First Day of School

... and the journaling says it all :)

Elements from: Sweet Melody kit by Maguette Designs; Template by Rainy Dayz Designz

Don't let the smile fool you. These were taken at home before we left for school. She started crying the moment we got there. And she cried for the rest of the class. And she did that for a few days. But as of her teacher's last update, she said that Andrea doesn't cry in class anymore :)

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Template Sensations Challenge for June 16-30, 2012.

Strawberry Farm

My family had been to Baguio several times, but last summer was the first time we finally made it the Strawberry Farm. It was hot in Baguio, but the farms are located outside the city and when we got there, it was a little chilly and foggy...

Elements from: Jardin et Marvelles collaboration kit by Digital Crea

And after a few minutes there, it rained! It was a mad dash through the muddy road back to our van, all thoughts of strawberry picking, forgotten. Oh well... maybe next year.

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Click It! Take that Picture Now! Challenge for June.

New kit by Sunny Day Scraps: Springtime

This cute kit is full of springtime!

Includes:

45 Elements

12 Papers

You can also get the kit, a set of stacked papers, and clusters in a bundle:

Available here:

Berry Sweet Scraps 

And you can get the bundle here.

Here are a couple of pages I made with this kit:

This is Andrea and her cousin, Ate Sefia. Ate was telling Andrea a story one afternoon when we visited them last December.

This is Andrea's other cousin, Helaena. The photo was taken when we were in Baguio last summer. In spite of the sweltering heat in Manila at the time, the weather in Baguio was cold so we bought the girls furry animal hats to keep their heads and ears warm.

Summer Loving

Andrea is missing her pool. She keeps asking me to set it up for a few weeks now but we've had cloudy skies and rains for a while. We both can't wait for the sun to shine again!

Elements from: Tropical Paradise kit by Sunny Day Scraps; Template by Scrapping with Liz; Wordart by Claudio

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's WA Lovin challenge for June 16-30, 2012.

Good night, Moon

My friend posted new pictures of my godson on her Facebook page. He's getting so big already! Seems like last I saw him, he was so teeny-weeny.

Elements from: Good night Moon kit by Baby Cakes Scrap

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Scraplift Challenge for June 16-30. I used one of the kits I won from Baby Cakes Scrap at a challenge hosted at Berry Sweet Scraps for iNSD last May, Good Night Moon. I admit, I picked the kit because of the title. Andrea loves that book! The kit is not about the book though, but the elements are cute anyway.

Tinkerbell Dress

Watch all the flowers,

Dance with the wind,

Listen to snowflakes, 

Whisper your name.

Feel all the wonder, 

Lifting your dreams,

You can fly!

- Fly to Your Heart (Tinkerbell OST) -

So remember that white dress post a few days ago where I said we went to the mall? I didn't mention there that Andrea got sick a few hours after we got home. She was fine until we got home, and I even gave her a bath before putting her to sleep. But when I checked on her before I went to bed, she was burning with fever. And I do mean burning.

So my husband and I had been taking turns staying at home to take care of her and my turn was last Tuesday. Her doctor gave her a ton of medicine which we had to make her take several times during the day. I think some of them makes her sleepy because she spent most of the day sleeping. Which gave me time to work on this:

Andrea and her Tinkerbell Dress

Ok, so Tinkerbell' actually wears a tube dress, but that wouldn't be too comfortable to play in. I used an old, faded pillow case to make the dress. So old in fact that the other piece of pillow case from the original pair was being used as a rag by our nanny. When she saw Andrea wearing it, she gave me a funny look and asked: "Is that our rag???" "Of course not! That's the other one... we have 2 pieces of that pillow case." And then I added some lace from Andrea's old dress that I took apart a year ago. Good thing the colors sort of match... I was too lazy to sew a zigzag edge on the dress.

She wore it immediately after I showed it to her, and we did her hair like Tinkerbell's and took photos. The healthy flush on her cheeks was actually the fever. I know she doesn't look it but she was running a 38.3 fever a few hours before this photo.

