Laura and Trish's entries for Marilyn's Alphabetica Journal

Our Alphabetica journal project continues!!! I believe it started around March 2006. I think we are about halfway through. Here are the entries from myself and Trish for Marilyn's journal. Marilyn is the leader of the project, and we are so thankful for her patience and guidance! We have met so many talented and lovely women through this project!

Marilyn's journal is called Alpha Muse. She had a bunch of different words in the front of the journal. We were instructed to pick one and use that as our starting point. I picked "1910." For my pages I used some vintage looking scrapbook paper, vintage buttons, vintage patterns, and some lovely images from a 1911 Ladies Home Journal. Oh, and the ever popular (to me at least) rub-ons!
Trish picked the word "Wings." See her very cool interpretation below in the next two photos. I love her use of images of flowers and butterfly wings interspersed with photos!!!
Aren't these pages totally lovely????
Well, I am off to try and finish Harry Potter tonight! I want to be able to talk to two of my friends who have finished it already! (Hi Noreen in California!! Hi Kim in Ohio!!!)

Willy-Nilly Posting - Part One

Hey blog buddies, sorry I have been absent for so long! I have been having so much fun lately that I have been overwhelmed and didn't know what to post! I always feel like I have to "go in order" and tell my stories exactly how each thing happened. Well, I can't do it this time. After Tootfest I was so overloaded by all the fun we had that I couldn't make myself post anything. So, here is a willy-nilly post of different stuff. Who says that chronological order has to rule the day!??? First up, is a darling book I found when we went to the antique mall in Crown Point, Indiana. I found tons of treasures in that town (as always!). If someone made me move to Indiana I would not mind at all. I love that state. Of course, that is where my Grandma is from so we have lots of family history there.
The ladies at the antique shop threw this card in for free with my order! Isn't it unique and cool?
Another find in Crown Point. The scan does not do it justice, what a cute baby!
Yesterday my Mom gave me this card she found when antique shopping in Michigan City, Indiana. It is exactly what I have been looking for. I am totally into "juvenile" cards from the 50's, 60's and 70's. Jane and I found the mother lode when we were in St. Charles, Missouri.

Today at work the building engineer brought in the above and below photos to see if Jane and I wanted to buy them. He goes "junking" and keeps his eye out for cool stuff for us. We got each picture for $3. I love this bridal picture! Can't wait to do something with it.
Here is the other photo from today. A bridesmaid photo which is lovely.
I have been heavily into tag making lately. I want to make tag books people!!! So, I asked each person at Tootfest to make me a tag. Above is Julie's extremely cool tag that will be the front of my tag book. She used "rebar" to make the letters!
Here is Kim's tag. She used an illustration of a tulip in a flower book I got at a used book sale for #1. She turned the tulip into the little girl's skirt! Genius!
As always, Jane blows me away with her cute design! Note: She cut into her new Basic Grey Infuse paper!!! Wow! How the times have changed. We are all trying not to hoard our favorite papers anymore.
Trish made a beautiful tag using lots of birdies (everyone's current favorite image!). This is the front of the tag.
Here is the back of the tag! Sheer perfection!
Kim made this awesomely cool ATC for me!!!!

More tomorrow!!!!!!!!

Tootfest 2 - 2007

Well, this picture about sums up our four days of Tootfest 2 - 2007. Here we are leaving the hotel on Saturday morning to go shopping. You can see from the left, Jane, me, Trish, and Kim. Julie was our photographer for most of the trip and she took some really great shots. I would call this one an action shot! We had a fab time creating art, eating too much, not getting enough sleep, shopping for beads, antiques, and art supplies. Truth be told, I am still recovering from all the fun we had! We really needed a week! I will be posting more tidbits over the next few days.

Small Blog Break

I will be taking a small blog break to make way for Tootfest Part Two, 2007. Kim, Julie, Trish, Jane, and I will be getting together and spending the weekend at Embassy Suites in a complete art, antique, laughing, girlfriend time haze! Oh, and we will be eating all the wrong foods too! Beth is unable to join us unfortunately. She is an original tootfest member and will be missed dearly.

So, anywhoo, I will write early next week to tell you about all of our outbursts, etc.

Currently on a Reading Jag......

