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you MUST GOT AND READ IT!!!!

she soooooo wants to be my next best friend!

I heart Heidi Snapp (I mean Swapp)

I started scrapbooking just over two and a half years ago now. I remember for about the first year or so brands meants absolutely NOTHING to me. I did most of my shopping at Michaels and I have to admit, some of the stuff I bought was quite cheesy. I remember going to crops and hearing people throwing out names like Basic Grey and Bazzil and quite frankly, it was all Greek to me. All but one name of course...Heidi Swapp.

I immediately fell in love and was drawn to the black packaging and EVERYTHING that was in it! As time goes on, the product just keeps getting better and better. I am addicted to her book Just for Looks. I've lost count of the number of times I've flipped through it.

I follow her blog religiously and now I'm even following her friends' blogs. Stalker? Kinda. But in a good way!

So once my new scraproom was finished, I decided to e-mail her. It was after the day of scrapbooking with the Del Montes using lots of Heidi goodness. I sent her a link to my Facebook pictures of the room.

Every morning as soon as I wake up and evening as soon as I get home from work (along with several times a night) I've been checking to see if she wrote back. This morning - it happened. The letters H E I D I appeared in my inbox. Cue the Alleluias! And today of all days I just needed it!

Here is what she wrote:

Dear Laurie.. thanks for the VERY complimentary and kind email! it made me happy !!

i am not a face booker... i can't get on... so i will have to take your word for your fabulous rooM! but it sounded as if you had a great time putting it all together! that is what it's all about!

thanks for writing!

take care, heidi

I think she wants to be my best friend...don't you just feel it?

I immediately e-mailed her back - adding these pictures (I know I've already posted one but here are a few more for those of you who haven't seen it in real life)...

I also *may* have mentioned that I *might* be posting about her...

Everybody wave to Heidi Snapp**! 'Cuz she rocks!

** Shout out to Cawi for coming up with the name Heidi Snapp - It's such a rockstar name for a rockstar chick (in the pink, blingy scrapbooking sorta way).

Sunday? How did that happen?

It's 10:30 Sunday night. I SWEAR it was just 4 p.m. on Friday. Where exactly did the weekend go? I know where it went - it went into lots and lots of creativity, friends and more great memories.

Denis went to Scott's place to chill on Friday night and I was more than happy to have a "me" night in the studio. I was in such a ZONE to get creative and I loved every second of it. I threw on my blog so I could listen to the music I got busy. Is that what married "gettin' busy" is? Throwing on some cheesy music and attaching some pictures to paper with glue dots? My how life has changed!!!

I have to admit, my pages on Friday night were very unexpected. I went through my stack of pictures, did some organizing and was faced with overwhelming choices. I probably have at least 200 pictures left! That is after THREE YEARS of working on my albums.

Several times a picture of my cousin Amber and I has "spoken" to me but I've never been in the right zone to scrap it. That all changed Friday night. I'm so glad it took me forever to use these pictures because I absolutely LOVE how my pages turned out and I don't think that would have happened had I done these pages six months or a year ago.

I used a Tinkering Ink (one of my favourite companies) line from last year. I've been wanting to use this paper (and embellishments) for a while but once again, they just weren't speaking to me in the past.

I wanted to stick with only one picture on this first page - it was taken of Amber and I just after we got married as we left the church. She looked just gorgeous that day and I was so happy they were able to make the trip to Ottawa to be there.

I have always been very minimalist in my style but I think Steph is rubbing off on me and I'm adding more and more elements to my page. I started this one from a page I saw on the Pencil Lines blog. In the end it looked NOTHING like the inspiration page I used.

I was nearly done the page but it looked BIZARRE and far too busy - there were all sorts of patterns converging at one spot with the flowers and the stems were barely visible. Then I had the idea of making some grass...that little piece of grass totally changed the look of the page. It was amazing to see the difference. I just couldn't resist adding the ladybug.

It turns out I came across another few pictures of Amber that I really liked so I decided to turn her into a double layout! The first picture is of her with my dad and the second is her with Hayden. I think Hayden has been calling Amber his girlfriend since he could talk. He LOVES her. I made him a scrapbook a few years ago with special pages dedicated just to his love for Amber.

I decided to not make this page just about the pictures but also about Amber herself. She is an incredible human being who has been through so much in her young life (she's a few years younger than me). In the year before we were married she faced cancer - she fought it like a warrior and won! I never heard her (or heard of her) complaining. She accepted it, put on her fighting face and went with it. I was SO HAPPY she was able to be at our wedding. She is so many wonderful things and I just had to put a few of those on this page. I used rub-ons all along the outside of the page with some words to describe her:

Beautiful, mother, sassy, friend, survivor, sister, strong, daughter

I love how the greatest pages happen when least expected...

