Back to Bloggin'.

Well, it's become obvious that blog more consistently wasn't one of my New Year's resolutions, huh? Although since the only sure thing about me making resolutions is that they will, in fact, be broken before Valentine's Day, I suppose I should have thrown that one on my list.  It might have held up better than the whole refrain from cursing attempt.  That one lasted a record five minutes into 2010 after a hectic morning of trying to load the family and all their accompanying ski gear into the car, while it's snowing heavily, and a certain four-year old is freaking out because OH MY GOD!  THE SNOW IS TOUCHING MY FACE!  AND IT'S COLD!  AND WET!  And taking this creature skiing, where, I dunno, it might be cold and wet, is sounding like a really fabulous idea, right?!?   So while the kid freaks out, Mike and I make stoic attempts to locate and load all four sets of skis, boots, helmets, snowpants, jackets, goggles, mittens, and other assorted ski necessities into the car, which really, should be a required assignment in all pre-marital counseling. If a couple can survive this task without breaking up, they likely have the will to stick it out for the long run.  Mostly because they'll be too exhausted to think about divorce.

But I digress...so we finally have what we think is everything necessary for a family day on the ski hill loaded in to the car.  Never mind that we are sweating under the many layers of clothing necessary for skiing, exhausted from hauling equipment and are trying to ignore the pleas of the above-referenced four-year old who now has to go pee. Let's hit the slopes!  Fresh powder awaits!  So we head to the ski area, spirits rebounding, only to realize upon arrival that we are missing one pair of skis. And here is where certain expletives might fly, breaking the only minutes-old resolution.  Sigh.

So now that we've established that I suck at keeping resolutions, let's move on to something decidedly non-sucky.  Like the gorgeous Jenni Bowlin Mercantile kit for January:

It's a wonderfully colorful assortment of scrap goodies that will inspire you to create (and make you feel better about your lack of discipline in the resolution department!)  Here's what I did with the kit this month:

patterned paper (Basic Grey, Studio Calico) + letters (American Crafts) + labels (October Afternoon ) + vintage tags + rhinestones (Prima) + font (Type-Ra)

This is just a cluster of patterned paper scraps, labels & tags, topped with photos and alpha stickers. (I used a black Sharpie to color the grey letters.)

patterned paper (Basic Grey) + letters (American Crafts) + labels (October Afternoon ) + font (Type-Ra)

A super simple one!  I secured the title letters with machine stitching because they kept coming unstuck. :)

patterned paper (Basic Grey, Studio Calico) + letters (Basic Grey, American Crafts) + bingo card (JBS ) + labels (October Afternoon) + felt button (JBS) + punches (Fiskars) + rhinestones

Since there were a lot of girly elements in this kit (pink, doilies, sewing patterns, etc!) this page was a no-brainer.  I layered some patterned paper, the BG Doilies, and a strip of scallop punched cardstock on the right side, scattering some punched flowers along the top.  The title is a mix of letter stickers, a doily cut from BG paper, two girl icons cut from Studio Calico paper, a JBS bingo card and a label.  Here's some of the close-up details:

patterned paper (Basic Grey) + letters (American Crafts) + stamp (Prima ) + labels (October Afternoon) + font (Ieicester) + stitching

I was stumped on how to use the stamp in the add-on kit, since the block of text is so tiny and my marginal stamping skills left the image a bit blurred.  So I used it in a more abstract way to create a blocky background for my photos.  I used a bright pink ink and rotated the stamp in different directions, adding a grid of machine stitching when it was dry:

I've still got lots of the kit left and hope to get to a few more pages this week.  Let me know if you have any questions and I'll try to answer them in the comments, ok?  Have a good one!