The last day of February - really?!

Hard to believe that we are spending the last few hours of February already. I guess with the last few weeks filled with Olympic triumphs and tragedies the hours have been flown by.

As Jennifer said in the previous post, this weekend was supposed to be filled with laughs, fun and a lot of creative time together. Sadly I was doing all this stuff on my own as we made the responsible choice for her to remain in KS. It seems unfair that the weather forecasts could have been SO WRONG - but we had to go with what we were told. Thankfully Jason made it home (on beautifully sunny roads) so that I could go to my crop this weekend. He left late today (still in beautiful sunny weather) because of the Canada - USA Gold medal hockey game. Sadly an agent wanted to show our house at 4:30 and we all had to miss the end of the game and Sydney's golden goal.

Back to my crop ... I had a great time with all the girls there. It was a LOT bigger than the last one, with at least 30 people there on Friday night and about 20 all day Saturday. Leisha made us fabulous food again and there were snacks and drinks being shared freely the entire time. I took my February and March Two Chicks kits with me along with all my cute Chick'n Stuff containers. The weekend was filled with some good chats, lots of laughs and great food. I was also able to come away with the following projects and still have some that are not quite finished. I loved working with these kits, and the Chick'n Stuff is so darn cute that it is hard to stop looking at it long enough to play with it and get it on a page!!

This is a canvas I made using papers from the February kit and fun stuff from my Chick'n feathers, Chick'n noodles and Chick'n feed ... I had three pink clothespins, but wanted an orange one, so I grabbed my trusted orange Sharpie and coloured it!
Next a group of OLD pictures of Rachel at VBS in 2006. I love these pictures and I think they are fun on this page. Again papers from the February kit and Chick'n Stuff.
A few more old pictures of Rachel making Jell-O in Fort Morgan in 2006. Not sure if you can tell from the picture - but those chipboard alphas are sparkly and so pretty! The best part is that it is sealed sparkly so there are not sparkles all over the place!
Finally a page with pictures from last October. I used a ton of buttons from my Chick'n feed to make that arrow - I love how they mimic the circles on the Pink Paislee papers!
I am off to continue creating ... trust me when I say go check out the Two Chicks website! The Chick'n stuff comes in tons of colours and those fun containers are packed to the max with loads of fun things to play with!!! Also the March kit is up and it is full of the prettiest papers and embellishments!

And I will just say this once I promise - Go Canada Go - you rocked the podium in Vancouver. 14 Gold, 7 silver and 5 bronze - proud Canadian here!! And a must shout out to the USA for finishing at the top of the medal count with 37 medals - they have never been at the top of the medal count at the Winter Games!

xo Amy

You can't really have a silver lining with NO clouds

So I am not supposed to be sitting in my living room right now - I am supposed to be chatting, snacking, laughing, and scrapbooking with Miss Amy right now. But I'm not... (insert 32 year old temper tantrum here) Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other not so comical plans for us. Just a little over 24 hours ago the weather guys were calling for winter weather for my drive down to OKC to meet up with Jason to enjoy a scrappy weekend in Midland. Didn't happen... not even a little bit...I am less than pleased that our weather was GORGEOUS today! At least give me a cloud or a few snowflakes!! In any case, it was decided I should stay here and plan another trip when they are closer. So I am throwing myself a little pity party for tonight. I will be over it in the morning (really I won't but I am going to try).


Instead of creating pretties all weekend with no crazies underfoot, I am sorting and purging my scrappy space. It's not really very fun. I had no idea how emotionally attached to my scrapbooking supplies I am. It is making it painful to sort through product to sell at a local scrapbook garage sale next weekend. And the tears from missing my friend aren't helping any either. But I am forging on because I need to earn some $$$ to help with the costs of the boys' baseball fees this spring. And I hear Dave Ramsey in my ear, reminding me that it is just stuff and I can always get more stuff.

How often do you purge your scrapbook space?

How do you decide what to keep and what goes?

Are you attached to your scrappy goodies the same way I am?

I will hold down the boy fort another weekend and look foward to the future - the 2 1/2 hours away from me future! YAY!

What is a Chick-A-Dee?

Growing up I had 2 great-Aunts on my Dad's side of the family. Since my Dad's parents were both gone before I could know them as grandparents - we called Dad's two aunts - Nini and Nome. Nome, like me, was the younger of 2 sisters - and we had a special bond. She was TOTALLY into birds and her favourite was the Chickadee ...


