My 10 Studio's

Edited to add my current studio set up: It is a mess but I have a lot of natual sun light and it is my little corner of the world...

So I have been a slacker blogging lately, actually pretty much ever since I moved. It is hard to get moved because you are so busy and then it just ends and you have to put it all away. Add to that the end of the school year, graduations (8th grade and high school), a toddler, a trip to LA...mix a little summer in with a broken camera and wala you have a neglected blog. Sorry guys I will try to be better. I have been visiting my sister blogs and have been inspired what they put up every day. I have also been organizing and going through photos and trying to get caught up. It is working so yeah me! I have managed to scrap 5 pages and make 3 cards and it is only August 5 so whoo hoo...I even developed some photo's so I am on my way and I will be sharing some pages and cards very soon. In the mean time I thought we would talk about space and where we scrapbook or make cards or sew. Where do you do these things? I don't sew but I used to paint. I thought I would take you down a little studio memory lane.


Studio 1 - My first apartment I had not yet discovered scarpbooking and I was doing a lot of painting and drawing. I loved colored pencils and pen and ink. I had a nice desk in a nook in my dining room. I loved this apartment so much. It was eventually turned into a desk against a wall to make room for toys.


Studio 2 - A corner in my living room. I didn't stay here long but the corner was nice as the living room was huge. I am not even sure I unpacked my craft stuff here.


Studio 3 - A corner in my living room and I used it all the time but it was not very cute. It stayed up on my scrapbooking and went to tons of crops.


Studio 4 - A area in the living room behind my couch. I think it was a good size considering how tiny the apartment was I had a desk a book shelf and a couple tables. I got so much scrapbooking done here! I loved this space because it was a part of the living room but you couldn't see the mess. This is the studio where I really started becoming addicted to stamps!


Studio 5 - The first time I had a private studio it was in my bedroom and my room was shaped in an L so I had part of the L as my studio and it was so nice and so pretty and so so so...lonely. I never got anything done unless the girls were up stairs with me watching TV.


Studio 7 - Now I am back in with the family and into a room that is suppose to be a dinning room. This room was nice it had two doors in it so I could close out the mess or the noise if I wanted and I scrapped on a folding table. It had the best lighting and I got a lot done here.


Studio 8 - Back into the bedroom I go but the house is so tiny and my now husband also has a studio in there a music studio. I know how did it all fit with a bed and all.

It was a challenge and then we got a new bedroom set and boom the studio 8 was moving into the living room and my hubby's into the kitchen which ironically was on the same wall about 6 feet away from each other. LOL it was a small house. I actually got so much done at this tiny little desk.


This desk actually was a part of my daughters bedroom set but again it was so tiny in the house and the girls were sharing a room so I took this to give them more room.


I fell in love with it though it was the first time I had ever faced a wall when scrapping. I love the vertical space though and the drawers are so big!


I was happy to move but I was a little sad to have to give her back her desk.




Studio 9 - Again I had a whole room but this time it was fabulous as it was beautiful and big and right in the heart of the home.
It was a sitting room I suppose once upon a time and I got to use these cool hutches my hubby got at work and we bought a new desk too. I kind of miss him working at the furniture store.

He got two of these and they were only $20 each wow what a steal huh...he got them at different times but one was "damaged" missing glass so they were going to toss it. The other was solo and so he asked if he could buy it too and they said sure.

We decided to purchase a table to match and give me a lot of work space so we went on the hunt and finally found a really cool one that was perfect and two toned.

We put it in between the two hutches and it had a lot of room. I even had a little computer area and still plenty of space to scrapbook and stamp.

I loved it because everything was right at my finger tips. I was facing the living room and I had room for company.

I also had a brilliant idea for my embellishments so I bought these shelves and made it look so fabulous and ease to see...you know if you can see it you can use it!

I will give you an up close cause this was my favorite part. Since it was so perdy and all. ;)


Then we moved again...I move a lot.

Bringing me to Studio 10 - Now we are back in a smaller home but it is enough space...almost. the hubster is in his man-cave a.k.a basement and I was at a loss of where to go. I can't be in the bedroom as it doesn't have so much room and my hubby works 3rd shift. I can't be in the living room becauase the baby will tough everything. The dinning room has a great closet and that is what I chose but then I started moving stuff around and now I ended up in a nook in the kitchen and I am back using my daughters desk...now it is all mine though. She wanted to get rid of it. Got rid of the matching dresser and we got her a new one so now it is all mine! Mine mine mine...LOL I love it. It is a little small but it works for now and I have really been using it a lot. Best part is it is at the very back of the house so if I am in the middle of something it is ok. The baby isn't really allowed in the kitchen alone so that takes care of that too. I am still using the closet and plan to put floor to ceiling shelves in there so I can have everything else at my finger tips.

Yep this is working good...well until the kids start moving out ;)

A short story about the closet!

My oldest daughter Danielle is such a girly girl. A few years ago after I got married we moved into a teeny tiny house. I mean itty bitty. She went from her own room with a good size closet to sharing a room with her sister and a small closet. She was forever complaining about not having room and so she came up with a solution! She added another row and instead of a small closet with no room she had a small closet with plenty of room. I thought it was a very clever solution.

