Laura Vegas

Scrapbooking And A Little Bit Of Everyday Life

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Project Life 2018: Week Seventeen

January 18, 2019

Ummmm. Yes, that does read "week seventeen" of my 2018 Project Life album. To say I fell a little behind is an understatement. Lol. I blame it on the whole "sold our house, closed my daycare business, bought a new house, moved, got a job" thing ;)

I left off, way back in June, sharing week sixteen. Which consisted of a week in April, if you don't want to do the math. I sort of abandoned my album at some point, and the last set of photos I had added in were my photos. I still had to finish the last week in April, and all of May, but at least the photos were in there.

Since it's been forever, I thought I'd recap what I used for last year's weekly title cards, since I get asked about them a lot. I used the Pocket Guide No.4 kit from Paislee Press. I created each week's card in Photoshop, using the template from the kit – switching out the week number and adding the dates for each week.

Fast forward many months later, and I eventually ended up with FIVE full months of photos that needed to be ordered. For over two years, I had been so good at placing a photo order every single month. And then life happened, and I got off track. I used to do my complete photo orders from my phone, but with five months worth, I ended up moving all of my photos over to my laptop, and I worked from there.

It took some work, but at the beginning of December, I placed an order for six months worth of photos – June thru November. It went from five months to six, by the time I got all of my photos edited and ready to go. And at the beginning of this month, I placed an order for my December photos. So all of my photos for 2018 are now in the album.

One thing that I'm doing in my 2018 album is using the Pocket Maps by Sara Gleason. I almost always work three into each weekly spread, and they're just perfect for those photos that don't have big stories. A quick sentence or two is all I need.

Ever since we moved, I haven't been able to get my photo printer to print good photos. It's so frustrating, because I can't figure out what's going on with it. I usually print these Pocket Map photos at home, and since I knew I wasn't going to be able to do that, I created a ton of them to add to that last photo order.

I create them in Photoshop, so while I was in there, I just plopped two onto a 4×6" canvas, and then once they came back in my photo order, I trimmed them apart. I worked on them over two days, and had about 70 done that I added into my order.

I've also spent the last few days typing up journaling cards like crazy. I think I have five weeks that are totally finished and I'll be sharing those next week. I know that it's a lot of work to have seven more months to finish in my album. But I also know that it's totally do-able.

I went pretty simple in my plan for my 2018 album, which is why I know I can finish it. It's strictly photos, journaling cards, and simple filler cards – no embellishments, no stickers, etc.

I know PL spreads aren't always the most exciting thing to see on here, but it's nice to have something to share in-between the layouts and cards. Since I don't have that many of those to share right now.
Jillibean Soup: Love and Shenanigans

January 14, 2019

Happy Monday everyone! I've got another Jillibean Soup layout to share with you. I created three layouts last month, and two of them were home related. Made sense, since that's what was going on in our lives at the time.

I got the idea for this layout from the cut apart card "this home is built on love and shenanigans", found on the Bite Sized Bits patterned paper. The floral strip and the butterfly strip could have been cut apart as well, but I decided to leave them all as once piece. Kind of like working a few more pieces of patterned paper into the layout, but without the extra work.

While our new house isn't quite "built on love and shenanigans" just yet, I knew my journaling could focus on the fact that it would be "built on love and shenanigans" – once we were moved in and settled. So I pulled together some photos that could tell the story of moving day (or maybe I should say moving weekend ;)).

I created a photo collage using a template from Kerri Bradford Studio (using her Travelers Templates: Holiday Style kit), adding the date we moved into the new house. While these templates are the perfect size for travelers notebooks, they can easily be sized up or down, to make them whatever size you need. I

I used patterned papers from the Garden Harvest collection, as well as Jillibean's new 6×8" All About Dots paper pad. The die cut house is actually from the You Make Miso Happy collection. I wanted to use an embossing folder on the white cardstock in the upper corner of the page, and I thought this circle one was a fun one to try out. It was the first time I used it, and it added a TON of texture. I had to add a lot of adhesive to the back to get it all to stick down.

I added a few torn pieces of the washi stickers to the top and the bottom of my photo collage. I thought it went with the "moving" theme of the page, since there's a whole lot of tape involved in packing up hundreds of boxes. Lol.

It's been almost six full months since I shared any Project Life pages, because – well, because that's the last time I actually worked on my album. Lol. I've been working on playing catch up, so I hope to have some of those weekly spreads to share soon.
Kerri Bradford Studio: Sleep Vibes

January 10, 2019

Happy New Year's my friends! I love the start of a new year. A clean slate. A fresh start. I've noticed over the last couple of years that I tend to get super creative at the beginning of the year. I'm not sure why exactly that is, but I find it best to just run with it 😉 I've also noticed that January is when I tend to pull out those forgotten projects. The half-done layouts and/or albums that just need a little attention in order to move them to the "finished" pile.