Saturday morning I was raring to go first thing. I just couldn't wait for the day to begin...

As I was having my cereal I came across the Michael's flyer for the week. This is itself was THRILLING because for some reason in the past few months we rarely get the flyer. The diva doesn't like this! As if just getting the flyer wasn't thrilling enough, it turns out it is DOLLAR DAYS at Michales which means big savings PLUS this week there was a 20% off your entire order coupon along with a 40% off for next week. TRIPPLE ARM PUMP baby!

I spent a good hour filling my cart with lovely goodies and then at least as long at the cash! Poor cashier forgot to take the 20% off my original order, then messed up several times along the way on the return. It is a very long story (I'm not joking when I say I was at the cash for nearly an hour) but in the end I got the 20% off plus a bonus $5 off because of her screw up!

Oh - and if THAT WASN'T ENOUGH - when I walked in the door there was a pile of flyers sitting there. JACKPOT. I grabbed a few and stuffed them in my purse - just in case the urge to shop hits me later this week. I went in for glue dots and I came out with so much more. Here is just a bit of a peak at my goodies...

Michael's took SO MUCH out of me but I had other errands to run including picking up some flowers for my studio. It was my first time hosting a friend in there so I wanted to make sure it was extra pretty! I wasn't thrilled with what was out there for flowers but it turned out ok. I was hopping for light pink roses but they only had these brighter, two-toned ones.

I got the vase last weekend at the lake with Chris and Cawi - I paid a whopping $4 for it and it's oh so lovely...

Funky pic taken by D...D ended up cleaning the ENTIRE house while I was out (thank you darlin' I really appreciate it) so I had a quick bite, got some stuff done and then took a quick nap while D went to the movies with Stephane to see the Dark Knight. I figured it would be a late night and wanted to be sure to make it through!

I also had time to embellish a gift from Cawi - she got Chris and I matching bulletin board type things - Chris' is denim and mine is HOT PINK. How perfect for the studio. I've been looking for something for D to put my mail in (so that it doesn't get lost or forgotten) and this is the perfect solution. Although it was gorgeous in all its pink loveliness, it needed a little something extra so I pulled out some "accent" pieces and went to town. It really turned out great - it's amazing how just a few little embellishments can really change the look of something. We still need to hang it on the wall.

Before I knew it Steph arrived (finally)...we've been looking forward to this all week! We hit Michael's right away (yes, I went back for more torture) and then we headed to The Works to meet the boys for supper. It was SO YUMMILICIOUSLY DELICIOUSLY WONDERFUL. Poor Steph wasn't feeling too hot but we still had a blast. As soon as we got home, we each went our seperate ways. Boys playing X-box, girls scrapping.

Yet another wonderful night that just flew by. I totally LOVE the page Steph did and it was fun watching her play with the latest Making Memories line Passport. I would love to pick it up but don't plan on doing any of our trips anytime soon so I think I'm going to hold off. Instead, I knocked out these two pages:

Clownin' around was the first layout for the evening. Once again it was "loosely" based on an image I saw but I had to do some pretty big changes. I have to say I totally scraplift all the time but I do try to make it my own at the same time.

I had a few goofy pictures of my dad so I put those on the page.

My first title idea was "send in the clowns" and then I thought maybe I'd call it "foolin' around". In the end I decided on "clownin' around" - a combo of the two! My dad is a clown so I definitely wanted "clown" in the title somewhere.

Steph gave me the idea for placing the "around" around and what a great idea it was!

Note: I know the lacing isn't evenly spaced - it's meant to be that way...

Last but not least, I did a page with my friend Mabel and my dad dancing. I've always loved this picture - leave it to Mabel to get my dad to dance! I really struggled with this page, I'm not sure if it was creative fatigue or what but it took me a long time to figure out what I wanted to do with it. Then it just started clicking more and more and more and voila! LOVE IT. I just can't get enough of this Tinkering Ink paper but I guess I sort of have to because I'm all out of it!

All in all it was yet another wonderful night. Unfortunately we had to cut it a bit short (1 a.m.) because D had to work in the morning.

Sunday rather than sleep in I got up and went right back into the studio for about an hour and a half before meeting the girls. I just can't get enough lately. Scrapbooking is my crack. I think a crack habit would be a bit cheaper than this but I'm thinking paper and embellishments are a little less harmful to my health...most days!

