Raspberry Road Freebie Cluster

OK so twice in one day, but I wanted to share this other layout with a Raspberry Road kit using the Victorian Holiday collection - don't you just love this Victorian look? It was perfect for the Christmas decorations at the Grand Floridian at Disney World. I just loved the soft pinks and beautiful papers for this kit. I had hard time not using all of the elements, they are all so wonderful!

You can see the Victorian Holiday Elements and Papers here and here.

Credits
Raspberry Road's Victorian Holiday Elements, Papers and Add-on
SO Tiny Templates by Designs by Sine
Scriptina font

Plus I have the cluster freebie for you, created from my layout above. You can pick it up here

New CT - Raspberry Road

Hey Everyone - long time no see! I've just been invited onto the Raspberry Road CT and have this layout to share with you! This uses the Letters to Santa collection! You can find them in the shop Elements, Papers and Add-on.

Credits
Letters to Santa Collection by Raspberry Road Designs
Template Set 3 by Designs by Megan Turnidge,
Very Merry Alpha by Brittney of Britt-ish Designs and DeCrow Designs,
dear Joe4 and Feltpen Fonts

Choooo-choooooo Freebie on Board

Hey everyone! Welcome to the Scrap Orchard Honey Bee Blog Train! Have you come to get your Free’bee’???

First I have to tell you, the whole time I’ve been getting this blog ready my 15.5 year old Maine Coon Cat, Winston, has been lying behind me SNORING like crazy! Do you have a cat that snores? It is the funniest thing! It’s like a little mini rattle kinda snore, he’s so darn cute! With DH in the other room it’s like zzzzzzz stereo. Hmmmm I think I’d rather listen to Linkin Park! ROFL! So when you leave me a hello here, tell me about your cats!

OK, back to business! I had the opportunity to work with Designs by Sine this month! She has some great template kits in her shop and lots of super masks, borders and text paths. I love using them! This time I chose her SO Tiny template pack to work with:


and created this layout of my new Grand-Nephew, Garrett – isn’t he just darling???? Look at those precious feet with the rings on them! Click the image to go to the credits and find Irene Alexeeva’s kit here: Tom Thumb!
Speaking of designers - be sure you check out the Scrap Orchard Blog on Halloween!!!! There’s going to be a Designer Trick-or-Treat Blog Trains with lots of Halloween Free’bees’ that you just won’t want to miss!

So, if you are on the Honey Bee Blog Train, then you came here from Jaimie’s Blog. At my stop, you get another Spooktacular Brag Book Page. This Orchard Collab kit is available here In the Shop. And now click the image to go to 4shared to get your treat. Heh heh are you SHOCKED that my free'bee' has a cat in it??? ROFL!
After you download your free’bee’, come right back here and take a ride on the train to the next stop at Tami’s Blog. And if you just wandered in here and want to start at the beginning, or you get lost - take the alternate route back to the Scrap Orchard Blog. And while you’re there – check out the shop it is chock full of Scrap Orchard goodness!!!!!

"Fish are Friends" New Kit by Britt-ish Designs

Hey I'm back! I have four layouts today for kits that are being released! First up is for Britt-ish Designs at Scrap Matters

Britt's new kit is Fish are Friends, take a look at this beauty!

And here are my layouts! I'll be back later today to add the credits when I post them in a gallery. The first one is Crushes' Coaster At Disneyland Paris - look at that wait time! I love the way this looks like the turtles are on the EAC!!!
The second one is my DH, Me, SIL and BIL in Feb 2008 at Epcot
Next kit is Pocketful of Templates 3.

I found these pics of me as a baby and knew Britt's kit Tiny Cowgirl would be perfect. Then she announced she would release this perfect template! What more could a cowgirl want? Am I cute with my daddy or what?
OK Next this kit is being released by Irene Alexeeva at Scrap Orchard - Whispers

And my layout is the Lost Treasure. This was part of the Fairy Garden at Epcot's Flower and Garden Festival in April '09 and is Tinker Bell's Balloon - made of cotton and powered by pixie dust! LOL I think this came out awesome, I really love it. I took that photo and extracted the balloon and then cloned out all the people in the backgound (as well as an ugly pink backpack) and then blurred it. Came out lovely I think. Then I put that old frame over it. Hmmm Maybe I should have distressed the photo too. Maybe I'll go back.......