I started this layout a full five months ago, as it was going to be one of my layouts for Kerri last summer. I must have went in another direction, with another project, for that month, and kept pushing this layout off for another month, and then another month. I decided that January 2019 would be it's month! And yesterday, it was up on the Kerri Bradford Studio blog.

When Kerri came out with her Summer Vibes kit, I brainstormed some ways to use the "vibes" word, and decided I could pair it up with photos of some of my daycare kiddos napping. I pulled some of my favorite photos of napping kiddos into one of Kerri's photo templates, using her Storyboard: Instagram Style kit, printed it out, and matted it with two different patterned papers.

For my background, I used Kerri's Heart Background kit, die cutting the full hearts from a blue patterned paper and the heart outline from white cardstock. I misted the die cut heart background piece before I adhered it to my page.

I picked out a few tags (along with a 2×2" PL card) to add along the top of the page, tucking them behind the photo collage. My patterned papers are a mix of different manufacturers. If I'm remembering right, I have some Dear Lizzy, Shimelle, Photo Play, and another one that has slipped my mind. I had them written down, but that all got lost in the move.

I die cut "vibes" from some solid brown patterned paper, and then die cut "sleep" (from the Oh Baby kit) from some red dotted patterned paper, to complete my title. Fun outline words were one of the first things that made me want a Silhouette all those years ago. I just love the look of those types of cut files.

You know what's crazy? I had my title die cut, I had my papers picked out and trimmed down, I had my photo collage printed – I even had my journaling printed! Why it took me so long to assemble this page and finish it off is beyond me. Lol.

To embellish the area to the left of my photo collage, I added some a few stickers and coordinating buttons. So glad to have this one finished and in the albums!
Jillibean Soup: Christmas Decor

December 29, 2018

Hey everyone! I hope you all had a very merry Christmas! I meant to get this layout up a few days ago, and then got busy with lots of family stuff and work. This was one of my other Jillibean Soup layouts for the month, and it was up on their blog a week or so ago.

When they suggested Christmas layouts for one theme they were looking for this month, I wasn't sure what I would create. I'm not one that does tons of Christmas layouts each year. My way of scrapbooking Christmas is to create one layout with any and all photos from the family get-together. That's usually it. Unless I create a layout with our family photo or something.

But in looking thru photos on my external hard drive, I realized I had quite a few photos of decor-related things for the holiday. I printed my photos as 3×3" square photos, and arranged them around the outer edges of my page, along with some 3×3" squares of patterned paper.

In the center of the page, I added a 6×6" piece of white cardstock, which would hold my title and journaling. I used my favorite scalloped border punch on some grey cardstock, and added a thin border on each side of my white cardstock, before machine stitching around the edges.

For my title, I used some older red corrugated alphas, along with some tiny alpha stickers. Since Jillibean Soup doesn't have a specific Christmas collection, I tried to find some embellishments that would work with the theme of the page, and in the end, I decided to just die cut some stars from white cardstock, using one of Jillibean's cut files and my Silhouette. I added a green sequin to the center of each star.

I don't decorate a ton around our house. Usually it's just our Christmas tree, the mantel, and a little something near the front door. But I thought the photos that I did have could be used to tell the story of how those few decorations come to be. It's a drawn out system that I seem to have, and I think it will be interesting to look back years from now and see if I'm still going about decorating for the holidays in the same way.
Jillibean Soup: Christmas Joy

December 21, 2018

Hey all! Just popping in with a quick card share today. I created this simple card for Jillibean Soup. While they don't have an actual Christmas collection, it's easy enough to pull patterned paper and other elements out of their collections that will work for holiday themed cards.

I like to keep my cards fairly flat and simple, so they're easy to mail. I added a few die cut stars, cut from white cardstock with my Silhouette, and a few enamel dots. Easy peasy.

Which is exactly what I need during the busy holiday season 😉
Jillibean Soup: Good Home

December 20, 2018

Hey everyone! I had a new layout go up at Jillibean Soup last week, and I wanted to share it here with all of you. The layouts that I created for Jillibean last month were the first projects I created in my new scrapbook room. While I'm moved in, and everything is fairly organized and in their places – I also realized I need to really get in there and fine-tune things, so that I know exactly where things actually are. Basically, it meant that I kept things fairly simple again 😉

I'm a fan of "lifting" my own designs from time to time, and that's exactly what I did on this layout. I used a design that I love, after coming across THIS layout that I created several years ago. I printed out two photos that I had snapped of our old house, the day we officially moved out, and started picking out patterned papers to match.

I used the new You Make Miso Happy collection, as I just love the colors and patterns. I was so happy to see some navy blue in this collection, as that's one color that I'm always wanting to use, but often have a hard time finding when it comes to some manufacturers.

