Darling Darlington ...

Being a fellow scrapbooker, my cousin, Marianne, was happy to take me to the local scrapbook store in the larger town of Florence, South Carolina, with our hussbands and her two daughters in tow. Florence is just south of Darlington. Scrapbook Concepts had all the scrapbooking staples, patterned papers and embellishments a scrapbooker could hope for, but with the added bonus of an abundance of racing and NASCAR themed items - appropriate due to the store's proximity to Darlington Speedway, of course.




After touring Florence and eating at the Five Guys restaurant (think California's In N Out in the South - quite tasty!) We headed out in Marianne's husband, John's 1955 Chevy Bel Air for a local museum, produce market and bakery called Mac's.



Inside the museum of sorts was a huge collection of antiques, cars, furniture, collectibles and more.




I just HAD to take this picture of the antique and contemporary phones together ...


We headed back to the Rock-N-Horse Ranch ... it was time to feed the horses! Buttercup, a palomino quarterhorse, came to the ranch pregnant last year and had her filly, Clover, the day after St. Patrick's Day.


And, last but not least, a good steak dinner among family at the end of a busy day!

From one Carolina to the next ...

(Sorry for the delay on updates - I did not have access to the Internet the past few days!)

On Monday morning, Michi and I headed to the only scrapbook store I could find in Jacksonville, NC, called A Crafter's Dream. This small store had all of the scrapbooking staples and plenty of military-themed papers and embellishments, this being a huge Marine Corps town.


I was surprised to find that Bazzill had Marine Corps and Navy cardstock collection packs and just had to get the Marine one for when I scrapbook Rodney's military career.

We said good-bye to Michi around noon and then headed off West again, to visit my cousin, Marianne, and her family in Darlington, South Carolina.


NASCAR fans might know Darlington due to the speedway there. And it is clear that NASCAR plays a huge part in the community there.

For the past two years, Marianne, with the help of her husband John and daughters Alyssa and Amanda, owns and manages the Rock-N-Horse Ranch in Darlington.



While I was raised in the Orange County, Calif., suburbs, I love the rural side of life, too. Rodney was basically raised on a farm, so for him, our visit to the ranch was going back to his roots. I cannot say the same for our dogs.


While they have stayed in less sophisticated areas than these indoor horse stalls, Marble and Ripley were not pleased to have been "demoted" to the ranks of livestock after staying in the climate-controlled and pillowed indoors through the trip so far. But they were none the worse for wear when their "camping trip" was over and it was time to go a few days later...

Hangin' out with Michi ...

... Chris has a two-week air space course in Biloxi, MS, so he flew out this morning and that was the end of our fun with him. Michi, however, was a wonderful hostess and showed us all around Jacksonville ... which took about 20 minutes. I didn't even have time to remember to take photos! Just imagine a small town where they are a lot of men with short haircuts and everything is very green, but very damp... it rained on and off all day.

We did do a bit a shopping: Rodney found some gear he had been looking for and I found some unique Marine scrapbooking supplies at the Camp Lejeune exchange - win-win for everyone! My favorites were clear acrylic dog tags etched with the Marine Corps logo and a few phrases, and a huge, 10-inch black Bazzill Cardstock die cut of the Marine Corps logo. Both are from Combat Creations. I have no idea what I am going to do with them, yet, but I'm sure I will figure something out!

After a short break at home in the afternoon, Michi took us back to base to introduce us to her "baby boy," Amedeus. They compete in dressage events around the area and he is just a beauty.


Each day, Amedeus gets to spend some time in the open pasture - complete with his anti-fly suit and boots on.



Last but not least, the stables had this telephone booth outside.


Seriously, this might be the last working telephone booth in America ... I took this photo so I could explain it to Will and Xan in a few years. :)

Tomorrow, Michi (who is also a scrapbooker) and I plan to go to a local craft and scrapbooking store here before Rodney and I head back west for a visit with my cousin, Marianne, and her family in South Carolina. Incidentally, they have horses, too...

Into the Carolinas...

We left Tucker, Ga., about 8 a.m., hitting the I-20 East towards the Carolinas. I had a couple of scrapbook stores on the list, Simply Scrapbooks in Augusta, Ga., and Scrappin' Creations in Columbia, SC.


