Tuesday Teaser - Long Overdue!!

Teaser Tuesday is a bookish meme hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

1. Grab your current reading

2. Open to a random page

3. Share two (2) sentences from that page

4. BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE ANY SPOILERS

5. Share the author and title, too, so other TT participants can add it to their TBR lists if they like your teaser.

"He stared up the alley at the doorway through which the new visitor had just entered. "I know that man," he said."

Current read: The Bone Garden, by Tess Gerritsen
This is not generally my style of reading. I started it for my book club assignment. I have not been able to put it down!!

from Goodreads:
Present day: Julia Hamill has made a horrifying discovery on the grounds of her new home in rural Massachusetts: a skull buried in the rocky soil - human, female, and, according to the trained eye of Boston medical examiner Maura Isles, scarred with the unmistakable marks of murder.

Boston, 1830: In order to pay for his education, medical student Norris Marshall has joined the ranks of local “resurrectionists” - those who plunder graveyards and harvest the dead for sale on the black market. But when a distinguished doctor is found murdered and mutilated on university grounds, Norris finds that trafficking in the illicit cadaver trade has made him a prime suspect.

With unflagging suspense and pitch-perfect period detail, THE BONE GARDEN deftly traces the dark mystery at its heart across time and place to a finale as ingeniously conceived as it is shocking

Back to School - OH YEAH! Blog Hop

Stop by September 1st to check out all the fun at 

Scrapping the Moments.

The Back To School - Oh Yeah! Blog Hop!!!

I am so excited!!! I get to participate in Scrapping The Moments first ever Blog Hop. It all happens on September 1st!! I can't wait. 

For more details stop by our Facebook page or our forum at

Scrapping The Moments

Scrapping the Moments August Challenge

Good Monday to you all!! I wanted to start off by thanking all the ladies who participated in our "Shag" challenge last month. I really loved the layouts you all completed and hope you had fun exploring the artist and his works.

This month I have found another artist, quite by accident. A friend of mine referred me to look at the quilling work of Jitesh Patel. He is a design and illustration artist living in London who specializes in illustration, advertising, logo design, and art direction to a variety of clientele. When you look at his website, you will see many different types of media in his art. However for this challenge I would like you to focus your layout designs on the advertisements for Alpina Yogurt.




You can also see the images here: http://www.jiteshpatel.co.uk/blog/ along with a cool little video on 3D butterfly animation.
Also, here is another fun website dedicated to Jitesh and his work: http://www.allthingspaper.net/2011/08/jitesh-patel-quilling-artist.html?spref=fb

Recently I polled our members as to whether they knew how to quill and if you used quilling in your layouts. The results were a mixed bag. This challenge is by no means a quilling challenge. I want you to take a look at Jitesh's ads and see what you can do with them. Maybe you are inspired by the colors, the images, the manipulation of the paper. It's all up to you.

For my example I went in a totally different way. I do not know how to quill, but loved the images I saw and decided to embroider them onto paper. I have not undergone a sewing project in this detail for my scrapping albums. And boy, my little thumb and fingers are feeling the ache today, LOL!! But I love the end results.



I hope you all get the opportunity to stop by Scrapping the Moments this month and join us to take a look at this artist and feel inspired to create something of you. I would love to see what you come up with. Please send me a link in the comment section so I can peek.

Until next time...

An Independence Day Hurray!!!

Hope you all have a big hurrah for the holiday!!!

Eat a hot dog or two for me!!

Until next time...

Scrapping away my evening

Tonight I took part in the Friday Fast Track over at Scrapping The Moments. We were given a sketch and told we had two hours to create, photograph and upload it to the forum gallery. I had a ball!! Here is where it started and then what I did with it.

Well, I'm off to go work on another project.

Until next time....

Sex. Murder and a Double Latte

Sex, Murder And A Double Latte by Kyra Davis

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Sophie is an author of a murder mystery series of novels. When events in her life start to look like the plot line from one of her books, she has to get to the bottom of it and find out who is setting her up as the victim. This was really a quick read. Funny and exciting all wrapped up into one.