And just so you don't think life around our house is perfect:

Yep, this was our first photo shoot attempt. I guess she was sleepy because she crawled in bed after this scene and fell asleep immediately (yep, while wearing the dress... we live in a hot country). When she woke up, it was instant mood transformation. We fixed her hair again and she started giving me those smiles and poses in the previous 2 photos.

Madame Butterfly

I haven't abandoned digital scrapping yet. In fact I have been busy with some CT work, only I can't post them here until the kits are released in stores. I just have to say the designers I work with have some pretty amazing kits coming out soon ;)

I've been so busy in fact that I haven't noticed that June is almost over! And I'm not done with my challenge layouts yet. 

Anyway, I have this pretty mini-kit from A-liya for Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Birdcage challenge for June 16-30.

Who am I? Add-on by A-liya

And here is my layout:

Elements from: Who am I? Add-on by A-liya

Err... not my best layout. I finished it while I had a migraine. I actually liked it better minus some of the elements but the challenge called for using all the elements in the kit.

The photo was taken at the mall a month ago. We saw some maintenance guys packing up the stage set-up at the lobby and I noticed these big butterfly wings attached to big metal stands. They were so pretty I asked Andrea to stand in front of it and took her photo. Looking at the photo, I realized the wings were too big for her... they look like they were growing out of her head.  Andrea loves looking at this photo though. I did mention she's into fairies and wings lately.

Little White Dress

I still have a few clothes pre-maternity (and when I saw pre-maternity, I mean way back in 2008) that I kept because they were relatively new when I got pregnant and I was planning to use them again. Some are back in circulation again, but some... um... let's just say I question my fashion choices back when I was... errr... younger :)

Here's one of them:

Nothing wrong with it really. And I think it might even look flattering if you are slim, which even pre-maternity I was not :) The puffed sleeves made my arms look bigger, and the white shapeless silhouette of this top made me look bigger, period.

Why have I kept it then? Because I like this detail at the bottom:

A few weeks ago, before Andrea started going to school, I took out this old top and decided to make a dress for her. 

I cut the blouse in half at the middle. The bottom part was used as the skirt, unaltered. The top part of the dress I fashioned from the upper half of the blouse. I used the neckline of the blouse for the neckline of the dress. Using the blouse this way meant there was only a little sewing involved (i.e. attaching the front and back of the top, attaching the top to the skirt, hemming the sleeves) and it only took me about an hour to finish. 

I finished this dress weeks ago. Only Andrea refused to take it off when I asked her to try it on, and then it got messy after a few minutes of playing that I was not able to take photos until last weekend when I asked her to wear it to go the mall.

She even picked the shoes to wear with it. Little girl has fashion sense, don't you think???

She saw the cardboard set-up for the movie Ice Age 4... she's a big fan of the squirrel from the Ice Age franchise.

This project is linked at the following parties:

Tuesday Alchemy Challenge |

Bandana Skirt

After a long hiatus... yes, I was able to use my neglected sewing machine again. And I used it to make these:

I have this inspiration pinned on Pinterest for more than a year now. 

Hankerchief Skirt by Cami (tidbits)

Cami has a tutorial over at her blog so do check it out. I don't know why it took me so long to make it since it really is so easy to make. So easy that I decided to use the parts I cut off to embellish a top for Izzie (one of Andrea's dolly friends).

They like matching you know (see Matching Dresses).

I only had 3 bandanas of different designs, and they were a little small. Since I wanted Andrea's skirt a bit long so she can use it for a few years (wishful thinking here) I only divided my bandana into 2 equal triangular parts and Andrea's skirt is only made up of 6 panels. I folded each triangle into half, and cut off one side to give me the pentagon-shaped pieces like the one on Cami's photo here.

Since I only had a few pieces, I had to change how I sewed each piece together. Instead of layering them like this, I took 2 pieces, right sides facing together, wrong side out, and sewed parallel to one side of the pentagon. See diagram below.

I sewed along that side of the pentagon until all 6 pieces form a sort of circle. So I had something like a "circle" skirt. And then I sewed a black elastic for the waistband.

