little desktop Christmas tree instead. :-)

I also decorated the coat rack by the front door. The subway art was a free printable but unfortunately I am unable to remember where I got it from. :-(

I hope you have enjoyed my little tour of my Christmas decorations this year.

Wishing you and your family a very Merry Christmas

and a happy and prosperous New Year!

Yoli

NYC photos

2011-11-17T18:37:00.000-08:00

This weekend I printed 228 photos of my trip to NYC back in 2007! This does not include a few 8x10 photos I plan to print at home. I think this may be a record for me.

Based on the photos below you would not believe this was only a four day trip! So I spent some time Monday night organize the photos by day. Now comes the fun part . . . scrappin' the trip!

Sadly I seem to have misplaced all my NYC memorabilia. I am so upset at myself. Just when I think I've got this all under control. Sigh!

Until the next time . . . Yoli

CKC

2011-11-16T17:31:00.000-08:00

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh . . . it's that time of year again . . . CKC.

This year I went with my SIL and another friend. So much fun! We arrived around 9:30am. By that time the line to get in the vendor event was already going up the stairs and up into the 2nd floor. Geez . . . the show did not open until 10am! So we shopped at the CKC booth instead of waiting in line.:-)
As usual I want to share with you some of the beautiful projects I saw. The projects however are not my projects. I also wanted to share a picture of my stash . . . my credit card is still smoking!

As for the projects, Button Farm once again knocked it out of the park with their mini albums. I did not buy the mini-album but I did buy the embellishments they used to create the mini-album. All papers and embellishments for this album came from October Afternoon's Boarding Pass collection.

Another gorgeous creation by The Button Farm .

Crafty Secrets. Always a favorite.

Once again we are seeing the effects of our economy on the industry. It seemed like there were more empty stall spaces this year than ever before. Also, for the 2nd year in a row we noticed more non-paper craft vendors at the show. However, as you can see from our bags, we did our part to 'stimulate' the economy. LOL.

My stash. Dear Lord!

Attending CKC certainly brought back my mojo. Working on a few LOs of a girls trip to NYC back in 2007 AND finishing up my Christmas cards. Yeah! Promise to share those soon.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . . Yoli

A LO AND a project!

2011-11-07T11:36:00.000-08:00

A new LO

This is the first, in a series, of pictures of a sista's trip to NYC back in 2007. There were two shutter bugs on that trip. I am going to have to pare down the number of photos to a manageable selection for my album. Wish me luck!

This is a simple LO of our first day in NYC. Immediately upon checking into the hotel we walked down to Times Square where my poor SIL discovered that Times Square isn't really a square. :-(

For the LO I made a postcard using my Vintage Postcard stamp set from CTMH. I needed some white space on the LO to balance the busyness of the Times Square photos. At the bottom of the postcard I added a cityscape from Basic Grey's Wander Collection. To give the cityscape some dimension I cut out some of the buildings and added pop dots underneath. Now all I need to do is finish my journaling.

My new project

I've had some trouble decorating my fireplace. I luv the rich, red but the color often masked any decorations on the mantle. So I finally settled on white decor for the mantle.

I found a few pieces that went well on the mantle but still felt like there was something missing. Than I remember how much I liked how my mantle turned out last Christmas with a wreath placed over the mirror. So I decided to make a coffee filter wreath to get the same effect. You can find various tutorials on how to make the wreaths right here.

I started by gluing the coffee filters to the wreath but got tired of burning my fingers. So I switched to straight pins which was slightly less painful. :-( Once I bought a thimble though all was right with the world. :-) As a seasonal decor I added a feather and pumpkin which can easily be removed once the season has passed. The little green flower was my son's contribution to this project. :-) In total I spent less than $10 on this project.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . . Yoli

Happy All-Hallows-Eve

2011-10-31T12:58:00.000-07:00

I am looking forward to going out trick-or-treating with my son today. I've spent the past few weeks working nearly 12-14 hour days on a project for a non-profit organization. So today its all about him.

Before I share my project with you today I wanted to post a photo I took at a local pumpkin patch. I luv how the morning dew revealed Mrs. Spider's handiwork.

Alice in Wonderland Tea Cup

This little beauty was suppose to be part of a lottery challenge. When the tea cup theme was announced I immediately remembered a project I saw in a magazine and knew what I wanted to make. Unfortunately life just sort of got in the way and I did not complete it in time for the challenge. :-(

I already had the tea cup. I purchased it at a local thrift shop right after I saw the idea in the magazine. To start the project I simply adhered (using decoupage) some old Sears Roebuck catalog pages to both the plate and the tea cup.

Once the decoupage was dried I painted the plate and added some embellishments.

Jester Cat is one of my favorite embellishments on the plate. I luv how he is peeking out of the frame just to show us his naughty smile. The frame is from Melissa Frances.

For the cup . . . well I guess you can say I temporary went a little 'mad'. Must have been out of my mind when I decided to paint an argyle pattern on the cup but I luv the finished product. Although hard to see in this picture, I added a little bling between each triangle to make the pattern pop.

Another detail that is hard to see in these pictures is the dimension of each character. To do this I simply stamped the image twice and then used pop dots to create dimension between each layer.

As a finishing touch I added a face watch to the tea cup, two colorful hands and a crown brad to hold it all together.

Although this project looks very time intensive it honestly took me about 3-5 hours to complete. There was a lot of drying time. The decoupage pages needed to dry overnight and paint needed to dry for a few hours. So I was only able to work on it about 15 min a day. From start to finish it took me about almost 2 weeks working 15-20 minutes at a time.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my project. Moreover, I hope you enjoy today.

Happy Halloween!

Yoli

Purse bling

2011-10-09T19:49:00.000-07:00

The first time I saw one of these little beautifies I was on vacation in Mexico. I knew then I wanted to make one. So when a crafting group I belonged to issued a lottery challenge with a theme of 'Falling Leaves' I knew this was my chance to finally make one.

They are called purse blings. A nice decorative item to add to your purse, backpack or keychain. Here are the two that I made. Why two? This is a lottery challenge so the winner gets all the projects submitted that month. So the one on the left is for me the other for the challenge.

I started by using Tim Holtz's swivel clasps I purchased from Joann. To the clasp I added beads and gold metal leaves I've had in my collection for years! The red maple leaf is actually a brad. I cut off the brad part and punched a whole to convert it into a charm. As a finishing touch I added a typewriter key from TH. F for Fall.

So this is the purse bling that I will give away in the lottery.

This is the purse bling that I will keep.

My 7 yo son decided to get in the game. So he made a backpack bling for his little 'friend'. Although not very pretty its awful sweet! I did enjoy spending time with him doing something other than playing or talking about BeyBlades. Any of you moms out there with a 6-10 yr old boys know exactly what I'm talking about. :-(

Lastly . . . a little confession. I did end up ordering the Nantucket Kit from Pink Paislee during the HSN 24 hour crafting show. Oh my! :-)

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Enabler alert -- 24 hr crafting on HSN

2011-09-23T21:19:00.000-07:00

Some of my favorite crafting ladies are going to be on HSN this Sunday, if you live on the west coast, or early Monday morning for those of you who live on the east coast.

Show times:

Nantucket Kit – Rebecca Cross – September 25th / 26th – 1:00 a.m. EST / 10:00 p.m. PST

Mistables Kit – Heidi Swapp – September 25th / 26th – (12:00 a.m. EST / 9:00 p.m. PST)

Phantom Kit – Heidi Swapp – September 26th – (11:00 a.m. EST / 9:00 a.m. PST)

I am seriously considering the Nantucket Kit. Unfortunately the kit comes with 6x6 papers rather than 12x12. So I'm not sure yet if I will buy it.

I would luv to buy the Phantom kit but I have so much Halloween stuff already. Seriously! It's a bit ridiculous!

I promise to report any purchases made. Even if I don't buy anything, I always enjoy watching the show. Hope you have a fabulous weekend and that you get to do a little crafting.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Remember

2011-09-19T00:10:00.000-07:00

Still working on my GD's 8th grade graduation photos. For this particular LO I set two goals. The first was to remember our special time together while still commemorating her achievement. Secondly, given the number or graduation pages I've already completed, I wanted to use non-traditional graduation embellishments for this page. So I came up with this design.

To achieve my first goal I used some old photos of Alexa and myself going back to when she was born. For the second goal (non-traditional graduation embellishments) I used a paper from Pink Paislee's Daily Junque collection. I also used a brick wall background stamp from Marah Johnson to frame the picture. But my favorite embellishments for this page has to be the dress form.

I can't remember where I saw this idea but I absolutely luv it. The process takes a little patience but it's really easy to make. I simply wrapped twine, in this case it came from the Daily Junque collection, around the bodice of a dress form (cut using a TH die). I applied A LOT of adhesive to both the front and back of the bodice. I then started wrapping the twine around the bodice. Once I was done I also applied some Mod Podge for good measure. Lastly I added a little bling as a finishing touch.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Giveaway winner and a new LO

2011-09-14T11:01:00.000-07:00

Giveaway winner
And the winner is . . .

Cindy Gay said... I love the zipper photo. Just keep creating, don't go back......go on to something else and you get better and better the more memories you scrap!

I am trying to adhere to your words of wisdom. I recently read a post by another blogger who also said, "better done than perfect". So I shall continue to create and stop trying to make perfect pages.

Congrats Cindy. Please email me your address.

New LO: Class of 2007
I completed this LO for a really neat challenge. In this challenge we are grouped into teams. The leader of the group gets a sketch and creates a LO based on that sketch. The leader then passes her LO (not the original sketch) to the next person in her team. The 2nd individual then creates a LO based on the sketch given to her. She then passes it on to the next member of her team. When everyone has created their LO we then share it and compare the LOs created to the original sketch. Since we all have different perspective it is going to be interesting to see what the final sketch looks like.

So here is the beautiful LO I received from Monica.

So here is my take on Monica's LO. For my LO I chose to use only two photos instead of four. I used the additional two spaces for embellishments instead. I also put the border in the middle of the page rather than at the bottom. My border was a little shorter than I wanted it to be leaving an left an empty space on the left side of the page. So I added the girl in the clock. The clock is a die from Tim Holtz. The lady in the clock is from the Debutante papers which are part of Graphic 45's Fashionista collection.

A closer look at the embellishments. Funny, there are more embellishments in this LO than there are photos. That's what I get for talking about folks who do that in their own LOs. LOL.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Remembering 9-11

2011-09-11T22:47:00.000-07:00

On this solemn weekend our family took a much needed trip to the coast. We wanted to celebrate our 9th wedding anniversary as well as to take time to reflect on 9-11. The beach was a wonderful and peaceful place where we were able to do both. Here are a few pictures and some thoughts about this weekend.

An early morning stroll on the beach allowed me to capture Mother Nature's imprint on the sand.

