Welcome Briana Johnson our April Guest Designer!

I started scrapbooking when I was 16 and my future mother-in-law invited me to a Creative Memories party. I am 31 now so I suppose I've been at this about 15 years. I scrap partly to preserve memories and to see the expression on my kids' faces when they look at their pages but it's mostly just because I love to mess with paper. And well, to collect and pet scrapbook stuff. Being the guest designer for April is a HUGE honor for me! Huge.

I was born and raised in rural Oklahoma. I graduated from OSU, we went back to our hometown for 5 years, then we decided to move to the big city : ) Oklahoma City that is, specifically Edmond, a suburb of OKC. I've been married to my high school sweetheart, Adam, for 10 years and we have two children, Zane who is 5, and Ava who is 3. We also have two cats. I am a stay at home mama. My hubs buys and sells mineral rights. This is a photo of our family at my daughter's third birthday a few days ago. Adam and I look happy enough but the kids - not so much : )

I really enjoyed working with this kit and "Tiny Dancer" is just one of my favorite layouts. The Sassafras paper was so easy to work with since most of the work has been done for you. I used all the squares and columns as a base for adding my photos and embellishments. I punched squares from the paper and ran some plain cardstock through my Cuttlebug to get the embossed polka dots. I adhered those with pop dots. I misted the fabric banner with white mist and stenciled pink polka dots. I cut the title with my Cricut.

The best two places I have traveled have been Italy on my honeymoon and Hawaii on my 10th Anniversary. One of my favorite photos is of my husband testing the water at Secret Beach in Kauai. When I look at that photo I feel like I'm about to witness an accident (not really just kinda). The waves were too big to go any farther and that current was major but the expanse of ocean and sky and the white foamy water are so beautiful. They all just blend in to each other.

This is a photo of my scrapbook room. My room is what I call "the attic room" as you can see by the strong eaves. That created a challenge when it came to storage. My husband and I installed floating shelves from Lowe's to fit the short but long wall and I loved the way it turned out. I know what you're thinking, you can't see what I'm talking about for looking at all those Martha punches! Scrapbook girls love that part. The punches are arranged on two tier chrome stands from Lowe's as are my wood mounted stamps and other punches.

Wow! What an inspiration you are Briana! We are so excited to share more of your amazing work tomorrow at midnight in the JBS Mercantile Gallery! In the meantime, be sure to check out her creations on her blog, "Paper*Lust." P.S. There's still a little time to enter our big True Scrap Giveaway!