Time Flies

 No excuses.

I just don't post often.

Time flies when you are having fun, or so the saying goes.... right??

Unless you count being bitten by a brown recluse spider (October 9, 2019), being diagnosed with HR+, HER2- Breast Cancer (December 30, 2019), 6 surgeries through 2020 four of them after COVID-19 shut the world down, another surgery in 2021... and the list goes on as fun, then yeah.

We'll just pretend my blog starts NOW!

So, if you've been here before, you know I have 5 children (My 5 Monkeys). They aren't little anymore.

Christopher is 28, lives at home again. He works as a security officer at a nearby hospital.

Mary Ann is almost 21, lives on her own in the next town.

Nicholas is almost 18. He'll be a high school senior this year. This should be an adventure!!

Katie is 15. She'll be a high school sophomore.

Benjamin is 14 and will also be a high school sophomore.

We do have a new addition to the family since September 30, 2022. Our beloved Pitbull Weimaraner mix. His name is Derby and he's 9 months old. We're being responsible pet owners and having him neutered next month. 

Our other dog, Cheddar, is a 12 year old Cocker Spaniel. I believe him to be an English Cocker Spaniel, but his pedigree says American Cocker Spaniel. Whatever, he's still cute; even if he's going blind due to cataracts and deaf.

My husband and I enjoy riding motorcycles. Maybe I'll share some of our adventures, eventually. We have not been riding much this year due ankle injuries. He fractured his ankle almost two years ago. I suffered a severe sprain in May 2023. Good Days. Bad Days. I'm sure you get it.

Plans for the blog going forward will be sharing about our family life. My planner(s), my cancer story,  my home projects, crafting, etc. Anything goes. If I feel like writing about it; it will be here.

From here forward, there may be some affiliate links used in my posts. I've been doing a lot of small home improvement, home organization, and other projects. When I post about those things, I'll be sharing links to products I/We purchased. If you buy something using the link I've provided, I might receive a small amount of compensation.

Ch-Ch-Cha-Changes

Maybe, just maybe, I should post more often than I do. I always say I will, then I don't. One post at a time, right?!

So much has changed in our family in the past two and a half years!

Oldest son, now 24 years old, moved away from home a little over a year ago. He didn't just get an apartment in town, or even the next town over. He moved away! From our small mid-Michigan town to a suburb of Madison, Wisconsin. We don't hear from him as often as I would like, but I'm his Momma, he could call every day and it wouldn't be often enough. We're still struggling to find our new balance, yes, over a year later - still struggling. I miss him.

Oldest daughter is now 16 and gearing up for her Junior Year of high school. She's also going to be dual enrolled at a local community college in their Culinary Arts program. Free college while going to high school - YES PLEASE! She plans to use the skills she learns in the Culinary program to get a decent job to pay her way through the rest of her college career. Right now, she's leaning toward sign language interpretation. Ideally, she's like to become a New York Times' Best Selling Author. GOALS!

Middle Son is 13, going into 8th grade, which is the first year in the high school building in our school district. He's an amazing runner and looking forward to joining the middle school cross country and track teams this year.

Youngest daughter is 11, going into 6th grade. Drama is her middle name. If we could get her over the stage-fright, I think she'd make an excellent actress! The girl can also sing!

Youngest son is 10, also going into the 6th grade. He's got the mind of an engineer, just like his dad. Wants to know how stuff works. Loves anything tech. Hoping he gets to take advantage of the opportunities our school district offers. I'm going to encourage him to join the Robotics Team this year, if he can.

Our two black cocker spaniels passed away last summer and the summer before. One day apart. They are buried in the back yard. The girls want to put in a memorial flower bed. Another project for another day. Our red and white cocker spaniel, Cheddar, is entering his senior years, but still acts like a puppy when he isn't lounging on the couch or the recliner.

We added a veiled chameleon to our family on February 17, 2019. We named him Picasso. I'll be honest, I didn't want to add a scaled animal to the family, but he won me over. Love that crazy little lizard.

That's the update... more later.

Early Morning Musings

I had a lot to do yesterday. Deposit a check at the bank, pay our home owners' insurance, pay the cable/internet/telephone bill, make a flyer for Thanksgiving Eve party and post Thanksgiving Dinner parties for the Eagles' Club. Got it all done by 11:45am.

Here I sit at 4:20AM ET writing this post. I need to leave for work in a little less than an hour.

