i make things

Project Life 2015: Week 9

Week 9 of Project Life.

So glad I am back on this horse. It's a fun project and I'm getting some of my memories and activities told. I know 10 years, or 15 years or even next year I'll look back and be glad I did this.

Some weeks I'm not so happy with the layout, some weeks I am but all in all I never am unhappy that I'm doing this. :)

So here we go.

My shortened layout this week. One small insert and the main page.

This is Bruce fileting a nice crappie. I wanted to use it for my title header this week because I didn't really have a big story to go with it but wanted to include the picture. (Right now my sister is probably grossed out that I put a fileted fish on my blog. LOL Thinking about it makes me chuckle a little. For me, it's a part of life and isn't really that gross but then again I'm a farm kid. Not much grosses me out.)

I cut out the "week 9" using my Silhouette but wanted to do computer type for the date.

I knew I didn't want to cover up the fish so I made my cutout to fit in the blank are on the bottom right. I knew how tall my cut-out was so I just set up the grids in Photoshop so I knew how how the week 9 would be then I wrote in my date.

The insert on the left side.

This year I've been taking more of a different approach to this project. I choose the pictures I want to show and then I fill in the embellishments and journalling. I used to try and plan out the whole thing first but that got tedious. It's been easier and faster for me to make sure I concentrate on one thing then add the next layer and so forth.

Kind of like a Christmas tree. You start with the big ornaments first then work your way down in size filling in the holes. That's how I am doing this project now. I start with the pictures I want then do journalling then fill in the embellishments. I think it's been working well for me.

I made a little boo-boo on this insert though. I was going to put this blog card in a 4x6 pocket but then realized that I didn't like the pig being so small on a 3x4 card. So I just cut the blog card in half. I think it's okay. You know that it says blog and the journalling is not cut up.

Moving on.

I love this card! I should make more of them since I am such a bacon fiend. That's right, fiend!

Pig is cut out of hot pink nubby paper using the silhouette (Can I just say this is turning into one of my favorite tools. I held off so long buying this bad-boy.) I cut out the word BACON from some pink cardstock and wrote my journalling around the pig using a American Crafts slick writer pen.

Right side!

This was all about birthdays.

Between Feb and Mar I have 10 birthdays in my family. 10. T-E-N, ten. So project life gets a lot of birthday pictures and embellishments.

There are two different birthday parties here. Traci's on the left and Chris's on the right.

This cutie is my nephew Ashton. He loves cupcake frosting. Not so much the cupcake but the frosting. I think he likes goatees too since he has a frosting goatee on his piggy face. LOL

This cutie is my cousin Traci who I've affectionately called 'Raci for years. Ever since she was little my cousin Tara used to call her that. She couldn't say the T in Traci so it was shortened to Raci. So now I just call her that.

I nickname everyone. Sometimes they aren't even nicknames I made up but for whatever reason I like 'em so I claim them as my own.

This was one of those hilarious moments from the night. It's hard to tell what's going on from the picture so I journalled about it in my spread.

Traci was digging into her little cake and her boyfriend Marc had a cupcake he was eating. Traci is a smart and wiley girl so she had her eagle eye trained on him because she thought FOR SURE that he was going to smash his cupcake in her face.

I was watching this just laughing. The expressions on their faces were classic and priceless. I wish my photography skills were better so I could have gotten those looks but at least I got this one. :)

On to the next birthday party.

This is my little brother Chris whom I affectionately call "Christles" (nicknames again. Dad made this one up when he was like 1 and I just run with it.) and his girlfriend Angi.

Christles' birthday party was at Dave and Buster's in a suburb of the Twin Cities. I found out that I had a knack for one of the games. I played it like I owned it. Beat it 'til it broke. So naturally I decided that deserved it's own shout out in my layout this week.

p.s. Glad my mom got a picture of me and all my seriousness. I'm competitive so when I play it's all business. Well, I have fun I just like to win so I've always got a serious look on my face.

Next is some journalling.

I decided that I needed a breakdown of the week since I had concentrated the most on pictures. So I made this card up using some digital Ali Edwards Story Kit .png files. (Little Things)

I used the numbers 1-10 brush and then in the background I used a brush file of the word Story and lessened the transparency from 100% to around 5%. That way my journalling would still be legible. I made sure I changed the bottom right story to a little bit darker just to make it show up.

Well that's about it for this week. Hope you enjoyed the post. If you'd like to see more project life click here.

If you'd like to check out my other posts click on the navigation bar above. There are drop-downs as well so you can pick which item you'd like to see.

