I took some photos of the Dogwood Blossoms today. I really liked a page I saw by one of the participants in the photography challenge at Deco-Pages, so I used it as inspiration. This is the inspiration page...

by BansGran posted at www.deco-pages.com

I am so excited, because I am hosting another Photography challenge for the month of May at Deco-Pages.com (http://www.deco-page.com/) and we are having such a good time. I have created a page every day along with the other participants... it's been so much fun to see all the beautiful Spring flowers and more... If you are not a Club Deco Member, these are 8 wonderful reasons why you should join the Club! All of the pages (except for the Martial Arts page) were created with Quick Pages from the Mother's Day - May 2008 - Mega Kit for Club Deco Members. Every Month our Design Team gets together and creates a HUGE kit for our Club Deco Members... we choose a color pallet and a theme, and then every designer creates a mini kit and Quick Pages for our members! I am telling you, this is the deal of a lifetime! You can now try the Club for one month for just $7.99 ... One Club Deco kit is worth way more than $20.00! You can also buy a 3 month trial membership for $15.00 or the Annual Membership is just $36.00 for a full year of Club Deco! If you are a registered user in our forum, you can order your subscription by coming to our forum... http://board.deco-pages.com/forums/payments.php

Here are my pages I have created for the Photography Challenge to date:


T.G.I.F.!!!! It was a very busy week for me, and I am so glad it is over and the weekend is here. On my break at work today I saw these dandelion seeds and I remembered when I was a child, how much I used to love to blow on them and watch the little seeds drift away. This little ball of fun reminded me of the days when my Mom would have the neighbors up in arms because we always had so many dandelions in our yard, and to them, they all wanted a rich green lawn, with no pretty little yellow flowers in it. Mom could never seem to get them under control. I created this page with one of CAZ Quick Pages from the Mother's Day Mega Kit for Club Deco Members for the month of May. This is such a beautiful page to work with! I love the way this came out! Thank you so much Carol!

Before I raked the leaves away this afternoon I took these photos. My Mom told me that she wanted to go home to Long Island and be put to rest in the cemetery where her family is, so we did as she asked. The first Spring after she was gone, I felt bad that I was so far away. So I purchased this Angel and put it in my back yard. I plant flowers for her here, and I sit and talk to her... I think of her and the times we had together.I think of the times when I held her hand, or we just sat and watched some old movie on TV that she loved. I think about cups of tea with sugar and milk, Macaroni's on Sunday, the smell of her perfume... all bring me quiet moments of gratitude.Mary Ridgeway's Quick Page was just perfect for these photos and the journaling I wanted to do. Mary created this Quick Page with her contribution to the Mother's Day Mega Kit for Club Deco Members. Thank you so much Mary!

I saw my scarecrow peaking out behind the bookcase today and decided he had to be moved out where I could see him... Thank you so much Marcee (RoseMade Designs) for your wonderful quick page from the Club Deco - May 2008 Mega Kit - Mother's Day! With a little color change, it was just perfect for what I wanted to do. Gotta love the ability to change colors with digital... not so easy to do with traditional scrapbooking supplies!

It was a beautiful day yesterday, and I had an errand to run for work... who would NOT volunteer to go pick up printer paper on such a perfect day, esp. if one has a digital camera in her purse! LOL!I used one of Dragons Lair Designs Quick pages from the May 2008 Mega Kit for Club Deco Members - Mother's Day for this. I did change the colors to match my photo, added a flower from the kit, and a jounaling area with rounded corners. Thank you so much for the Quick Page! I love the way this turned out!

It was another beautiful day today, so I was able to take a walk by the river again.My breakroom at work is grand when the sun is shining and mother nature fills it with beautiful flowers for all to enjoy! I was taking photos up by a tree, when the shutter went off on the camera, a woman walking on the path gasped and said I scared her. I guess she did not see me up there taking photos. Maybe next time I am on a photo shoot, I should wear a bell around my neck. Do you think that is why cows wear bells? I used Carol Rupley's Quick Page for this! I just love Carol's page... it really worked out great for my photo! Thanks Carol!

