Teacher Cards and a Smash Page

Today is the last day of school, and of course I didn't think to make cards (let alone gifts!) for my kids' teachers until yesterday.  Why do these things always sneak up on me?  Must have other things on my mind...  Anyway, I thought it best to keep my card design simple, but I also pre-ordered the new summer Distress Ink from Creative Accents and just got them yesterday - perfect time to play!  Here's what I came up with: 

Wow, I thought the spring release colours were fabulous, but I don't know, I think maybe Tim outdid himself with these!  Aren't they GORGEOUS?!?!  I quite like how the cards ended up, but I'm thinking maybe the "white space" is a little bit too empty?  I should have done some dry embossing or something... ah well, they're done and given away, too late to change anything now!  I used this sketch from Clean and Simple Stamping:

I haven't been doing a lot of smashing lately, and I think it's because I've been over thinking things a bit much.  I need to get away from the feeling that smashing is like scrapbooking, because they should feel totally different (at least, in my opinion).  Smashing should be more spontaneous and random, and so one night, I gathered up all my little souvenirs from the Fiesta crop in May and "smashed" them onto this page.  I think this is my favorite spread yet!  I also just grabbed some odds 'n' ends from my desk, like that silver shoelace in the bottom right, and stuck them on as well.  What do you think?

Close-up of the left side.  I've got my entry ticket, some draw tickets, a little title card from Simple Stories 6x6 Fabulous collection, and I die cut the wrapping paper from my door prize to make the flowers.

 And a close-up of the right.  The "Roxy" flag was my place marker, and the pocket was attached to the bottled water at my place setting.  Seeing Fiesta was a fundraiser for breast cancer, each pocket had the little pink ribbon clip attached - love that!  The silver paper is more of the wrapping paper from my door prize, and I embossed it on both sides using this tip I found on pinterest here.  The kraft paper that says "Fiesta" is actually part of our goodie bags - I just ripped it up and mod podged it onto the page.  I tucked a little journaling card into the pocket - it has my top 5 memories from the event.  And that's about it!

 Oh, you want to know about the photos, do you?  Haha, each table got together and put on these crazy glasses with the nose attached and had our photo taken.  Too fun!

Well, the kids are home now and summer's officially on!  Both Nolan and Ailis had wonderful report cards, I couldn't be more proud of their efforts!!!  Now what to do with them, eh?