I saw Mama Mia for the second time with the girls - what a blast! I think I laughed more at Lynn laughing than at the movie. I liked it even better the second time around. Denis surprised me with the CD on Friday so I've listened to it a few times over the weekend so I'm now used to the voices.

We made a yummy dinner tonight and then had some fun snapping pictures of my weekend creations!

Well, I must say goodnight - it's getting late and tomorrow morning will come very quickly.

Happy Monday morning everyone.

'night lovelies

Freaky Friday

It's Friday!!!

This week really seemed to fly by for me...up until this afternoon that is! I think this afternoon felt longer than the entire week put together.

I was exhausted after work so I stopped for ooey gooey pizza on the way home and after devouring it I went for a nap. Ah yes, nothing like a Friday post-work siesta.

When I woke up I was all raring to go - creative juices flowing. I managed to get a double layout done tonight - tripple arm pump!

My darling photographer is already in bed so I'll get him to take some pictures of it tomorrow. It's a really special layout done of my cousin Amber. It was just an unexpected layout that totally came together and I'm really happy about it. I'm most excited about emailing Amber some pictures, I really hope she likes it!

Well, must get some zzzzzs. Tomorrow is another day of creativity.

'night lovelies...

P.S. Check out what Janet found - just under my profile picture. That girl has this amazing talent for scoring the COOLEST things!

Thirsty Thursday

Can you believe it's Thursday already? I sure can't!

The days seem to fly by at work lately (this is a good thing)...Having a power outage for over half an hour this afternoon also makes things go a bit quicker.

This is the first day I don't have any scrapbooking pictures to post -that will change by Sunday (hopefully)...

We're having a chill night at home tonight. Supper was DELISH - shrimp and veggie vindaloo on rice. D has been working in the garage and watching the game and I have been working on my blog and watching the game.

I don't want to jinx anything but it looks like the Bombers might actually have a fighting chance of winning tonight. Fingers crossed...

Well I took Steph's lead and added the playlist application to my blog, I just couldn't resist. I've been on other blogs that I love listening to their playlist and decided to go for it.

I have always been the ultimate cheeseball when it comes to music and this playlist if no exception. The first handfull of songs have special meaning to me, I played them for comfort while going through a recent upset. I found them on a woman's blog who was going through something similar, only much worse. I'm happy that now these songs are part of me in some small way.

Well, back to the game I go. I can't wait for the weekend to be here and all the creative goodness to begin.

'night lovelies

Phew...crisis averted

Well, it took a few hours, several censored words and buckets of patience but my blog list is back up and running. The first hour generated nothing but errors and that was SO VERY FRUSTRATING. I tried and retried and retried to no avail...after adding about 50 or so blogs I was left with the same 7 in my list that I started with.

UTTER FRUSTRATION

I finally shut everything down and tried again - this time VERRRRRY slowly. I gathered extra patience and went for it. I'm SO HAPPY to report that it worked. Call me crazy to waste so much time on it but I just love the new blogger function of keeping a list of blogs that lists which ones were updated when and puts them in order for you. I'm addicted to scrapbooking blogs right now and trying to view as many as possible. I dont' always read what is posted but I love looking at the pretty pictures.

On that note, I feel like I'm the only person in the scrapbooking world that was not at CHA this past weekend in Chicago. Now I know this is not the case - my peeps were with me most of the weekend so they weren't there either - but I mean SERIOUSLY...every blog I read either has CHA pictures or giveaways! Did my invite get lost in the mail or something? I think that is something to add to my vision board - attend CHA. I think I better put a winning lottery ticket on the board beside that one because I cannot even fathom what I would spend there!
This weekend is shaping up to be a good one and hopefully a creative one!

We're getting together with Steph and Steph again on Saturday (horray) for double dates and finding such great friends! Who would have known we'd meet and click so quickly?
I guess I need to get cracking on getting creative because I'm running out of pictures to post on here...

I also have to get cracking on some cards. Our 3 year anniversary is around the corner and D's birthday is a month away. I always seem to end up making the card the night before or day of special events. I'm telling myself this will NOT HAPPEN this time. Heck - I'm already thinking of starting Chrsitmas cards but have to wait for the new Heidi Snap line Winterfresh to be released!

I actually made a card for Lynn's birthday - I think it is one of my favourite cards EVER and the best part is it was made in record time! So fast actually that I didn't even have time to take a picture!!!
Here are the pages I've done in the past week.

I called this one Butterfly Bubbles mostly because I couldn't think of a more original title.

I LOVE this picture (do I say that for every picture? It sure feels like it) but it's true, I love love love it. What I love most is that our photographer captured such a true and innocent moment between Rylee, Hayden and Stef.