She had loads of birdfeeders and always stocked them with their favourite seeds - especially black oil sunflower seeds. I can clearly remember the familiar chick-a-dee-dee-dee call from these tiny birds. Nome thought Chick-A-Dees were so wonderful that when she saw this children's magazine - she got me a subscription ... I loved this magazine!!!


Yesterday when I was at Target (I know shocking that I was at Target) ... I found these ... how fun is that?!


So now that I have been chosen to join Jennifer on the Two Chicks Design Team I am a Chick-A-Dee. I think it is so awesome and it makes me fondly think of my Nome - who would be 106 if she were still with us. I think she would be happy that my love of scrapbooking has brought me to a place where I can BE a Chick-a-dee. With that said - I am off to create with the fabulous kit that Christie sent me this week!!

xo Amy

On my mind lately

This post make me smile. It's my story too. It gives me hope. And we need lots of hope these days.

Two Chicks February Kit

This was the perfect, eclectic kit for me! I was able to make a couple of Valentine's Day altered projects as well as my layouts and I still have goodies to spare! In fact, I have a page in the works on my table right now. :) The best thing about this month's kit is a little taste of custom Chick 'n Stuff!!! Lots of bits and baubles to add that special touch to your creations.
I love Valentine's Day and Easter pages because I get a reason to use lots of pinks on my pages and this was no exception. I loved that Kaden and Jackson were able to celebrate together at school last year! See that applique heart??? CHICK 'N FEATHERS BABY!!!!

Was I cute or what?!? I loved using this color combo to document my first spiral perm - ahhh, those were the days...

This next layout is brought to you by my Library of Memories storage binders. I took these snapshots of our little guys shortly after Kaden was born in 2005. I knew I would eventually get them on a layout and I found them quickly when I saw the colors of this kit. Gotta love circle punches for a super fast layout!

My final layout this month is a very simple 2 page spread of one of our weekends earlier this year. These are some of the only photos I took while we lived in temporary housing in the apartment in Fresno after we sold our house. More yummy Chick 'n Feathers and Chick 'n Feed added just the perfect amount of embellishment to this layout.Ah, the punches came out to play again - I picked up an inexpensive 5x7 black frame at the Dollar Store and used my little heart punch on my scraps to create this little bit of Valentine's Day decor. It was the perfect addition to my Valentine Buffet table.

So, if you don't have this kit - click as fast as you can over to Two Chicks to get it right now!

Where in the world is Amy now?

Jennifer has reminded me (ever so sweetly) that I have not written on the blog in a long time. And that is very true so here is a post on what is going on in the vanderkooi neck of the woods ...

Jason has finally finished his 8 months of training for his new job. And with the end of that came the placement for the new job. As expected it is not in Midland - but unexpectedly it is not in Houston either. I had come to terms with the fact that I was going to Houston and was in fact getting ready to make the most of it. Then, while at Jennifer's house to celebrate Jackson's birthday and Christmas, Jason got THE call. And we found out the new job is in Oklahoma City ... a mere 2 hours and a bit from Jennifer. This could not have been better news for all of us and I was so very happy that we were at Jennifer's house when we got this news. Because they are as excited as we are about OKC!!! This means more time spent with our family of 8 ... more scrappy time together, birthdays together ... no more need for the video cam to do these things!!

And so we are getting ready to move to Oklahoma ... these three Canadians will now be Okies. I have made some good friends here in Midland, but I have to say I will not miss seeing that burnt orange colour everywhere I go!! Our house is officially on the market - essentially meaning it looks like nobody lives here. But Rachel and I are in fact living here and cleaning up more often that we are used to. There have been lots of showings but no offers so far. The weekends are nice because Jason comes home - and I get to listen to those wrestling giggles that are always present when those two are playing.

Jason has been getting the lay of the land in Edmond - where we will live once we sell this house and get a new one there. There are lots of choices in there and I am confident that we will find what we are looking for. It is nice to have more time to check out the city and the schools before actually buying - I have been looking at real estate listings and sending Jason out on scouting missions to check out the ones I like.

