Cards with Fall Puns

I'm not really into puns, so when I saw that one of the National Scrapbook Day challenges at A Cherry on Top was to make a project featuring a pun, I wasn't 100% sure if I even had any supplies that would work. But once I started looking through my stash, I found a fall collection with puns. I used them to make these two cards. The fox says, "Falling for you" and the squirrel says "I'm nuts about you."

Cards with Fall Puns (affiliate link)

Steve loves puns, so maybe he'll get two unexpected greeting cards in the fall. Or I might just donate them. Either way, it was a fun challenge and I enjoyed the opportunity to work with fall colors.

First Flight

When I was cleaning for National Scrapbook Day, I came across a pair of black and white photos taken at the airport in 1972 when I was a baby. I'm with my parents in one picture and my maternal grandparents and uncle in the other. I suspected that the pictures were of my first flight, which I thought would be a fun topic to scrap. I checked with my mom; indeed, I took my first flight in September 1972, at 6 months old. Unfortunately, the reason for our flight was not a good one. 

My dad had gotten a call from his brother: their mom was hospitalized following a heart attack. My parents packed their bags, loaded 6-month old Cindy into the car, and drove 800+ miles from our home near San Francisco to Seattle. My parents dropped me off with my mom's parents, then visited Dad's mom at the hospital. We stayed two days. She seemed to be recovering well, so we drove back to California so Dad could get back to work. Grandma Jones died right after we got home. My first plane trip was from Oakland to Seattle so that we could attend my grandmother's funeral. While I wish my first flight had been for a happier reason, I'm glad to have documented this story. 

First Flight (affiliate link)

I entered this page in the Choose a Sketch Challenge at A Cherry on Top. As you can see, I included the basic elements of the sketch, but tweaked a few elements to make them work better for this page. 

These pictures are, by far, the oldest ones I've ever scrapped. I have more than enough recent photos to scrap, but I'm inspired to occasionally go back to pictures from my childhood and tell some of those stories. I'm particularly interested in learning the stories I didn't know, like the story of my first flight, and getting those into an album.

2025 Christmas Card Layout

I like to include our family's Christmas cards in my scrapbooks, but I struggled figuring out how to deal with this year's card. I ended up treating the card like picture frame and "hanging" it on a split background. My page was inspired by the Half-It Challenge at A Cherry on Top.  

2025 Christmas Card (affiliate link)

It's a really simple page, but I'm ok with that. The title and journaling that I would normally put on a layout happen to already be on the card itself. Into the album it goes!

Happy Birthday 2026

Here's another layout I made for a National Scrapbook Day challenge at A Cherry on Top. This one required us to follow a sketch, using at least three items that start with the letters in the word SKETCH. I used: stickers (S), a tag (T), and cardstock (C) to complete the challenge. 

Happy Birthday 2026 (affiliate link)

This layout is from a joint birthday dinner at Cattlemens. It's not obvious whose birthday it is (mine and Trevor's roommate's) unless you read the journaling. I'm annoyed with myself because I forgot to ask the waitress to take a group picture at the table AND I forgot to take pictures of our food. Too busy having a good time, I guess! I made due with separate pictures taken after dinner. 

I had a lot of fun making this layout. Once I figured out that I could do a tag for letter T, it came together quickly. I'm happy with how it turned out. 

Our First Road Trip

Saturday, May 2 was National Scrapbook Day. I didn't get to participate as much as I normally do, but I did get some scrapping in and enjoyed the games, challenges, and camaraderie at A Cherry On Top. The first layout I made was for a scraplift challenge.

1st Road Trip (affiliate link)

The layout tells the story of the first road trip that Steve and I ever took together, back in July 2003. We had been engaged for two weeks when we took off on a 9-day adventure from Sacramento to Calico Ghost Town, Grand Canyon National Park, Zion National Park, Las Vegas and the Hoover Dam, and Yosemite National Park, then back to Sacramento. 

The trip got off to bad start when the undercarriage of Steve's car fell off about two hours into the trip, in the middle of nowhere. He'd had the car serviced the day before in anticipation of such a long road trip and apparently they did not secure it correctly after the service. Steve saved the day (and the trip) with zip ties and his engineering skills. While there were some other hiccups during the trip (though none so dramatic), we had a fantastic time together. It was the first time we'd traveled any distance together and it was immediately apparent that our travel styles were compatible, just like we were in so many other ways. 

I was 31 and Steve was 27 when we went on this trip. I love looking back at the pictures of us, so young and so happy. We're not young anymore, but we're still happy. It's been 23 years since that first road trip and we still love traveling together.