Project Life, Week 25

Hi friends, I thought I'd pop in here and share something crafty that I've been spending a lot of time on this year -- Project Life. If you're not familiar with this scrapbook system, check it out at beckyhiggins.com.

I have to let you know I'm uncomfortable sharing my PL pages here on my blog, because a) they're not very good; b) I'm pretty boring; and c) I'm not much of a photographer. [Interestingly, I used to take much better family photos years ago, when I first got a DSLR and let the camera just do its thing in auto mode. Over the past few years, I've learned just enough about photography to be dangerous, but not enough to be any good (yet). Seriously!]

I intend to fix that, but until then, I'm not letting my familiar friend Perfectionism keep me from tackling this project!  I haven't really scrapbooked in years, and while I don't necessarily miss the scrapbooking itself (cards are a perfect size canvas for me, thank you!), I do wish I had more stories and memories recorded for my children to enjoy both now and in the future. Project Life, with its 4x6 and 3x4 pockets, is perfect for me!

Here's Week Twenty-Five, June 17-23:

And some close-ups:

(left side)

The Project Life Core Kits all come with pre-made title cards, but I thought this would be the perfect place for some creativity, so I'm doing my own thing for these. Even if I don't get very creative elsewhere on the weekly spreads, I think it's fun to make each of these unique and interesting. For Week 25, I've used the Echo Park This 'n' That Charming collection, both the papers and some sticker elements. The corrugated letters and numbers are by Jillibean Soup. I like how this one turned out.

Father's Day 2012 may get its own traditional scrapbook page someday, but I still wanted to include a snippet in this album. The base of the top left (3x4) card is by Echo Park (either Charming or For the Record?). I added the "Happy" sticker element and then an old "Father's Day" rub-on from my stash, as well as some yellow baker's twine. The right card is from the Project Life Clementine core kit. I added a photo, some washi tape, and handwritten journaling. (By the way,  my handwriting is definitely something that has deteriorated with age!) On the photo, the "we love" comes from Ali Edwards' We Word Art Brushes & Stamps (available at Designer Digitals). The letters are stickers.

"This photo tells a story" is another digi element by Ali Edwards: Little Bit of Messy.The journaling card is from one of the Echo Park Charming 12x12 patterns (I think).

More Ali Edwards digi elements (I may have combined brushes from two sets to create pool party) and more Charming papers and stickers. I need to switch out that smudged journaling label!

(right side)

A photo of my boys rough-housing. Behind the photo are two 3x4 Echo Park journaling cards, accented on the right with patterned papers. I used a craft knife to cut around those little flags on the left, then just tucked the photo behind them. Some Tim Holtz tiny staples hold everything together.

Another Charming journaling card, an oval punch/die-cut, and some yellow letters that I cut with my Silhouette (Postino font)

Two really bad iPhone photos of our first trip to a local ice skating rink, as well as our admission stickers and the receipt. The letters are stickers -- I think they maybe October Afternoon. (And I think I should take notes so I can I.D. this stuff better!)

A trio of random photos from the week. The numbers were punched from an Echo Park Charming pattern and correspond to items on the weekly summary card (included below). To make the trio, I used a free photo template from Persnickety Prints, 6x4 Tiny Templates.

Mr. Popper's Penguins was a free movie at the local theater this particular week. I just did an internet image search and saved the highest resolution movie image file I could find. The decorative card on the right is (I think) from the Project Life Clementine core kit.

Last is a week-in-review card that I pretty much loathe :) Just didn't turn out like I wanted, but I was too spent by this point to change it up. The numbers (again, punched from one of the Echo Park Charming patterns) correspond to the numbered photos elsewhere on the week's spread.

Whew! That's it. Let me know what you think!

Verve July Project Parade: My Hero

Verve kicked off a new Project Parade this past Monday, and today is my turn! Our theme this month is My Hero. That can be anyone -- a person serving his or her country, a family member, friend, public figure, etc. My project is a scrapbook page tribute to my deceased paternal grandfather, who served in the United States Army for fourteen years. Head over to the Verve blog for more about my project and the man who inspired it!

As with all Project Parades, play along with our theme and/or leave comments on each Project Parade post for chances to win. Full details are posted on the Verve blog.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and have a great weekend!

Valentine, Sweet Valentine

As promised, more Verve projects. This first was created with Sweet Valentine. I love this red, brown, green color combo - great for a guy card, even with the big ol' ribbon.

Next is a four-pack of little 3 1/4" x 3 1/4" love notes, created with Hearts On Fire:



And a tote to hold them:



My favorite set of the new release is Hundred Hearts. The sentiments are phenomenal! I chose to pair one of them with a photo of me with my youngest when he was only a couple months old. I'll either slip this into a scrapbook or put it in an 8x8 frame I picked up recently. I have to tell you, it feels strange putting my big ol' mug on here like this, but here goes anyway:




And a close-up of the ribbon/tag/sentiment combo:





Thanks for visiting!



