Crafting is My Sanity

How do people happily survive without a hobby? Seriously. With all of the demands with family, work and church, it's so nice to have a craft where I can take time out and create something. When I'm making things with paper it's like I'm giving myself a really big breathe of fresh air.

This week a crafting break was inspired by my Today is Beautiful kit scraps that were in a messy piles on my desk. After making six layouts, there were still a lot of great bits and pieces still left, so I decided to make some Valentine tags for my kids, Ward and a few friends.

White tags that I had on hand were the base for each of the tags. I sprayed a few white doilies with Heidi Swapp Color Shine (Tropicana Teal, Gold and Primrose) and folded those around a few of the white tags. 

It was so fun to stack and layer bits and pieces of pretty paper, glittered embellishments and flowers. My talented friend, Tessa, gave me a sweet gift of handmade flowers and bows and I used those and finishing touches on a few of the tags. 

Once the tags were finished, I decided that it would be fun to tie them with baker's twine to some candy. I was so happy to find these hot pink candy bars at Trader Joe's. I didn't even care what chocolate flavor they were (luckily they were plain swiss chocolate) because I knew the pink candy wrapping would add the perfect pop of color.

It took about an hour to create these eight tags and I'm thinking that was an hour of crafting happiness that was well spent!

Happy Friday, friends!

Project Life 2014 >>> February Part 1

I'm continuing to fill a spread in my Project Life album every two weeks and I love the flexibility and time saved by not doing a spread a week.

Lacrosse Tournament /// Grandma's Sugar Cookies /// Gilbert Temple Open House /// Cross Country Banquet /// Babysitting Cousin Vincent

This spread has two insert pages which may seem like I ended up doing a lot more than just one spread, but really it just gave a space to share a few more photos plus a few Valentines.

Valentines /// Phoenix Suns Game /// Cross Country Meet /// Boy Scout Fundraiser

On a Run /// School Valentine Party /// More Suns Game

Success! Another two weeks documented. Love this project!

Celebrating Together

We enjoy celebrating holidays with small family traditions. I think it's important to celebrate together as a family because it creates strong bonds and special memories.

One of our traditions for celebrating New Year's Eve is that our family drives a couple hours north and we stay in a hotel for a couple of nights. This is always a relaxing time that we all look forward to after participating in many Christmas activities.

This year, we lit up sparklers at midnight to celebrate the new year. I think this was the first year that all three of our kids made it until midnight!


The Glitz Hoopla line was perfect for this page with the party and celebrate sentiments used throughout this line. Just what I was looking for to create a playful, party feel.


Another holiday tradition we have is that grandma brings delicious Valentine sugar cookies each year for Valentine's Day. This is one tradition that our entire family looks forward to!


I created the doily background by placing a paper doily on the background paper and misted over the top of it. When the doily was lifted, it left a cool design behind.


Thanks for stopping by and sharing a couple of my favorite holiday traditions with me today!

Lisa

Layout Supplies

Happy New Year
Glitz "Hoopla" Paper: Zebra, Pipework, Frames, Polka
Glitz "Hoopla" Whatnot
Glitz "Hoopla" Rubons
Glitz "Hoopla" Journaling Stickers

Grandma's Sugar Cookies
Glitz "Love Nest" Paper: Damask, Floral, Sky, Polka
Glitz Giant Rhinestones
Glitz "Love Nest" Whatnot
Glitz "Hoopla" Whatnot
Glitz Ivory Teeny Alpha
Other: Tattered Angels Mist, Paper Doily, Cosmo Cricket Numbers, Elle's Studio Tags & Scrapbook Circle Be Mine Printable

Happy Valentine's Day

We've enjoyed celebrating Valentine's Day all weekend. These Bingo cards were a success with our friends this weekend. The kids didn't want to stop playing!



We also baked, frosted and ate way too many sugar cookies.


I've also done a little Valentine card making today with a FREE printable that Scrapbook Circle is offering on their blog.

The little hearts are my favorite element on the page. Plus I really love those little banners! Here's a look at what I've done with the printable so far.



Be sure to stop by the Scrapbook Circle blog and pickup your own free copy of the Valentine printable.

Hope you have a Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine BINGO

This Sunday we are getting together with friends to celebrate Valentine's Day and I thought it would be fun to have a game the kids could all play.

While I was looking for game ideas, I found this fantastic Bingo template on the eighteen25 blog.

They share a Photoshop template that can be used to make Bingo cards with photos. If you are interested in making the Bingo cards, they share the directions on their blog.

Here's a look at one of my cards.

There will be eight kids at the party, so with 24 squares, they each get to be on the Bingo card three times. I just had to make sure that they are not in the same column twice.

I made eight different boards by just switching around a few photos on each board.

The file was uploaded to Costco and I had the Bingo cards printed at 8 x 10 inches for only $1.49 each. I've also laminated them so that we can reuse them next year.

Hopefully the kids will enjoy playing with these this weekend!

Are you doing anything fun to celebrate Valentine's Day?