All winter long as I look out our living room window at the barren tree with the nest still sitting in it, I wondered if in the spring the Robins would use it again... well they have been rebuilding... And the tree is in bloom and looks so pretty.I used a Quick Page by Carol Rupley from the Mother's Day kit for Club Deco for this page! I just loved it! Thanks Carol!

Today was a very exciting day for Matthew, he was awarded a Black Belt in his Martial Arts Class. This is the first time in 10 years that Mr. Josh has given out a Black Belt, and Matthew and Dwight (not pictured) were the first to get them. This is a new kit I am working on that will be available in our store very soon at www.deco-pages.com

Before work today, the sun was out for just a little bit, and I saw this pretty little weed and had to get a shot! It's fun how this challenge makes me look for things I might not have taken the time to see before! These little flowers are much smaller in real life than they are in the photo! I used one of the quick pages I created for the May 2008 Club Deco Mega Kit - Mother's Day!

I took this photo yesterday on a little break from designing ads for my day-job. This sculpture caught my eye. Club Deco - Mother's Day - Quick Page by Burkhart Scrapzone

WILD THING

This months kit for Club Deco Members is WILD THING! Oh what a fun kit! The contributing designers did an excellent job on this kit! I loved working on it! Deco-Pages is now offering three ways to join the club... you can join for 1 year for $36.00, 3 months for $15.00, and now we are also offering a 1 month trial for just $7.99! So why not try the club for a month and see what a great deal it is! You get the equivelent of 12 - 14 kits from the designers every month! You also get the Color Challenge Starter Kit, and so much more from our Design Team! Please join us today, you now sign up for Club Deco in the forum... here is a link to find out how...

http://board.deco-pages.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3355

This is my contribution to the WILD THING KIT....

I am so excited! Candie has joined me as a Guest CT Member,

and has a couple of Quick Pages she created to share with you.

You can pick up the Freebies at her blog... http://www.candiescreations.blogspot.com/

This is the page I created using her Quick Page. She created the

quick page with my Grungie Day kit, which is available at

http://www.deco-pages.com/ The photos I used are of Jeff

when he was just a little guy. I showed him the photos and then

took the words out of his mouth for the quote on the scrapbook page.

Now, I want you to know that you cannot DATE me by the date on

this page... I was not even born yet! He sure was a little cutie!

Hello everyone, I have a very important announcement to make! The Deco-Pages Designers and http://www.printmykeepsake.com/ have joined forces to bring you an exciting and fun new contest! The winner of the contest will get 5 free 12 x 12 printed pages of their choice from their scrapbooks from http://www.printmykeepsake.com/ and will also get a 3 month membership to Club Deco for FREE! Please take a moment to visit our sponsor, I will tell you personally, that I think they do an excellent job with the printing! I have a page that they printed for me framed and sitting on my mantle in the living room.

Your scrapbook pages will be voted on in the gallery, and the top 5 runners-up by votes will also get the page they submit to the contest printed for FREE by www.printmykeepsake.com. In addition to that, ANYONE that participates in the contest will get a 1 month FREE TRIAL to Club Deco!

The Deco-Pages Designers have been working away on a wonderful new kit, which you will use to create your page for the contest. This Mega Kit is a steal at only $7.99 in the store, and don’t forget, if you purchase this kit, and participate in the contest, you will automatically be given a 1 Month FREE TRIAL to CLUB DECO! (This months Digital Mega Kit for Club Deco Members is called Totally Grungy, and you are going to love it!) The contest kit is called My Favorite Things… and you are going to love adding this kit to your Digital Scrapbooking Collection!

Click here to go to the store to purchase the My Favorite Things Digital Scrapbook Mega Kit.

Here are the rules of the contest.

You have the entire month of February to complete your scrapbook page using the new kit, My Favorite Things from the Deco-Pages Designers. You must use at least 2 elements and/or backgrounds from the My Favorite Things Digital Scrapbook Mega Kit by the Deco-Pages Design Team in your scrapbook page. The Theme for your scrapbook page must be "My Favorite Things!"

Your page must be submitted to the gallery no later than February 29th, 2008.

You may submit as many pages as you like, but you must use the My Favorite Things kit. You will submit your pages and post them to a special area of the gallery (I will include a link to it here for your convenience).