I also thought it was so funny how obsessed she was about her closet and the clothes. She would spend hours organizing her clothes and even more hours dreaming about how to get more clothes. Since it was so funny around the house when my husband finally put the bar up I snapped some photos of the stack of clothes on her bed and then of how nice and color coordinated they were after she put them away. Honestly I am pretty girly myself but I have never seen one girl have 5 pink shirts in the same style but when I tease her about it she says…”but mom they are different”

I am happy to report that she again has her very own room. A girl needs her space right?

All materials for this papge are Stampin' Up! oh wait...cept the flowers.

Just you...

So I've had these photo's of my daughter laying around for a few years and I never really knew what to do with them.

Over at PS they are always doing fun crops and whatnot and this month we are doing a scrap-it-forward crop it is fun we do a challenge and then who ever finishes and posts first gets to post the next one.

This one was to use a sketch by Becky Fleck over at Page Maps. I had some more of my Feb 2008 kit left featuring scenic route. Haha you may have seen this paper in what my last two posts. I am almost all out of it but you can see how stinking cute it is I just can't help myself.

Here is a close up of the title and the journaling. Chipboard letters I love them as they are so red and shiny. I love the heart as an "o" I normally journal freehand but since this is obviously Dani I just cut apart some stickers and used some descritpive lovey dovey words to talk her up.

I also love how the embelished layers turned out. Here is another view of them. Dani is my girly girl too so all the pink and all the hearts fit perfect. Not to mention she is making a heart in the bottom photo!

I also used a Marth Stewart punch to make the frame and was pleased that it turned out the first try and that it all matched up in the corners. It must have been my lucky day!

Showing more love...t-ball style

I heart t-ball :)

So todays post is all about t-ball. My middle daughter has always been in love with sports. First t-ball and then onto softball, soccer, basketball, more softball...but never a big fan of volleyball.

Anyway back to the beginning. T-ball. She started asking when she could play when she was about 3 or so. I called when she was 4 to ask when she could sign up and they said next year she was so sad I think there were even real tears involved. Well the summer of 2000 she finally go her wish and was on her way to t-ball bliss. At one of her first games, grandparents everywhere of course, she finally got her turn to bat. She went up to the T and turned her head and actually spit over her shoulder. My dad was like...huh...then she went tap tap tap with her bat and swung her little behing to get into position. Again my dad was like huh...then he said the funniest thing "if she grabs her shorts I'm outta here" she didn't and he stayed for her game. Now he goes around telling this funny story whenever there is another grandparent or friend around. I always chuckle because I can picture it in my head like it was yesterday.

Here are the journaling spots telling the story that I just told you up above. I have never journaled like this but let me tell you it was fun and I loved it! The pink flower is popped up and the green one is a little under it. I will use it again for sure. It turned out so cute.

These papers are from a scenic route line actaully they are the leftover from the band aid project. Seriously one of my favorite kits over at PersonalScrapper.

Another favorite part of my layout is the arrows. I adore the way this turned out and the three little chipboard peices mimic 1st 2nd and 3rd base! It also makes it look like her ball went up up and away and it draws your eyes up to the first base she is rounding.

Sketch Talk

So here is an oldie but goodie. I did this page about 6 years ago when I first changed from CM style. Now it seems to me that CM styles have changed too but I am not so sure and I have moved on from them. I mention that because I was so trilled at this time to be using color for my base pages! This was also a new time in the world of "sketching" I love sketches and simply cannot get enough of them. I have always been artistic but I never felt I could get things to come together. With a sketch I have somewhere to start and sometimes it ends at the same place with my things and sometimes it takes me in a totally different direction. Another thing I love about it is once I do a few pages with some sketches then I branch out on my own as the creative juices just take me away.

Actually this is one thing that I love about CTMH they have great books that have sketches the new Wishes card confidence program, Originals card confidence program, Reflections scrapbook program, Cherish scrapbook layouts, and Imagine scrapbook layouts. These books let me enjoy my hobby...my passion without getting caught up in the design aspect. They let me focus on the photos, the papers, the embelishments, and yes even the journaling. I also love to hop on-line and go to fun sketch sites or over to a friends blogs for sketch challenges. Another place I get ideas from is well idea books! The CTMH catalog, Scrapbooks etc., Creating Keepsakes the list just goes on and on. How about this though...a Pottery Barn Catalog or a Better Holmes and Garden magazine? These are also great places to get ideas! As you are flipping through if something catches your eye mark the page or tear it out. Perhapse it is a color combination or a design layout. Inspiration is everywhere...art is everywhere.

In the next few weeks I will do a card or a page based on a non traditional idea source and post it here. I would love to see what you came up with too!

Perfect Day's

So it is raining again here in the midwest and so I wanted to share with you a few pages featuring the Perfect Day paper pack. I think when it is gloomy outside it is so nice to grab a scrapbook and flip through the pages and laugh and remember the fun, silly, exciting things that you or your loved ones have done.

For this reason alone I thought ahhh that is a perfect day and so here I share some of my memories. Here is one of my favorite pages of the girls as it shows them just being themselves and having fun. I love it when I capture them acting like sisters. Let me rephrase that sisters who like each other! :)

These pages are about Dodgeball as you can surly see. I love the way the title turned out and I also love my button groupings. I am not always sure what to do with buttons so when I tried this I was so happy to discover how much Iliked it.

Where I've Been...

Celebrating Birthdays...

Flying on airplanes

Playing in the ocean....ahhh bliss

Celebrating a 8th grade graduation...

and a high school graduation!

Planning and throwing a threw a party.

So not much scrapbooking or stamping but soon! I am working on a project for club so I will share that soon. I hope everone has had a great month.