Speaking of work, I'm not sure if I ever shared that I became a substitute school bus driver for my kids' school district. I trained in late 2014-early 2015. I was hired as a substitute driver on April 15, 2015 - a tax day I won't forget. ever. The general reaction from people when they find out I drive a school bus is, "I could never do that!" Honestly, that's what I thought before I actually went through the process and got my CDL B SP (that's commercial driver license class B School Bus and Passenger endorsements). I love my job! I really enjoy being among the first people representing our school district to greet many of the kids in the morning and being one of the last friendly faces they see in the afternoon. Sure, it has it's bad days... the trouble-makers, the inclement weather when school really should have been delayed or cancelled, and mechanical issues. There are far more good days than bad ones! Our mechanic, Mike, is the best! He gets the buses in and out of the service garage as quickly as possible!

Starting this afternoon, I'll be subbing long term for one of our drivers who will be out on medical leave. There will be some mornings all my kids will need to go to work with me due to my husband's and my oldest son's work schedules. Today is not one of those, thankfully. Four o'clock in the morning is hard on my two 8 year olds. Next school year will be easier, they will be in 4th grade. In our district, 4th grade is in the Middle School building which means they start an hour earlier than they do this year.

My oldest son is 21. Lives at home. Works 3 part time jobs, which some weeks adds up to a 40 hour work week. He helps me a ton at home, not so much with chores... he's great at getting the kids ready for school and on their buses and he's an amazing cook! Good thing he enjoys cooking, otherwise, we'd be eating cereal and mac & cheese every night. I'm not the best cook and I do not like cooking. I'm learning and growing. My parents always joke that I could burn water, problem, it's no joke. LOL

Enough of my musings for now.

Must check out Pinterest for cute, safe, no mess, and not too mischievous/naughty activities for our Elf On The Shelf.

*****
Rather than make a new post... just thought I would add on to this one.

My 13 year old 8th Grade daughter is currently memorizing the Periodic Table of Elements. She's using this....

to help. I'm almost sick of hearing it already!!

Random Ramblings

WOW! Two years and two days since I last posted. Oops. I guess I've let life just run away with me. I'll try to do better, but no promises.

I'm currently trying to get my house ready for the Thanksgiving holiday and feast that we're hosting again this year. We've been hosting Thanksgiving for 14 or 15 years now. We've almost got it down to a science or art-form. My husband cooks an amazing turkey! One year, no carving required... the bird literally fell apart as we were pulling it out of the oven. Best. Turkey. Ever. He also makes pumpkin pie... from scratch!! I'm responsible for prep (cutting celery and onions for the stuffing), mashed potatoes, sweet potato dessert, and clean-up. He handles the turkey, the stuffing, and the pies. Some years, he's even done all of the grocery shopping.

I'm also trying to plan the Advent/Christmas season fun and activities for our family. It's so hard this year. We have our oldest, 21 years old, still living at home. The other four kids are 13 (she turns 14 four days before Christmas), 10 (he'll be 11 a little over two weeks before Christmas), 8 (she'll turn 9 about three weeks after Christmas), and 8 (he turned 8 the week before Halloween). They are all very different personalities and interests. About the only thing they all agree on is the fun of our Elf On The Shelf "Elfis". I'm planning for his return the day after Thanksgiving.

Speaking of Santa's Scout Elves, does anyone have any tried and true and non-messy things our elf can do? Places to hide that I haven't already thought of? I'm notorious for doing super well for the first 5 or 6 days... then I get spotty about it. I'm going to make an appointment in my calendar or an alarm on my phone to remind to get it done each night. Any other suggestions on how I can handle that little dilema? My biggest enemy this year is going to be my work schedule. I'm a substitute school bus driver, so I get up very, very early in the morning... which means I go to bed super early in the evening. I'm always up and dressed and ready to go in case my supervisor calls.

Health Care Woes

I seriously hate this time of year! I was actually enjoying it until my husband called today. His boss has revealed his new cost savings measures.

New health insurance.

Our current relationships with our current doctors are coming to an abrupt end. The new insurance will be going into effect on December 1. Nothing like giving us some time to find the doctors that we think will best suit our families. There were two options for family doctors near (if you call more than 10 miles/less than 30 miles away near) my home. The first (and closest) option does not accept patients under the age of 12 years. Seriously?!? So I called the other option. They will have no problem participating with our daughter’s Children’s Special Healthcare Services coverage on top of our primary insurance.

We also get new dental insurance. The nearest dentist is over 45 miles from our home. Looks like we’ll go another 10 years or so before we go to the dentist again.

