a year ago and some Jillibean Soup

It's hard to believe that this picture was taken about a year ago when Hailey was in first grade:

This green really didn't photograph well but hopefully you get the idea. 

I used Jillibean Soup's new Sweet & Sour Soup collection (my fave from the new release) along with some Dutch Mustard Soup (the green background) and some Homemade 6 Bean Soup (the strips). Since we did a cross-promotion with Maya Road for this month I also used some flowers (the blue corduroy one on the right and a chipboard one on the left with the paper ones). I also used a little birdie, some cute wooden bingo chips and some butterfly rub-ons from my Maya Road stash. 

Have a great day!

sharing some Crate Paper love

How is your week going so far?

It was SUCH a Monday at our house yesterday.

Maybe some of you know what I mean. There was much to do, places to go, laundry to wash (my husband is home this week, though, and he's been doing LOTS of it for me, which is nice for a change), soccer practice for poor Aimee who came home and later got sick to her stomach.

It's been a fun while here and we're just ready for everyone to be healthy again.

I took some pictures of Lily the other day and I thought they turned out so cute that I rushed to scrap them them and finally used my long-hoarded Crate Paper Neighborhood collection.

Isn't she such a cutie? 

did you see this?

Just in case you missed it, here's a peek at my final project as a design team member for American Crafts. I am going to miss it but am happy for the year I had on the team and wish the new team the best- they're amazing!

I bought a bunch of the new release so you'll still be seeing lots of American Crafts here on my blog.

You can see the rest here:

http://americancrafts.typepad.com/studio/2011/08/my-favorite-week.html

And here is a quick card for My Little Shoebox:

You can see more from other ladies on the team here:

http://mylittleshoebox.typepad.com/my-little-shoebox/2011/08/cards-.html

Happy Monday!

p.s. I forgot to share this page for My Little Shoebox; it's always fun to mix things up.

Okay, I think I'm done adding to this post now. ☺

4 months old already

It's hard to believe that four months have passed since this sweet little girl was born yet it seems ages ago that I was cooped up in my hospital bed waiting and just praying I could keep her inside of me even one more day. It was a rollercoaster of emotions back then and I get emotional even now as I think about it. Now that time is just a tiny speck but it was such a huge thing at the time.

This is our precious Lily Grace when she was just days old in the newborn ICU.

It was so hard to have to leave her at the hospital each day and it took my all to trust her to the care of others but I also knew that I had 3 other girls at home who needed me and a husband who was exhausted physically and emotionally from having to play the role of both parents for too long while I was in the hospital on bedrest.

She is now healthy and growing, adored by her sisters and by my husband and me. 

She is the sweetest little thing; I just love to hear her coo and make other cute little sounds. 

Her smile makes my day, seriously. 

One day Sarah, our 5 year old said, "A baby is the most precious thing," and she is absolutely right. 

I love these sweet pictures of Lily and Sarah together. 

Created using a mix of cute Bella Blvd. collections. 

Have a wonderful day!

another back to school page

I have a quick page to share with you this morning before I head back to bed.

It's been a long week and I am so glad that it is Saturday.

Granted, it's really early on Saturday; I have been up with baby Lily but now she's back in bed and I can go back to sleep.

Today two of my girls have their first soccer games of the season.

Little Aimee is SO excited!

It's been a good week back to school for Hailey and Sarah.

Here is a page I created with pictures of them on the first day of school using papers and embellishments from Bella Blvd. The button is from Doodlebug (they're having a DT call in case any of you are interested. The link for their blog is in my sidebar) and the pearls are from Queen & Company. Bella Blvd. is also having a design team call and you can find their link in my sidebar as well. There's just one more week to apply so hurry!

I hope that you have a wonderful weekend! 

Guess what I just found out? 

One of the ladies posted this in the forum at My Scrapbook Nook:

My "First Day of Kindergarten" page that I posted the other day was the featured project at Two Peas!

a new page; first day of school*updated

Good afternoon!

It's been another busy day and I am dealing with a sinus infection or something not-so-fun and I haven't been around my blog to add anything new.

I did find some time to scrap last night after the kids went to bed and I created this layout with the new Amy Tangerine line from American Crafts. I really like the rich colors and ecclectic patterns in this collection and they went perfectly with Sarah's outfit from the first day of school. There's nothing real fancy about the page but it was fun to play nonetheless.

I am really liking the chevron striped paper lately!

p.s. there is a fun new challenge going on over at My Scrapbook Nook right now and it uses this color comb. See the details here:

http://myscrapbooknook.org/forum/showthread.php?5615-Ladies...-we-present-the-*HHCC*

p.s. lookie here: 

This page is the most liked page from the last 24 hours at 2 Peas in a Bucket. It's also the 2nd most viewed and the most bookmarked. That's so fun for me! 

sharing some cards today

Today is  my last post on the blog for A Walk Down Memory Lane. It was fun to be a guest designer there this month. Their store has lots of the newest scrappy supplies and the ladies there are so nice!