Thanks again. Come back soon! If you have any comments or questions please post below.

Make a Card Monday: Happy Birthday Flower Card

Welcome to another edition of Make a Card Monday! (If you haven't been here before you can click here to see all of the cards I've done so far. Cards.)

This week I needed to do a card for a very special friend of mine from college. It was her birthday.

I wanted to make a card that would fit her. I've found that if I just go through a person's pinterest page I can get awesome ideas for either making them something or buying them something. Their pinterest page is a reflection of what they like and who they are. It tells a story just like reading a book.

In this case I happened to see that she had a lot of chevron/diagonal patterns in her "my style" page and she had a beautiful picture of a flower (somewhat similar to the one in this card). I took that and ran with it and this is what I came up with.

Here's a quick tutorial on how I made this card. Please note that I try to link my products as best I can so that in case you like them you can find them easily. I'm not being paid by anyone to do this. I just like to give you options.

Also, I don't always use current products because I like to use up my stash instead of just buying new stuff all the time. So I don't always have a link to buy something because it might be discontinued now.

Don't lose heart though. The beauty of most of these cards is you can substitute patterns or colors with your own stash of products.

Okay, enough yapping, here we go!

The products:

• White Card -  I'm using a 5 x 6.5" card but you could certainly use a smaller one.
• 4" White Doilies - I just buy these from Michael's. They are cheap and easy to use.
• Pink Chevron Patterned paper - I'm using some American Crafts paper but you could use any pattern or color that you want.
• Pink gems - from Martha Stewart. You could also use stickers, buttons, etc. Any type of embellishment would work.
• White and Gray Pearls - Doodlebug - you could also use gems if you like.
• Staz-on Jet Black Ink - used for Happy Birthday Stamp
• Happy Birthday Stamp - I can't find the packaging for this so I'm not sure which brand/manufacturer. Sorry about that. You could use your own handwriting, a sticker, another stamp that you like. This is completely open.
• Adhesive of your choice. I used Scotch glue for the doilies. It's a clear-drying glue and has two different sized applicators for big or small application.
• A favorite picture. I used a flower but you could really use anything. I found one that has

1. Find and print out a favorite flower picture. (Really you could use any picture you like.)

Specifically I found one that had some space that I could put the title without taking away from the picture.

On the left-hand side I specifically blurred the background when I took the picture because it puts more emphasis on the flower on the right. This turned out to be the perfect picture for this card project.

When I printed it I gave it a white border because it really made the picture pop off the page more.

2. Cut your piece of patterned paper 2.5 x 6.5 inches. Glue down onto the landscape .

3. Grab two paper doilies and figure out where you'd like to put them. Then lay down your picture and move around as necessary.

I liked having them in opposite corners. It seemed to give the card a little something extra.

Once glued down cut off the excess doily.

Note: I glue directly in the middle of the doily and usually in the little circles on the edges but that's it. That should be enough glue to keep them down.

4.  Next step is to add some embellishments at the corners with the doilies. I chose gems and pearls because they fit nicely with the flower and the doilies. I wanted something sparkly yet elegant and those items fit the bill.

If you were doing a boys card you could make it much more masculine with stars or metal instead of pink and gray.

I like how the embellishments frame the picture as the doilies also do. There's just more texture and interest.

 

5. Next add your happy birthday sentiment. There are several options you could do. Pick whichever option you'd like. Honestly for me it depends on the time I have. If I have more time I'll maybe do a cut-out or find a type I like on the picture.

• a stamp
• your handwriting
• a sticker
• letter stickers
• type on the picture before you print it
• a die cut
• a silhouette cut out

I used a stamp because I liked how it fit in that section. Note: I use staz-on because it dries quickly and has a nice dark black color.

Walahh you are done. That's all folks. Easy peezy. You've got yourself an elegant birthday card.

The beauty of this card is that you could really use this design to make several different cards. It could be a fun young boy card, a thinking of you card, a just a note card. The possibilities are endless.

Thanks for reading this post. If you'd like to see more cards please click here.

 

http://www.michaels.com/search?q=Recollections%205%20x%20card

Pacific Northwest Road Trip: Day 7: Willamette National Forest: McKenzie River Trail & the Blue Pool

The McKenzie River Trailhead to the Blue Pool in the Willamette National Forest was my adventure this afternoon.

This was, by far, my absolute favorite hike of the trip. Favorite. Hands down. No question. No hesitation. I'll remember this hike for the rest of my life.