Hayden totally fell in love with Stef the day of our wedding, I mean FELL IN LOVE. Three years later he STILL talks about marrying her! He's even decided they are going to open up their own minature golf place and Stef will be responsible for making the clubs because, in his words, she's "one smart cookie."

I love how it looks like there are really butterflies coming out of his bubble blower and the look of wonder.

On a side note, Butterfly Bubbles is the one and only page I did on my scrapbooking weekend with Chris and Cawi. I had a JEEP FULL of stuff (all for scrapbooking) and I did one page. But you know what? I wouldn't trade 100 pages for the good times we had that weekend. We're already trying to figure out our next getaway. I think we may need at least a good six months before seeing eachother again - my liver needs to recover!

This next page I did at my first ever Scrapbox Crop. I was pretty much looking forward to it, mostly just to hang with the Del Montes but didn't have many expectations. The best times happen when you aren't expecting anything. We laughed SO HARD I felt like I had completely lost my marbles!

This page is chalked full of HEIDI SNAP goodness! Naturally the most stunning part of the page are the pictures of my two beautiful bridesmaids, Stef and Lucia. They made our day so wonderful and made me thoroughly enjoy the girly stuff like getting reading and of course reapplying the lipgloss!

Where do I begin with all the Heidi goodies? I can't get enough of the damask stickers (this one was a gift from Steph) and her new pink chipboard letters are fantastic. They are much thicker than a lot of chipboard and sort of spongey at the same time!

I have the mandatory bling (love Sassy because that's totally Stef and Lucia) and of course the little bird's crown - scraplifted that idea!

Finally, the new heart mirrors are to die for! I need to order more, I have gone through my package like nobody's business! I think the wings are the perfect accessory for the mirror.

Top it all off with the sheet of "runway" paper and it's pure perfection!

I love how this next page seems to capture the moment we were in when these pictures were taken. It feels so serene and peaceful like we are the only two people in the world at that point. The reality was that we were at the Museum of Civilzation literally SURROUNDED by people - some we knew, others we didn't. The group that stood out the most was a bus load of Italian tourists who clapped when they saw us and suddenly broke into a traditional Italian wedding song. Such a fun memory from the day!

Once again this page is almost exclusively Heidi - hmmm notice a trend here?

You have no idea how much I struggled with the smallest part of this page...the "of"
I tried rub-ons but since the blue heart is covered in sparkles they wouldn't stick.

Finally one of the girls suggested putting the "of" beside it and luckily they had the right letters to do so - Now who was it? Lynn? Janet? Steph? I would normally say Lynn - she has EVERYTHING I ever need but I think this time it was Janet!

I totally drooled all over the new Heidi chandier crystals but I had NO CLUE how I would go about using them on a page. Then I stumbled across this idea on one of Heidi's friend's blog and what a GREAT IDEA! Why didn't I think of that???


I also stole this idea for decorating the butterfly from the same blog! ohhh - don't you just love turquoise, pink and brown? wow! what a colour combo.


Well, time to head to bed. Hopefully the rain eases up a bit - I love the sound of rain, I'm just not too crazy of the sound of torrential downpours when I'm trying to sleep.

'night lovelies

$$$$$$$$$$$HIT

OH MAN
so i found this oh so pretty template for my blog. I totally love it - it's me...
i was all excited and showing it off to denis when i realised that the ENTIRE LIST of my favourite 40 or so blogs disappeared with the new look. CRAP. I should have saved my last one but I got very impatient because it was taking so long. SUCKS TO BE ME.

It's not the end of the world, it just took me a long time to create.

I guess I know what I'm doing tomorrow night...

2 days in a row...

Wow! So this is the second post in as many days - that must be some sort of record for me!

It was another great day and once again flew by quite quickly.

I'm happy I decided to go back to translation - definitely the right decision. I leave the office and forget work - what a concept! I'm far more relaxed and even D says he notices a huge difference in me. THANK GOODNESS...

D and I planned a quick date after work tonight to see...MAMA MIA! I love Mama Mia in a way I can't put into words. I've seen the stage production five, yes FIVE times so I've been anticipating this movie for several months now. I am happy to report I was not disappointed. I do have to say that the theatre was an absolute ZOO. We went to the 4 p.m. show - you'd think at that time nobody would be around. Apparently I was wrong. There were lineups galore!

Fortunately D got there nice and early and was able to secure us our favourite seats. The funny part was we were surrounded by several women from the Red Hat society - all of them clad in various items of red and purple clothing. Some of their hats were the standard red hads but others were quite...original! My favourite was the feathers - lots and lots of feathers perched on their heads like pet birds.

