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What do scrapbookers like to do with an extra day in the year? Shop for scrapbooking goodies, of course. And if you happen to be one of those scrapbookers, Designer Digitals is launching a special sale for leap year, featuring 29% off our 2,900 most recent releases.
If there was something you missed picking up at our last sale, now is another chance to save.
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I'll admit it: I haven't been doing much traditional scrapbooking of late. Blame it on my Project Life obsession.
Not that I have any problems with being obsessed, but as I was working on my Week 8 stuff, I came across a picture that sparked an idea for a simple page about my girl.
With the stress of last week behind us, I wanted to make a simple, straightfoward page for her album. And I suppose not a lot needs to be said other than here's the layout I made.
I can't remember the last time I used paper flowers and mini brads. I feel so old school right now.
Clean and simple. Reminds me of everything I love about this hobby.
Amen.
TECHNICAL NOTES: I also went "old school" and designed this page using InDesign CS 5.5. I designed the concept on screen, then broke apart the components (photos, titles etc) and printed them out separately. The thing I love about using a page layout program like InDesign is the freedom to quickly come up with exactly what I want to create. It's funny, but I'm so much slower in Photoshop, even though I design all of my Designer Digital templates in that program. InDesign will always be my go-to program for straight up hybrid scrapbooking from scratch.
DESIGN NOTES: I always look for ways to create unity on my page; elements to tie it all together. Here, I repeated the striped patterned paper, as well as repeating a single rounded corner on opposing corners. I also repeated the same font for the title, the journaling and the small word strip, as well as the color of the type, which I sampled from Aidan's shirt using the Eyedropper Tool. Further, I repeated some of the same flowers that you see in the headband she is wearing (something she made last week.)
Also notice the common margin widths on the top and sides. White space is always a critical component of any design I make. It is quiet and it allows everything else to breathe and live within the space. Ahhhh.
SUPPLIES: (Note: the mini brads are so old I don't have links; same with the flowers.)
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OBSERVATIONS: The love affair continues with Project Life. Here I am in Week 7 and still really loving this process. Some of you have asked me if I'm still doing regular scrapbooking, regular defined as creating separate layouts outside of this album.
The answer so far in 2012? Not really.
Part of the reason is that these two pages I do each week for Project Life feel like one, big 12 x 12 layout in and of themselves. It's been so cool because I don't have to simply keep the layouts to one particular subject. They can be a random mish mash of the week's happenings. This is such a freeing way to document.
I think that's why this concept is so successful: it is a very liberating approach to memory keeping. I know I don't have to cover everything that happens in my life and yet I'm really on the lookout for the stuff I want to keep, save and remember.
It just keeps getting better. Here are my pages for Week Seven.
I designed a new card set to use for my weekly recap journaling. It includes 11 layered cards in a 6 x 4 horizontal format. Aside from the "week in review" text, the set also includes each day of the week in "a saturday story" format. I wanted to create some more journaling cards to give me more room to share daily stories as well. These layered cards are fully customizable in Photoshop Elements so you can tailor the colors and backgrounds to match your album.
I plan to mix these up with my other layered cards throughout the weeks.
One thing that's been pretty constant from last week (and ho BOY for this week) is Zielske people under the weather. I'll be sharing a bit of Aidan's ER visit next week.
I also am continuing to love using Tiny Templates to document life. Last week, I went out for a fabulous dinner with two of my dearest friends. We took some really poorly lit shots with our cell phones, and I wanted to create a tiny layout card to celebrate. Tiny Templates are perfect for using your less-than-stellar photos to tell a story. Every bad photo looks just a tiny bit better the smaller it gets!
The other thing I added this week was some of the Project Life Big Envelope Pages.
There are things that I want to save throughout the year—like the Valentine's Day cards that Dan and I exchange every year—and I figured it was time to pop one of the Big Envelopes in the back of the album to have a place for such memorabilia. Anything that I really don't want to cut up to use in the weekly spreads will go back here for now. I may even add a pocket for Aidan and one for Cole.
I already figure that I will be keeping my Project Life pages in more than one album as the year progresses, so we'll see how these pockets end up adding bulk to the overall project.
And that, memory savin' friends, is all she wrote on Week Seven.
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Sometimes on Sunday nights, I have no idea what to post on my blog come Monday morning.
Since January 2007, I've blogged every week of my life. I've faced many a Sunday night, scratching my head, staring at a blank Typepad composer screen, thinking, "Okay, now what?"
