The good life

What seems to give this beautiful ride we call life more meaning than the mere act of celebration. I am a firm believer in celebrating all things in life, basking in the warmth of the sun, bare feet on fresh grass( fresh cut grass is the greatest of smells) , the tiniest clasp of a fist from your new born baby, these are the beautiful gifts of life.
Among the beauties to celebrate, are the gifts we know as another year on this earth, more time to celebrate these little, everyday gifts. Just a few short months ago, we celebrated little K's 3rd birthday. What a sweet celebration it was. A day filled with friends, fun, laughter, and great celebration.

Nothing screams "celebration" like floating confetti. I played with the balance of greens and pinks, sprinkled with a dab of glitter, for just the look I was hoping for! I created this layout, using this weeks My Scraps and More sketch #94 ! It was great inspiration!
I hope everyone had a beautiful holiday, I myself have been terribly under the weather, but as long as we can get on the mend intime to travel out of state for Christmas, there will be no complaints here!
                                                                Brianna

Happy turkey day!

                                                            Brianna

9 blissful years!

This day, just 9 short years ago, will forever remain one of the greatest days of my life. Nothing could have prepared me for the journey of the day that was November 24th, 2005. In to the Dr's for a routine exam, I was told that my looming preeclampsia had cased the proper issues, resulting in a night of admittance and observation, only to be told that the following day (Thanksgiving day as it was) would be the day I would become a mother. Over 18 hours later, this beautiful, bright eyed baby girl changed my forever title and my life. I would forever, from that day forward, be known as "mom","mommy", "mother".
As the story was shared, gathered around the kitchen just late last night, all 6lbs, 11 oz came sweetly into this world. Wouldn't you believe, there was no screaming or crying to be heard. As they placed her in the bassinet for observation, she just gleamed in wonder towards the soft tones of her daddy.
( beautiful years late, she remains my soft hearted, observant natured, creative, soulful, sweet baby girl. Here is to another year of life, and as we see it, a most blessed reason to be extra grateful this week!

                                                                          Brianna

Besties always

Good morning friends! We are on day two in a row with cancelled school here, lots of snow and ice, but very happy girls to get to stay home. I created this fun layout during the crop this past weekend, using the current My scraps and more sketch found HERE. Such a fun sketch. I loved playing with my jillibean soup paper, cutting the rows of triangles into individual triangles to lay about my page.

I love how fun the layout is, and it makes me happy just looking at it! Thanks for peeking in, and I hope everyone stays warm. I know I will be rocking my wool socks today!
                                                             Brianna

Love life!

It is a beautiful(chilly) day here, the snow is gently falling and I caught a photo coming back rom the bus of the house . It is the most magical sight, making me yearn to put up all my Christmas décor now, but I will hold off another week, as next week marks my oldest baby girls 9th birthday!

How can you NOT love life in moments like this! I wanted to share this layout also up on the UmWowStudio blog today. I have always loved this photo of little L, she looks so deep in beautiful thoughts and a love for life! I created a quite monotone layout than my usual style, to be able to focus on these gorgeous UmWowStudio products. I mean, seriously, how perfect is the saying on this flair!

I created this layout, once again, with my hand creating, cutting tools, rather than a machine.

#1: first I chose the best letters to trace, and found them in a very old stash of chipboard letters, they are so old I am unsure of the brand and they were taken out of the package long ago. I chose the letters and placed them together to create the word of choice.

#2: I than traced one letter at a time, slightly overlapping so that the finished word would be one piece.

#3: after tracing, I used my exacto knife to cut out the word from my cardstock. I repeated this two more times to have enough "love" words to fill my 12x12 paper properly.

I chose to finish the look with some gradient misting, and adding all my UmWowStudio and other embellishments.
 I hope everyone is having an awesome start to their week! Thanks for stopping in :)
                                                                Brianna

Use it if you've got it!

Good morning lovely friends and readers! As mentioned earlier, I have been playing along with the ladies over at My Scraps and more. The pinterest crop was great for inspiration and lovely chatter. I loved using the same idea and seeing so many takes on it. One of the challenges was to create a page inspired by a child rubiks cube game. Going based on an idea of a square grid, I created this layout, using cut squares as my photo mat.

I had also found this photo on pinterest myself and needed to use it for inspiration, and this felt like the perfect match to combine ideas.

I had so much fun making this. For quite sometime now I have been weighing the idea to share a bit more of my process with you and this deemed a great start! I was never quite a fan of the cricut, too cutesy for my style, so I never invested, and had yet to get a cameo( until I can open it at Christmas...eeek...shhh, hubby told me to get it so he wouldn't get the wrong one). So what's a girl to do when she loves the look of shapes, words, and designs from a lazer cutter.... create her own of course. So I created this shape like so.....

