smash books!

Everyone that knows that I am obsessed with anything and everything crafty and creative. My closet looks like a summer camp arts and crafts room, playing home to bins and baskets of paints, beads, scrapbook stuff and other various nick-nacks and craft supplies. I am always looking for new fun crafty things to play with. Here is my newest find, which I owe to my mom (thanks Mom!): Smash Books.

I love these. They are kind of like a scrapbook/photo album/journal/catch-all. No rules, no pressure. You can use them for whatever you want - pictures, quotes, ticket stubs, lists, notes, anything and everything that you never knew what to do with before. (There are some really cool ones if you search on Google Images/YouTube.) They have a few different versions that you can get, each one with a different theme and pages on the inside. Each book comes with a super-sweet pen/glue stick combo (called a SmashStick) that conveniently allows you to "smash" anything anytime anywhere.

I got this pink one for my birthday last month, and of course the first thing I had to do was decorate the cover.

After that, I had to figure out what to do first. We had planned a "craft day" at Cara's, so I decided to make this my project. I went straight to my "stuff drawer" (which I now call my "smash drawer") where I keep random trinkets and treasures from my life. I dumped it all out, spent a few minutes sorting through things, and ended up with a pretty good pile of notes, letters, and other random keepsakes to fill the pages. I spent the evening working on it at Cara's, and have since done a few more pages. Here's a peek inside: 

The first page - "Oh Look! You baked a cake..."

..so of course I had to write down some of my favorite recipes to paperclip in. 

I think this paper spent a summer taped to our cabin wall at Sky Ranch. 

FINALLY have a place to put all of those silly/sweet OU Weekend bus notes I saved from Singers. I probably have about six pages of these throughout the book. 

...and this slip of paper that was handed to me by our waiter at Spaghetti Warehouse at OU Weekend 2009. We were [probably loudly and obnoxiously] enjoying our traditional "Singers family dinner," and spreading our "Texas Pride" all over the West End.

"I know that our rivalry will continue on Monday, 

but today this is one Aggie that is willing to say Hook 'Em Horns."  

A few notes, ticket stub, a list of "God's characteristics" made by some girls in my small-group one week during my summer as a Rockwall counselor, and one of my counselor bios from camp. 

These pages came already in the book. I added the "no day but today."

Rent shoutout, of course. 

Map page! I'm not finished with it yet, but I like it so far.

"Adventure is worthwhile in itself." 

Fun page for lists that I haven't done yet! 

More tickets, a program, and a card featuring my cousin that his mom made for us a few years ago. 

"Things to Do." Also not finished yet.

This page is probably my favorite.

I found some sweet house plans and ran with it.

Thank-you notes, etc. from my 5th graders last year.

And, in the middle, an awesome temporary tattoo that one of my students gave me. 

I never found an occasion worthy of wearing it, 

so I decided to stick it in the book so I can remember it forever.

It's a glittery star with a frog (I think?) in the middle.

"Miss Vincent, you want a tattoo?"

"...of course." 

"Oh The Places You'll Go" graduation card from the parents.

It's fun and obnoxious because John Lithgow animatedly 

narrates the first page of the book when you open the card. 

My brother and I both received this card upon our graduation from college. 

I think it's become one of our quirky Vincent-family-...things. 

I'm for it. 

Memories from my first semester in Singers.

"Princess today. President tomorrow." 

My other favorite page. 

The book came with the tree paper, I added the text. 

I still have a few pages left to fill in this one, but that's a very good start. 

It's not as creative and artsy as some of the other's I've seen, but it's mine,

and it's full of my life.

After I successfully almost-filled this one up in a day, I convinced my mom to send me the blue one that she had stashed at home for the future. I'm working on finishing the pink one first, but here's a look inside of the blue: 

SUPER FUN! Can't wait to fill it up and make it mine! 

Okay, so that's my current "craft fix." I would definitely encourage everyone to buy one of these things and SMASH. They sell them at scrapbook stores and online here. They also have some sweet accessories and cool stuff you can buy to go along with it, like tabs, stickers, pockets, etc. DO IT. 

That's all I've got for today! Here's a picture of our cat! (...playing with my camera as I tried to take the above pictures...) 

MEOW.