Challenge Layout

I did this layout as a challenge to use 6 or more photos on a page. I used just 6. If you are a member of Scrappin' Fun please do not go look at this layout until March's challenge is over...



This also makes my 22nd page for March...9 more to go to actually do a page a day!

FMX

Last night we took Spencer to see an FMX event (Freestyle Motocross). I must confess that it was mainly my idea to do this because I think it's amazing what these guys can do. Spencer has a video game like this and likes watching some of the events on TV so of course he loved it too! Here are a few pictures. They are not great, but better than nothing. I had to turn the flash off, use the "action" setting, and the burst mode. I took a ton of pictures and about a third of them actually had a rider in them! Anyway...the riders are blurry in them all because they are going so fast but you can still get the idea of the crazy tricks they are doing.

Latest creations

Wednesday night I was on a roll... I created one 12"x12" layout and 10 cards! I was so excited. I was able to use up a lot of little random things from convention make-n-takes, etc. Plus I used scraps from the last two layouts I've done (birthday and basketball themes).

The layout I completed was of Matt's birthday LAST year (Jan. 2005).






I don't do this many cards very often so it's nice that I should have a decent stock pile. It seems like I never have what I need. Someone had said, on a group that I'm in, that they always create cards with their leftovers after creating a page. I think this is a fantastic idea and want to try and do it more often.

Eastertime is here...

Sadly enough, my favorite holiday has come and gone. As is tradition...it won't be back for another year. So, I must go on and find other holidays to celebrate. So, it's Eastertime! I have never been a big fan of pastels so decorating for this holiday is hard for me. But I am getting better and decided to do more this year than normal. I really enjoyed how we had the house slightly decorated for St. Patrick's Day so I decided to stick with a similar trend for Easter.

These are a few decorations in our kitchen on a tray (also was used to hold SPD decorations). I like having them "contained" and not just scattered haphazardly around the house. I would like to get some Easter kitchen towels as well. Oh, and we have a picture of Spencer with the Easter bunny in 2004 that needs a frame...it might be added here once I find a frame for it.






















The other little spot in the house that I like to decorate is on the table in the foyer. This way people that come to the door, but not in the house, can still catch the spirit! The framed photo is Spencer and a friend from 2003 with the Easter Bunny - they look SO tiny! The bunny on the left I think I bought last year and the three "eggs with legs" with egg candles in them are bargains I found at Party City this year.













On Monday, while Matt went to interview with the Chief, Spencer & I started a fun little project. We made an easter egg wreath. We started with a square styrofoam wreath form. Spencer covered the entire thing with plastic Easter eggs (using a low temp glue gun). Then I went back and added pieces of ribbon with floral picks in between the eggs to make sure the wreath form didn't show. I made a bow using my BowMaster. I think Spencer enjoyed the project and he was definitely being a ham for the camera.

This is the finished project hanging on our front door. It did come out larger than I expected, but I'm pleased with the results.

EdVenture

After touring the State House and its grounds, we moved on down the road to EdVenture, which is a kid's museum. They have the largest "kid" there - where kids can actually go inside the body and it's a huge playground. There were various exhibits on different kids of work, body parts, story books, etc. I think Spencer really enjoyed it.

The very last thing we did before heading home was to swing by a USC bookstore so we could stock up on some unneeded, but highly desired, Gamecock paraphanelia. I got a camo hat with pink lettering! Love it! Next week I'm hunting down a shirt to match :)

Here's a quick shot of Matt and Spencer building something in the "construction" area of the museum:

A Little History Lesson...

After our Irish adventures in Five Points, the three of us ate at our favorite Columbia restaurant, California Dreamin. Next, we took Spencer to the State Capital (for those that don't know, Columbia is the capital of South Carolina). It was free to get in but we spent enough money in the gift shop to support the governor for a while! Matt got a very nice tie. Spencer and Matt found a children's book on Boykin Spaniels which we bought for my sister and her family. Boykins are the official state dog and they just got their 2nd one. She was tickled with it. Spencer bought a few random things like key chains, etc.