Sweet Valentine:
Stamps: Sweet Valentine (Verve Stamps)
Paper: Riding Hood Red, Very Vanilla, Chocolate Chip, Old Olive dp (SU!)
Ink: Chocolate Chip craft, Riding Hood Red, Old Olive
Accessories: clear embossing powder, sponge daubers, ticket corner punch, ribbon, paper piercer, brads (SU!); Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder (Provo Craft); Copic marker, Labels 2 Nestabilities (Spellbinders)

Hearts on Fire Love Notes and Tote:
Stamps: Hearts on Fire (Verve Stamps)
Paper: Pink Pirouette, Basic Gray, Going Gray, Very Vanilla card stock (Stampin' Up!)
Ink: Versafine Onyx Black (Tsukineko), Pink Pirouette (SU)
Accessories: clear embossing powder, ivory taffeta ribbon, sponge daubers, small oval punch, dimensionals, paper piercer (SU); Fancy Scalloped Piercabilities, scalloped square Nestabilities (Spellbinders); narrow ivory satin ribbon (Offray); adhesive pearls (K&Co.)

Hundred Hearts Scrapbook Page:
Stamps: Hundred Hearts (Verve Stamps)
Paper: Night of Navy, Whisper White, Maine Blueberry dp (SU!)
Ink: Night of Navy, Bashful Blue (SU!)
Accessories: self-adhesive pearls (K&Co); Victorian Border Piercabilities (Spellbinders); heart charm (Blue Moon Beads); paper piercer, scallop border punch, silver cord (SU); ribbon (Pink Hedgehog Paper Crafts); Scor-Pal; foam adhesive
Photo Credit: Portrait Innovations, Leesburg, Virginia

Scrapbook Club Make-and-Take

After a summer hiatus, my scrapbook club is meeting again tonight for some crop time and a make-and-take. I've said before (but it's been a long time) - it's haaaaard coming up with make-and-take ideas. Everyone scraps a little differently, plus there's a mix of women at different ages and stages in the group. We all love papercrafting and we're all wives and moms. But those are about the only things we have in common. I opted for an easy Halloween spread for tonight - can't go wrong with that!

Sorry for the poor photograph - I haven't figured out how to get a good picture of such a big project. Anyway, I'm a bad demo for a lot of reasons ... one is that I don't mind pulling out my retired stuff (Booglie Eyes) and using contraband when it works (oval Nestability). If I were doing a workshop with potential new customers, I wouldn't do this, but these girls have been with me forever, and they don't mind.

The page base is 12x12 black card stock. The large green pieces are just single sheets of 8 1/2 x 11 turned landscape (yay, no cutting!). The space on the left where I've added my watermark is intended for journaling. Since the green panel is 8 1/2 x 11, they'll easily be able to print their journaling on the computer if they want to. They will be stamping the Halloween creatures on watercolor paper and watercoloring with SU markers. See that spider web on the right-hand page? I got that idea from this amazing card by Monika Davis. I wouldn't live to post here again if I had my club ladies stitch that web with a machine!! So we're doing some piercing and faux stitching (with a black marker) instead.

Have I mentioned before how much I loathe full spreads these days? The day I let go of the notion that opposing pages had to match, and started creating stand-alone single pages instead, was the day I found freedom in scrapbooking. One thing I dislike about full spreads is finding a way to visually connect the two sides, so that they really look unified. On this spread I tried to do that with the thin white strip that runs full-width along the bottom and by connecting the two pages with hinges made from Stampin' Up's tag punch.

Here are a couple of detail shots:





Thanks for stopping by!



Stamps: Booglie Eyes [retired], All Holidays (SU!)
Paper: Basic Black, Certainly Celery, Lavender Lace, Tangerine Tango, Whisper White (SU!)
Ink: Basic Black, Jet Black Staz-On (SU!)
Accessories: Basic Black, Certainly Celery, Lavender Lace, Pumpkin Pie, Going Gray markers, paper piercer, silver brads, tag punch, Tangerine Tango double-striped ribbon (all SU!); classic oval Nestability (Spellbinders)

Scrap Club

Just a quick post this morning to show you what my scrap club ladies made on Saturday night. I had a big collection of pictures from last summer that weren't very good, but yet still had significance, so I created this round-up style page (but I see now that I forgot to include the year underneath the title, ooopsie!). The photos are all about 2" x 2 3/4" each -- not big enough for the low quality to matter and small enough to cram a bunch on one page. On the left side, I included a picture of each child, along with his or her age and a couple of specific highlights. The bullet point journaling on the long white vertical strip corresponds with the pictures on the right and is computer-generated using one of the Stampin' Up! fonts.

Have a great day!



Stamps: Garden Whimsy, Live Your Dream, Big Deal Alphabet
Paper: Bashful Blue, Wild Wasabi, Real Red, Brilliant Blue, Whisper White
Ink: Bashful Blue, Wild Wasabi, Real Red, Brilliant Blue
Accessories: corner rounder, 1/2" circle punch, 1 3/8" circle punch, paper piercer, computer journaling
All supplies by Stampin' Up!

