Kylinn at 13

I gave my goddaughters their birthday layouts yesterday, so I can share them here now. Here's Kylinn at 13:

Kylinn at 13 (affiliate link)

I am proud of the teenager she's become. Kylinn is very interested in social justice and equality for all. She speaks up against injustice and is a kind and caring person. 

As always, I didn't look back at the previous layouts I've made for her until I finished this one. If I had, I probably wouldn't have chosen a purple color, since I've used some shade of purple on 6 of the previous 12 layouts! On the other hand, she does have purple hair and a purple tie in the photo, so the color scheme was pretty well set for me. I'm pleased to see that I haven't used this particular arrangement before either. There's only so many ways to put a title, one 4x6" photo, and list of adjectives on a 8x10" page. I'm very happy with how this turned out. 

Celebrating 13

I've already told you about Trevor's Peanuts-themed 13th birthday party; here's the layout about that fun day. 

13th Birthday Party (affiliate link)

Every item, except the white cardstock, is from the Party Boy collection by Photo Play. Sometimes it's nice not having to dig through different collections or different manufacturers to find embellishments that coordinate. It certainly makes scrapping faster to stick with a single collection. 

12th Birthday Party

One of my favorite things about blogging is that I can tell more of the story and include more photos of an event than I can squeeze onto a scrapbook layout. So while I want the important photos and the story to appear in the album, it helps knowing that the details are preserved here on the blog. Because I shared so many details from Trevor's narwhal-themed ice skating birthday party back in June, I didn't feel compelled to include close-ups of the narwhal items we made on the layout. Instead, I packed it with photos of Trevor and his friends having fun.

12th Birthday Party (affiliate link)

I debated whether to include the grinning alligator on a page about a narwhal-themed birthday, but I couldn't resist. He fit the space perfectly and looks so cute holding the present and the balloons. 

You may have noticed that the only journaling I did was to label the kids (and Narwhal). The photos answer the rest of the basic questions:

• What: Trevor's birthday party
• Where: ice rink
• When: Trevor's 12th birthday

You might argue that, years from now, one of Trevor's descendants won't know when his birthday was and thus what year this took place. Nor will they know which ice rink we visited. But I'd argue that both of those questions are answered by other layouts in the same album. For the record though, I'll note both of those here, with the optimistic (though perhaps unlikely) expectation that my blog will be accessible to future generations: This party took place at Vacaville Ice Sports on June 8, 2018, the day after Trevor's 12th birthday. And it was awesome. 

The MAKE Party

I've been wanting to check out MAKE in nearby Vacaville for a long time, so I was thrilled when I learned my goddaughters would be having their birthday party there. MAKE is an art studio and it is awesome. 

The space at MAKE is divided into a small lobby, a main room with supplies and tables, a paint area, a party room, and a designated glitter space. 

After a tour, we were given free reign to create. It was overwhelming, because they have literally every art supply you could think of. I started the background for a painting, set that aside to dry, and then started really digging through the dozens of bins of supplies for inspiration to strike.

Meanwhile, Trevor had said, "What should I make?" and someone answered, "Parakeet." He gathered a bunch of supplies, sat down, and started creating.   

I wandered around looking at what everyone was making, spent some time taking photos, and then sat down with an empty frame.

I have a clean and simple aesthetic, but have always wanted to try just gluing a big pile of random bits to something to see how it would turn out. I scooped a few handfuls from the bin of game pieces, grabbed a glue gun, and jumped in. Everything about this was completely different from what I'd normally make. I didn't plan ahead, didn't edit, and didn't hold back. It was a lot of fun. 

I did put some thought into the items I chose to glue on the frame. You'll see our initials, my birthdate (3/12), our family colors, and tokens from our favorite games. Amazingly, even though I was just gluing stuff on haphazardly, I still managed to make something that: a) I like; and b) is still quite Cindy. 

 

That's Trevor's parakeet leaning up against my frame. He turned a glass bottle upside down, glued half of a plastic egg to it, then added tissue paper and built up the features from there. Super cute and so creative! 

Happiest of birthdays, Kylinn and Ellia! We had a blast celebrating with you.

And I can't wait to go back to MAKE! Check it out if you are local. Better yet, let me know when you're going and I'll meet you there!

Kylinn at 12

For 12 years, I've been making framed birthday layouts for my goddaughter, Kylinn. This might be my very favorite so far. I was struck by how grown-up she looked in her picture, so I chose papers and an embellishment to reflect that. Twelve. How can it be?! 

Kylinn at 12 (affiliate link)

You can see all of the previous layouts I've made for Kylinn's birthdays here. I love looking back at them!

Kylinn at 11

My goddaughter, Kylinn, turns 11 this week. It doesn't even seem possible that the brilliant, outgoing infant I fell in love with just a few short years ago is going into middle school!

