Book Review "Girlfriend in a Coma"

Keeping up with my goal of reading a book a month...here is the one I read for the month of April.
Yes, I completed it today...nothing like completing a goal at the last minute.
This book was given to me by my friend Tessie.
Now that everyone knows I want to read a book a month, everyone is giving me books...thanks friends :)

Now before I give my review I want to say I am not a writer...I wish I was, I think I could be, but I am not, so my review is only my opinion as a reader.
With that being said here I go.

One of my favourite authors is Stephen King, so when I read this write up comparing the book to his writing, I got a bit excited.
I can see why they thought that...but the person who wrote that, I don't think has ever read a Stephen King book.
This book seemed to be all over the place and there were a few places I thought "what, I think he just contradicted himself in his writing"?!
I did enjoy parts of this book and it was an easy, quick read.
I did like the apocalyptic part of this book!

Onto My Day:
Yesterday Kristy took off for her trip to Italy.
I drove them all to the airport and snapped a quick picture.
Kristy has been texting us and even Face-Timed with me twice :)
Needless to say with the 6 hour time difference I have been bringing my cell phone in my bedroom at night.

My daughter Ashley and this cool little dude came for a visit today :)
I can't get enough of him...but I am sure most of you know that.

I should actually go down in my library of books and pick out one for tomorrow so I can get a jump on it before the end of the May.

I hope you all have a ver Creative Day :)

Tracy :)

Birthday Balloons

I had mentioned in this post "Its a Mouse Thing" about this fun kit I had purchased from Crop & Create last year.
I tried to use up as much as the kit as I could, so with the extra's I put together some cards.
The papers came with some cut a-parts, I cut them up and used them as focal points on my cards.
Check out this post "Say Cheese" for another one of my cards from these cut aparts.
I don't do Project Life so these are a great way to use up these types of elements.
One thing I did with every project with this kit was to back the papers on black cardstock.
I just love the how the colours pop off of the black!!
I also backed the tags with the black.

Here is the inside of this card.
I usually add an index card or a grid card to the inside of my cards to stamp or write my note on, but with this light yellow polk a dot paper I may just write directly on the paper.

Onto My Day:
My youngest daughter is going on a trip to Italy tomorrow!
We all wanted to spend time with her today, so Ashley, Tyler and Sawyer spent the day with us.
I ran to Applebees to pick us all up supper as we wanted to have a nice quiet dinner at home, just the 6 of us.

Kristy is traveling with her boyfriend and his family.
I am so excited for her, but also nervous.
She will be gone for 14 days...14 days!!!
I have never not seen any of my girls for this long.
Because this is her first trip without us, I have come up with every possible thing that can go wrong.
I have even thought of things that could probably never happen, but in my mind they could.
I guess you never stop worrying about your children no matter their age.
I know she is going to have a great time and will be happy when I stop sending her videos of how to not get mugged when traveling, lol.

I hope you have a very Creative day :)

Tracy :)

Say Cheese!

Remember from this last post "It's a Mouse Thing" that I had shared that I had picked up the Disney Magic Layouts kit from Crop & Create event.
Well here is another card I had made with some of the left over papers.
I am sure the background paper is from some of my scrap from another collection, but I wanted to use as much from this kit as I could.
I punched the banner on the top right with some mini punches I just think are so cute.
I also punched out a red heart and popped it on the lens of the camera.

The inside of the card.
just some bits and pieces left over from the front of the card :)

Onto My Day:
We are in the middle of a major ice storm.
Kristy wasn't confident driving to work, so I drove her.
It took the both of us over 25 minutes to scrape the ice off of my windows of my jeep.
I even had to get hot water to melt the ice a bit before I could scrape it off.
The rest of the jeep was still covered in a thick layer of ice.

The ice was an inch thick in places.

Even though it wasn't a nice day, it sure was beautiful.

Even though the weather hasn't been the nicest, it sure was fun seeing others skating on the roads and skiing along the sidewalks today.
Put a smile on my face and warmth in my heart to see this today.