This hike was EPIC! If you've read my PNW posts you'll notice I say that...a lot. But seriously. I was so blown away by this hike. I loved it. LOVED IT. I'd go back and do it again. Albeit I'd start in the morning so I could take more time. I started in the afternoon right before a rain storm. Not the greatest circumstances.

But anyway, here's my story of this magical and gorgeous hike.

I stopped at the McKenzie River Ranger Station and talked to a guide. I also bought a waterproof map of the area with trails marked. I find that when I’m hiking I feel safer if I have a map, if for some reason, I get lost. Not that I really worry about that but you never know so it’s better to be safe than sorry.

The ranger pointed me in the direction of the McKenzie River Trailhead. He said, since I had a time limit, I should walk that 4 mile round trip as it’s a hiker favorite. I figured I had enough time to hike that trail before the storm came in so I went that route.

It was about 45 degrees outside and it seemed cold so I put on my under armour pants and shirt, then my hiking shirt, my vest and my raincoat. I also had on wool socks and my hiking boots. Oh and my Twins stocking hat. I figured it’s better to dress in layers because you can always take them off. (Turns out I was right. I ended up getting hot and taking some of it off.)

There were 2 groups starting out ahead of me. 1 was a woman and man probably in their 40’s and a group of girls. One with a baby on her back.

I was glad to see others on this trail because hiking alone is dangerous so knowing that there are other people hiking the trail with you is comforting. If something happens it won’t be long before they find you.

At the start of my hike.

As I started out on the trail it was fairly easy. The narrow road was packed nicely with some rocks poking out. The river was beautiful, clear with huge boulders and dead trees covered in moss and grass. I stopped at least a dozen times to get pictures.

You start going downhill a bit passing over these bridges made of logs usually covering a small stream or part of the river.

To your right is the McKenzie River.

You weave back and forth across the river a couple of times which, for me, was a lot of fun. I love the wooden bridges made out of real logs and not square cut wood. It's rustic and realistic.

I love seeing these downed trees with roots exposed because you really start seeing how much a root system can spread underground.

In order to get this picture I balanced my camera on a down log with a piece of dead bark underneath it to prop it up. You get creative when you're by yourself. :)

Notice the trail? Doesn't look as easy anymore, does it? Nope, no sir-ee, it doesn't. Starting to get slightly more difficult. rocks, tree roots, mud, boulders, moss, lichens....

I'm not complaining, because it's all a part of the journey and the fun. I'm just pointing out the terrain changes. P.S. There is an old lava flow through here so the rock is very porous and easy to walk on. You don't slip.

I stopped a couple of times to walk down to the river and get some pictures. I probably could have walked across it, it wasn't too deep but I didn't have the right gear.

Notice how clear it is. You can see every single rock in the water.

This was part of my path down to the river.

Now the river starts to thin out a bit and I weave across it a few times.

 I kept thinking, “God this is beautiful. The colors are so incredibly vivid. It’s like a technicolor movie.”

Movies like Tinkerbell and what Dreams May Come and Avatar and any movie that has a majestic forest background must have walked this path for their inspiration. It’s amazing. Crystal clear rushing water. Bright bright emerald green colors. Reddish colored trees. Moss. Lichens, Ferns, Plants galore. Part of me thought is this really real? It’s insane. It’s sick. It’s unbelievable. Why have I never heard of this before.

I decided that if fairies were real they would live in this beautiful forest.

The bridge.

Alongside the river again.

I really truly love the covered rocks. It makes it so magical and ethereal.

Back over another bridge. Tred carefully though. The bridge was wet and it was raining so it was a tad bit slippery.

As I walked the road got rougher, muddier and more difficult. I started climbing up hills picking my way around water-filled mud puddles and lava rocks. Sometimes I had to climb off the path onto dead logs with moss growing on them or tip-toe along a rock path beside the mud pits. It was pretty tedious work and my legs were getting a workout.

After about a half mile I put my camera away because I got into a very difficult section where I needed to pay attention constantly. In fact, I stopped looking at my surroundings and just paid attention to the road ahead of me. There were rocks and tree roots everywhere and I was scared of tripping and falling, slipping, twisting my ankle or breaking something. I didn’t want to have my mind on trying to save my camera should any of those things occur.

Occasionally I noticed a hiker-made path going to the river and I would stop to take a break and check out the scenery. It was epic. I’m so glad I decided to take the hour and a half drive to this Forest and walk this path. It was work. No doubt about it but it was worth it. Worth every minute.

