Laura Vegas

winner + a layout peek

September 13, 2010

thanks for all your well wishes on my back. it's not totally back to normal, but it is getting there. i'm on day 6 now, and am getting around a little easier.

now for the giveaway. i turned to the random number generator, and it choose #14. congrats peggy! email me your mailing info, and i'll get that design card right out to you 🙂

would love to be in the give away as just bought a slice a couple of weeks ago…have yet to use it though but hope to soon; got it because you recommended it. i do enjoy looking at your layouts as it gives me different ideas! posted by: peggy grant | September 10, 2010 at 04:49 PM

and speaking of the vintage findings design card. i used a few shapes from that card, on a new layout that i have up on the making memories blog. i also dug into the new paper reverie collection, that should be out in stores any day now. you can see the entire layout and get instructions on how to create it, over on the making memories blog.
a giveaway + stuff coming up

September 10, 2010

i've been down for the count with a tweaked back for a few days now. this happens to me at least once a year, and it never gets any funner. lol! i thought it was funny, when i was digging around for the links for this post, and came across THIS. that's the last time i had tweaked my back. anyways, that means i never got around to finishing anything fun to blog about. but i have stuff planned. i promise. just to give you an idea of some of things i've been working on to share, here's a few hints.

i did some of THIS months ago, and promised to share the after photos. figured it was about time.

am planning an updated look at THIS project.

finally scrapped about THIS trip.

and also scrapped THIS exciting trip.

and also scrapped all about THIS once-in-a-lifetime adventure.

i'm not doing any sharing about THIS, but seeing those pictures sure does make me miss those two crazy kids 🙂

working on finishing THIS project. what you see in that post, is all that i ever did with it. figured it's time to finish it, so that i can pull it out this thanksgiving. which will be here before we know it.

it's been exactly a year since i made THIS big move. and i'm planning on sharing all about my space in detail and my storage set-up.

until then, how about a giveaway to tide you all over? i happen to end up with an extra vintage findings design card, for the slice. instead of sending it back to them, they said i could do a giveaway with it. so one of my lucky blog readers will get to enjoy this. just leave me a comment, and let me know if there's anything else you would love to see me share here on my blog. there might be things that you all want to see, that i'm not thinking about. so i'm open to suggestions, and will take any ideas into consideration. i'll be randomly drawing a winner on monday morning 🙂

and since i'm link-happy today, i wanted to share a few more fun giveaways out there from the generous manufacturers that i am lucky enough to design for. check out the pebbles blog today. not only will you see some cute layouts, but at the bottom of today's post, it tells you an easy way to get in on a fun giveaway. and then head over to the making memories blog, where you can get in on a giveaway for some of the new paper reverie products.
words of encouragement – a layout

September 7, 2010

i wanted to share a layout from the july/august issue of creating keepsakes with you today. when i received my copy of the issue, the first thing i noticed was that you couldn't really read my journaling. so i've been patiently waiting until i could share a closer look at this layout.

as seen in the July/August 2010 issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine. copyright creative crafts group. posted with prior permission from the publisher.

my assignment was to create a layout that included conversation bubbles. i knew this was a summer issue, and that the photos i choose had to have a good story to them. so that's how i decided to use these photos of joe and sarah. these were taken at a trip to my uncle's cabin, back in the summer of 2003, i believe. will double check that in the morning and adjust if needed. but i'm pretty sure sarah was 4 years old at the time.

so, the story? the cabin is right along the edge of a river. and if you hike up the river, over rocks and down creeks, you get to this gorgeous area. you'll find nature-made waterslides. the land and the rocks have created these "slides" of sorts, and the water from the waterfall (a small hike away) goes through all the slides. once you hike up to the top slide, you make your way down each slide, one by one. once you go down the first slide, you're in for good. and the only way out is to slide down the other slides.

as we were hiking up towards the top, sarah actually fell into the #2 slide. on that slide, you actually sit at the top of a rock wall. then you splash water over the side, and slide straight down into the shallow pool of water at the bottom. but sarah? well, she was looking over the edge or something. and simply fell straight down into that shallow pool of water. mind you, she's 4 years old at the time. i think it was my dad, who jumped in after her and got her back out somehow. sooooo. we proceeded to the top, went to the waterfall area for a bit, and then hiked back down to the first slide. sarah got down the first one, and then the second one (the right way).