I hope you all have a very Creative Day :)

Tracy :)

It's a Mouse Thing

I had purchased this fun kit from Crop & Create last year called Disney Magic Layouts.
The kit was designed by Virginia Nebel.
Even though I have never been to Disney and probably never will, I loved the colours in this kit.
I am pretty sure the papers are from Eco Park called Magical Adventure.
So after bantering with myself, I grabbed it!
Even though the kit is Disney themed, I think I did a good job in not having the layouts look Disneyish.
The kit makes 7 layouts.
I made 10 layouts and 4 cards with this kit.
I love to stretch my kits.
Now, because I don't have any photos on these finished layouts I can't show them (as my daughter Kristy has mentioned more times than not, that it isn't completed until the pictures are on it),
I will share with you one of the 4 cards I made with my left over papers.

Out of all my projects with this kit, this card is the only one that looks like it would look to be Disneyish.
The reason....this is going to a friend of mine, that not only loves everything Disney, she also visits the Happiest Place on Earth a lot, and is actually heading there again soon.

Here is the inside of Schell's card.
To bad those tickets didn't give her free access to the park and the rides.
Everything on my cards were left overs from the kit.
When I was done with all the bits and pieces I was going to use, I passed the rest onto my friends.

See how fun and happy these papers are!!!
Not my usual colour palette, but so much fun.
What is your usual colour palette when creating cards?

Onto My Day
I visited my daughter Ashley and my grand baby Sawyer.
I held Sawyer most of the day and then played with him on the floor...I can't get enough of this little sweetheart.
My daughter needed my help in hanging a shelf in Sawyer's room.
I should have snapped a photo of it as it is a wood shelf, shaped like the letter "S" with dividers in it for some mini trinkets, it is really cute.

I hope you all have a very Creative Day :)

Tracy :)

Eva's Layout...page 2

This is the second page to "Eva's layout" I had shared a week or 2 ago.
I was waiting for a photo from my daughter, as she didn't like the photo I had used of her on here.
So all is perfect now, lol.
This is my great niece Eva and she is so cute.
Top photo is of me holding her, and the two beautiful girls holding her below and my daughters, Kristy and Ashley.

I love these papers by Bo-Bunny and will be using them again in the future that's for sure.
I will add the journaling later on.
It will be her birthdate, weight and such.

As I had mentioned in my post of this first page, I had also purchased the chipboard pieces and punch outs to this collection.
The first piece of the banner cluster is from the punch outs and the other pieces I just cut out of the left over pattern papers and backed them with the brown cardstock.

Love this word embellishment and the little one is fast asleep in the photo above.

Here are the 2 layouts together.
I have done a few single page layouts in my time, but being a 2 pager, it is hard to break the 2 page habit.

Are you a one page scrapbooker, or a 2 pager?

Let me know in the comments and your reasoning why, I would love to know.

I hope you all have a very Creative day :)

Tracy :)

Giving a Scrap about Autism Event

I went to a 12 hour crop on Saturday.
It was called "Giving a Scrap about Autism"
I have been going to this event for the last 5 years and sadly, this was their last year.
But they sure went out with a bang!!
Everything was top notch.
They had raffle tickets for a lot of awesome prizes and they gave away a prize every hour.
We received a delicious lunch and and even more yummy dinner.

Here are my friends and I celebrating and being silly.
We had 12 ladies in our group...well actually 11 as my friend Lesli (Vintage Scraps) couldn't make it at the last minute...but we kept in touch via texts and photos.
As we were taking this photo the photographer from our local news paper asked if he could take our photo for the local paper....then the camera man from our local TV news asked if he could video us for the 5:00 news, lol.
Here are the links if you are interested.
News paper link - https://www.tbnewswatch.com/local-news/giving-a-scrap-about-autism-589464?platform=hootsuite
Here is the TV news link...Starts at 2:26- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWUUw4IMG7c&sns=fb

Here are the originals, teehee.
Denise, Lynne and I all have been going to this crop and every other crop around are area since day 1.
We also had bunny teeth in our group photos, but they kind of freaked my daughters out, so I thought I would spare you the horror, lol.