At about the mile mark I ran into a family. They moved off to the side, they had dogs, and let me pass. I stopped to talk to them quick. They told me that the blue pool was about another mile ahead of me. I thought, holy cow, I’ve been at this for almost an hour and I haven’t even gotten to the mile mark. This isn’t going to work. So I double-timed, albeit carefully, the rest of the way. I didn’t want to be on this trail when it got dark. It was raining at this point and I wanted to make sure I made good enough time to get there and get back. The slow-going path was making my “good time” idea a moot point.

With my new plan in mind I made the second mile, even though it was harder, within 30 minutes.

 

 

When I got there the other two groups of hikers in front of me were surveying the blue pool. You are looking at it from above.  I couldn’t believe the woman with the kid on her back made it that far without any mud on her shoes. That couldn’t have been easy. Granted I had a backpack on but it didn’t weight the 50 pounds that the kid her on her back probably weighed.

This hike was a workout. It's an intermediate trail but the end is so incredibly worth it. You definitely earn the view at the end. The blue pool is incredible but it's a "hike" to get there.

The blue pool was gorgeous. EPIC! It was a true blue hue yet you could still see everything in the pool. It was crazy. I’ve never seen a lake that color or that clear. Insane. I just stood there staring at it. Trying to take it all in. Trying to figure out how deep I thought it was.

I thought about how it would be cool to jump off the cliff down into the pool, assuming it was deep enough that I wouldn’t break my neck or be paralyzed.

The man and woman group was down at the bottom right next to the pool. I yelled, “How did you get down there?” They yelled back and gestured, “Go around swirling their finger.” I stood there for a few more minutes taking pictures and observing then decided to attempt to make my way around the pool and down. It wasn’t easy. There was a path but it didn’t go around so I tried following a hiker-path that worried me some because I lost site of the pool so I made my way back to the edge of the pool by the rocks and watched as those two made their way back up. As they did I could see the woman’s pink coat. I met up with them halfway and chatted with them about how they got down there. I took just a second and decided to try it even though it was really dangerous.

As I got about halfway I stopped, thought for a second, and turned right  back around. It was TOO dangerous. I wasn’t on a true path, in fact there wasn’t really one at all. I was walking over large slippery boulders wet with rain and moss and I kept slipping. There weren’t very good handholds and all I could think about is “I’m going to break my ankle in this mess and nobody will find me because I’m way off the path (even though I’m wearing this ridiculously LOUD orange raincoat). I’m turning the heck around and getting back to the real path.” I felt like a chicken and it seemed like a waste to go halfway and not finish because I really wanted to see the view from next to the pool but decided the risk was far too great. I was alone and didn’t know of anyone coming behind me that could find me so I nixed that idea and made my way back to the path and started the 2 miles back to my car.

 Thank you for reading this post. I hope you enjoyed my adventure. If you'd like to read more about my Pacific Northwest Road Trip click here.

Have a great day!

Pacific Northwest Road Trip: Day 7: Edition 1: Grants Pass to Eugene on I5 and the Happy Donut

On to day 7 of my epic journey. The Pacific Northwest Road Trip!

Today was filled with a lot of driving along I5 from Grants Pass to Eugene. It's a lovely trip. A little over 2 hours. It's lovely, granted there are no sweeping vistas off cliffs but, nonetheless, the journey was beautiful.

Quite a bit of this drive is filled with ups, downs, and curves. It's like you are driving through the middle of the forest. There are trees in front, on both sides and behind you. I gotta say it's pretty cool.

 

It's like driving through the pass...think Seven Brides for Seven Brothers the old-school movie. You know the part where they have stolen their ladies and are driving the sleighs through the snow-covered pass during winter? It feels kinda like that.

You're threading an eye of the needle but the thread is your car and the road and the needle is the forest.

Here's the route.

Notice my pit stop? the Happy Donut. How can you have a happy donut you ask? Well, I'd say it's more that after eating the donut YOU are happy. Not the donut is happy.

They have a drive thru for grabbing donuts. How lovely. I didn't partake of that because I wanted to get out and stretch my legs.

I desperately needed a pit stop. I wanted to actually get out of the car and take some pictures of the scenery instead of doing the, "setting my camera on the dash using the remote timer" or "pulling over to take a picture on the main road."

Check out these lovelies. Just walking into this quaint little bakery is heavenly. The yeasty sugary goodness hits you like a gale-force wind as you walk in.  And it wasn't because I was starving. It's just that good.