For my post today I share how you can adapt layout sketches to use for cardmaking.

Becky Fleck kindly allowed me to use some of her sketches for this project and it was a lot of fun!

Here's one of the cards and you'll be able to see the other on the blog as well as the sketches I pulled ideas from.

and a detail shot: 

For these cards I used the 6x6 pad from the My Mind's Eye Lime Twist Life of the Party collection, SRM Stickers, EK Success flower punch, Queen & Co. bling (thanks, Ginger- I made this card while at her house in Houston), American Crafts kraft cardstock and foam adhesive. 

You can see my blog post here: 

http://www.awdml.com/index.php?main_page=wordpress&p=3379

and here is one more project that I did for them that I haven't shared here yet:

This mixes some Cosmo Cricket, Pink Paislee Hometown Summer, My Mind's Eye Lime Twist, Basic Grey, My Little Yellow Bicycle and alphas from American Crafts and October Afternoon. 

Have a great day!

lots of firsts for us

Good morning!

Yesterday was the first day back to school for us:

The girls were both excited; Hailey was headed off to the 2nd grade and Sarah was going to start kindergarten. Both picked out what they wanted to wear the first day- these cute dresses that we found at our local Carter's store. I thought they looked adorable. We tried to curl their hair a bit, too, just for the special occasion. And, never fear, I am sure these pics will make their way onto a scrapbook page sometime soon. 

Hailey was excited though also a bit nervous since she didn't know any of the kids in her class, a first for her. She had a great day, though, and LOVES her teacher. She's shy so I always worry about her but think she's going into this year with a bit more confidence. 

It was Sarah's first day of kindergarten. I think she was so excited the night before that she couldn't hardly get to sleep. She has the same teacher that Hailey had for kindergarten and has a few friends in the class. I loved how she was beaming from the anticipation of her day. When I asked her about her day after school she told me that she liked "P.E., play time, recess and lunch time. I liked EVERYTHING!" Cute girl. She said that she wants to stay in kindergarten forever. 

Aimee went to her first speech therapy session; she's having some trouble yet with some of her letters and tends to drop the first letter from words when she talks and since she's almost 4 our pediatrician wanted us to get it checked out. She had a great first time, even went with the speech therapist by herself while I waited there with the baby (they don't let you take other kids into the sessions so I had to sit in the waiting area). 

Aimee so wished that she could go to school today with her sisters but had fun doing some preschool activities with me at home. She really is blossoming right now!

Aimee also had her first day of soccer; she's had a tough time with some gross motor activities, she walked later than the other girls and is a lot more cautious about what she'll do. I just KNEW she'd love soccer and was happy to find that I was right. She was such a good listener and did really well at what she was asked to do. I think she has a great coach who knows that this just needs to be fun for these 3 and 4 year olds. She has her first game on Saturday and I'm interested to see how they do. 

(Aimee is in the center between the two pink bows)

waiting for her coach to tell them what to do 

She even wanted to stay after and play some more and helped her coach clean up the cones.

Not to be left out, Lily decided for the first time that she'd roll over in bed. I went in to check on her during the night and she was on her belly. It's hard to believe that she's almost 4 months old.This sweet girl loves to play with her tongue, gurgle and coo and make all kinds of cute faces. She's a sweetheart for sure. 

We all had a very busy but wonderful day. 

I am trying to make some scrappy decisions and will hopefully have something new to share with you soon. 

Things are going to be very busy for the next little while with taking kids to and from school every day, speech therapy twice a week for Aimee, soccer practice for her on Mondays, gymnastics for Hailey and Sarah on Tuesdays, gymnastics on Wednesday morning for Aimee, soccer practice for Hailey on Thursday, helping out in the kids' classes, soccer games on Saturdays, preschool time at home for Aimee everyday, and everything else in between. 

Have a great day!

My Little Shoebox Blog Hop winner

I just wanted to let you know that the winner of the giveaway here on my blog is lucky commenter #25 picked on random.org:

 Ann G's crafts said...

I love your cards and even the black and white cording that you used on one card, you don't often if ever see it in black and white. Great job.

August 19, 2011 3:04 PM

Congratulations to Ann Greenspan! 

Please send an email to mattandbeckywilliams at yahoo dot com to claim your prize!

MLS Blog Hop

My giveaway is now closed.

Stay tuned for the winner announcement.

Thanks to everyone for stopping by!

just a quick post today

**if you are here for the My Little Shoebox blog hop please scroll down. 

It's been a fun weekend so far. 

How about you?