Don't we look cute ;)
On the left is Ingrid, she is one of the ladies that organized this amazing crop.
Char is in the middle, she is one of my newest crafty friends.
And me on the left.
I look pretty good here considering my morning didn't go so well and with the help of Ingrid's photo shopping skills, teehee.

I put all of my eggs in one basket as
I purchased a lot of tickets to win this beautiful painting.
Isn't it gorgeous.
I love umbrellas in art and with the pop of red against the greys...I just had to have it.
It was painted by my friend Verna's husband Roger.
Sadly I didn't win it though.

But I did win a hourly prize.
I won this $25.00 gift card to Michael's as well as some kettle corn.
The gift card will come in handy, especially since I am in a challenge with my friends to use our supplies and we can't purchase anything new in crafty supplies.
There are only 3 of us left...the others all caved, teehee.

Not only did I have a great time visiting and laughing with my friends, I even got some crafting done :)
My friend Debbie purchased a mini album kit from Crop & Create at last years event.
If I remember correctly she purchased the last kit, so I bought the mini album and just picked out papers from my stash.
So we worked on this project for the whole crop.
Debbie actually completed hers...I guess I visited to much as I still have a long way to go in finishing mine.

When I first started scrapbooking many moons ago and first heard about crops I wasn't sure if I would like them.
The idea of carting my supplies there and then carting them back home, just seemed like a lot of work.
But I love them!!!
I have figured out the perfect way to pack for me...which doesn't include bringing everything including the kitchen sink.
Plus being with my friends and meeting new creative people is is the best!!
Do you enjoy going to crops?

I hope you all have a very Creative Day :)

Tracy :)

Happy Easter!!

Happy Easter from my family to yours.
Here is my adorable grandson wishing you all a Happy Easter.
I seriously can't get enough of him.

My daughters surprised Wayne and I with a Easter basket full of yummy treats and a gift card for dinner out.
These girls are so thoughtful.

I purchased a Peeps chocolate mould the other day, so Kristy wanted to give it a try.
I usually make marshmallow filled chocolate eggs, but Kristy wanted to try them with this new mould.
The moulds were really deep.
Even though they were delicious, they were sugar overload, lol.

After reading the instructions, we were suppose to place an actual peep inside of the mould after filling it with chocolate.
Take 2...

I don't care how old you are, it is always fun having an egg hunt :)
It snowed today, as it usually likes to do this time of year here.
Just after the snow melts and the hope of Spring is in the air, Mother Nature tricks us to show us who is really in charge with some snow.
But back to the fun stuff.
We had an egg hunt.
Even before Wayne and I had kids we would hide chocolate eggs for each other, even when we were on a trip, we would hide them in our hotel room for each other.
Here is Kristy's find.
Once all the eggs are found, they divide them evenly with each other..so Heather has the same haul.

I had a very busy, yet fun weekend.
I had our Easter dinner on Friday as everyone was off from work.
Then on Saturday I attended a Scrapbooking Crop for Autism....more about that in my next post.
Today is Sunday and spending a nice relaxing day at home.

I hope you all have a Creative Day.

Tracy :)

Baby James' card

This was suppose to be my year to end my procrastination.
Well I have failed.
Before I share my failure, let me show you the card I made for my nieces baby :)
I picked up the stamp a while ago from the Michael's seasonal bin and coloured it in with my coloured pencils.

The inside sentiment was also from one of those seasonal wooden stamps from the Michael's $1.50 bin.
I coloured in the heart with one of my Copic markers.

Here is the sketch I followed from Freshly Made Sketches.
Planned on going into this challenge, but yet again, I didn't make it...but that isn't the failure I wanted to share with you today.

My niece had her baby boy back in September and I made this afghan for my great nephew James back in November.
But I never got it mailed out because I wanted to pick her up a gift card as well.
I hardly ever go to the store that I wanted to get the gift card from...and when I did go into that store, guess what...I forgot to get the gift card.
So I finally ran into this store to get the gift card and shipped off the baby afghan.

