I found it!! The perfect fabric for my craft apron! Oh, and guess what???

It has PINK in it!!

I found some gorgeous cloth today and I'm going to use it to make a crafting apron. Yep, you heard right - a crafting apron not a cooking apron.

The apron will be of this style. (See the crafty scissors in the pocket?!)
I got the free pattern for this apron at this really great site!











And, I will be using the fabric below for the apron's 'base'. I have yet to choose the other colors and/or patterns for the pockets, waistband and ties. Any suggestions?
Don't you think this fabric is just 'fun'?!













Can't wait to get started.... I'll let ya know how it goes - maybe I'll even model the finished apron! Scary! ;)

xoxoxo
PattyAnne

My Town, Current Reads and Precept Homework

Hi all,

This past weekend we had a beautiful day on Sunday so my friend Robbie and I headed downtown to the park to hike.
It was gorgeous. The weather was sunny and warm - so unlike the day before when it was windy, rainy and rather COLD. Here are a few shots from 'my' town.











After we hiked, we ate at little Italian restaurant where we both had scrumptious salads with all kinds of greens, walnuts, strawberries, grilled chicken and feta cheese. YUM-OH! Well, that's not exactly accurate -- I had feta -- Rob doesn't like feta so she had shredded mozzarella. I still can't believe she doesn't like feta. I could put feta cheese on everything. :)

So, let's see. What else?? Ummm..... I've been reading. I'm almost finished with Sophie Kinsella's, "Shopaholic Takes Manhattan". I absolutely love this series. It is just so light and fun. At the same time, I'm also reading Kim Edwards', "The Memory Keepers Daughter". Boy this is one book that is hard to put down. I cannot wait to see what happens to each of the characters because Kim has really drawn me deep into their lives. I am sooo waiting to find out what becomes of Phoebee! I'm only on page 147 (out of 401 pages) but I highly recommend this book! If you have read it or want to read it AND discuss it, leave me a comment on my blog and I'll email you the info on joining the fun book club I'm in. We are going to begin our discussion of the book on March 1st.

Oh, one last thing.... I'm going to an Advanced Precept Leader Training class in March and got my pre-workshop homework yesterday. Wowzers. I think I will be busy with this (and lovin' it!). As a matter of fact, you should see my kitchen table right now. I've got all my study materials strewn out on it.

Anyhooo, I will be doing homework in 1 Samuel Chapters 21-23, Daniel Chapters 1-7 and Matthew Chapter 5 verses 1-4. If any of you have ever done any Precept Bible classes you KNOW that I am going to be really, REALLY busy with this probably right up until the day of the class.
Say a prayer for me. :)

xoxoxo
PattyAnne

My American Idol Vote Goes to.......

I love this guy! :)
Love his costume! Love his nerve!

Chattanooga Choo Choo

This past weekend I drove to Chattanooga to visit my daughter, her husband and
my grand-DOGS, grand-CAT and grand-BIRD. (nope, no grandKIDS).
Pictured below is one of those grand-babies. Cute,huh?














While in Chattanooga we visited an awesome nature center. Isn't the treehouse that was within this nature center cool??



















Check out the Nature Center's website here.



Ok, back to my trip..... my daughter and I had planned on doing a bunch of scrapbooking when I got there but she and her dh had been in a car accident on Valentine's Day (the day before I arrived) and she was hurting quite a bit. Thank God that both she and her husband are OK - just bruised.





So anyway between her hurting and worrying about their car (they are a one-car family) she wasn't exactly up for 'scrapping happy'. She did make one 8 x 8 scrapbook page though.

Today they found out that the 2001 Honda Civic would NOT be totaled which is good news! Now they are waiting to be told when the car will be repaired.

Well, all in all, my excursion to Chattanooga was GREAT. I'll tell ya, it sure is heartwarming to see what a nice home your grown daughter has. I'm not talking about how fancy her house is/was or how clean it is/was -- I'm talking about the nice homey home she has made.

She sure makes her momma very proud!

Yikes! Look at the time!! I have to get offa here. I am sooo far behind in my Bible Study for tomorrow since I was out of town. AND, I need to make a few more of the books that I showed you last week on my blog for my Bible Study friends.

Have a grand day! :)
xoxoxo
PattyAnne

OH, and no, we didn't see the Chattanooga Choo Choo this time but someday I will tell you about almost getting smoooshed by a Chattanooga Train.

Really!

We were almost squished!!

Do you know the old rhyme:
Eewy gooey was a worm
Eewy gooey had no home
Climbed upon a railroad track
Eewy gooey never came back....
EEEEEWWWWWYYYY GOOOEY!

My Chaos Layouts

Here they are...FINALLY :) - the layouts I made at my LSS this past Saturday. The photos don't do them justice because you can't see the textures and popups but you get the idea.

