Hello! Melissa here from the ScrapMatters Gang. Today I am interviewing a truly talented scrapper, Paige! She always does the most amazing, awesome two page layouts! Be sure to check out her fabulous gallery.

1. Your screen name? Your real name? My screen name is Paige, my real name is Paige, I know it’s very original, huh?

2. What is your main job/career? I am a Stay at home mom for one daughter, age 2 and a half. I am also my husband’s personal assistant (at least he thinks so)

3. Are you married/children/pets? My next anniversary will be to celebrate 7 years and you already know about my daughter. I also have 2 cats, they are 4 years old and we have had them their whole life (although my husband wishes otherwise, haha).

4. Where is home for you? Home is at my house, with my cats, my family and my stuff. I am originally from Michigan and have lived all over, Spain, New York City, Chicago and Texas. Now I live in Texas. Yee-Haw!

5. What are your 3 favorite foods? I love a good turkey sandwich loaded with mayo, mustard, cheese and avocado. I guess I would also say these chocolate/coconut/pecan/heath bar desserts I make. And geez, how can I just pick one more? I would say chocolate of any kind. Or pumpkin pie. Oh, I don’t know.

6. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream? Ben and Jerry’s Half Baked (for those of you missing out it’s half brownie batter and half chocolate chip cookie dough. YUMMY!)

7. Snacks…Salty or Sweet? Both, I love those chocolate covered pretzels, it’s like a 2 for 1…salty AND sweet!

8. Beverage of choice? Diet Cherry Coke Zero

9. What’s your least favorite food? Food that is TOO spicy

10. PC or Mac? What program do you use? PC and I use Photoshop Elements 5

11. How long have you been digi-scrapping? How did you get started? I started scrapbooking when I was in college, maybe 10 years ago and then a friend of mine told me all about digital scrapbooking and I totally didn’t want to do it. I already had a HUGE stash of paper and scissors and stamps, etc. Then last winter my daughter began to stand up and she would grab all my supplies off of the table so I decided in the summer of 2007 to give it a try. Since then I have made abour 175 double page LOs. I would NEVER go back, in fact, it’s really hard for me to paper scrap now. There are just too many options with digital and you don’t have to get any pictures developed. I tell my husband I am saving us a fortune on paper and photo developing. Not that the middle of the night shopping sprees online for digi-supplies doesn’t do me in.

12. What was your 1st LO about? My first LO was a summary page of my daughter’s first year, highlighting a picture of her from each month. I almost finished the whole thing when my old computer crashed and I had to start from scratch. It’s a miracle I kept scrapping.

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13. Do you have any other hobbies besides digi-scrapping (are there other hobbies)? Well, I am kind of an addict and it drives my husband NUTS. Other than digi-scrapping I love to be social with my friends and I also play tennis (although not very regularly) and I love to do paper crafts and other crafty things and make gift baskets for friends.

14. What is the most challenging part of scrapbooking for you? Figuring out how to arrange the pictures. I sometimes get in a rut so I use a lot of templates. I don’t think I really work faster with the templates, but they help me figure out how to arrange things. You still have to be pretty creative with a template to make it your own (at least that’s my story, so don’t tell me otherwise).

15. What would you like to learn to do (or do better) not related to scrapbooking? I would love to take better pics (ok, so that’s scrapbook related). Really, I would love to learn to be a better cook. I just don’t have that gene. I love to bake, but I’m so afraid of setting fire to the house I refuse to do a lot of normal things in the kitchen. I am just getting better about taking hot food out of the oven. I know I am SO pathetic. We eat out A LOT!

16. What are your favorite movies/TV shows? At the moment, I am addicted to The Office, Grey’s Anatomy, Heroes, True Blood and Entourage on HBO. My husband watches WAY more TV than I do. I don’t have a TV near my computer so it’s either scrap or watch TV. Scrapping wins every time.

17. Describe your “scrapping” environment. Music? TV in the background? Drinks? Snacks? Where? We just moved into a house and it has a little built in office room with shelves, etc. Anyway, one would normally think that the person who works outside the home might need a home office, but in our case it was much more important to have an office for my scrapbooking. So I have a little oasis called the “nook” and it’s off of my living room and it’s only for me. I don’t listen to any music, because the room is also accross the hall from my daughter’s bedroom and since she is usually sleeping or trying to sleep while I scrapbook I usually try to be quiet. Sometimes I have the TV on in the other room for some noise. I usually eat a lot of chocolate while I am scrapbooking, way too much, and I stay up way to late doing it! One of my cats refuses to be away from me while I scrap so I have to leave the shelf above my monitor clear. He lays up there the whole time
and snores like crazy.

18. If you only had 2 elements to use on a LO, what would they be? Stitching and Flowers

19. Would you like to share a little known fact about you…? Geez, that’s a tough one. I don’t know…..I speak Spanish. Not such an interesting fact, but that’s all I have.

20. Can you tell us a little about your scrappin’ style? I think I have a clean style (although it takes a while for each page to look that way) and I try not to have too many items. I like my pictures to be the main interest of the page. Oh and you probably notice that I am pretty much strictly a double page scrapper. I think I’ve done maybe 3 or 4 single LOs. I just like the way they look in a book after I print them out.

21. Favorite LOs that you have done?
I love this LO. I did it for a speed scrap a while back.  (Bubble LO)

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Actually, every LO I do is my favorite until I complete the next one. I usually don’t stop working on a LO until I’m totally satisfied.

22. Your favorite holiday tradition? I always get my daughter’s pictures taken for Halloween. And as for Christmas I really love buying a special ornament for the year. I buy two of the same special ornaments and I put one away for my daughter to have when she has a tree of her own (yes, I know that’s years away). That way she grows up knowing the story behind our special ornaments and then I don’t have to give her mine, I can give her a set of her own. Also, I love wrapping presents and opening presents at Christmas. It’s always fun to give and to watch people open their gifts. I’m so excited I think I’m going to have a “present wrapping” party this year for my girlfriends. I already have a title for the scrapbook page brewing in my head. Sometimes I wish I could get scrapping out of my brain, but it’s just too much fun!

Thank you Paige! Be sure to check out her gallery.