My rejected layout...

Since it's been 3 weeks since I submitted it and I haven't gotten an email I am pretty sure it's safe to say that CK didn't want to publish the layout I sent in for February's page call for layouts with ink which means two things...1) no extra scrappy money for me...phooey and 2) I get to finally show it to you all.

No worries here though...the rejection doesn't bother me...I'm not 13 anymore...I can handle it without crying and/or buckets of ice cream. I will admit though I was really hopeful though cause I was super proud of how this layout came out...and why shouldn't I be...it's got lots of cool things going on.

First of all it's got these awesome tags...of course made with ink. They were super easy to make and I love how they turned out. I just stamped the tree image and tag frame with some staz-on on the front of a piece of transparency and then flipped it over and used alcohol inks to add all that vivid color...after it dried all I had to do was cut out the tag shapes and voila! Awesomeness!

Of course since the call was for ink I wanted to do even more fun stuff with ink so I sprayed the background with some glimmer mist and dribbled some alcohol ink to add some color. After that I used black pigment ink to stamp a ton of leaves all over and embossed them ... haven't done that in ages... really love how they came out...I thought doing them in black was very striking and a little different. 

Then I used some orange stazon to stamp some uber cute polka dots on the ribbon and used pigment ink to color my chipboard title. Lastly I used my fave Creative  Memories marker to outline around the pictures. If you've lost count...all together I used ink in 5 different ways! It was such a fun layout to work on...although I had to be patient for all that ink to dry...which was a mega feat in itself...that and I was so worried about getting ink on something that I was constantly wiping my hands and put everything I used away as soon as I was done with it. It was worth it though...I can proudly say I finished it with zero smudges! Hooray me.

Welcome to ACOWSAYS 2.0

I remember way back when I first started scrapping I did a layout about my daughter eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich...naturally being a total newbie to scrapping and therefore totally clueless I thought the best way to do that layout was to painstakingly cut out shapes from cardstock to create really big peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and then lovingly slap the pics on top of them...when I was done I thought wow I am so clever, isn't this cute. Of course now when I look back at that layout...I laugh...loudly. Seriously.
Well now that I have my blog up and running I feel the same way looking at my old blog...it is so peanut butter and jelly!! Seriously. Rookie. Amateur. Kindergarten finger paints. Actually finger paints are way cooler than my old blog.
My new blog however...version 2.0...is so so so so so so so much better.
What's better about it...umm pretty much everything.
Let's start with the blog header...it's amazing! Even if I do say so myself...which I do..just did...whatever. I love love love it ...annnndddd I had tons of fun making it. Digi is cool! And before my paper girls freak...no worries...I will not be going over to the dark side...love my paper and glue too much...but I must admit...digi is cool. For so so many reasons. All of what I used on the header were digi freebies...cause I love me some free stuff. A big shout out to freedigitalscrapbooking.com and grannyenchanted.com where I got all my great freebies...both sites have some super cute stuff and again you just can't beat free!
So what else is new and improved besides the header? Well let's see...
...I added a picture of myself...this way people will see I'm not actually a cow.
...and I added a bio...cause I'm just so fascinating
...I added a video bar so you can see previews of all 6 of my videos.
...I added a gadget so you can click and follow my blog (Please do!)
...I have a favicon!
...I added 4 new gallery pages...1 one for layouts, 1 for cards , 1 for all my other projects and 1 for my orgazination ideas. The galleries are pretty cool...not just because they are loaded with a ton of awesome creations ..but because if you double clik on a picture in the gallery it will open all of them in a photo array. Very cool.
My old blog did have some stuff I liked so I didn't completely trash everything when I switched...I did keep some of the stuff from there and brought it over here including...
...the page for my scraproom
...the dancing cow :)
...the list of blogs I follow (which I need to still add to)
...oh yeah and every single one of my old posts! Yeppers cause I'm crazy like that I brought over every post from my old blog and dropped it on the new one. I wanted a new blog so bad but really didn't want an empty blog so even though it took some time to do it I did it and it was worth it.
So yep that's pretty much all you need to know about ACOWSAYS 2.0 except for one other teeeny tiny little thing ...

I'm hosting a contest to kick off my new blog!!  

Yeppers ...I am gonna kick off this spanking new blog right and give away some scrappy goodies. In order to be eligible to win you have to do 2 things...first you have to start following my blog...you know you want to..so go ahead and do it. Second you have to check out my new blog...I mean really check it out...because your going on a bit of a scavenger hunt. Your mission if you choose to accept it is to look around my blog and hunt for these...

Before you panic ...you won't have to read every post to find them and there are only 8 (the one in this post doesn't count). All you have to do is look on my on the pages of my blog to find all the "hidden" hearts (hint..be sure to check the side bars and the header!). When you find them make a note of what color they are...they will either be pink like the one above or blue, green or orange. Post in the comments how many of each you found for a chance to win a package full of scrappy stuff from me! Simple right! Right!

so to recap ..1) follow my blog and 2) find the hearts and leave me a comment on how many of each color you found.
I will be drawing the winner on Monday March 19, 2012.
Good luck!

In need of a change

A change to my blog that is. Pretty much since the day I started my blog I have been unhappy with my blog's appearance. When I started in the bloggy world I had no clue about blog design but I was eager to get blogging so I decided to start my blog and work on tweaking it's appearance as I learned more. Well so much for that plan... here it is months later and I still have no freakin clue about blog design and my blog still looks like crap. I have tried and tried and tried to improve my blog but I think between my general lack of knowledge and the fact that wordpress frustrates the heck out of me I think it might be time to throw in the towel and start anew. After playing around on blogger I am thinking of moving my blog over to there. I have only been playing around with blogger for a little while and I am already finding it much easier than wordpress...at least in the design department. Here's the problem I have with wordpress...since I don't have the skills, time or patience to design my own blog I have to rely on whatever templates are available...of which there are alot..and for as many hours as I have spent surfing through template after template I cannot find anything that I like. Some are close but just not close enough. I've tried learning about changing CSS but every time I've tried changing the CSS I have failed miserably. Since I have barely enough time to scrap and blog on a regular basis I really don't have time to keep wasting on blog design. Now I just have to commit to making the jump because it basically means starting over...getting a new blog addy out there and all that. But I think it will be for the best. Of course when and if I get the new blog up and running I will be sure to let you all know.