OH, they are going to be Soooo GORGEOUS when I add my photos. I can hardly wait! :)

All You Need is Love

I did another tutorial on Scrappersguide.com and LOVE how it turned out. You can see my finished embellishment below.

If you're at all interested in learning how to do some of the fun digital stuff to add to your paper scrapbook pages, you outta go to Linda's Scrappersguide website. She offers many freebies there, BUT, the deal of deals is her monthly video class. (I'm pretty sure that you need to have Photoshop Elements or the full-blown Photoshop software to follow her tutorials.) You can get good deals on Photoshop Elements if you shop around. Anyway, back to Linda's tutorials. I have to say that they are THE BEST on the web. She consistently offers great, highly usable classes. In addition to the video classes you get a complete digi kit each month including background papers, fonts, ribbons, tags, brads, etc. etc. etc.

Anyway, I signed up for the year and LOVE it. I believe it was $36 for a year. What a DEAL. Really, it is!

Oh, Linda also has a free newsletter with tips available! Photoshop users you gotta try it this. Fun, fun, fun!

Here's my first attempt:
,
xoxoxox
PattyAnne

It was a Marathon - 10 Pages in 6 hours!

Saturday I had a ball at my LSS. We made 10 scrapbook pages in 6 hours - during which time we also woofed down our lunch!! These pages are BEAUTIES!!!
Dana and Carmen had beautiful pages all planned and ready for us to cut out and assemble. I think the hardest part was cutting the darn chipboard for one of the layouts. It turned out so cute though!

Usually when I go to one of these crop things I'm just the slowest poke in the group. Not this time! I was able to keep up almost ALL day. Phew!

Well, here are the ten pages we created. A couple of these pages aren't quite done because I didn't know what size to cut my mats since I didn't have any photos with me.

I almost think I'll leave the pages as is and let my daughter put in the pictures SHE would like since I'm making the book for her. What do you think?

Ok, I'll get my photos taken of the layouts in the next day or so so check back. :) Yes, I'm procrastinating!

A & E Play Ball

Both of my nephews are basketball players! I haven't seen them play (they live over 8 hours away from me) BUT, my bro-in-law sent me a few pictures of them in action. :)

I've been learning a new digital scrapping technique from scrappersguide.com and thought I'd use my nephew's photos as my subjects. Sooo cool. Sports pictures look really great 'exploding' out of the picture frames!!

Here are my nephews!! Oh, I deleted their last names - they are TEENAGE boys who probably wouldn't like their aunt plastering their full names on the net! ;o)







Woohoooo, I just thought of something. My son has taken some really cool duck and goose/geese pictures. I bet they'll look really funny waddling outta their picture frames!

Until next time,
xoxoxoxo
PattyAnne

Happy Birthday Evelyn

It was my MIL's birthday last week. This birthday was a BIG one. Evelyn turned 90!! Happy Birthday!!!

I digitally scrapped this picture of Evelyn enjoying her birthday.
I created the ribbon and the hearts using tutorials from scrappersguide.com
The letters were free from Marie Stones at http://www.freedigitalscrapbooking.com
I used the tutorial on Jessica Sprague's site (Photoshop Friday #15) as a clipping mask refresher. The background is my creation.

Well, Eve's birthday was a lot of fun. We (a group of 6) went out to eat dinner. (Eve had sirloin and I had Mediterranean Chicken.) After dinner we headed back home to Eve's for cake. Since Eve found out last year that she is diabetic, we had a sugar free cake. It was made using a purchased angel food cake, sugar free cool whip mixed with sugar free pistachio pudding and pineapple. It might sound kind of 'yucky' but it is actually VERY good!




Well, thanks for stopping by!!
xoxoxo
PattyAnne

4 x 6 Notecard Books

Another sunny Sunday... a sunny Super Bowl Sunday.

I don't really have a favorite Super Bowl team this year so I guess I'll just pick who I want to win by their "outfits". When in doubt, this is ALWAYS a good way to choose your team LOL. Ask my dh, that's what I do!! ;)

Yesterday was a busy scrapping day for me. I came across directions for making a simple book using 4 x 6 inch lined cards and thought, "Hey, these books would make fun gifts for my Bible study buddies". See, when we do our Precept Bible study we are supposed to mark various key words in our Bibles AND keep track of how we mark them so we can be consistent throughout our Bible marking.

For example, when we mark love, we put a red heart on the word. Not too tough, right? But what about if you also have to mark faith, trust, prayer, gospel etc. etc. etc? How do you keep track of all those markings?? Well, that's where my little 4 x 6 card books will come in handy. We can keep track of the way we mark these 'key words' in our booklet and just refer to them as needed!

So, are you wondering what the books look like? I think they turned out really cute! I used the Bind-It-All to bind the books and, oh, hey, can you see the stitching on each cover? I got out my sewing machine to add the stitching! I love them. I hope my buddies do too!

Ok, I'll be right back. I have to go take the photo! ;)

I'm back. Here they are!