Our son is 7 years old. Until this weekend we had not told him about 9-11. He was struck by the sadness of the story. We shed a few tears together.

So in the midst of all this saddness we tried to focus on our blessings and enjoy some of life's simple pleasures. We strolled along the beach, made a new friend (the beautiful golden retriever pictured below with my son Diego), ate ice cream before dinner and finally flew the kit my son got for his birthday back in January.

As I look at this picture below I can still hear the wings of that kite flapping in the wind, the sounds of children edsquealing with delight and the roar of the waves in the background. Simple pleasures!

Although the photo below is just a 'little' overexposed (LOL) I luv it nonetheless. I look at that little boy and can't help but to reflect on our blessings and . . .

bask in the beauty of another day.

So on 9-11 I pray

I pray for the souls of the victims who died on 9-11.

May they rest in peace.

I pray for the survivors of 9-11.

May they have peace in their heart.

I pray for the families whose loved ones died tragically on 9-11.

As Vice-President Biden said, "may the memory of their families bring a smile to their lips before it brings a tear to their eyes".

I pray for the brave soldiers who serve our country.

May God reward their bravery by granting them peace in their hearts.

I pray for us too . . . for we were ALL affected by this tragedy.
May we never forget!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The motherload!

2011-09-03T09:19:00.000-07:00

Forgive me for not telling you about this sale before today. I honestly just didn't think about it. I know . . . bad blogger friend. :-( Pink Paislee had a warehouse sale in August. For $49 you got a 7 lb box full of scrumptious goodies from various collections. The picture below shows you just some of the stuff I received.

I can't begin to tell you how pleased I am with this purchase. Most definitely worth the money. I luv, luv, luv the fact that they included so many goodies from their Hocus Pocus and Old School collection. I especially love the brooch brads from Parisian Anthology.

I am still drooling over my box of goodies and already looking forward to next year's sale. LOL

For those of you here in the U.S., hope you enjoy your long holiday weekend.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Printer's Tray and giveaway

2011-08-30T16:43:00.000-07:00

I finally finished the printer's tray I've been working on for months! :-) I made this tray for my GD Alexa who recently graduated high school and is scheduled to start her freshman year at DePaul University in the Fall. We are so very proud of her and look forward to watching her wings take flight.

Now for the tray. The tray is from Kaiser Crafts. It comes unfinished so I painted it black. The papers are from Pink Paislee's Daily Junque collection.

Since her name is so short I was able to use some of my old Scrabble tiles to adorn this little square. The green scalloped banner underneath the Scrabble tiles was made using a Martha Stewart punch.

I wanted to give the tray a little more dimension so I 'raised' several of the embellishments. To raise the embellishment above the edge of the tray I piled several of my thick pop squares together. See pic below.

You cannot tell from this photo but this key is one of the embellishments I used pop dots to raise it above the tray edges. For the wings I used some grungeboard from Tim Holtz. I stamped it with a French script background stamp from SU and added pink Stickles for a little sparkle. I used a little wire to secure the key to the cardboard then glued the bow on top to cover the wire.

Remember my zipper flower. Well here she is. The cage and bird are both dies from Cricut's Serenade cartridge.

Here is another one of the embellishments where I used several pop dots to raise it slightly above the edge of the tray. The little glass jar is from Tim Holtz and the beads are from Club Scrap. I just luv that little glass jar. It's so freakin' adorable!

With the exception of this chandelier I am pretty happy with the way this tray turned out. I've been fussing over this chandelier for months! I've redone this embellishment at least 4 times! Because of all my fussing over the chandelier I now have to ship this tray to her rather than hand delivering it. I just saw her in June for her graduation. It is not what I envisioned for the chandelier but its DONE! Luv the metal 'Carpe Diem' plate though. :-)

One last look . . . . :-)

Now for the giveaway:

I am giving away an 8x8 travel album from DCWV. Leave me a comment . . . more like advice . . . on how you stop yourself from fussing over projects/layouts. :-) You have until Labor Day to post a comment. I'll announce the winner on September 6th.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Deck the Halls . . . in August . . . really???

2011-08-28T08:16:00.000-07:00

I made this little tag for a Christmas in August challenge. I purchased this stamp a few years ago and have never used it until now. I generally don't do cutesy so I've had some trouble incorporating this stamp into my LOs. But for this challenge I decided it was time I give it a try. I used some water color crayons to color the images, stickles and liquid pearls to decorate the Christmas lights and stickers from Anna Griffin.

I can almost hear the little bear whistling the tune "Deck the Halls". Can you? LOL

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Photo tour of Chi-town

2011-08-22T10:58:00.000-07:00

I'm on a roll . . . not only did I finally complete a mini-album this week but I also finished this layout. I've been working on this LO, on and off, for a few weeks. Now it's finally done!

These LOs are the first, in a series, of a family trip to Chicago we took back in 2007. You may click on any of the photo images for a larger view. For the first page I used a swinging shutter page protector from Memory Book. The design for the front page was inspired by Lauren Bergold's New York travel book.

I absolutely luv the embellishment she made so I knew I was going to make one for this trip. I started by using a Chicago city map for the background of the embellishment. For the cityscape, I drew and hand cut the buildings using another cityscape embellishment as my template. The ferris wheel came from the Summer Vacation Cricut cartridges. The Chicago marquee sign is from EK. I outlined the letters with silver Stickles for a more authentic look.

Inside page
The page in the middle I believe was inspired by a LO I saw on CK. I used a mask and some glitter mist from Tattered Angels to embellish the background.

For the title on the page I used another city scape and a pizza embellishment from EK.

Left side of the page

This is a photo of I took at the Navy Pier. I do not own a 12x12 printer so I printed an 8x10 copy and cropped it to fit the page protector. I then embellished the bottom of the page to fill out the page protector.

Right side of the page
This photo was taken at the Lincoln Park Zoo. Luv that city scape in the background. The boat ride around the lake was fun although a little scary because my 4 year old would not stay still inside the boat.

Hope you enjoyed the pages. Now to finish the printer's tray.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . . Yoli

Cabo mini-album

2011-08-19T09:52:00.000-07:00

I FINALLY finished that mini-album I've been talking about for months! Yay!! I made this album for my friend who invited me to join her on a girl's trip last year. We stayed at her gorgeous condo in Villa La Estancia in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. This album is my way of commemorating the trip and thanking her for her generosity.

Front cover
For the background I used a mask from Tattered Angels and sprayed it with some of their glitter mists. I used red Stickles to make my own flourished styled bling. Then to finish the front cover I altered an ornate plate from Tim Holtz.

Photo courtesy of Villa La Estancia

Our first day

Since my friend and her family frequently visit Cabo I wanted to focus most of the pictures on the group shots. However, I could not make an album without highlighting some of the beautiful Cabo landscape. So, more often than not, I used 5x7 photos for landscape pictures of Cabo and wallet size photos for pictures of the ladies.

Except for the tag, no special technique was used here. I used a Tim Holtz's mask with a few of his distress ink pads to create the tag. The paper is from Club Scrap.

Top photo courtesy of Villa La Estancia

Day 2
On the second day we enjoyed a lovely brunch where I enjoyed trying new (to me) Mexican dishes. Afterwards we lounged by the pool since the waves were rather wicked that day.

For this page I used several elements from Pink Paislee (my new obsession). The corner stamp and the border stamps as well as the blue ruffle are all from their Daily Junque collection. Tucked behind the photo is a little journaling tag . . . also embellished with Pink Paislee stamps. :-)

4th of July
We celebrated the 4th of July in Cabo. We enjoyed a fabulous dinner set against a magnificient view of the beach and Los Arcos all while listening to live Jazz music. I truly enjoyed getting to know these ladies. Amazing what kind of stories you are willing to share after a few margaritas. :-)

Top photo courtesy of Villa La Estancia

Upclose photo of embellishment

Another day on the beach
One of my favorite memories of this trip was when I went surfing on a buggy board. So much fun! Those waves were pretty strong . . . a couple of times I was up side down. I've never held on to anything so tightly in my life as I did to that buggy board. LOL. But I loved it. I felt like a kid again.

To add a few more pictures and a little more interest I added a few flip outs to the album. For the top page I used the flip out for journaling. For the bottom page I used the flip out to showcase a few more photos. Although not shown here, the flip out actually has 3 pages . . . sort of a mini-album within a mini-album. :-)

What is a girl's trip without a little shopping
This part of the album is to showcase our little shopping trip in downtown Cabo. It was Africa hot that day . . . World Cup was playing on EVERY television and heard over EVERY radio in town . . . and were shots of Tequilla were being served in jewelry stores! Only in Mexico I suppose. :-)

Once again I utilized a flip out album to showcase a few more photos of our shopping trip. The page above shows the album closed while the page below shows you the flip out album open. 

Por Que Te Vas

My trip was much too short. I left a few days earlier than the rest of the crew. Every time I see this photo I hear that old song by Mana, "Por Que Te Vas". The girls were signing that song to me on my last day.

Photo of Villa La Estancia courtesy of Villa La Estancia

I made another flip out for the top page but this time I used it for journaling. I added a photo (3.5 x 7) of the resort and used the back space for journaling.

Back cover

I kept the back cover simple. I used a Stampin Up frame stamp and signed it.

Thank you for accompanying me on this trip down memory lane. I hope you enjoyed the mini-album.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . . Yoli

The art of flying a kite

2011-06-28T22:25:00.000-07:00

A friend: Is that what I think it is?

Me: Yup.

A friend: Nooooooooooooooooo. Say it isn't so!

Me: Yup . . . its a layout! Yeah!!! LOL

I've been so busy working on two side projects; a printers tray and a mini-album, that haven't had a chance to work on my own sb album. Although I'm still fussing with both the printers tray and mini-album I took a little break from those projects to complete this page. The LO was inspired by the June sketch challenge posted on My Little Sketch Blook.

In this page I luv the fact that I used multiple patterned paper. Always a challenge for me. I also luv the little journaling tag tucked behind the top photo. Of course the subjects in the photo are just too darling. I enjoyed watching them make the kite and then overcoming a few challenges in order to make it take flight.

Well . . . I better get back to working on those projects.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

FREE photo book from Shutterfly

2011-06-26T08:53:00.000-07:00

**UPDATE**. It appears that the code is good only once. My apologies to everyone for the oversight. Congrats to the lucky follower who used the code.

Free photo book offer from CK and Shutterfly. Use link and code below (not the link on the photo). Enjoy!

	Turn pictures from your favorite summer events into an 8×8 photo book.* It’s fun and easy. Make a photo book in minutes through Shutterfly’s Simple Path, or fully customize it with their All New Custom Path.
	To get your free photo book: 1. Visit shutterfly.com/ckoffer 2. Enter the unique promo code (CK69-9D54-VWX4-31HNAB) 3. Sign up for a free Shutterfly account Yoli

I was such a good girl . . .

