Happy 2nd Birthday Master Sawer

It was my Grandson's 2nd birthday.
How has 2 years gone by so fast!?!

I made Sawyer this birthday card as his birthday was a construction theme.
The base is done the same way I did his banner....which I share below.
I used distress ink (on watercolour paper) for the background and then flicked water on it with just my fingers.
I did the sandy ground the same way as the sky, but popped it up for dimension.
The truck and sign are pop up stickers ;)

Sawyer wasn't up to celebrating his birthday....its okay honey, lots of people don't like birthdays either, teehee.
Actually he woke up with a cough and his molars are coming in.
He was good all day, except when his mommy wanted to get a little photo shoot in and when we tried to sing Happy Birthday to him.

Sawyer's Aunty Heather gave him some Lego's and built him a giraffe which he loved.
 

I made Sawyer a birthday banner for his party.
I started with hand cutting 40 banners.
20 orange and 20 smaller ones in black.

Ashley wanted the banners to have a construction look to them.
I didn't have construction looking paper, so I made some.
I used some orange cardstock and added some diagonal stripes with a thick black marker.

I then adhered the black card stock.

I then used my cricut to cut out the letters.....that is about the only thing I do use my cricut for.

Here is the completed banner!!
Well I did add some of those dimensional stickers on some of the banner pieces.

Sawyer was much happier at his kiddie birthday party.
We did skip singing "Happy Birthday" though.

Hope you all have a great creative day.

Tracy 💗💗💗

Halloween Crop of 2018

I love a good crop...and I love to host crops.
A crop is when scrapbookers get together to create...just in case you don't know.
I have been putting on scrapbooking crops in my home for quite a few years now.....these are different then my Friday Night Scrapbooking get togethers.

Most of my Scrapbooking Crops (and the ones I attend) are at least 12 hours long.

Now to the decorating!!!
I love to decorate just as much as I like to scrapbook.
My daughter Ashley also loves to decorate for these events I host.

Looks like this scrapbooker was chained to her/his chair and needed help completing their page, teehee.

The Halloween banner was from a swap I was part of that Gail (The Happy Stamper) hosted.
I made the second "E"

The zombie area and the dress up center, if anyone didn't have a costume, they could use one of these.

The witches caldron mixing up a brew.

Here is the full view of the witches table.

Here is my craft table.
I have enough room to fit 8 people comfortably....unless you are like some of my friends who like to take over other areas other then their own, lol.

This is a new display this year.
My husband had this fish tank that he built into the wall...all the fish have long ago died, and the tank is dry.
Ashley got me to run to Dollarama to pick up these skeleton piranhas and we tied them to fishing line and dangled them in the tank.

Here are my friends and I.
Lynne, me and Sharon.
Lynne is the Snowflake queen.
I'm a Little Devil.
Sharon is Kitty..meow.
These ladies are some of my biggest cheerleaders 💗💗

Denise is the Ringleader.
Not only in her costume.

My little skeleton cutie Dawson 💗

My oldest daughter Ashley came as a skeleton (as did her babies), Kristy came as a doctor.  Unfortunately Heather didn't dress up.

And here is Sawyer in his costume....which he didn't want to put on at first.

My friend Ingrid came as a pumpkin....she is such a trooper as she had just had carpel tunnel surgery the day before.

So I dressed up her bandage as Ghosty.

We always have such a great time when we are together and 12 hours still wasn't enough time!
I didn't scrapbook, I worked on my knitting that I need to complete for a Christmas gift.

I hope you all have a very Creative day.

Tracy 💗💗💗

Day 5 of Fun Shopping...time for home.

Last day of our getaway and I was missing my daughter's and grandsons.
But before heading back home I had one more crafty store I love to visit..Pine City Scrapbooking.

They have the cutest cards there and I love to see all of the creativity they share.
I found these cute little stamp sets and thought they were adorable...I even picked up the flare for the lamb's face.
Also am excited to play with the Tim Holtz plaid stencil...I actually have an idea for a background I want to try with it.

I know, I know.....I don't need any more papers.
But look how cute these are for Dawson's baby album!!!
I have enough boy-type papers to create many baby boy albums, but these papers and cut aparts are just so cute, how could I not get them, teehee.

We came home Friday evening to my daughters and my grandsons waiting for us 💖.
We unpacked the jeep and went straight for some snuggles...actually I got some snuggles in before unpacking the jeep, teehee.
The rest of the evening was chatting with my daughters and playing with the grandbabies.
When they went home, I went downstairs to decorate for my Halloween Scrapbooking Crop I host every year.
I will share that in the next post!

I hope you all have a very creative day.

Tracy 💗💗💗

Day 4 of Fun Shopping...starting to slow down.

