My new favorite photo place!

It was such a gorgeous day here today, like 74 with a nice breeze. The kids are off with spring break, I've got spicy italian beef in the crock pot and plans for garlic mash potatoes! The kids were semi cooperative for some photos (well Callie was VERY cooperative, which is NOT the norm) so I've had a GREAT day! LOL Here are a few from today...

I'm so excited!!!!!!!

*****This post has nothing to do with the picture, other than maybe the wings are a homemade, handrawn transparency 3D sorta thingy I made and that relates to HAMBLY...

Yesterday I ordered a small boatload of Hambly papers, rubons and overlays for Scrap-Masters! YEAHHHHHHH, now we are going to be a Hambly retailer! So happy! Can't wait to get it but it won't be unveiled at the store 'til the Birthday Bash with Kristina. Also, yesterday the entire collection of Jenni Bowlins AWESOME TASTIC new goodies that JUST debuted came in and was put on the floor! It shines in all it's yummy scrap glory! In other COOL news at Scrap-Masters...I placed a order today with Fontwerks for the store too! Papers, rubons and stamps...I even ordered the incredibly beautiful WING SET BY TIA BENNET! Sorry for the screaming but man I can't WAIT! I think we are one of the only stores in MD to have Fontwerks! :D

In other news, my husband sold his motorcycle last night. After being rear ended last month, he realized how easily you could SERIOUSLY be hurt on a bike. As much as I know he loved it, I have to say, I'm releaved!

Horses and Hambly...

A couple weeks ago, my father purchased our children a little 4 wheeler. Okay, before you get all postal on me, as far as 4wheelers go, it has some cool safety features like a remote turn off (on a little remote control my husband keeps on him) and speed control, etc. As a whole I'm a nervous nelly momma but, I grew up with all kinds of stuff like this, go carts and dune buggies and Sea-Do's so I want my kids to have the same kind of fun that I LOVED. Anyway yesterday we finally caught a few hours to take it over to my brothers farm about 5 minutes away to let the kids ride. Here are some cute pics...and C IS a little large for it, but oh well! Oh and there's one of C and Chester that I just LOVe!

OHHH and Kristina's albums are IN DA HOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OHHH I'm so loving this HAMBLY in it! I can't wait to get my hands on my own. I'm just going to leave it at this:

KRISTINA'S MINI BOOKS ROCK!!! Totally enough said!

THE COOLEST THING...

Kristina Contes, Scrap-artist extraordinaire and 2007 HOF (go KRISTINA), is coming to little old Bel Air and is teaching 2 AWESOME mini book classes at Scrap-Masters! This is going to be too cool! I'm just a tad excited (times 50). I already signed up for both classes! LOL I can't wait for April 21, plus the store is having their birthday bash that weekend with all kinds of give aways and contests and a special birthday build a page! Oh yeah, btw, that's one of Aprils SMU (scrap-masters university) layouts. I'll be teaching this layout and another. It's basic grey, jenni bowlin, some heidi swapp stamps and embossing powder. We are going to DISTRESS your pictures too! cool huh? Plus I'll tell you how to de-saturate your photos to get this lovely washed effect above. In the other layout we are going to do a cool 3D photo pop effect. :D

St. Patty's day too much fun!

I almost forgot to post about St. Patty's day. Matt's band played at Looney's North. MY GOODNESS, and to think I wasn't going to even go! Wow! Good times, good times! The place was packed. PACKED. Like sardines packed. When we left at 4:00 in the AFTERNOON there was a line snaking around the building of people waiting to get in. Crashnelson rocked the house, of course and DANG is that drummer a HOTTIE! LOL :D

So here's Matt with some girls I work with. Yes, I'm comfortable enough to let him squeeze a couple chicks more than a few years younger than me! It was my idea, lol! And here is a cute pic of my neice, Kady getting some Chester lovin' yesterday at P's b-day party.

These are too much fun!

I'm totally in love we these tiny little hangers from my jbs kit this month! Aren't they cute!!! I copied Jenni's quotes 'cause I loved them! Papers are 7gypsies, Hudsun Valley. It's a yummy collection! Sorry for the bad photo, I had to take it at night and the flash and all.

