Alex...and then there was you mini album

Now that I have 5 grandchildren, I've realized how many great subjects I have to keep me scrappin' happy for a very long time. The newest addition to our crew is Alex. He arrived in April, 2009, so it's about time I started an album just for him.

I just LOVE the MOSD chipboard sheets that are perfect for use in making mini albums. For this album, I started with 3 tabbed sheets and 3 square sheets. I trimmed the 3 square sheets to 5" w x 6" h so that the tabbed pages would extend past the edge of the "non tabbed" sheets.

Then I trimmed two of the three tabs from each tabbed sheet, leaving 1 top tab, one middle tab, and 1 bottom tab.

Then I went to my stash and pulled out my collection the Basic Grey "Granola" line...perfect for a boy themed book:) I found I had the "perfect" striped ribbon from SEI and a sheet of vellum quotes that I've had for YEARS!...so glad to be able to use them.

Of course, for those of you who know me, I can't complete a project without "grunging" it up. I used distress inks and a blending tool to grunge up each page edge as well as the vellum quotes I used. I was also happy to see I had some great buttons in my stash that worked perfectly for this project.

I also used some of the frames from my MOSD stash...I just LOVE these! Last month I used them to make some awesome cards and was able to incorporate them again this month. The reason I love these is that they are so easy to alter. I used Staz on ink on the one above. On those below, I used rub-ons, ribbon and some small buttons to spruce them up. Also below, I popped one up off the page so that I could "interlock" it with the second frame. I received SO MANY awesome colors in these frames! I'm sure they will be a staple in my future projects as they've been already.

I just showcased a few of the pages in my mini album. For a peak at the entire album, click here.

Thanks for visiting:)

Ink Swatch

We have all seen paint chips in the hardware or home improvement store, and we've all seen fabric swatches and even cardstock swatches. The other day, I was in a stamping store (Stamping Details in Poway, CA) and they had some tags which they had turned into ink swatches! What a cool idea! I am forever forgetting which inks I have and which I don't, so I thought a swatch would be a cool thing to carry in my purse. However, it needs to be small and durable.

I had a Petite (key chain) album from MOSD in my stash and thought it would make a cool swatch book for my Tim Holtz Distress Inks. The album is 2x2 and comes with two clear covers and four chipboard pages. I used some scrap chipboard left over from another MOSD project to make some extra pages for my swatch book. The chipboard was easy to cut with my Fiskars trimmer and I rounded the corners with my Round-it-All tool.

I covered each page with white cardstock (from the scrap bag!) and then stamped an image with each ink color, then labeled the pages with a Zig pen. Easy peasy! I used some black Staz-On ink to decorate the little clear acrylic covers.

When I add more ink colors, I can just add more pages! And this is small enough to stick in my purse so that when I'm in a craft store I don't have to try to remember which ink I still need!

And aren't these Hero Arts stamps to die for?! I've had these ladies in my stash for a long time and they are just too fun for words!

I hope you have fun making your own swatch book! MOSD products are such fun to play with and the possibilities are endless!

Happy Easter to everyone! May the Lord bless each of you!

- Gloria