Mickey PaperClips - Tutorial and Special Freebie for my Followers

I want to say thank you to those of you who follow me in my journey through this blog.  Mine isn't the happiest journey and I want to thank you, my digi-friends, for being there.  I made this new freebie for you full of lots of fun Mickey Clips all hand made by me in Photoshop!

I will be sending this new freebie out to my newsletter subscribers and putting it on my facebook wall for my followers there.  If you are a blog follower but aren't a newsletter subscriber or facebook follower, you will need to email me at agrievingmommy@yahoo.com and request it with your blogger name because Blogger often does not give me info on how to reach you.  Want to get it?  Become a follower on Blogger or Facebook.

And here's a little tutorial for use with these paper clips...
Want to make your paperclips look like they are actually on your paper strip?  Here's a little tutorial to show you how to do that.
First, place your paperclip on your paperstrip where you want it like this:

 Next, duplicate the paperclip layer and move one of the layers below the paperstrip like this:

 Then, choose your top paperclip layer.

 Finally, making sure you have selected the top paperclip layer, erase the part of the paperclip that should be behind the paperstrip like this:

The 2nd paperclip behind the first allows you to erase easier.  You can then add shadowing to the bottom paperclip layer if you'd like.

You can use this same idea with ribbon, wire, strings, etc. to get one thing to wrap around another!

Sending hugs to you :)
Denise aka A Grieving Mommy

February is Dental Health Month - New Charity Kit for Operation Smile and Freebie too!

I have a new Charity Kit for Dental Health Month today called Tooth Fairy!  It's perfect for those dentist and loose tooth pages and all profits will go to Operation Smile - a nonprofit group that helps children all over the world in need of dental help.  Find out more about Operation Smile here.

It is 140 MB with 13 papers and 51 elements.
Here are the pages I scrapped with it of my son losing his first tooth :)

Donate any amount over $2.35 to get this kit and the profits (minus the PayPal charge) will all be forwarded on to Operation Smile by me along with my own personal donation.
Please note:  The link to download the kit will be sent to the address used in PayPal so make sure it's correct!  Also, please allow at least 24 hours for the link to come - I do sleep once in awhile :)  If you have questions, you can contact me at agrievingmommy@yahoo.com
Thanks for helping me help Operation Smile!

**EDITED - Proceeds will now go to this month's charity since this kit is over a month old.

And here's some freebie wordart to go with it!  Enjoy :)

Download here
Hugs :)
A Grieving Mommy

Donate Blood, Save a Life and then Scrap it with this Freebie Kit!

Whenever we have a birthday or angel day for the girls, we always try to do some kind of charity or service project.  This time for Chloee's Angel Day yesterday, I donated blood.  Chloee was hospitalized for the majority of her life and had a blood transfusion after one of her surgeries.  I often wonder who donated that blood for her and gave her that gift so this time I went in and donated myself.  I really can't believe I've never done it before - it was super easy and my blood will probably go to help 3 people who need it.
If you haven't donated before or haven't in awhile, I hope maybe you will think about doing it and giving up a half hour of your time to help someone else that you don't know.  Something good comes out of giving with no thought of anything in return.
Then, you can take some pics and you come back and scrap all about it!  Cause I've got a very special freebie for you called Donate Blood, Save a Life :)
My dear hubby gets the Donate Blood Wuss sign - he said he was afraid of needles...  I'm making him next time though :)

Here are my pages of me donating in Chloee's memory yesterday.  I donated at my local Red Cross Donation Center.

Here is the freebie kit for ya.  I really hope that it inspires someone out there to donate blood!

Download here
If you get an error message - please try again in a few minutes, it just means the server is really busy at the moment.
Sending hugs to you!
Denise aka A Grieving Mommy

5 Months in my Arms, 5 Years of Missing Her

Yesterday was my daughter Chloee's 5th Angel Day - 5 years since she died.  We spent the day spoiling our living son, donating blood in her memory and getting memorial family photos.  I also started working on a "Lost Princess" kit in her honor since she is MY lost Princess.
I wanted to share our family pics since a lot of my friends out there are grieving and family photos can be so hard when the ones you love are not here to be in the pictures.  Our photos were done by Fotofly and they did an awesome job so if you are in the Salt Lake City, Utah area, check them out!

and just a fun family photo

And of course I got some of my cute boy!  One thing I learned from losing Chloee is that you can never have too many photos.  Ever.  Cause you never know what's going to happen.
Here's my boy in a RockBand style photoshoot we did:

So go take a photo already!

Valentine's Day Freebie for ya!

I've been busy getting my Valentine's day stuff done before Valentine's day is over!  We were in Disneyland last week and I'm busy catching up.  I barely made it, he he :)  I finished my kids' photocards just in time to run them around to the fam.
Here's my son's photocard for Valentine's.  I saw someone else do this fun idea making their hand into a heart and wanted to try it!  It turned out fun - hope it gives you some ideas!

Originally, I wanted to do a Disney one for my girls but I ended up changing my mind when I found some big bears to decorate their graves.  So I went with Irene Alexeeva's new kit called Oh Dear Teddy.  It was perfect for their Valentine's photocards and grave decorations.

So I ended up not using the Disney Valentine's characters that I photographed and extracted for their photocards, but I wanted to share them with you!  Hope you can use them :)
Here they are:

Download here

Hoping that you were able to spend your Valentine's Day with those you love.
Hugs :)
Denise aka A Grieving Mommy

Are you behind like me??? Freebie 2011 Calendar

Anyone else behind like me?  It's February 1st and I just finished our 2011 family calendar!  Only one month behind...  Well, all I can say is that I've been enjoying lots of time with my boys lately and it just had to wait :)
I wanted to share the calendar I made with you - in case you're like me and wanted to do one, but never got around to it.  Here's a quick and easy way to get that calendar done.  Comes with Feb. 2011 - Jan. 2012 so that next year when I'm a month behind - we'll still have a calendar!  he he
They are in png version so that you can just place your photos behind the holes!  I really hope that someone else out there can use it!  Hope it helps you get a calendar done :)
They are 4x6 prints so that you only have to pay 13 cents or so for each page.  I bought 4x6 holders a few years ago and we just keep re-using them and it only costs me about $12 to print everyone in my family's calendars for the year.  You can find the 4x6 holders here at calendar-case.com.  I paid $10 for 10 of them initially and just re-use them every year!
Here are some of our family pictures from the set:

Here's the entire set preview:

Download it here
Hugs:)
Denise aka A Grieving Mommy