I applied for a CT

Yep - it's the truth. I applied to be on the Creative Team at Scrap Matters. It took the encouragement of so many of you to get my courage up and apply. Not that the applying part was difficult, you only send an email stating you are interested with links to your gallery, blog, and a short bio to them, but man it was the thought of not being good enough that does a person in.

But I took the plunge and applied anyway. I love Brittany's designs at Scrap Matters and if I get chosen to be on the CT you have access to the whole store - all the wonderful designers there. I've been getting back into the swing of things and since I had created 3 layouts in 3 weeks time I figure I'm on a roll and if I get chosen I'll have lots more reasons to make sure to scrap!

I also got myself a new toy! I got a Wacom Intuos3 Tablet. I was so excited waiting for the Fed Ex person to arrive and bring my new tablet. I was pacing all day in anticipation. When the driver finally arrived (4:30pm) with this very large box I ripped it open to get to my new tablet. Remember I'm very excited about getting my tablet - I open it, look at it and think omg what have I done? When I ordered it I'm not sure what I was thinking, but I got the 6 x 8 size tablet. Now I know in my head that's the size of the writing area, but for some reason that little section of my brain just shut down. Those poor little mice on the treadmill that keep the lights on in my brain must have been taking a break. The tablet is big. It's about the same size as my laptop. I usually work on my laptop sitting in bed or on the couch watching tv. Now to figure out a place to actually put the tablet while I'm working on my laptop. So what's a girl to do? Promptly put the tablet in a drawer! I know I spent all that money on a tablet and put it in a drawer. So my list of things to do today is to take the tablet out of the drawer (and the plastic it came in) and install it on my laptop. Oh ya and actually try something on it. It's a good thing my friend Veev's has a new tablet too so we can learn how to use them together.



My New Toy

So I'm off to play with my new toy and watch more of the Olympics. Have a good day!

The dogs think I've lost my mind

Ok the dogs think I've lost my mind. They are probably right, but I hate to admit it to them since they usually think I'm pretty wonderful. I am the one who gets them food, water and treats so I'd kind of like to keep them thinking I'm pretty wonderful, but I put a big dent in that thought process the other day. I've been in turtle slow mode for a couple of months, you know the lights are on but no one is home syndrome, so i'm going to blame my outburst on that.

I've been trying to get back into the swing of things and thought I'm finally ready to start making layouts again. It's been really hard to even look at my pictures since Mark is in so many of them, but I figured I have to work through this. So....I open my photos, decide which ones to work on, open photoshop and then my brain comes to a GRINDING HALT. I upgraded to CS3 while I was taking Jessica Sprague's last class and while it's similar to photoshop elements, there are many things that are different. I remembered how to open the photos, get the paper in, well I was working with a template and just used the paper that came with it so I didn't have to deal with any paper, so then I go to "clip" my photos to the mask and that's when my brain just came to a stop. I'm looking at the keyboard like it was something from outer space and none of the keys were familiar. I couldn't remember how to clip the photos onto the mask. So I do what any normal redblooded girl would do - start hitting random keys and hope it works. Well my first guess didn't work. My second guess didn't work either, or the 3rd, 4th or 5th. Well by now I'm not gently hitting the keys (I'm sorry little keyboard), and I'm yelling at the computer. Masking is my very favorite photoshop tool and for the life of me I couldn't remember how to do it!

By now I'm scaring the dogs who are looking at me like I've lost what little mind I had. Here I was sitting on the couch yelling at the computer, hitting keys, the dogs hiding under the table thinking they are the next in line. Mind you NOTHING IS WORKING! I figure I'm better than this. I can figure it out. So I finally think (yes the brain finally started to catch up) I'll just use the layers menu. There is a clip to mask there. So that's what I finally used. During my tantrum Krystin came to see what I was yelling about - saw what I was working on shook her head and turned around and went back to her room. The dogs followed her thinking they were safer with her.

Next thing I think of is Hey! We learned this in the DID class so all I have to do is re-watch the video and it will remind me how to do the clipping mask trick. Told you my brain was starting to catch up. So off the the JS site - load up the class video, (love that they are there forever!) and then watch away. Well I found the lesson and boy did I feel dumb when it showed the little trick. One of those DUH moments. I had been hitting every combination of keys except the correct one. Oh well I'm sure it won't be the last time I'm doing the duh moment, I just hope I figure them out easily like I did this one.

Well the dogs have forgiven me for my lack of self control and are back to thinking I'm pretty wonderful so life is getting back to normal.

Here my latest layout. I'm finally getting to where I can look at pictures of Mark without it choking me up too much.

Thanks for looking



Chirpi Sunday Morning Kit - clip & paper, Old Toy Camera action

Getting Back to Life

It's been a long time since I've been to my blog. As most of you know my husband passed away suddenly in May and I've been kind of in a tail spin for the last couple of months. There are so many things to take care of and I'm still not done with everything.

I want to thank all of the incredible people at Jessica Sprague who made cards for myself and my girls. They were so thoughtful and meant so much to us.

So now I'm on to getting back to life. So I thought I'd start out slow. (Turtle speed actually) I started by just cruising the galleries and message boards at JS. Then gradually started posting on the message board. One of my good friends at JS decided I needed to take the Oh Shoot! photography class with Candice Stringham at JS as a kick in the pants to really get me started. I enjoyed the class, the videos that Candice did were outstanding. I'd like to say I finished all the projects, but I didn't. Not because they were too hard, but I got side tracked. It's been over 100 degrees for weeks now and it's just too hot to go out and take pictures. I have my camera on the tripod and I just can't lug it around myself with the dogs. I'd hate to drop it! So I've just put it off and I'll finish the class in my own time. That's one of the best things about the classes at JS, the class materials are there forever and you can finish when you are ready.

Krystin is going to nursing school and doing great. She had a week off between semesters so the two of us headed to Disneyland for a couple of days. So I've done some scraping and put together a page of the photos we took there. This seemed to be just what I needed to get me scraping again.

So here are some of the pages I've done lately. Thanks for looking.


This is from our last trip to Disneyland
simplysarahdesigns.blogspot.com Layered Template #42 , Digs My Heart Font


The new Kitten
joyrevisiteddesigns Heather Lee Template, Sabdesbois Impressions Papers


Krystin, Bryan and I went to the Olympic Trials for Wrestling and Judo at the Thomas and Mack
simplyyin Template #42



Creative Lesson - Picture that represents song lyrics - Candice Stringhams' Oh Shoot Photography Class