I'm off!

To Scrapbook that is!!  I'm headed with a couple of my besties to go to a condo for the weekend and scrap!  As I copy off of Ali Edwards, these three things are the new purchases I have made to make my weekend fun.  First, a storage unit for my ribbon.  It is from Michael's.  And unfortunately, I cannot find a picture of it anywhere online, so sad for you :(  It is made by Store in Style, and has 20 compartments for ribbon (if you buy extra dividers).  I am quite excited about it because, although earth friendly, I need more  space than the kids shoe boxes I have the ribbon stored in currently! 

Second:   Dymo Caption Maker.  I am quite excited about this one as well.  I have often wanted to add this piece of flair to my embellishment bag of tricks.  So now, I have this pretty cute little tool that came with three different font thingies (how do you like that for technical?) and I added the primary colors to my purchase so I have four colors to choose from!!  Now, let's see how many pages I have that can boast this product!!!



And finally: Creative Memories Cheerful Seasons Cricut Cartridge I am looking forward to using this wonderful cartridge for my Cricut.  This new cartridge offers some wonderful things to the line of designs I have.  I am so excited!!!  I purchased this through Kristen and her website is linked.  Since I was her "down line" when I was a Creative Memories Consultant, I stick with her still.  Her website does offer shopping and can be shipped right to you.  There are two cartridges that are Creative Memories exclusives, and this one was my favorite! 

So now, you'll have to wait until I post about the weekend!  Have a great weekend yourself!!

My other Goober

Meet Graham.                               A.k.a Graham Cracker.                            Since I give Gabe a lot of attention because of his autism and for other reasons in life, I thought I'd take a moment and introduce you to my other goober.   Graham turned three this summer and has really quite the personality.  Where Gabe tends to be, "enough already" with the camera, Graham screams cheese!!  He does naughty things just for attention, but truly is a sweet and wonderful little boy.  He also adores his brother.  Currently, when we talk of autism at our house, I'm almost certain that Graham doesn't really understand.  He finds his brother quite hysterical when Gabe is being silly when he is supposed to be serious.  Graham trails around Gabe, finding the same things interesting, trying to talk to him and truly annoying Gabe.  I take personal enjoyment out of that!  (just kidding!) 



Graham is constantly on the move.  Which is why, even with my new camera, this picture is out of focus!  I can't believe how much energy he expends when he bedazzles the hallways at school with his presence.  He walks no where, but does every movement possible!  He is smart, like his brother, but in many different ways.  Gabe and Graham are opposites, that compliment each other as much as possible.     

If you ask him his name, he will say, "Graham Cracker!"

The Face of Autism

This is the face of autism.  The off stare, the simulated smile, the disinterested look.  This is a face of Gabe.

I have thought of the two pictures here on this post many, many times. . . My oldest son Gabriel has been blessed with Autism.  Some of the doctors have said Aspergers, some have said, PDD-NOS.  Either way, it doesn't really matter.  What matters is that I love this child for everything that he is.  I see the parts of his autism and I see the parts of him that are without autism.  In my family, I try to view this as a blessing.  I frequently remind myself that without this disability, my son would not be who he is and there would be some other annoying thing that he does just the same as some of his autistic tendencies do. . . it's not the autism, it's life. 

We truly are blessed, because his case is very mild.  He talks, walks, interacts, is social, accepts physical touch happily, and is extremely smart.  There are many parents out there that have children with autism and cannot use the same words to describe their children.  We are blessed.  I cannot count how many times a day he makes me laugh by quoting some random phrase from a movie, commercial, TV show, radio moment, etc.  He is so passionate and imaginative, so creative and loving, so intelligent and silly.  He is also socially awkward, physically awkward, and a mess in the sensory area.  Each and every moment may bring a response that is expectable or a response you wonder what planet it came from, good or bad! 

I cannot begin to tell you how thankful I am for him.  Gabe is not only a son of mine, but also a teacher.  Everyday, I learn about him, and autism.  I can't fathom who I would be without all the knowledge I've gained by him having autism.  He is constantly challenging me to grow as a mom. 

People may look at Gabe sometimes and see the face of autism.  Underneath the autism, when he shines through and moves aside the disinterest, this is what I see. . . This is the silly face of Gabe, that so many people get to see so often. 

It's a guy thing - really

A new cricket cartridge = a page embellished in it's honor!!!

Here's the story, my Graham was playing at his Great-Aunt's house and came across a safety helmet.  I have a few electricians in the family, and a few engineers, and thought how cute it would be to make it a guy thing. . . and that it is!  The paper is from DCWV, a stack of course!  And the card stock is random things I have.  Truly from the scrap pile.  The ribbon is from Stampin' Up!, I love their ribbon!  The eyelets are from Oriental Trading (I know I have mentioned that I don't like the quality of their things - so please understand that I abhor their scrapbooking items' quality!!) and the vellum quote is from DCWV - "Quotes Stack," I have quite a few of the stacks so I don't honestly know which one it is from.  I use a lot from the home and family stack and of course the all about boys stack as well.  And here, my friends, is my favorite part!!  I got a new cricket cartridge (and I have loaned out my cartridges, so I don't know which one it is from, and it may even be one of the new ones a friend got - but it still rocks!!) and love this thing!!! 

 Feel free to comment and leave a note about which cartridge it is - if I figure it out, I will comment or add the info as it comes to me. 