I was so looking forward to going to Mall of America today to get my crepes!!
I love the banana caramel crepe!!
Wayne and I walked around the mall and even checked out the mall's map...only to find out that the crepe place "Magic Pan" closed last December 😭
I was seriously so sad...nothing I ate today measured up.

But these came to a very close second, teehee.
We always get these twists with the icing, YUM.
But today they had something I had never had before...Churro Frosting Sandwiches.... its 2 churros with icing in the middle of them.
Wayne liked it, I haven't had mine yet.

To help me get over my loss of crepe, I went to Hobby Lobby and picked me up some Tim Holtz goodies as well as 3 quilt wall hanging panels....haven't sewed in awhile, but looking forward to putting these cuties together.
We did sneak off to Cabalas in Woodbury (nope, we didn't see the governor there).

I ran into Micheals to pick up some more distress ink round foams, then I noticed that they had their paper pads on sale....a real good sale.

Lastly I went to Dollar Tree to look for a large tote bag to cart my new goodies home.
Sadly they didn't have any totes, but I did find 2 cute infinity scarves for the cooler weather.

I always bring a plastic case with me on a trip, to bring any loose papers home without ruining them. I also usually bring 2 bigger totes for my purchases.
One tote I used for my knitting (as I am knitting a queen size afghan for my daughter) and the other one is full.
I will be doing plenty of knitting on our long drive home tomorrow.

I hope you all have a very creative day.

Tracy 💗💗💗day 3 of

Day 3 of Fun Shopping...not shopped out yet.

Yes, more shopping and I am NOT shopped out yet.
Wayne and I went to Crafts Direct in St Cloud.
I usually go with my friend Sharon to this store when we come for our girls getaway. This is the first time Wayne was here with me.

ok, this is a no judging zone.
I have beautiful paper, I love beautiful paper, I don't need more beautiful paper, but they keep designing beautiful paper.
So I keep purchasing beautiful paper.
This paper is just so so pretty...I usually have an idea on what I plan to create when I purchase papers, but this time, nope....but I still bought it ;)

I also had to pick up these Tim Holtz alphabet foam stamps...they were so inexpensive, how could I not.
As well as these Kelly Creates month and weekly stamps....couldn't pass them up for the price as they were on clearance.

Then onto Crafts Direct outlet store.
They have such great deals...which they did again this time.
I was so happy to see these ephemera packages.
We never see them in our city, we usually have to wait for the Scrapbook Cottage to come with Crop & Create to get ephemera.

When we got into Minneapolis we headed to a Joanns.
I don't understand coupons rules.
Wayne was in line ahead of me (as I like to use coupons for every purchase) and theJoanns coupon needed to be used on an app...so I told him to use a competitors coupon that he had on his phone.
I was then called next, I had the same coupons, and the young man let me use 2 competitor coupons.
Where the teller Wayne had said he could only use a competitors coupon if he had the paper version, not his phone version.
I told him he should have not bought the ink....as I only purchase from big box stores when using a coupon.
So one of these inks was actually full price..every thing else I purchase is with a coupon, on sale or clearance.
I may buy a lot at one time...but I use coupons, teehee.

How awesome is Tuesday Morning!!
I love this store and look forward to seeing the goodies they have when we come here.
I was excited to see these Tim Holts stamps here..and of course a great price!!!

A quick run into Michaels for some more blending foam circles and another Distress Oxide ink (thank you Tim and Jennifer for your videos).

I also noticed that there was a new Hobby Lobby close to where we were, so guess what...I went in to check it out, teehee.
I picked up 2 more of these mini distress ink holders as I seem to be collecting them, lol
I also picked up these rose gold letters and these cute word stickers.

We enjoyed a lunch at Denny's and then supper at Red Lobster.
We will be enjoying leftover shrimp tonight in the hotel as we weren't as hungry as we thought.

I hope you all have a very creative day
I will share my shopping goodies with you tomorrow as phone coupons never run out, teehee.

Tracy 💗💗💗

Day 2 of Shopping Fun

Second day of our trip and I am having so much fun shopping (maybe to much fun).
I uploaded the coupons on my phone and got Wayne to do the same thing, and we sure are making the most of them, teehee.

I was so excited to see so many Art Basics by Finnabair on sale at Micheals today.
I have wanted more brushes to use with my distress and art crayons and these were such a great price!
I am hoping to have a brush for each colour family.
I also love love love these silicone brushes (again by Art Basics) for adding gesso to my pages for a nice smooth finish. I have the thin 1" brush, so was excited to find these..again at a nice price!