We will then set up a voting area in the forum, where anyone can vote for his or her favorite page.

The Voting will take place for one week, beginning on March 1, 2008. The winner being the top voted for scrapbook page on March 7, 2008.

If you are already a Club Deco Member, and purchase the My Favorite Things kit, and submit a scrapbook page for the contest, your membership will be extended for one month, or 3 should you win the contest!

Good luck to you all, and we are really looking forward to seeing your pages!

Oh! I just love the new Snow Much Fun Brag Book that is now available at www.deco-pages.com ! These pages are so easy to use... they are .png formats, you open then up in your graphics programs, and then open your photo, copy and paste it, then in your layers palett, move the photo under the Quick Page, position it where you want it, add a little journaling if you so desire, and you are finished! How quick is that for creating a really cool brag book you can print out and share with your family and friends!

Visit Deco-Pages today and purchase this wonderful Brag Book!

Here is the page I did today for my 31 days of photos. As you can see, I came back to it after dinner and left myself a note to self! THAT is NOT the same thing as Chilli Powder! LOL

It finally stopped snowing today... the sun was shining, and the pine trees were beautiful in their frocks of snow. This is day three of my 31 days of photos. I loved working with a Quick Page by CAZ from the January 2008 Club Deco Mega Kit - Snow Much Fun! There are so many wonderful winter backgrounds, elements, papers and quick pages in the kit! Club Deco is a fantastic program at www.deco-pages.com!

I went to the surgeon for my first follow up visit since my surgery on Dec. 20th. I had to have sinus glands removed from both of my underarms last year. Then on Dec. 27th, I was working on Layout for my day-job at FMA and fell and broke my left arm in the parking lot at the office. The parking lot is blacktop, and it was dark out, and I did not see the ice... This is the second time I have fallen in that stupid parking lot! I fell there last winter too... The most recent surgery was on my right underarm, so I have two "bad" arms right now! I am just glad it is all over with in 2007... hopefully that means 2008 will be much better! Anyway, the Surgeon said that the right arm is healing ok, that I need to keep using the anti-biotic cream on it, and she is not worried about the infections that are still there. I have to go back in two weeks.

Happy New Year Everyone! I am so impressed with the new Mega Kit for Club Deco Members that our Design Team has put together! Every month I sound like a broken record... I keep saying that they outdo themselves, well, this month is no exception! This kit is just beautiful!

I have two different challenges going on at Deco-Pages right now. I have a Photography Challenge... 31 days of photos. The Challenge is to take a photo every day in the month of Jan. Then to create at least 5 scrapbook pages with your photos. I have already created two pages with my two photos so far this month... here there are...

and here is the one from today...

If you participate in the 31 days of photos challenge, you get to choose any one of my kits from the store for free! So get those cameras out!

Every month Deco-Pages sends out a newsletter. In the newsletter I have posted a little note. In that note is another challenge. If you do not get our newsletter, you can sign up for it on the homepage at www.deco-pages.com or you can check the newsletters which can always be found at the site... here is a link to view them...

http://www.deco-pages.com/pages.php?pageid=7

The reward for participating in my newsletter challenge is my new kit Panache! Please visit the store at www.deco-pages.com to see it.... I had so much fun creating it!

http://www.deco-pages.com/product.php?productid=17139&cat=0&page=1

Today is Digital Scrapbooking Day, and I have created this little freebie for you! You will find it in the forum at www.deco-pages.com. Here is a direct link to the thread in the forum where you can download my little gift... I hope you had a wonderful Digital Scrapbooking Day!

http://board.deco-pages.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2780

My new kit, Fancy Fringes 2 has been released in the store at http://www.deco-pages.com/ I had so much fun with this kit! This is a scrapbook page I created with it...

This page was created for my son Matthew's Scrapbook, so the journaling reads:

Joseph Bifulco

Your Great-Grandpa

Matthew, this is my Grandpa. He was my Mother’s Father. His name was Joseph Bifulco. He was born in the United States, but when he was a young boy, his Mother and Father took him to Italy. His Sister Julia told me that their Grandmother hid him and when it was time for his parents to come home, he was left to spend his childhood and early adolescence with this Grand-- parents. When he was 17 years old, he was sent back to the United States to his parents.