Hey I'll be back this weekend with more Scrap Orchard loveliness that I've posted recently and also another LO for Britt. Plus I may just have a freebie template to post!

I'm Yours Kit by Britt-ish Designs

Finally back with an update, I'm just so busy with CT commitments now, that I've been neglectful of getting posts about them onto my job. So my half year resolution (is there such a thing?) is to post more of my layouts here and talk about my CT kits.

Lots has changed in my CT world. My commitment to ESS was done at the end of June. And the Supreme Team gig was to be over at the end of July, but they asked me to stay on for two months, so I accepted. I have to say, I have been assigned some kits that I thought ???? what am I gonna do ???? Not the usual kits I would buy, but I've found it stretches my imagination and my skills to work with ones that are out of my comfort zone. So I"m very happy for that, I've got a lot of great LOs done being on the Supreme Team.

Mid-June I started the Honey Bee Creative Team contest at Scrap Orchard. Much to my shock after 3 weeks of making the cut, I made it once again on the 4th week and am now a Honey Bee. I am trying to work my commitments into my days but the work is worth is as after I have done my 3 layouts for the month, I can choose anything from the shop. Wow! Kid in a candy store!!!! My Wish List is HUGE! I'm only taking what I can use and make sure I create something with each item. But it's making me more productive for sure!

And then - most excitingly (new word, Google it....) I applied for Britt-ish Designs Britt Girls. I really would like to be on a designer team and she is my #1 choice! While I didn't make the team, she did offer me a guest spot for August, so I'm happily there, if not just for the time being. I can still hope for a permanent spot someday! My assignment there is one layout per week with her new product and then a layout with whatever I take from her shop. I have Totally Buggin in my Britt folder now, waiting to be scrapped!

So being up to date now, here is the first kit assignment from Britt and my layout. This lovely collab with DeCrow Designs I'm Yours and the I'm Yours Word Art Pack.

And here is my layout with the kit. This my nephew Greg and his wife Jenny. They are expecting their first child on 9/9/09. For the photo, I used a gradient map to change to B&W, then I extracted them because the background was distracting. Then I used a gaussian blur on the background. The result was too sharp for the soft colors, so I made a distressed overlay so soften it up. I really liked the results.
Credits for Wedded Bliss


OK so now that I'm back, I hope I can do this - um - at least once a week? Ha - I don't want to go crazy and commit to twice a week! Hopefully I get on here soon and dress up my Blog with the blog stuff I bought months ago. Hmmmmm. Don't even know where to start!

Hugs, Nancy

Still here!

Well, OK, so i've been a bad blogger once again. I'll be back with a new post this week, but for now, I'm taking down the links for the freebies! They've been up a long time, so it's time to say good-bye!

I got LOTD!

Oh wow! My first (hopefully not my last....) LOTD. I made this as part of my CT commitment for ESS. I really obsessed over it because I couldn't get the elements "just so" LOL, took me a while to get it right..... It was also a scraplift challenge at Scrap Matters. I used to think scraplifting wasn't very creative and preferred to do my own, but then once I started doing it I realized how you make it your own and that just because you scraplift a great LO, it doesn't mean that it results in "as great" an LO. I was really please with the pink and peach colors here. This is my granddaughter when she was 8, and my DH in our yard.

So now it goes to a vote for LOTW. I think I'll vote for myself. That's not bad right, I mean, don't you think Obama voted for himself? LOL


Grampa's Flower Credits

scrapidea-timkova Greeting of Spring and Moss Path

Just a quick post today to tell you about these two awesome kits by scrapidea-timkova! I saw them and instantly fell in love!

