First Kit for Keep It Simple Scraps Site

I have a preview of my new kit for Keep It Simple Scraps. I am so excited for my new store to open. Cheryl and Dyanna asked me to come a long with them and join them in their new venture. It is a very pared down version of The Scrapping Garden. The great thing is there is no pressure and I get to have my life back!!! No longer do I feel chained to this computer because I have to get this done for this chat or get that done for that challenge, or Make sure to get your submission done for the Mega Kit. And also did I forget to do three submissions for my store or did I only do two. It all gets to be tooo, tooo much!! Then add on all of my commitments as Church and home and family and I am overwhelmed just thinking about it!!! This new site hopefully will take all of that stress away and just let me have fun designing. I know that I really enjoyed doing April's Rainbow Element and Paperpack.

I do have a little bad news not to me but you may think so. I am not going to be offering very many freebies anymore. I feel as if this community is getting to saturated with them and It really does effect my sales. I dont expect to make a million dollars at this but it does take time and effort to come up with new and fresh ideas for all of my kits as well as the elements and papers inside of them. It does cost me money everytime I make a kit as I have purchased actions, as well as other CU items to keep everything fresh. All I want is to make enough money to break even. I havent even come close to that and I believe it is because of all the freebies I have been giving away. This is not your fault as a consumer. It is the fault of the whole designing community at large. It is a sociatol problem of wanting something for nothing, or at least at a great discount. We as designers are small business people. Even though we may belong to a large site we are still in business for ourselves. We do all of our own advertising and we each own our own stores inside of the site itself. We also pay comission fees so that the site expenses can be paid and it they are lucky the administrators. Yes, it is even tough being an administrator of a site. Many times they go unpaid because the site expenses barely got paid for that paticular month. This is a dog eat dog business. And it is saturated. There are more and more new designers every day and more and more new sites opening. Not that this is a bad thing it just makes more competition out there in cyberspace.

Okay, I am off of my soap box. I am sorry if I offended anyone I just needed to get the above off of my chest. It has been weighing me down for a long long time. I know you are going to love the new site. We are trying to make it a little more upscale without losing that homey feel that was so great at The Scrapping Garden. Again, I want your feedback. I want you to let me know what you would like to see in my kits. Believe me I need some help coming up with ideas. I want my new store to be fresh but still contain updated versions of your old favorits. Look for a Grandma's House two, and another masculine kit like boys, boys, boys. I may make some QP's for sale with these kits or enough 8 X 8 QP's for you to make a nice mini album with.

I am rambling on and on and I bet all you want to see it the previews! LOL Just like me huh? Keep you waiting and in suspense. Well here they are. I hope you like them and will be there on Grand Opening day to purchase them. Believe me like everyone else my business is suffering because of the economy and I can really use your help.






I am working on a few more kits now. I am working on an element kit of my favorite Bible Verses as well as working on a Page kit called Feelin' Lucky. These will also be in my new store and I will be sharing previews of these also. Notice that I changed the color of my logo. I needed to do that so it would show up better on the Black Background of our wrapper. The darker color did not stand out that well.

I am having problems with another head cold right now that I believe has turned into a sinus infection. I think I am going to need to get in to see my doctor. I am trying not to go unless I really need to because we are having problems with our Medical Insurance. You think I wouldnt because we have military benefits because my DH is retired but YES, WE ARE HAVING MAJOR PROBLEMS. Sorry didnt mean to yell it just makes me so so mad!!! I hate insurance companies.

Anyways, thanks for listening to all of my rantings. I know they were many today.

Oh, Oh, Oh, before I forget I am participating in the Blog Train for Easter. I will be offering my April's Rainbow as part of the Blog Train so this is your golden opportunity to get a freebie. 18 papers worth. A $5.00 value!! Yes, I may be participaing in blog trains every once in a while and this will be a golden opportunity because I am not going to be offering freebies very much any more. So keep your eyes peeled and come back often. The group that I am participating in has a lot of Blog Trains.

