First, sorry this is so late. Life has been very hectic in the Washington household and about to get even more hectic I am sure :-)

My challenge is a timed for the holiday gift giving whirl wind we soon will find ourselves in. I love this time of year, especially the time spent celebrating with family and friends. I also enjoy creating gifts and home decor for my loved ones. So my challenge is simply this: create a piece of household decor for a gift or for use in your home. It does not have to be holiday themed although it certainly can be. You do need to use some scrapbooking supplies. That is it. Really. The prize for the lucky winner will be some Tim Holtz product :-) The winner will be chosen December 4th. Yup, I am giving you a few days more since I took a few days to post.

Last year I ha an opportunity to take a class given by Tim Holtz. We made holiday mirrors. For my challenge I took the same concept, but simplified it... i.e. less embellishments and used a bird theme. The materials used were: the wonderful 2.99 Ikea mirror (love Ikea), scrapbook paper, clip art, Fragments (clear plastic shapes I mounted paper and clip art under), Glossy Accents, Gel Medium, inks, jewelry findings, bead charms, feather, Grunge Paper cut into squares and Crackle Paint).

My recently done mirror:

The mirror I created last year in Tim's class.

Thank you all and I look forward to seeing your pieces! Let the fun begin! :-)
Anne

and the winner is...

Penny!!!!!!

Congratulations Penny! My boys picked your name randomly, thanks to all of your beautiful entries. I've enjoyed reading everyone's tags and hope you all continue creating them for the rest of the month! I'll edit this post later and add some of our favorites...we chose them as a family.

Penny, send me your address (laverneboese@gmail.com) and I'll put your ATC & Photo Carousel in the mail!!!!

Have a great day....and I hope to see you back for our next challenge!

Simple Thanks

In my household, yesterday (Halloween) marked the beginning of the hectic, holiday season.

We run around crazy on a mad dash to the month of December, where people celebrate holidays like Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Christmas.

So, today my challenge is designed to slow down the pace a little and get you into the spirit of this month's holiday, THANKSGIVING.

Don't worry, if you don't celebrate Thanksgiving, you can still play along!

Before I share my challenge with you, I'm showing you what you'll win:

Your very own 7 Gypsies ATC & Photo Display!

So, here's what you have to do to play along:

I'm keeping it very simple since the one thing we lack during the holidays is TIME. It's so simple, that if you truly want to get into the spirit of "being thankful", you'll play everyday.


1. Throughout your day, think about something that you're THANKFUL for or something that happened to you that day that made you HAPPY and put a smile on your face.

2. When you have a chance, decorate one side of a tag, ATC, piece of chipboard, a photo, etc. about what it is that you're THANKFUL for or what made you HAPPY that day.

3. Remember that your creation should really take you no more than 10 minutes to make. It's all about what made you happy or thankful that day. Your design doesn't need to be elaborate or fancy.

4. On the back of your creation, jot down an act of kindness you're going to do for someone else (how you're going to "pay it forward"). You get to decide when to "pay it forward", by the way.

5. Take a picture of your creation.

6. Leave a comment with a link to your creation. And if it's not too personal, include a sentence on how you're "paying it forward".

7. To play, you only need to submit ONE ENTRY. However, you can submit ONE ENTRY every day to increase your chances of winning the ATC carousel. So since my challenge runs from the 1st to the 15th, you can have a maximum of 15 entries total.

I'm doing this challenge with my family for the entire month of November. This is how we're using our ATC display and how we're "paying it forward":

We started a day early, so we'd have samples to show you today:

Mine:

Back:

Alexander's:

back:

Christopher's:

back: (i will draw a picter for sumwun)

My husband's:

back:


Our tags displayed on our ATC/photo carousel:

We have decided as a family that this challenge will emphasize being thankful in November and giving in December. So all during November, we'll be writing down things that we're thankful for and adding them to our carousel. On the back is a plan for giving back. Then in December, we'll take our creations off of the carousel and fulfill the task on the back --"pay it forward". This is meant to be easy. Some people might have something to be thankful for every day in November - and a plan for giving back every day in December. Some might only have two or three from November. Easy.

But again,TO PLAY ALONG YOU ONLY HAVE TO SUBMIT ONE ENTRY.

Just a few sample tags, to show you how fun and easy this is:








And the one I did this morning that took me all of 5 seconds:


And if your family is playing along with you, it might be helpful to have tags and materials already set aside for them to use:


Can't wait to see all of the things that you're thankful for!!!

Photo Mix Up Challenge Winner

Congratulations to Peg! Not only did you create a fabulous layout, but I drew your name as the winner of the Mix It Up Challenge. Peg please send your email address to me at nichoda @ comcast dot net. I hope you enjoy using your Studio Calico gift certificate!

Interested in seeing Peg's layout? Check out her layout by clicking HERE.

Get ready...

Hello All. Anilú here bringing you a new challenge.

Start thinking about your fave fonts cause you'll be using them for this challenge.

I'm slightly swamped in paper work, so the challenge might be a couple of days late.

Photo Mix Up Challenge

Hey everyone! It's Denise and it is my turn to host the BASB challenge. Just a little info about me...I love taking photographs and editing them in Photoshop. I am far from being a professional, but in my opinion it doesn't matter how good you are...just have fun and experiment. Due to my love of playing with photos, I thought this challenge should involve editing them somehow. I am challenging you to a mix up. Make a creation using a mixture of color and black & white photo(s). You have the option on how many photos you include. If you are a superstar at editing and want to do one black & white with spot coloring, go for it. You put whatever spin on the challenge you wish. I kept it simple with including photos of each.

This is my layout:

Greta's:

Dawn's:

Waleska's:

Briana's:

Post your layouts/cards on your blog or favorite gallery with a link in the comments of this posting. You have until midnight on the 14th of October. I will post the winner on October 15. Up for grabs this time is a $15 Gift Certificate to Studio Calico. Have fun!

Drumroll please!

Thanks to everyone who went mini with us. It's always a pleasure seeing everyone's layouts. Now to the point...

MICA, you're our lucky winner! Please email me (glbaksa at gmail dot com) with your mailing address so I can get your prize off to you. :)