January Challenges, Part 2

It's so good to have a little time to scrap, and a place to do it! I'm still working on arranging my little scrap closet to get max use out of each shelf, but it's coming along. Meanwhile, I'm having so much fun participating in the challenges at Scraptastic Club. This challenge is simply to use a favorite photo and at least 7 lines of journaling.

I may tinker with this some more. I'm not happy that the photo doesn't show up better; nor do the journaling strips. 

In addition to the Thursday challenges, Danni has started offering a little weekly prize for her card challenges, which were already fun. I plan to take part in those too. It's the challenges that give me a focus and a deadline, and I love that as much as I love seeing what others create.

I did a card for Scraptastic's color challenge. I chose the other kit this month, so had to scrounge through my stash to find the right colors. 

In the meantime, I liked the colors in the other kit so much that I ordered it to come with my February kit. Glad I did too because it is now sold out.

Danni's card tutorials/challenges are always fun. Last Monday's was a recipe challenge to use 3 labels, 2 patterned papers, 3 arrows and two hearts. Her example was a longer format, so the elements may be a little squished on an A2, but I had fun even though I forgot to post my photo before the deadline. Oops! 

Speaking of cards, I got a tax receipt from Operation Write Home for 92 cards! This was a down year for me and I barely had time to make any, so I was astonished at the total. I hope to do better this year. It's a great way to use up paper and materials, and I am more creative in making cards than I am in layouts. Not as big a commitment, ya know?

Just up today, another fun challenge at Scraptastic. We were talking on the Forum about stuff we have but don't use, one of which was old magazine articles. The challenge was to pick one and do the project. I chose some softly inked flowers in an article in the current Cardmaker magazine:

And here's what I did with it:

Challenge #4 was to use six or more paper strips on a page. The grandkids were really squished on air mattresses in the office when they were here at Christmas, and I took a photo to document the tight squeeze. For the LO, I felt rather smug cutting off the little margins of all the papers in my "The Story Begins" kit, and mixing them with washi tape.

Last challenge for January was to use Heather's fun sketch. When the kids were visiting at Christmas from Atlanta, we spent a couple hours at the beach. Lauren wasn't feeling well and stayed home in bed with a bowl of oatmeal, but it's a nice photo of Paul, Angela, PJ and Ashlyn. Here's the sketch and my take on it:

Ha! I believe I actually managed to participate in all 5 Thursday challenges as well as all of the card challenges this month. It's a great way to get projects done! On to February...