that's when she got scared. she did NOT want to go down the third slide. but it was the only way out. she had to do it. so dad walked her through it. i have always loved these photos of sarah and joe. and i always felt like they told such a great story. not just about what happened that day, in that moment. but about her personality and how she acts. so it was perfect for the conversation bubbles. click on the photo, to see the journaling better.

i used the great escape collection, from making memories, for this layout. the orange chipboard letters on the first page are from heidi swapp. but everything else on these pages is from making memories.

for the conversation bubbles, i ended up free-handing my shapes. i cut some practice bubbles first, and then used those as a quide for my journaling. it was just trial and error, to get the journaling spaced just right, to fit in the shape i wanted. i have no tricks up my sleeve for that. just holding the paper up to the screen, and mixing it around until it looks and prints right. lol! once i printed, i traced the basic shape around my journaling, and then cut around it. i then sanded all the edges of each bubble, to soften then up a little bit. each conversation bubble is pop-dotted on the layout, for some extra dimension.
great america day trip

September 6, 2010

i'm doing this post more for myself than anything. there have been some events, activities, and get-togethers that i never shared or talked about. and since i use my blog as a journal of sorts, i like to get those photos on here at some point. i love going back to my blog, and saying "oh look, THAT is when we did that". or "oh look, THAT really did happen and here are the photos to prove it". lol! so i think i'll post these "catch up" photo days once a week until i get everything on the blog.

first up is a day trip we took to great america. this was about a week or so before school started back up. so around the beginning of august. we didn't end up with that many chances to go anywhere this summer. and we squeezed this day in at the very end. we made the hour drive, and got there shortly after the park opened.

we hit most of the major roller coasters. although this one doesn't actually look familiar to me, so it must be one that we skipped. nice that i have a photo of it, anyways. lol!

the girls waiting in line for the crazy boat ride. this is the large boat that goes back and forth. and then really high, back and forth. and then suspends you at the top, and goes all the way around. and around. and around. and then suspends you back at the top, and then back and forth. and back and forth some more. it's a crazy ride.

and yes, i ride the crazy rides. here's the proof. and how goofy is sarah? in the middle of this crazy ride, and she's still posing for the camera. lol! that lady sitting next to me? she was convinced she was going to die on this ride, and she let all of us know. over and over. lol!

i think the girls ended up riding this boat ride about 4 times.

here's me and the girls, waiting in line for the survivor ride. i'm actually quite surprised and proud that joe thought to take the camera out and snap this.

the survivor ride doesn't look that crazy. it's this huge round platform, where everyone sits around the edge, on these scooter-type things. i have to admit, this was sort of a crazy ride. and yes, alyssa is next to sarah. you just can't see her.

and joe? well, he's not really into roller coasters or anything crazy and scary. so he usually sits them out and holds the backpack. but we managed to get him on a few rides. one of which was the demon, a great roller coaster. and even guilted him into going on one of the newer roller coasters, in which you stand up. he was convinced that you should never have to stand up on a roller coaster. lol! but in the end, he said it wasn't as bad as he thought it would be.

yes, they always pose for me.

even in the middle of a ride that's tossing them all over the place, and spinning out of control.

yes, they're goofy and crazy. and i love them for it 🙂

this is part of the water area of the park. i seriously can't get over how much water stuff is back there now. i grew up going to great america, and i actually can't even remember what used to be there. the girls had brought their swimsuits. we went back to the car to eat our lunch (for once, we packed lunches and saved a ton of money), and then they changed in the car.

then they went on some of the water rides. we all went on the log ride, since you cannot go to great america and NOT ride it. they went on a few of the water slides. hung out in the wave pool. played in the water playground. just had fun getting wet and cooling off.

and i'm guessing there was something big with snoopy at the park this summer. i kept saying we had to go see the "snoopy on ice", or whatever the show was that they had going on. but we kept missing the start time. or we'd be all the way across the park. so we missed the show. but we did see snoopy.

we were at the park until closing. afterwards, joe went straight to work the night shift at the store. he was exhausted the next day. and the girls and i crashed hard when we got home, and slept in the next day. and we all paid the price for riding so many of the crazy roller coasters, and walking the park so much. i think we were all sore for a few days. but it was well worth it 🙂
tidbits – a pebbles layout