Aside from posts about projects (layouts, step by steps, new products, Project Life—those come very easily), I like to keep a balance here on life, work, chub and scrapbooking.
In fact, my favorite posts are those where when I'm done putting it together, I think, "Why can't I write like this every single time?"
I still get quite a high when I can write about something really inane and still find an angle or a twist that I think, "My readers might actually like this."
So on Sunday night, as I sat there staring, not an idea in my head, I thought: "Well, that's it. The ideas have all run out."
It was bound to happen.
So I decided to just sleep on it.
I didn't know I'd be woken up at 3 a.m. on Monday morning by a girl in excuciating pain. I didn't know we'd be heading off to a first ever trip to the Emergency Room by anyone—knock on wood—in the Zielske family. I didn't know that I would be a very strong and calming force in Aidan's hour, or five hours as it were, of extreme need. I didn't know she could be as stoic as she was, keeping her cool for the doctor's, then falling understandably apart when they left the room. I didn't know just how much she still needs her mama.
I didn't know she would tell me on the way home: "This was a bad day, but it would have been the worst day if you weren't my Mom."
After a goodly amount of tests, she was diagnosed with a small, albeit extremely painful kidney stone. We came home around lunch time, I tucked her into my bed, and hovered over her all day and all last night. She is still asleep—pain free, thank God—this morning as I type.
In her lighter moments yesterday, we laughed when I said, "Well this'll be something to liven up the Project Life album, won't it?"
I'm going to take the week to nurse this girl back to full strength. Look for my regular Project Life post this Thursday.
Thank you for all of your well wishes for Aidan on Facebook yesterday. They were very much appreciated.
And don't worry. I'm sure I'll come up with some really good ideas to write about for next week.
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OBSERVATIONS: This week, it seemed like my camera and my iPhone weren't as handy as in the first five weeks of the year. Translation: I just didn't take a ton of photos. One thing I will say about Project Life is that it takes commitment.
Last year, I didn't have the level needed. This year seems very different. One thing I've really been looking forward to is Sunday afternoon. It's when I sit at my computer, gather my photos and go over the Day One entries I've made throughout the week, and basically pull it all together to create my pages.
It's my own personal Sunday afternoon crop and I'm really enjoying it. Even in a week where I didn't take a ton of photos, I still managed to save enough story and bits and pieces to easily compile my spread for the week.
I'm also managing to include a bit of ephemera again—a post card from our dentist's office and the packing from my new CS5.5 software. Nice little bits to add in to fill in the week.
I do think one of my favorite parts of this project is the weekly wrap up journaling card. It might not always be the most riveting read on earth, but it quickly sums up the basics of our week. I know this is something that I'm really going to be thankful that I have. It really serves as a weekly journal of our lives.
And though I'm still working to remember to include my old man in the weekly photos—sorry honey, you know it's not personal—I did manage to use my new wireless remote that I read about on Ali's blog to get a shot of my having my afternoon chai.
And yes, apparently I do extend my pinky finger when I drink.
Imagine that! Project Life has made me instantly more refined.
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I'm in love, I'm in love and I don't care who knows it!
(Don't tell Dan but there's another man. Shhhhh.)
On this day that celebrates love, I'll tell you who I'm crushing on right now: It's Gotye, (pronounced go-tea-yay), also known as Wally De Backer, a Belgian-born, Aussie artist whose second album, Making Mirrors, is fast becoming my favorite album of the year.
I posted his "Somebody That I Used to Know" back in December after seeing it on Facebook and was instantly smitten. Mark my words: that man's gonna snag himself a Grammy come next Winter.
He has been compared to Sting and even Peter Gabriel in terms of his style. Considering PG is numero uno in my book, that's not bad company to be sharing.
Today I wanted to share another track off the album, a song called "Bronte." It's a beautiful, haunting tune, and it turns out, it's about his family friend's dog who passed away. The family put the dog down in the backyard. Gotye wrote this song for the dog and to commend the family on what an excellent job they did for helping their children cope with the grief, according to the Internet.
Hence the opening line "Now your bowl is empty, and your feet are cold and your body cannot stop the rocking, I know it hurts to let go."
So pet owners, it might make you a bit too sentimental. I'm just saying.
Aidan, who is also crushing on Wally—I love it when the teen and me can share music love—loves this video as well because it reminds her of a movie she loves, Princess Mononoke. But then again, give that girl some Japanese anime and she'll follow you anywhere.
I hope you like this song. Enjoy.
I'm thinking the tickets I bought to his show in Minneapolis will make me very happy. Very happy indeed.
