Scraplifting

They say that imitation is the highest form of flattery.  When I learn that someone loves my work enough to copy it exactly, it is indeed incredibly flattering.  I recently got a message from a woman named Lisa (Dancinirish90), telling me that she'd done a lift of my layout "So Happy Together." 

Here is Lisa's:

And here is mine:

Lisa, thanks for the compliment!  And thanks for being the kind of person who gives proper credit.  You're awesome.  Lisa does very nice original work as well, which you can see using the link above.

And speaking of giving proper credit, I should mention again that my layout was based on a sketch by Shannon White. 

Usually when I scraplift, my finished project bears little resemblance to the original.  Try as I might to embrace someone else's, my own style pushes its way through.  Over the years, there have only been a few layouts that I've copied outright.  The layout below is one.  It's of the most scraplifted layouts I have ever seen.  And it's no wonder- it is gorgeous.  This is by the fabulous MissyGinCT.

Here is my version:

How You Can Tell I Am Not from the South

I was born in Northern California and have lived here all my life.  I grew up in a city about an hour from San Francisco, moved 2 hours away to go to college, and now live halfway between those two.  I'm a Californian through and through.

I've been to the South a few times, mostly to go to Disney World, start a cruise, or do other touristy things.  None of those trips gave me much of a chance to experience what the South is really like, with one exception.  About 10 years ago, my friend Kathy and I spent a week in Northern Florida visiting our friend Colleen, who had recently moved there.  That trip was different, as I got a much more in-depth taste (literally!) of life in that part of the country.  We stayed at the very charming River Park Inn in Green Cove Springs.  There, I had grits for the first time in my life.  (Verdict: delicious!)

But there remain many Southern dishes that I have never tried.  In my 39 years of life, I have never had fried green tomatoes.  This year, our tomato plants are so heavy that they are bending and sprawling out of their raised bed and onto the lawn.  We're doing a decent job of keeping up with the ripe tomatoes, but there are some huge unripe ones that are really weighing down the plant.  I picked the largest and googled "fried green tomatoes."

I found several recipes with the title of "Best Fried Green Tomatoes."  They had small variations, but generally involved a some combination of a milk/buttermilk/egg wash, followed by breading in cornmeal/bread crumbs.  I picked one that had good reviews and set forth.  Here are my slices, breaded and waiting to go:

I heated up a tablespoon or two of oil, then added a few slices, taking care not to crowd them. 

Then I reread the recipe.  Wait a minute- did that say to put a QUART of oil in the pan??  Silly Californian!  I'd automatically put a tablespoon in, like I do whenever I fry something.  I pulled out my tomatoes and heated way more oil.  Not nearly a quart, but at least the oil was visible in the pan.

I cooked the tomatoes until the crust was golden brown, then put them on paper towels to drain.  I heated up some leftover spaghetti sauce and laid the fried green tomatoes on top.  I added a side dish of cucumber and tomato salad.  Dinner is served!

And then I suddenly wondered- are fried green tomatoes an entree?  I have no idea.  Should I have served something else?  Would they have been an entree if I'd used the entire quart of oil the recipe called for?

As for the taste... well, they were OK.  Not what I expected.  Not as good as other fried food, nor as good as a plain ripe tomato.  They were more tart than I expected, and the cornmeal crust wasn't what I expected either.

Help me, my Southern friends!  (Or my foodie friends from other places.)  Was my version so laughable that I haven't actually tasted fried green tomatoes the way they're supposed to be?  Do you like them?  Do you have a great recipe to share?

Little Details

Back in June, I blogged about the zoo-themed birthday parties Trevor had when he turned five.  Here is the layout from the celebration with his friends at the Oakland Zoo.  I had so much fun putting this together- I love the bright colors of the pictures and wanted the layout to be equally fun and happy to match the spirit of the party. 

What I like most about this layout are the little details.  With twelve pictures and bright lime/orange papers all demanding the viewers' attention, I needed to keep the embellishments simple, but not so plain they'd be lost.  I started with the grungeboard 5.  I painted it orange, rubbed it with orange Stickles, and then tied on the ribbon.  I used the same Stickles to cover the brad and to fill in the center of the star-shaped button.  I edged the vellum circles in Stickles. 

I love the way the dotted vellum sets off the 5 and the date.  I'd originally used the same dotted vellum for the journaling, but it was hard to read.  I switched to a plain vellum and it looks much better.

Such a fun layout and such great memories from a fantastic day!

Mindy Derosfir, at your service!

I spent the first 32 years of my life being Cindy Jones. Not surprisingly, my name didn't get misspelled or mispronounced very often. In fact, I can only remember two times EVER that someone got my name wrong.

When I was about 13, our family went to Mexico. "HOE-ness family?" the man called to the waiting crowd. Nobody answered. "HOE-ness family?" he asked increasingly loudly. I can't remember which of us finally realized he was calling for the Jones family. It is the one and only time I've ever heard Jones mispronounced. I've never seen it misspelled.

When I was 18, I became a California 4-H Diamond Star. (Scroll down to 1990-1991 to see a picture of my team.) I traveled all around the state giving speeches. Usually I wrote my own, but occasionally I received a pre-written speech. One arrived with an introduction that read, "My name is Cindy Smith." I thought this was hilarious and practiced it that way. My mom warned me not to... and I should have listened. I told an assembled crowd of about 1000 people, "My name is Cmindy Sith." And a nickname was born that lasts to this day.

When I married Steve and became Cindy deRosier, I knew that my new last name would cause some problems. Pretty much nobody pronounces it correctly on the first try. Some of my longtime friends don't know how to say it. (It is French for "of the rose" and is pronounced de-ROSE-e-a.  Think Cartier, Garnier, or dossier.) That was quite a shock for someone who grew up as a Jones.

And as difficult as deRosier is to say, it is even harder to spell. It starts with a lowercase letter and has a capital letter in it with no space in between, which freaks people out. We are frequently alphabetized after the Z's, as if lowercase d is somehow not a D at all. 

For the last 7 years, I've been collecting address labels and other things with ridiculous spellings of my name. I keep them in a file labeled, "deRosier is not THAT hard." I have enough that I could do a whole book. Instead, I chose the 'best' and made this layout.

I encourage all of you to collect misspellings of your name and make your own layout! It was so much fun... and quite hilarious to see all the weird versions of my name in one place.

Trevor at 5

I am very lucky in that my husband is a talented and knowledgeable photographer with professional equipment.  Every year, Steve does Trevor's birthday portraits.

Here is Trevor at 5:

I used this great sketch from Shannon White:

It's so fun looking back to see how much Trevor has grown.

Time flies when you're having fun!