No, I have not fallen off the face of the earth....

...I have just not been scrapbooking! There were of course the endless holiday preparations last month and a long and not fun to - do list greeting the new year. But during our 4 day crop....yes....Friday, Saturday, Sunday & Monday, I scrapped a dozen layouts to share with you. So here are the first few featuring the Alphabet Soup collection from My Mind's Eye.

This collection is so much fun and has a bright, kid-friendly color scheme. It also features a unique embellishment...playing cards. Here I sanded the cards and added them as an extra background layer on the layout. Aren't they cute?

For the "girl layout" I strung together several cards to form a banner accented by crystal embellishments from Melissa Frances.

And finally, there are some fun prints for Valentine's Day, like this argyle heart pattern. I red ribbon as an accent. Remember....colors don't have to be matchy matchy to be look good. They can be the same hue...just a stronger tone as in this layout. Colors should compliment, not clash. And I used the backside of the playing cards to add another heart element to the page. The weaving was super easy....just cut one inch strips and inch apart from one another.

Hope this inspires some creativity for you in the new year. I'll share more layouts soon!

Sonja