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The number one question I've received in the past few weeks is: How do you get that weather image like that and how can I do the same?
I decided to record a very non-fancy video showing you not only how I do it on my phone, but also how I use DropBox to upload all of the images I shoot on my phone (including my Instagram photos).
Of course, my steps only apply iPhones, but I would imagine that any smart phone with apps would let you take screen captures of your phone screens as well.
I'm also going to show you how I edit the weather image in Photoshop Elements, and size it to fit into a Project Life Design A pocket. Sound good? Good!
Questions? Comments? Leave them today and I'll do my best to answer! Enjoy your Monday.
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The winner of the simplify 101 workshop Organize Your Paper Clutter with creative organizing expert Aby Garvey, is:
Jennifer, email me at czdesign@comcast.net! Thanks everyone. See you tomorrow on my blog!
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simplify 101 is giving away one spot in their upcoming workshop Organize Your Paper Clutter with creative organizing expert Aby Garvey.
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP: Is your paper clutter zapping your creativity? If paper like bills, school papers, ideas for creative projects, memorabilia to scrapbook, recipes to try, to-do lists, magazines, and catalogs (to name a few) are piling up around you, it’s hard to relax let alone be creative. There is a better way! With the right paper organizing systems in place, you can free yourself from paper clutter and the stress that comes with it.
In Aby Garvey’s online workshop Organize Your Paper Clutter, you’ll learn a simple, step-by-step process to organize your paper. You’ll find out how to decide if you need a piece of paper (and for how long) and how to organize it so you’ll find it again when you need it. With easy to follow action steps, your paper clutter and your stress will be replaced by organizing systems you love and feelings of confidence, relief and peace of mind. (Which means you’ll feel more creative, too!)
SAVE ON ENROLLMENT: simplify 101 is offering my readers 15% off enrollment in their upcoming workshops. Along with Organize Your Paper Clutter, they are also offering a workshop this month on how to Simplify Your Life with Habits + Routines. To take advantage of this offer, enter coupon code CZ15FEB during checkout. It's good now through Feb 17, 2012 and cannot be used with any other offers. This offer expires Friday, February 17th at 12 PM CSD and may not be combined with any other offer. (If you sign up and win the spot in the workshop, simplify 101 will refund your money.) The Paper Clutter Class begins Thursday, February 16th, 2012. Click here to view the entire workshop syllabus.
TO ENTER: Here are the ways to enter this giveaway (up to four chances to win!):
ABOUT SIMPLIFY 101: Simplify 101’s mission is to make getting organized fun! Get a taste of simplify 101—and the organized life—with their FREE, simple-to-follow guide How to Create a Command Central Binder. You’ll put together a home reference binder that will help you get organized, save time, and minimize paper clutter and the stress that comes along with it!
I'll choose a winner on Sunday evening. Good luck!
Comments are now closed. Check back to see if you're a winner!
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OBSERVATIONS: Five weeks in and I'm still on a roll. Want to know a secret? This is as far as I got last year. Somehow, this year feels different. It's different because I'm comitted to having this project be the main story telling vehicle for my entire year.
It's true that my scrapbooking is more sporadic in terms of making traditional (or digital) pages. I tend to bounce from story to story with lots of time and space in between. The thing I love about Project Life is that I'm honing in on the minutiae of my life and it's really bringing me joy.
That's it! I'm feeling joy about story telling again. Even during a week where it seemed like not much happened, I found little things all over the place to save and record. From a piece of packaging from a new gadget I bought, to sharing a 5-second exchange about something funny Cole said, life is just sitting there, waiting to be noticed.
I think Project Life is making me more aware and far more grateful than I have been of late. And that is a pretty cool thing. Here are my pages from last week.
Here is the Weekly Wrap Up (and I am loving this process of typing out what happened during our week.)
And here's a close up of the Boy Who Missed a Week of School:
Here's the second page:
This week, I decided to add a little packaging from my favorite spice shop, Penzey's, onto a Project Life grid card. I'm trying to add a bit more of the ephemera from our lives into this album, but you know me: this requires baby steps. I am just now getting used to staples!
Here is a close up of of my journal card with a great, short story about Cole:
Yes. My boy has seen and memorized much television. We are so proud.
Today I have a video tutorial to show you how to take a PNG file as you see above and customize the color for use in your own Project Life albums, or other hybrid projects. If you have any question, please don't hesitate to post in the comments and I'll do my best to answer. To watch the video larger over at Vimeo, click here.
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