Happy campers (ignore the dirty feet... she was playing barefoot before I dragged her here for the photoshoot)

I still had a few small scrap pieces of the bandanas that I cut off when I made Izzie's dress and I made them into a little accessory to match the skirt. I will be sharing that project maybe tomorrow. Let me just say that only very few small pieces of those bandanas were thrown away.

New kit by Keep in Touch Designs: Pink Enchantment

It's girly. It's cute. It's pink. Perfect for scrapping your precious memories of your favorite girls.

Kit contains:

14 papers (3600 x 3600 in 300 dpi)

53 elements

Available here:

Gingerscraps
Scrappity-Doo-Dah

Here is a layout I made with this kit for inspiration:

Elements from: Pink Enchantment kit by Keep in Touch Designs

News and new freebies!

So I've been stalking CT call threads at forums lately. I still have a full-time job though, so I usually only go for One-kit Calls. But the truth is, I'm always hoping, and hoping and hoping, that one of my favorite designers will post a CT call so that I can have a chance to apply. 

And what do you know, a few days ago, one of them did! *insert big smile here*

Notice the new blinkie on my sidebar? I am now part of Mariscrap's Creative Team. YEY! I actually made a couple of layouts for her a month ago for her Boston kit when I saw her One-kit Call at a forum. I can't wait to start working on her other kits! 

On to other news... 

Recently, I'm into text paths. Feli Designs' Wordart/Quote Challenge over at Digidesignresort this June really got to me.  I've checked a few tutorials online on how to make one and have been practicing. But so far, I've only done simple curve paths. I still need a LOT of practice before I can make more complex paths. 

I'm also trying my hand at making my own elements using Photoshop. I still can't draw, but I can make simple elements using default shapes, and then "Liquifying" or "Warping" them to get them to look the shape I want. And in line with my drawing attempts, I have a new freebie for you!

DOWNLOAD

And since my Facebook fan freebie is getting a little old, I decided to make a new one. I prepared a layered .psd template for my Facebook fans.

Click here to go to my Facebook page.

Enjoy! :)

Imagine!

For the past 2 weeks, Andrea toggles between being the baby Rapunzel in Tangled, and Tinker Bell. She has even taken to learning some of the songs in both movies: I see the Light by Mandy Moore from Tangled, and Fly to your Heart by Selena Gomez from Tinker Bell. Sometimes, I listen to her when she's playing with her dolls and from their "conversations", I can tell she's pretending they are all fairies. A little girl's imagination is a beautiful thing.

Elements from: Mother-Owl Add-on by Pati Araujo

I made this layout as part of Digidesignresort's Sunset Colour Challenge for June.

This is the last layout I need to complete the 6 Cocktail Hour challenges:

• Sunrise Theme Challenge - Summer Dream
• Coconut Reef Scraplift Challenge - Fairy Princess
• Seabreeze Template Challenge  - Beat the Summer Heat
• Monkey Puzzle Wordart Challenge - Remembering the happy times
• Sunset Colour Challenge - DONE (this post)
• Tourist Trap Photo - Fun on the Sand

And for completing all 6 challenges, I get this free kit next month. YEY! :)

Digidesignresort's collaboration kit: Family Time

Enny the Panda: A contest

Have you ever seen anything so cute?

Catherine, a talented artist and blogger from Russia, is giving her away to one of her lucky readers anywhere in the world! How cool is that? I want to win her! Did I already say that she's so cute???

If you want to join the contest, head on over to Catherine's blog to find out how to join. The contest ends on July 20.

Celebrating Andrea's Favorite Dude - Part 3

I made quite a few layouts using Daddy and Andrea's photos last weekend and they were all supposed to be posted last Sunday. However, the weather was affecting my broadband signal so my internet connection was unbearably slow.

Anyway, here's the last for my daddy series:

Elements from: Extraordinary collaboration kit by Statements by Jodie and Ellie Lash

The photos were from our trip to Enchanted Kingdom last summer. Daddy wanted to try this challenge where you have to cross a rope ladder and hit the buzzer at the top. This challenge favored people who are light and not so tall because you have to keep your center of balance really low, and cross the ladder really fast. Suffice to say, we didn't get any prizes from this challenge. But Andrea and her cousins (ok... and us other adults too) had a lot of fun watching Daddy try :)

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Cardinal Mega Mix-up Challenge for June and this layout was scraplifted from one of Kathryn's layouts.

