Cruising

Ahh...Scrapbooking. I so love scrapbooking and during the summer I have more time to play with pages :) It's been hard to find the time the last few months to just scrap for fun but now that school is out I'll have some free time to be creative.

Lucky me, Mel decided that she needed a Creative Team again and she asked me to join. Woo Hoo. I love Mel, she's a wedding photographer too. Her first kit is called Cruising and it was perfect for me. I have folders and folders of digital files from the cruises we have taken. If you scrapbook and you need a vacation kit that not too kid oriented, which is what I always need, this one is fabulous. Check it out at My Memories and check out Mel's blog for a freebie :)

Breleigh smiles!

Last night we had a break-through. Breleigh smiled for her photos :) I've been photographing her for four years at Christmas and she's never smiled. She's smiled for her bluebonnet photos in the spring and she smiles whenever I see her but for some reason in holiday photos...never. But this year...Mommy was smart. She brought the dog. Breleigh loves Alex and so we got lots of great smiles :) I'm smiling too!

I love this one where Alex is looking away.

 They are so cute!

 The whole family :)

 So Breleigh was all about modeling for me this time. We jumped and I climbed on a chair and Breleigh even suggested some poses for us. Awesome! She's definitely a cutie!

 I made a scrapbook page from on eof her photos using a kit by Lacey Bittner Designs. The kit is called Cozy Christmas and I just loved the colors and peppermint striped paper and oh yeah...I love this photo of Breleigh SMILING!

Scrapbook Page

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month so Lacey Bittner Designs and Designer Girl Scraps made a collab kit called Think Pink. I just happened to have the perfect photos of Kenzie to scrap with this kit so here is what I did to showcase the photos with this perfect for them kit. If you know Kenzie you know she has a Guardian Angel who passed away from Breast Cancer before she was born. I was lucky enough to meet Kenzie's grandma and I know what an amazing woman she was. Love these photos, love this kit, love this family.

Baby scrapbook page

So today I was just posting my scrapbook pages in the galleries I post in when I noticed the home page at Plain Digital Wrapper. My layout was there. I won layout of the week! How cool is that? I'm on the creative team for Artgal Style and I made this layout last week.

 Here it is a little bigger :) The photo was from a newborn session I did in July and the kit is called Georgia Moon. I loved all the cardboard pieces in this kit and it really let me show off Hayden and his new baby brother, Logan.

If you want to book a sweet newborn session or you are interested in having some custom scrapbook pages made, contact me.

Scrapbooking Sale

So I've been so lucky to be on the Creative teams for the Scrap That Idea designers for the last nine months or so and I've loved every minute of it. Unfortunately for me they are retiring and closing their store but fortunately for you they are putting everything in the store on sale until they close for good. I'm terribly sad to see some of the best designers in the business go but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they'll get bored with retirement and come back ;)

Mel started it all by giving me a kit in an RAK. I sent her the layout I made and she asked me to join her CT. Her designs are lovely and you should pick them up while they are on sale. My personal favorite kit is Mama Bear. Here's a layout I made with it.

Then there's Vicki who asked me to be on her CT after Mel took a break to shoot wedding photos, I love that Mel's also a wedding photographer like me, and I'm so happy Vicki asked me to be on her CT while Mel was out shooting and asked me to stay even after Mel came back. I've always loved Vicki's designs. I downloaded them all when she released them a little at a time as freebies on her A Work in Progress Blog and I have always been impressed. You should get some of her kits while they are on sale. Soon they will be gone forever.

 I love her kit Blooming Garden and here is a page made with it. Love my puppy, Vicki has two puppies too and I use so many of her kits to scrap photos of Miss Annie because they just seem to "fit"

Then Stacey asked me to join her team. She has so many gorgeous hand drawn doodles in her kits. If you like doodles then you definitely need some of Stacey's kits. She lives in Texas too so we have lots in common. If only she had done a bluebonnet themed kit before she retired. Sigh.

I made this page using her Welcome Spring Kit. Love it.

Sara had a CT call a few months ago so I've been on her team the shortest amount if time but she's super talented and from Australia. It's so cool that I got to meet and interact with scrappers from all over the globe at Scrap That Idea. Mel's in South Africa, Vicki in in England, Sara is in Australia and Stacey's in Texas. So cool. I made this page using Sara's Superstar kit and one of her templates. You know I love Stars!

And this is a page from Cullen and Jo's wedding using her Early Bird kit.