We went to the open house at the kids' new gym on Friday night and the girls had a wonderful time. We've been at the same gym for more than 4 years and it's been a great place for us. The kids have done well and it's given them something to look forward to each week, a way to get to know more kids, to do something active and to develop their talents. Sarah in particular has excelled in gymnastics and is in the pre-team group right now. 

While we aren't trying to groom professional gymnasts it is something fun for the kids to do right now. 

Switching to this new gym was a tough decision but something we know will be the right thing for our girls. Hailey is so excited for her gymnastics/karate combo class! 

We had a birthday party for Hailey and it was a great time! I'll post some pictures of that sometime, too. 

Frankly I am tired and worn out today but wanted to share a quick page that I put together using the Jillibean Soup Watermelon Gazpacho collection. 

Thanks for stopping by today! 

Tomorrow is the first day of school for our kids- they're so excited! 

Welcome to the MLS Trick or Treat blog hop!

Hello and welcome to the My Little Shoebox Trick or Treat Blog Hop!

We thought it would be fun to share some fun creations with you using the fun new Halloween release, "Trick or Treat".

If you have just stumbled upon my blog today you will have missed out on lots of other creations. You should have started at Pearl's blog and then follow the links as you go through, making sure to jot down the letter given at each designer's blog. You will collect these, put together the message and then, when you've reached the last blog (Erin's) you'll find out what to do with the message. If you visit each of the blogs you'll have a chance at a big MLS prize! Each designer will also offer either a "trick" or a "treat" along the way.

Here is the blog hop line-up just in case:

 Pearl Liu

Shemaine Smith

Zoe Nemburt

Mandy Starner

Pattie Beltran

Linda Kretz

Keely Yowler

Beckie Dreyer

Ilene Tell

Becky Williams (that's me)

Rô Philippsen

Rocio Duran

Kristine Berc

Erin Yamabe

I thought I'd put together some quick cards with these cute papers and show how they can be used for Halloween or non-themed projects:

My secret letter for you is the letter O

And, to make things a bit sweeter, I will offer one lucky random winner the whole Trick or Treat collection and maybe a few other miscellanous My Little Shoebox goodies! Just leave a comment below for your chance to win. I will close the giveaway at midnight PST. All of the winners will be posted on the MLS blog on Monday afternoon. 

Your next stop on the hop is the lovely Ro's blog. 

Have a great day and happy hopping!

and another card today

How is your week going so far?

I hope it's a good one for you.

We've kinda been taking it easy since it's our last week together before the girls start school.

Many of you know that there's a design team call out right now for Bella Blvd.

Because of this I decided to take a break from assignments, pull out my Bella stash and create a little card.

This uses the fun Family Dynamix collection, Thickers from American Crafts and some Twinery twine.

Have a great day!

happy birthday to our Hailey

We have noticed that Hailey is starting to look older these days.

She's not a tiny little girl anymore.

She's seven today, so hard to believe.

Here's some October Afternoon and American Crafts; page made a couple years ago after our Disneyland trip. The rest of these are old layouts, too, but it's fun to look at them now and then. And, a lot of them most of you have probably never seen before. 

(Bella Blvd, American Crafts, Sassafras)

(lots of old American Crafts)

(October Afternoon)

(more OA)

(more American Crafts)

(a fun mix of stuff- OA, AC, Sassafras- in the recent publication, The Big Idea Book of Scrapbooking Pages)

(Good ol' Cosmo Cricket Early Bird)

(fun mix of Sassafras and an old Scarlet Lime kit)

(Sassafras, American Crafts, Prima, MME, Making Memories)

(Lovely Crate Paper Restoration collection- done for PageMaps)

(Sassafras- My Scrapbook Nook kit)

(more Sassafras, recently published in Scrapbook Trends)

(Basic Grey)

(Webster's Pages- Hollywood Vogue)

(more Basic Grey)

(Lily Bee- my FAVE collection from them!)

(a quick page- published in Scrapbook Trends)

(Crate Emma's Shoppe collection)

It took two years for us to be able to have her but she sure has been worth the wait.

She's smart, helpful, a beautiful singer and artist, quite the little scrapbooker and is always willing to try new things even if they're hard for her. She wasn't a natural soccer player last fall but she stuck it out and is going to play again this fall. She got to sing a solo in our children's program at church and I was amazed at how poised she was.

She's shy in a group but wild and crazy at home.

She's the organizer and the task master, sensitive at times and silly at others.

She loves to hula hoop, do gymnastics, loves to sing and draw and make up songs.

She's a fantastic reader, a great speller, quite the little smarty pants.

She is a perfectionist and sometimes gets down on herself if she can't do something as well as she'd like.

What she doesn't realize is how amazing she is.

We love her so much.

Happy birthday, Hailey.