a bag of chips

Bye, Simple.

As you have probably heard, my beloved Simple Scrapbooks magazine just released it's last issue:

There are so many things I want to say about my experience with Simple, but somehow I can't find the right words. It's just probably best summed up in one word: incredible. This cover features my photo, my seventh and final cover photo. This magazine also, as it happens, includes all three of my kids on one page (pg 33), and another photo from the session (my gorgeous friend Marlena and her lovely mother) featured on the cover (page 63).

I remember the first time I heard from Wendy Smedley at Simple that they wanted one of my layouts I had submitted. It was the shriek heard 'round the world. This was the very first layout of mine they picked and my first ever published:

(page 113, July/August 2006)

Not long after hearing from Wendy, I heard from Stacy. The second shriek heard 'round the world. They wanted to see more of my work. I don't think I stopped smiling for a week. And then I met Stacy just about a week later at CHA and made a total gushing ass of myself in front of the person who had been almost single-handedly responsible for fueling my passion for telling and recording my family's stories. And then I found out they were adopting from Korea and well, as an adoptive mom I felt a whole 'nother level of connectedness with her.

My next big break came in the next issue when they selected a photo of mine for the back page:

I loved that my son, whose birthday is Halloween, was featured in this Sept/Oct issue holding pumpkins from the previous year's pumpkin patch excursion. I think my mother bought every issue at her grocery store and accosted everyone she met to show them. Of course, I bought every issue at my grocery store, too.

Then not long after this issue came out, I was asked to be a Simple Gal for 2007. Yes, that would have been the third shriek heard 'round the world. And then in September 2007 I became an editorial board member. 

In the time I'd been with Simple in those various capacities, I'd had nearly 50 layouts and projects published in nearly every issue, seven cover photo credits and and four cover layout credits. 

I've shared a meal (or two or three) with Stacy, Wendy, Tara, Donna, Cathy (who showed off some of her ice skating moves), Celeste, Elizabeth, Karen, Kim, Beth, Rebecca, Candice, Renee, Lin, Lain, Angie, Margaret (we went to Sweetwater House together last summer - had so much fun getting to know her), Melanie, Linda, Ali, Rachel (roomed with her one night at CHA in 2008 and talked about adoption for hours - she's so sweet) and many others I'm probably forgetting. And in the midst of all these people you can't help but be in awe of the amount of talent surrounding you and feel just a bit humbled and so incredibly thankful to have been a part of it. 

(This photo, swiped today from Elizabeth's blog, was taken at CHA 2008. The good ol' days.)

I'm so sad the magazine is gone but the best thing about it all is that all of these ladies are still my friends and are still out there to inspire and continue to provide the scrapbooking inspiration and words of wisdom you've come to rely on. The magazine is gone but the people we know and love are still there for you. Simple will live on. I pinky swear!

And as part of our collective farewell, most of my Simple peeps and I are blog partying this week and giving stuff away. Here's what I've got to give away to one lucky, randomly chosen winner who shares a Simple memory or story:

One copy each of the last three Simple issues, including the "Scrapbook Play with Photos" special issue, a Dot-n-Go, an awesome stamp kit and a Simple instructional video.

So today, go visit Candice Palmer, Jen Wozab and Elizabeth Dillow as they share some of their own Simple memories and stories, and check out the blogs of the rest of my Simple friends as we all wax on about the Simple days - and maybe win some stuff:

Angie Lucas

Beth Proudfoot

Cathy Zielske

Celeste Smith

Cheryl Overton

Elisha Snow

Margaret Scarbrough

Marnie Flores

Rebecca Cooper

Stacy Julian

Wendy Smedley

Rachel Gainer

Peace out and stay tuned.

Studio Calico - May

Wow. Last night was the big reveal of all the loveliness that was created using Studio Calico's May Playground kit and add-ons. One of my teammates called this kit "energetic" and that is spot on, man. One of the things I've noticed since joining this team a few months ago is that each kit really moves me in different ways. I'm inspired differently and I swear each kit affects my mood and mojo in different ways. Where as the Garment District kit and add-ons had me feeling feminine and creative, this one had me feeling um, well, energetic and spunky. I wonder if I'm the only one who feels this way or if there is just simply a padded room with my name on it. Hmm...