First is the Greeting of Spring - look at those extracted flowers - yummy! And the cute little birdie in the nest and the darling trees. You can get the kit at Sunshine Studio Scraps: Greeting of Spring

The second kit I'm drooling over, I just love it so much! Wonderful fence, little rounded shrubs, great flowers! So much to love. Again at Sunshine Studio Scraps: Moss Path

I'll be back this weekend with more layouts and some previews of the kits that I've been working with. Also going to ask if I can give out a couple of quick pages - we'll see!

Oh and by the way - Enchanted Studio Scraps has big events in the planning for National Scrapbook Day on May 2nd - be sure to watch for news on the blog. Follow the link on the right side list to visit the site!

I'm back! Had a busy March, I guess! I've done a lot of pages and also tried out for not just one, but two CTs and was accepted for both. I hope I can keep up with both, we will see, I can always just fulfill the contract and then not try out again, or renew. But, I'm enjoying both so far!

First up is Enchanted Studio Scraps. This is a new store, just opened up in January. It's bringing in a lot of designers from two stores I frequented last year - Snap and Scrap and Digital Candy.

So I submitted my gallery pics and was accepted to be an Enchanted Pixie. And anyone who knows me knows that I'm already a Fairy Godmother, so becoming a Pixie is not a stretch! LOL For this CT, I'm assigned to a designer and I need to do 4 layouts per month, two per kit. Plus I can get the site collab and do two layouts from that. And I can volunteer for more after I've done my first 4. We'll see how many I can do!


My first LO was for the site collab - Overboard. Lots of cool stuff in this kit and perfect for these pics of the Volcano Pool at the Polynesian. We pool-hopped there in April 2007 while staying at the Wilderness Lodge Villas.



Overboard Credits


My second LO was for my assigned designer - Flutter Expressions. She has a Boy/Girl kit ensemble called Just the Thing - Diva Style and Dude Style. I had to do this pic of my grandson Chris in his orange shirt for the Dude kit. He has the "make your own cookie" dessert from Wolfgang Puck in Downtown Disney.



Gourmet Dude Credits

Next up is GoDigitalScrapbooking. For this site CT (called the Supreme Team) I had to complete for four weeks, one LO per week, with an assigned kit. So obviously, I made it to the end and was actually accepted to both CTs within a few days of each other. That scared me! Yikes I hope I didn't over extend! For the ST, I need to do 6 layouts per month. They assign you a kit as you complete your layouts. So I have my first one done there, with a the April Designer Collab called Spring Blossom. I thought it worked very well for Pocahontas - Disney fans will remember the Animal Kingdom's Pocahontas and her Forest Friends attraction, and I had that in mind while making this page.


Note that I extracted the kids and Pocahontas out of the photo. Takes a LONG time to do that, but I think the result was worth it. I also did a challenge at Scrap Matters for this page and made a brush out of a butterfly included in the kit and used it under the string. And I blended that top paper (it started out tan) into the layer below to get that brownish-blue effect. Plus I cut that tree (think Grandmother Willow) out of a paper as well.


Pocahontas Credits

That's it for now! I'll be back with more I'm sure!

Such a bad blogger! LOL I guess I need to update my last few ADSR layouts. Assuming I remember which ones, seems so long ago, but I think there are just two more. Unfortunately, my partner and I didn't win the drawing. But we have a lot of great LOs to keep.

First up was an easy challenge. Take one person, living or dead and ask them one question. Use one photo that alone would help to explain what you are asking. And the only words on the layout can be the question. So I chose Walt Disney, of course. (Ironically, so did my partner.) I sometimes wonder what he would think of the direction his creation has taken. I suppose he would love some it, not so much love other parts of it. But he always wanted family entertainment - something to bring families together. Despite all the mocking of Disney, all of the bad press, all of the issues with partners - Disney still delivers what Walt dreamed about. A safe, fun place for families, whether it is the Disney parks or the Disney movies or the Disney channel. They remain true to their founders dream.

This photo is of a poster I have. It's a great one, with the barren land in Florida, the castle and Walt imaged together. Underneath it says "Vision" and "It's kind of fun to do the impossible" quote by Walt Disney. Being an optimist, I love this, really speaks to how I think.

Credits - Are you pleased?

