October Scrapbook Retreat

Wow! We had so much fun this past weekend! What a great group of ladies! The title for the retreat was "Spooky Christmas" because it is so spooky how close Christmas really is! So, I made these nametags for everyone from the Cricut Paperdolls cartridge...





This retreat sold out, so the crop room was full. Sara took this picture after everyone had FINALLY gone to bed... at 5am on Saturday morning! Yep... they were having fun! Several ladies stayed up until 5:30am the next morning too! LOL!



Dinner on Saturday night consisted of sandwich trays from Subway, chips and a salad. Yum!





And lots of snacks on the Ladybug Snack Bar!






Sara helped me teach a Flip Book class. She did a great job and everyone liked the class...









Cindy did such a great job on her Flip Book! She used it right away for a Thanksgiving layout that she was working on. I loved the colors she used!





Sara used her Flip Book for this Sweet 16 layout:



Beth made the cutest layout of her son jumping in a Johnny Jumper! She used the Pooh Cricut cartridge to make these Tiggers:



Susan is one of my regulars! She and I became friends back when Lisa owned the business and I was just a Crop All Day customer.



Carolyn & Erin were in 'the zone'! They cranked out some awesome Disney pages this past weekend! I was impressed! Both had pre-planned their pages and arrived with cricuts in hand!




I was especially proud of one of my new customers, Ann... she used the cricut Storybook cartridge to make this layout of her daughter wearing a dress that her aunt had worn about 65 years ago!! It's just adorable:





Well, Anne, a good e-pal friend of mine, sent me a great link for some really cool paper trees. I think I am going to try to make one this week... they will be perfect for the wedding in December. Thanks Anne! I'll show you my progress here on my blog!

See ya!

Cricut Wedding Cartridge

My daughter is getting married and these are the Save-the-Dates that she designed using the cricut cartridges Opposites Attract, Base Camp and Home Accents. We put magnets on the back so that our family & friends can put them on the frig as reminders.

We are decorating glass candle holders with the wedding bells cut from the Wedding Solutions cartridge. The shadow is black paper, the base is in the wedding color (aqua blue) and the bells are white. We stickled white glitter to the bands on the bells. This was a 4" cut.



We plan to make one of these for each table at the reception. Haven't decided if we are going to use white candles or the black ones like in the picture. What do you think?

Haunted Library

Saturday was yet another busy day! My youngest son needed costumes for the Haunted Library that he had volunteered for in our Little Elm Library. So we dug out all the costume boxes from storage and organized them quickly and I took him to the library in time for makeup. He was the dead pirate...



Oooo... spooky! I'm so proud of him. He loves our local library and loves to do community service work there. He's such a good teen!



Hubby and I got the opportunity to have a date night on Saturday night. We attended a charity called "Rock the Red Door" in downtown Dallas. Our two good friends, Jon & Angela went with us and we had a blast! Can't wait to crop those pictures!







Good friends... good times... we had so much fun!

Two Scrapbook Classes in TWO days!!

Wow! I almost never get the luxury of taking a scrapbook class... but not only did I get to take one... I took TWO... in TWO days! LOL! I had so much fun!

Both classes were at the Scrappin Bunny in McKinney (I just love Emily & Jodi!) Yesterday was with Mr. Pickle himself, Lance Anderson. We made a really fun round book with sliders.



It was cute and Lance was very funny. He told us the story about how they came to name the business Rusty Pickle... cute story. His jokes were a little elementary, but I think he was faking it! LOL!



But today's class was taught by Staci Etheridge. She is a contributing editor for Making Memories magazine and on the design team for KI Memories. She taught us how to make this adorable little HAPPY book from Cosmo Cricket.



It was really great to meet Staci today... she's really cute and bubbly and I like her style alot. The pictures she put in her HAPPY book were so unique! I like the picture of the inside of her new front load washer... it made her happy! I can totally relate to that! And of course the picture of her camera... I think she named it "David"?. I could be wrong... help me out Staci! My memory isn't what it use to be... lol! I haven't named my camera yet. Haven't had a camera long enough to name it! Long story... but let's just say that I am Camera Challenged!




Well... gotta go to bed now. Today was a really nice day. Let me leave you with an email that I got from my baby sister who lives in Tampa... it brought tears to my eyes and gave me a warm fuzzy feeling. Tell me what you think... leave a comment... i know who your lurkers are!! LOL!

