Rumble Grumble

I have been busy, busy, busy preparing for this school year. I'm pretty much ready. Only 4 more days! Yay! I can't wait. :)

Here is my biggest concern right now - the noise. We have some major construction going on, practically in my backyard. What used to be a ton of trees and a ditch on the other side of my back fence, now appears to be completely empty space with the ditch completely filled in with dirt. Now, because the ditch was HUGE and is now full of dirt, obviously we have had work trucks bringing dirt, scooping dirt, dropping dirt....all of this after they already spent a day knocking down trees. They are very close to my fence - so close that their trucks keep bumping the branches of trees in my yard. My house literally shakes ALL DAY LONG. I had a horrible migraine two days ago, and it is near impossible to get rid of it with the house rumbling.

So, now that my grumbling is done, would you like to see my latest layouts? :) I've been busy
making new pages, but have neglected posting them on my blog. In my defense, blogger hasn't been very cooperative for me.

My first three layouts were made using the Pampered Princess kit by Sheri Smith, SheLynn Designs at Scrappin' Secrets. The layouts just flowed once I got started. The first two are of sweet Elena. I used the ShangriLaNFSmallCaps font in the first one, and Scythe font in the second.

My third layout was of Cassidy. Don't you just love that silly smile she had? LOL It was taken on her first real Halloween. She was Sleeping Beauty and was thrilled, as you can tell. :) I used Pea Catherine as the font on this one.

Next is a layout I did for the Ad Inspiration Challenge on SS. I am far from thrilled with it, but I liked the concept. I decided to do a layout on Cassidy's favorite things. What you see is the result. LOL Barbie, the color PINK, Disney Princesses, My Little Ponies, friends, and of course, her Purple Baby, which she never leaves home without. The font I used is Kayleigh, and the kit is Miss Mint's "To My Mother" kit from Peppermint Creative.

What's next? Hmmmm. My Abc Album is coming along nicely. I just finished my letter E page. I just realized I never showed the C and D pages either. Yikes! I am WAY behind!

C always stands for the older princess around here. LOL I'm still trying to get my tears to look halfway decent. I'm not thrilled with how they turned out here, but they will do for now. All of the papers and elements are from Ginger Thibodeau's Softly Shining kit. I love this kit. I have used it on at least 3 layouts and could keep using it over and over. It is a beautiful kit! The font I used is ITC Garamound. I decided right from the start that I was going to use the same font for this entire album to sort of tie the entire thing together.

My D page features a photo of some ducks that I took on Jacob's first fishing trip. The little babies were so cute. They would follow their mother into the high grass at the edge of the lake and simply disappear in it. Do you see the little white duck among all of the brown ones? He is too cute. LOL I used V. Kim Smith's Woodland Meadows 2 kit.

Just as C stands for Cassidy, E is for Elena. Scrappin Secrets has a new Mega kit out right now for free (so go get it - good through the month of August!) and I loved the lightly colored papers in there. I really loved Colleen Shibley's background that I chose to use, as well as the little tag. It just seemed too perfect. :)

Let me see. Wow, I did not realize how long it had been since I posted my layouts. LOL Next is one I did for the SS Quote Challenge. Journaling reads:
"Joshua, you have always had a special bond with Elena. I remember when this photo was taken in the hospital only a few short hours after Elena was brought into my room. You were so proud of your new sister. At that time you were still not very verbal, but the joy you showed us was amazing. Elena is so lucky to have such a wonderful big brother." I used Robin Carlton and Mandabean's Deco Fabulous kit. The fonts are Libby Script, Pea Jennifer, and Kayleigh.

I took part in the lyrics challenge at SS as well. I didn't think I had a single photo to go along with it, which is why I didn't do the same exact challenge at RAKS. While looking through my photos for one to use on the quote challenge, I came across the photo I decided to use. It needed something done, so I played with it a bit. You see the final result. The lyrics are from Natasha Bedingfield's song "Unwritten". The font I used is Apple Chancery, and the kit I chose is Funky Bunches of Flowers by Tania Cordova aka luna designs.

Finally, I made two layouts using Julie Major's Spring Time Kit. The first is A Little Cake. I got the stitching from Atomic Cupcake, and the font is Pea Becky. Gotta love those Pea fonts!

The other is titled Smile. I took this photo on Elena's birthday. She was so cute. She sat on the seat and kept smiling and saying "Cheeeeeeese". What a ham she can be at times. LOL I used Pea Becky on this one as well. Now that I am looking at it, I wish I would have kept her eyes colored when I desaturated the pic. She has the most gorgeous blue eyes. I may redo it one of these days.

I think that pretty much brings you up to date on the happenings and the layouts from this month. I'll try to be better about updating regularly so I don't overwhelm you with the layouts like that. ;)