Lorado Scrappy retreat!

Hello all!  This past weekend I went back to the Lorado Taft Crop located in Oregon IL, at the Lowden State Park.  The Lorado Taft campus in the park is just beautiful! It's so relaxing to be there. No stress! The food is wonderful. Granted, the sleeping arrangements are dorm rooms, but hey, who sleeps at a crop retreat?? ;)

All those lovely scenery pics... wait what's that at the top? that would be the snack table in our cropping room that my friends filled with every sugary treat imaginable... I could have none of it! ugh, lol. ;)

I got lots of scrapbook pages done! You'll be seeing them soon! I will start writing the posts now so they will go up automatically the next several days! Also, there was a name tag contest, and normally I don't do the contests but this time I had an idea, and ran with it. This is what I came up with:

Since I used to teach belly dance I thought this was appropriate. :)  I even made it so her hips would wiggle! I wish I looked as good when I was dancing! LOL!  Oh, and I did win the contest! $25 toward my purchase at the crop store. :)  I used my cricut (Rock Princess) to cut the dancer, but altered the clothing cuts to make her costume.

Come back soon, I will have lots of layouts to share! Thanks for stopping by!

(oh and if you are interested in the crop, contact the owner of this store for more info http://www.etsy.com/shop/itsalwaysfabulous) 

I'm published again!

The newest issue of Cricut Magazine is out! And I'm in it!!!

I made this mailbox and submitted it for the "flowers" theme the magazine had a call for! And they asked me to write up a tutorial for it!

I got a 4 page spread!!! I did not take any of the pictures. I sent my project to them and they took all the pictures and followed my tutorial to make the flower example for the photos.

I'm so excited to be published!!!  But not only that, Northridge Publishing (the makers of this magazine and Scrapbook Trends, Cards, Handmade and others) also sends out a weekly email newsletter, and my project was the featured project for last weeks email! Here's the pic that was in the email!

It's so exciting to me! I'm lazy about submitting to magazines but I'm glad I did for this one!

Thanks for visiting!

Announcements! :)

Hey everyone!!! I'm so super excited!!!

First off, I've hit 100 followers!!! OMG! I never thought that would happen but I'm so grateful to all of you!  I'm going to give away a nice blog candy so stay tuned for that post, I will be posting about it tomorrow!!!!

And my big announcement for which I'm really super excited for!  My local scrappy store, Scrapaganza! has asked me to join their Design Team! Oh my gosh!!!!  I'm so honored to work with them, they have a SUPERB design team, which includes designer Kim Garner from the Rusty Pickle DT  and designer Penny Smith on the Imaginisce DT!! Not to mention my all time favorite heritage designer, Alisa, she's my hero.  Scrapaganza! has some awesome changes coming up, not just locally but they will soon be offering a kit club online that will be amazing!  So don't be surprised if I mention Scrapaganza in my posts. lol

Well, I'm off to bed. I am sick! I think I mentioned being sick over new years, well it all came back! Sinus infection, sore throat, pink eye! fun times at the Ramsey house. But I don't care. I have 103 followers and I'm a Design Diva at Scrapaganza! LOL

The Gypsy Spot!

There's a new challenge blog in town, The Gypsy Spot!  Created for Gypsy/Cricut owners! And I've been chosen for the Design Team so I'm especially excited! All my favorite things in one place, challenges, Gypsy and cricut! and I get to be on the design team!  If you like cricut swing on by! You don't have to own a gypsy to hang out and play along.

I got picked!

I am on a design team!!! Starting October. :) Woo hoo! Inspirational Card Sketches had a design team call, and I have loved Dawn's sketches since she started that challenge blog. I have missed submitting a lot of weeks but I always check it every week and add her sketch to my "to-do" list for the week. (Seriously, my to-do list is more organized than I can ever actually be... I print a new list every week with pics of the challenges!)

Well every call ICS has had, I have tried out. I finally got chosen! And you know, I didn't have a lot of faith in my card so I didn't look at my "competition" till after I got the email from Dawn. There were some seriously stunning cards out there that weren't chosen, so I am shocked and honored that I was picked!  I've gotten a peek at the upcoming sketches and I'm thrilled, they are very inspiring!

If you are one of the ones that didn't get picked this time, keep trying out!

Yay me!

Wow! I've had a great start to this month!

I won the August contest over at Scrapbook Dreamer. I will be the Guest Design Team member there in October (I love october!). If you haven't been to Scrapbook Dreamer, you should go there! Fabulous message board and a wonderful store! And check out the yummy gallery. The art there is just stunning. I am so honored to be a part of that place.

One of my new favorite blogs also chose me as their August winner! Scrap the Boys has a monthly challenge for scrapping your boys, and I won with my Salsa Stir Fry layout. I get to be their October Guest Spotlight! I love that blog, I love all the ideas there. Sometimes it is challenging scrapping my son and hubby but with great sites like Scrap the Boys, I will never lack for ideas.

And just to top off my wonderful September beginning, I won some blog candy! lol!  BITTEN by the BUG has a monthly blog hop and I won one of the hop's blog candies. A package of cute pumpkin name holders which I think I'll take to work and use as photo holders, a set of mini fall cookie cutters and some bling! Woot! I thought I'd never win blog candy at such a huge blog, but that just goes to show me, always try!

Best of Show!

So I entered scrapbook layouts into our county fair and today was judging day. I have never entered anything in the fair before, and since I've only been scrapping since September 2008, I was a little nervous!

I entered 5 out of 6 categories. I placed in all of them! I couldn't believe it! But what really shocked me (in a good way!) is that one of my layouts took Best of Show! Wow!!!

Here's a picture of Kim Garner judging, who is on the DT for my local scrappy store, Scrapaganza and also on the DT for Rusty Pickle.


Here is my "beginner's category" entry. This is the one that took best of show.

This was my entry for the "paper manipulation" category. It took a first ribbon.

My entry in the "purchased elements" category got a second place ribbon.

And my entries in the "memorabilia" and "mixed media" categories got third place ribbons. I really didn't expect to place with these two layouts at all, so that was a surprise! In fact, all I hoped for at all was to get one ribbon, any place, and I'd have been happy. What a wonderful boost to find out all my pages took ribbons!


Thanks for looking!