My Great-Aunt Julia told me that she remembered the day they went to pick him up on Ellis Island from “the boat”. She said he was so handsome!

The memories I have of my Grandpa were that he loved my Grandma very much. I remember them kissing and hugging. He would sing to her. They would cook together. My Grandma was very affectionate to us too. I remember big gatherings of all the family at Christmas time. My Mother was one of 8 children. We would all come together at the Christmas Holiday.

My Grandma passed away on Christmas Eve when I was in the 5th grade. My Grandpa passed away, two years later, on the day before Thanksgiving. I remember, after that, the Holidays were always bittersweet for my Mom.

I remember Grandpa & Grandma used to speak in Italian when ever they did not want us to know what they were talking about. I don’t know if my Grandma spoke Italian because her parents did, or if she learned it from my Grandpa.

This photo was taken at the front door of my Grandparents house.

Another page I recently did was with a photo of my Mom and Me that I recently found. It was taken around 1977!

I love this photo of me and my Mom. It was taken in 1977, so I would have been about 13 years old. I loved using Little Sister by Lorene Hill for this page. Believe it or not, people were always asking my Mom if I was her little sister! (Ha! Bet it was a man too! She was so beautiful, all the men went ga-ga over her!) I also did a little Scraplifting on this page, hope you don't mind Lorene, but the page you did of your daughter and the kitty worked so well for this photo too, I just couldn't resist a little copy cat action!

Here is a link to the Little Sister kit by Lorene Hill in our store...
http://www.deco-pages.com/product.php?productid=16773&cat=0&page=1

Club Deco Mega Kit - Art Nouveau Surprise!

The October Club Deco Mega Kit - Art Nouveau Surprise has been released! If you are a Club Deco Member, you can download this kit in the private area of the forum at http://www.deco-pages.com/ Above is my contribution to this months kit.

This is the Quick Page that you will also get from me:

and this is an example of what it looks like in action:

This kit was so much fun to create, and although the colors are a little too brass to be true Art Nouveau, the creative licence taken is what makes this kit a surprise and so much fun! This kit can be used for so many digital scrapbooking page themes! I think the whole Design Team did an excellent job on it... here are a few more of the designers contributions...

By Dana Conditt:

And this contribution is from Designs by CAZ:

That's all I have time to show you right now, I will be back later to show you more of this fantastic kit! If you are not a Club Deco Member yet, or your membership has expired... do you really need more of a reason that this to join? LOL...

Susan G. Homen For The Cure

For the entire month of October, 100% of the profits from the sale of "Little Sister" kit by Lorene Hill will go to the Susan G. Komen foundation. Lorene will donate the profits of all the purchases of this kit on Oct. 31, 2007, You will also get the APR07 Sweet Beginnings (Shown: Top Right Corner) Designer Release by Lorene Hill for free and the Think Pink (preview above) mini will by e-mailed to after your purchase. You can help researchers and get a cool kit, too! Just add Little Sister and APR07 Club-Deco Sweet Beginnings ~ Lorene Hill to your cart. I will e-mail you your free Think Pink mini shortly after your purchase is complete!

A Note From Deb Ammerman:

I believe that this charity is a worthy cause. I don't know off the top of my head exactly how many women I know personally who have been touched by this disease, every year the number goes up. I think this is a fantastic way to help out your sisters and you get a wonderful kit
created by Lorene Hill too! Deco-Pages will be donating it's share of the profits from the sale of these kits too, and I have personally purchased a kit already! I hope that you will all join me in supporting this cause.

Best Regards,

Deb Ammerman

Co-Owner

www.deco-pages.com

deb@deco-pages.com

Last month, Jeff and I cellebrated our 21st Wedding Anniversary! WOW... time sure flys! I think the roses he brought me were very pretty. They reminded me of our days living in the Married Housing apartments on the campus of MSU... Jeff was studying Horticulture, and worked part time in the greenhouses on campus. Frequently he would bring me home big beautiful bouquets like this one from the nursery.