In other cool news...KRISTINA CONTES IS COMING TO SCRAP-MASTERS. TOO COOL! She's going to be our guest artist for the birthday bash. I'll give you more details as I get them from Kristina. I'm giddy here!

Next build a page

EDIT: Since several of you have commented on the flowers I thought I'd tell you about them. First of all, in real life they match the blue in the tan, georgia clay and butter yellow brocade pattern that's a strip on the left. The flowers are cut with a cricut (both layouts) and then heat embossed with a tone on tone effect in a french script pattern (See-D stamp). The centers on this layout are kraft cardstock distressed with Orange marmalade distress inks by Tim Holtz.

I've finished the next build a page for Scrap-Masters. It's the companion page for the first one from 2 weeks ago. It's all 7gypsies Hudson Valley. I hope you like it and gosh it's a great deal at $6.00 a kit including the 6 x 6 photo!

My birthday girl and an act of kindness

I can't believe this little girl is 5! Almost feels like yesterday that I brought a pudgy little bundle home wrapped in pink with a sweet little eyelet bonnet atop her head. Now she's a sassy little sprite who cracks us up constantly with her silly and witty comments. Here are two recent ones:
*While discussing her love for "High School Musical" she dreamily said "I'm never going to have a boyfriend like Troy!"
*She recently asked me why I went to CCD (religious ed) with the twins. I told her that I was the teacher and she said with too much attitude, "What do you know about GOD?"

I hope your birthday is the best, little one!




I also want to tell you a little something about this girl down here. She is both of my daugher's awesome dance instructor and the creative genius behind a wonderful dance production every year. She has totally inspired C by believing in her and her abilities. She's been a total boost to her self-confidence.

And Peyton thinks the word COOL was written for Tracy! I want to share something that Tracy did yesterday that was just a little thing but a

huge thing at the same time. C has a dance class after P so during C's class P usually just amuses herself by singing and dancing. Well she made up a "new" dance move and after class she excitedly showed it to Ms. Tracy. Tracy said she loved it and maybe she's add it to a dance! I'm sure teachers have to say things like this all the time! Anyway, yesterday in class, Tracy added that little move to the dance! C and I just about died and it really made P so incredibly happy! She's such a neat lady to remember something like that and then make a little girl's day extra special! We are blessed to have people like this in our lives!

P.S. she's a darn good bartender too! :D

Glorious DAY!

Such a beautiful day here today. Yesterday too! I really wanted to take the kids to an old bridge yesterday to take their pictures. NO one was cooperative, I could have talked P into it but without the other two, I just didn't want to bother. Today, we decided she'd let me get some photos since it's so close to her b-day. Some turned out so cute! These were at the same house/gardens that my sister had her garden-reception for her wedding. Such a lovely old place!

Too much FUN!

Last week when Scrap-Masters got the new Basic Grey line in, I took one look at "Perhaps" and KNEW it would match the 7gypsies sticker "unique"! I couldn't wait to do this little album. Who's kids are NOT unique? LOL This album went so fast and was so easy it practically scrapped itself! And as you know I'm lovin' the pink and green goodness of it too! I'll be teaching this little cutie Monday, April 23.

Editied to add, I won't be teaching it that day. :( I'll anounce the date as soon as I know!

I heart chipboard!

Man, I love chipboard! Such a cool product, who would have thunk? :D This little album is made from Jenni Bowlin Heart shaped chipboard and Around the Block papers. I'll be teaching it later this month.

I've hit the button motherload (aka: don't hate me because of my buttons)

YESSSS!!! Look at my button jackpot. It's okay to be pea-green with envy! LOL Really, I'm lucky! Okay, so I'm going to let you in on a little secret...shhh, don't tell anyone else. I know my secret will be safe here with my 10 loyal blog readers.