2011-06-24T09:42:00.000-07:00

I'm just arriving home from a trip to Chicago and Ohio where I visited family and friends. Of course I could not visit my family in Ohio without doing a little shopping at Archiver's. We don't have a local Archiver's so when I get a chance to visit one of the stores I am worst than a kid in a candy store. Actually I act more like a kid who has been deprived of candy for a long time but who had to endure watching her friends eating the luscious goodies in front of her. Now suddenly my time has come and I'm let loose to devour all the candy I can consume! LOL Ok . . . so I'm exaggerating a bit but you get the idea! :-)

Despite the drama I was a very good girl. I purchased a few items but more importantly I kept to my budget! I was delighted to find one of Tim Holtz's new stamp sets and hardware. I also purchased some Cub Scout embellishments along with some metal frames from Teresa Collins. It was a good day!

Lastly, I'm putting the finishing touches on the printer's tray. If anyone has a good recommendation for a glue to use to adhere the wooden frame to the base I would love to hear from you. I have a hot glue gun but I'm uncertain if that is the best way to go. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Zipper flower

2011-06-07T08:59:00.000-07:00

This is my first attempt to make a zipper flower for a printer tray project I'm working on. I used embroidery thread because it matched the color of the zipper. Unfortunately the thread kept breaking. So if you've made this zipper flower before I would love to know the kind of thread you used?

If you are interesting in making one of these flowers here are several tutorials for you. I've seen these flowers on necklaces, headbands and of course craft projects. So while you are off checking out the videos I am going to put the finishing touches on the printers tray. I promise to post a picture soon.

As always, thank you for stopping by . . .

Yoli

a class with Marah Johnson

2011-05-18T12:31:00.000-07:00

In March I took a LuminArte class taught my Marah Johnson. Learned some very cool techniques in class. My favorite technique though was an unexpected surprise. We started by painting the paper pictured below using Twinlkling H2o's. Sorry don't know the technical term for the paper. Just by itself the paper looks pretty festive.

However, it was the artwork underneath that paper that came as a beautiful surprise. You see underneath this floral paper we used paper towels to keep the desk clean. However, since the floral pattern on the top paper is a die cut of sorts the excess paint spilled onto the paper towel creating its own pretty pattern.

Marla told us that we could use our die cutters to cut an image from the paper towels. Using a Stampin' Up die I created the flower pictured below. Not sure what I'll do with that flower yet but I sure do love its brillant colors.

I also used a piece of the painted paper towel to adorn the body of the little birdie pictured below. Side note: The red background paper in this project was also a technique I learned in Marah's class. I painted flocked paper with the Twinklies H20s. For information on this technique please visit her site.

Lastly, the flower bud on the left side of the birdie frame was also created using some of the beautifully painted paper towels.

I still have some paper leftover safely tucked away in a drawer awaiting my next project. Remember this post? Now you know what I am storing in the left side drawer of this CD case. :-)

This is all for now. I'm diligently working on a travel mini-album I hope to share with you soon. In the meantime, happy crafting.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Happy National Scrapbooking Day

2011-05-07T13:42:00.000-07:00

I think I shared with you that a few months ago DH & I watched a show about hoarders. It shamed us into cleaning up our own space. After some great progress we unfortunately ran out of steam. :-( But today I was inspired to clean up the mess created after I reorganized the sb closet.

BEFORE

AFTER

CLOSET -- before

CLOSET -- after

I continue to be very selective of what items I allow to return back in the closet. I want to keep this space as open as possible. I also plan on purchasing and installing a rolling rack for the Scrap Rack. The rolling rack will allow me to tuck the Scrap Rack into the closet and free up some desktop space.
BOOKSHELVES

Adjacent to the closet is my homemade CIU, my bookshelves and my metal file cabinet. On one side of the metal file cabinet I have Ikea CD cases that I use to store UMs and some fabric. Originally I planned to have those CD cases flank each side of the metal cabinet. I may have to scrap that idea in order to make more space for the CIU. Hmmmmmmmmm.

DISPLAYING PROJECTS

I am using the file cabinet to organized my WM stamp sets. Above the file cabinet I have desk organizer that I am using to display some of the art projects I've made or received in a swap. Haven't decided if the organizer should be painted black or the blue of the file cabinet. Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

NOT QUITE DONE

Don't be fooled by all those pretty pictures of my clean sb room. I still have so much more to do. Those plastic drawers pictured above use to be in the sb closet. I used it to 'hide' some of my sb stuff. The drawers will not return back to the sb room but I have to empty it out before DH can reclaim them. So I will do what I always do . . . create three piles; donate, organize, trash and tackle this project 15 minutes at a time!

NATIONAL SB DAY PROJECT

In addition to sharing pictures with you of my newly clean room I wanted to share this little project I made. I promise to post details on how it was created soon. For now . . . I hope you enjoy National Scrapbooking Day. Happy Mother's Day to everyone!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Closet -- before and after

2011-03-29T09:13:00.000-07:00

Before

After

I am still re-organizing and purging but I'm amazed at how much space I've gained in the room. After I'm done organizing the closet I'll then focus my attention on making it pretty. Not sure how . . . but I'm sure I'll think of something. :-) Stay tuned!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Scrapbook closet

2011-03-25T13:35:00.000-07:00

The desk and shelves have been installed . . . the paint is drying . . . now for the fun part . . . organizing the scrapbook closet. I still need to add a protective glaze to the desk, thus the green frog tape, and spray paint the closet rack black to match the desktop colors.

As I put the finishing touches to the closet I'm rethinking my original design for this space. The Scrap Rack will still be placed on the left side of the desk on a rolling rack for easy access. However, in order to maximize the usable space underneath the desk I pushed the metal shelf to the end of the closet as pictured below. I'm not crazy about its current location so I'm working on a different design.

Right now I'm not sure how I am going to organize the closet. I do know one thing . . . it is time to purge . . . starting with those plastic drawers pictured below on the right side. I don't even remember what is in there anymore. Shame!

In the meantime, I was able to carve just enough space in the craft room to help my 7 yr old son with his Cub Scout project. He is participating in his first pinewood derby race this evening. He used the Indie Art Cricut cartridge to create the flame and the skull for the car.

Wish me luck this weekend as I re-design the closet space and begin a major purge. Hope you have a good weekend.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The closet is finally getting done!!!

2011-03-24T11:49:00.000-07:00

The handyman is here . . . the wood is being cut . . . and I am one happy scrapper. Here is my before picture of the closet. It's an assault on the senses! LOL.

BEFORE

DURING:

Stay tuned for the after shot. I am soooooooooooooooooo excited!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Can't see what's inside the drawers? Part II

2011-03-21T07:10:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I shared an idea with you that allows you to store your goodies in a drawer while 'seeing' what's inside. For that post please click here. The very talented Rachelle had the same idea but has taken it to a whole new level. Using various techniques from TH's book Compendium of Curiosities Rachelle has turned an old seed drawer into this beautiful little treasure chest for some of her embellishments. Check it out.

Before

Now

Drawers upclose

As you can see from the current photo Rachelle has one more drawer to finish. I don't know about you . . . but I can't wait to see how she alters that last drawer. In the meantime, be sure to stop by and visit Rachelle's blog. She is a super talented lady.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli
ps/Tim Holtz is on HSN today. Just saying :-)

Storing memorabilia

2011-03-17T12:15:00.000-07:00

I have gotten rather lazy lately when it comes organizing my memorabilia. Rather putting it in the file drawer I was stuffing it into the desk organizer. Bad scrapper! :-( So this past weekend I spent some time organizing my memorabilia. The first thing I had to do was clean out the desktop organizer. In my eagerness to get this task done I forgot to take a 'before' pic. :-( You will have to trust me when I say it was overflowing with stuff! Nonetheless here is the after photo. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!

Once the memorabilia was removed from the desktop organizer I began to file the memorabilia in large Ziploc bags.

I originally used the label on the Ziploc to identify its contents. But this time I added a little tab on the right side corner for easy reference. The bags are then organized in chronological order.

I am using this file drawer to organize the memorabilia. The file drawer came with a kit I order from QVC many moons ago.

For easy access I keep the Ziploc bags in one of the drawers. Hopefully this will encourage me to keep organize the memorabilia and not fall back into my old habits. :-( 

I hope you find this information useful. Have a fabulous weekend and Happy St. Patty's Day!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Storing our markers/pens/pencils

2011-03-13T20:00:00.000-07:00

As you may remember, I am hosting several organizational challenges over at the Scrapbook Room Yahoo group. This month we are talking about storing and organizing our markers and pens.

Organizational
According to the folks over at Scrapjazz, "pens have specific storage requirements if you wish to maintain them optimally." Here are some of their suggestions:

Horizontally. Markers/pens that should be stored horizontally: marker-style pens, pens with writing tips on both ends, metallic pens or any pens that require that you shake it before using it. Storing these markers/pens horizontally will keep the ink from 'pooling'.
Vertical. Ink pens such as gel pens, Zig Writers and similar pens should always be stored so that they are vertical, with the writing end down, cap on.
Pencils can be stored vertically or horizontally. If they are stored vertically, place them in the storage container with the sharpened ends up. This way, you have less chance of the sharpened tip breaking off, requiring additional sharpening before use.

Storage
How you choose to store the markers naturally depends on available space, use of the item and personal taste. If, for example, you attend crops your storage choice may prioritize mobility. If you are like me, then I want a storage solution that is both cute and practical. LOL. So allow me to present to you a few samples of how other crafters store their markers/pens/pencils. I finish this post with my all time favorite idea for storing pens/markers/pens. It will blow your mind!

Cans/containers

Photo courtesy of Superally at Scrapbook.com

Photo courtesy of Christie

Photo courtesy of Patter Cross

Caddy

Photo courtesy of Cheryl Horton

Modular Units

Photo courtesy of TimelyTeaCup over at Scrapbook.com

Shelves

Photo courtesy of Leigh O'Brien

Racks

Photo courtesy of Angelina

French drain????

My all time favorite idea came from Karen over at Sew Many Ways. She used French drain pipes to create this beauty. Imagine all the cool stuff you can store in these babies. Ohhh . . . my head is spinning from all the possibilities!

Here are a few more cool ideas.
Recycle crafts
Sunflower Studio
Crafty Storage
Harriets
Kaiser Craft

Thank you ladies for sticking with me throughout this very long post. I hope this information was useful to you.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Free 8x8 photo album

2011-03-09T15:43:00.000-08:00

The links in the ad are not live but click here to get to Shutterfly's special offer. Enjoy!

*To Receive Your FREE Photo Book use Promo Code: CK65-2YZD-N305-8MDYH1 Offer expires March 29, 2011.

**Offer valid for one 20-page 8x8 hard cover photo book (leather, padded and soft covers excluded) at Shutterfly.com. Taxes, shipping and handling will apply. Additional pages incur a per-page fee and additional taxes and shipping charges. To redeem the offer, you must have or create a Shutterfly account and enter the offer code into your account. Offer valid for one-time redemption only. TM and 2011 Shutterfly, Inc.