Isn't this card just gorgeous!!!!! My friend Trish made it and sent it to me!! I love the use of piecework pieces of paper!!! Love the sentiment, the colors, the image of the girl!! The ribbon, the button!!! Love it!
As the title of this entry indicates I have been madly reading books over the last four days. When I have not been at work, I have been reading!!! I am addicted. I am reading about 3 books at one time! Above is a new artsy book I ran across at Barnes and Noble when Mike and I were there tooting. It is totally worth getting. I love it! I put it in the same league as Alphabetica and True Colors for those of you who are familiar with those books.
Mike and I took two huge boxes of books to Half-Price books. We got $55 for them. I, of course, turned around and bought some more books. I took a chance on the above novel as I read Anna Maxted's first novel some years ago and loved it. She is in the "chick lit" genre, but probably shouldn't be cause her books are a step above that tired stuff. So far, this book is a really good read. Funny too.

I am still reading The Diana Chronicles. It is probably the best book on Princess Diana I have ever read. It really puts her life into perspective. I highly recommend it.

I have stacks and stacks of books to read. I am so lucky!!!!!!! It is always fun to plan what is next. What are you guys reading right now?

A is for Alphabetica

Trish, Jane, and I are in an Alphabetica round robin project. This is our work from one of the latest books. It is Debbie's "Alpha Female" book. These two pages (above and below) are by Trish. Debbie asked us to use as our inspiration a female who was important to us. Trish's pages are about her grandma, Cecil Violet. Please enlarge the pages by clicking on them so you can read about her grandma. She was really cool! Below is a photo of Cecil.

Above and below are Jane's pages. As always, Jane is the Queen of Color!!! Above she used a transferred image of her Mom. Below she used an image of her Grandma.

Above and below are the two pages I did. I was going to use my Mom or my Grandmothers, but then I felt guilty cause I could not use them all. Instead, I made an imaginary person. I typed out her story and printed it on vellum and put it in between my two pages.

The story is: L: Lost Love leads to a Lulu of a Life.
Lorna was in love in 1929. She was to become a lawfully wedded wife, but when her lover ran away with a Lolita, lovely Lorna decided to lead a new life.

She lived her lifelong dream of becoming a librarian. She took the train to Louisiana, long from her little hometown of Louisville. There she lived to find herself surrounded by the love of books, and soon thereafter she met Lawrence who became the true love her life.
I love our pages!! It is hard to part with them. I figured if I put them on the blog we could always remember them!

Stamping Fun on Saturday!

Last Saturday was spent stamping the day away (and I mean the whole day) with my Mom, Jane, and Trish. We had a blast! All of my cards were done using my new Copic markers. I realize I need even more than the 12 I have!!! I need a red and a light brown. A more subtle yellow... A light violet......They are the most fun to color with!!! Above is a card using a retired Stamping Up stamp.
Above card was made with one of Jane's Rubber Romance stamps!!! Love it! I think the patterned paper it is paired with is so groovy!!! Right???
Tickled Pink! The word stamp and this darling little Garden Girl stamp are from Red Lead.
This little butterfly gal stamp is from Invoke Arts. Jane got the vintage rick-rack at an estate sale on Saturday morning.
This wonderful ballerina stamp is from Rubber Baby and can be found online at Stamp Francisco. The Wish Upon a Star stamp is from Cat's Life Press.
I can feel an order coming on!!! I want more stamps from Eat Cake Graphics where the above stamp is from.
I forgot who makes this darling bridal couple stamp. If you really want to know, just ask and I will run upstairs and find out! I made this for an engagement card for my cousin Bill. Hope he does not see it here!
The bathing beauty is a Tin Can Mail stamp and the word stamp is from the fabulous collection from Red Lead.
Both of these stamps are from Red Lead. Aren't those bears just the sweetest?
This lady stamp is from Hero Arts. The word stamp is a stamp from Michael's that my friend Kathy gave me!

Again, thanks to Donna who gave me the inspiration for all of these cards with her wonderful style and generosity!

I really wish I was stamping and coloring right now, but I am too pooped!!!! Hopefully, I can get a lot of my chores done and then stamp some on 4th of July. I think it will be too hot to go outside!!!