I don't know how anybody could walk in there after smelling that goodness and not leave with a donut. They must have a will of iron. Their mouth taped shut? Not a penny to their name? Even if I were broke I'd stop in there and ask if I could wash dishes just so I could have their donuts.

Anyway, this is the one I picked:

Turns out that place makes donuts fresh every morning and let me tell you this one was TASTY. T-A-S-T-Y. Tasty.

I got a honey bun with cream cheese frosting and 2% milk. Perfect combo although I couldn’t finish either of them. It was just too much yeasty goodness.

Did I mention how good it smelled in there? Soooo good, like a real bakery should. Yeasty and bready-like. Almost a sweet dough smell.

The perfect pit stop and the view was spectacular. Green glorious mountains of trees, blue skies and some fluffy white clouds.

This pic doesn't really do it justice. It was beautiful though.

I need some new adjectives other than lovely, beautiful, pretty, etc.

See what I mean about driving through the forest. Trees in front, along the sides and when you look in the mirror trees behind you.

I really do love this.

Got a little bit of rock and trees to my left.

Had this perfect farm on my right. Had to stop to get this pic. Damn if it wasn't idyllic. Seriously, I'd swoon every morning waking up to this view.

Ok. I'm not really a swooner but if I were I'd swoon.

I'm breaking every grammatical rule when I write...run ons, bad punctuation, saying swoon too many times. The grammar police are going to be knocking on my door soon to take me off to grammar jail.

Grammar jail is a place where an old school marm with plastic cat-eye black glasses and an extremely tight hair bun on the top of her head stands in front of you, staring at you with her beady black eyes and a very long wooden ruler. Each time youscrew up she wacks your knuckles with that wooden ruler.

Okay, maybe not but it's a funny visual don't you think?

One more for you.

Thanks for stopping by and reading this post. If you'd like to read more about my PNW adventure click here:

Have a great day!

Jen

 

Fair Food Scrapbook Layout: 2014

I created this two-page 12x12 spread last year. I was going through my fair pictures and thought...I take so many pictures of fair food yet I've never done a layout about it. Okay, let's do a layout and I did.

I grabbed picture of all my favorite food, layed them out on some white cardstock and then just moved them around until I liked what I saw.

While I was doing that I realized I wanted to add some kind of dimension because let's face it, if I didn't it would just be a modge podge of pictures and you'd look at it and immediately look away.

So I decided to cut out the sweet corn and the bacon using my exacto knife and put them on foam pop dots. I really loved that bit of visual interest. They are two of my favorite fair foods and they are popping right out of the corners.

Just looking at that bacon makes my mouth water.

 
Next was to add the title. Right smack-dab in the middle and in Bright RED! Why? Because that is the color of my local county fair and it pops nicely amongst the myriad of colors.

I got to use some glittery foam stickers. I absolutely love those and I don't say that a lot about glitter products. Most glitter products just get little bits of glitter all over the place which drives me bonkers! It's like that stuff multiples when you turn your back on it.

I also added some stickles (again, another glitter product I love. It doesn't get all over and it dries hard) on the border just to give it more emphasis and make sure it stood out from the page.

Notice the blue scallop with red heart. I added that too...to kind of signify blue ribbon and to add some visual interest.

Here's the right side of the layout.

There are some other embellishments I added as well. Just when I got going I just kept going. This was one of those fun layouts where you just keep working on it and it all works out.

I added these little banners to each picture to label them. I figured that the food should be labeled then later on it was easier to see what each food was.

BACON! Bacon is on here twice, cuz it's one of my favorite foods. Notice the border. It was made using some food stamps that I have. I believe they are Kelly Purkey (you can't buy them anymore).

For the food border I just alternated all these stamps all the way around. I alternated an image of food with some text. So an ice cream cone then "Yes Please" then a fish then "yum!"

I also ended up adding a black and red border around the the pictures because it seemed to help ground it more and add a pop of color.

I hope you like this layout. If you'd like to see more layouts please click here. If you'd like to see more of my projects like project life or cards or my travel adventures scroll to the navigation bar at the top. Each category has a drop down with more detailed categories.

Thanks for reading this post! Please come again and don't be afraid to leave any comments or questions you might have.

Jen

Project Life 2015: Week 8

Week 8 is here! I'm behind but I keep on going because every week I do this I remember why.

Because it's fun!

Because I love seeing my pictures in an album.

Because I love writing things down.

Because I know in a year or two I won't remember that specific day or what I was feeling or doing.

I hope you enjoy this week's spread and maybe even find some inspiration.