Yoli

A few new layouts to share . . .

2011-03-07T21:40:00.000-08:00

Here are some of my recent layouts for my 2007 album that I realized I have not shared with you yet.

This is the very first LO of my 2007 album. For this page I incorporated my son's artwork (featured on the right side of the page) into the layout. DS had some sensory issues when he was young so getting him to get his hands dirty with paint was a big deal back then.

This next page was a bit outside the box for me but I like the way it turned out. The LO was inspired by a sketch from PageMaps.

For this page, instead of journaling I used some of the lyrics from the song "My Funny Little Valentine" as the title. For the wing embellishment I hand cut the shape from cardboard, painted it pink, stamped it with SU's french script stamp, inked the edges and added some a little Stickles to give it some sparkle. The paper is from Club Scrap.

Easter 2007. Besides the adorable children there are two other things I luv about this LO. The first is the stamped image around the circle. For that I used an acrylic stamp set, Adorning Corners, from CTMH. Since the acrylic is flexible I was able to manipulate the shape of the stamp to fit the circle.

The second thing I luv about this LO is the adorable tear bunny peering from the side of the picture. Just too stinkin' cute!

Summer 2007. This is where I am now . . . at the beginning of summer. I was so pleased that I was able to use one of my roller stamps to create the carnival image at the bottom of this page.

Upclose photo of the embellishments.

Lastly, a 2 page LO of a fun summer day. I stamped and hand cut the TH rain man image for this page. I was happy to learn that he recently released that image as a die.

Well . . . this all for now. I hope you've enjoyed seeing my latest creations.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Free watch gear

2011-02-26T08:31:00.000-08:00

Image from Graphic 45's Steampunk Collection

I'm not sure where I'm going with this project. It may be the cover page of a travel/bucket list journal or it may become the backdrop to my new CIU finial. I honestly don't know yet. However that is not the reason for this post.

You see all that beautiful watch gear adorning her head? Most of that stuff I got for free. How you ask? Stop by your local watch repair store and see if they are have extra parts to share with you. Generally these are pieces that they would otherwise throw away. Why not recycle? Unfortunately the shop I used is now closed. I am now on a hunt for a new 'supplier'. I plan to visit another shop this weekend and hope to score a few more treasures. Happy hunting!

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Ink pad caddy

2011-02-22T09:34:00.000-08:00

The other day my friend Alessandra called me to tell me she found not one . . . but 4 rotating cassette tape holders at Goodwill. She emailed me a picture and asked if I wanted her to buy them for me. At an average price of $3 a piece I could not pass up this deal. Major score!

Excited to put one of these babies to work I've temporarily set a caddy on my desk. Until I move that Scrap Rack into the closet I'm not going to be able to set up my Inky Station. So in the meantime the caddy is allowing me easy access to ink pads that were once stored in a shoe box in the closet.

The slots on the caddies are not always evenly spaced which leads me to believe these may have been custom made. On one side of the caddy I am able to store my SU, CTMH and Adirondack ink pads but not the StazOn pads which are slightly bulkier. However these same pads fit nicely in the slots on the back of the same caddy. I'm not complaining though. The largest caddy fits 48 ink pads . . . multiplied by 4 . . . that's 192 slots for ink pads . . . that's more slots than I have ink pads. And that my friend is a good problem to have. :-) Thank you Alessandra for finding this treasure.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The Love Award

2011-02-19T06:00:00.000-08:00

Cherrie, from The Scrappy Cottage, has honored me with my first blog award. The purpose of the award is to shine a light on some good blogs that perhaps may not be as well known. I am touched that someone thought enough of my little blog to nominate for me for this award.

In an effort to continue to bring these good blogs to light I am making three nominations of my own. If the individuals whom I nominate choose to accept the award there are two conditions they must follow.

1. If you have been tagged and choose to accept the award then you have to create a post on your blog and post the love blog photo.

2. Choose 3-5 of your favorite blogs to tag, link these in your blog too and tell the lucky people they have been tagged.

Choosing blogs to highlight has been difficult but here are three of my favorites:

Paper Dreams -- I'm not sure how 'unknown' Karin's work really is but her layouts are gorgeous. Her attention to details is marvelous but it does not take away from the star of the show which, in my humble opinion, should always be the photos.
Triple the Scraps -- One of the primary reasons I created my blog was to share organizational ideas for our craft rooms. One of my favorite sources for ideas is Patter, from Triple the Scraps. Luv her posts titled Organizational {Friday} where she shares some really cool storage solutions.
Paper Therapy -- Jessica is another one of those gals whose work is so gorgeous it is hard to believe that her blog may be relatively unknown. One of my all time favorite homemade hostess gift idea was inspired by Jessica's work. Family members who received this thank you gift from me are STILL talking about it!

I hope you ladies have a chance to check out the blogs I've recommended. You won't regret. I promise. :-) Once again, thank you Cherrie for the honor.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

15 Minute Friday

2011-02-18T11:47:00.000-08:00

Once again I have allowed my magazine subscriptions to get out of hand. So now I'm in the process of ripping out layout ideas from each of the magazines.

I am using the 15 minute principle to get this project done. Whenever . . . wherever I can steal a few minutes you will find me with a magazine in hand ripping pages. For example, if I'm watching a television show with my little one I grab a magazine. While I watch him play in the tub I'm also ripping out LO/sketch ideas from the magazine. Heck the other day I took 2 magazines with me to the park. So while DS played with his little friends I kept one eye on them and the other eye on the magazine. LOL.

Once I've selected the LOs/sketches I want to keep I then place them in a page protector and organize the page in one of the 3 ring binders pictured below. You may find more information about the binders here and here.

As a way of saving precious real estate on my bookshelf I am considering altering a wall mounted file holder like the one pictured below. Besides, the less space I have to save magazines the less likely I am to hoard them. :-)

Photo courtesy of RSH catalog

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Graphic 45 banner

2011-02-13T18:25:00.000-08:00

I absolutely LUV Graphic 45 papers. However, I've shied away from using their papers in a LO because their print designs tend to be very busy. While I love the print on its own, I wasn't sure how to incorporate the paper in a LO without it overwhelming the page. I did not want the photos to get lost in the print.

So this weekend, while visiting my LSS, I saw this cute little banner which gave me a whole new perspective on these wonderful prints. The banner was a collection of hand cut images that came from various papers in the Transatlantique Collection. The images were then pieced together to create this delightful art piece.

So of course I purchased the papers and made my own little banner. It was easy and so much fun. It reminded me of the days when my mom and I would design clothes for my paper dolls and then cut the dresses from fashion magazines.

Female image from Fashionista Collection

To finish the project I added some pearls to her necklace, a little bling to her shoes & hat, and a feather to her cap. To create a perception of depth, which is a little hard to see in these pics, I used lots and lots of pop-dots. Luv it!

Lesson here: not to limit my creativity but allow the print to inspire me. I'm looking forward to infusing some of these images in my next LO.

Supplies:
From the Transatlantique Collection:

Background paper with train -- All Aboard!
Vintage automobile -- Transatlantique
Suitcase -- Pack Your Bags

From the Fashionista Collection:

Female image -- Fashionista

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Can't see what's inside the drawers? No problem . . .

2011-02-11T10:29:00.000-08:00

Although I'm technically suppose to be organizing my Inky Station, inspiration struck me so I decided to finish this project first. This is not my original idea but I thought it was a practical and beautiful way of labeling my Ikea CD holder. So although I cannot physically see inside the drawers, thanks to my new little labels I now know exactly the treasures it holds inside.

I started with an Ikea CD holder and a 3x3" metal frame. Unfortunately I only had one metal frame. So I made a 2nd frame from black cardstock. I used the metal frame as my template. Can you tell which is which? The frame on the left is made of metal.

I then removed the label from the CD case. You'll need to exercise your muscles a little to get it off.

I then photographed the contents, printed and cropped the photo. Afterwards, I simply adhered the paper frame and photo to the drawer with double sided sticky tape. This way if the contents change I can easily change out the label. I've also kept a template of the frame for future use.

Love the drawers and the label but as I look it at it now I think to myself . . . "should have painted them first". A little backwards I know . . . oh well. But I think the drawers would love even nicer when I paint them in the slate blue color that accents the room. When I finish phase II of this project I promise to post an updated photo.

In the meantime, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Storing your ink pads

2011-02-09T07:14:00.000-08:00

As promised, here is a first in a serious of challenges we are hosting over on the Yahoo site Scrapbooking rooms. This month we will focus our efforts on creating and organizing an Inky Station. For our purposes an inky station includes supplies used to color alter other items. Here is the first of such items:

Ink Pads
1. Something you should know. Prevailing wisdom tells us that we should store the ink pads flat, of course, but also upside. According to the folks at Scrapjazz, “this is especially important for dye-based ink pads, as this ink is thinner than some other inks and will migrate through the pad at a faster rate. Ink pads containing thicker inks, such as pigment ink, can be stored face up.”

2. Sorting your pads. Before you to out and buy a new storage system, it is important that you take stock of your current inventory. This will prevent you from buying a system that is inadequate for your needs. Then consider how you want to organize your ink pads.

By color
By manufacturer
By ink type
By size

For a more detailed report please visit Scrapjazz

3. Storage options
So now that you know how to lay the ink pads and decided on to sort them, let’s talk about a few storage solutions. This is not meant to be an all inclusive list. Instead I am presenting you with a few options for storing your ink pads.

In a drawer

Old tape cassette holder -- A popular option is to use an old tape cassette organizer to store the pads. Some manufacturers have customized the design to include storage for re-inkers. Be mindful of the size of your ink pads when buying one of these organizers. You may not be able to fit some of the chunky ink pads in the slots of some of the old tape cassette holders.

I like the model pictured below because it provides additional space for re-inkers and markers.

If desktop space is at a premium for you perhaps you can wall mount a smaller unit like Angelina did with hers.

Photo courtesy of Angelina

A custom made cabinet

Stampers Storage

· Ink caddy – there are several popular options in this category. Unlike the units above that can be wall mounted, these models are made to rest on your desk. So if desktop space is an issue in your room this may not be viable option for you.

Photo courtesy of Stampin' Up

Photo courtesy of Triple the Scraps

· Cat eye ink storage

Photo courtesy of Kanary

Now comes the fun part . . . organizing your ink pads. :-) I plan to temporarily store my ink pads in a drawer until I finish the closet and remove my Scrap Rack from the Inky Station. Depending on how much desktop space I have I may then organize the ink pads in an old cassette player.

Leave me a comment and tell us how do you organize your ink pads?

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

And the winner is . . .

2011-02-01T20:10:00.000-08:00

Cindylu2u

I had to choose the winner the old fashion way . . . names out of a hat. For those of you who left a message on both days your names went in the hat twice. DS then choose the winner. He thought this whole process was a hoot. Cindy I've sent you an email asking for your home address.

