Scrapbookers are the Nicest People

They are. Really.

I have been fortunate to meet the nicest people through my hobby. Most of them I have met online. Now people not familiar with the online scrapbook community might think it is a little strange. I can assure that it is not.
For one example, remember my post about my December Daily from last year that I finally finished but was missing the size of Owires I needed to bind it? I posted that and within 30 minutes had someone offer to send me the size I needed. And within a week, Marcia from OH, had sent me exactly what I needed. That sort of thing happens all of the time. You post on a message board that you have been looking for X and can't find it, and you will have tons of people looking for you at their local scrapbook stores. Sometimes I think it is a contest to see who can find it first and get it sent off to the lucky recipient.

All of this takes me to today. A few years ago, I got to meet Nikki. We had met online on the Creating Keepsakes Message Board. She is from Springfield, MO and since I live in St. Louis, we decided to meet up at one of their local conventions. First time we met was in Kansas City and then at the convention here in St. Louis. There was actually a total of four of us that met up. We took some classes together and even went out to dinner.

Well about a year ago, Nikki decided to start up her own scrapbook company, Nikki Sivils Scrapbooking. I was so lucky to get to see her lines when she was developing them back in April at the St. Louis CK convention. She has some really cute lines!

And today I get this box full of her products. She sent me a kit to make an adorable Christmas Album. How awesome is that!?  About a week ago, she emailed me and said she wanted to RAK (Random Act of Kindness) me something. I can't believe all of the goodies she sent me. I can not wait to make this album!

And isn't this pen of her mascot, Willie-Bee, just the cutest?! Love it!

So THANK YOU NIKKI!!! I love all of it and I am so glad that I got to meet you through this awesome hobby of ours. And I wish you nothing but the biggest success in the new year!

As for my other accomplishment, I got the first batch of my Christmas Cards in the mail today. Yippee! Once I know that most folks have received them I will post the actual card here.

Thanks for visiting me!

Cookie Night with Santa

Last night was Cookies with Santa night at the boy's school. I will be honest and say that I wasn't really wanting to go to this. It was rainy and cold outside. And warm and cozy in our house.  But they wore me down and convinced us to go. And we had a really great time! 

They had crafts for all of the kids to do. This was just one table out of about 10 tables with different craft projects.  

They also had a shopping area. The boys brought their own money and bought gifts. I believe they bought a gift for me, their dad and each other. I told them they had to buy presents first, then they could buy a little something for themselves if they had money left over. They both managed to have a little money left over to get themselves a little something. :-) (They get that honestly from both their mother and father!)

Then we wrote some letters to Santa and went to see the big guy. Connor has been having a difficult time coming up with something to ask Santa for. Here he is thinking about it. 

And thinking about it some more. 

Aha! Something finally came to him! 

Spencer jumped in there for a quick picture and to tell his list. Spencer has no problem coming up with lots of ideas for Santa! 

Then it was off to decorate cookies. 

Spencer came up with quite a masterpiece!

I'm still working away on my Christmas cards. I took this picture myself with the self-timer today. I thought it turned out pretty good! My goal is to have them all done and ready to be mailed out next Monday. That is my goal!!!


Thanks again for visiting me! 

My Comments Came Back!

I was just looking over my blog here, trying to think of something else to post, when I noticed all the comments carried over from my old blog! I thought they were all gone. Well, they were all gone for about a week when I changed the name. How weird.......I'm just going to go with the idea that this was a Blogger Christmas miracle. Yea, I know that is a stretch but I'm trying to keep it with the season. :-)

I am actually doing a lot of creating. It just happens to be on my Christmas cards. And if I post them before they go postal it will spoil the surprise.

So I got nothing for you today. Nothing but my Blogger Christmas miracle. ;-)

Thanks for visiting.

A year late, but I finished!

So in celebration of changing my blog name over to Christie Cre8s, I thought I would finally finish and post my December Daily album from last Christmas. 