September 6, 2010

the new pebbles design team officially started our term last week. they've been introducing us over on the pebbles blog, and i'm included in today's post. they also gave all of us some fun questions to answer, and you can read it all HERE :)

our first assignment was to create a layout about ourselves. i choose to use the treehouse collection for my layout, because it has all my favorite colors. lots of fun patterns in reds, yellows, breens, and browns. and the ribbon, the brads, the flowers, the letter stickers? those are my go-to embellishments, so they come naturally to me.

i finally picked up this large circle border punch, and i LOVE it. i've used it on a few projects just in the last week.

i wasn't actually sure what my journaling would be until the very end. that's usually how i work. my title is chosen, by what i can fit in the space that's left for a title. and then i determine my journaling, based on the title i came up with. i went with looking at the two sides of me, in a few areas of my life. i'm a gemini, so i always joke about my split personality. i can switch from side to side, at any given notice. lol! so i thought it was fun to look at how i feel about a certain thing, but also how i can feel the total opposite about that thing, at the same time. these kinds of layouts are important for us, as scrapbookers, to do every now and then. we need to make sure we're represented in our albums, just as much as our kids 😉
random tidbits #2 – facebook style

September 2, 2010

i had some layouts to share. but quite frankly, i'm too tired to type them up. and i don't want to just plop them up, with telling the stories behind them. so i figured this was a good time to do another version of "facebook status randomness", just like i did a few weeks ago. here's an assortment of the random, but ubberly important, things that i've taken the time to facebook about. with a random, funny picture of sarah to make you laugh 🙂

i finally switched out all of the girls hangers to regular adult hangers. can't believe we still had the white toddler langers. lol! anyways, this means i have almost 200 white and pink hangers to get rid of.

both girls are finally asleep. i think they were both having some first day of school butterflies. i hope they both wake up excited to see what the new school year will bring them 🙂

it's sort of pathetic that i've had nothing to say all day … and i still can't think of anything tonight. i'm racking my brain, but i got nothin.

i have survived getting up super early for the first week of school. and giving alyssa more props for getting up at 6:00am to get ready, a full half hour before i get up to help her. looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. oh wait, maybe not … we have to be on the soccer field at 7:00am. lol!

school week, done. work week, done. scrapbooking work, not done. soccer practices, done. soccer games, not done. i think we're actually more done, than not done. not that any of that probably made sense to anyone but me 🙂

i am finally, finally watching the season finale of grey's anatomy. i'm 30 minutes in, and i didn't see any of this coming. i'm actually amazed that none of this was spoiled for me over the last 3 months. lol! ok, back to the show 🙂

had the girls first soccer games this morning. alyssa's team had a double header, and won the first game 1-0, but lost the second game 4-1. sarah's team won their game 3-0, and she got a hat trick (3 goals). great job girls!

i love target so much, that i went there 3 times today. lol! had an idea for some organization stuff, but wasn't sure it would work. then realized it would work. our target didn't have more of what i wanted, so i went to the other target in the next city. then back to my target for what the other target didn't have. an…d now? i'm finally ready to re-organize in the scraproom 🙂

remind me to never again go to costco again on a sunday. i usually go there to pick up pictures, and i'm in and out. i assumed i could do the same for regular food shopping. those shopping carts are huge, and i'm not afraid to knock my way through all the people dilly-dallying their day away 😉

i find it slightly ammusing that i choose to order alyssa's english reading material online … rather than try and find the time to drive 15 minutes away to the nearest bookstore. i ordered her 4 books this afternoon, they shipped tonight, and will be here wednesday with my free 2-day shipping 🙂

then apparently i went like an entire two days without updating my status. and this is what my super funny friend sierra, wrote on my wall. "Dude, its Thursday. Update your status. Sheesh". she keeps me accountable and current, and i'm thankful for that. lol!

mental note to self, written on facebook, so that i'm bound to see it tomorrow … "remember, you have to bring snacks for sarah's soccer game on saturday".

i'm getting all "halloweeney" right now in the scraproom 🙂

the downside to cleaning out my scraproom SO well … is that i now have empty boxes, jars, bins, and baskets all over the place. now i have to figure out where to store them, until i have more stuff to fill them up with again. lol!