I decided on the soft pretty planner (remember my dilemma in yesterdays post).
I think the weekly layout will work better for me.
When looking at the cover I noticed that they can not be taken off anymore.
Good call Micheals!!!
Last year I heard and noticed that many customers were changing the covers and the planners were just a big mess.
My planner cover from last year can be removed, so if I get tired of the soft colour and need a bold one, I will just add my last years on here.

Another one of my favourite stores here in the good ol' US is Barnes and Noble.
They have the cutest journals...believe me, I have most of them in my bookshelves at home, teehee.
I took a quick peek into this "The Story of my Life" journal and thought the prompts in there looked interesting...I wish the cover was cuter, but I can fix that ;)
The "Ten Little Pumpkins" book is for my grandsons. The cover caught my eye as the pumpkin is made with those fun sequins, when I rub my hand across it, it changes to the word "Boo"
The story is a take on 10 monkeys jumping on the bed.
And of course I needed some writing or note journals and these are so so pretty.

Next is to Hobby Lobby again.
I know I keep going back to these stores....but they won't let me use multiple coupons in one trip, lol  and I hate to pay full price for anything.
I have the regular sized distress inks and have had them since day 1...but these mini ones are perfect for bringing and leaving at our camp/cottage for the summer as I create up there more in the summer than I do at home.
I have one Oxide ink back at home and haven't really given it a good work out.
But last night as I sat in the hotel room, I got a chance to watch a few videos, I haven't been able to watch craft videos for a few months!!!
Well thank you Tim Holtz and Jennifer McGuire for enabling me in purchasing all of these Oxide distress inks, lol.
Me being a collector.....well I think I may need them all, lol.

Another visit to Hobby Lobby as I really like this stamp set.
It is so versatile.

That is all for today......tomorrow we head to Minneapolis and Crafts Direct!!!

Hope you all have a very creative day.

Tracy 💗💗💗

When the cats away, we will..... shop.

Ohhh I have so much to share with you....its been a month since my last blog post!!
I used to post every day and now that hubby and I are both retired it seems I should have more time...but it goes by more quickly, lol.

I will do an update post or posts later on, but lets start with today.
My honey and I are on a little getaway!!!
Every once in a while we like to head to the border for a little R&R and some shopping 😏

Here we are!!!!

At first he wouldn't let me get a photo of us together, so I was trying to make it look like I was picking his nose....I never once claimed to be mature, lol.

We went to 5 Guys for lunch and then Red Lobster for supper.
Just a little phone etiquette.....please turn off your ringers during dinner.
It is a bit infuriating to hear someone's cell phone go off every 3 seconds (I'm not even kidding..a party of 3 and I don't think any of them looked up from their phone the whole meal) during dinner.
I love themed rings, my friend has one and I will call her when she is over just to hear my theme (which by the way is the music from Walking Dead), but hearing a themed ring isn't any less irritating  than a ring during a meal out.
Off my soap box for now, lol.

First stop was to Hobby Lobby 💗
We don't have a Hobby Lobby at home, so it is always a treat when I get to shop at one.
We also picked up some Christmas wrapping paper.

I ran into JoAnns while Wayne went to Best Buy.
The Joanns here is a smaller store, but I always seem to find something.

I then went into a Dollar Tree.
What I love about these stores is everything really is ONE dollar.

Ashley asked me to pick up the alphabet puzzle from the Walmart here....I found it!!!
As well as something extra for Sawyer and Dawson.

Micheals was next!
I found these really cool keys, they are really heavy.

Wayne picked up a container for Kristy as she has taken up that Diamond Art and has baggies of those diamonds, so thought this would be easier for her to organize them in.

Target always has such cute clothes for little ones.

We also ran into Office Depot as I wanted some of these Job ticket clear pockets..I like them for storing my 8.5x11 cardstock.
Wayne and I love these Pilot G2 gel pens so purchased 3 boxes, teehee.
And I was happy to see these sticker books by Vicki Boutin and Heidi Swapp at the front entrance.

I was very excited to see the new Recollections planners at Michaels today!!!
I am torn on which one to get.

I love both of these covers!!
I am a more drawn to the bold colours so my eye went straight to the Every Moment Matters cover.
But the Enjoy the Simple Life is so soft and pretty.
Ohhh such a dilemma.

So I opened each planner to the weeks (as the month pages are the same).
So to make it even harder, each of these planners has a different weekly layout.
My planner I use now, has the same layout as the bold planner....but then looking at the soft planner I think I could merge my creative planner and my life planner into this one, so I would only need one (but do I only want one, teehee).
Sooooo I was thinking if I got tired of the soft planner cover I could change it up with my planner cover I have now, as it doesn't have the date on the front.
Why do I make things so difficult, lol.

So that is our trip so far and I will share with you again what we do tomorrow :)

Hope you all are having a creative day

Tracy 💗💗💗