Remember last month, I was lucky enough to do that human interest segment on a local tv station (If you are bored or need a really good laugh, there is a direct link in last months archives)? Somehow during the LIVE segment I mentioned that the button from the layout was from my grandmothers button basket. I'm really not sure where this statement came from. I plucked it out of clean air, really. And if you know me, I'm not one to do a lot of air pluckin' statements. Of course, I really should have been blonde and all that and some of my comments are for sure out of left field but they are not really BS just usually....ODD. Anyway, I guess I always wanted the kinda grandmother who HAD a button basket. Mine didn't. She actually wasn't particularly domestic but that's another story. My kids on the other hand ARE lucky enough to HAVE a grandmother WITH a button basket. Actually it's more like a cigar box and a cigar box and an organized little compartmentalized piece of rubbermade. Anyway, because this woman somehow loves me (and my inescapable ohhhhs and ahhhhs and embarrassing giggles over the sight of said cigar boxes) was super kind enough to GIVE me one of the cigar boxes FULL of the lovely button goodness. And I do mean lovely and there are tons of buttons PLUS they were her GRANDMOTHERS. Just wanted to share my happiness with you all! All 10 of you! :D

Build a Page

A couple days ago, this little scamp was busily drawing colorful butterflies. They were so pretty! She's always said she wants to be a baker when she grows up-it kinda goes along with her HUGE sweet tooth! After admirering the lovely drawings I asked if maybe she wanted to be an ARTIST and a BAKER. And she said, "I don't want to be either of those!" So of course I asked what she wanted to do then when she grew up. This was her reply: "I don't want to get a job, I just want to stay here and hang out with you all day!" :D

Been working on some events for my lss, March is National Craft Month, so we have a lot going on. Saturday we are having a build a page event for $5.00 and you get a 6 x 6 enlargement for that! This is the page we are going to be building. I got to use the new 7gypsies called Hudson Valley, it's so LOVELY!

Some quick pics of my album in a night class. These ladies were so FUN! MY GOODNESS, my stomach hurt from laughing so hard. Carol had to show off her BIG tool, and make us all jealous! Man, now I want one of those huge adhesive guns, it's so awesome.

Forgot this..

Something about pink and green just makes me grin real big! :D Really, I do like it, it's such a happy little combo. I really like this new Doodlebug paper, it screams SPRING~ As one of the March classes, this tin is in a CD sized case so it's perfect for 2 x 2 photos and 3 x 3! Love funky sized pics.

Patriots and Valentines...OH MY!

Patriots and Valentines...OH MY! The twins had their Patriot assembly today. SO cool, I'm so proud of them. Can you believe that Callie is actually OLDER than Cole! Look at that height difference!Then I finally taught the twins' class their Valentine craft. So fun! Crazy, but fun. 30 10 year olds with Jenni Bowlin chipboard hearts, paper, Heidi Swapp stamps, omgoodness! Too funny. I'll show you the twins close up but I don't want to show everyone else's except from far away, here are 27 of them on the chalkboard.Finally a layout I'm teaching in a challange class. Old Sei but it's still cute!
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by Robyn
6:06:00 PM

I'm not a nipper! I JUST CAN'T NIP!

I had a fun group of ladies today at Scrap-Masters for the February Junque bracelette class. They had me laughing
constantly! One of them, who shall remain nameless, (she knows who she is! LOL) just couldn't cut the wires. She just couldn't NIP! LOL


In other news, I hope to be able to link March's Calendar here soon. We have FUN stuff planned for March, all kinds of doodling classes and and artist visit and cool sales too!

Scrapbooking as therapy...

Cole and I worked on his class Valentines project tonight and then he made his own Valentines for the class. I LOVE that he wanted to make them instead of buying them! ...cool kid! LOL He then made Callie's too although she said she wanted store bought ones. He said he'll just put them in her room in a bag. That boy can be a sweetheart. On the other hand, Callie must be pre-hormonal or something. The girl is driving us batty! One minute, she's sweet as can be and the NEXT WHAM!!!! Tears and ATTITUDE galore! Geez! So while Cole was doing his V-day cards I whipped this up, and I do mean WHIP, it took me about 30 minutes. AND yes I DO feel better!

The journalling says something about Callie's TWEEN 'Tude!