View all my reviews

Two Journaling Entries

Over at Scrapping The Moments we have a journaling challenge for June that I participated in last night. In the challenge we were to create a page based on "Right Now". So while I was was at work yesterday I had the opportunity to take some photos with my cell phone and created a story around my photos. Here is the end product:

 This was a fun project based on the fairy tale characters in the photos and my rather quirky sense of humor.

 My second journaling project today is based on the writing prompts over at Mama Kat's place. It must be her quirky sense of humor that I feel a special bond with, LOL!! Hop on over to her blog to see the prompt choices and join in the fun.

 Create a bucket list of 50 things you want to do this summer (with or without the kids!)
1. Get a new job.
2. See my family member doing well after on upcoming medical procedure.
3. See my DD start college.
4. Tell my family members I love them every day. (Sometimes we are just too busy for this)
5. Add at least 20 miles to our coverage of the Blue Ridge Parkway.
6. Visit Table Rock State Park.
7. Take a scenic drive to see at least two different waterfalls.
8. Cross the border and visit TN.
9. Cross the border and visit VA.
10. Read four more book titles.
11. Buy a new shirt or two.
12. Grow herbs successfully ( they are practically dead at this time)
13. Earn two badges on Scrapping the Moments for my profile.
14. Go to the Seabird Sanctuary/John's Pass in St Pete while we are visiting.
15. Try a new fish recipe.
16. Walk a little three times a week.
17. Get a new hair cut.
18. Lose 10 more pounds.
19. Log into Sparkpeople daily, even if only to earn my log in points.
20. Participate in at least two writing prompts a week on my blog.
21. Add at least two blog entries based on scrapbooking projects.
22. Take down the wall paper in my master bathroom.
23. Paint my master bathroom.
24. Trim the bushes and the crepe myrtle tree in the front yard.
25. Go through old boxes and purge some of the paperwork we have stored.
26. Begin scanning old photos to make them digital copies.
27. Buy a new desk lamp for myself.
28. Sew a new cover for my bed wedge.
29. Organize my digital scrap book elements in my computer so that I can actually FIND the stuff I need.
30. Visit a vineyard.
31. Catch up with at least one long distance friend.
32. Play mini golf one evening.
33. Take at least 20 photos during the month of June, even if it is only one a day.
34. Take at least 7 photos every week in July, even if it is only one a day.
35. Take at least 50 photos in the month of August.
36. Clean out dresser drawers and donate the proceeds.
37. Drink water twice a day in June.
38. Drink water four times a day in July.
39. Drink water 6 times a day in August.
40. Begin to make this year's Christmas cards.
41. Complete and send off 100 cards to Operation Write Home.
42. Complete Xbox Lego Indiana Jones game, opening all levels and earning all Xbox prizes for the game.
43. Complete a scavenger hunt at the flea market.
44. Try two new vegetables this summer.
45. Eat at least one fruit every day.
46. Make sushi for lunch at least once.
47. Jar some chow chow.
48. Make a peach pie.
49. Go bowling at least once.
50. Print this list and keep it on the bulletin board until August 31, 2011. Cross things off as I go.

What are the 50 things on your bucket list this summer?

Until next time...

Edit: Crossing off as I accomplish them.

A Tease and a Couple of Cards

 
Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Book of choice: Sex, Murder, and a Double Latte, by Kyra Davis

Page: 114 of  298 

Anticipation for the rest of the book: HIGH!!!!

"Suddenly I couldn't breathe. This was the moment when I needed to scream, but his hands were too tight around my throat."

Here are the Father's Day cards I made this year.

I really loved all three.

For Dennis:

For Michael:

For Richard:

Happy Father's Day!

I love you all!!

Until next time...

Online Crop - Saturday June 25th!!!!

The fabulous Moments design team will be hosting a crop!!! 

It will be held from 9am to 6pm EST Saturday the 25th. You will have until Sunday June 26 at 6pm EST to load your creations into the gallery & challenge thread. 