Kylinn at 11 (affiliate link)

I'm really happy with this layout. It's colorful and whimsical, just like Kylinn. What a blessing to have her in our lives! You can see Kylinn's previous 10 birthday layouts here, here, and here. I love looking back on them and watching her grow. Happy 11th, Kylinn!

Kylinn at 10

After ten years, it's not exactly a surprise when I give my goddaughter Kylinn a framed scrapbook page for her birthday. But she's always SO excited to see the color scheme and the words I choose to describe her. I just love her enthusiasm!

Here's this year's layout. It's the one that had the tone-on-tone background stamping:

 

You can see Kylinn's nine other birthday layouts here and here. Ten years old. Where has the time gone?!

Kylinn at 9

Hi everyone! This is Cindy. I hope you all enjoyed Trevor's blog takeover the past few weeks. Huge congratulations to Trevor for a very successful Project CAT! Thank you to all who participated. Trevor and I had a blast putting it together.

With summer-themed kids' crafts dominating the blog for the past few weeks, I haven't shared the scrapbooking I've been doing. First up is the layout I made for my goddaughter Kylinn's 9th birthday at the end of July:

I'm really happy with how it turned out. More importantly, she loves it! I really enjoy making these layouts for her each year. It's so much fun to go back and look at all the layouts from her previous birthdays to see how she's changed and grown. 

Tomorrow I'll share what I made for her little sister's birthday.

Kylinn at 8

Each year, I make a framed scrapbook page for my goddaughter Kylinn's birthday. This year, for the first time, she requested a specific color scheme: lavender and pink. Yikes. Totally not my colors at all. But, anything for the Birthday Girl!

Thank goodness for Tanya's box of goodies.  It was loaded with all sorts of pinks and lavenders, stuff I never buy. While there were lots of pinks and lavenders to choose from, there weren't any papers that combined the two colors. I selected a pink and white floral to use as the base for the layout. I matted the photo with a lavender, then used the scraps to punch small circles, which I added as centers to the floral background. I inked some light pink letters to make them darker, then added Stickles so that they'd sparkle. Here's the finished layout:  

Here are the previous seven years.  I love going back and reading the words I used to describe Kylinn each year.

Happy 8th birthday, Kylinn!

Kylinn at 7

Each year, I make a framed scrapbook page for goddaughter Kylinn's birthday.  This year, I was inspired by her skirt to create this bright and happy page.

Here are the previous six years.  It's so fun to see how she's grown and changed.

Happy birthday, Kylinn!

Kylinn at Six

As promised, here is the layout of my goddaughter Kylinn at 6.   

 

And here is the coordinating card.  

I had a heck of a time making this layout.  Ellia's came together quickly and easily, but this one was quite the struggle.

The problems started with the picture.  Kylinn's mom Courteney emailed me the picture she wanted me to use.  As I always do when I need to complete a layout but don't have a hard copy of the photo yet, I printed out a quick copy on ordinary paper using our home printer (which is not a photo printer).  It looked like Kylinn's shirt was blue, so I designed an awesome layout based on a specific piece of glittery blue floral paper.  Then I picked up the developed photo and learned that the shirt was actually purple and clashed horribly with the paper.  Aargh.  

I ended up chalking the paper to make it work. Unfortunately, when you chalk a glittery paper, you end up removing huge amounts of glitter. And the sharp glitter tears up the applicator / kleenex / cottonball that you use to apply the chalk. It took FOREVER just to get some hints of the right shade of purple on the paper. The left is the original paper, the middle shows it with sweeps of purple chalk, and the right shows the huge amount of glitter that ended up on my table instead of the paper where it belonged.

 

But the paper was only Problem 1.  The next problem was the pale blue bling-string (that's what I'm now deciding to call it).  It looked great with the blue paper but looked terrible once I chalked the paper purple.  Fortunately, the solution to this problem was faster and easier.  I added a tiny dot to the top of each rhinestone using a black sharpie.  Here's the side view (original on the left, dots added to the ones on the right):

Here's the exact same thing, but from the top view.  Amazing how adding one tiny dot of color to the tops changed the whole look.  Once I added it to the layout, it reflected some of the purple and totally worked with the page.

It was quite a relief when this layout finally came together!  In the end, I'm very happy with how it turned out.  If you'd like to see them, here are the other layouts I've done for Kylinn's 1st through 5th birthdays.

Happy 6th birthday, Kylinn!

Kylinn at Five

I met Kylinn and her mom Courteney at an infant storytime at the library in January 2007.  Trevor was seven months old; Kylinn, 7 weeks younger.  The two babies were alike in so many ways and got along so well.  Our families quickly became close friends.

Now 4 1/2 years later, Kylinn and Trevor are still best friends, and I am Kylinn's godmother.  It seems like we've known each other forever.

Each year, I make a framed scrapbook page for Kylinn's birthday.  Here is Kylinn at Five:

And here are the layouts I've made for her other birthdays:

I love looking back on these!  We're so blessed to have Kylinn and her family in our lives.  Happy birthday Kylinn!  We love you.