Click on any photo to enlarge it. I add a lot of inking and dimensional items to my pages. Greece (title Page) Using what I have. The G in Greece is a blend of two Thicker letters, hence the ribbon bow to cover the joint On the Way Over... Torn and inked frames on each page and layered and inked leftover silk flowers from her wedding hair barrettes that she made herself. Old dictionary word tear-outs with words Greece, Travel, Vacation are inked and used as accents. Athens: the big door opens to a journaling box and the little window at bottom opens to a quote. Upper right window has a photo behind the shutters out to the marvelous view. Acropolis: featuring their Acropolis tickets as memorabilia and stickle dimension on the title letters. The Agora: ahhh, Grungeboard. And lots of leftover paper scraps as my mats in this whole album. Island of Santorini: Using a premade GREECE paper here and some mats. This was probably my fastest and flattest page with only the 3-D boat for a dimensio...

Generally I try to take my own advice. Yep. Good policy right? :D Probably a good idea not to be a hypocrite if you can possibly help it. LOL So here's a look at what I have been creating (besides jewelry) since January 1st. I am trying to get ahead of my greeting card swaps and trades, my ATCs (primarily I use these for holiday displays and tree ornaments), and charitable cards. I have an upcoming large commissioned album order later this month so I want to leave lots of time for that project. Doing these smaller card projects ahead of time is keeping me on track and using up stash in a beautiful way. Win, Win. And I end up with lovely usable cards from friends in the process. WIN! Here is a peek (and how many of each). Now these blue items above were on my desk from the last ATC holiday/winter card swap in 2011 --so I used them up for more Get Well/Be Well cards. You know me, no wasting! And they were beautiful elements so I put them to use for cards for later in the year. ...

While I had my tools out ---and my beads and chains and baubles--I decided t make some gift items. This bracelet is for my mom whose birthday is in Feb. It has hints of gold and amethyst in the glass beads.I wire looped every bead charm myself. The Christmas tassle necklace below it is for me for the next holiday season. I loaded both projects up with beads because I am using up my beading stash too! This is one of my goals in 2012. I want to process through most of my outstanding crafting projects of ALL kinds and get 'er done! So far so good....Enjoy!

A friend of mine asked me to make some chic up-cycled jewelry from a big bag of her grandmother's old loose jewelry items. These mementos are going to be for herself, sisters, and nieces in honor of their grandmother's memory. Here are most of the pieces I reconfigured for her. This was a fun project and so meaningful! Honor those you love.

2012! Happy New Year! Let's Get this Party Started in Here! Oh there is a LOT of talk today (and will be for a month or so) about goals, resolutions, hopes, refocusing ourselves and so on in 2012. I am going to add my 25 cents into the pot today too. Why? Because I love all my Scrappers Challengers! And because I had a darned good year in 2011. Productive-wise I mean. Not only did we pull off a fantastic wedding full of paper crafted goodness from A to Z. We also made donation greeting cards by the hundreds, cards to gift out by the hundreds, page layouts in the hundreds, and three JUMBO 55 page 12x12 wedding albums and a 40 page 12x12 Greece Honeymoon album! Not to mention some genealogy gifts for my family, a dozen pieces of jewelry, candy making for gifts, and a few new hobbies too like Paper Putz Glitter Houses and Needle Felting. Pretty much all from stash (except the needle felted stockings for which the wools were bought at secondhand stores.) I am very...