We also get vision insurance. Let me just say, what a joke!!

Frustrated.

On top of this, if my husband’s employer did NOT offer health coverage, we would be eligible for subsidized healthcare coverage. If we opt out of the “employer provided” coverage, we also “opt out” of subsidized coverage. This is freaking frustrating. The ACA (Affordable Care Act – aka ObamaCare) is making it impossible for families to have affordable options!

***end of rant***

Summer Has Begun

Summer officially began for the Ingram household at 12:15pm when the last day of school dismissed. The 5th graders did their Final Walk of the Hall to the tune of “Happy” by Pharrell (the fact I spell that name even remotely correctly surprises my daughter).

Interesting twist #1 for Summer 2014 occurred at 6:15pm this evening when my husband called. We’ve been looking for a camper – any camper that would sleep our family – for a while now. Hubs found one listed on a Facebook Yard Sale group yesterday. I went and bought it today! Happy Father’s Day!! LOL The thought of all the gear we’re going to need to even go camping in it has my head spinning. We got a really go deal. We’re looking at this as a “starter camper.” Most people get a starter home. LOL With 4 kids (at home) and 3 dogs I didn’t want to buy anything super new & expensive. I managed to back the silly thing into the driveway all by myself. Honestly, it took a little while. Our gate is fairly narrow and we have a dead vehicle parked in the driveway.

Friday we’re ditching our big name, big bill cable and internet provider for the local smaller more personal service cable and internet provider! Looking forward to it!

Friday is a big day… Christopher is coming home from school for the weekend. Ok, so he gets off the train at 10pm on Friday night and we have to get to the train station before 7am on Sunday morning – so he’s coming home to spend Saturday with the family. Looking forward to seeing him. he’s been away at school since the 13th of May. Then in July I’ll go get him and all of his stuff. He’ll be home for a 6 week stint before going back to school on September 2 (just like the rest of the kids).

Took the kids to the library today after school. The summer reading program starts on June 23 – must remember to go back and sign them up! Started each of the (at home) kids a “shelf” on my GoodReads account so we can track the books they read this summer. I’ll try to show/link the books (with my Amazon affiliate account) as we finish them.

Time Flies

Time flies when you’re having fun, I suppose.

Nicholas started basketball in January. Practice one night a week and games on Saturdays. This ended just in time for big sister’s activities to really ramp up.

Mary Ann is currently participating in Girls On The Run, a volleyball league at our local YMCA, and she’s continuing with her Hip-Hop Dance class. Recital is coming soon!

Happy 2014!!

I should have dropped by the ol’ blog yesterday to wish everyone a happy new year and to fill you all in on the latest from the Ingram homestead.

December ended up being a lot more –fill in the blank- than I bargained for!

Early in the month, I went to my doctor because I had some pain in the left side of my neck and it looked swollen. He ordered an ultrasound. A couple of days later he calls me to make an appointment to come see him, but he needs me to get a lot of blood work done before the appointment. Fast forward a couple of days to completed blood work and my appointment. He is referring me to an endocrinologist to have a biopsy done on my thyroid. Wait! What?!? Yes, I heard him right, we were on a path to rule out cancer. YIKES! I got a letter from the endocrinologist on New Year’s Eve – “The results of your recent biopsy were negative.” Good news. I could have wished for more personal delivery of such delicate and important news.

Now, let’s back up again to December 19th. My kids are pumped about how close Christmas is getting. Our Advent Chain saved me from an endless stream of curious children wanting to know how many more days until Christmas. SCORE! Problem, we were awakened at 5:30am by the telephone ringing – School “will be closed on Friday, December 20th, 2013 due to inclement weather.”

WHAT?? Since when is an inch of snow “inclement weather”? Oh – right. When it has ice underneath of it.

One severely disappointed almost 6 year old… all vacation long asked when is my Christmas party?

Saturday, December 21 – My beautiful daughter turned 11 years old. I’ll spare you the gushing. Later that evening, hubby and I went to our Eagles’ Club for a caroling party. We were pumped. Couldn’t wait to share all that Christmas cheer with the residents of the assisted living facility and the nursing home. I think we were even going to visit some of the home-bound elderly Eagles Members. We’re at the club… Caroling is CANCELLED. WHAAAA!!