Celebrating Andrea's Favorite Dude - Part 2

It's all about daddy today :)

This photo was from our last trip to the beach. Daddy had to take Andrea to the water all the time to wash her feet because she kept complaining that her feet were dirty (i.e. sandy).

I made this layout as part of the Studio's Featured Designer Challenge for June 1-15.

Celebrating Andrea's Favorite Dude - Part 1

... ok, and mine too :)

Elements from: Sit Back and Relax collaboration kit from Digital Crea

Happy daddy's day to all the daddies out there!

This layout was created as part of the Studio's Surprise Me Border Me Challenge for June.

NOTE: This is a late post because my internet connection at home was super super slow all weekend!

Sunny Day Scraps CT Call and Blog Call

Charly is also looking for bloggers.

Blogger Requirements:

Blog 2-3 times per week on the sunny day scraps blog with different points of interests, new releases, store sales, challenges, Post CT Layouts, post about scrapping how to's, and projects of interest.

Bloggers will get 2 kits of their choice per month. No layouts required but much appreciated!!

If you are interested, you can send Charly an email at: charly@sunnydayscraps.com

Please send the links to your best gallery, link to your Blog, any other duties you may have (designer or CT duties), short bio and why you would like to be on the Team, and what position you are applying for (e.g. Blogger, CT).

Call ends when all positions are filled!!!

To see samples for Charly's work, you can visit her shop here.

I'm losing it...

Preparing a layout can take me hours, especially when I have to do extraction. I noticed lately that I have been taking a lot of short cuts, like using templates, steering away from extraction... etc. I make layouts for the sake of finishing one because simply submitting a layout qualifies me for the challenge incentive.

Dear, CSD... I miss your friendly contests. 

I am not very satisfied with my recent layouts. I am running out of fresh ideas. 

Anyway, I was preparing a layout for Digidesignresort's Wordart Challenge for June a few days ago. The challenge is to use your own handwriting OR a text path in the layout. We can make our own or use this lovely set provided by Feli Designs:

I wanted to customize the text so I tried to make my own text path. Since it was my first try, it needed a lot of fine-tuning, meaning a lot of time I do not have right now, so I decided to go with a text path template I got from DigiOD.

Here's the layout I managed to finish.

Elements from: Silent Atoll kit by A-liya; Text path template from: DigiOD

Looking at it now for the second time, I guess it's not so bad. But a few days ago after I finished it, and after looking at other people's submissions for the challenge, I wasn't so happy with it. So I tried again. And this time, I used one of the wordart provided for the challenge:

Elements from: Une Lumiere dans la brum Add-on by Annliz; Wordart from: Feli Designs

I like the second layout better because it's simpler, and looks "cleaner". I guess this is the problem I have with clustering. It always makes me feel that the page is too cluttered, which tells me I must be doing something wrong because I have seen some clusters that take up most of the page but still look beautiful.

Anyway, both photos were taken at the mall. They had this exhibit of ocean animal plush toys in the garden outside. The first time I took Andrea, she was so scared for the big toy animals that she cried everytime we went near. The second time was better and she was the one who asked me to take her photo before running off to pose in front of the turtles :)

Beat the Summer Heat

Last summer (our summer here in Asia Pacific, I mean), we decided to upgrade Andrea's baby pool to a bigger one.

Elements from: Under the Sea kit and Under the Sea Add-on kit by Sunny Day Scraps; Template by: Silke

See how happy that made her? 

I started noticing that Andrea always tries to lie down on her belly in her small baby pool and pretend she's swimming around February. Stretched out, she didn't fit in the old pool anymore so after a lot of measuring in our small "backyard" space, we got her one that's big enough and with room to grow. It's roomy enough to fit an adult sitting down too. I never got to try it, by Andrea and her nanny enjoyed cooling down in that pool during the hottest days of summer this year :)

Next year, she's going to swimming lessons. 