I had a great day today... my car broke down, and I was here all day, so not only did I get some work done on the October PTP kit for Club Deco... which I can't tell you about yet, but it is going to be outstanding!... but I also got these three scrapbook pages done! I had to do some serious photo restoration on my Dad's ID card, but I think it turned out pretty good... and I love the way the scrapbook pages turned out... I used Dana Conditt's new kit... The Way Things Were, which is available at www.deco-pages.com for both of the pages I did of my Dad. Then I did some colorization work on the photo of my Mom and my brother... I think it turned out really cute! I used Carol Rupley's Haunted Houses kit for that page... which is also available at www.deco-pages.com

The Medical School page I did for my Dad was also based on a Template by Michaele Burhhart of Burkhart Designs at www.deco-pages.com ... the template is free and can be found in the forum for the September Template Challenge! If you have not stopped by and got a copy of this template yet... you will be happy you did ... if you go get it!

The "Day-Job" has been extremely time consuming these past few months, and now that it is off to press, I can breath a heavy sigh of relief. Now I have a week to get caught up on some digital scrapbook designs!

I have a new kit that I will be releasing to the store at http://www.deco-pages.com/ in the next few days. It is called Gotta Have Friends. Here is a preview of what it looks like.

This is a digital scrapbook page I created with it. Jeff, Matthew and I went for a ride in a canoe... It was the first time Matthew had ever gone, and only my second! I was so sure we were going to end up tipping the thing over, but wet feet was about the worst of it. Next time we do this, I am going to bring a zip lock baggie to keep my camera in for just in case!

The big news is that Deco-Pages will be turning 2 years old in September, so we will be having lots of fun! Club Deco Members will also have big fun, because the Club will be 1 year old in September too! What a fun Month! Be sure to stop bye and visit us! www.deco-pages.com

Oh have I got exciting news for you! Our May 2007 Club Deco kit has been released for Club Deco Members, and it is simply a fantastic kit! I LOVE it! Our Designers have done a wonderful job... if you are not a Club Deco Member yet... Join Today! Not sure it's worth it? Then try us out for three months for only $15! That's $5 a month! Believe you me... once you try it, you are gonna love it! This month's kit is wedding based... but let me tell you, I have seen some awesome pages in the gallery created with this kit that have nothing to do with weddings... this kit has so many versatile backgrounds and elements... you gotta check it out! Click Here to see the contributions to the kit at a larger size.

ATC (Artist Trading Cards) Challenge at www.deco-pages.com

Oh, I am so excited. I recently found out about ATCs (Artist Trading Cards) and tonight I made my first one! I decided to create a new challenge for you... if you want my card... you may have it... but you are at your honor to create one to share with everyone! Lets see how many cards we can collect! Please share a high resolution image so that people can print them out if they want to! Oh this is going to be so much fun! Please go to Deco-Pages to download the high res. image for FREE from me, and share one of your own! Here is a link to the gallery:

http://board.deco-pages.com/showphoto.php/photo/7677/cat/706

The April Mega Kit - Sweet Beginnings is now available for download to Club Deco Members at http://www.deco-pages.com/ This kit is full of so many adorable items for those baby pages just waiting to be created for your scrapbooks. The page I did of my son uses photos from when he was just a tiny baby... ok, so it's been a few years in the making... but it's still cute as can be! That is one of the things I love about scrapbooking... there are no rules... you can scrap a page with photos you took yesterday, last year, or ten years ago... not to mention if you are working on a heritage book, then you could be talking decades or longer! I just love Digital Scrapbooking and all the fun I am having creating scrapbooks.

Michaele Burkhart has a wonderful FREE template at www.deco-pages.com in the gallery that you can use to create wonderful pages for your scrapbooks. The page above is one created with her template as a guide. I really love the way it turned out! So come on over and create a page today, share it with us in the gallery, and Michaele says she has a suprise for you! Check out this thread in our forum to find out more:
http://board.deco-pages.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1595

My American Idol

This is the first year we have watched American Idol on tv... so I thought, just for fun, I would do up a page for Matthew ... If you didn't know, my son is an Elvis Presley Tribute Artist, he has been singing in public since he was in the 2nd Grade and we have had lots of fun with it. This page is about my hopes for Matthew... I don't care if he ever goes on that show... I just want him to have fun, and to continue to make people happy when he sings... he will always be my American Idol!