Again, thanks for popping in and checking things out! 

Yep, yep - I got it!

Do you see this camera??  Well, I see "this" camera every day now.  In the happy home of my hands!  I purchased it on Labor Day at my local Best Buy.  It was not the one the salesman was hoping to sell me, since he and I had visited a few weeks ago as well; however, this one will fit my needs and had a wonderful package deal! 

My friends following this blog will know that I am a bit of a shopaholic and tend to spend money like it is water at times.  However, I have been saving for four months and have gotten the money to purchase the camera.  Here's the part that I had to break to my loving husband - I got the package deal which includes the extra lens, a high speed memory card, and an extra battery. . . oh, and throw in the Geek Squad protection plan to include yearly sensor cleanings and some firmware update stuff I don't know about.  And the protection plan also covers it for damages and accidents that happen, which, with me, could very well happen. 

Here are the first two pictures I took with my recent purchase: 

These are my loving children sitting in the parking lot of the Best Buy, while their obsessed mother opens the package of her camera and snaps pictures.  Obviously, Gabe, sports the uninterested look of, "really mom, pictures in the car again, don't you have enough?"  And Graham, since only being three is still happy to say, "Cheese!" 

I love my new Canon Rebel xT1i, and will be experimenting greatly over the next few months.  (And paying for all of the extras I added on! )

So, I've tried a little harder on the photos. . .

Well, I've done it - I've tried a little harder and have accomplished better photos for my blog.               Reasons will be posted later. . . . suspense!  :)      This picture is of an embellishment on a page I don't feel comfortable sharing. There are children in the pictures that I don't have parent permission to post.  Anyway, it was a birthday party and I just loved the idea of this "p" for party that I inked.  The letter is by Chip Chatter and the ribbon is from Close to My Heart.  I wrote the rest of the word party out in a Creative Memories silver ink.  Simplicity this is! 

So this is the page I will feature of my boys.  This was taken in October of 2009 and I adore these pictures. 

I do an album for each of the boys with the similar pictures, just featuring the one who's album it is.  This one is Gabe's album.  I just love fall and sunflowers and leaves changing, so this paper from  a DCWV stack - one of many I own.  There are no other embellishments on this page, other than the writing, which I adorned to compliment the existing design of the paper.  This was a SIMPLE layout that met the needs of the photos. 

A few more to add

Here are more Debbie Mum bases in the red shade.  These two have background paper from the stash I have and added CTMH inks and stamp to embellish it.  I loved using the ribbon on these cards.  I actually ran out of this ribbon!  I never would have thought I would run out of pink ribbon, having two boys means pink is almost never used - but here in cards, I use it a lot!!

As you may have seen before, I absolutely love this stamp.  I paired it with some scraps from Creative Memories.  The border is stitched on creatively and then the purple square has a stamp from Stampin' Up!  I love this stamp set as well.  This is absolutely so simple to make and was all done out of my scraps.  One thing to note here, I did not sew directly on the card.  I sewed the green background and the border strip together.  Traditional sewing may use pins, instead I used Creative Memories clips from my absolute favorite tool ever - the multipurpose tool.  Love it!  And have now found another purpose for it!! 

These two cards also use scraps from Creative Memories.  I find I have been using a lot of their old background paper since they have now moved to a true 12x12 format.  The dream with faith stamp was one I purchased at a garage sale as was the sending thoughts stamp.  I love adding just that little touch of flair to both of these cards.  The dream card includes sewing around the purple and included the designed paper.  The card on the right included mulberry paper (which I stamped on) and the punch from Stampin' Up! with ribbon.  It is so easy to embellish with that punch!

Just a little close up of the dream with faith. . . I'm a little saddened that it doesn't stand out more; however, the picture also does not do it justice.  It doesn't stand out as much as I'd like it to in person, but it does look pretty amazing.  Kinda' dreamy if I do say so myself!  hee hee he ha ha! 

Again, these cards used scraps from a Creative Memories paper set.  The circular embellishments are "cricutted" and were going to be tossed because I didn't like them on a layout for my album - but here they are saved. The top card features a best wishes sentiment and the other two have "for you" stamped on them.  I have sewn on the two upright cards down the left hand side of the paper, again, not the card base, just the paper.  Each of these feature brads, I used these out of stuff from oriental trading - I DO NOT RECOMMEND PURCHASING SCRAPBOOK SUPPLIES FROM THEM.  The eyelets that came with the brads in a package have the color come off when you set them.  I have tried every way possible and the set horribly as well.  I had also purchased some paper from the company (their brand) and it was so thin and gritty I really would have rather not used it. 

This is a picture of the embellishment I "saved." I used Martha Stewart's glitter glue stamp pad and a Close to My Heart Stamp to add the glitter on it.  The glitter is from Stampin' Up!  You can really tell that I don't have a loyalty to one company, yet have great friends who sell from each (and an addiction to Hobby Lobby, Jo Anne's and Michael's)!!  The only reason I am unhappy with glitter is that it falls off after you put it on.  For my albums, I add a layer of Super Seal - which I purchase at Pages in Time before it recently changed owners.  The Super Seal helps to hold the glitter on the page better. 

I hope you have enjoyed these cards - it has been a month since I have posted, so I thought I would throw these up.  Hopefully, I'll be able to post again before the month!  Feel free to comment as you wish!