The title card is a hybrid of traditional and digital. I used A Beautiful Messes "Frances" photoshop filter. It gives that lovely pink filter on the bottom. I wrote in the week using Rockwell font.

Then I did a little magic with my favorite Paislee Press (no.9) .png image in Photoshop and Silhouette.

• I erased the "of"
• used my black marker brush in Photoshop to darken the lightened areas of e and k
• then turned it into a brush in photoshop (yep a brush into a brush)
• opened up in silhouette and traced
• then cleaned up some of the crooked lines

and Waalaa! It's my own cut file.

This took me a bit of work because I've never done something like that before but I spent the time doing it because I know I'll use this cut file again. I might have thought twice about it if I wasn't going to use it again.

left side layout

left-most of the left side.

I've been using these quadrants for my stories. I like to keep my layouts organized somewhat instead of just having picture willy-nilly. It seems to satisfy my Type A-anal side a bit more.

Used a "currently" card that I made and used in a different layout. Loving that. It makes me think differently about what I'm journalling for the week. Instead of just cold hard facts I lighten it up and speak from my heart instead.

I think that gives a better and more complete picture of how the week went and what's going on with my life. I want to do more of that so I'm pretty sure you'll see this again.

This picture is one of my favorites. I turned my blank cookies into a canvas for my journalling using the conversation hearts technique. OMG loved this page. Loved loved loved loved it! Wish I would have thought of this before but glad I did it now.

It was fun, cute and kept my wordiness down to a minimum...cuz that can be a problem. It was creative and fun. If you decide to jump on the cute conversation heart train post a link to your project. I'd love to see!

Right side of the left layout. All about a visit from a couple of the kiddos.

This is my brother and my niece aka the clone. Looks and acts just like him. It's cute and funny. She loves him to pieces right now. He's her favorite.

Stickers are from Ali Edwards.

Korby is lots of fun but getting into that I want to do this and this and that phase. He bounces from one thing to the next. Transformers to crayons to markers to coloring pages to the ipad...and on it goes.

Journalling in the middle.

3x4 card from Ali as well as the circle (I cut the left side off the circle, flipped it around and put it on the right side. Added the foam heart circle in the middle of the two. Loved playing with that.) Just added a couple of things I wanted to mention about that particular moment.

Used a basic grid card and added some Ali "little memories" stamps and some journalling. Just wanted to keep it basic... that helps keep the time down on how long it takes me to do this project life layout.

I used a shortened Type A pocket protector page because I just didn't have a lot of pictures this week. Which is totally fine and I modified to fit that.

I used a Cathy Zielske photoshop .psd file for the following instagram images. I just love her clean lines and the template worked perfect for how I wanted to showcase these pictures.

Noticed that I could change the instagram logo and writing for each one? I love that. It's like personalizing each one.

The journalling cards:

I chose to keep going with the pink theme from the left-hand side. I think it brought the entire week together more.

Just used some pink letter stickers, and Adventure sticker and "this was awesome" stamp (studio calico kit), and a purse die cut from Silhouette, plus the lovely pink gem (used pink and sparkly mostly because that describes my friend Lynn)

Used a basic grid card from Becky Higgins and some stamps from Kelly Purkey for the Sat, St Paul and Stars. Again, just trying to keep it basic to finish. While I love the process of doing this I don't want to spend all night doing it. I need to live life...so that I can have adventures to make more pages with. LOL Okay not quite like that but I need to live too not just sit in my scrap room.

I hope you enjoyed this layout and if you'd like to see more please click here or check out the navigation bar above for more projects including scrapbooking, cards, adventures or just life in general.

 

Make a Card Monday: Rainbow Heart Balloons

Hello!

Another edition of "Make a Card Monday"

This week I've got a simple, colorful and all-around card. Heart balloons! You can use it for a variety of things: Happy Birthday, Hello, Thinking of you, etc. Plus it's just plain cute and who doesn't love cute? I know I do.

So let's get started.

Here's what you're going to need:

• White cards (I'm using 4.3 x 5.75 inch cards)
• Patterned paper of your choosing (I'm using a light gray vertical stripe, a light gray floral, a light pink polka dot and a black typed paper)
• Rainbow cardstock (red, orange, yellow, light blue, dark blue, green and purple) - although you can choose any colors you want really. You could do 7 hues of red if you'd like...hey that's not a bad idea for Valentine's day.
• Sentiment (I'm using happy birthday and hello. You can use stickers, stamps, handwriting or computer text, whichever is your preference)
• Red line tape (or adhesive of your choosing)
• Heart punch (or die cuts or stickers...again, whatever you like to do. Notice a pattern here? This is all about using what supplies you have on hand)
• String/twine (I used this cute red-striped twine)

1. Cut out your patterned paper slightly smaller than your card. So in my case I used a 4.3 x 5.75 card so I cut my patterned paper at 4 x 5.25 inches. Adhere to your card.