one of sarah's spelling words this week is "mute". so her sentence for it on her homework? "i pressed the mute button on the remote while my mom was giving me a lecture". she's as funny as her mom 😉

why are there always cats hanging around my house? there is one sitting on my front porch right now, making sounds like it's dying or something. i'm not a fan of cats … and their fondness for wandering the streets and homes of other's is a big reason why.

a few days ago, i was working on a layout and dropped a small self-adhesive silver accent. i just found it … stuck on my plaid jammie pants. lol!

i decided to try some parent volunteering for the high school band. my first mission? working the snack bar at the varity football game for 3 hours on friday night. eek. alyssa's marching in the band for the game … wonder if she'll acknowledge me or pretend she doesn't know me. lol!

i can hear "don't stop believing" blaring at the school … kind of wishing i had walked sarah to school now. i might have broke out in dance. lol!

all the toys from the daycare kids were picked up hours ago. but i just glanced over at the fireplace … and there is prince eric, standing by himself on the bricks with a sword in his hand. always funny when i find some random toy in some random spot, when there are no toy-playing aged kids left.
a random organizing tip

September 1, 2010

i have every intention of sharing all about my scraproom during the next few weeks. i moved my scrap stuff from the upstairs loft to the downstairs bedroom, exactly one year ago. and over the last year, it's been an on-going process to get certain things set up to my liking. and i think i'm just about there. i did some major, major cleaning and sorting over the weekend. and i thought i would share one of the things i did that felt really good.

i'm really big on taking things out of their original packaging. it can save you a ton of space. not everything, but a lot of things. one of those things is my chipboard alphabets and shapes. it's usually easier to get rid of the original packaging, which usually consists of a cardboard backing and a plastic piece holding them in. some of the packages, once you open them, you can't close them up again. so i put them into baggies. there are a few sizes that i use, and i get them at michaels or any craft store. if it's a larger group of items, i will use a ziplock bag of some sort.

but you know how chipboard alphabets usually come with the letter within the negative piece? sure, you can use both the actual letter, and the negative piece, on your projects. in fact, those negative pieces can look really cute when you cover them with paint or pattern paper, and then tie little ribbons around the side. i've done it. on cards and layouts. BUT. you knew there would be a "but", right?

truth be told, i havn't used a negative piece in years. so, why am i keeping them all? they just take up space, and clutter up my scraproom. so i decided to punch out all my alphas from the negative pieces, and then toss them. does that sound crazy? maybe it was. there were even quite a few moments where i questioned what i was doing. "i could maybe use these on a layout". "these are still good pieces, someone can do something with them". "i could use them as masks, and use my misting sprays with them". "they could be used as stencils to make more alphas". laura, laura! face it, if you havn't used them in years and years, the chances of you using them are slim to none. so i kept going, ignoring that voice in my head. this pile here was huge. it may not look like a ton here, but it was. this was about 3 feet wide, by 4 feet. and it was piled high.

hard to believe all of those extra pieces, came out of this basket. but they did. and this is what i have left. just the letters and numbers. actually, i do see a few negative pieces there. the colorful circles. that's only because those pieces were colored and patterned, and i do firmly believe that i'll do something with those. lol! this basket isn't jam packed anymore, and it feels clutter-free. which is good, since this is only a small part of my chipboard alphabet collection. lol! i also did this with all my chipboard shapes this weekend. i'll show more of all this over the next few weeks. but just wanted to share this one little idea for now. this idea may not be for everyone. but i know it felt really good to get rid of the pieces that i knew i wasn't likely to use. and if i ever change my mind, and decide that i want to do something with a negative piece??? then i'll just go buy more chipboard alphas 😉
umpire – a layout

August 30, 2010

i sort of forgot about this layout. is that bad of me? lol! this was created for an assignment for an article in creating keepsakes. then it got moved to the online content part of the article. and then the article got moved out a month. so maybe that is part of the reason i sort of forgot about it.

as seen in the online content for the July/August 2010 issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine. copyright creative crafts group. posted with prior permission from the publisher.

this was for an article called "cool scrapbook layouts for boys and men", written by mandy douglass. you can see the online part of the article HERE. my assignment was to create a layout about a man and his hobbies or job. so i figured a layout about joe and his hobby/job of umpiring was a perfect fit. the other half of the assignment was to use masculine products and textures on the layout. here's a closer look at each of the pages. can you pick out my masculine product picks?