Sunday, December 22 – huge ice storm hits. Trees down everywhere. Power goes out for a lot of people including my in-laws – thankfully we kept ours. So, my in-laws move in with us until their power can be restored. The energy company was estimating 12/28. My home – 9 people + 3 dogs (one of the people doesn’t like my dogs). It made for a very long 5 days – in-laws’ power was restored on the 26th. They were able to go home on the 27th, we wanted them to wait until the furnace could warm the place up a bit. We had our generator at their place running their sump pump, refrigerator, freezer, and a space heater to prevent the pipes from freezing.

Christmas Eve was spent with my parents at their home. Wonderful as always. I’ll probably make some scrapbook pages and share them eventually.

Christmas Day was spent here at home for a change. We usually go to my in-laws’ home. They were already here. So we just kept the meal plans in tact and changed the venue. They had fun being here to watch our children open their Christmas gifts.

New Year’s Eve we went to the Eagles’ Club. We had a great time. The band was amazing. Potlucks always have the best food!

Today – I just want school to open back up, my husband to go back to work, and to have some time and space to myself, by myself. *sigh*

In other news – TLP (The-lilypad.com) is having their 2nd annual Month of Challenges. One scrapbook challenge per day for the entire month of January.

Day 1.

Day 2.

Pages are linked to the gallery where proper credits are displayed. When in doubt, assume Michelle Godin at TLP.

ADVENT*ures Day 4

PHEW!! *Wiping sweat from my brow*

What a day!!

We woke up late. Not sure why… maybe I hit snooze one too many times?!?

Youngest daughter, Katie, had an appointment with the Cleft Palate Clinic today.

She is growing like a weed and gets prettier every time the doctors & nurses, dentists, surgeons, psychologists, social workers, and other members of the team see her. She will probably need more work on her defect when she is bigger, for now, we wait & watch her grow.

While he was at school today, Nicholas lost another tooth!! The tooth fairy is going broke! 4 teeth in 4 weeks!!

This photo made it very obvious I need to take the child and his glasses in to the Walmart Vision Center to get them adjusted – again. LOL

This evening, we went to our local Home Depot for a Kids’ Craft night. We also got to see Santa!

For some reason, my oldest – 18 year old Christopher did not want to sit on Santa’s lap or do the craft. LOL He was a huge help with the kids though and he plans on bringing them to craft night next week for “Build A Gift for Mom”. (That way, I can be surprised.)

I’ll post a picture of the cute craft they did tonight when the paint dries. Some of the children were more liberal with their paint.

Day 4 of Bible Study & Advent Devotionals – DONE! WOOT!

ADVENT*ures Day 3

Today was mostly uneventful. Seriously.

Grocery Shopping.

More cookie baking.

Yesterday was a serious adventure in cookie baking and decorating. I think I have the royal icing thing figured out. Maybe.

Oldest daughter is at her Hip-Hop Dance Class. I seriously cannot wait until recital to see how far she has come.

Tomorrow, youngest daughter goes to see all of her specialists for her cleft palate. It’s an annual thing, I do not expect to get any serious information or that they’re planning another procedure for her any time soon. She works with a speech therapist at school twice per week and this seems to be enough for now.

Tomorrow evening, our local Home Depot is holding a special Kids’ Workshop. They’ll making a Christmas craft. Next week they will make a gift for Mom and the week after that is a gift for Dad.

Yesterday, youngest daughter took a link off of the Countdown Chain.

Tonight, the middle child & middle son took the link off.

We also managed to get Day 3 of all of our Advent Devotional materials done. YAY! I’m even current on my Bible study and don’t need to play catch-up yet!

As for making scrapbook pages about our December – that will probably start happening soon, but I’ll be ok if that project is waiting for me in January. Documenting our days here on my blog counts!

ADVENT*ures Day 2

This post is going to photograph heavy. Please be patient.

First, I’ll show & tell you about the awesome craft I made yesterday.

Did you (or your children) ever make chains out of strips of construction paper? Do you get as disappointed as I do when they fade? rip? and need to be thrown away?

I have the solution!

My children and I started making construction paper Countdown-To-Christmas Chains a few years ago. All that work just to throw it all away.

*light bulb moment*

This year we made our countdown chain out of craft foam sheets – like these…

I cut the red & green into strips about 1/2”-3/4” wide.

Then I used Velcro Brand self-adhesive dots for the fastener.

I used clear ones, but couldn’t find those to link up at Amazon.

Then I wrote the numbers 1-24 on the strips using Tulip Dimensional Fabric Paint 4oz Puffy White

While I was patiently *ahem* waiting for the puffy paint to dry, I made a template for a star.