2. Punch out your hearts.

3. Cut 3 pieces of twine all the same length.

4. Adhere a piece of red line tape to the card where you think you want your balloon strings to go. I just eyeballed it.

You could also measure it out if you like. I would suggest the middle of the page so around 2.125 inches from the left or right side of the card.

Put a piece of string on the left edge and right edge of the tape. Then put your remaining piece in the middle.

By doing this you make sure that the edge of the tape is covered up and won't be sticking to anything else, like your envelope and causing all sorts of messes when you try to pull the card out of the envelope.

Notice that I left some extra at the top and bottom. I like to do that just in case I measured wrong or if the ends are a bit straggly. I can always cut it down. It's harder to add more than it is to cut off excess.

5. Now it's time to put the hearts on. Here we go.

I slightly folded some of my hearts before adhering to give it a slightly 3-dimensional look. You don't have to do this but I like how it makes the card pop.

Just bend the cardstock slightly with your fingers.

6. Add your title on the front page or on the interior page and you're done!

I did a couple of different versions of this card...quite frankly it was because I didn't have enough of the light gray striped patterned paper but hey I ended up liking all of them. Plus I'm using up some of my scrap stash which is always good.

Thank you for stopping by and reading this post. If you'd like to see more cards please click here or check out the navigation bar at the top for other craft, photography, daily life posts.

Pacific Northwest Road Trip: Scrapbook: EPIC

EPIC! That describes my trip to the Pacific Northwest (PNW). I kept saying that word over and over as I was describing my trip to my friends and family. I thought, "What better way to do a summary layout for the beginning of my album than to start with EPIC!"

So this idea was born. Big EPIC letters, a summary of where I went and a collage of my favorite pictures.

I decided that since I couldn't decide on a main picture on the left-hand side, I would use a bunch of my favorites in a collage. I printed out a bunch of 3x4 pictures with white borders and just started laying them down and moving them around. I didn't spend too much time on this. Just though to get the ones I wanted and make sure what was showing was important.

Left page:

 I think it turned out fine. It looks like a big ole' mess but I like that. This trip was a collage of different things. It was a road trip and should be reflected that way.

I did need a focal point though so I picked this picture because I liked it and there was space above for some embellishment. I also put it up on pop dots to make it stand out even more. It's the only full picture in the bunch.

Used some stars and the stamped sentiment "so totally love this story" from an Ali Edwards kit (can't remember which one though.) The banner sticker is from an old sticker set that I had.

I layered pictures so that I got the parts of the photograph I wanted to see. Like the bottom left corner I made sure you could see me but then let the other pictures cover up part of the background.

I didn't need the right side of this star fish picture so I let my main picture hang on top.

 After I got every picture where I wanted it I just carefully put some glue on each picture at a time and glued it down. Then I went around the edges with a scissors and cut off the extra.

Right side of the page was actually the hardest for me.

I've been trying to take more of a minimalist approach to cut down the amount of time I spend agonizing over embellishments and just concentrating on the important stuff. but this one took me awhile because I wanted the "right stuff" not just junk. It had to be meaningful.

First things first. the background paper. I made this myself. I wanted to get down all of the places I stopped, the roads I was on, etc. So I decided to make my own patterned paper.

Trust me, it's easier than you think.

All I did was started with a 8 1/2 x 11 page and drew up a text box and started typing.

If you notice I didn't put any gaps between words/phrases. I only put an asterisk to separate them.

For instance: *Minneapolis*Washington*Sea-tac*Seattle*Space Needle.... and so on. There are no spaces between each set of words. The only spaces are between Space and Needle because they are two different words.

The reason I did this was to help the words flow better across the page. The more spaces you put the more likely you will see white space. I don't want white space here. I want the words to cover the entire page.

I made my text box a little larger so that the words wouldn't end on the edges but continue on.

Once I got to the end of my text I highlighted it, copied it and pasted it beneath the first set of text. This kept the text free-flowing and it didn't look choppy.

I loved this. It gave me journalling without the traditional look of journalling. Plus it kept my background from being just a piece of green cardstock.