Finally there's Laramie. She's Artgal Style and she was always nice enough to let members of everyone else's CT scrap layouts with her kits. This is her most recent kit called Fly Ladybug with some of the first photos I shot in the new studio on it. Love my favorite little models and I love Laramie's kits.

Thanks to all the designers for letting me be a part of a great online community and thanks for sharing your amazing talents with me. I'll miss Scrap That Idea. It's all on sale...go get it now.

Scrapbook pages

It's been a busy week but I still found a little time to scrapbook. Always :)

This is Breleigh and Lily running through the bluebonnets. I love these photos and I scrapped them with the April Collab Kit Easter Bunny from Scrap That Idea. That crumpled purple paper is so pretty with the flowers.

 This one is me and my puppy. Annie V. Wiggle. I used Sweet Blossom Designs I Love my Dog kit. I love the word art in this one.

Scrapbooking

It's spring Break and you know what that means...SCRAPBOOKING! Actually it means working on my new website and buying furniture and samples for my new studio, but in my downtime to relax I'm working on a few scrapbook pages.

By the way, have you seen my new website redesign...that's what I was really working on all weekend. It's slick. I love it. There's all kinds of sliding photos and a redirect so that if you are on an iPad you get an HTML site without the Flash. It even has a separate redirect on it that will send you to my cool mobile site if you are on an iPhone. Let me just say, I sat in my chair for like 20 hours over the weekend editing and uploading photos. Whew! It's finally up...go check it out.

Last month I went to Las Vegas to get inspired at WPPI. IT was a fantastic photography conference, I learned a lot and I used my new iPhone and the Hipstamatic app to take all my photos. It seems crazy that a photographer would go on a vacation without a "camera," but I wanted to travel light and force myself out of my 35mm SLR comfort zone.

So this is the page I came up with. The background is two photos sandwiched together. One is of the hotel taken from the conference center while waiting an a very long line to get into a class and the other is a photo of the painted wall in the hallway between the MGM Grand and the Conference Center. I love those swirls :) Then I saved some stuff from the trip, the folder my room keys were in, the Mardi Gras mask and medallion from the Canon party, and the wooden and plastic toothpicks that were in the burgers I ate. I scanned all that stuff when I got home along with my name badge. When I started putting my page together I decided it needed a little something si I went into my embellishment stash and pulled out the Clear Tabs and Staples by Gunhild Storeide and the Glitter Smears from Uptown Girl Collab by A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki. Viola! I like it. It takes a lot longer than using a coordinated kit, believe me but the whole page is totally my creation and I love it.

This one is a few more Hipstamatic photos from the first day I had my new iPhone. I used Happy Days, the new kit from A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki. It was perfect for these photos don't you think?

Finally Mel came out with a new kit this week called Spice. It's full of reds and oranges and made me remember that I had never scrapped the family portraits I took for my brother's family last fall. Cute, huh? I love those little girls!

Scrapbook Pages

Here are a few of my recent scrapbook pages. I so love these kits from Scrap That Idea. Super cute.

First is a page from my second cousin's wedding. It rained on her wedding day so Vicki's new kit Cloudy Day was perfect for it. If you follow my blog you've probably seen the kiss under the umbrella photo before, if not, you can see all of Glynnis and Tim's wedding photos with the umbrellas here.

These photos are from last weekend at WPPI in Las Vegas. I totally don't gamble but I was there for the Wedding and Portrait photographers convention so of course I took some photos of the sparkly lights at the casino. Who can resist sparkly lights? Not me! These are actually photos from the Hipstamatic app on my new iPhone. So much fun. The kit is a Scrap That Idea Collab called Four Leaf Clover. Hmmm....maybe I should have scrapped all my silly superstitions. ;)

Finally is my current favorite photo. I took this sunday of Briana at her sister's soccer game. She's such a beautiful little girl and really she is my sunshine. Love that little kid she makes me happy. This is another Scrap That Idea Collab called What Spring Brings.

http://www.scrapthatidea.com/xcart/product.php?productid=18145

Scrapbooked Recently

I've been motoring through some scrapbook pages since I've had a little downtime.

Here's a page I created from Taylor and Clint's Wedding. I used a new kit by Stacey's Scraps called Always and Forever. I like the textures in her papers so when I use her kits I tend to blend a big photo into the paper for a unique background. 