Matt and I have decided to do our 1/2 bath downstairs in a South Carolina/Palmetto theme. At one of the boths at the festival, we'd bought a pretty mirror that had a palmetto tree (our state tree) on it. The gift shop had a very nice hand towel, which of course we bought. We decided it'd be neat if I could get some cool pictures of the capital to print and frame for the bathroom. That's the main reason I took SO many pictures there. So, here are some of the better ones and a quick lesson on the State of South Carolina (smiling faces and beautiful places).

Matt and I both really like this one because of it having the State House and the Confederate Flag in the picture. Plus the blue sky is beautiful and the angle is kind of cool. Note for non-South Carolinians: The Confederate Flag used to be ON the state house dome (with the US and State flags). NAACP raised cain and our government finally gave in and took it down. Now it's just on the property (as you see here), but they still aren't happy. This change was made a few years ago.















I love this photo as well, if it weren't for the silly Wilbur Smith building in the background. If I can manage to digitally remove the building, we will probably use this shot, though I'm not sure if I'm talented enough for that. This is the Palmetto Tree which is our state tree and it's also on our flag. Of course, this is the Confederate Flag again.



























This is a shot of more Palmetto trees, the state house in the background and Yellow Jasmine - our state flower.


























This shot was taken inside the State House, and is of the dome, obviously. I love this. Matt doesn't quite "get it". He doesn't understand architectural or "artsy" photos. LOL. Anyway, I think it's cool and we'll probably use this in the bathroom too.

Luck of the Irish

As I have already shared...St. Patrick's Day is a big deal in our house because it's my favorite holiday. We began our celebration on Friday night with tacky decorations being hung throughout, and a supper of green pancakes, green sparkling grape juice (and green beer). Spencer enjoyed going through our box of goodies that we've collected over the last several years. He dressed all of us in festive green wear...and even Rio was involved in the torture. Of course, looking at this photo, it appears Spencer is actually the one in pain...but it's deceiving.

Saturday marked our third year of taking Spencer to Columbia for the St. Patrick's Day Festival in Five Points. The festivities begin with a parade which is always a blast and quite hilarious. The "celebrities" this year were USC Gamecock's football coach Steve Spurrier and Kinik Sky from American Idol.

























We spent some time perusing Five Points...shopping at booths, checking out the green fountain, Spencer climbing the rock wall. Here's a shot of the family (taken by a friendly policewoman) and a shot of Spencer gazing at the fountain. Isn't he precious?

Basketball Layout

Since I've been focusing on basketball and had bought a ton of stuff, I decided to go ahead and scrap the pictures from LAST year that I had not gotten to yet...

The layout is based on a sketch at 3KPScrap.

Basketball Banquet

Tuesday night of this week, we had Spencer's basketball banquet. This is his third year playing and they always have a banquet at the church at the end of the season. Each player on Spencer's team received a trophy and medal.


Matt was the assistant coach so he also helped hand out the awards. Here he is giving Spencer his trophy.



















Here is Spencer with one of his closest friends - definitely his longest friendship so far. They went to preschool together, go to church together and have played basketball and t-ball on the same team for three years.

Pinewood Derby

Last Saturday, we had Cub Scouts Pinewood Derby. The weekend beforehand, Matt and Spencer worked hard sanding, painting and glueing to create "the perfect car."










The final result was a sleek, red Grand Prix style car decorated with patriotic stickers and some wiggly eyes! These are the six Tiger Cub cars - Spencer's is the first one.










Here are Spencer and his two close buddies watching the races intently to see which one of their cars did the best! Spencer didn't do all that well in the races but he did receive a Best Design award for his age group.

Here is Spencer with his car after the races -- can you tell I forced him to take this picture???

Basketball Mini Album

Spencer has played basketball for our church for the past three years, always under the same coach. Next year he will move up to a different age group, and therefore he'll have a new coach. We just had our basketball banquet on Tuesday night and I wanted to give the coach a little something special to thank him for his hard work and dedication to the boys.

