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I found myself both honored and completely surprised when Rebecca asked me to pick out this week’s Friday Five, which is coming at you all a little early this week due to the long weekend (!!) here in the States. For those of you who have not seen me around the site, my name is Jordan and I’m relatively new to the Scrapblog team. I help out Rebecca when she asks, produce the Get Crafty! videos, and work on search engine stuff here in the office. I have to agree with Carlos when he said selecting only five scrapblogs to highlight in a week is not easy, with so many wonderful creations being published every day. Also adding to the difficulty is my complete lack of craftiness. In school, I was the kid that ate your daughter’s glittery glue. Fact: I was forced to use safety scissors until age seventeen. My one true talent was, and remains, my uncanny ability to affix a pair of “googly eyes” to everything I see.

But I cannot and will not allow my utter ineptness at this craft to prevent myself from judging others’ work! And I’m gonna kick it off with a rule-breaker of sorts, just so you all don’t get too comfortable. Ready? Okay, I bring you my selections for this week’s Friday Five.

Our Wildlife Habitat by med

This is really cool. Med has created a scrapblog documenting her successful efforts to convert her property back to it’s natural state, thus providing a healthy habitat for local wildlife, which was driven out by residential development. It’s amazing to see the changes in the land after just a few simple steps. Stop by her scrapblog page and congratulate and thank her on a noble job well done.

Wizard of Oz by med

So I said I was going to kick it off with a rule-breaker. Well, call me crazy, but I’m featuring two scrapblogs created by the same person in a single Friday Five. I don’t know if it has ever been done before, but this is my show today. I’m calling the shots. And med’s work lately has struck my fancy. Even though I was born and raised in the great state of Kansas, I still, to this day, have yet to see The Wizard of Oz. But, now, thanks to med and scrapblog, I may never have to! Also worth noting, this scrapblog is part of our first challenge, which you can read more about here and also over at our lively forum.

Wichita Mountain Wildlife by rainyskies

Speaking of the land of ahhhs, rainyskies’ continues our adventure through the Midwest to, not Kansas, but Oklahoma, where, in her scrapblog, she documents her trip to a wildlife refuge. I’m really digging the monochromatic color scheme. Nice work!

Triathlons by Lindsay Blum

I’ve always wanted to complete a triathlon but I can’t really swim and my cycling skills are more sharply tuned to avoid drivers in Miami than for racing. Question: am I allowed to use “floaties” in a triathlon? This scrapblog by Lindsay Blum documents a few triathlons around the country. I love the simplicity. Bonus points for including Kansas.

Somewhere in Time by little_m.

I’ll wrap up this week by genuflecting toward the much revered and very talented little_m. She knocks it out of the park once again with a beautiful photo journal displaying her ancestors. In fact, scrapbooking as an art today can attribute much of its growth to an early interest in documenting genealogy. What better reason to create a scrapblog than to preserve family history? Great work, once again, little_m!

Wow, that was a lot of work. But fun. I hope you enjoyed my picks and, those of you in the States, enjoy your long weekend! Go see some fireworks!

The other day I realized that I have never chosen the Friday 5. That is simply inexcusable. So here I am, trying to redeem myself. I have to admit, it is more difficult than I expected. So many great scrapblogs by so many passionate people to choose from and I have to select only 5! Should I select among the ones that I like the most? Sure, but based on what criteria. Should it be based on artistic value, journaling or storytelling? Should I lean towards the ones the make me smile or the most heartfelt ones. Maybe I should also take into consideration the scrapblogging techniques implemented in the scrapblogs that I choose. Well, I tried to take all these into consideration and came up with this shortlist of my recent favorites.

Hot Wheels - by ShannonParks
In the recent days, this scrapblog has become one of my all-time favorites. It makes me smile because I used to play with Hot Wheels as a kid and now I see my son, Lorenzo (4) enjoying that as well.

Megan’s Yearbook 2008 - by MeganBrooke
Were you part of the yearbook club? I wasn’t and there’re only two pictures of me in my high-school yearbook. So, why not created your own yearbook in Scrapblog. Megan did.

Ballet Portraits - by Octamom
Simply beautiful. Good photography and consistent use of a good font.

Tully’s Afternoon - by Aberbird

Boys in Spring - by Alannarusnak

So, Hey! It’s Rebecca! I have a special treat for you today. I met Bekka Bess and PAScrapgal (who was featured last week on the blog) last weekend in Nashville. Here’s a photo of them - aren’t they the cutest ever?! It’s such a treat for me to meet Scrapbloggers in person and I hope to meet all of you someday!

Bekka has chosen the Friday Five for this week. I know you will love her choices, she has great taste! Enjoy!

One:

Music 100% 24/7 by LoLmusicRBK - The composition of this scrapblog rocks!!! And the music fits perfectly.

Two:

Dream in Black and White by addibug - I love how much she did with just black and white. There are some gorgeous photos here.

Three:

Zander by Anniek - I think the 2nd page of this scrapblog won me over. I love the variety of pages used.

Four:

My Boys by Kristi Jones — I love how she incorporates several videos into her scrapblog.

Five:

Summmmerr by Lien005 - I really like the use of couple photos and photos without people to create a theme.

How how great are Bekka’s choices??? She’s a doll, go check her out, leave a comment and have a happy Friday!

Hey, it’s Annemarie AKA MommyVictory coming at you from Central Texas, land of the beautiful bluebonnets. I was asked to choose this week’s Friday Five, and I jumped at the chance. Then came the task of deciding what kind of scrapblogs to pick. If this had been earlier in the year, I probably would have had to regretfully decline, but now that school’s out for summer, I have some time to scroll through the cornucopia of talent we have here at Scrapblog. If you haven’t had a chance to hit that “Explore” button, I suggest you do. You might be surprised at the level of creativity that takes place within these pages.

For those of you who are as busy as I was, let me give you a glimpse at some of the great scrapblogs there are.

The first question that came to mind when I was brainstorming where to begin was, “What does summertime mean?” I am sure it means a lot of things to different people. Of course there are vacations like wuuwcy took to Disney. What kid wouldn’t want to come back from summer break and share a scrapblog like this.

She used a variety of background pages to accent the numerous photos taken on her trip.
And you can’t forget trips to the lake and the views like curiouskiwi shared entitled At the Lake. I loved her use of reflection and the photos of wildlife. It gave me such a feeling of relaxation, much like the feeling you get while visiting the family lake house.

My dad’s birthday is on the Fourth of July, and nothing could be more fun than a summer birthday party and fireworks. I wish I could have been at Noah’s Summer Birthday Party. Digiscrapper72 did a excellent job showing us their fun day in the sun.

I especially would have liked to have shared the fun with happyfamily at their Fourth of July celebration.

Last but not least, what kind of Texan would I be if I didn’t lead you to the Texas Trails 2 Fort Worth Zoo with JennyMac. I especially love her page with the orangutans.

I hope you use these Scrapblogs as inspiration to share with everything you do this summer. I look forward to seeing them.

Annemarie

Last week the United States celebrated Memorial Day. This holiday was founded in the US in the mid 1800s, following the Civil War. Celebrated on the last Monday in May, Memorial Day is a time to honor those who lost their lives while in military service to their country. I know we have many military families in our community here at Scrapblog and so today’s Friday Five is in honor of the men and women who serve in the military. I think the following scrapblogs speak for themselves and they will no doubt touch your heart.