Thank you ladies for playing along with us during this two day blog hop. I appreciate you visiting my blog. I really enjoyed reading all your comments.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Homemade Clip-it-Ups (another long post but with lots of pics :-)

2011-01-31T07:14:00.000-08:00

A few months ago I made a homemade version of Simply Renee's Clip-It-Up (CIU). For details as to how I made this CIU please go here. Since then I have noticed so many wonderful versions of this same product. This post will provide you with a small sample of some of the many different versions of CIU trees.

Floor Model
This has got to be one of the most wonderful inventions for scrapbookers. Its practical . . . you can see what's on the tree and the items are easily accessible . . . and yet its still beautiful. Luv it! I am using my tree to store my acrylic stamps, embossing folders and dies.

Unlike some other floor models my tree has 4 tiers. I did not notice that one of the lamp shades had supporting wires that connected the top ring to the bottom ring. So instead of buying that last lamp shade with a spider support system like this

I bought this instead.

It was a happy mistake though because I ended up with 4 tiers rather than 3.

Desktop model

This beauty was made by Pauline van den Bosch. In her version Pauline used a beautiful, yet sturdy, decorative flower pot for the base of her tree.

For instructions on how to make a desktop version of this CIU tree please watch Margaret's tutorial.

Table lamp
I may make one of these CIU to display my ATCs.

Shoe Rack
I am always amazed by the creative imagination of others. While I see a product meant to organize shoes someone else had a vision as to how they could create a homemade CIU from a shoe tree. Simply amazing!

Like the original CIU this version of the tree also several different models.

The desktop model

Photo courtesy of Debbie J

The floor model

Photo courtesy of the Container Store

The floor to ceiling model

Photo courtesy of Julie F

You can find video instructions on how to make your own version of a shoe tree CIU right here.

Ceiling Model
Don't have any floor or desktop space in your craft room for a CIU? No problem. You can hang your CIU from the ceiling like Brenda did.

I hope you have enjoyed seeing the different versions of this wonderful product. Moreover I hope it inspired you to make your own little tree.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Blog hop -- day two

2011-01-29T06:16:00.000-08:00

Welcome back ladies! I must say that I am so pleased with the responses our little blog hop has received. Thank you for taking the time to visit with us and leave us a comment. We really do appreciate it.

As promised here is a simple tag I made for the little brag book featured in yesterday's post. I wish I could tell you I invented the technique but unfortunately for me, Tim Holtz, has copyrights. LOL. The background technique was inspired by one of the tags from TH's 2008 Twelve Tags of Christmas.

I won't go into the specific details on how to create the background since Tim already posted a tutorial on his website. Please click here for the instructions. I followed the tutorial and allowed the paint to dry. Afterwards I applied a flourish rub-on to the tag. The flourish gives the tag, at least I think it does, the illusion of movement. The little girl in the die cut is from A Child's Year by Cricut .

Blog Candy
Please note that if you win this blog candy you may request a few additional die cuts from the Summer in Paris, Home Decor and/or Sentimental cartridges. Just tell me size (up to 5.5") and color cardstock you want and I'll add the image to the box.

In order to win the blog candy you must do the following:

Become a follower of this blog.
Leave a comment on this blog. If you left a comment yesterday. Thank you. If you want to double your chances leave a comment today as well. If you use the anonymous option to post a comment please be sure to provide contact information.
Visit the blogs of the other talented ladies participating in this blog hop.

The winners will be chosen on Tuesday, February 1st. You will have until Friday, February 4th to contact me. Your next stop is to Sharon's Pretty Paper Things blog.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Celebrating our Milestones Blog Hop

2011-01-28T00:22:00.000-08:00

Thank you for joining us. I hope you enjoy our little blog hop. The theme of this blog hop is Celebrating Milestones. I have chosen to share with you a mini-album I created which celebrates one of life's greatest milestones -- the birth of a child. So I made a little brag book for my friend Val who had a baby girl this past Summer.

Cover Page

Page 1 & 2 -- Welcome Bebe. I wanted to make sure this was a brag book about the baby and not about my scrapbooking skills. Given the limited real estate, the embellishment also serve as photo corner. So the photo will fit right under the Bebe embellishment.

On the right page, I created a pull out tab that can be used to easily attach a photo. I strategically attached some of the brads to the frame while others are attached to the page. This insured that the pink tab could easily be moved in and out of the frame. PS/the secret to adhering glitter . . . decoupage!

Page 3 & 4 -- Once again I utilized the embellishments as photo corner.

Page 4 & 5 -- Instead of a traditional page I layered a few tags to add more interest to the album. The page on the left I did not embellish. I liked the paper so much I did not feel it necessary. I will provide her with clear photo corners for her to use when she adds the pictures to this page.

Page 6 & 7 -- This is the other side of the tags pictured above. LO #7 has two little tags for journaling tucked underneath the beautiful butterfly frame.

Last page -- I used the Mariposa paper from DCWV for the page on the left. I used cut the butterfly and used pop dots to give it dimension. What's a sonnet without a ballerina?

Blog Candy -- how to play?

In order to enter to win the blog candy you must do the following:

Become a follower of this blog.
Leave a comment. Perhaps you can tell me which page of the mini-album you liked the most.
Visit the blogs of the other talented ladies participating in this blog hop.

Your next stop is to Sharon's Pretty Paper Things blog. Be sure to stop by tomorrow. I'll be sharing a technique I used to create a tag for this mini-album. Enjoy!

Yoli

SPOILER: Parisian themed blog candy

2011-01-27T10:20:00.000-08:00

Thought I would post this little teaser as a way of enticing you to stop by tomorrow and checkout my first blog hop. Pictured here are some of the goodies I am giving away.

My blog candy has a Valentine/Parisian theme which includes some of the following items;

A 21 pc Valentine themed stamp and ink set from Martha Stewart.
An ornamental hook with a postcard picture of the Eiffel Tower.
A few embellishments
A few Cricut die cuts from Summer in Paris, Home Decor and Sentimental cartridges. I've also included the 3D version of the Eiffel Tower.
What would Valentine's Day be without a little chocolate? So you will also receive a little heart shaped box of Russell Stover chocolates.
Everything will then be shipped inside this beautiful Parisian themed little box.

So be sure to stop by tomorrow to check out the mini-album I created.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

My inspirational board (long post)

2011-01-24T00:12:00.000-08:00

As promised here is a picture of my inspirational board. I told you it wasn't very pretty but nonetheless functional for what I need right now. :-)

I used the back of a door to create my inspirational board which highlight three areas in my sb room I want to focus on this year. Those areas are the closet, an inky station and my bookshelves.

It's hard to tell from this photo but the inspirational board is divided into three columns; the station, the inspiration, the reward. On the left side you will find a sketch I drew of each of the stations. In the center column you will find inspirational photos of specific items I will make/purchase for the space. Lastly, and equally important, the third column details the reward. I've built a reward system into my plans as an added incentive to get things done!

So let's take a closer look at this inspirational board.

I. The closet. This is my sketch of the plans for my closet. This new configuration will allow me to move the Scrap Rack from its current location into the closet. The Scrap will be placed on tracks so it can be pushed out of the way when not in use.

In order to best utilize what would otherwise be wasted space I will build shelves on the side of the closet much like the ones pictured below.

Photo courtesy of Workbench Magazine

Here is a picture of the 'real' inspirational board I am considering making for the closet. Did you know they now make magnetic chalkboard paint? Cool eh?

Photo courtesy of Art & Artifact

My Reward: The closet is a big organizing project and I'm going to need a little bling as my carrot. :-) 

Photo courtesy of Amazon

II. Inky Station. The plan for my inky station is to centralize my WM stamp set along with my ink pads. What needs to be done?

Currently I store my UMs in CD cases which are then organized in an Ikea CD holder. If I decide to keep the UMs in CD cases then I'll have the Ikea CD drawers flanking either side of the file cabinet. If however I decide to store the UMs on the Clip-it-Up tree then I will build some shelves to sit along side the library file cabinet.
Inky stations needs ink pads which of course will need a storage system of their own. Inspired by the ink pad storage unit shown below from Stamper Storage I may do something similar in my own space.

Or I may store my ink pads on the side of the bookshelf like Angelina did in her old room. This would save me valuable counter space.

My ultimate favorite addition to this space however is the Pottery Barn inspired cubby organizer. I will probably buy a shoe cubby, paint, distress and hang on the wall. I want to store some of my camera lens and equipment on this cubby along with a few decorative elements. I'm so excited about this idea I may start with this project first. LOL.

My Reward: A few blue mason jars by Ball. I've been eyeing these for awhile and I think the would look most beautiful in the cubby organizer.

III. Lastly, the bookshelves. The goal is simply to organize the bookshelves in a way that helps reduce visual clutter. Investing in beautiful boxes that are well labeled and easily accessible will be key to my success with this challenge.

My Reward: Two new Tim Holtz dies. Have you seen his new line? Yum!

Thanks for sticking with me through this very long post. I hope you found this exercise useful and inspiring. If you have or make an inspirational board of your own, be sure to share some photos with me.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Organizational challenge

2011-01-23T08:26:00.000-08:00

As many of you may know I am one of the moderators of the Yahoo group scrapbookingrooms. We have started a series of challenges that will help us organize our craft space. If you need to organize your craft room I invite you to join us. :-)

So here is some information regarding the various challenges as well as an update of my own

efforts to meet these challenges.

Challenge #1 -- Pick-up/clean the craft room. In order to move forward with the other challenges, and do some crafting, most of us need to at least pick-up/clean-up our rooms. We understand that sometimes the task can can be overwhelming. The idea of this challenge is just to pick-up. Beginning in February we will begin to organize the space. However, if you need to purge perhaps you can do what I did back in October.

My progress: I have three 6 ft tables which were full of stuff as a results of my Christmas projects. Photo on the left is one of those tables.

I had already purged back in October but I used the same principle to clean-up my space. I created and worked on three piles; (1) scraps to be put away, (2) paper to be put away, (3)embellishments to put in my Scrap Rack.

I am happy to report all three tables are clean, the piles have been been organized and I am busy crafting which is what this is all about!

Challenge #2 -- Create an inspiration board. Use your inspirational board as a map . . . a guide . . . to what we want to achieve your craft space. If you are like me, you have a folder full of pictures and ideas for the space. If you are like me, you may have multiple ideas for the same station. So having the inspirational board will help me do two things; (1) make a decision as to what I want to do in the space, (2) help keep me on task. Afterwards I will them use my pretty little inspiration board to display other artwork.

My progress: I am just about done with mine. My inspirational board is not pretty but practical for this exercise. My real board is a project onto itself. I will share those pics with you tomorrow so please stay tuned.