I love that my niece made this digital scrapbook page to show me how much James loves his afghan from his Aunty Tracy <3 p="">Isn't he a cutie!!

Sadly Baby James lives quite a distance from me, so I have been watching him grow through Facebook.
Isn't social media great for this.
I hear that my niece and her family may be coming to town this Spring...so excited to meet this little guy in person.

I am really going to make a conscious effort to do things NOW.
My SIL says that I work great under pressure..which I do, but things like, sending out mailings...I really need to step up my game.
Any tips on how to help me with my procrastination..if so, I'd love to hear them :)

I hope you all have a very Creative day.

Tracy :)

Eva's Layout

A couple of weekends ago I went to a crop.
It was a 12 hour crop that a local lady hosted at a rec center near me.
She also sells Close to my Heart, so had her tools for everyone to use and also was selling some products.
At first no one in my group was going to come with me...but then 2 of my friends changed their minds.
I think, just the thought of me having fun without them, was just to much for them to handle, lol.
We only had to pay $10.00 to attend.
We didn't stay for the full crop as it was held on a Sunday...and you know, I can't miss the Walking Dead ;)

While I was there I made a couple of layouts.
Here is one that I did that I just love so much.
This is a layout of my niece with her husband and baby daughter (who is now 2 yrs old).

I picked out these gorgeous papers a couple of years ago.
The papers are from Bo Bunny called Primrose, gorgeous, gorgeous papers.
When I saw them, I instantly fell in love with them and bought 2 of each sheet as well as the stickers and chipboard pieces.
I then went to the back of the store where they kept their cardstock, and picked out matching cardstock as well.
I made a kit in the store :)
I had no idea what I was going to do with these papers, but with 3 daughters, I figured I would find a use for them ;)
And I have many more papers to make a few layouts of my daughters.

Do you do this?
Not only am I a hoarder of pretty papers, but I am also thrifty with my pretty papers.
I like to save as much of them as possible.
Like with this layout for instance.
I cut the back of the brown cardstock out of the center to use for matting.
I also cut the one side out of the main piece of pattern paper to use for another layout.
If you are confused...this is the back of the above layout.

I have a second page to this one, but I have to change out one of the photos, as my daughter doesn't like the photo I used of her, lol.
And because I have photos on this layout, I can call this layout complete!

Oops, here is the sketch I followed for this layout.

So are you thrifty with your pretty papers as well?
If so, tell me if you do what I do and if not, what do you do to stretch your pretty papers.
I hope you all have a very creative day.

Tracy :)

Tea on Me

It was my friend Lynne's birthday last week.
She love tea, so I made her a teapot card.
Isn't this such a cute die!
The die is by Poppystamps and is called Teapot Stack.
I have to say I sure made a mess cutting all of these little pieces out, but it was so worth it as it is so cute!!

Here is the inside of the card.
I used the left over pieces from the background to use on the inside.

Here is the sketch I used for this card.

And a link to the challenge..MFT challenge.

I hope you all have a creative day :)

Tracy :)

Walking Dead Season 7 Finale

All I can say without giving anything away....I didn't trust those dirty buggers, lol.

Tonights episode was pretty great.
I have watched the Walking Dead from day 1.
My daughters have read the comics long ago, but I haven't...yet.
This season isn't as exciting for me and for many others, who watch it.
I have to say I still love it....but besides the tears I shed in the first episode of this season, and the surprise of Sasha in this episode, the rest in between have been good, but not Great.

Let me explain.
I look forward to Sunday's purely for this show.
I  prepare for it, by watching last weeks episode, then watch the new episode after that we watch The Talking Dead.
Then my family all go to bed and I stay up and watch the new episode again.
This season I have only stayed up to re-watch it a few times.

Don't get me wrong, we still love this show.
We love it so much that We even have a marathon of this show (all seasons) at least once a year.

If you watch the Walking Dead...what is your opinion on this season?

Tracy :)