from our family, to your family.
wishing you all a very merry christmas!
Laura Vegas
Scrapbooking And A Little Bit Of Everyday Life
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i know i've been a little sparse around the blog this week. but i wanted to stop in and wish you all a very merry christmas eve.
here's a quick 6×6 layout i created for making memories a while back, using the noel collection. the photo is from last christmas.
we usually have a quiet christmas eve around here. the girls are with alyssa's dad, and going to her grandparents to celebrate christmas. so they'll be back tomorrow morning. so our christmas eve is spend doing housecleaning and laundry, finish last minute grocery shopping and gifts we might have missed, and wrapping presents late into the night. can't wait until the girls get back tomorrow.
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i started this year doing project life, and made it about 4 full weeks. but then made the decision to take the year off. i had completed my project 365 for the previous year, and loved it. but i felt like i had too much going on this year, to keep up. you want to know what happened this year? i took hardly any photos at all. it's really sad. if you were to look through my photos for the year, you would find full months without folders. the majority of the photos i took were of projects. which isn't right.
so i'm making the committment to becky higgin's project life this year. it just arrived at amazon today, and mine is ordered and on it's way. they're super fast there. love it! i ordered the turquoise edition, because i love the colors and the clean, graphic look to it.
but there is also an amber edition, which is really pretty too. has more of the floral look to it. love that becky designed 2 different choices this year.
this is my christmas gift. my family doesn't know they got it for me yet, but it sure made their shopping for me a lot easier. lol! i'm really hoping this gets me back on track with taking more photos, of everyday life. not just the events. but all the little details, that make up the grand scheme of our life.
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i had some other layouts to share, and started to type one up for you. but then i had this nagging feeling that i should only be showing christmas projects. lol! so, i came up with this one. i think i showed a quick photo of this project i created for making memories, back in july. in the summer. because that's when we all think about christmas, right? lol! figured i would re-show it, now that we're actually IN the christmas holiday.
i used the new making memories noel colletion to make these photo holders. i have made these before, for valentine's day. these are wooden blocks, with the curled wires already in them, all set for holding photos. i found them at michaels, for about $1.50 each.
i started out by painting the unfinished wood block, with brown paint. then i cut some pattern papers to size, for the front, back, and sides of the blocks. i used mod podge, to decopauge them onto the blocks. after that had dried, i added another layer of mod podge over the papers, to give the entire block a nice, shiny finish.
then i simply added a few embellishments to the fronts of the blocks. on two of them, i used a noel rosette. that was as easy as peeling and sticking. and they have a ton of dimension, with all the layers to them. on the third one, i layered together a few paper flowers, a glitter foam pointsetta sticker, and a snowflake brad.
then all you need to do is print out a few smaller photos, and stick them in the metal spiral clips up top. then set out to enjoy, with the rest of your christmas home decor 🙂
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sadly, we just spent the last 24 hours without internet. it wasn't good. lol! finally got back up and running this morning, so watch for a new blog post later today. and here's a recent shot of the girls, because i hate to post without a photo.
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i got an email a few weeks ago, asking me to be a guest designer over at inspired blueprints. i always enjoy a good sketch to get me going. and i was asked to use sketch #62, for a christmas layout. which i was more than happy to do, since i rarely scrap my holiday photos.
and here is my take on the sketch.
i followed the sketch pretty closely. i usually do. although it can be fun to turn pages around, or flip flop pages, i usually go with what's in front of me and make it work. and this sketch ended up working perfectly for my christmas photos from 2007. i didn't have a ton of photos from the holiday with my family. but i had some great group shots, and couples shots, that managed to get every family member on the page. i did change all the photos to black and white, because there was a ton of color going on. too much to keep a clean page, and to use the products that i had in mind.
i dug into a few boxes of christmas product for this layout. it's mostly making memories, fancy pants, and little yellow bicycle products.
for the large circle, i layered a printed snowflake transparency on top of some white cardstock. i had to use the lid of one of my huge glass ribbon jars to get a circle this big. i traced it onto the cardstock, and cut that out. and then adhered my transparency to the cardstock, and then trimmed around the edges. i added the rub-on christmas tree directly to the transparency.
i choose not to add any journaling. just the facts. the what, the who, and then when. some journaling might have been nice. but most of our christmas's are pretty much the same. not in a bad way, at all. but we follow a lot of the same traditions, in how we celebrate. so i was really just getting the photos from that year, into the albums.
instead of using three horizontal photos going down the side of this page, i choose to tweak it a bit to fit five photos. i simply added two 3×4 photos, to two of the spaces that would have held 4×6's.
on this second page of the layout, i used white cardstock for my background page. where, on the first page, i used kraft cardstock. to tone the whiteness down a bit, i adhered the printed snowflake transparency to cover the white cardstock. it mimics the large circle from the first page.
i want to thank inspired blueprints for having me a guest designer this month. make sure and check out their blog, to see what their own team of talented designers created with this sketch. and then browse their site, and check out all the past sketches for even extra ideas.
