Merry Christmas!

I'm not sure why this picture shows up so dark on the computer. Reviewing it on the camera, you can see the stockings and details. It's the perfect picture. But not here. So sorry!



Christmas preparations have taken over and although I see photos everywhere as my little girl experiences the excitement that Christmas being just around the corner brings, I am trying to hold myself back from photographing it all and just enjoy being with her.



I just completed all of my holiday preparations today, wrapping the last gift. Other than the constant housework that needs done, I find myself at a loss to know what to do for fun! I am so used to scrapbooking always being an option, but now everything is neatly packed away, waiting as I am for our addition to be done so that I will always have a desk of my own to scrap on!



My constantly moving belly lets me know that I need to clear my memory card (Which I will do after saving my favorite photos on a disk.) Since I have most of the photos in albums already, now is the time I do this.



Tip of the Day: I'm always learning, and one thing I recently discovered was a new way to journal in my daughter's album. Some ways I journal are by writing things on my kitchen calendar, or writing a diary-like entry in a notebook after an event. A new technique that recently worked for me was to ask my daughter questions which I jotted on a post it note and kept with my photos until it was time to scrap the pictures it went with. We had been to the circus, and I just asked her things like her favorite part of the show, the funniest thing there, what she would want to be if she were in the circus, and things like that. I quickly jotted down her answers and found them tremendously helpful when it came to journaling the page. Usually, I journal pretty much from my point of view, so this was a completely different perspective, and I loved it.



Scrap Happy!

Falling from my memory

Ahhh the fall! Leaves falling from the trees, Pumpkin stands by the road, the sweet crunch of a caramel apple....all of these things bring back memories of years past. I feel like last year's ride on the haywagon just happened a few months ago, but I already have pictures from this year's pumpkin patch experience, so it had to be over a year ago! Life gets confusing, especially if you wait a few years to put your pictures into an album! Here's another example! Last night on the news, the weatherman was talking to another anchor about the weather, and that we were getting the first frost of the season. This is unusual, he said, because at this point in October, we have usually had several by now. The anchor said, "I remember that we had snow on Halloween a few years ago." The weatherman says, "Actually, that was 10 years ago!"
If you already have years and years worth of pictures that are collecting dust somewhere, don't stop with just feeling guilty! Put those pictures into an album with journalling telling what was happening. If you are starting a new phase of your life, as a wife, mother, or gramma for example, start scrapbooking those memories and photos now. You will never regret it!

short and sweet

Ahhhh, Summer! I love it! There are so many things to do that you just can't do at other times of the year, especially when you live in the northern states. Often, I find myself at places that I have gone yearly, and I still take a few pictures to capture the moments. Last year, we spent the day at a local amusement park and I only took a smattering of pictures. I put them all on one page, and I decorated it very simply. Often when I overlap a central picture, I mat it, to seperate it from the others. I did that here. I used two, soft, blue papers on part of the page, and just decorated one corner of the page by punching out 4 squares and placing a square sticker from the CM Lazy Days pack right in the center of the 4 squares. It kind of mimics the way the pictures are placed on the page, actually. In the left hand corner, I jotted down a few memories of our day in what we in the scrapbooking world call "bullet journaling". It really says all that it needs to. I used the photo I took of the entrance sign as a sort of title for the page.

I love this page!

Scrap Happy!

What you mean to us

At my Mom's 60th birthday party, I made sure to get a picture of every guest. This is something I always do at my daughter's parties. Next, I handed journaling blocks and a CM pen to them after taking their picture, and asked them to write something to my mom. I've learned that people like to have some kind of guideline with this activity, so I asked them to write something they had learned from her, or something sweet about her and how much she meant to them. It's very important to collect them before people leave the party. They always want to take the paper and write later, but in my experience, you probably will never get that person's completed journaling box back, so strongly encourage them to finish it before leaving that day.

I then put together a 7x7 album for her, including the pictures of the party first, and then placing the journaling boxes with a picture of the person who wrote it. It's one of my favorite albums I ever made! It was relatively easy, too. I used the Paradise Storybox, and it comes with paper and journaling boxes that are perfectly coordinated.

I gave it to her for Mother's Day, and she loved it!

Scrap Happy!

P.S. I answered your questions as best as I could in my own comment. See the comments in the blog below this one!

A Flower from my Girl

Hello! Isn't this a beautiful tulip? When my daughter gave it to me the other day, I thought it was so gorgeous, and would live so much longer if I took a picture of it! It's currently my profile picture on My Space. What a sweet little gift!

After I put my daughter to bed tonight, I grabbed an hour to work on her album. I didn't feel like starting with Christmas, so I skipped ahead to March and did a fun 2 page spread, using journaling boxes, matting a few of the pictures and using a couple stickers. It's cute!

Tips of the Day: The pages I did today were of an event that my husband took my daughter to. Since I wasn't even there, I simply added the journaling boxes, and I have asked him to fill them in. I'm really into using journaling boxes lately, especially since I have been journaling later, rather than at the time I do the page. Each pack of perfect fit paper comes with coordinating journaling blocks, and you can find them in the storyboxes as well. I like that they have different sizes, so that I can fit them to my page.