I cut the star shape out of that fancy-schmancy glitter foam sheet you see in the photo above.

Anyway…

It all ended up looking like…

Last night, my youngest child took the first link off.

Now we have a reusable “Construction Paper” Paper Chain to Countdown-To-Christmas. The whole project including the overage I purchased cost just over $8.

Today, I am playing with sugar cookies and royal icing.

My middle son wants Dinosaur Sugar Cookies to take to school for his Birthday treat next week. I’ve heard that royal icing is difficult to work with so I decided to start practicing this week.

My grandmother’s sugar recipe is perfect!

Now to start making royal icing. Adding more confectioners’ sugar to the grocery list, I think I’m going to need it.

Proud moment! We made it through all of the Advent reading and activity things I showed you yesterday again this morning. I’m even on track in my Bible Study!

Oh… the tree?!? Did we decorate it? We sure did, finished it up last night.

Then we watched The Grinch and ate popcorn.

Our ADVENT*ures Begin

Today, Sunday, December 1, 2013 is the first day of Advent. We are so excited to start counting down to the birth of our Lord Jesus! This is an exciting time in the life of our family, made even more special by the fact our two youngest children (5 years old) are understanding the Faith & Family traditions more.

Most families have one Advent wreath or calendar. We have *way* more. I'd be an over-achiever if I expected we will do all of the activities and readings that came with them.

First up, our family Advent & Christmas "wreath".

This Nativity sculpture and candle holder was a gift from some very dear friends.

Next up we have the Advent wreath which came home from Religious Ed. with my kindergarden students last weekend.

Pardon the sideways photo, I have not figured out how to edit the photo orientation on my phone. (This post is coming to you from my phone.)

Next we have the Advent countdown activity my 2nd grader brought home from Religious Ed.

I've never seen this one before, so it should be fun!

The we have a Jesse Tree brought home by my 5th grader.

I also have a countdown to Christmas book and calendar.

I'll be thrilled if we do, read, etc. only one or two of these each day. I also found an Advent Bible Study I am going to try to complete. There is a version of the study for children also. Not sure if I will add the children's study to our activities or not.

Today is the day we decorate our Christmas Tree! The kids are so excited!

Happy 1st of December!

Happy first Sunday of Advent!

105 Days To Christmas

Will you be ready?
I will!
Thanks in part to 100 Days to Christmas by Jennifer Tankersley of ListPlanIt.Com.

I’ve used Ms. Tankersley’s system for preparing for Christmas for several years now… every year she makes some small tweak that makes a big difference!

This year, all of the linked lists & planning sheets are built right into the e-book! Since I got the PDF version, I selected to start printing at the page where the worksheets start. Now to find my paper-puncher and an empty binder.

The book is organized in a daily format – quick & easy reading for busy Moms (or Dads). The worksheets are PDF files which you can edit on your computer and then print. I just printed and will “edit” by hand, it’s what works for me. As much as I love being a computer girl and living in the digital age, I still love to hold a pen and write things down.

I swear, this Christmas is going to be the best one yet.

Now, if I could just find someone to come deep-clean my house for free! LOL

Don’t miss out on the 100 Days to Christmas Facebook party on September 16 – THE BIG DAY!

Oh - Before I forget...
get the 100 Days to Christmas 2013 eBook for just $5 (regular price $8) when they use the following coupon code in the checkout:  100DAYS3OFF

Graduation Countdown

I cannot believe my son, Christopher, graduates from high school in just a few weeks! He will spend the summer at home then in the fall he will attend Michigan Career And Technical Institute. He will pursue vocational training in welding, metal work, and machine technology.

Meanwhile, our family summer calendar is rapidly filling with 4-H, dance classes, bicycle rides, open houses, and other great stuff! I know summer is just going to fly by.

That's it for this check-in... More later.

Project Life 2013 Week 2

Week 2 was January 7-January 13 for our family.

It started out quiet enough, but toward the end it got quite busy. Thursday, January 10 was the high school art show. Saturday, January 12 was Katie’s actual birthday and we had a party for her on Sunday, January 13.

I have already completed the special pages for the Art Show and the Birthday Party. Tomorrow I will work on the Week Summary page(s). I’m fairly certain it will only be a single page.

I decided to throw having “cohesiveness” out the window for Project Life. Our life isn’t simple… I want each page to be a reflection of that week, that day, of us… in all of our chaos, creativity, and confusion! (that last part just sounded good).

