JOY - an early holiday layout and original patterned paper

NOTE - IMAGE WAS DELETED AS THIS LAYOUT WILL BE PUBLISHED IN THE OCTOBER ISSUE OF SCRAP N' ART ONLINE ZINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I know that it isn't even Halloween yet but I noticed Christmas stuff was already at Michaels so - actually that's not why I created this layout. The current challenge at Candy Shoppe is to make your own patterned paper and since I am obsessed with stamping right now, I decided to use a couple of the Harlee-Quinnz stamps ( a border stamp and an accent stamp) to stamp this piece of kraft paper. I think it has almost a Jenni Bowlin look (I love Jenni Bowlin but have never been in a store where I could purchase any but I read her blogs - speaking of, congrats to Amy who just won a fabulous stash of Jenni Bowlin on the Moxie Fab blog) so I went with a vintage b/w photo and embellishments in the dark red, dark green, and brown ranges. I cut out the little felt heart and added the edge embroidery and the buttons. The striped pieces are cut from a little holder that I got at Starbucks with a free cookie in it (had to get a pumplin spice latte on Saturday), the title JOY is the name of the type of tea on the TAZO bag, and the journaling block was stamped from a Harlee-Quinnz stamp. I also added a fabric scrap, a lace scrap, a tape measure scrap, a Prism trim scrap, a book page scrap, a HQ Tabacco scrap, some mix and match flowers (Making memories and Lil Davis and my buttons), a Heidi Swapp tape scrap, and a couple of funky vintage buttons.
Sometimes I find myself doing layouts with a purpose - that is, to use certain brands of supplies or to answer a challenge; and other times I do layouts just for fun - just to play with my stuff. This layout started out with a purpose but it became fun - I just kept digging through my scrap box (and that's another story: Julie T-W once said she kept her supplies in her rollaround tote so I was determined to weed mine down to something like that, and though it's not quite there yet, most of my supplies and scrap stash are in a rollaround crate that is 13x15x15 - are you not impressed????I keep a few things out to inspire me but most stuff is now organized and I find that I am really using up old stuff, like alphas, etc.) and found all these little treasures.
I had a terrible night last night with my stuffed up head and with my cat throwing up 4 times - I thought animals were supposed to be easier than babies?! but today I feel way better (just tired) and the cat seems fine. I will be busy in the studio working on some projects to submit and on some items to put in my etsy shop, which will open very soon. Thanks to everyone for the encouragement!
Hope you have a great day!