I'm a huge B-side scrapper. I love to pick one of the busier patterned papers to use on a layout, and then fill in the rest of the page with lots of the tone-on-tone patterns that can usually be found on the B side of the papers in each collection.

I started with the floral patterned paper from our You Make Miso Happy collection, and then used an additional five patterns, in colors that coordinate with the floral paper. By using lots of the tone-on-tone papers, using so many patterns/colors on one page doesn’t feel overwhelming at all.

I used one of the new foam stickers, along with some older corrugated alphas, to create my title. I had good intentions of adding "it was a" with tiny alpha stickers, to make a longer title, but decided to keep it simpler in the end. I added the cute house card from the Bite Size Bits patterned paper, and a few enamel flowers to embellish the page.
Jillibean Soup: You Make Me Smile

December 13, 2018

Hey everyone. I somehow missed sharing this layout that was up on the Jillibean Soup blog last month. This was the last of three layouts that I created while in-between homes. Meaning I created this at my brother and sister-in-law's dining room table, and my only "tools" were a paper trimmer and scissors. I feel like my style is very simple when you get right down to it, and I love that having minimal supplies meant that I didn't feel any pressure to NOT go with my simple style. If that makes sense.

I was also without a photo printer during this time, so I had to order my photos. I wanted to include several photos of the girls, taken last year on Christmas day, so I ended up arranging them on a larger canvas (most likely a 12×12" if I'm remembering right, since I had additional photos as well that I trimmed apart). I ended up with two 3×12" strips, each having three photos. So much easier to have two larger "photos" to adhere, and build the layout around, then six smaller, individual photos.

For my title, I used one of Jillibean's new foam stickers, as well as some small alpha stickers. I'm sure you all know that I like to keep my embellishments simple, and enamel dots are always a favorite. I didn't have my favorite scalloped border punch on hand, so I freehand cut that scalloped border. It's not perfect, but it's close enough.

I cut apart one of the 3×4" cards from the Bite Size Bits patterned paper, and matted it with a navy blue patterned paper. Most of the papers and elements I used for this layout are from the new You Make Miso Happy collection.

I know I hadn't been blogging as much the past few months, but I hope to be back on track soon. I have some more Jillibean Soup projects to share, but I won't be able to share them for a bit. Will share when I can 🙂
Kerri Bradford Studio: Merry Christmas

December 12, 2018

I've got a new project up at Kerri Bradford Studio this week. While I'm fairly settled into my new scrapbook room, in the new house, I wasn't quite ready to scrap with paper and glue just yet. Things are all put away and the room is clean, but that doesn't exactly mean that I know where everything is or that it's organized the right way 😉 So when it came time to create something for Kerri this month, I decided to go digital.

I'll be honest. I'm not one that scrapbooks much about Christmas, other than creating a layout or two each year with any photos that we take at family get-togethers. However, as I was prepping our family's Christmas cards to send out to family and friends a few weeks ago, I realized it was a tradition that was worth documenting. I've made it a habit to make sure that we take a few family photos on Thanksgiving day, so that we would have a photo all ready to go for ordering Christmas cards. I usually end up ordering them that very night, if not the next day. I always love getting our cards out as early as I can.

I decided to create a digital 6×8" two page layout, as we recently moved and I'm still trying to get situated in my scrapbook room and am not quite ready to play with paper and scissors just yet 😉 I used two different templates from the Half Pints: Wander kit to create my two page spread. I included our family photo for this year, along with our photos from the last two years.

I came across the "did this" image from the Deck The Halls digital stamp kit and knew it would be perfect to include, adding a little digital check mark from the Versed: Note It digital stamp kit. I also added the years to each of the photos, using both the Label Maker digital stamp kit and the Side By Side digital stamp kit.

I added the wreath above my journaling using a digital stamp from the Bundled Up digital stamp kit. On the first page, I created my title using PNG files from the Christmas Calendar kit.

I typed my journaling on the second page, using the text box that Kerri included within the template. I printed both 6×8" pages of my two page spread. Once I add this layout into my 6×8" family album (or my December Daily – which I have started, but time will tell if I stick with it), I will also be adding all three coinciding Christmas cards that go with those three family photos.
Jillibean Soup: Beautiful Reasons To Be Happy

November 27, 2018

Soooo. If you happen to miss this little tidbit of info (I shared a bit about it on both Instagram and Facebook), with the sale of our house, I also made the decision to close my daycare as well. Here's what I shared about a month and a half ago:

17 years ago, after moving here, I opened up my own daycare business in our home. I love and adore kids, and I knew it would also be a way for me to be home with my girls while they were growing up. Each and every child that came into our home was special and so very loved. Not just by me, but by my girls and Joe as well. Sure, some were more special than others (I can’t lie – it happens). But each and every one will hold a special place in my heart forever. Over those 17 years, I was lucky enough to spend my days with 54 precious kiddos. Babies, toddlers, and school aged children. Some were with me a short time, and some were with me for 4-5 years. I am so thankful that I got to play a small part in all of their little lives, and for their parents trusting me with their babies.