Simply Scrapbooks wasn't too far from I-20 and it shares a parking lot with Wal-mart, so it was a great stop for us travelers. The owner was very nice and friendly and the store had a great variety of scrpping goodies. I especially liked their military section, which had some things I hadn't seen before.


They also had a pretty good Disney section for Magic Kingdom lovers ...


Scrappin' Creations was very much how I would set up a scrapbook store if I owned one.


It was a brightly-lit labrynth of scrappiness, differnt rooms dedicated to different things: the tool room, the theme room (papers and embellies organized by theme) and the one I could have spend considerable time and money in: the cardstock room.



I really enjoyed this store, with its friendly, knowledgeable owner and staff and it's great selection of products that were easy to find. I would have spent even more time (and probably money) there if we didn't have the dogs traveling with us in a black Ford Explorer in 92-degree, humid weather. There is only so long husband and dogs would be happy meandering around the grassy knoll behind the store.

Rodney, the dogs, and I headed for Jacksonville, NC, where our friends, Chris and Michi, also at the mercy of the Marine Corps, are currently stationed.


They took us to a really interesting bar/museum, Sywanyks.




This place is huge, and covered from floor to ceiling in Marine Corps paraphernalia, contemporary and historic.



We played pool, listened to the Top 40 hits and just took in all the stuff. Chris said he's een there several times and he always finds something new.


Today we'll be looking around Jacksonville and Camp Lejeune.

In Atlanta tonight ...

... actually, we are in Tucker, which is in the Atlanta metropolitan area, on the East side. We left Pensacola at about 8 a.m., first stopping by Scraphappy so I could drop off my sample for the beginning acrylic class I am teaching there next month. Then it was off to Alabama!

Fortunately, the drive was uneventful. We did stop at a Guthrie's chicken restaurant in Tallassee, Alabama (Not to be confused with TallaHAssee, Florida) for lunch. Rodney managed to drive 12 miles past the exit before I looked up from answering my email via iPhone to ask him what was taking so long to go 13 miles ... but we turned around and went back to Guthrie's anyway, simply for blog fodder. We even asked an amused stranger to take our picture for us. By the way, the chicken was excellent. Off to Georgia!




We arrived in Tucker at about 3 p.m. Well, we thought it was 3 p.m. It was actually 4 p.m. - we forgot about the time change to EST. Whoops! Good thing we didn't have anywhere we really needed to be. Unless you count the scrapbook stores ... There were two in the area I wanted to go to, but due to the lack of time (both stores closed at 6 p.m. and we needed to drop the dogs off at the hotel) I only got to one of them. Paper Impressions was on the opposite side of town, in Murietta, and traffic was starting to get bad. So I settled for just going to ScrapChic Boutique, which was only about 6 miles from our hotel, in Decatur.

We actually just drove right by ScrapChic before we saw it ... not because it was small, but because we were looking for a strip-mall type store and ScrapChic is actually housed in a turn-of-the-century house. I really loved the feel of the place!


The three owners had done a great job keeping the antique, rustic feel with their decor, use of space and fixtures, such as this ladder ...



The range of supplies was good. I picked up some of the new Sassafras, some Hambly Screen Prints transparencies and Atlanta-themed paper. But I loved the crop space.


While you did have the climb stairs to get to the crop space up there, there were three spacious rooms filled with tables. The huge windows gave great natural light for day crops and there were plenty of tools and computers for croppers to use. Rodney even managed to keep himself occupied with all the fun goodies to look at! And, of course, I just HAD to drop off some samples of Kits2Remember products while I was there ...

As always, the dogs traveled well. They were excited to be on an adventure and were thrilled this morning when they found out that they weren't going to be left behind, They had been edge all day yesterday ... the suitcases were in the house! For the trip, Marble has her crate, which Ripley sometimes sleeps in, so we got a travel crate that was chew-resistant fabric and folds down, sort of like a car sun shade. I laughingly call it the dogs' "sleeping bag."


We put Marble in it first, since she is smaller than Rip, but while we were at ScrapChic, and they were at the hotel, she managed to UNZIP it and meet us at the door when we came in to the room. Seriously! So, when we went to Fuddruckers for dinner, we put Rip in with a clamp on the zippers. That seemed to work out better.

