The Good Stuff (Layout)

Layout: Party Pic

This is from 2-3 years ago (wow, I need to lose weight again…) at a friends’ child’s 2nd birthday party.  We lobbied long and hard to get invited to these shindigs (not sure why anyone would turn down a free present for their kid…  Oh, wait, yeah, I do get that… lol).  They kind of dragged their feet on it, maybe because we were having trouble having kids and they thought we wouldn’t enjoy it.  But we love all these kids, and wanted to celebrate them, too, so evidence that we were there was hard-won!

I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but I am NOT a vintage gal.  I usually do clean, bright layouts.  But I love Tim Holtz’s work, and I love vintage items in general, and I keep buying antique-y, distress-y products…  I have also always turned up my nose at beginning a layout with product as inspiration.  It seemed so… materialistic? shallow? superficial?  Not sure.  lol  But I started with a product this time, and picked everything else to match, including the photo.  I have such a stash, it’s time it starts getting used.  And since I never think to look at my grungy embellishments when I scrap picture-first, I figured I should start there every so often so they get used, someway, somehow.  So the photo corners and bookplates were the starting points for this whole layout.

The balloons on the blue bookplate (trimmed down so it looks like a tag) sparked a memory of this party.  T and I were both in grad school.  I was working a few part time gigs, and he was full time, but we were hurting financially.  So we bought Luke a giant mylar balloon.  That’s it, it’s what we could afford at the time.  And may I say?  He loved it.  It was the hit of the party.  :-)

Silhouette-cut Birthday Cards

I made these on Sunday, too. Simplified the process ever so much by using my Silhouette SD. Even went ahead and bought new shapes for it! Inexpensive and soooooo convenient. I bought the ‘restroom girl icon’ and a scalloped cherry spot.

I removed the cherry and little faux-stitching slits from the perimeter of the cherry spot. Then I sized my text and cut-cut-cut! Slipped snippets of black paper lace underneath. Quick, easy, cute. :-)

iBirthday

I found this pic last night, just waiting to be scrapped for, oh, the past year and a half…  :-)  No matter, it was the perfect opportunity to break in my new Silhouette SD!  The layout’s theme was the iPod Thomas broke down and got himself for his birthday.  I found a music font on dafont.com, found a handful of characters I liked, arranged them in varying sizes, welded them together and voila!  Instant cool background.  I was very happy with my first embellie cut from this machine!

A close-up of the super-intricate cutting on that drumset!

And a huge YAWYK update!  I will definitely hit my goal of using up or otherwise getting rid of 2010 items in 2010!  I know it didn’t seem possible, but I’ve got 3 big Christmas projects that are finally concluded, plus all the stuff I can now sell or give away since my Silhouette handily replaces them all!  (The really good news, though?  My scrapping goal for next year will be far more interesting for you guys.  I’m channeling Late Blossom and trying to use all of my stamps in 2011, which will result in more projects to share!)

YAWYK Count:  1857/2010

2011 calendars (which failed miserably and then turned into albums) for the soon-to-be-grandparents:

1028-1029) 2 ready-to-scrap calendars

1030-1309) 280 letter and number stickers

1310 – 1361) 52 sheets of patterned paper and cardstock

1362-1378) 17 embellishments

1379-1380) 2 books dried out rub-ons

2nd cousin’s first year album:

1381-1382) album and strap hinge kit

1383-1404) 22 sheets cardstock

1405-1435) 31 embellishments

Being replaced by my Silhouette:

1436-1444) 9 alphabets

1445-1447) 3 machines

1448-1449) 2 sets of cutting mats

1450-1482) 33 individual sizzlits!

Additional purging yesterday!

1483-1494) 12 ugly sheets paper

1495-1502) 8 dried up markers & pens

1503-1511) 9 ready-to-scrap 12×12 calendars (the first 2 were such a disaster that I’m just giving them all away.  Sigh.)

1512-1514) 3 vintage paper items

1515-1532) 18 square brads

1533-1556) 24 weeded out flowers

1555-1563) 7 starbucks cozies (long story)

1562-1607) 44 Christmas swap items (not finished items, just die cuts and ribbon scraps), long unused, wrinkled or otherwise not my style

1606-1626) 19 1/2 used letter sticker sets

1625-1724) 98 journaling spots (well, over half of them were index cards…  the other half were ones that I could easily recreate with stamps)

Used on the Christmas cards that my students made and we send out every year:

1725-1840) 116 square brads (I just don’t like them, so donated away!) and big gold brads (ditto!)

iBirthday LO:

1841-1843) 2 sheets paper

1844-1852) 9 rub-ons

1853-1857) 5 mini-brads

So…  153 more to go!  Soooooo close!

Happy B*Day, ITAK!

It Takes All Kinds is celebrating its 2nd birthday! Join in the fun by taking part
in our blog hop starting today and running until Sunday the 29th!

We will be giving a way the August Scarlet Lime Kit, a grab bag ofPink Paislee stuff, a grab bag of stuff from Bella Blvd and more! You can enter on each of the participating blogs and also right here on VexedAngel, which means you have at least 7 chances to win!!

I thought I’d share one of the b-day cards I made for T this year. I actually made him 7, and gave him one each day leading up to his birthday. Each one had a little gift–like a coupon for cooking on his week, or a pack of nerds for my nerd.

With textured cardstock and manly ledger and stripe patterns in bold colors, accented with some ‘studly’ brads, I had a fun, festive, masculine card.

To enter here, just leave a comment on this post telling me your favorite kind of birthday cake. :-) (Mine is strawberry.)

Then you will continue on with the blog hop by going to Rani’s blog next.
Lots of great inspiration coming your way, so be sure to check out each blog!

We will pick the winners on Wednesday, Sept 1 so be sure to check back here to see if you have won. For an additional chance to win, simply subscribe to VexedAngel in a reader or by e-mail and leave me a comment here that you have.

Each separate comment you leave is an additional chance to win!

Thanks for celebrating with us!Now click here to go to the next blog in the hop!

Child’s Birthday Card… What a puzzler…

I can’t wait to do this again for Aidan’s birthday in the fall! Check out the details by clickinghere. Also, there’s a big blog hop coming to celebrate ITAK‘s 2nd birthday, with goodies, etc., I’ll keep you in the loop. :-)

YAWYK Count: 497/2010
494) Pink DCWV chip stack piece
495-497) Butterflies from stash