Next up was an Intersection, where we were required to collaborate on another Layout. This time we were given a word art "we are storytellers" and we needed to document why we are storytellers etc. Ugh, this was not something I wanted to do. I just like to create, I don't want to think about why I do it. Anyway, we decided to do a dialog as if we were chatting. We did it thru emails though. I thought it ended up great. We decided it's the whole Disney thing - Walt being the master storyteller himself. And we both have very creative backgrounds. Bianca then set up the journaling and the background stuff/papers/flowers. I then added the photo and the embellishments around it, the title word art and the corner embellishments. Complete with Hidden Mickey. The photo is from a breakfast at Whispering Canyon Cafe at the Wilderness Lodge in Sept 08. We were headed out on Disney cruise that day with a couple hundred of our Disney friends from the Internet. :-)

If you'd like to read the conversation, just click on the link to the Credits.

Credits - {we are} Storytellers

There is actually one more LO for the ADSR, but I only made it quickly to get the free kit. It was not a required LO. So I'm not going to post it because I'm not really pleased with it. Someday I will change it up a bit and post it here.

Hope you day is wonderful. Hugs, Nancy

ADSR Week 5 and Word Art Freebie

I guess I'm a little behind this week, was kind of busy at work. New project, lots to do. But I did manage to get two pages done this week and have another freebie for you.

Challenge #9 was to create a page with more than one generation and include lace, metal, a scanned thing and flowers. So I scrapped this great c. 1934 photo of some family members from Norway. The gent in the center with the white beard and the hat is my great-grandfather, Hans August Ahlsen. The lady on the far right is his sister Gerda. She would have been nabout 50 in this photo, right around my age. I note her striking white hair. Precisely the same as mine. This is the second Ahlsen family member that I have noted with the prematurely white hair (not grey, mind you, white). And all females. Two men, Hans August here and his father Olaves both had very white beard (and both wore hats in the only photos I have). My grandfather, Hans Olaus, died before he reached this age and my dad, Harold, never grew a beard. Ah, the genes, the genes!!!!!!

Credits - Clan

Next up was a Roadblock - only one scrapper to complete. Since my partner did the first one - this was all mine. Challenge was to ask at least five questions of the race partner and then scrap a layout about it. This was the first one that made me nervous. I scrap Disney and my family, cats and flowers! LOL Not other people! Yikes. Oh, and we could only use two designers. So I picked a collab kit and went outside of my box - using extractions, blending and "art" type elements. I knew I would get great answers from Bianca and wasn't disappointed!

Credits - What's in a Name?

So this will be the last week of ADSR and I'm kinda sad. Will need to be sure to continue to scrap at least two pages a week. Oh and I've been taking Project 365 photos since Jan 1st, so I will be able to catch up and start posting them.

In the meantime, a freebie Faith, Trust, Pixie Dust Word Art from my earlier Tinker Bell layout. Easily recolored, I am giving you both a vertical (in purple) and horizontal version (in black). Just didn't have time to convert the purple to black. Hope you enjoy it. Please give credit to Nancy at LilyFG Designs if you use it, and please do think about sending me a copy. And I would like to thank Brittney of Britt-ish Designs for the inspiration to make the word art for my layout.

Have a magical day!

Link Expired!

Link Expired!

ADSR Week 4 and Word Art Freebie

I decided to make this word art from my "Angel Mother" layout that I posted a couple of weeks ago. This quote is so meaningful for me. I believe that the spiritual beings live among us, and in particular, my Mom's is very close to me. I know of her presense, I feel it deeply. She is truly my Angel Mother. She has been gone from this earth for 11 years now and I still miss her so much.

I also am still updating on a few layouts I've finished. First up is ADSR #7. You may note that I skipped #6, because it was a roadblock and my partner completed it. I'll catch up with some of hers later (and another freebie).