We're off across I-20 tomorrow, headed for the Carolinas!

Dad, Grads, Teachers and Travel ...

... While summer officially starts on the 21st, there are certainly the signs of the warmer times. School years are ending, students are graduating, Dads will soon be celebrated and many of us will be taking summer vacations. The K2R Design Krew has been working on some fresh and affordable handmade gift ideas for the special teachers, students and Dads in your life. Be sure to check out the K2R Design Krew blog to see what they've been up to ...

While the kids are away, the parents will ... take a road trip! My husband, Rodney, and I are fortunate to have parents who love to take our children for weeks at a time during the summer months. That means we can actually have a conversation without getting interrupted! :) We've decided to take a road trip through Atlanta, Georgia; Jacksonville, North Carolina; Florence, South Carolina; Savannah, Georgia; Jacksonville and Tallahassee in Florida over the next week. We plan to visit some friends and family. And, OF COURSE, we will be stopping at different scrapbook stores along the way! I've already mapped some out and can't wait to see what the scrapbook stores of the South have to offer! Any suggestions for scrappy stops along that route would be appreciated ... just post here or email me: jessica @kits2remember.com.

If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to this blog (just click the links on the right) so you'll get the latest chapter to our travelog each day... I love to travel, especially road trips, so I am very much looking forward to this vacation!

Fun with Fragments ...

... I have been messing around with Tim Holtz's Fragments Charms. With a little Glossy Accents, these have turned out to make some great little embellishments. Here are the first four I made - forgive the glare on the large one, I didn't realize how bad that was until I went to edit the photo... but you get the idea! These Fragment charms are pretty affordable, too, 48 for $10, so 21 cents each. Check them out in the Kits2Remember store...

New June project kits, sale items and more ...

Kits2Remember has two new kits available for June!

The first is “The Men in My Life,” a complimentary 8 x 8 album to last month’s “The Women in My Life.”


The kit features high-quality, double-sided paper from We R Memory Keepers, four packages Rebekka Erickson rub-ons and acrylic, chipboard and metal panels from Kits2Remember. With this project, you’ll also get to play with foam stamps and acrylic paint – the four different-sized circle stamps are included in your kit! Just like the “Women in My Life” kit, this project can be altered to suit many themes – you will get an entire Rebekka Erickson chipboard alphabet to work with!



The second kit released this month is the “Favorite Recipes Cookbook” featuring Teresa Collins’ “Bon Appetit” line, including her great double-sided papers and an entire package of her coordinating chipboard charms!


You’ll also work with embellishments from Imaginsce and Heidi Swapp, and an 8-inch Kits2Remember stadium album. About 24 recipe cards come with the kit, plus there is plenty of room to slip more favorites into the pockets of each section.





O-rings (also known as book rings) are back in stock in a variety of colors and sizes. Now you can order them individually for 50 cents each.



The last of the current kits that feature Teresa Collins’ lines (A2Z of Me, Family 6 x 12 and 4 x 8 albums, True Love 8 x 8 album) have been uploaded into the inventory. Once these sell out, there will not be any more of these kits made, so get them now while supplies last.

Some items on sale through June 7:
• Selected Kits2Remember flourish stamps are 30 percent off or more.
• Zutter Bind-it-All o-wire is buy one, get one of the same size and color FREE (discount applied when your order ships)
• Ranger Paint Dabbers are buy 2 get one FREE (discount applied when your order ships)
• Stickles are buy 3 get one FREE (discount applied when your order ships)
• Rebekka Erickson rub-ons are buy 2 get one FREE (discount applied when your order ships)

Kits2Remember products will be all over the country this month: Jessica will be teaching in Pensacola, FL, and Foley, AL, while K2R products will be featured in Chantilly, VA. For more information, please visit the Kits2Remember calendar!

Need inspiration? Be sure to check out these three places for great project ideas:

The Kits2Remember Project Ideas web page
The Kits2Remember Design Krew Blog (have you seen the latest video on acrylic paint dabbers?)
Right here on Jessica’s Blog (scroll down for a great teacher’s gift idea!)