Scrap Happy!

the journaling begins

I hated to admit it, but I had lost all the notes I had written while on my cruise! I can admit it now, because I finally found them over the weekend! I had placed them in a safe place, that's why I couldn't find them!
Anyway, I began the long process of journaling my trip. I got out a pen and notebook, the memories I had written on the trip, and the list that we filled out daily, ( best, worst, we tried... and the weather was...), and I laid out the pages that I have already put photos on. As I write in my notebook what I will later write on my album pages; I look at the album and how much room I have left for journaling, and kind of plan out where I was going to write what. I am not always this anal about it, but I want this album to be as near perfect as it can be because it's really special to me! So far, I have only written in the notebook. It's a long process! I'm combining the notes I've written, the info from our daily lists, as well as things I 'm remembering as I look at the pictures! Whew! Who knew scrapbooking could be so much work!?

Scrap Happy!

History Lesson 101

I must be getting tired of My Space, because I have made writing this blog more of a priority lately. My brother told me that I would get less addicted to My Space as time went on. Scrapbooking, now that's something I will never get tired of!

Today I drew out a little family tree for my daughter. It's hard to know how all of these relatives are actually related to you when you are 4. I drew each stick figure and wrote their name underneath while explaining who they were and how we were connected to them. She loves this little chart. I have always been interested in my family line. Even when I went to visit my Gramma, I was asking both her and Grandad about names of their parents and grandparents so that I can try to trace my history. Someday, I hope to make an album for Jaelyn of all of her relatives. The hard part would be finding photos of all of them!

Tip of the Day: Write the stories, too! One of my newest clients, Pat, was showing me a copy of a book she created for her brother. She had written interesting things about their family, rumors and truths from the past, and even had some old pictures to go along with whomever she was writing about. That's what I want to do. Not only include photos, but the stories my Gramma's have told me. What a rich heritage we all have if we only ask in time for the information!

Scrap Happy!

Still on that cruise of mine!

I finally got to scrap last Friday! Hurray! I am so far behind now. I have 3 books to do for other people, and I'm working on my cruise album. I find myself using a lot of the aqua paper packs, to mimic the carribean water that was so gorgeous. The library has asked me to do an album for them, and I had to tell them I couldn't at this time. I felt so bad, because the librarians there are so great, and I would love to help them, but I simply can't. I had just told my mom that I needed to start saying "no" to things, because I can't do everything and I am worn out from trying. What I need to do more often is scrap, because when I do that, I feel like I am accomplishing something that matters and it's a stress reliever as well.

Tip of the Day: In my quest to leave more room for journalling, I have discovered something I'd love to share! When you are using the 12x12 or larger albums, you don't really want to leave the entire width of the page open for journalling. It's simply too difficult for the album reader to follow. Even when reading with your finger underneath the print, it's so easy to lose your place on the page when you go to the next line. I think this must be why most paper, books, notebooks and such is no wider than 8x10.

Scrap Happy!
Congratulations to Missy on the birth of her second boy, Alex! We miss you at workshops, girl!

selfish journaling

I have almost caught up on all of my journaling and have gotten back to our cruise photos! Very exciting! I had been having trouble with how I wanted to do them, so I set them aside, did the journaling in my daughter's albums, and read a few articles, talked to a friend, and finally realized how I wanted to create my cruise scrapbook! I want to be sure to leave enough space for journaling. This was my major realization. This was OUR first cruise , and while I do want to show the world my pictures, my main objective is for my husband and I to be able to look back and read everything, and remember! So, I'm not going to mind if people skip all the extra words I've written, but I want to include them... for us!

Writing the Right way

I always save journaling for last, mostly because I don't know what to say or I'm afraid I will write sloppy and mess up the whole page! Tonight, I buckled down and worked on journaling the past 6 months in my daughter's album. The first thing I did was take the pages I'd created and sit down with a pen and a notebook and write whatever came to mind. Often, I think of more than will fit into the space I have saved for this purpose, and then I need to pare it down. I've found that I make a lot less mistakes if I write it down first. Of course, by the end of the night, I was just writing straight onto the page. But I was also making spelling errors. I keep a dictionary on my scrapbooking table. We rarely get through a workshop without someone needing it! Of course, it only works if you actually look things up! If you do make a mistake, there's always write again strips from CM. I'm going to be using at least 3 of those on pages I did tonight. Everytime I wait this long to journal, I wonder why I did! I hate to show anyone my pages until they are completed and that includes journalling. I also have a bad memory, so I can't recall everything that happened, unless I wrote it down on my calendar. I always think I'll remember! Ha! I can hardly remember my own phone number!

Tip of the Day: The more pens the better! I have every color pen that CM sells, and I use them too! I like to find that perfect color that compliments my page. Here's a secret! Creative Memories pens are changing! They will still be the same pens, but they will be different colors! Remember the pen sets you used to only be able to get from having a party?..... OOPS! I've said too much already!

Scrap Happy!

scrapbooking ideas and revelations

I have a confession to make! I'm now 2 months behind in my daughter's album! I try to create an album for her, and an album for myself. My own album is now a year behind. Here are my excuses: First, I take way too many pictures! I can't help it! I just don't want to forget anything she says or does. She has 2 books for every one year of her life. Secondly, I do other people's albums. Enough said! I just don't have time to put my own pictures into an album.

A HA! Now you're thinking, how do you have time to write about scrapbooking then? How can I resist?! Writing and scrapbooking are both passions of mine! So, my writings in here may be short, but I want to share a little bit of my experience and ideas.

Tip of the day: make sure you journal in your albums! You might hate your handwriting, but it is a part of you. Imagine getting the mail and spreading all of the envelopes out on the kitchen table. You'll see bills, and flyers, but what jumps out to you? An envelope with handwriting on it! How many times have you looked at a handwritten envelope and known immediately whom it was from? You recognize your mother's handwriting because it's a part of her! What will your handwriting mean to your children when you have passed away?
That's it for today! Scraphappy