This layout involved using all of the item in a mini kit. I'm not sure if it was because I was on vacation when I did this, but I just couldn't make my mind work with the colors. Or maybe I was just too lazy to look for photos! Or maybe I just wanted to use my own kit! LOL Anyway I tried my hand at recoloring. This photo just doesn't do the cardinals justice (there are two in the right circle of the ribbon and one in the left). I think I will perform a little redo on this someday and get them to pop out more, but right now I'm just not skilled enough with photo editing. We had a huge huge all day snowstorm, the kind where the snow blows sideways. Birds came to our back door all day long in the snow, they could hardly fly against the wind. I kept throwing seed outside, and the snow would cover it. We had about 6 cardinals at all, but the most I ever got in a photo was these three. We also had juncos ("junk dealers" DH calls them), three kinds of sparrows, mourning doves ("dubs" also from DH) and a few other types of birds.

Credits

The second challenge last week was to scrap an "idols" layout. So I chose Brittney of Britt-ish Designs. I love her store (own most of it.....) especially the Disney stuff. I also love her style, the clean lines and great clustering. So here is my take on her layout that is located here. You may want to check back for another word art freebie that is growing out of this layout. You can probably guess, huh?

Credits

All of you Disney lovers should also check out Britt's store for the awesome Disney kits. And if you find her blog, she has a Show Off feature every week where you can submit a layout that uses her product and she'll give you a giftie for it! They are awesome of course.

You still with me? Now for the word art freebie. This is my first one so be kind OK? Thanks to my friend Bianca for helping me understand how to make this file from my layout. I made in black, but it is easily recolored. On my layout, Angel Mother is in red. You can recolor in a snap with the eye dropper/paint bucket (I only know PSE, so sorry can't help you with any other program.) If you use the word art, please give credit to me as Nancy of LilyFG Designs. And of course, I would love to see your layout. Who knows, I may even post it here.

Link Expired!

Thanks for visiting! Nancy

ADSR Week 3, Disney World for my Birthday

So I've been on vacation - off to Disney World for my birthday. We left on 1/21 and returned on 1/27. It was very cold in Florida the first couple of days - it got down to 33 at night and we had frost in the morning! Brrrrrrrr. But, we were at Disney! Cold at Disney is better than cold in Maine! Oh and when it was 37 when we got up that first day, it was 23 in Maine. LOL

We flew over a huge storm on the way back, landed in Philly just as it was about to start there, and then it travelled up the coast and dumped about 8" on us up here in Maine in a very nasty snowstorm/ice storm. I hate it when it rains after a storm and then everything is just a sheet of ice for a couple of days. Luckily it was warm enough to melt the ice the last couple of days.

So, catching up on my layouts for ADSR, we have #5. I did this one before I left for Florida. The challenge was to use three frames and no photos. You didn't have to journal, but I had written this about my cat when we euthanized here back in April 07 and I knew I had to record it somewhere on a page. Whitney was such a cute cat, she used to carry stuff around the house and cry over it. Indoor kitties get the strangest habits and hers was just a reflection of her need to hunt.

The vet came to the house to euthanize her and told me that it is been observed that surviving cats often take up a habit of a cat who leaves. Since Whitney's habit was so prominent (every day, several times a day she would cart a pen or something small), she said she bet Winston would start carrying pens. I said no way, he's never done anything remotely like that and isn't even vocal.

Well, he didn't. Carry pens, that is. He carries socks! The exact same way as she did. Crying all the time. Several times a day. Usually when we are not home, but sometimes when we are there. Like we came home Tuesday and he carried FOUR socks in about 30 minutes. Welcome home Mom and Dad! LOL Oh and he will drag a shirt, even my husbands skivvies. It's really hysterical. I like to ask him if he is channeling Whitney. LOL

OK, so enough of that story, here is "waiting for us at the Bridge"

Credits

And here is my little girl in another layout I did last year. I love tuxedo cats.

Credits

Three Layouts!

I finished 3 layouts in the last 3 days. Sweet! Funny that they all have one photo, and in the lower right corner. All three were for challenges at Enchanted Studio Scraps, a new store. Two were mini kit challenges (have to use everything in the kit) and one was a speed scrap.