Have a wonderful day and I am going to try to post at least once a week. I am not going to try to promise something that is impossible for me to do. If I can post a few times a week I will but I am really going to try once a week. I hope I can make it!! ROFL

Sad News

I have some real sad news. The Scrapping Garden is closing its doors at midnight on March 19th. It has been my home away from home for the past two years almost three. I have been designing for them for the past year and a couple of months. I am going to miss them terribly.

My sad news though can be your great news. I am going to be selling my entire store for $20.00. Over $75.00 of designing heaven. The only catch is you have to have it all downloaded before the store closes.

I will be following a few of the designers to a new site. We dont have a definite opening date. We are hoping by April 1st, so keep your eyes peeled and watch the site develop. www.kisscraps.com
Keep it Simple Scraps. We are developing a Misson Statement as we speak and are working closely to make sure that this site will help you Keep it Simple and make it meaningful. Not just slapping pictures on the page. Its not about getting the challenge done no matte what so you can get the freebies it is about leaving a legacy for your children and their children and on and on and on. I know that you will love shopping at our new site and also find the chats and challenges we do have will help you get books finished and that they are meaningful.

So check out my store at The Scrapping Garden under April Sevigny and either buy a kit or two they are all $2.00 or Buy My Store!!! Thank you so much for your continued patronage of my store and I look forward to doing business with you in the future!!

Well, it has been a little while hasnt it. I am sorry about that. I have been so busy. Busy designing new kits for you and busy taking care of the family and doing housework. Oh my I said it. I said the bad word, housework. Well moving on! lol I have some wonderful things to share with you. Some layouts and a freebie!! Yes, I said the good word!! FREEBIE!!! It coordinates with our (The Scrapping Garden's) first Members Choice kit!! It was a few extra pieces I made in case we decided to do a bonus. Well, we decided not to do a bonus and so here you go a small gift for you! The downside. You have to wait until the end of this post. Make sure you read it all because if you dont the link will not work (NOT!!!) I would appreciate if you do read and look at everything though. I have a lot to say ya know and hope that someone is reading! lol

I heard from my DS (The one in Iraq). He is at his new home in An Niminiyah. He has his assignment. He will be doing medical work after all. He will be doing sick call for approximately 120 - 200 people. He may have a lot of time with no patients but the paperwork is killer. He will most likely be doing a lot of reading and a lot of college work. It is good to know that he is safe and sound. If you get my newsletter you will get more detailed info on him so if you are interested or just nosey lol then make sure to leave a comment with your email addy and I will make sure that you get on my list. My newsletter seems to be going out once a month right now but may get to be more than that. Not more than twice a month though.

On the first my Vintage January Kit will be put into my store for $3.00.

I also am adding an add-on duo to my In My Heart Mini Kit. If you remember right the Mini Kit was offered free in January and will be put into the store for $2.00 on Feburary 1st. Also, I have a Paperpack add-on and an Element Add-on that coordinates perfectly all together and will give you enough to work with to make a brag book, a mini album or even a full album. The elements in this kit is great for Weddings, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, or Tributes. Any kind of situation you can think of.

I made a couple of layouts with this kit. I made one of the weeks of my 365 day project and a QP for my Sing a Song Challenge. February is the first month for me to do this challenge. I am taking it over from one of the Creative Team Members at The Scrapping Garden. The choosen song for February is "Have I Told You Lately That I Love You." Written by Van Morrison and sung by Rod Stewart. I think this kit goes perfectly with that and will make such a beautiful layout.

Here is my layout from 365 day project.

Right now I am working on a kit called Godiva which will be the featured kit for my New Challenge at the end of the month. It is called Sketch by Design. It will be the last Wednesday of the month and run til the last Tuesday of the following month. I am just finishing it up now and should have it completed before Friday of next week.