Next I cut out my title using orange cardstock and my silhouette. You could use large sticker letters too if you wanted.

I decided after letting this layout sit out for awhile that it needed something else. So I put the letters on foam pop dots and added some embellishments.

I used Kelly Purkey's PNW stamp kit for the boat, space needled and PNW stamps. It fit this project to a tee and they are so cute.

I put the boat on the bottom of the E mainly because it could fit that big boat and the other ones couldn't.

I put a compass on the P just to cover the space and wrote the dates on the long part of the P.

The I got the space needle and the C got the PNW.

 I ended up adding a star (to complete the visual triangle. If you look above the left-hand banner has two stars in it.) and the stars for the Exclamation point.

Overall I'm very happy with this layout. It's simple and fun. Plus it's bold and big just like how I felt about this trip. p.s. the orange color was chosen because of the orange that shows up in some of the pictures on the left-hand side. I wore an orange raincoat during most of the trip. :)

Thanks for reading this post. If you'd like to see more scrapbooking layouts click here.

If you'd like to see more pictures from my PNW road trip click here.

Make a Card Monday: Get Well Soon w/Band-aids

Make a Card Monday - Get Well Soon Card

Pretty simple card but lots of fun...is that bad to say about a "Get Well Soon" Card? That it's fun?

Being sick isn't fun but in my mind I want to brighten their day. Send them something that says, "Hey, I'm thinking about you. Hope you get better."

Here's what you're going to need for this fun card.

 

• White card (I'm using a 5 x 6.5" card but you could go smaller if you wanted. You could also do a cream color if you like.)
• Flesh-colored cardstock
• Warm Brown Cardstock
• Foam Squares/Dots
• Silhouette or other cutting software
• Band-aid Die cut
• Computer (for font - you could use letter stickers or stamps as well)

1. I started by Printing off the "Get Well Soon" on the card. I made sure there was space between Get and Well AND Well and Soon for the band-aids.

Here's what this will look like with the band-aids in between.

2. Cut out your Band-aid die cuts. The dark brown is the background, the flesh is for the main part of the band-aid and the rectangle middle piece.

3. Glue down your brown piece.

4. Glue down your flesh piece.

5. Glue down the rectangle piece using a foam square. I like it being raised up because it looks more like a real band-aid and it adds some dimension. A real band-aid has that white pad there that soaks up the blood (if you want to get gross. :) Sorry, old farm kid. This stuff doesn't phase me.)

Here's what it looks like from the top. It just gives it some dimension.

Easy peasy lemon-squeezy. :)

I hope you like this card. It's easy to make and it was quick. Any questions on this project please leave a comment. If you'd like to see more cards click here.

French Lake Fishing, Rice County, MN - a new technique

Bruce and I went out fishing on an absolutely beautiful Friday night. It was exquisite. Perfect mid-70's temp, a little bit of cool breeze. Perfect.

It's one of those days you never want to miss. A day that you wish you had more of AND it was a Friday night. So incredibly perfect.

Okay, I'm done waxing poetic about beautiful Spring days in MN.

This is Bruce, well the back side of him. He's a little camera shy.

He drives the boat.

He navigates us to the best Walleye fishing spots.

And occasionally navigates us around this huge weed bed which I don't want to fish in. All you end up doing is pulling up weeds instead of fish.

See what I mean. Total weed bed.

Today we are out trolling with crankbaits trying to land a walleye.

Walleyes are always the goal. Sometimes we catch and sometimes we don't. Occasionally we get other fish like a Northern aka northern Pike, bass, perch or crappie.

Todays new technique were to use planer boards.

Basically I called it a little wake board. It looks like it's skiing on top of the water.

See, it just gets pulled along by the boat, bobbing and floating all along.

The idea is to keep your line out from the boat and hopefully catch a fish.

If you do catch a fish the flag goes down so you have to keep your eye on your planer board.

Feet up, snacks on hand, eyeballing your board.

You also have to make sure that if you get weeds that you reel in and take them off. I've never caught a fish with weeds on my hook. I'm sure that isn't something a fish would want to take a bite of.

Bruce fishes out of the front and I fish out the back.

We ended up jigging instead of pulling crankbaits so Bruce moved up front and I stayed in back.

Our fishing adventure was over when it started getting too dark. Fish weren't biting (and Sheepshead don't count, they don't even make it in the boat) and it was getting dark.

Time to go home.

p.s. I made him pose for this pic. I absolutely love it. Love the silhouette.

Hope you have a great day!

Jen