.Christmas in July.

It's been a while since I've blogged because Scott and I have been enjoying some downtime with family in VA and an extended honeymoon/vacation in South Carolina (pics will be posted soon).  While on vacation we went to several different Christmas shops trying to find some eccentric ornaments.  This Christmas will be our first together so we wanted to find a cute ornament for the occasion.  After searching several different shops in the low country, we found a snowman ornament made out of the easily-recognizable sock monkey material (red & grey).  As soon as I saw I knew that was what I wanted for our first ornament together!

While searching the many ornament shops (with the other weirdos who don't find looking at Christmas paraphernalia in the middle of summer unnerving) I found many very cute ornaments that I could easily make with some felt, buttons, and other simple materials.  So in addition to working on the vacation scrapbook, I will be making a trip to Michael's for some materials to make ornaments!  Here are some of my favorites after googling online:

Scrapbooking pt. 2

The last few days I was able to finish the rest of our wedding scrapbook.  Here are more of the pictures:

[I love this cute little card with the picture in watercolors of the wedding chapel...I dedicated this page to the music in our wedding (although we didn't get a photo of our pianist)]

[The paper from this page came from one card (if you can believe it) and I just reworked it to create borders and frames.  My family loves the color brown so I thought this was appropriate for my family's pictures]

[The white patterned paper in the middle is textured which creates a nice little added 3-d effect and I love these little silver tags (Dollar Store buy!)]

[This paper came from a scrapbooking place I found down the street and I've found that when I use really busy paper, I tend to do less so not to take away from it]

[This is the back-side of the page from above...I rarely use the backsides of paper because then I can't move pages around if I need to.  I just hated to waste this pretty green paper...it is patterned too (although you can't really tell from the picture).  The paintings in the bottom corner came from a small calendar..I really like how they add to the colors of the page...just shows you can use any kind of paper product!!]

[This is another new sheet from the scrapbook store.  I very rarely buy sheets because I like building onto blank pages but I really liked the colors and design of this one]

[The Dollar Store tabs return again along with some stickers given to me from my friend Chelsea.  I love these colors together...light blue and cream!]

[The frame in the top right corner came from a card and I really liked how it turned out!]

[I had so many pictures and stickers of cakes so I just had to dedicate two pages to ours!]

[Some more cute stickers from Chelsea; the framed picture in the top left corner came from a beautiful card]

[Yet another new sheet from the scrapbook store; this one is so beautiful because it has glitter and lots of color! I did not add anything to this but pictures because I didn't want to take away from the pictures or the designs of the paper]

[Here is the cover of our wedding scrapbook.  Someone gave us this album as a present and I just love the raised, textured stitching and the color.]

*I will still be adding a few photos taken from our honeymoon but other than that my wedding scrapbook is finished! (3 months after our big day!!!)

Scrapbooking and Zumba

One of my goals over spring break was to work on our wedding scrapbook.  Thanks to one of our dear friends, we have a beautiful green fabric scrapbook with dark green stitching and large pages ready to be filled with all our pictures.  After a wonderful visit with our family in the mountains, I still had four days of break left when we returned to our apartment.  Along with reading, I have been scrapbooking! I've always loved scrapbooking and, to me, it's something very relaxing.  I have a little three drawer box with all the stickers, papers, and stencils that I have collected over the years and I surround myself with all the paper and pictures in the floor.


For our wedding scrapbook, I decided to include the cards that we were given from the shower and wedding.  I thought everyone bought such pretty cards and I just hated the thought of them sitting in a drawer or box so I decided to cut out some of the pictures and words from them to include in our scrapbook.  This way, they can be viewed whenever we look at our pictures and they have a special part in making our scrapbook even more beautiful.  I've included photographed pictures of the pages I have finished so far.  Many of the colored paper and small art came from wedding cards. 

[I love this paper because it looks like strips of black lace.  It came from Michael's. The little wedding dress and the "cherish" came from a card...a lot of the cards actually helped me pick a color scheme. I thought this page looked good with the crisp light blue, cream, and black with the black and sepia pictures]

[I loved this picture of the bride that I used in the middle, which came from a wedding card.  All the extra colored paper also came from cards!]

[The dress on the right sticks out from the page making a 3D look.  I thought this light purple went well with the pictures with my bridesmaids.  I also love that my photographer captured the picture on the left. Jaime was taking a while to get dressed and we were all standing there looking at here (I also like that it captures a picture of my room and my Phantom poster above my bed)]

[I didn't use any wedding cards for this page but I love all of these pictures and thought they looked good with black and brown.  I also bought this brown and pattern paper from Michael's.]

[This picture came out a bit blurry. I used a card in the top right as a frame.  Cards make great frames! I've also used Christmas cards for frames in other scrapbooks.  You just cut out the picture in the middle of the card and voila! you have a frame for your pictures...when I first started making scrapbooks I would try to cut out my own, but using cards is so much easier!]

[I love the colors on this groom's page and Scott's picture also got a frame made from a card at the top of the page.  I'm pretty sure I got the little picture tab stickers at the Dollar Store a long time ago but I think they work great for this page!]

[I used several pieces from cards on this page.  I absolutely loved the little picture of the tiny yellow church (it's made with fabric).  The flower at the top sticks out from the page, making a 3D effect]

[Another blurry one : (  But this page is beautiful! I used another frame from a card at the top left and the flower in the middle came from a card as well]

[This is one of my favorite pictures so I thought minimal was best - just a crisp white page and this black and white photo.  It also creates a nice juxtaposition with all the other busier pages]

[The 'i do' and 'bride & groom' came from cards and I thought these colors looked great together]

[This paper also came from Michael's.  The curvy paper at the top is a card that I cut in half - I thought it made a kind of 'two hearts becoming one' effect.  And I love the picture of our hands in the card frame at the bottom]

I'm nowhere near finished with the scrapbook since there are more than 30 pages so I may be documenting some of the honeymoon pictures in it too.  I will be posting more pictures of the scrapbook when I get more finished.

IN OTHER NEWS, Scott and I signed up as members at the Urban Fitness down the street and we have absolutely loved it so far! There's the usual free weights, elliptical machines (with small tv's and cable), a racquetball court, basketball court, and (my favorite) a lap pool.  There is also a "Cardio Cinema" room where you can go watch a movie while you are riding a bike or walking on the treadmill.  Also, there are numerous classes you can take: Yoga, Cycling, Hip Hop, and Zumba.  Today I went to my first Zumba class.  It was so much fun! I was sweating like a pig when I left and wasn't very coordinated with some of the moves but I can't wait to go back! Hopefully along with getting fit, it will teach my goofy self how to dance!