As for crafting - I have returned to the land of scrapbooking and I can honestly say that it was the Two Chicks Designs kits that did it for me! I started getting them in October and I have been creating with them and getting back into it. So much so that when the design team contest was posted I threw my scrappy hat in the ring. As Jennifer said - I was one of the successful designers and I am SO excited to be working with the great stuff that Christie (the chief Chick) has to offer!! If you head over there now you will find some awesome grab bags that are for sale - and when I say sale I mean BIG savings!

Well now you know where I am and be sure to check back with us as we have vowed to keep this blog up to date. For now I leave you with a few things I created for the Two Chicks design team contest.

First we had to create a 2 page layout of who we are ... I chose to do a a layout about what the different important people in my life call me ...

Next we were asked to create 6 cards ... since it was getting close to February - I chose to make some Valentines - here are 3 of the 6 I made ... and yes I actually remembered to use them!!

We were asked to make an altered project ... this is what I came up with. I used green embroidery floss to make my flower stems and used my punches, some buttons and cute patterned paper to make the flowers. The blessings chipboard word is from Maya Road and the birdies are from Jenni Bowlin (I think). This is hanging in Rachel's room and she loves it!

Our final project was to create a mini book that explained why we wanted to be a designer - and we had to use at least 25 different types of embellishments. It took me a bit to decide what I would do - but once that was done I had fun making this book which I titled "WHY I create" I had the many reasons I scrapbook.

That's all from me for now!
xo Amy

A full and Random Post

First I want to congratulate my sweet friend on being chosen to join the new Design team at Two Chicks Designs!!! We are both Chick-a-Dee's!!! How fun is that???? And I get to hand-deliver some yummy goodies to her this weekend. I can't wait to see what she does with them!! The best thing is that it means we both get to create with new fun, products and that we have to post them here. YAY!!!!

Remember that frame? - yes, the one with the darling little girls playing make-up ;) Well, here she is now!!! I love it, love it, love it!!! I have been searching the Goodwill for a big, fancy frame for soooo long to make this and finally hit the jackpot last month. It is the perfect inspiration board for my rather eclectic craft room. {Ignore the boring paint color. That too is in the works.} But for now I will sit back and enjoy all the did-it-myself-shabby-chic goodness!!!

And when I wasn't painting, distressing, or stapling chicken wire on the frame last week, I was making stuff! Sweet pink and red Valentine's stuff!

First up, these great chocolate boxes gleaned from a tutorial at Jana Eubank's blog. I used a smaller sized box, but still loved the results with a bit smaller price tag. I think I made 8 total for all the teachers, assistants, nurses, and neighbors we love. This is the one I created for my brother and SIL on their first Valentine's Day as a married couple.

Next, is this fun little muffin tin project. Back in December, I saw this in the form of a 12 days of Christmas countdown. However, I didn't want to wait that long so I used up some scraps from my February Two Chicks Designs kit to make a gift for my mom and dad. We put a few candies in some of the spots along with handwritten love notes from each of us to my parents. I can't wait to make another one to leave hanging at our house. Maybe little pots of gold for St. Patty's Day?
I have sooooo many ideas that I want to try right now. My inspiration book is overflowing!!! I will post my other layouts and projects from the February Kit a little later this week.

Finish Line Scrapbooking

It's no secret that I love Stacy Julian and her Library of Memories photo system and simple story-telling scrapbook style. But I think one of my favorite ideas gleaned (is that spelled right?) from her is Finish Line Scrapbooking. I have created each of our Walk to Cure Diabetes books in this style and I think it is perfect for using lots of photos, making them shine, and best yet, creating a finished album QUICK! Last weekend I had to use up 50 free prints from Shutterfly so I ordered 49 photos (plus an extra) of Kenny's All Star season last summer. We spent a few moments in the the scrapbook store yesterday choosing 5 papers for his book. And I was good, really good, I only got the 5 papers! Progress for me ;) So while he is at a training camp for Tae Kwon Do today, I am going to finish line scrapbook his entire all star season! It will be a huge weight off my shoulders as I generally get overwhelmed by the abundance of photos we take during baseball season.

I have a couple of other scrappy projects churning around in my head as well as plans for this baby -

I have BIG plans for this project and I am very excited about it! Ken just shakes his head anymore when I come home with things like this. And don't mind the baskets and baskets of laundry that need to be dealt with... I am hoping they will clean, dry, fold, AND put themselves away while I am creating. A girl can dream, right?

Looking forward to a fun day of crafting mixed in with a bit of housekeeping to keep things lively around here. What are you working on?

xo, Jen