This is one from last year's Giving Gallery. My students pick their best photos from the year and we mount them and show them off in a gallery space for one evening and hold a silent auction. The "Giving" part of the Gallery is that they donate all the proceeds from the silent auction to charity. It makes me proud to see my students all dressed up and showing off their talents but it makes my heart really smile to see them donate all the money they make :) Love my students! This page is made using a kit called A Day in the Life by Artgal Style.

Finally Vicki released a new kit last Friday called Boys will be Boys. I've had these photos of Gregg and his photographer buddies sitting on my hard drive for almost 2 years, just waiting to be scrapped. I liked the colors in this kit...the green made me think of Key Lime pie and since they went to Key West, well I just went with it. I like how it turned out. Silly like the boys.

I also made a page using the same kit showing of Annie's little bat ears. Love my puppy.

Snow Days = Scrapbooking!

This week has been crazy. The ice storm shut down school for four days. No I don't live in the northeast. I live in TEXAS! Not that I'm complaining about a 4 day vacation form school but it's just not supposed to be like this here :)

Anyway, since I had tons of time on my hands I caught up on lots of scrapbooking. Bonus! I created several digital pages but I also had the time to finish up a lot of traditional cut and paste pages that I had on my plate from before I went all digital. It was kind of nice to get out the trimmer, the corner rounded and the e-xacto knife again. All in all I think I did about 25 pages in three days. Here are the digital ones.

This is a catch-up page from 2009. Yes I am that far behind. When I get a kit I just look through the millions of photos I have taken that haven't been scrapped yet and see if any of them inspire me. I love these photos of my nieces playing in the park and this kit Doodly Doo which is a Scrap That Idea Collab had the perfect colors to go with my photos.

Next is a page about Rachel's Basketball game. It's actually scrapped using a Valentine's Kit called Funky Love but her team color is Pink and the basketball really was that green color so again...perfect kit to scrap with. I had taken the photo of the floor to use as a page background but when I saw this kit I decided to use the pink and integrate the floor as a mat instead.

Last year I got to ride on a fire truck in the Parade of Lights. I'll admit...it was pretty cool. I'm not a 4 year of little boy, but seriously, who doesn't want to ride on a fire truck? The only think that might be better would be to ride on the zamboni ;) I used Vicki's new kit 911 Rescue and a few cutouts from the side of the fire truck to make it fun.

Finally, my wonderful friend Michelle asked me to come photograph her Grandparents 60th anniversary party last weekend. So sweet. The post right before this one is all about their party. I was so inspired by the photos that I had to scrap a page and Artgal Style's Be Mine kit was waiting there in a folder on me desktop for some sweet romantic photos.

 I so love scrapbooking and taking photos :) Memories are all we have.

Scrapbook Page

It's Friday and that means new scrapbook pages :) I do them during the week, and when the kits are released at Scrap That Idea I can finally post them...it's so hard to wait! You know how I love to blog about my adventures in photography and scrapping right away :)

First up is my niece's birthday party. Their birthdays are so close together they decided this year to have one big birthday party instead of two small ones. Smart kids if you ask me except for one little detail...you only get cake one day instead of two ;) But anyway, I made this page using the newest kit from A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki. It's called I {Heart} You and I absolutely love that cute alpha. Oh and I totally love event photography. I love to photograph birthday parties, anniversary parties, weddings, little league games, school carnivals etc. If you are interested in having me come photograph your event contact me.

Second is Christmas PJ's. My brother's family loves the Longhorns. Seriously LOVES the Longhorns. It scares me a little ;) So when we were all visiting my mom for the holidays they put on their matching pajamas and I took a few photos. Artgal Style just released this kit Winter Blessings where the colors worked perfectly with the photos. Woo Hoo...usually I'm changing colors to match but it was my lucky day!

Finally, speaking of LUCKY. I won Layout of the week over at Plain Digital Wrapper. I post my layouts in their gallery and they picked one of mine as the best of all the ones uploaded last week. Me? Seriously? So excited! That's my layout on their homepage, bottom right corner!

My Beautiful Nieces.

Here's a scrapbook page I made for my sweet niece. I took these photos on her birthday last year and I'm just getting around to scrapping them. I used a new set of elements by Vicki that go along with her Calendar Collection. These are the February Elements along with the Calendar Cardstocks and the Calendar Collection Alphas. It's a cool kit and by the end of the year it will be fun to collect all the parts :)

I also used the cardstocks and the Alphas to make cards for Brook and Briana's Birthdays. They fold so the top will be the back of the card and the bottom will be the front. I took their photos at Christmas.