Challenge #3 -- the real challenge. This is where the real organization begins as we tackle different work stations in our craft room. These challenges will start in February. We are organizing the challenges by stations with sub-categories for items that may be stored in that station. In addition to the challenges, when appropriate, we will post a few projects that will make the space not just functional but beautiful as well.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

One perfect moment

2011-01-19T13:59:00.000-08:00

This is about the sweetest picture I've ever taken with my little guy. Although I cannot remember what I was thinking at that time (photos taken in 2007) it is obvious that we are both thoroughly enjoying the moment.

Although my page turned out a bit different, it was originally inspired by artwork from Karin. All papers are from Club Scrap's Seashore and Maritime kit. The kit included a sheet of quotes which worked perfectly with my pictures.

Lastly, not wanting to interrupt the harmony of the layout I chose to tuck the journaling tag behind the photo. I still need to journal . . . but that's another story.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

A new layout (but not part of the blog hop)

2011-01-17T08:55:00.000-08:00

This LO is NOT part of the upcoming blog hop. Instead I completed this LO as part of a challenge so the sketch is not my original design. Nonetheless, it's been a LONG time since I've had an opportunity to share with you a LO I created for my own sb album. As a matter of fact, I just realized today that I've been working on my 2007 album since Dec 5, 2009! Ouch!!

This LO commemorates what use to be an annual trip to the Oregon shore. We use to attend the yearly Sandcastle contest in Cannon Beach. It's always so much fun to see the beautiful sandcastles. Some are truly a labor of love. I like the fact that the contest is divided into categories so the novice are not competing with the more professional teams. They even have a category for families with children. Perhaps one year we may enter the contest ourselves. Won't that be fun!

All papers are from Club Scrap's Seashore and Maritime kits.

Don't forget to stop back here on the 28th for the blog hop. In the meantime, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

A blog hop and a little blog candy to go with it

2011-01-15T20:44:00.000-08:00

I've been invited to participate in my very first blog hop. I am so excited! Yolie from, JustYolie, has asked me to participate in a blog hop celebrating life's milestones. The blog hop will showcase layouts Celebrating Our Milestones. As part of the blog hop I will share a mini-album I've been working on. The mini-album celebrates one of life's greatest milestones -- the birth of a child. So be sure to mark your calendar and join me back here on January 28th.

Repurposing a jewelry armoire

2010-12-27T10:02:00.000-08:00

As a Christmas present this year DH bought me a jewelry armoire. The cool thing about this armoire is that it can be wall mounted or hung over the door. My intention for this piece is to organize my jewelry . . . however it can easily be used in any craft room.

Perhaps your guest bedroom doubles as your craft space. If so, this organizer can easily serve a dual purpose in that room. The inside would house some of your craft goodies but when closed the front of the armoire has a full length mirrors for your guests to use. For those of you who sew, this dual functionality may also be an attractive feature for your space.

While hubby did not purchase my armoire from HSN I am providing a link to their site because they have the best photos and videos of the armoire.

So what craft related goodies did you get for Christmas? I received two new Slice cartridges and a $100 gift certificate to Ben Franklin. Jackpot!

Yoli

Feliz Navidad

2010-12-24T08:11:00.000-08:00

This is the time of year that many of us become nostalgic about Christmas gone by. I am no exception. As such I am sharing with you a painting (name of original painter unknown) which depicts country folks/farmers (or as we know them on the island, jibaritos) celebrating a traditional Puerto Rican Christmas. The photo shows the jibaritos singing Christmas songs, with traditional instruments (most likely a classic guitar and a cuatro) right outside of a small, wooden house. I could just about smell the roasted pig . . . YUM! The picture probably depicts a traditional Christmas celebration around the turn of the 20th Century. However, many of these customs are still celebrated in much the same way on the island today.

No matter how or where you celebrate this holiday season I wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas and happy holiday season. My wish for you in this upcoming year is that enjoy a happy, healthy, prosperous new year. . . full of lots and lots of crafting!

Deseandoles a todos una Feliz Navidad y un prospero ano nuevo!

Yoli

Free Christmas Subway art

2010-12-21T11:02:00.000-08:00

I created this darling little vignette in my entryway using a free printable subway art. Could you believe that is a photo of my baby boy when he was just 11 months old. Come this January we will celebrate his 7th birthday! My how time flies.

I always try to give credit to the original artist who inspired any of my work. I'm afraid this time I failed to jot down the name of the blog from where I copied this print. So if anyone knows the artist please let me know.

So while I search for that site I wanted to share with you a few links to a couple sites that offer printable Christmas subway artwork . . . many of them free of charge.

Eighteen25

Tip Junkie

So Much Ado

Craftily Ever After

A Little Lovely Blog

If you prefer, you could always create your own subway art. Here is a tutorial from Tatertots and Jello. Or try using Worldle to achieve the same results. Regardless on how you do it, be sure to post a pic and share a link with us.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

CIU finial -- Christmas theme

2010-12-18T19:35:00.000-08:00

This is one of the first, of what I hope to be several, decorative finials for my homemade Clip-it-Up (CIU). For the Christmas themed finial however I cheated. :-) I could not resist buying this cute little house and tree at World Market.

In order to display my house on the CIU tree I needed a base. So I purchased a round styrofoam in the floral department at Michael's. I used good old cotton balls to cover the styrofoam with some snow. Sprinkled snow flakes to make it glitter and added a snowman at DS's insistence.
The snowman is almost as big as the house but it made DS happy to be able to contribute one of his toys to my project. Lastly, I used the ruffled ribbon from Pink Paislee's Anthology collection as a skirt around the styrofoam. Absolutely love that entire collection. My next project is a necklace using the flowers from the very same collection. Stay tuned.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . .

2010-12-07T18:10:00.000-08:00

Capturing the holiday lights is a photography skill that I have yet to master. Nonetheless I am pretty pleased at how these pictures turned out. Once again I used my Nikkor 50mm 1:14D lens with the camera set on P mode and an ISO of 1600. Hope you enjoy.

Christmas Tree
As you can see from this photo . . . I still need to find a skirt for the tree. :-)

Fireplace
I love the decor over my fireplace. This photo is a little darker than I would like. :-( Still trying to find the right angle on the external flash so that the overhead light on the fireplace doesn't cast a shadow or the flash doesn't wash out the picture all together. :-( Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

The idea of adding a wreath in front of the mirror was inspired by the gal over at In My Own Style. I originally learned of her blog because her mantel was posted PK's blog, Room Remix. Both of these ladies have some INCREDIBLE decorating idea. Go take a peek. You will not be disappointed.

Tray
I previously posted a picture of this little vignette I created. Since then I exchange the frame for a mirror and viola! Luv the additional elegance the mirror adds.

Ornaments

In addition to hanging ornaments on the tree this year I am displaying the ornaments in various clear glass or apothecary jars. For this particular display I sprinkled the ornaments with a little snow for an added touch of whimsy. The little angel I purchased at a flower shop but can easily be duplicated . . . a Cricut image . . . a little glitter and you've got an instant angel.

Well this is all for now. As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Christmas decorations

2010-12-02T23:26:00.000-08:00

I generally decorate two Christmas trees; one real & one artificial. The real tree is generally adorned with burnt orange/sienna & gold colored ornaments. Our second tree, the artificial tree, is generally decorated with ornaments inspired by the beautiful colors of Hanukkah. This year I decided not to buy a real tree and to mix ornaments from both trees.

So although I am still trying to decorate the Christmas tree I wanted to share with you this little tray I made today. The tray, which is actually a picture frame, was inspired by the gal over at House of Smiths. When you visit her blog be sure to check out her pantry. It is simply unbelievable!

I am pleased with how the 'tray' is turning out. I am also pleased to have captured a rather nice photo of the tray without the use of natural light. I used my Nikkor 50mm 1:14D lens with the camera set on P mode and an ISO of 1600. By George I think she's finally got it! LOL.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The blog candy winner and a spoiler

2010-11-27T08:25:00.000-08:00

Congrats Christy your guess was about $7 shy of what I actually spent. My grand total was $117.10. I realize it is hard to tell from the photo but I purchased 3 full kits ($18-$20 a piece), several boxes of chipboard from Tattered Angels at $5 a piece, a whole lot of goodies from $1 store and a few goodies that were free. Christy please email me your home address.

Thank you ladies for playing along. Ya'll come back now y'hear. Sorry . . . it happens every time I watch Paula Deen. :-) Nonetheless, I will be posting my first video of this darling mini album I am completing for my friend who recently had a baby girl. Here is a just a little peek.
As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Blog candy . . . with a little twist. :-)

2010-11-17T12:51:00.000-08:00

So here is a picture of the stash of goodies I purchased at CKC. Now you know why I was dragging that bag around by the end of the show. LOL.

Can you guess how much I spent? I thought it would be fun to offer a some blog candy with a little twist. Got the idea from another blog friend, Yolie, who is also offering some blog candy on her site.

To qualify to win the blog candy all you have to do is post a comment on my blog telling me how much you think I spent on these goodies at CKC. The person who comes the closest to the actual amount spent will win the treats pictured below. You have until the end of day next Friday (Black Friday) to post. I will announce the winner the weekend right after Thanksgiving.

Happy guessing!

Yoli

Creating Keepsakes Convention . . . oh my!!

2010-11-13T19:49:00.000-08:00

It's that time again boys and girls . . . CKC is in town! So roll up your sleeves . . . loosen the wallet and enjoy the ride!

I've enjoyed attending this convention for a number of years now. I look forward to it all year. However, this year some vendors were noticeably absent and there were a couple of empty areas where there should have been a booth. :-( Despite these obstacles I did manage to grab a few things. LOL

So for those of you who were unable to make it to one of these shows here is a pictorial highlight of some of my favorites projects.

First, Crafty Secrets. I luv, luv, luv her stuff! Luv the vintage, retro, botanical, aviary themed creative scraps she manufactures. Her booth is always one of the best at the convention . . . full of some many wonderful ideas. The owner, Sandy, is very warm and friendly. Its no wonder I always drop a dime, or two, at her booth. So there I am hob-knobbing with Sandy.

But here are the pictures you really want to see. These are photos of some of my favorite projects she displayed at her booth.

Another one of my favorite booths at the show was The Button Farm. OMG . . . they had some of THE most Fabulous albums at the show! This Christmas beauty retailed for $60 (album & stand). It was a little pricey for me so I did not buy one. But those albums sold out nonetheless!
And this little beauty to my right was another one of their projects. The album is from Tattered Angels but the paper is from Graphic 45. You know the best part of this project? I already have all the supplies. Yeah!

For the first time this year I enrolled in a class where I got to make a project. The album was designed by Heidi Swap for Tattered Angels. This is a photo of what my album should look like once I'm done. We did not have enough time in class to finish the project. Photo btw is courtesy of heidiswapp.typepad.com.

Lastly there is a picture of me . . . dragging my bag because its so heavy . . . finally heading home.