Ok - back to the movie. It was tres frommage but so am I so I loved it! Poor D was seated next to a few "red hats" who sang through the entire movie. I have to admit, they were so cute all dressed up that it didn't even bother me. Then again, it wasn't my ear they were singing into.

This is definitely a movie I'll be going back to see and I will be buying the DVD. Other than the girl who played Sophie, most of the main characters' singing left something to be desired but it just didn't matter. It was impossible to NOT be happy sitting through the movie!

Ok - time to focus on my task for the evening - posting more pics. I was doing so well a bit earlier and then blogger went down - GRRRR. Hopefully it'll work this time.

And now, as promised, my latest pages...

This layout is called "have your cake and eat it 2" - i have been looking forward to scrapping our cake for a very long time. Basically for nearly the past 3 years I have tried to do our wedding photos in chronological order - that's not always easy because sometimes I'm "feeling" other pictures and by forcing myself to stick with the order, I think I was limiting my creativity. I no longer do that so I'm jumping around with my pages more and more.

As I was saying - I was really looking foward to scrapping the cake. I/we LOVED our cake. It was as yummy as it was visually spectacular. We hired the best of the best in Ottawa - Tatiana. She makes the cakes for the Prime Minister and Governor General's functions. You don't get any better than that. She was amazing to work with - a true artist and master of her craft. I gave her ideas and she basically ran with them and designed the cake.

I kept these pages simple - I wanted the cake to be the focus as opposed to a lot of "busy" stuff. I don't generally put lots on my pages (although I'm working on it) but I wanted this one to be particularly streamlined. I'm really happy with the way it turned out.

Although I squeezed quite a few images onto the double layout of the cake, there were still a few left over. I know I know, no need to scrap ALL pictures but I just couldn't resist. Once again I wanted something simple and pretty and I came up with this...

Ok, now that you are all hungry for cake, let's move on!

I did this next layout on a most enjoyable afternoon hanging out with Steph. She loves this one and given how much I adore her style that is a total compliment. I rarely use black cardstock but I love the way this turned out. These are a couple of my favourite pictures of the wedding.

You'll notice a new trend on the next few pages - oval bling framing either words or pictures. I swear it's like my "signature" lately - I can't seem to get away from it. Note to self - time to stock up on the bling!

I have bad news - I'm running out of pictures of Rylee. I LOVE doing pages with pictures of Rylee from our wedding. She looked so adorable and I swear at times she was even more excited about our wedding than Denis and I. I loved living the wedding through her eyes. She partied like it was 1999.

I had this quote and I felt that it perfectly describes my Rylee girl:

Precious jewel you SHINE reflecting all good things in the world.

Shine she does - I just had to add some bling for an extra glow to this little beauty.

I love the combination of pink and turquoise.

Well that's it for tonight - more to come tomorrow...

Now I'm off to try and get ideas for my blog banner and work on the design.

Sweet dreams.

rediscovering my creativity

Well, I have to say, I went through quite the dry spell when it came to my scrapbooking. Life took over and I didn't have the time/desire to be creative. All of that has changed in the past month or so. It's amazing how a life-changing event can really bring out one's creativity and that's exactly what happened to me. That and I made a new friend, Steph, an amazing scrapbooker. She inspires me to create more and better (if that makes any sense)...

I've also had a few great crops with Lynn and Janet both here at our place and at the Scrapbox. We're a great bunch together and it's amazing to see how different yet equally amazing our styles are!

This past Saturday the four of us (and Denis and Steph's Stephane) celebrated Lynn's 29th birthday!



I was actually spoiled even though it wasn't my birthday...Janet got me a camera strap that is SO ME. I cannot even put into words how much I love it. Denis and I have often joked that if I could I would spraypaint my camera pink just to make it pretty. Seeing as I won't be able to take any pictures if I do that, this strap is the next best thing...and I LOVE IT!

Another exciting thing I did on Saturday night was I e-mailed Heidi Swapp - or in some circles we call her Heidi Snap! She is my aboslute favourite and I should seriously buy shares in her company. I love everything about her and her line - the pink, the bling, the damask, you name it, she is me. So basically, she was the inspiration for my brand new scraproom and I decided to tell her so. I REALLY hope she e-mails me back...that would be SO COOL. This is what she inspired:

Well, I wanted to post some pics of my recent pages but I think I'll wait and do that tomorrow or the next day because I have a hot date with hubs to see Mama Mia tomorrow night!