Scrapbook Page

I was inspired to make a scrapbook page from some photos we took a few years ago making tie dye shirts. Ha! It was so messy but it was fun. I needed a little mental break from editing wedding photos :) Last night I photoshopped 250 images from my last wedding!

I used a template by Artgal Style. It was free for participating in a challenge in the Scrap That Idea Forum. I don't typically use templates but I decided this one was fun and I liked how I could make that green wave connect my photos of the finished projects. Isn;t it cool how the green looks like it flows into the grass on the top photo. I like that. The t-shirts, squeeze bottle and paint jar are cutouts from photos I took while we were tie dyeing.


The rest of the stuff:
Background papers (some the original color and some recolored): Calendar Collection Cardstocks - A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki
Paint Splats (recolored): Mother Wife - Mel Hains Designs and Retro Revival - A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki
Leaves: Happy Days - Mel Hains Designs (retired kit)
Star: Calendar Collection January Elements - A Work in Progress Designs by Vicki
Alpha: Friendly Frappe Alpha Addon (recolored) - Artgal Style
Alpha: Say Cheese Alpha (with the hearts taken off most of the letters) - Mel Hains Designs
Font :Throw My Hands Up in the Air

Scrapbook Pages

I made a scrapbook page and a few cards over my winter break as well as shooting two weddings a family portrait, a newborn session, a hockey game and two football games. Ok it was a break from school but I was still busy. I love busy. Here is my page and the cards.

This is a page from the newest Scrap That Idea Collab Kit called Reflection. I took photos of the images in my in-laws wedding album using the macro setting and natural light since I didn't take a scanner with me to visit them and made a page. I like scrapping my families old photos these days, it makes me happy.

Then my sister in-law had a birthday so I took a photo of her from our Festivis Party and made her a card using another Scrap That Idea Collab Kit called Life of the Party. It's a really cute kit with bright colors just perfect for a card. Happy Birthday Holly!

My nephew Josh also had a birthday over the break so I made a card for him using Vicki's teenager dot com kit. I made a page with this kit earlier in December but I pulled it out again to make this card. Love you Josh!

Scrapbook Page

Vicki has a new kit out today at Scrap That Idea. It's bold and bright and I had fun playing with it. This is Kyle and a page all abut him using the kit teenager dot com. Go get it here.

I also made a Birthday card using this kit. Josh's birthday is tomorrow. Happy Birthday Josh!

Laramie also has a new kit in the store today. It's called Night on the Town and I used it to scrap a page from last New Year's Eve. Jim and Kathy got married and we got to party the night away with our friends in Philly ;)

Baby, It's Cold Outside!

It's finally cold outside and it feels like winter. Vicki released a fun winter kit today called Love To Chill. I scrapped last Christmas Eve's photos with it. Yes we had a white Christmas in 2009! I'm hoping for more snow this year...that was so much fun. Annie didn't know what to think.

You can get this kit at Plain Digital Wrapper. Super cute.

Scrapbook pages

I'm loving being on these creative teams because it forces me to scrapbook :) Not that I have to be forced...I love it but it forces me to find time. I have thousands of photos on my hard drive that need to find a home! Mel Hains released two new kits last week and they are beautiful. If you like them go check them out at Gingerscaps where she is guest designing this month.

First is Happy Snaps. This kit is so perfect for me. It's all about the photographer. Thanks Mike for the photo of me on the sideline!

Next is Mother Wife and I used it to scrap some photos of my grandmother, my mother and myself. I don't think I ever saw this photo of my mother until a few years ago, and it's pretty weird and cool at the same time that we have the same pose for a portrait taken in high school. If I remember correctly she wasn't even at that photo session with me!

More Scrapbook Pages

I know I'm a year behind but hey...one year isn't too bad, right? This week I used two awesome kits designed by Vicki to scrap last years holiday festivities. She released the kits in her store at Scrap That Idea today so you can get them too.

This is last year's Christmas Tree in downtown Fort Worth and I made the page using the Jolly Christmas kit. I love this kit. It might me my favorite so far. I'm into non-traditional holiday colors this year (wait until you see my Christmas Card!) so the teal and lime green made me happy. I love the silly photos of me too. Yes my husband puts up with me ;)

Breakfast with Santa was scrapped using Christmas Time. It's a more traditional kit with reds and dark greens. I like the sloppy border paper in the kit. It rocks.

Get Jolly Christmas at Scrap That Idea here.

and get Christmas Time free when you buy Jolly Christmas. What a deal. You can buy it here too if you don't want both kits.