With this move, I knew that it was time to make a change. The decision to close up my daycare was so very hard to make, especially since it meant letting go of the 4 special kiddos that made up my last “squad”. But I’ve felt ready for a change for a while, so I knew the timing was right. Don’t ask me what I’ll be doing next, because I don’t know yet. I’ve been job hunting, since I do have to work. Just one more change that’s happening in our family right now. We’re deep in a transition phase and doing the best we can. But I sure do miss my little friends, as it’s been a really quiet week since we all parted ways ❤

Along with those words above, I also shared several collages of photos that I had put together. These collages were made up of 45 of the amazing kids that have meant so much to our family. There were 9 more kiddos, but they were during my film years, so I couldn’t easily track down their photos at the time I was creating the photo collages.

I knew that I needed to work those 45 photos, of 45 adorable faces, into a layout. So that's just what I did for one of my Jillibean Soup layouts last month. To start, I used a photo template from Kerri Bradford's Travelers Templates, which held 15 photos, and I created three collages. I knew I would make this a two page spread, so I sized them to fit one on the first page, and two of them on the second page.

I mentioned in my post yesterday that I created my layouts for last month using very limited supplies, as I was in-between homes for a few weeks and I didn't have access to all of my scrap stuff. I lucked out, in that I had this circle background already die cut and mixed in with my Jillibean Soup papers, since it was created with a Jillibean cut file. I had actually die cut it a few years ago, and didn't end up using it. I think if I had had my Silhouette handy, I most likely would have die cut that circle background from white cardstock, for a white-on-white look. But I love how the kraft looks mixed with the patterned papers and the white cardstock.

I used patterned papers from the new You Make Miso Happy collection for this spread. This 3×4" card, from the Bite Size Bits patterned paper worked perfectly for my title. I matted it on a piece of black patterned paper, to help it stand out a bit more. I love these floral die cuts, from the Pea Pod Parts pack, and have been using them quite a bit on my projects.

I've also been using lots of these die cut houses. Without really thinking about it, I used it on a layout this weekend that I created for next month's projects. I added some journaling strips along the bottom of the two pages, but I also added a little journaling block in this empty space on the first page, as I had a bit more to say.

I used that old school paper tearing technique again, just like I did on the layout I shared yesterday, as I didn't have any border punches or special tools – but I didn't want a straight edge, so the tearing adds some texture and interest.

I've created a few layouts over the years, where I've included a photo of every kiddo that I've taken care of. You can see a few HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE. It's fun to see how the number of faces grew over the years. I won't lie – I miss seeing those little faces greet me each morning. It's been a good change, but a weird change too. I'm so thankful that I still keep in touch with the majority of these kiddos and their families, and I can continue to see cute photos of them, hear cute stories, and watch them grow up.
Jillibean Soup: Together

November 25, 2018

Hey everyone! I know I sort of fell off the face of the earth for the last month or so. If you don't follow me on Instagram, which is the only real place I share everyday life happenings, we recently sold our house and downsized to a new place. It happened rather quickly, and we were actually in-between homes for several weeks.

I haven't done too much creating the last 2 months or so, what with packing up an entire house, and storing it all – both in a storage unit, as well as my parent's and my brother's garage. Most of my scrapbooking supplies and such went into storage, but I did keep out my Jillibean Soup products, as I knew I would need to create a few layouts during those weeks in-between homes.

I created three layouts, sitting at my brother and sister-in-law's dining room table. And I went pretty old school, as the only tools I had were my trimmer, my edge distresser, and my scissors. I didn't keep out my Silhouette machine or my sewing machine – although I did luck out, as I had a few die cut background that I had saved from previous projects, where they didn't get used or portions of them didn't get used. I had a single row of a circle background, and it was all that I needed for this layout, as you can see above.

Jillibean Soup came out with some foam stickers with their two newest collections, and they ended up being just what I needed to create the titles for a couple of my layouts. I usually use my Silhouette to create parts of my titles, and fill in with alpha stickers when needed. These larger foam sticker words worked great for my titles on their own.

I used lots of patterned papers from the new Garden Harvest collection for this layout. When I was thinking of photos that I could use with it, this family photo from Mother's Day 2017 came to mind. We had gone out to visit Joe's mom, along with his brother and our niece, and I'm so glad we thought to get a photo together before we left. The colors in the photo worked perfectly with this collection.

To add a little interest to the yellow patterned paper strip – rather than having a straight edge – I tore the paper lengthwise, which is a super simple technique that was popular years ago. Overall, this is a really simple layout. But there was something sort of refreshing about limiting what I had to work with.