Colorado 2011

Oh my - September is already nearly over!  Where has the time gone?!?  I knew it had been a while since I've had some 'me' time scrapping, but now I realize it's been an entire month!  I have missed it and am so happy to have found a little time to get back to scrapping!  I'm also very excited  for this weekend, as I have plans for a scrap night with one of my best friends and a few other ladies.  I'm sure it will be a good time and I can't wait to get working on some projects!

On to my project for tonight....  For the past few years, my sweetie and I have gone out to Colorado to visit my brother and his family and spend some time skiing and snowboarding.  Back in January, we spent 8 days at Keystone, Breckenridge and A-Basin with my brother, his wife and their daughter.  We had a great time boarding, tubing and night-boarding a couple of times.  It's a trip we look forward to every year for sure!

There's quite a bit of glare in the pictures - sorry about that!  The picture at the bottom right of the left page is a group picture of all of us at Keystone.  It's on top of an envelope that I modified by cutting the top flap off of, then slipped in a DVD that my brother put together with a bunch of pictures and videos that we took during our trip.  I think it's an easy way to store the DVDs or CDs with pictures, as opposed to putting them on a shelf somewhere!  Thanks for stopping by to check out my pages, and I promise to be back again soon!!  :)

Recipe:
Solid cardstock from Bazzill
Patterned cardstock from my stash
'Colorado' cut from 50 States at 1 1/2 inches
'2011' cut from Birthday Bash at 1 1/2 inches
Snowflake embellishments
Sakura white gel pen for faux stitching

New House

A little over a year ago, my parents decided they wanted to move to Arizona.  They were in no hurry, so they put their house here on the market while they somewhat casually looked for a house in AZ.  Well, this past winter was a pretty bad one here in the midwest - cold, snowy, even a blizzard.  I think the winter weather was finally too much for them, because back in early February my parents decided to go ahead and move.  They didn't have a house to move to yet, but off they went!  Finally last week, they closed on their new house.  They have been very busy making this house their new home.  While my sweetie and I miss having them close by, we must admit that we are very excited to have a warmer climate to escape to during the cold and snowy midwest winters!  This is a card I made for them to celebrate closing on their new house.  I love my Gypsy and the ability to make shaped cards with it and decided it was only fitting for the card to be in the shape of Arizona!!

Recipe:
Card base is Arizona welded on my Gypsy at 9.3 inches from 50 States
House from Create a Critter cut at 2 inches
Tim Holtz Burlap embossing folder (then inked over with black stamp pad)
Sentiment from Inkadinkado
Flower brads from The Paper Studio
Stickles and pop dots

50 States!

As some of you may already know, I am a runner.  I started running regularly after college as a way to stay in shape and keep my weight in check.  I ran two half marathons and after finishing the second I felt like I could keep running, so I decided to train for a full marathon.  Little did I know that would lead to goals of qualifying for the Boston Marathon and also running a marathon in all 50 states.  I have run 11 marathons in 10 different states, so I have a ways to go!  I want to make a scrapbook of all my marathons.  Below is the title page I created for this book.  I plan to add a jewel on the map, marking the city where I run the marathon.  This is a 12x12 page, and in case anyone else is wanting to make a map of all 50 states for any reason, I'll save you A LOT of time and tell you - cut the states out with real dial size off at 2 3/4 inches.  I spent quite a bit of time playing on my Gypsy to get that figured out!!  I glued all the states down on a piece of black cardstock then freehand cut around the map to create the shadow.

Recipe:
Cardstock from Bazzill and Recollections
States cut out from 50 States at 2 3/4 inches
QuicKutz die cut font (borrowed from a friend so I don't know the name!)
Jewels