Birthday Roundup

[Edited To Add: I give up!! I've tried a couple of times today so far to get a decent picture of this page, and just can't. This is the best I can do. The page isn't great as it is, and the photography isn't helping any -- maybe I was thinking my camera could work a miracle ;) ]

My scrapbook club is coming over on Saturday for our second of six crops. I put together a spread yesterday using a Valerie Salmon sketch (#52). I'm not doing a whole lot of scrapbooking these days (can you tell? this cardmaking stuff has completely taken over - anyone else?), and the little that I do do tends to be more reflective, story-telling stuff, rather than event-based. So instead of big birthday spreads with the same ol' info (this is the cake, these are the guests, these are the gifts, these are the games, etc.), I'm just putting together a 2-page "2007 birthday round-up," with a few photos and/or notes for each of the 5 of us. My youngest, who turns 1 next week, had his actual birth day last year, thus the hospital pictures!

Here's the right side:



I've had my hand in a bunch of random stamping projects here lately - PTO appreciation gifts, prom invitation samples (yikes!) for my sister and the junior class at the high school where she works, and a family scrapbook project for my son's Cub Scout den. All fun stuff, but it has left precious little time for card-making this week. Looking forward to the weekend to get back in my groove!

Have a great day, and thanks so much for stopping by!



Stamps: Big Bold Birthday, So Many Scallops, Celebrate Everything, Office Accoutrement
Paper: Tempting Turquoise, Old Olive, Whisper White, Purely Pomegranate, Pumpkin Pie, Pumpkin Pie prints, Rose Red Prints, Celery Prints
Ink: Purely Pomegranate, Tempting Turquoise, Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive
Accessories: 1/2," 1", 1 1/4" and 1 3/8" circle punches, scallop punch, ticket corner punch, spiral punch
Size: 12x12
All supplies by Stampin' Up!

Speed Scrapbooking

I've been a little quiet for a few days. While I was away, I learned a hard lesson - four days isn't enough time to prepare an Artisan Award entry. LOL! I tried, I really did ... begged, borrowed and stole every spare moment and then some, stayed up way too late, but in the end, it just didn't come together. If I only had another day or two, but whose fault for waiting until the last minute?! I'm a little disappointed in myself that I'm not giving it a shot, but hopefully there will be more chances to enter in future years. And no matter what, it will still be the Stampin' Up award highest up on my "watch list." Good luck to those who entered!

As I was attempting to put together some projects for the contest, I was reminded of a speed scrapbooking strategy I adopted a few years ago, but forgot somewhere along the way. Whenever I used to make a card I was really happy with, I would immediately make a coordinating scrapbook page. The supplies were already out, the concept was already executed, all I had to do was adapt everything to a larger canvas. I got a lot of pages done that way!

Today's project was my attempt to remake this card into a scrapbook page. I love this picture of my mom holding my sleeping daughter. It's not a particularly great photo, but it's one that resonates with me on an emotional level. Photos of quiet moments like this don't need a whole lot of description, so instead of journaling, I went with this quote: "A garden of love grows in a grandmother's heart."

Stamps: From the Garden, Print Pattern, All Holidays
Paper: Always Artichoke, Soft Sky, Chocoalte Chip, Whisper White, So Saffron
Ink: Chocolate Chip, Always Artichoke, Soft Sky, So Saffron
Accessories: aged copper hodgepodge hardware, soft sky double-stitched ribbon, corner rounder (for scallops), sewing machine, paper piercer, edge distressor, aqua painter, 1" circle punch
All supplies by Stampin' Up!

2008 Scrapbook Club

I'm kicking off my 2008 Scrapbook Club tonight. Six scrapbookers are coming to crop, place an order, and complete this make-and-take (you can click the picture for a close-up):



I haven't done any scrapbooking since early last Fall ... I forgot how happy it makes me! I'm not so much of an "event" scrapbooker, so I tried to put together something that could, but doesn't have to, be used for Valentine's Day. I'm always a little anxious (okay, a lot!) about the make-and-takes. Coming up with something that suits everyone can be challenging. (I seem to have a learning disability when it comes to the whole "you can't please everyone" advice!)

This spread is quite simple, but I like how it turned out. Probably because I used one of Valerie Salmon's sketches as a starting point (#40) -- love her stuff. If you like sketches, check out her site, Got Sketch. Can you believe the whole page was completed with just one stamp set, SU's new Always set? The "you mean everything to me" quote is microscopic compared to your average page title, but I think it works, don't you?

By the way, I don't know why those four middle black and white photos look so washed out ... they don't look that way IRL.

Stamps: Always
Paper: Rose Red, River Rock, Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla
Ink: Rose Red, Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla craft
Accessories: 1/4", 1/2", 1 1/4", and 1 3/8" circle punches, scallop punch, paper piercer and template, scallop scissors (old, old, old Creative Memories), "textile" Cuttlebug embossing folder
Sizes: pages are 12" x 12"; photos are 5" x 7", 4" x 6", 4" square, and 6" x 4"