I made this layout as part of Digidesignresort's Seabreeze Template Challenge for June.

The Secret Stash

Missing:

• 1 Tangled (yes, I mean the animated movie from Disney) bracelet
• 1 small plastic medicine case
• several small hair clips
• 1 pair of pink child-size chopsticks
•  2 costume jewelry rings (mine!)
• several pieces of Barbie's shoes
• several small toys
• etc...

No, we didn't have a thief in the house.

I have a toddler. And she likes "hiding" stuff.

Elements from: Cutie mini kit by ScrapAngie; Template from: Aimee Harrison

Caught in the act! According to Andrea, the hole in the speaker is Kelly's (her doll's name) house.

Riiiiiiiiigggght....

At my mom's house where she and my toddler niece hang out the whole day, they opened one of the speakers and found a LOT of small toys inserted through the hole... including a half-eaten hotdog... eeeewwww!!! 

This photo was taken a year ago and we have discovered several of her secret stashes in the months that followed. I suspect she has a couple of new ones in her room and in mine, but I have yet to discover them *sigh*

I made this layout as part of Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Wordart Lovin' Challenge for June 1-15.

Sail to your dreams

I was checking my stash and I still have a LOT of unused kits. 

A LOT.

Last Monday, I started working on some challenge layouts again and I have this self-imposed rule that as much as possible (i.e. the challenge has no restriction on the kit to be used), I will use only the kits I haven't used yet for all my challenge layouts for June.

I saw the kit I bought during iNSD weekend from Feli Designs, Sail to your Dreams. I used it on my Fun in the sand layout but there are still some beautiful elements I wanted to use so I created another layout with it.

Elements from: Sail to your Drams kit by Feli Designs

The photo is from the same set as Andrea's beach photos (you can tell from the dress :) and the only "elements" included in the original photo are Andrea, the sand she's standing on, and the Dora beach bucket. The rest are elements from the kit, including the sea gulls on the sand (notice they don't have shadows?).

Summer Challenge

All this talk of summer is making me miss summer already! Aaargh!

"Dear Janelle... think about the heat. You don't miss the heat right?"

Right. Ok, me good.

Here is another summer-themed layout... and don't even expect this to be the last just yet!

Elements from Nautical Days Add-on kit by Dana's Footprint Digital Designs.

I made this layout for Scrappity-Doo-Dah's Birdcage Challenge for June 1-15. The challenge was to make a layout using all the elements in the provided mini-kit. This is the mini-kit they gave us:

Well, I'm a girly-girl type of gal and anything that is not girly-girl is out of my comfort zone (think steampunk, and well... nautical). It took a while for me to pick a photo, and took even longer for me to work my way through the layout. It was like working on a puzzle.. add element here... does it "fit"? No? Ok, let's move it here. Better? Ok, you stay there element. Now how about this next element here... repeat 100x. 

Yep, like that. No concept in mind when I started. I just needed a place to stick all elements as required by the challenge.

Now the photos. Those were taken during our company's summer outing last May. I wasn't supposed to go. I didn't have anyone to go with because my one and only team mate in our current team of 2, was on maternity leave. But the other team I work with and who sit behind us volunteered to "adopt" me during the outing so I went with them. Our summer outing theme was "Summer Challenge"... yep, there were games. And guess what... my team won first prize. YEY!! But I digress. I only had a few photos from this trip and most of them were on the beach during the challenges where I had to wear the department shirt (color: mustard yellow), and my team bandana (color: hot pink), and we were all sweltering under the hot summer sun. It was definitely a challenge... a challenge to look graceful for photos. 

I finished the layout using one of my less-than-graceful photos during the kayak race and uploaded it to the gallery. It wasn't even there for an hour, during which I was mulling over deleting it from the gallery and submitting something else using Andrea's beach photos instead when I got a message on my inbox saying my layout (yep, the one with my less-than-graceful photo) made Layout of the Day (for June 6) on Scrappity-Doo-Dah.

Uh... Um... Ok... YEY!! (???)