There will be challenges every hour, also a few games.

Raks & prizes will be awarded!!! 

 

Check in early to participate in Groovy Deb's Bingo game.
I hope to see you here bring your scrapping buddies!!

Wonderful Wednesday

Good Wednesday to you all. Today is my day off, WAHOO, and I am up to my ears in laundry duty. My good hubby is very helpful with laundry, but does not enjoy folding. What is up with that?!! But I will suffer finishing up what he started and completing the last two loads.

In between this fun I am playing!! Here's where I am currently...







To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…
• What are you currently reading?
• What did you recently finish reading?
• What do you think you’ll read next?

To play along with me, click on the link above.

I am currently reading the same book I was reading at the beginning of the week, but hoping to finish it up by tomorrow: The Four Corners of the Sky: A Novel, by Michael Malone.

I recently finished Shem Creek, A Lowcountry Tale by Dorothea Benton Frank.

I know that I will next be reading.  Sex, Murder and A Double Latte by Kyra Davis. It is my next book club reading for July. I am just waiting for the mailman to bring this one to me tomorrow. So I need to get back to Four Corners ASAP!!


Otherwise I am working on scrappy stuff.
A double page layout:

and a couple of Father's Day cards:

Really? Did you think I was going to reveal them before the Dad's got them? LOL!!


Until next time...

Monday Musings

 

 

Musing Monday's: Up All Night

Musing Monday's is hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading. This week's musing:

What’s the last thing you stayed up half the night reading because it was so good you couldn’t put it down?

For me, this just happened about 3 days ago. I have been trying to catch up on my reading; I have a goal to read a certain amount of books by the end of the year. I had only intended on reading for an hour or so, but was up until 4:45 a.m. on that day. I am reading The Four Corners of the Sky: A Novel, by Michael Malone. I picked it up as a Friday Freebie on my Nook. And what a good story it is!! So glad I was given the opportunity to read this author as I had not read any of his works previously. Can't wait to see what happens on the next page.

Until next time...

New Sunday, New Projects

Today is one of my favorite days of the week. It's the second Sunday of the month and that means that it is my day to post another new scrapbook challenge over at Ch{all}enge Masters!! Actually I am just one of 5 or so ladies who will have a new project for you this week. I saw that Blademasters  and One Little Word had posted their challenges already this morning. I can't wait to see the rest. Head on over and take a peek at last weeks challenges too. They all looked great.

But back to me (bwahahahaha!!).  I posted the Ad/Art Challenge for June. And here it is:
 
This month we are going off the radar a little again and looking at another type of art.

The Covey Awards are given out to artists that create book covers. From their site: “THE COVEY AWARDS started out of a love for Book Covers, out of a love for this virtually ignored form of visual media. We at THE COVEY AWARDS have loved and cherished and indeed made our own Book Covers in order to ensnare readers, draw readers in and add beauty to the world.”

Isn’t this what we all do with our layouts, cards and projects? We catch the attention of our “readers” with our projects. We draw them in with journaling and the photos. And based on the photos I have seen posted in our gallery, we add beauty to our families’ histories.

For June, I would like you to create a project based on a book cover. You may pick a book of your choice or use an example I have listed here. There are lots of wonderful book jackets out there. Just let us know which one inspired you.




I did two examples. With the first one, I copied the colors of the book, Pretty Poison, and the title logo is similar to the book. The second is inspired by the Jules Verne book in colors and shapes.  See below for the rules to play!! Hope to see you around the forum!!

Rules:

*Each submission must be a newly created project specifically for the challenge.

*Only one entry per category.

*Challenges may be combined, but each submission is one entry no matter how many challenges are combined.

*Each submission must be uploaded to the proper folder in our gallery no later than 11:59PM ET on June 30th, 2011 to be eligible for the random draw.

*Each submission must follow ALL requirements of the challenge to be eligible for the random draw. For example, if the challenge states blue must be used then there must be some blue in the project to qualify.


Until next time...