This was in response to my earlier blog today:

Tammy,
Wow!! It looked like you girls had so much fun. I know that was exciting looking at all those beautiful dresses. And I liked your blog. I never knew you were a Proverbs 31 lady..read it ..starting with verse 10... A wife of noble character who can find? She is far worth more than rubies..(your birthstone ruby) Her husband is full of confidence in her and lacks nothing of value. She brings him good not harm all the days of her life. She selects wool (aka scrapbook material) and flax (chicken and dumplings) and works with eager hands. She is like a merchant ships ( The USS Tammy Skinner) bringing her food from afar ( from Walmart) She gets up while it is still dark ( but her mind is not up yet) she provided food for her family ( makes Matt his lunch before school) and portions her servant girls.. ( The numerous people she has had living in her home over the years) She considers a field and buys it (started a business) out of her earnings. She plants a vineyard...( scrapbooks memories of her family to be passed down generation to generation..so they will never forget the love) She sets about her work vigoursly..(up at 6am..being PROUDUCTIVE)..her arms are strong for tasks..(LOL..from moving alot..you get strong)...skip down to verse 23 Her husband is respected at the city gate where he takes his seat amoung the elders of the land...(Baylor ..he has created a good name for himself) she makes linen from garments and sells them. and supplies the merchants with sashes; She is clothed with strength and dignity..she can laugh at the days to come. She speaks with wisdom and faithful instruction is on her tongue. (over the years all the artwork you have done..and the pride in that ..and all the heartache you still laugh..cause you know where your strength comes from..nothing will get you down..not for long..that is for sure). She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness...(very seldom does she just sit down and watch her favorite shows)....Her children arise and and call her blessed..her husband also and he praises her..(the kids lean on you..Patch, Samantha, and Matt..and Glenn really respects you). Many women do noble things but you surpass them all. Charm is decepetive and beauty is fleeting but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her the reward she has earned. and let her works bring her praise at the city gate. I love you Tammy your little sister Tina

Wasn't that sweet! Thanks Tina! I'm gonna put that in my scrapbook! I love you too!

Me & my little sister

Good night all.

Catch Up on Life in Ladybug Land

I love to blog...
I love to read other people's blogs...
I love to scrapbook...
I love my cricut...
I love to rubberstamp...
I love to sew...
I love to shop (mostly for scrapbook stuff)...
I love to crop with my scrapping pals...
I love reading the message boards on meetup...
I love water aerobics...
I love to ride my bike...
I love to cook...
Most of all, I love to spend time with my family!

What I don't love... is that I don't have time to do everything I love! Makes me think of that old movie Multiplicity (it's a family favorite)... any one know the one I'm talking about? Michael Keaton plays a contractor who is trying to juggle work, family and fun and decides he needs to clone himself to get it all done. It's hilarious, if you haven't seen it, you should rent it and be prepared to giggle. My family's favorite line... "Steve (which isn't even his name!), she touched my pep pea!"... favorite scene is where the 3rd clone (who is a copy of a copy and not quite right in the head... get it?) is running around with a towel tied around his neck claiming to be Batman.

Anyway... sometimes I think cloning would be the answer to my prayers. Then I wake up and realize that God doesn't give you too much to handle, you just have to be creative sometimes about getting it all done... or learn to say 'no' to some people! Not something I'm good at.

Well, this past week I have been juggling work... family... friends... and personal time. I've done well on just about all of them except the personal time... hence the gap in posts on my blog. The good news though is that I have tons of pictures to post and scrapbook!

Let me start with a few pictures from last Friday. I took my daughter, Samantha and her Maid of Honor, Heather, and one of her bridesmaids, Sara, out for a day of wedding shopping. It was a fun day and we accomplished alot. Here they are:

We started with pedicures... gotta have pretty toes to try on shoes!


We started at LuLu's in downtown Dallas... tons of dresses!


We really like this Maggie Sottero dress... but its not the one!


On to the next store... Whatchmacallits in Dallas!


These dresses were put in the "NO" pile!


All that shopping and trying on dresses made the girls hungry...


...and thirsty! LOL!


Last stop for the day was David's Bridal in Frisco.


Isn't she cute in her undies! LOL! We ended up getting everything we needed at David's Bridal... undies, dress, bridesmaids dresses and flower girl dresses! Woo Hoo! One stop shopping!


I can't show the dress that she did get (because that would be BAD LUCK!), but I can show you another dress we liked... but the train was not long enough.


We really had alot of fun together and I can't wait to scrapbook those pictures!

