Things You Can Make with Tinker Toys

For Christmas last year, the boys got a barrel of Tinker Toys. These toys are frequently spread out on our floor as works in progress, and the boys create some pretty imaginative things. Here are just some of things you can create with Tinker Toys:

• an umbrella
• a steering wheel/ship's wheel
• a skyscraper
• a ferris wheel
• an arrow
• an "up 'n' down thing"
• an anchor
• a hand trolley
• a crutch
• a cane
• a key
• a hook

Love to see what these two will come up with next.

The Story Right Now

More inspiration from Camp Scrap over at Big Picture Scrapbooking. For a journaling prompt, May challenged campers to tell a story about something going on right now in our lives, some little slice of current life.

Since Joey's been singing "God Bless America" almost constantly lately, I picked that as my story. Given the July 4th holiday, it was an especially timely story to tell -- and a chance to use patriotic papers -- too. To make this layout even easier, the Ella blog had a great sketch posted by Donna Januzzi and using that made this digital page come together in no time. I was proud of myself for figuring out how to make a clipping mask for the word "sing" to be able to use the striped paper for the letters, and using a shape tool to be able to make a digital scalloped border.

Thank you to May and Donna for being my inspiration and for helping me get this sweet story captured. I love when I can finish a layout every few days, even in the face of work.