#1: first I cut two 6x6 papers and lined them up at their halfway point stacked on one another, creating the star shape.
#2: Using this star as my guide, I turned my paper facing the blank side, so not to show the pen marks on the paper side, and traced the negative space between each point, alternating patterns of paper as I went( I chose to cut  4 papers, 2 of each).
#3: I lined up all the papers to create a shape similar to my pinterest pinned shape, creating this shape.
#4: Cutting equal sized squared, I created a grid inside the shape as my photo mat.
#5: I than chose to use vellum to place in the triangle shapes to complete the pinned shape. I used my ruler and placed the vellum atop the spaces to trace the EXACT shape needed for each space, as shifting of patterned papers may make them a tad different from one another.
And Voila... I created what I set out to do, and completed the layout until my heart felt it was right!
So there you have it. No pricy lazer cutter, still want similar results, create your own. I just used my imagination, a tiny ruler, and my trusty exacto knife!
 I hope you liked seeing a bit of how my brain works to complete projects!
And speaking of "using it if you've got it" , as I know most of us scrapbookers do, I have a long tucked away bin of stash products. I have been saving it for, who knows, in hopes to sell on ebay(difficult with little to no motivation), to pass to the girls( I still will on some things), but until than I am about to raid it for my Christmas "daily" album. Who says you need to use all new product to create holiday memories! Have a BEAUTIFUL weekend friends!
                                           Brianna

Life in recent-November

Life has been a blissful chaos in the Marshall home lately. After our move across country just a few short months ago, we are all falling into a daily ebb and flow that works well for the time being. We are preparing for the holiday months, as all are, but we are exceptionally excited for the holiday season this year as it will be the first time in 3 years traveling "home" to Maine to be with family. We were so blessed to spend the past 2 years with our West coast family, but with a brand new baby niece, a new family pet to share, and the ache of a motherly hug, this year is set up to be a beautiful Christmas. Until than, I fill my moments in between with what speaks to my heart, and I felt it would be a lovely thing to share with my friends. So here is my life in recent, what I am doing lately!

Doing:
 Honestly, lots of filling time with background T.V, some playing with paper, and basic daily cleaning. I know, its a very exciting thing, this life of a stay-at-home mom!

Reading:
I have been on a reading streak lately. I have soooo many books saved up, that as much as I desire to enjoy these books, part of me is just as excited to read one book so I can start another! I just picked up this book the other day and is my current read. I have always been drawn to stories of the holocaust for the connection of empathy and sociology, a reminder of what is truly necessary in life.

Watching:
Seriously, hubby and I happened upon this new show last night, and being from Southern Maine where the cast and crew shoot, it is my own little slice of nostalgia.

Listening to:
Is it wrong to be a 30 year old and jam out to a once boy band member?? If it's wrong, I don't want to be right!

Thinking:
Oh how I missed the four seasons. First snowfall of the season touched lightly upon my boots( yet to be worn in years due to west coast weather), and it took all restraint not to screech out in excitement like a little kid!

Thanks for peeking into what life has been like for me lately! I hope everyone has a BEAUTIFUL day!!!
                                                                      Brianna

and I shall keep you!

Happy hump of the week day! It has been long days here. Hubby has been working long hours, leaving me to my babies, and than books at bedtime. Of course on my down time, I have been filling the hours with my paper and glue. I created this fun layout to go along with this weeks sketch over at Elles Studio. I am not one to often scrap pets, but we captured this amazing photo of Chester-Bu and I just had to put it to paper. Those that have followed me for quite sometime now will remember this post of our previous pet, Sunnie, whom passed away suddenly. This layout became a beautiful thing for us as it was the only layout ever scrapped with her. I vowed to include our next pet more in my projects when the time came. Fast forward 2 years after her passing, we stumbled upon the cutest ball of wrinkles at the pet store and just had to bring him home.

He is now known as the majestic lion, mountain goat, as he feels the need to climb on everything, to the highest peek. Quite the feat for such a large dog, if I do say so myself. So here is to Chester-Blu, my always slobbery, sometimes stinky, but ALWAYS playful and loveable beast of a dog!
                                                          Brianna

Ode to thirty!

Good morning friends! It is a chilly day here in NY and I am spending it with lots of paper and glue, playing along with the crop over at My Scraps and More! Its a fun group! I wanted to share this layout I created just for fun , documenting my 30th birthday! I have really come into myself in my late 20's, and I HIGHLY embraced the upcoming of my 30th birthday, so here is to the past 3 decade, beautiful memories, and optimism of the next 3 decades( hopefully more). Stay warm and have a beautiful, blessed weekend!

                                                        Brianna

Getting fancy!

Good morning friends! I wanted to share the optimistic layout I created just for fun! It has been a rough few weeks in our household. It is with heavy heart to share that we lost a beautiful family member last week. My husbands Nana, a beautiful woman through and through, sadly lost her battle with Cancer. Are we sad?? Greatly, but amongst all the sadness is great blessing.We were truly blessed, as a family to get the chance to be stationed 2 hours from here these past two years. We will forever reassure the time spent and memories made. On the home front, I have had a declining issue with breathing since the move. It may be something in the home, or outdoor allergies, but I have been struggling to breathe, ontop of being asthmatic. It finally became to much, and I chose to got to the ER Monday morning. This resulted in a crazy long wait, as to be expected, and lengthy treatments of liquid inhalants and liquid steroids, to be sent home with steroid pills and inhalers! So, seeming necessary, today, I rest.

I wanted to share this layout of a beautiful time for our family, despite the crazy week. We were also blessed the past two years with this view out our backyard! This view and a warm cup of coffee on the back porch; YES PLEASE! How my feet wish to be bare here again, rather than confined in my warm boots!

 I played along with this months FANCY PANTS SKETCH! I loved the lines of the sketch, and knew right away I wanted to build off of the idea of masking and spraying my title! You have until the 10th to share if you feel inspired also! I hope everyone is feeling well and not too sick with tummy aches from this weekends "candy tax" we all love to collect ;)

                                                                                       Brianna