Actually it was mostly completed last Christmas, but has been on my desk all year only needing the cover and binding done. I'm afraid that is what I do with a lot of projects; almost complete them except for one part. And I still don't have one part done: the binding. I do not have a big enough Owire to bind this because it got kind of fat. I think I'm going to need the 1 1/4". So I will be on the look out for those at Hobby Lobby or Archivers. I hope I can find them there so I don't have to order online. 


So now that the Christmas 2009 season is upon us, I will proudly display my Christmas 2008 December Daily album! 

The cover I completed this morning. I like how it turned out!
Then page/day one and so on. 

I like how Day six turned out. I made a file folder on my Cricut. I think I used the Graphically Speaking cartridge, but it has been a year ago and my memory might not be so accurate. Anyway, I like how it opens up for the journaling and more pics. And then one more pic on the back. 

Our Christmas doesn't end on the 25th. We either travel to Dayton, OH or Kansas City to celebrate with family. Last year we went to OH and the drive there was horrendous! Terrible, terrible fog. 

The last page of my book has a pocket that I recorded the gifts we received. I thought it would be fun to look back on later and see what was the hot toy the boys got in 2008.


So now that I got 2008 done, I can start on 2009!  


Thanks for visiting me and checking out my new blog. Everything stayed the same except that I lost all my previous comments. That was a bummer, but I hope that I won't be getting any strange visitors with this new name. :-)

I'm here.

I really haven't had anything to blog about. Hopefully that will change with the holidays right around the corner.

I'm working on my Christmas cards, but keep changing my mind on what to do. ~Sigh~ One of these years, I'm just going to do the photo card.

Since I don't have anything new to share I thought I would show a few pictures from our Gulf Shores trip.

One day we decided to drive up to Mobile, AL to go to the USS Alabama. We arrived in Mobile right at lunch time and decided to find a place to eat in downtown before we went on the USS Alabama tour.

We parked and just walked around until we found a restaurant. First we came across this pretty park that had this fountain right in the middle of it.

Then we found this restaurant. Mama's Restaurant. Oh my, it was so good! And I'm sure extremely unhealthy.
And then we walked around a bit more and I took this picture of two silly boys.
Mobile was really pretty. I loved the architecture of the buildings and how green everything was.

If you ever happen to be in Mobile, AL, I highly recommend Mama's. I'm wishing I had that fried chicken and mac & cheese right now. Yum!

Thanks again for visiting me!

More Holiday Planners

These are the planners I made in more traditional Christmas colors.

Here is a close-up of the Santa. He was from the Holiday Button Bits stamp set I got from Paper Trey Ink. They really have the cutest stamps.

I colored him with my Copic markers.

There is a snowman in the set that I can't wait to make up too. So cute!

And last night was Connor's final soccer game. Finally! It was suppose to end 3 weeks ago, but all of the rain we had in October kept extending out the season. He was very happy last night because he got his 2nd Soccer Trophy. Although on the way home he kept talking about how the trophy looked like it was wearing a bra. I told him I was sure it was just manly muscles.

In all honesty though, it does look a little like the guy is wearing a bra.

If you click on the pic to make it bigger, you can kind of see what he was talking about. ;-)

Thanks again for visiting me! And have a great weekend!

Christmas Planners

So last month I bought these cute notepads and stamp set from Paper Trey Ink. And I have been having so much fun making these cute Holiday Planners. They come together really fast and easy. (Click on the pictures to make them bigger.)

Nichole from Paper Trey Ink gave a free download template for the covers. (You can get it here. Just scroll down about half way through her post.) After I started making mine I found that I like to make them a little longer than what her template shows. You can see in the picture above that the center notepad just fits right inside the cover. That one is using her template exactly as is. When I started making them a little longer, it gave a little more room around the notepad. For me, I just thought it looked a little nicer and the covers seemed to close better. I also thought the inside pocket would be be good to keep receipts.

I have made a couple with more traditional Christmas colors. I will share those later this week.

So have you started your Christmas shopping yet? I have bought a few things, but I really don't start until it gets closer to December.

Thanks again for visiting me!