As always, thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Journaling

2010-11-02T18:15:00.000-07:00

I'm a chronological scrapbooker and I'm currently designing LOs for events that happened in the Summer of 2007. :-( As you can see, I'm just a little behind on my scrappin'. In an effort to remember what happened at the time of the event I've come up with a system. Here are a few ideas that may be helpful to you.

1. I often find myself emailing the family a story . . . generally about something funny my son did. If that is the case then I keep an electronic copy of the email thread in a separate folder named appropriate enough after my son.

2. If I don't email the family about the event I email myself the story and transfer the email to the folder. I have just started to transfer the email thread to a word doc. I'll keep the word doc with the appropriate digital photos. So when I'm ready to scrap the event I'll have both the pictures as well as the story behind the photos all together in one folder.

3. My SIL does something similar when she travels. She may email the family about the sites she visited that particular day. Then when she gets home she has ready-made journaling.

4. On Saturday my SIL is departing for a wk long trip to Rome. Lucky girl! This time instead of just emailing the family she wants to send herself postcards of the trip. In this way the journaling is done and she has an authentic stamp from the country she is visiting. Very clever if you ask me.

So . . . how do you remember to journal events from the past?

Yoli

Finial for my Clip-it-Up

2010-11-01T09:30:00.000-07:00

When I made my Clip-it-Up I purposely left some of the threaded rod exposed at the top of the tree. My original intention was to add a decorative curtain rod finial. However I decided it would be much more fun to create my own decorative topping rather than to using a traditional finial.

As you can imagine, my head is spinning with so many ideas. The plan is to change the topping with the seasons/holidays. For now, the first of such finials/topping is the little cake I made the other day. It's just too stinkin' cute don't you think? LOL

As you can see from this picture, I've added a few more items to the tree. Items such as my embossing folders and a few large Sizzix Tim Holtz's dies I have in my collection. Unfortunately, I've run out of clips. If you own a Clip-it-Up I would love to hear what you are using for clips. I've used some of the Clip-it-Up clips. I've seen others use paper clips and shower curtain rings. What are you using?

As we remember today, on El Dia de los Muertos, all our loved ones who have passed away I leave you with this picture. This art piece was created by the kids at our local community center using rice, beans and chiles. Pretty awesome if you ask me.

As always . . . thanks for stopping by.

Yoli

Homemade clip-it-up

2010-10-31T08:31:00.001-07:00

I am so excited to finally own a clip-it-up. I absolutely loved the floor model by Simply Renee but could not justify the cost. Inspired by Sharyn Carlson's Clip-it-Up I decided to make my own.

I owe such a debt of thanks to Ryan from our local Ace Hardware store. He was such a trooper. I came in the store armed with a video and a vision and he helped me make it a reality. That was EXCEPTIONAL customer service!!!

How did I . . . oops I should say we since Ryan was an integral part of this project . . . do it? I've attached the video that provided the original instructions. However rather than using PVC piping I purchased a halogen lamp ($15), an idea I found during my research. We cut out the electrical cord and modified the base to make sure it was sturdy but otherwise we followed the instructions on the video.

I was able to find two of the lamp shades at a local thrift store. One was $7 the other smaller one was free. Yeah! The bottom shade I purchased at Target for $15. I made a 'mistake' when I purchase the bottom shade. I did not realize it had metal connectors between the top and bottom ring. However, this may be a blessing in disguise since I have 4 tiers to my clip it up rather than three. I'll live with it for awhile and see if it works.

I am using my clip-it-up to organize my acrylic stamps, embossing folders and possibly my Cricut cartridges on it. I've run out of clips so my clip-it-up is looking a little sparce but overall I am just delighted with this project. Now all I need is a few more clips and a finial for a decorative touch.

Final tally:
$15 -- lamp
$7 -- shade from thrift store. Top rung was free
$14--bottom shade from Target
$8--estimate for 40 Clip-it-Up clips
$8--threaded rod
$3--estimate for washers, nuts and the like

$55 TOTAL. A savings of almost $140! PRICELESS!!!

Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

15 Minute Project: card holder

2010-10-27T09:25:00.001-07:00

While I was cleaning up my sb room I found a small box of handmade Christmas card. These days I only make my own cards for Christmas so I don't have that many. However, I still wanted to find a way of displaying them in the room.

I found this flip up album I wasn't using and put the Christmas cards in the sleeves instead of photos. Now inspiration is never too far away. LOL

Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The closet -- Part I cleaning up

2010-10-26T11:49:00.000-07:00

BEFORE
In order to finally organize the closet in my sb room I needed to start by cleaning up the surrounding area. In a prior post I showed you the condition of the room. There was so much crap on the floor you could not safely navigate from the island to the closet.

So this is before.

THIS IS AFTER
Do you hear angels singing? I know I do. :-) All joking aside I was able to find a new 'home' for everything on the floor. I did this by placing three boxes in the hall; (1)docs to shred, (2) sb goodies to be donated, and (3) old photos to be organized. What did not fit into any of those categories my old friend Hefty Bag took care of the rest. :-) What is most amazing about this project was the fact that I did this all over the course of a weekend working a few minutes here and there.

Closet Part II: Finally organizing the closet

So now that I've cleaned the floor . . . sketched the closet layout . . . and called the handyman . . . its time to finally tackle the closet. If you don't hear from me over the course of the next few weeks . . . call 911. LOL

Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Fabulous cake pin cushion

2010-10-17T19:08:00.000-07:00

This little pin cushion is almost as beautiful as it is easy to make. The minute I saw the video on DIY Dish I knew I had to make one.

I've embedded their video so you can see just how easy it is to make. To get beyond the initial chatter and right to the instructions you will have to fast forward the video to about 5:33.

For my little pin cushion I used both felt & fabric. The bottom layer is made with a scrumptious chocolate felt from Club Scrap's Academy kit. It's hard to tell from this picture but the felt has a flourished embossed pattern that is just divine!

For the top cake I used fabric on just the outside layer but felt on the inside. Now . . . what's a cake without a little sprinkle? To create this effect I used enameled straight pins. I then finished the top of the cake with a little flower made from the same pleated ribbon that adorns the bottom of the cake.

If you make one of these beauties be sure to send me a link to your blog or email me a photo. Until next time . . . thanks for stopping by

Yoli

15 minute Friday . . .

2010-10-08T06:00:00.000-07:00

This project got a little more involved than I expected. But I am happy to report that it is done! I did end up keeping my metal embellishments and tools in the desktop organizer. I used Crate Paper to provide a decorative element to the front of the drawers. I then created labels, using some chic hardware from SU, to identify the contents of the larger drawers.
During this process I discovered that regular Scrap Rack page inserts were not well suited for metal embellishments. Scrap Rack does sell insert sheets for chunky embellishments but I did not want to spend any money. So I kept the metal embellishments in the drawer and transferred the flat embellishments to the SR. I did however have to re-organize the spindles in order to fit the new embellishments into the Scrap Rack.

At this point I'm on a roll so I decided to get rid of my Pampered Chef tool caddy. I know what you are thinking . . . "OMG she didn't" . . . but I did! I separated the pens & hobby knives I use most often and stored them in a desktop organizer I have on the island. The rest of the pens are now stored in a drawer. I never fully utilized the caddy so I doubt I'll miss it but let's see what happens.

Stay tuned until next time . . . same bat time . . . same bat channel

Yoli

15 Minute Project: re-organizing my embellishments

2010-10-03T10:13:00.001-07:00

The fate of this little bin is still undecided as I am currently purging and re-organizing its contents. The bin sits on one of one main scrapbooking tables so its taking up valuable real estate. Before purchasing my Scrap Rack this is where I kept the chunky embellishments.

I am now organizing most of the embellishments from the drawers into my Scrap Rack. I may keep my metal embellishments and assorted tools in the bin but that is yet to be decided.

While I decide what to do with my little drawer/bin organizer I was wondering . . . what do you organize in these plastic bins? I would appreciate different ideas on how you use these drawers in your sb room. If I cannot use it I could always give it to the boys for their Lego room. :-)

Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

Cricut Cheat Sheets and labels

2010-09-26T09:09:00.000-07:00

This morning I spent too much time carefully examining every freaking Cricut cartridges I own looking for a particular image. After nearly 20 minutes I finally realized the die cut I was looking for was from a Slice cartridge instead of a Cricut.Two good things came out of this experience. First, I joined a Yahoo group that provide cheat sheets of the Cricut cartridges images. The group, Circut Cheat Sheet, allows you to download the sheets so you can create an index file if you wish. The electronic version of the index file can be found Cricut Search.

After finally finding the right die cutter I was able to make these cute labels for the side of my scrapbook album. I used the Spooky Alley cartridge from my Slice machine to make the labels. I embellished the labels by adding a few pearls along with an accent to represent the seasons.
Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli

The many faces of you

2010-09-18T14:23:00.000-07:00

Although my scrapbook room is still a mess I've actually managed to carve sometime to do a little scrapin'. One of the most recent LOs I completed is dedicated to my SIL and the some of the things she loves to do. Like me is a scrapbook aficionado and quite the shutter bug which is just a few of the reasons we get along so well. :-)

This was the perfect opportunity to use some of the papers from BoBunny's Mamma Razzi's collection. Luv the whole collection of course since its dedicated to the photography nut in all of us. LOL. For the guitar die cut and wings I used Cricut's Indie Art cartridge. Lastly, to give me more space on the page I tucked the journaling tag underneath the main picture. TFL!

Yoli

The good . . . the bad . . . and the ugly!

2010-08-07T20:25:00.000-07:00

THE GOOD NEWS:
I read a street billboard that said something like, "The anticipation of knowing you have to wait makes you anxious and increases your perceived wait time". I guess that's what happened to me. Busy schedule aside,my perception was that it would take a long time to clean up the mess. As a result, the room has been messy for months! Reality: I'm happy to report that all three of the work surfaces in my sb room are now clean!!! And I did it all in just one afternoon. :-)

In addition to having a clean space I was delighted to have found a few treasures. One such treasure was a set of UMs I purchased back in May!! So I trimmed the rubber . . . treated it . . . created images for the index file and stored each of the UMs in a CD case! I also finally assembled the stool hubby purchased for me as my Mother's Day gift! See photo above.
Oh wait . . . there is more! Also back in May I ordered 3 new Cricut cartridges. Until today the cartridges were unopened in their original shipping box! Sigh!! They are now organized in one of those generic Cricut storage boxes.

THE BAD NEWS:
As you can see in this next photo, I was only able to clear out one side of the room. :-( However, this side of the room is cluttered with mainly with things like my old school text books, files, and camera equipment . . . none of which should be on the floor! So I am looking for a new file cabinet to organize the docs. In the meantime, I have to find a safe home for my camera equipment and begin organizing the embellishments from the drawer, which BTW is FULL, in my Scrap Rack.