Aunt Betty's Funeral

Wow... what a weekend! The funeral for my Aunt Betty was so beautiful... there were over 200 family and friends there. My cousin, Kathy and I organized tons of pictures in photo frames and I cropped 3 storyboards of her life. My favorite one was a board of pictures of Aunt Betty with all her grandchildren... they called her MEMAW.



I also loved handling the pictures of Aunt Betty when she was a baby and growing up... and her wedding photos! Everyone said she looked like a princess and she did... those photos were so precious and brought back many memories for her family and friends at the services.



This last storyboard was a combination of pictures that family & friends had donated. I put this board together around 2am the morning of the funeral, so it's not necessarily my best work, but just getting it done was the important thing. Kathy and I both finally climbed into bed around 3am and got up at 7am to go set up at the funeral home. The pictures and the flowers looked wonderful.





Aunt Betty loved Betty Boop stuff, so we displayed some of her favorite pieces. I put together a little 8x8 scrapbook of the Hat Party that was given for Aunt Betty when she lost her hair from the chemo... and that wedding dress of hers... wow!



It was a beautiful service and special time with family.

Good News.... Bad News...

Bad news first... my Aunt Betty passed away today. She has struggled with cancer and was doing well, but pneumonia attacked her and she just couldn't win the fight. Some of my very earliest childhood memories of my Tennessee family include her. She opened her home to us when we had just moved from California to Tennessee and allowed us to have Samantha's 3rd birthday party in her backyard pool. It was a great day. I leave tomorrow morning to drive to Tennesse (its an 8 hour drive) to help my cousins, Kathy & Sammy, get ready for the funeral. Services will be on Saturday. Please say prayers for my family and for safe travel for me. I'll be back on Sunday.

Good News... Glenn has applied for a new position. Actually he and 73 other people have applied! 26 of the applicants received a telephone interview 2 weeks ago... 5 were given a face-to-face interview last week... and they have now narrowed it down to TWO! And Glenn is one of those two! He got the call today to come back for a final interview... he will meet with several key players in the new facility and be given a tour AND will interview with the president of the hospital system. Normally, we would be very hush hush about something like this for fear of 'jinxing' it. But, we have decided to put it in God's hands and we are asking EVERYONE for prayers. Please pray for God's will and guidance. We are excited about this position for many reasons and would LOVE for Glenn to get it, but we want it to be the right thing too!
{UPDATE: Glenn got the job!! Woohoo! Praise God!}

Bad News... Cris (my daughter's fiance) arrived in Anchorage, Alaska on Monday safely. He is inprocessing at Fort Richardson and found out yesterday that he will indeed be deploying to IRAQ with his detachment in February 2009. They had planned to marry in August 2009, but that is now going to be impossible because his deployment will probably be the standard 15 months. So...

Good News... Cris & Samantha will wed this December 21st! We will be planning a wedding for the Sunday before Christmas. That gives us less than 3 months to throw this thing together! The most important part happened today, Cris got his leave approved for the wedding. Thank you Mr. Army!

Let me end on another bit of good news... the October Spooky Christmas Retreat has officially SOLD OUT!! I am so excited! I have been working on the make-n-takes in my new studio all week! I had planned to send an email out with pictures this weekend, but will do that next week. I have updated the website to reflect the SOLD OUT status and to list the details for the December retreat. It's gonna be a Death-by-Chocolate Christmas retreat. Two, not one, but two chocolate fountains will be going. Everyone will go home with tons of already made gift tags to use on their christmas presents and I will have Christmas card stations set up to make it easy to finish your Christmas cards. Postage stamps will also be available so that all you have to do is slap a stamp on your card and drop it off in the mail first thing Monday morning!

Well, gotta run... I've gotta finish packing. Take care everyone... and don't forget to hug the ones you love today!

Tammy

In a Card-making mood...

I got alot accomplished today... it was busy... but I got alot accomplished. I worked in my new studio all day and loved it! I would work a little on the computer then go and work a little at my table, load my cricut and go back to my computer. The hum of my big cricut is in the background even as I type this post. I got alot accomplished today and I feel good.

I am in the card-making mood now. Thinking about all the holiday cards I want to make for the upcoming retreats. I started making tons of scalloped cuts today for cards. I like this cute little 'Homemade Memories' stamp... what do you think?



I made this card for my mom... she's in Spain and I miss her.




Shhh... this one is for my neice Sara! Her birthday is one week from today!