First mini kit, these birches are in my neighbors back yard. We had an ice storm in December, not as bad as the one in 1998, but still a lot of damage. I stopped the car in the middle of the street and hopped out with my camera to snap this pic.

Credits Ice Storm

Then last night a speed scrap, where you are given seven instructions over one hour and then have another hour to complete the LO. I kind of fell into the red/pink with this because I was trying to us an ESS kit and this was all I had. But I think it came out very well. I like speed scraps because of how they make me do different things than I would on my own.

Credits Cold as Ice

And then today, I took on the second mini kit and believe me, that purple cow was torture thinking about how to use it. I almost took a picture of my yogurt cups (Stonyfield Farms) but then decided to go with Winston sleeping, since there was a purple cover in that pic. Do you like my cow jumping over the moon? I made the moon myself :-)

Credits Slumber Kitty

Speaking of slumber kitty, he is lying half in my lap, half on my laptop as I type.

Off to watch for the next ADSR Challenge!

ADSR Week 2 again

I've been working all night on this challenge. I just had to finish it while the idea was in my head. The challenge was to 1) use "art" meaning ephemera type stuff and arty elements/papers etc. So I have the wings, the blending in the background and the little dolly, the birdcage. I think those qualify. and 2) journal from the heart. So that had to be about Mom. I combined this with a couple of other challenges - the Roadmap at Scrap Matters and the letter A at Enchanted Scraps.
I must say, I think this is my best work to date. Although it still takes me way, way, way too long. I'm just too fussy I guess!

Credits

ADSR Week 2

Just finished the next ADSR challenge - this one was to take one of my galleries, select the oldest layout in the gallery and them rescrap it! I knew immediately what I would do, as I was planning to re-do this one anyway.

This is my very first digital scrapbook page, created in Dec '07. It is painful for me to look at!

Credits: December 2007 Challenge Kit at DigiByDesign. Vladimir Script Font

And this is my rescrap. Much better!

Credits

Edward Cullen - Robert Pattinson Layout

I made this for my 13 year old granddaughter at Christmas. We saw the Twilight movie together after Thanksgiving and then I started reading the books. She had seen the movie three time and watched it on the internet a few times. I asked her and her friend why they were seeing it so much and they said, in unison "Edward Cullen!!!!!".

There were a few Twilight kits that came out around then too, so I decided to make her something she could use as wallpaper.

One of the fonts used is called Porcelain. I thought that was appropriate for a man with cold, hard white skin! LOL

Credits

ADSR Week 1

Well, well. I guess I'm not very successful as a blogger! Last year I had surgery in March and went through a long recovery. Although I was housebound, I was not too active and spent the majority of my computer time making scrapbook pages. Occasionally I thought I should really blog about my recovery, but it was depressing, so I chose to do happier things! So I'm hoping my post counts will increase a bit over the next few weeks as I chronicle my Amazing Digital Scrapbook Race Pages.

I'll bet most of you who wander over here know what that is already, but for those of you who don't know, this is a cyber-race hosted by Natural Designs in Scrapbooking . Teams of two scrapbookers race around the digi-world, completing two digital scrapbook pages per week and collecting prizes along the way. Just like on TV, there are roadblocks and detours and even intersections (where you both complete one layout together.)

So here is the layout I completed for the first challenge. This kit is from one of my favorite designers - Brittney of Britt-ish Designs. And of course, my chosen topic is Disney, this time my grand-children from a trip in April 2007. The rules for this challenge were to rip/tear a photo into at least three pieces (I chose to hang them from the little ribbon there) and there had to be journaling.



















The second layout this week was an Intersection. We had to do a layout about Cabin Fever. My race partner lives in Washington State and I live in Maine. We both had huge snowstorms at about the same time so decided to go with that theme (our other choice was a cruise cabin - from a cruise we went on in Sept 08, Disney of course). We had to use specific numbers of items, like 4 papers, 8 elements, 3 photos. And we had to collaborate on the layout. Our styles are very complimentary don't you think? Credits for the two kits used go to sussieM_designs and Peta Boardman.























OK, so I'm off to continue reading Eclipse before dozing off. Thanks for visiting!