October & Halloween 2017

October is always an epic month! This year has been no exception! All of these photos, plus about 200 more, are going into my October Occasionally mini album!

Halloween displays started going up in.... August. Now, don't get me wrong, I LOVE Halloween more than I can even describe, but August? Really?! Nothing spooky until October 1st is my mantra hahaha. Still, the kids were excited! And yes, Jane was wearing her bat costume even back in August! She's worn it almost every day this entire past year and wanted to be a bat again this year so I just ordered her the next size up.

Target also started getting Halloweeny in early September and we took our turn trying on all the neat hats and masks.

Oh WOW the leaves in Washington! So vivid! I really have to soak it in since this is the only year we'll enjoy them here! #movin'toColorado.

Phoebe and our decorated mantle. It was empty up until October 1st. I don't know what to put there when it's not a holiday! Suggestions??

This is the mini album in which I'm going to create my October Occasionally 2017. This AMAZING charm is from Emily Inspired Designs - she has more! Go check them out!!

Frenemies. I mean, Rachel is literally sleeping on Joey's butt hahaha!

Off to the school Fall Festival!

Outside IKEA. Too cute to spook.

My niece Zoe turned two on the 15th - the day after Fox's 7th birthday! Eric & Tanya hosted a super fun Halloween party at their home.

Complete with mummy wrapping, pumpkin decorating, donuts on a string, Costco pizza, and of course, costumes! I made this banner for the party :) Zoe knew exactly what to do when we sung her Happy Birthday!

Last Friday we went to Kirkloween - the Halloween party at Google where my dad works in Kirkland.

There were booths set up allllll over the campus, luckily my dad knew exactly where to go, so we got our steps in and the kids collected some candy and treats. Fun fun fun!

The last Saturday in October Eric & Tanya & Zoe invited us to go to the Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium in Tacoma. It was a beautiful day, no jackets required! There were a few Halloween things here and there, it was cute, just like these penguins.

That same night we hired a babysitter and went and saw Happy Death Day. It was really good!!

We hit up the local pumpkin patch called Schilter Farms. We each picked out a pumpkin then enjoyed playing on the various playgrounds.

There was a hay bale maze with festive lights inside a barn.

See! The leaves! They're amazing!

I went a little (or a lot!) Halloween book crazy this year... I can't help myself!

For Family Night we carved our pumpkins. Fox requested a Five Nights at Freddy's "Foxy" just like his costume, Janey drew a cute li'l face, I made a cat, and Chris carved a traditional jack-o-lantern. I LOVE the smell and feel of pumpkin guts. Who's with me? Today, Halloween proper, I helped set up for the party in Fox's class then the school had a parade. The kids dressed up and walked about a mile up and down and through the neighborhood. It made me so happy. This is truly the spirit of Halloween!

Hi kiddos! Look at this weather for trick-or-treating! I'm tellin' ya, ever since we moved here it's only rained a handful of times! Sure it got a little cold at night, but no rain, so I'll take it!

After I picked the kids up from school we went straight to "downtown" DuPont for the first round of trick-or-treating! All the shops along Wilmington handed out candy. And business cards haha.

First heaps of loot.

Around 6pm we got our first trick-or-treaters so I headed out into the cotton-pink candy sky with Fox and Jane for trick-or-treating round 2!

Jane the Bat and Fox the Nightmare Foxy.

 Yaaaaaaas. Love this.

These pumpkins are the best.

 This neighborhood is perfect for trick-or-treating: it's flat, the houses are close together, a lot of people were home, and it wasn't very crowded. We may just have to fly back next year :)

Fox and Jane quickly filled their buckets after just one lap right around our house so we dropped off their candy then headed out AGAIN! So in total they each got about three bucket's worth of candy. Go to bed kids, mommy and daddy want their "tax"! :)

 Also - the instagram filters today are on point!

AWESOME October and Halloween 2017!!! Can't wait to print all these pics tomorrow and start working on a mini album! 

Now off to watch Bates Motel!

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BTW You're Pretty Great Layout

Here is the 3rd of 4 layouts from Paige's Pages 14 at Big Picture Classes! Since I spent so much time and worked so hard on the hand stitched background (free stitching template available in this lesson!), I used a smaller photo and kept the embellishing super simple: just a cluster under and around the photo and a bit of journaling with a white pen on the side and this layout was done!

 The start-to-finish process video can be found over in the class if you want to see exactly how this page came together!

Supplies: Patterned paper, die cuts, journaling spots, chipboard stickers: Turn the Page by Paige Evans / Pink Paislee; Adhesive: American Crafts; Embroidery floss: DMC; White pen: Sharpie; Stitching template: Paige Evans for Big Picture Classes

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Love You Big Title Layout & Process Video

Here is one of the pages we made at She Loves Color 2017 and Crop & Create Thunder Bay!

Once again, a short & simple process video so you can see exactly how this layout came together!

I love creating BIG titles on my pages because I think they make a BIG impact! Plus, you get to use lots of colorful patterned papers that make my heart go pitter patter :)

Like I mentioned in the video, what do birds and snails and bunnies have to do with Fox & Jane standing in front of a door? Not a whole heckuva lot, but they're cute, and so are my kids, so it works! CLICK HERE to download the LOVE YOU cut file for free! Can't wait to see how you use it!

Supplies: Patterned paper, stickers (chipboard, paper, puffy), die cuts: Turn the Page by Paige Evans / Pink Paislee; LOVE YOU cut file: Paige Evans / Silhouette; Die cut machine: Silhouette Cameo 3; Paint: FolkArt; Pen, adhesive: American Crafts

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Silhouette Design Team Projects #4

Time for another round of awesome creations from my Silhouette team!