There will be journaling about the art show on the main page for the week – in fact, the main page will probably match the kit and elements I used on the art show page.

I will come back tomorrow and edit this post (when & if I get the chance) to post credits and link the pages to my TLP gallery.

Catching Up

We’re only two weeks into the New Year and I’m playing catch up already… especially where the 31 Days of Challenges at The-LilyPad.Com are concerned!

I just finished days 10 and 11.

Credits:
Kim Jensen Chalk Artist
Jacque Larsen Lone Star
Kate Hadfield Under The Tree
Sahlin Studio Field Trip
Allison Pennington Duly Noted v.2
TLP Collab Grateful (ScrapStacks #1) template by Amy Martin
TLP Collab Hoppy BDay
Valorie Wibbens For The Record

There might be more in the credits. I didn’t take notes like I usually do. I was naughty.

Credits:
TLP Collab Winter Wishes
Template: 31 Days of Challenges Day 11 Freebie by Emily Merritt

Day Late & a Dollar Short

*sigh*

I was on a really good streak with the 31 Days of Challenges until yesterday. Now, I’m a day behind. I might be able to eek out today’s (day 9) challenge later, but right now – I just want to take a nap.

Day 8’s challenge assignment was to scrap a page without using a photo. I’ve done photoless before, so no problem… or so I thought. I just couldn’t find inspiration. So I started browsing through all of my layouts (all the way back to the first one in February 2006). In my browsing I discovered I hadn’t made a cover for my youngest son Benjamin’s album.

Problem solved.

Credits:
Template: from Beechtree by Sara Gleason
TLP Collab Things That Matter Most
Font: DJB Play Misty For Me by Darcy Baldwin

Why am I so tired?

I did a bunch of errands today…

Bank #1

Library

Bank #2

The roads were super icy, so it took longer than it should have to drive from home to the first stop. By the time I finished at the first place the roads were much improved.

Nothing out of the ordinary at Bank #1 or at the Library.

Bank #2 is where things started to get weird.

Weird? At the bank?

Yes. Weird.

While I was conducting my business with the teller, the manager got a telephone call. It was the alarm company. The bank’s “Hold-Up Alarm” had been tripped. Police were in route.

As I was pulling out the parking lot, the Shiawassee County Sheriff’s Deputy was pulling in. He looked at me critically as he pulled right up to the bank’s front door.

What a day! Now my neighbor is teasing me that while my kids are at preschool I run around robbing banks. HILARIOUS!

This should make for interesting entries for Project Life!

On A Roll

I’ve stuck with the 31 Days Challenges at The-LilyPad.Com for 7 days!! So proud of myself!

Day 7 Challenge – Build a Title using 4 Different Alphas. Harder than you might think!

Credits:
-Template by Band Geek Designs
-Papers, doodles, flower, and 3 alphas from TLP Collab You Make Me Smile
-4th Alpha from TLP Collab Fall Moments
-Font: Janda Elegant Handwriting

Project Life Week 01 – January 1 – January 6, 2013 is complete!

Day 6 of 31

I just finished my Day 6 layout for the 31 Days of Challenges at TLP. The challenge was to scrap an imperfect photo. I had no trouble finding one!

The lighting at the bowling is *always* bad. No matter what I do or try with my phone, p&s, or dslr - the lighting just sucks and there is no way to compensate for it that I have found that gets me good results. So I just deal.

Credits:
Papers & tape from The People In Your Neighborhood (a TLP collab) (I blended a paper by Amy Jaz and another from Amy Wolff together to get the look I wanted)
Journal card - Journal It by Jacque Larsen
Fonts: Title - Showcard Gothic and Journaling - Janda Everyday Casual
bowling element by Dream BIG Designs - (April 2012 Facebook freebie)

31 Days–Day 4 & Day 5

I’ve been scrapping like a maniac so far in 2013! Averaging just under 2 pages per day.

Day 4 Challenge: Realistic Stamping

Credits:
Template by Amy Martin
December Bits by Sabrina Dupre
A Little Jingle Papers by Amber Clegg
Kitschy Christmas by Jennifer Barrette & Sahlin Studio
Petal Pops 4 by Amy Wolff
Very Merry Papers by Gina Miller

Day 5 Challenge: Color Inspiration – Purple

Let me just say, I am NOT a fan of purple. I went stash diving to find this gem of a kit so I could avoid purchasing any purple.

Credits:
Follow Me by Allison Pennington