The Color Room - Palette#50 - Bloghop & a new D.T

Hello Dear Friends and Welcome to Blog Hop! Today, I am very happy to announce that I have been asked to join the Color Room's incredible design team and that we are celebrating the 50Th Palette which you can see by clicking on The Color Room.

Here is my page. I turned the sketch to accommodate a 8 1/2 x 11 L.O. The title means "With 2 teenagers..." and the journaling talks about the fact that when the going gets tough, nothing replaces a little humor ;-)

UPCLOSE AND PERSONAL with.....alexandra sirugue-mac leod

1.    I am Franco-American. I was born in Paris and I live in Chicago.

2.    I Live with D.H Mark who is half Irish ( Happy St Pat Honey!) and half Scottish. We have two teenagers: Gabrielle Rose (17 1/2 , Keelan Ange (16) and Gallianne Lily (7 1/2). We have no pets because Mark and Keelan have asthma but if we could we would have a cat!

3.    On my desk right now you will find: my camera to the right, my lens to the left, my dark red Moleskin and my iphone charging.

4.    My favorite colors to work with at the moment are: "off colors" or washed colors but I love any colors as long as I can pair them with Kraft!

5.    What kind of themes do you often scrap? (what do you most like to record, or do you just scrap for art’s sake?): "capturing the moment" ( which is also the name of my photo blog )that's what I'm all about. I strongly believe that by doing so one can preserve the very essence of that memory.

6.    Where do you scrap? In my kitchen. I have granite counter tops and they are perfect for all of my crazy experiments! I like to be there in the heart of the house and we are very fortunate that it is spacious and leads into a backyard.

7.    What is your scrapping process? I almost always start with the pictures but when I don't, I'll let myself follow an idea or a sketch. These days, I have been loving incorporating ephemera into my pages but whatever I do, I try to have a strong design (which to me is "the backbone" of the page)with lots of textures while keeping the ensemble rather "clean"

8.    My favorite food is simple, wholesome, homemade and often vegetarian. I love a my Mom's Lentil dish, a good ratatouille, a Pissaladière with a glass of Rosé, fresh Sushi with loads of pickled ginger, fresh baguette with a slice of Alsacienne Foie Gras...I could go on and on ;-)

9.    My top 3 favorite tools are: my Guillotine (I am French after all), stamps and dies. 

10.   I get my inspiration from absolutely everywhere: Friends, fellow bloggers, dreams, adverts, street windows...

11.   Describe a Technique you used on your project this week: Let's see, I inked (with Distress Inks from Ranger) the edges of the fabric flower on the lay-out up above: by doing so I added dimension to the petals and depth to the page.

I would like to thank you for stopping by and encourage you to post comment for a chance to win ;-) And now let's go see Anna in Warsaw, Poland who is the next designer on the blog hop list.

EDIT: Sorry Friends, I forgot to write my question for your chance to win ;-)
What are my favorite TOOLS?