Anywhoooo, here are my creations with the Playground kit and add-ons, starting with two scraplifts I did. The team decided to do some scraplifting for this month's reveal and I got to pick from the Garment District gallery. Holymoly, but that was a tough thing to do. So tough, in fact, that I couldn't pick just one.

This sweet layout (which you can view larger here) was created by Diana Albright (moonlightgrrl) and it's one of the first that really jumped out at me. I love how she used the paper to bracket her photo (be still my ovaries) and put her title on top. I feel like so many of my titles go in the same spot on my layouts, so I loved the challenge of putting my title in a new place. Here's my lift:

My next lift was of one created by the fab just g. I've followed Gillian's work for years and have always loved her scrappy style, and she's so damn funny, too. So when I came across this layout of hers, which caused my brain to skid to a full stop, I knew I couldn't NOT lift this one as well:

(You can see it larger here.) What don't I love about this one? Um...nothing. I used her hearts and title styling to make this layout:

I used a bunch of photos from our recent week-long stay in Carpinteria and some of our adventures in the area. For my title, I used the SC Noah stamps with my Versamark stamp pad and then outlined the letters in pen.

And here are the rest of my Playground layouts and such:

(this one is straight IRL, but it photographed weird. Really.)

Aidan and his silly faces. He's got millions of them.

Behind the photo I used strips of the fabric that comes in the project add-on. I also used the Fiskar's Boundary Water's punch from the SC store. 

A layout about my mommy-upper.  I can't be held accountable for my actions until I've had my cuppa.

And then here are some bookmarks I created in honor of the first Studio Calico book club meeting this month. We read "Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet" by Jamie Ford and had a great discussion in the SC chat room. So now that I'm officially in two book clubs now, I figured it's time for me to stop dog-earing my pages and become a grown-up about it.  These are simply strips of paper with stuff at the top.

So that's it from me, folks! If you wanna see more Playground creations, please go here or visit the blogs of my SC girlies (see linkies to the upper right------>) to see what they made. Prepare to be amazed!

NSD 2009

In honor of National Scrapbook Day - Saturday, May 2 - my Studio Calico buddies are posting challenges on our blogs and are giving away some SC Kit add-on loveliness (even some that are sold out!!!). We are all doing different challenges and many of us are giving away different add-ons. 

My challenge to you is to embrace the white space. If you are at all familiar with my scrapping style, there's a lot of white space on my pages. Very simply, the folks at Merriam-Webster define "white space" as "the areas of a page without print or pictures."  I don't remember when my style shifted to this simple, uncluttered style of scrapping, but it's been the way I scrap for at least a few years. And I love scrapping this way. It saves me time, it keeps the focus on my photos, and it takes less product to complete a page - all great things for this busy mom of three who is also a photographer and has a lot less money to spend on scrap crap these days.

So, whether you're already a white space scrapper or if you want to get your feet wet and try a more minimalist style, take my challenge and take all week to get it done. Then here's what you gotta do:

*On May 2nd, head on over to Studio Calico and upload your layout to the gallery

*Then add a link to your layout in my "embrace the white space challenge" thread in the Studio Calico forums which I'll post that morning. You'll have until 11:59 pm on May 2nd to get all this done, and then I'll pick a winner just after midnight (San Diego time, that is). 

*Please be sure to check to my challenge thread at SC to see if you're a winner on Sunday and contact me immediately with your address as we'll want to get your goodies out to you ASAP. 

For my challenge, you could win this, the Bo-Peep add-on to April's Jack & Jill kit:

And, just in case you needed any idea of what white space looks like in a layout, here's one I just made today using a bunch of other past and present SC kit goodies:

But please don't limit yourself to my challenge. All my girlies on the Studio Calico design team are doing their own challenges on their own blogs, so be sure to check them all out using the links to your right------------>. The more challenges you take on, the more chances you have of winning. And I understand that in addition to the chance to win add-ons, April and Scarlet have some more give-away goodness going on next Saturday but I can't spill the beans on that. You'll have to show up and see for yourselves!

Have tons of fun with all of this, and good luck!!!

Studio Calico - May Sneaks

Okay, okay. I know I've been promising some blog posts, and even a certain sneaky (and surprisingly articulate) young lady got herself on here promising stuff, too. And guess what. It's still coming. I promise that I have some very good excuses for why I've not had so much blogging time, but I'm just not ready or able to say much about a few of those excuses just yet. Soon, though. K?

