Telling the Photo-less Story

Another layout from February's online challenge. This prompt was "I Always Thought..." (Hence, the original title. LOL)

I always thought that I would grow up to own a home that would have a library in it because I love to read so much. If you read the last prompt you read that our home is only 900 square feet. Needless to say it doesn't include a library. But almost as good if not better...it does contain a scraproom for me. Alright, so it's in the basement with limited natural light and ventalation but it's my creative oasis. The room that keeps me sane in a world of child rearing craziness.

What do you do when you have a story you want to tell but don't have a photo for it? In the past, I have still told the story through my journaling and added some embellishments to relay the theme of the story, for this month's challenge I wanted to use photos. This forced me to learn how to download internet photos and get them transferred onto help a memory card so I could print them out. (I don't print photos directly from my computer. I don't like how my printer prints them. I print all my photos from my Epson PictureMate Printer .) This photo is one of the ones that I downloaded from the internet. Since my house doesn't have a library I needed a photo of one. I got it and a couple of other photos from the website Dreamstime . There's a charge for them but I love the quality of the photos.

This layout also let me try out a new journaling format. I've done other layouts with the journaling strips but those have had each line cut into strips. On this one I tried to break each line down a little further to give it a different look. Not an original idea but something new for me.

Spring Cleaning Means Less Scrapping

Whew! I'm exhausted and it's not because I've been up late scrapping either. Nope, it's from spring cleaning. John's on vacation this week, we're cleaning out the house and we're having a yard sale on Saturday.

It's amazing how quickly stuff accumulates. I feel like junk just multiples in my house like bunny rabbits. We live in a house with only 900 sq feet of living space. I think 750 feet of it is filled with non-essential stuff. I was daydreaming yesterday that it would be nice to get a fire hose and just wash everything out and start over fresh with so much less.

After this week I have to concentrate on organizing what I want to bring with me to my Maine scrapbooking weekend retreat. I can't wait! Three whole days of non-stop scrapping with my sister. I haven't been to a weekend crop in over a year. Things have been so crazy and hectic here that I really need it.

I've been trying to figure out what I want to work on. My Europe album WILL be done by then. (Positive thinking and fingers crossed.) I really would like to get my album from last summer's 101 Summer Things to Do done. I wanted to make it a quick album so I made it in an album that has all 4x6 photo pockets. All I had to do was print the photos, organize them, slide them into the pockets, journal, and add some embellishments. I had the photos printed, organized and into the album by last October but just need the time to do the journaling. I have 101 different things to talk about so every page is going to have journaling. I love to journal so that's not the problem. The problem is I just need some uninterrupted time to get it done. If I can get Printshop downloaded onto my laptop I'm going to plan on bringing this and my printer so I can get it done. I only have two months left before 2012's list of 101 Summer Things to Do and I can't still be working on last year's or else my stories will get all mushed together.

Sorry I Was Off the Grid...

Well, 2 days into my blog and my computer goes out. Arrgh!! So much for my daily commitment. Sounds like most of my diet efforts. LOL

A good thing about my computer difficulties...I had more time to work on my Europe trip album. I'm almost done. There's about a dozen pages I need to add journaling to, a couple of additional photos I need to print out and add to some pages. I need to do a layout of my return flight and one thanking John for letting me go on this adventure. (Not that he could have really stopped me-LOL)

I'm proud to say that most of my 1600 + photos have made it into my three volume scrapbook. Plus I love the classy style of the album. I'll be sharing just as soon as I finish it. I'm giving myself a deadline of April 30th. Those of you who know me well knows that means I'll be pulling an all-nighter that last night.

Till then let me share some more of the layouts I did for my February online challenge. Here's one for the prompt "Favorite Memory" Hence, the title for my page. LOL Actually the layout says a little more. The full title is "My Favorite Memory from Childhood." What I like most about this page, other than the memory it brings up, are the circles and strips of paper at the bottom. I used one of the sketches from Scrapbook Generation Sketches for Scrapbooking books. (By the way which are my ABSOLUTELY favorite scrapbooking tool!)

I chose this layout because of the circles and thought they would add the perfect amount of fun to this page about summers, swimming and childhood memories. There is also a double meaning to them for me. They represent a sort of 'circle of life' in my life. This lake is the lake I spent my childhood summers swimming in and now I get to bring my kids back there to swim. Daniel and Joseph were the age I was when I spent my last summers there before my Uncle Hughie sold his cottage.

One thing I'd like to change is the layout of the title. I LOVE my letter stickers and love to mix & match them but I'm starting to feel like my titles are all starting to look the same. I feel I need a course in title enhancement. I scour the scrapping magazines each month, looking ideas but then come back to the same old same old. Oh well, something for me to work on.

In February, I joined an online challenge group. It's called Layout a Day or LOAD. The theme of it was PAST PERFECT. Each day we were given prompts to inspire you to make a scrapbook layout. PAST PERFECT referenced making layouts from past memories. Initially  I was a little disappointed because I don't have many photos from my childhood. The ones I could find from my late teens, early 20's were horribly out of focus. (Cheap cameras.) Instead of relying on old photos I didn't have, it caused me to go online and find photos to match my story.
Like this layout about my first car. If you read yesterday's entry you'll remember me saying I'm not too computer savvy so I was very proud of myself for getting this photo downloaded, copied onto my memory card and printed.

This challenge also gave me the opportunity to scrap some layouts I've been kicking around my head but never had the chance to do because other more recent layouts or events seemed more important than past memories.  For example, the layout below about my very first apartment. The layout is actually not black & white. I have no idea why this photo came out b/w when I uploaded it to this blog. (See proof I wasn't kidding when I said I'm basically computer clueless.)

My favorite layout from the month was from the prompt, "Favorite Photo" I used my favorite photo from my trip to Europe. I like this layout for a couple of reasons.
1-It's my favorite photo because of the lighting, I like the silhoutte of the couple as they are walking away, I love the arches from the building and it's from Venice, my favorite city on my tour.
2-I love the papers and colors I chose because I think they are a perfect match to the photo.
3-I love the unexpected pop of color from the blue tag which also matches the photo.
4-This is about as shabby chic as I get on layouts. The little collage of embellishments in the corner is not really in my comfort zone but I made it work where I still felt comfortable with it working with my linear style.



Ok, that's it for today. It's getting late and the kids will be up in just a few hours. I'll post more layouts from the challenge tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by.

Welcome to My Scrappy Life!

Here I am finally jumping on the blogging bandwagon. I've been kicking around the idea of having my own blog for all things scrapbooking in my life, which is quite a bit considering I think about it 24/7, for some time now. I'm not that computer savvy. I can read and send emails. I can upload/download a photo. I can spent endless amounts of time on Facebook games but that's about pretty much it. So I've been a little apprehensive about starting a blog because to put it bluntly...I don't want my blog to suck. I love reading other scrappers' blogs. They always look so professional with perfectly cropped photos and links built into their text. Yeah...don't expect that here. At least not for a while (hopefully).

I was at a crop at Right at Home Scrapbooking a couple of weekends ago and another woman (thanks Kristy!) asked me if I had a blog because she had just started one and after thinking about it I was convinced it was time to get my butt in gear and get it done. So here I am. It may not be the fanciest but this is my scrappy life blog.