No really, YEY!! I was so happy about it... but I still wish I can erase that blended photo of me on the kayak. Believe it or not, that was actually one of the best shots I had during the race where I didn't look like I was dying ;)

Fun on the sand

Here's another challenge layout:

Elements from: Sail to your Dreams kit by Feli Designs

I made this layout for Digidesignresort's Tourist Trap Photo Challenge for June. The challenge is to create a layout using a summer photo. 

I used a photo from our recent trip to the beach. We arrived at the beach late so the sun was about to set in this photo. This is only the second time Andrea has been to the beach, I think. The first time was when she was only 6 months old. This is the first time she was able to play in the sand and though she liked playing with the sand... she hated getting her feet dirty with it *rolls eyes*. Daddy had to take her to the water every few minutes to wash her feet.  A little ironic for someone who refuses to wear slippers around the house. 

This layout makes 3 challenges out of 6:

• Sunrise Theme - Summer Dreams
• Coconut Reef Scraplift - Fairy Princess
• Seabreeze Template
• Monkey Puzzle Wordart
• Sunset Color
• Tourist Trap Photo - done! (this post)

Three more to go and that kit is mine! :)

Fairy Princess

Andrea is going through what I call the "Fairy-Princess-Mermaid" stage that every little girl, it seems, must go through. She is sometimes a fairy, sometimes a princess, sometimes a mermaid, and sometimes all 3 (don't ask how, I have no idea either). Kind of like a rite of passage. Being the supportive mom, I bought her fairy wings, and she sometimes runs around the house and plays while wearing that uncomfortable thing (I imagine it's uncomfortable... I won't really know since I haven't tried wearing wings myself).

Elements from: Magic Breath collaboration kit by Digidesignresort

I made this layout for Digidesignresort's Coconut Reef Scraplift Challenge for June. That's 2 challenges out of 6 that I have already completed to get the Family Time kit at the end of the month!

• Sunrise Theme - Summer Dreams
• Coconut Reef Scraplift - done! (this post)
• Seabreeze Template
• Monkey Puzzle Wordart
• Sunset Color
• Tourist Trap Photo

Summer!! Summer???

I took a short break from work to clear my head and attend to small things (like the parent's orientation for Andrea's school which starts next week!!) for me and for our house. I filed the leave from work because I wanted to go out of town but I was not duly informed that summer was apparently over in my part of the world and a typhoon was scheduled to hit us last weekend (it "swerved"... but it was raining and grey all weekend anyway).

Welcome monsoon season!

Monday was my last vacation day and I didn't really have any plans. I stayed home anyway and decided to check some of the other forums I frequent. I was confused for a while to see so many people talking about summer. And then I remembered that it is summer in other parts of the world... north of the equator I think. I'm on the equator, and though summer is officially over for us, we get summer-like weather most of the time still. Like, after every typhoon.

Anyway, last month, I was participated in several challenges in Digidesignresort to get this kit:

And I was able to get it last Monday. Yey!!

This month, this is the kit they are giving away for participating in the 6 Cocktail Hour Challenges:

Welcome back mojo! Since I didn't have anything else to do that day, I decided to jump in on the challenges. To get this kit, I need to complete these challenges:

• Sunrise Theme
• Coconut Reef Scraplift
• Seabreeze Template
• Monkey Puzzle Wordart
• Sunset Color
• Tourist Trap Photo

Let's start with the Sunrise Theme. The theme for this month is "Summer Dream". We were asked to scrap about our summer dream... whether it has already happened, or hasn't happened yet. This was easy for me:

Elements from: Ocean's Hopscotch kit by Kaklei Designs

White sand is optional. 

By the way, this photo was taken a looooong time ago :)

After my haircut

The last layout I was able to squeeze in for the May challenges.

This one was for Digidesignresort's Mixed: Use it all Mini challenge.

The challenge is to use all elements in the mini-kit provided. We were given this mini-kit from JanetB Designs to use:

The photo was taken after Andrea had her second ever hair cut (from our current trend, it looks like she's only getting a hair cut once a year). I wanted it shorter, but the stylist (can you believe toddlers have stylists nowadays too???) suggested a longer length because of Andrea's hair type. Her curls, which for some reason only grows on top of her head, are more evident now :)