One of the reasons for my absence is that I've been drinking in the happy scrappy goodness that is the Studio Calico May kit, very appropriately named "Playground". I still have a few things I'm wrapping up with this kit, but these are the only sneaks I'll be sharing. If you MUST see more, visit the blogs of my SC peeps (upper right) to see what they've been working on.

Have a happy Friday evening!

My Mommy is Old

I'm just here to tell you that my mommy is older now from her birfday she said she had a great party but I wouldn't know because I was home with the babysitter who was nice and let me have Oreos and milk for dessert and splash a lot of water out of the bathtub.

My mommy looked really pretty and got her hair cut and colored and I hardly recognized her when she got back from there and she got all dressed up for her party that daddy did at a wine place in Temecula far far away and had lots of growed ups and yucky food that I don't like and she said her friends didn't recognize her either and Uncle Billy told her she didn't look so bad for an old lady and then she slugged him because he's a nincompoopyhead.

She wanted me to tell you that she is still working on getting around to writing the big long fancy thing that she does here and that she'll get to it after she gets some other things done like buying toilet paper and cheese at Costco tomorrow and chasing after me and my sister and driving granny all over so she can do her shopping and working on her pitchers. 

Know what? I can say Starbucks and dammit.

Go now. Byebyeseeyoulatergator.

Wait wait...

...I have a big ol' post brewing but it's not going to come until at least tomorrow. After being gone all last week and taking nearly 1000 photos during our little road trip, preparing for the arrival of my MIL from Trinidad tonight, shlepping Aidan to therapy twice this week, unpacking, cleaning the house, editing photos, a touch of PMS, and creeping ever so closer to my 40th birthday (pssst...it's Saturday), well, I'm a bit behind.

So to hold you over until I can wrap my aging brain cell around the pending post, here's a sweet little layout I made in about ten minutes last night. At around 1:00 AM. I used the Studio Calico Garment District kit (love all the Sassafrass goodies) and left a large amount of the photo paper around my photo rather than make more work for myself. Oh man, how I love white space.

More to come, hopefully tomorrow.

Easter Beagle Winner!

Congrats to Sheila H!  YAY for Sheila!

Please send your mailing address to [email protected] ASAP so my friend can get your goodies to you in time for Easter.

Thanks, everyone, for sharing your Peanuts stories and love for Snoopy. I have loved hearing from you!

I'll be out of town this week, so have a Happy Easter everyone!

The Easter Beagle (a giveaway!!!)

The other day I was Easter Bunny shopping at Target (where else would I have been) and came across these darling pastel-colored little Snoopy dogs holding Easter goodies in their wee wittle paws. So I got one of each color for my three wee wittle ones.

Snoopy and I go waaaay back. When I was eight or nine years old (or maybe even slightly older - my memory sucks) I had two Snoopy dolls. One big one and little one, and each of them had several outfits. There was the darling little aviator outfit, a surgeon's gown and mask, a night gown and cap, and a cowboy outfit with vest, bandana and hat. I think I might have even had a Santa outfit for at least one of my Snoopies. I loved these dolls (they were dolls to me - I was never into Barbies or baby dolls) and every year for my birthday or for Christmas I would ask for more outfits for them. 

And I remember this shelf in my aunt's room at my grandparents' house that had several Peanuts books full of Peanuts comic strips and I would spend hours reading them. I think I read every single one. I also loved watching all the Peanuts specials on TV and I think I even saw a Peanuts movie in the theater about summer camp and a rafting race.

I'm also a huge Vince Guaraldi fan, the fabulous composer of most of the Peanuts music, and who, along with my grandfather, inspired my love for jazz. 

So it was a particularly crazy koinkidink when, after my Target trip, that same afternoon, I get an email from my aunt that her friend, who works for a PR firm that is working for Peanuts (ha - that's funny), is looking for some bloggers to help promote The Easter Beagle. And she asked me to offer to my readers a giveaway that includes the VERY SAME Easter Beagle dolls I had just bought for my kids. So, here it is:

The winner of the giveaway will receive the Easter Beagle movie, the book, the large Snoopy and one of the little candy-toting wee wittle Snoopy dolls. Your prize package will be shipped directly from my contact.  

So, leave me a post below with perhaps your own Peanuts or Snoopy memory and I'll pick a winner on Monday evening. And, because Easter is next weekend and we want to make sure you get your package in time, US residents only please.

Good luck!