For now . . . I'm savoring my little victory over part of the mess in that room! :-)

Thanks for stopping by.

Yoli

2010-07-13T08:56:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time since I've had a chance to blog and even longer time since I've had time to be crafty. :-( As my darling SIL likes to say, "life just gets in the way some times". LOL.

The good news is things have settled a bit . . . for now . . . so its time to get back to doing something I love . . . scrapbooking. However, I have one little problem . . . my room is such a mess that I'm barely able to enter the space let alone craft! In the past few months the room has served as the family's dumping ground. I have important personal papers that need to be filed . . . expensive photography equipment that should be stored . . . projects that need to be finished . . . and a crap load of embellishments and papers that need to be organized.

If your messy room is preventing you from being crafty . . . join us at the Scrapbooking Room Yahoo group for this month's challenge. My personal goal is mainly to clean up and put things away. At this time I'm not going to re-organize any of the items but instead focus on putting things back in their place.

Don't let the magnitude of the challenge discourage you from join us. Break down the task. I'm going to dedicate at least 15 minutes a day to the clean up effort. Perhaps you could focus on that box that has been sitting on the floor starring at you. Yup . . . I'm talking to you. :-) Perhaps you have papers . . . embellishment . . . stamps you recently purchased that need to be put away. No that was not meant for you. You would NEVER do that, eh? LOL

Whatever the personal challenge you decide to set for your room . . . join us. Tell us your area of concentration and send before and after pics. Your among friends who understand so its ok to share with us. :-)

Look forward to having you join us in this challenge.

Yoli

SPOILER: Girly banner

2010-04-15T06:44:00.000-07:00

I completed this cute little banner for yet another swap. This thing is dripping in girliness and I luv it!

For the skirt I used a few flower petals from Pataloo's Color Me Crazy collection. These flowers are meant to be altered. I sprayed a little Tattered Angels on mine and distressed the edges with an ink pad. The chandelier is from Cricut's Home Decor cartridge and the glitter is from Martha. Had some problems with the glitter though. I used Martha's glitter glue but it wasn't sufficient to keep the glitter on. I had read somewhere that spraying hair spray afterwards would keep the glitter from getting everywhere. Tried it. Didn't work. So if you have any advice in this area your feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for stopping by.

Yoli

Happy Easter!

2010-04-03T08:13:00.000-07:00

My son and I recently enjoyed a whole afternoon together listening to music while coloring our Easter eggs. The simple joys of life! Wishing you and your family the gift of time so that you may enjoy the simple pleasures of life. Happy Easter!

Yoli

SPOILER: Altered dress form

2010-03-30T22:11:00.000-07:00

The inspiration for this beautiful altered dress form came from Stacy Cohen. Her art was featured in the Dec/Jan issue of Simply Handmade magazine. As soon as I saw it I knew I wanted to make one for a swap . . . not to mention one for me. :-)

I love the details of this dress form. The bodice is made of red sequin and beads. The skirt on the other hand is made of beautiful papers & ribbons adorned by Stickles finished by a bling studded belt buckle. Just luv it!

I would estimate that the bodice alone took me 2-3 hrs to complete. The problem was that the opening of the bead was larger than the pin head. So in order to insure the beads did not fall off I used a TON of Crystal Effects (CE). I dabbed a bit of CE . . . placed a sequin . . . dabbed more CE on top of the sequin . . . placed bead and pin with one last dab of CE for good measure! You can see why it took me so long. However, once I got a rhythm things naturally sped up. The skirt on the other hand was easy as pie. :-)

Supplies:
*body forms by Dylite. Purchased on eBay.
*Red sequin, beads and size 8 (1/2") straight pins
*Crystal Effects
*papers and ribbon from my stash.

TFL and thanks for stopping by!

Yoli

15 minute Friday . . .

2010-03-21T09:24:00.000-07:00

on Sunday! I know. :-( I set the wrong date for this to post. I thought Friday was March 21st. Mommy moment I suppose! :-(

Original post:
A few weeks ago I was working on a LO about a visit to our local aquarium. After selecting my photos I went to the Scrap Rack (SR) to see what embellishments I had that could be used for this LO. To my surprise there wasn't much there with an aquarium type theme. So I went to my LSS and purchased a few things.

PROBLEM:
A week or so afterwards I was going through my stash of papers and found not one but TWO kits with an aquatic theme!! In addition to the paper the kits have flat embellishments that would have worked out nicely on my aquarium LOs. ARGH!

SOLUTION:
First, I'm going through the paper stash again. I have been breaking out my kits for a little while now. Obviously I missed one or two. :-)

Secondly, I am leveraging my SR & adding at least one 12x12 sheet in hopes that it will jog my memory. For example, I just recently purchased some gorgeous papers & stickers from Bo-Bunny's Mamma-Razzi collection. If you are live with a camera glued to your hand, as I do, these are MUST have papers. But anyways . . . I digress. Back to my story . . . afraid that I would forget I had the papers I have created a new sub-category. Under the travel section in my SR I created a tab for any embellishments that have to do with photography. Just in case the sticker sheet isn't sufficient to remind me of the accompanying papers, I added one 12x12 Mamma-Razzi sheet to the SR.

For the aquatic themed kits, I separated the flat embellishments from the kit and stored the tags under the summer section in my SR. I considered creating a new category in my SR just for animals. However, the papers have a beach/aquatic theme which of course immediately reminds me of summer.

If your papers are not organized in the same way your flat embellishments are organized, you may want to put a little note with the embellishments reminding you where the paper is stored.

Well . . . this is it for today. Hope you find this information helpful. Thanks for stopping by.

Yoli

My wish list gets bigger and bigger . . .

2010-03-19T21:12:00.001-07:00

I thought I read somewhere that Provo Craft is scheduled to release 100 cartridges this year! If true, I am delighted to finally have so many beautiful new cartridges available. Of the new releases, here are a few of my 'MUST HAVE' cartridges.

Serenade.* Scheduled to be released mid-April. Luv the bird cages!

Summer Vacation.* Scheduled to be released mid-April. So many wonderful uses for these images on this cartridge. I am especially in love with the gas tank and ferris wheel. How cool is that! I believe, but don't quote me, that it may also contain an image of a roller coaster. If so, that would be icing on the cake. I LOVE roller coasters!

Summer in Paris.* Also scheduled to be released in mid-April. Haven't been to Paris . . . yet . . . but don't need to in order to enjoy these dies. I luv, luv, luv the hot air balloon, the chandelier and the dress forms, of course. Did you notice it has a few 3D objects! Oh la la!

*images courtesy of Provo Craft.
Well that's it for this evening. Hope you have a great weekend. BTW . . . my Jill-e bag arrived and its FANTABULOUS!
Thanks for stopping by!

Yoli

15 minute Friday . . .

2010-03-12T19:51:00.001-08:00

For awhile now I've wanted a stash of ready to use mats but refrained from buying the 4x6 paper stacks because I did not have a dedicated place to put them. So a few weeks I found two vintage floppy holders at my MIL's house that belonged to DH. So I repurposed the floppy holder and I'm now using one of them to store my 4x6 mats. The mats are organized by the colors of the rainbow (pink, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Violet, brown, black, gray, white)but I kept the Autumn & Christmas stacks together.

I'm looking forward to flipping through the file and easily finding the mat I need for my LO. Easy, breezy, beautiful cover girl! LOL

Thanks for stopping by. Have a fabulous weekend!

Yoli

Alice in Wonderland fever . . .

2010-03-09T18:26:00.000-08:00

Alice is everywhere . . . in magazines . . . in scrapbook stores . . . at the movie theater . . . and even featured in a few blogs. So I was not surprised when I caught the Alice in Wonderland bug. Inspired by Rinda's artwork and a card by Carol Myrick, which is featured in the March/April issue of Somerset Studio, I created this little banner.

The banner was made almost entirely out of scrap paper! I also used pop-dots, ribbon, bling and watercolor pencils to give the piece depth and dimension. Unfortunately it's a little difficult to see the dimension by just looking at the photos. It was fun and easy project to make though.

Supplies:
*rabbit image from TJ designs
*ephemera (Ayer's American Almanac) from 7 Gypsies
*ribbon from SU
*keyhole from Melissa Frances

Thanks for stopping by.

Yoli
ps/You are not seeing things. The keyhole was added after the first 2 photos were taken. After reviewing the photos I decided the banner 'needed' a keyhole. What's Alice in Wonderland without a keyhole featured somewhere. :-)

Happy freaking birthday to me . . .

2010-03-05T12:04:00.000-08:00

The sun is shinning . . . the windows are open . . . the salsa music is playing . . . DH is at work . . . DS at school and I'm in my scrapbook room spending all the money I received for my birthday!!! It's a good day. :-)

So check out one of the purchases I made with my birthday money. I am now the proud owner of Jill-e camera bag. A much coveted item!

I debated for little awhile whether to purchase the small or medium size bag. I finally settled on the small one since I mainly wanted a stylish camera bag for dressier occasions. On those occasions I am more likely to just need the camera, 1-2 lens and the flash which will all fit nicely in this bag.

Ohhhhhhhhhh . . . can't wait to get my birthday present! In the meantime, I've got more money to spend!:-)

Have a fabulous weekend!

Yoli

Taking my camera off auto mode . . .

2010-02-21T20:42:00.000-08:00

I am happy to report that I am FINALLY taking a few photography courses and learning how to take my Nikon D50 off the green button. Yeah! One of the first things we discussed last week in class were the different semi-automatic modes commonly found on D-SLR cameras.

(photo courtesy of Nikon)
P: Program mode offers partial control over shutter speed and aperture.
S: Shutter priority controls the shutter speed, and aperture is calculated by the camera.
Av or A: Aperture priority controls the aperture, and the shutter is calculated by the camera.
M: Manual mode controls shutter speed and aperture independently.
(info courtesy of Wikipedia)
Our homework assignment for this week . . . take a few photos on program mode and compare them to auto mode.

This photo was taken inside a library at our local university. The first photo was taken on auto mode. Although the flash automatically pops-up in this setting the onboard flash is not sufficient to light up the stairwell.

This next photo was taken by setting the dial mode to program. In this setting the onboard flash does not automatically pop-up. Instead, the flash must be manually triggered. I took these photos around sunset with the camera set on program mode without a flash.

P mode also allowed me to capture this next shot without the flash attracting attention or disturbing the students who were studying.

Things I like about program mode. I prefer the warm glow of the stairwells captured when the camera was set on program mode than when the same photo was taken on auto mode. I love the fact that the flash is not so intrusive. Moreover, I love the fact that in program mode the camera does not automatically think I want the flash initiated based on the lighting conditions. So although in some ways program mode is similar to the green button, in P-mode the photographer gains control over such features as the flash, ISO and white balance.
I hope you find this information helpful. Moreover, I hope it encourages you to go out and take your camera off the auto mode.
Thanks for stopping by . . .

Yoli