Okay, enough is enough right? Where is your freebie? Well here it is:

www.scrappinggarden.com/april/als_fridayfreebie_bonus.zip

There you have it. A Friday Freebie, some personal info and some layouts as well as new kits. Make sure to check out my store at: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/shop/manufacturers.php?manufacturerid=21

Today has been a tough day. You know one of those days where nothing seems to work out the way you planned. When I wrote my newsletter on Sunday I promised to have two kits ready in the store. Well, that didnt happen. I tried to work on it today but gave up after having problems with getting a preview to stick. It kept disappearing even after I saved it!! Argh!!!

Well, tommorrow is a new day. I also wanted to get some advertising done today!! That always seems to go by the wayside also. I even got up early to get more done today. Of course I had laundry etc to get finished!! So much for advertising. I still would like to get it done before the week is over. I also wanted to get some designing done. I have had the itch for several days now and just havent gotten that far. I did get to work on the Member's Choice Kit Yesterday though. That was fun. It took all day but was fun!!

I have a lot to share since it has been so long since I posted last! Here are some recent layouts:

Here is the layout that I completed for "A" in the ABC Challenge at www.scrappinggarden.com

I used my portion of this January 2009 Mega Kit Just Imagine for this layout. You can find this kit here: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/shop/product.php?productid=17904&cat=0&page=1 It is on sale through the month of January for $3.49

Here is the preview of my portion of this kit:


Here is a preview of the "Memeber's Choice" Kit so far. Marsha Connell is the last designer and I think she is working on it tonight. There is still time to find a name for the kit so make your suggestions in the forum here : http://www.scrappinggarden.com/forum/showthread.php?p=45004#post45004


Here is the layout I did for Scraplift with Karen:

There is still time to participate if you would like. This challenge runs through the end of the month. You can find the link to that challenge here: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5225 I used my Indigo kit for this layout. You can find it here http://www.scrappinggarden.com/shop/product.php?productid=17910&cat=0&page=2 It is $3.00 until January 31st

Last but not least here is the layout I did for Snap a Masterpiece with Keiki
There is still time to participate in this challenge also. You can find it here: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5232 In this layout I used my Boys, Boys, Boys Kits. These kits have everything you need to scrap the men in your lives young or old!! The colors are a neutral pallette with a hint of blues and greens. You can find those kits here: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/shop/manufacturers.php?manufacturerid=21

Okay, I feel better I got my advertising in. LOL I dont want you to forget to snag your freebie kit before the end of the month. At that time it will go into my store! Here is the post in the thread where my link is. http://www.scrappinggarden.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5224

Keep an eye out in my store for the add-on. It will be appearing sometime next month!

I am thinking positive - today is almost gone and tommorrow is a new day! Thanks for reading to the end. I hope to post more often but will at least once a week. Thanks for checking in!!

I have a few layouts to share with you and some great things happening at The Scrapping Garden.
I have taken on some CT Work also at TSG and so you will see some layouts here with other peoples kits. Just wanted to let you all know so you wont wonder what is going one.

Here is one I did with Pamela Dempsy's (PDD Designs) Sugarland Kit. You can find it here at The Scrapping Garden: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/shop/product.php?productid=17875&cat=0&page=1



This is a picture of my Great Niece Miracle that you have seen pictures of previously.

Also, If you havent heard about the 365 day project you are missing out on a big challenge that will help you to bring your photos up to the next level. It also helps to teach you to take your camera everywhere!! You take a picture a day and at the end of the week do a two page layout.
You can find more information here: http://www.scrappinggarden.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5239

Here is my first week layout that is still in progress. I got a tablet for Christmas and really want to get it out and use it for journaling for this project.



I used the Daily Download from December at The Scrapping Garden/www.scrappinggarden.com
Marsha Connell and I collabed on this kit and we I will be putting it into the store by this Friday.
we both have add-ons to these kits that are currently in our personal stores.

Another exciting thing happening at The Scrapping Garden. See the below ad for all the details!



Lots of great things coming up in this new year. I also am starting the ABC Challenge and am anxious to get started. I am doing a theme that will take some thinking to do. I might have to get some pics off of the web to help me with this one. It is sort of subjective in its thinking so we will see how I do on it. lol

Take care and have a wonderful evening. I will be posting again on Wednesday and hope to have a freebie or two for you.