Day 5 - A song which makes you happy.

Rock Island from THE MUSIC MAN - everytime I hear this song it makes me happy.  Such a fun, clever song.  Both of my kids memorized this song when they were in elementary school.  They used to sing it over and over and over.

Day 6 - A song which makes you sad /teary.

Bring Him Home from LES MISERABLES.  From the first note the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and my nose gets tingly.  I have to work at not crying whenever I hear this version of this song.  Sometimes, though I just let the tears come.  It is so incredibly moving. 

Blackberry Patch

When I was in high school I lived in Vancouver, BC.  I lived about 2 miles from school and I got a ride to school every morning but I had to walk home.  Once I got off the sidewalk on Kerr and began the walk along Marine Drive I entered blackberry country.  In the fall was when they were ripe and I would eat my way along the last 1/2 mile or so home.  Years later when we lived in Grass Valley , specifically at Wolf Mountain, there were so many blackberry bushes, just like home.  There was even an area called Blackberry Pass. Our house was in a different, drier part of camp and we didn't have blackberries there. 

Now, here in Sonoma county, I have my own personal blackberry patch.  It's huge and has the biggest and best blackberries ever!  The thing is, though... I don't really like blackberries!  Maybe those years of blackberry picking in high school burned me out, I dunno.  I'll go out a and pick a few handfuls every so often and even make a cobbler or crisp but I don't like them in pancakes or jam or jelly.  So I don't pick buckets and freeze them and I curse at them for taking over EVERYTHING more than I really enjoy their fruit.  They are nice photography subjects though and I do claim bragging rights for the best berries on camp.  They gotta be good for SOMETHING, right?

Green fruit before ripening.  I love their brown fuzzy skirts.

A bit fuzzy.  Sorry.

In this house...

This picture was taken on September 12, 2011.  It is my beautiful daughter in law Dusti on her 30th birthday. I am so proud of her and glad to be her mother in law.  Tyler made the best choice ever in his pick for a life partner.  This picture was taken that day. Norm and I wanted to make her something special for her big day.  Awhile ago she posted this picture on her blog:

She said she wanted one of these to hang on her wall.  So we set about to try and make that happen.  Norm has tons of old wood around and so after we figured out how wide the pieces needed to be (8") and how long (24") he cut them and we set about sanding and prepping them.  Then he fastened them together.

I love how the paint is all peel-y and the under paints are showing through.  

I cut all the words out on my Cricut using the Opposites Attract cartridge.  We snapped the lines on the boards using a chalk line (not sure I would do it that way again if I ever make another one of these) and I gathered my lettering materials together.

The actual lettering took me less than an hour.  I didn't want the letters to be stark black so I used a charcoal black paint.  Then I used aqua paint for the word LOVE to fit in with her living room decor.  I didn't have the right kind of sponge so I cut open an old dish sponge.  Worked like a charm!

The cost of making this sign was very minimal.  It cost us more to mail it than it did to make!  It was so much fun to work together on this project.  You'll notice there aren't any pictures of Norm here.  The only excuse I have is that it was very sunny when I took them and they were very glare-y.  Yeah...that's it....

One of the things I had to do was to blank out the insides of the O's and D's.  I did this with cream paint and a reverse stencil.  Worked great!

Happy birthday, Dusti.  We love you!!!

Day 4 - A song demonstrating how overrated you think a musical is

The Internet Is For Porn/AVENUE Q - hate this show/song.  Just hate it.  How are a bunch of people onstage using puppets Broadway worthy?  And people fall all over this show like it's the Second Coming.  Just. don't. get. it.

Greetings from This Life I Travel

Here it is, the first scrapping project I've posted on this blog.  My scrappy friends will be happy.  I made it for a swap so I will be sending it to a new home.  It is a mini book made out of toilet paper rolls.  I know.  I know.  That skeeves some people out but I'm ok with it.  

So here it is.  No real tutorial needed I don't think.  I flattened the TP rolls by putting them through my Big Shot a time or two.  Years ago when I went to CKU (Creating Keepsakes University) I went to a class taught by the very talented Jennifer MCGuire.  We made a tag book called BLESSINGS FROM THIS LIFE I TRAVEL.  I have used that same theme in several forms since then and thought it would be perfect for this project.  The paper line I used is an older one from 2007 from Fancy Pants.  It's called True. Love it when I can use my stash. 

I used my old school Dymo labeler for the black letters.  The BLESSINGS word is a QK font.  (Yes I still have a QK!)  I was in a monthly charm swap for about 6 months last year and I collected quite a lot of them.  The charms I used on the rings are from my stash from that swap.  I used a bit of a bird theme throughout.  I am out of these little metal flowers.  I hope they have more at Michael's!

So HOME and FRIENDS are the first two BLESSINGS.  Use a MS punch to make the paper lace and a Sizzlets die to cut the tags.  Pretty straight-forward duo of pages.

LAUGHTER and FAMILY are next.  The charm on this page is another from my swap stash.  I used Lindy's Magical Mica's to add some shimmer to the leaf and sunflower.  I especially love the tiny crocheted flowers on these pages.  And isn't the orange rick rack sweet?

I used bright orange embossing powder on the stamp on the TIME page.  i knew the blue of the paper I put it on would tone it down to a lovely brown.  I was also in a long running stick pin swap and pulled this one for my stash to use on the same page.  the LOVE page holds an explosion box type fold out for more pictures or journalling.

Here you can see one of the birds I used to carry on the theme.

NATURE has a little fold out accordion on it to be sure and have lots of room for pictures. The resin bird is like the one I used on the cover. It's from Webster's Pages. The apple stamp on the FOOD page was stamped with the same bright orange embossing powder I used on the previous page but on the lighter color paper it shows up much more orange.  Another stick pin and some more of those cute crocheted flowers round out the page.

Inside the TP rolls are tags folded lengthwise with pull tabs on the top.  Each one is different and has a bird stamp on it somewhere.  


I hope you enjoyed this little book.  Remember to give thanks for the blessings in your life.