i chose not to use any pattern paper for this layout. instead, i went with cardstock and cork paper. the self-adhesive cork paper (by karen foster) is a great way to add a fun texture to the page. and i also choose it, because it picked up the leather of his face mask in the photos. i added in some green, by stamping a background stamp (by hero arts) with green ink onto white cardstock, and then inking the edges with black ink. i used my finger to brush a little bit of black paint around the edges of the clear acrylic stars (by heidi swapp), and then added fabric covered brads (by making memories) to the centers. the metal word charms (by making memories) were tied around the stamped cardstock piece with some jute, and then the entire piece was adhered with pop dots to lift it off the page.

for my title, i chose some large raw chipboard letters (by basic grey). i stamped versamark ink on each letter, and heat embossed with a distressed denim blue embossing powder (by tim holtz). the distressed embossing powder gives a very gritty, rough feel after heat embossed. which went really well on this layout. you can also see here, that i added a rough edged digital frame to each photo, before printing. gives the photos a grungey feel, and a matted look at the same time.

along the bottom of the two page spread, i had a strip of black textured cardstock. i pulled out some older products to embellish these strips. first, i cut some strips from a metal mesh sheet (by making memories), that mimics the chain link fence in one of the photos. i adhered it to the black cardstock with some mini glue dots, and then added some screw eyelets (by making memories) to secure it. yes, i said "eyelets". there's a reason i keep super, duper old products sometimes. because there WILL be a perfect reason to use them again.

and here's a closer look at my journaling. i printed it onto blue textured cardstock, and inked the edges. then i adhered it to the layout with pop dots. so, all in all, i would say that i did a pretty good job at using lots of masculine products and lots of textures. and i got a great layout to add to the albums, and documented joe's favorite hobby/job 🙂
quick post today

August 30, 2010

quick card share for you. this one went up on the jillibean soup blog today.

making this a super quick post today. i've been working like crazy all weekend. spent a TON of time in my scraproom, cleaning and organizing and purging. i do this over and over, and yet there always seems to be more to go through every few weeks. but my room is looking so good, and i feel like i decluttered it in a big way. i didn't even have to get rid of much, just moved things around and got rid of a lot of packaging.

i was able to work my schedule with the daycare kids, so that i have today and tomorrow off. having part-timers makes that a little easier to do every now and then. lol! but that doesn't mean i'm not working. just working on my "other" job, the scrapbooking one. i have some older projects that i'm making the time to finish up, so that i can hopefully share them with you soon. i have some assignments to work on, that are due this week. i have tons of photos that i've put off editing, and really need to get too. and i'm determined to get a lot of that done in the 7 hours the girls are in school. lol!
just because – a pebbles layout

August 26, 2010

i have another pebbles layout to share, from my design team submission. i started making this about two weeks before haley was leaving, and tried my best to finish in time to get it in her book. but i ran short on time. so this is new to her parents and to all of you.

last night, we had haley and her mom over for dinner. dad had to stay home since he wasn't feeling well, but we did send some yummy food back for him. it's been a few weeks now, since haley left us to start pre-school. i think it's been quite the adjustment for all of us. we miss her more than ever. i miss having someone to talk too during the day. she was such a great story teller and talked non-stop. we miss her smiling face and bouncy way of running all over. i miss seeing her mom (and her dad every now and then) drop her off and pick her up. she was always wide awake and chatting in the mornings, when i was half asleep still. and i was wide awake and chatting in the afternoons, when she was half asleep. lol! i know that haley misses us. her mom said that she's liking pre-school, and learning a lot. she's making friends and getting settled. but she also says that she still asks to come to my house every morning. which in some ways, makes me feel just a little good inside. just knowing that we were that important to her.

i used the twitterpated collection for this layout. this is why i have loved pebbles pattern paper for years. look at all the fun patterns. this might be a collection geared towards love. but the pattern papers are always so versitile, and can be used for so many different things. hearts, dots, stripes. these are patterns i'll use over and over. for my title, i cut out one of the blocks from the perforated 3×3 sheet (it's a 12×12 sheet, but the blocks are all 3×3). there was a doodley flower in the middle that i didn't care for. so i wrapped some string around the card, adhered some paper flowers and a button with brads in the middle, and pop dotted the entire thing on the page.

supplies:
pattern paper – pebbles
die cut border – doodlebug designs
flowers – pebbles
button - making memories
brads – making memories
other – string

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