Audrey Yeager says, "I used the Pumpkin Trio cut file to make a large pumpkin stencil for my background and used some inks and water to fill it in. Then I cut the Bats Background from a purple Take Me Away patterned paper and trimmed them out. I cut more pumpkins from the Pumpkin Trio using Oh My Heart patterned papers. Finally, I added some black and white washi to the edges to bring in more of a Halloween feel."

Next up is Bea Valint! She says, "I wanted to show you a fun way that you can create easy and beautiful texture on your cards. I used four different background cut files and the Turn the Page 6x6 Paper Pad for creating these colorful cards. Due to the smaller size of the cards, I had to reduce the size of the cut files too. To avoid the thin lines, I cut out a part of the background cut files using the knife tool, and used only the divided part. I backed the cut files with patterned paper and embellished the cards with fussy cut stars and butterflies. I adhered my cards to colored cardstock to finish. It was so much fun to create, I hope I could inspire you to use background cut files on your next cards!"

Halloween card: Bat Background, Happy Halloween Banner; Blue card: Circles Doily; Mint card: Diagonal Stripes Background; Pink card: Circles Petals Background

How stunning is this layout by Zsoka Marko?! Here is some information about it: "I've used the Ampersand cut file and the beautiful Turn the Page collection for this one. About a year ago I made a layout using an ampersand cut file that I really liked so when I saw this cut file I thought I'd lift that layout. I sometimes do this, recreate an older layout and put a different spin on it! It will always look different anyway because I'm using different supplies, plus they go into different albums anyway, so I'm not too bothered that I have similar layouts. Also, I have to mention, the ampersand itself has absolutely no relation to my photos or topic of the layout in this case, it's purely a design element. I'm a bit random aren't I?!"

Here is what Lorilei Murphy has to say about her colorful and fun layout: "I love Paige's 'cut and fold' designs! There are hearts, stars, butterflies, and snowmen! For this layout I actually cut the Cut and Fold Hearts twice. The first time with plain white cardstock and the second time I used the rainbow striped paper from Turn the Page. I folded the hearts on each of the papers and then I slipped the rainbow paper hearts into the cut side of the white paper and folded the rainbow hearts back. I stitched a line through each row of hearts and fluffed up the edges. I trimmed around the heart paper and mounted it on a pretty pink paper from Turn the Page. I went to town with Turn the Page embellishments and used a title from the Take Me Away collection. Along the edge of the page I tucked in my journaling and a few more embellishments!"

Can't wait to be back with more of their projects!! They are AWESOME!!

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Butterfly Cards by Flóra Farkas

Design team member Flóra Farkas is here today sharing a pair of "flutterly" beautiful cards!

Hi friends! I am back with two cards created with Turn the Page collection. This week we are featuring butterflies on our projects, which is my favourite element to add to my projects. You can never go wrong with butterflies!

First I fussy cut many lovely butterflies from Paper 04. I always love to leave a thin white border while cutting because this helps the elements stand out from a busy background. After the butterflies were ready to fly on my cards, I looked for background papers. I chose to use two 4x6 cards from Paper 01 and create simple but lovely scenes. For the first card I used the colorful forest. I placed a sign from the Chipboard Stickers sheet and adhered the butterflies all around. I added just a little bit of adhesive to the middle of the butterflies so the wings could mimic movement.

The second card has a pretty sentiment in the middle and is edged with flowers. To create a 3D effect I added the same flowers from the Ephemera Die Cuts pack with foam tape and few floral Puffy Stickers. Then I scattered lots of cute butterflies here and there.

I love Paper 01, it has so many possibilities! You can use them for cards, Project Life spreads, or even make a mini album from it. What would you use it for?

SUPPLIES: TURN THE PAGE: Paper 01, Paper 04, Ephemera Die Cuts, Chipboard Stickers,  Puffy Stickers

Blog: pinkandpapergift.blogspot.com Instagram: @floramfarkas Pinterest: @floramfarkas
Facebook: pinkandpapergift YouTube: Flora Monika Farkas

I've only made one card recently but after seeing these cards I am so inspired to make more! That's why I love Flóra, she's always making me want to run to my scrap room and, well, SCRAP!

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Crop & Create Thunder Bay 2017 Recap

I landed in Thunder Bay, Canada in the afternoon of Saturday October 14th, ordered some room service for dinner, and then taught a class! Check out this huuuuuuuge room full of scrapbookers! I am in awe!

 I barely had a voice to teach, luckily there was a microphone and all the girls were super nice and understanding!

Crop & Create teachers and organizers! Vicki Boutin takes the best selfies :) 

Speaking of Vicki, I snuck into one of her classes while she was teaching and wish I could have stayed the entire time! I looooove what she was sharing!

I screengrabbed this photo below from Vicki's instagram because I took a total of TEN photos at the event. TEN! I'm so embarrassed! I guess I was just so happy and involved with teaching I forgot to snap more. Next time!! 

Cute photobooth!

 The trip home was an adventure :) From Thunder Bay to Toronto to Calgary to Seattle. Everything went smoothly though and I made it home safe and sound! Can't wish for anymore than that!

Catherine gifted me this "smile" decor and I love love love it. I'm going to keep it on top of this mint green Fabrikör forever and whenever I look at it I'll always remember this whirlwind of a weekend teaching in 2 countries, 5 classes and 6 flights in 3 days! Countless memories made!

I don't have any set plans for future classes, but definitely talks of teaching in Spokane, Los Gatos, San Diego, and Ben Franklin in Redmond! Check my Upcoming Workshops page frequently - that's where I post when and where I'll be teaching next! If you own a store or shop at one, I'd love if you could request me to teach!! :)

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