I made this 6"x6" mini album for him. The album is by Making Memories - one of those where you buy the cover and pages separately (both were purchased in black).

In the album, I have included team photos from each of the three years that Spencer played. Then I left blank pages for two more years. (I have blurred out the children's faces for privacy.)

If you are interested in seeing better scans of the individual pages or want to know details on the supplies used, you can go to my gallery at 3KPScrap.

Welcome to my home...

Gradually, I plan on sharing photos of parts of our new house as we get things arranged and improved to our liking.
Since moving in, we have purchased this new table, the lamp, and the frames seen here. We did not have an official foyer in our old house so we needed to create something welcoming in the new home. This area is to your left as you walk in the front door.

I knew I wanted to create a photo collage of our family portraits but was originally going to do it in the den. We were pondering what to put over this table so we decided to do the collage here instead.

For some reason, I really love this. I like all the brown (my favorite) and I love that the table has drawers for keys and such. I think it will look better once the walls are painted, but for now it gives the foyer a little extra something.

After we paint, especially the dining room which would be behind you if you were staring at the table, we will probably add a table runner or something to tie in the colors.

Also, this gives me a place to put a touch of seasonal decorating. We currently have a St. Patrick's Day decoration hanging on our front door, and have a decorative plate on this table.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

Yes, I'm a day early, but St. Patrick's Day is my FAVORITE holiday and I didn't want to risk missing it tomorrow. I thought I'd share a few snapshots of my SPD decorations. It's hard to find stuff that isn't too terribly tacky but I think I've managed to spice up the house with a bit of Irish love without going overboard. Tomorrow night, I will let Spencer help decorate the house even more - with the tacky stuff. We'll just leave that up for the weekend. "Lucky" the Leprechaun always drops by for a visit and makes for a fun morning. Saturday we'll spend celebrating in Columbia at their festival.

The first photo is in the kitchen. I set up a little SPD central with a frame (featuring Spencer from the festival last year), a couple of cards we've gotten in the mail, and a green candle. I also took the picture at an angle so you could see the SPD towels in the background. The 2nd photo is in our hallway where I hung three little ornaments. We don't use these hooks for much now so I'm thinking I might do this for every holiday going forward.

My Latest Creations...

Welcome to the Neighborhood!
We have recently moved into a new house...which is in a new neighborhood so more people are constantly moving in. About two weeks ago, we had several neighbors close by move in. So, I made cookies as a little welcoming gift. I bought plain white boxes at Michael's and decorated them, as you can see here. You can get more details on the supplies used at 3KPScrap.



Lucky
St. Patrick's Day is my all-time favorite holiday. Unfortunately last year, I lost many of our pictures during a computer crash. Luckily, pictures of our annual trip to Columbia survived. They have a great celebration in Five Points every year and Spencer loves the parade. I created this layout for 3KPScrap using the custom cut title.



Wish
This is another layout using a 3KPScrap custom cut title. I rarely get to use pink in my layouts so I jumped on the opportunity with these pictures from my niece's birthday. This was a really fun layout to do.

A Snapshot of Spencer's Life

Friday night marked the last basketball game for Spencer's team. With it came the opportunity to get some team shots. Even though Matt helped coach this year, he refused to get in the picture! Spencer is to the immediate right of the coach.

Monday night was the big Blue & Gold Banquet for Cub Scouts. Spencer, and several other boys in our den, received their Tiger Cub Ranks. I helped put the event together...probably won't do that again! This is a photo of the entire den after receiving their patches. Spencer is the third from the left and Matt is the only adult in uniform, since he's the den leader.

First picture is of Matt & Spencer and then Spencer being silly!

Family Portraits!!

These pictures were actually taken quite some time ago (end of November, to be exact). However, I wanted to get them posted...just because. These are our family portraits that we had taken professionally at Portrait Innovations for our Christmas cards. I was impressed with the place, the pictures, the speed of getting the prints (instant). We purchased a ton because this was our first professional portrait of our family. However, we will probably get them done each year going forward (and just not buy so many...we have a TON left). So...here we go.