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this week has been crazy busy here. the girls get out of school on friday, for the holiday break. which means alyssa has finals for three days. those being half days. sarah has a half day on friday. both the girls had band concerts, on seperate nights. we've still got soccer going on for sarah, with joe coaching her all-star team, and i'm the team manager. lots of organizing and phone calls going on. and alyssa is gearing up to try out for high school soccer.
i've got the little ones keeping me super busy. i should have remembered this from all the previous baby's that i have helped raise over the last nine years. but once they start walking, they're a ton more work. lol! and add to that, a girlie that takes out every single toy we own, over and over and over, and just dumps them on the floor, before moving on to something else. i think i pick up every toy here at least 10 times a day. i have haley coming back to visit for the next two weeks, and the girls home from school.
joe has been working long and busy hours at work, since the holiday's are his busiest times. i've had tons of scrapbooking stuff that i'm working on. trying to keep up with it and stay organized, and make sure it's all done on time.
and somewhere in there, i'm trying to think about christmas. because, apparently, it's next week. lol! i have one last scrapping assignment to get done, and then i'm all about getting the shopping done. which means, i need to figure out what shopping i need to do. who i need to buy for. and what i'm getting those that i'm buying for. and it needs to get done soon, because i do NOT want to be out shopping with all the other last-minute shoppers next week.
i found those photos above on sarah's camera. i think alyssa was trying to get a photo, for her facebook page. the second one makes me laugh. sarah's dancing away in the background. lol! one thing that comes to mind when i see these, is that i really need to take photos in their bedrooms every now and then. or we'll have no record of what they look like.
and just to humor you, here's 2 video's i found on her camera as well.
only sarah would record herself spinning in her desk chair. lol! or i should say, in alyssa's desk chair. since it looks like sarah stole her chair, for this recording session. i like how, halfway through, she's got her tonque sticking out in concentration. and at the end, she hit her arm on the desk. which is why she got that look on her face. and is honestly the only reason she stopped filming. lol!
and this one is funny to me. apparently, we get very little rain around here. and rain is pretty much as bad as it gets here. but i guess that when it DOES rain, it's a big enough deal to warrant a video to document the event 😉
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i was asked to create a layout for making memories a while back, that was to be featured in an upcoming creating keepsakes publication.
as seen in 101+ Creative Ways To Use Your Scrapbook Supplies, by Creating Keepsakes magazine. copyright creative crafts group. posted with prior permission from the publisher.another two pager. yes, i do create a LOT of two pagers for CK. i used some favorite photos from our christmas 2008 get together with my family. i know, at first glance, this isn't necessarily a christmas layout. these photos were all taken on christmas, so i guess it kind of takes the place of one for this particular year. and want to know a secret? i NEVER scrap christmas photos. maybe one or two, for a sample layout here or there. but i never take the time to scrap our christmas holidays. i have years and years worth of christmas photos, just waiting to be scrapped.
sometimes, i honestly have no clue how i come up with my titles. lol! usually, it's partially decided by how much room i have left myself to put my title. since it's one of the last things i do. sometimes, it's decided by what letters i have to work with. i came up with the "one spot", and then later worked in the "together in", which i think made for a cute title.
i was asked to focus my layout around their new metal embellishments. just about ALL the metal embellishments on here, except the photo turns, were from a new release at the time i created this. one of my favorite things were the pagemarks. i went back and forth on how i was going to work them onto my layout. then i had the idea to make flaps for extra photos, and to use the ribbon pagemarks as the "handle" to lift up the flap.
my photos underneath the flap, take up the same space as the photos on the top. to make the flap, i adhered my photos to a piece of cardstock. then i trimmed it down, so that i had an extra 3/4 an inch on both ends. on that extra cardstock right beneath the photos, i adhered my ribbon pagemark.
on the other end, i scored the cardstock right above the photos, and then folded it over, and adhered that behind the photos on the layout. you notice the photo turns there on the left side of the photos? i added those, with some rhinestone brads, to hold the flap shut.
i did the same thing on the second page of the spread.
the only difference, is that i flip-flopped my flap. say that ten times fast. lol! i used the pagemark at the top, and had it open downward.
making a flap, is a great way to get additional photos on your layout. sure, i could have used these inside photos right on the pages. but one reason i wanted to hide a few, is so that i didn't have to worry about the colors matching. or the santa hat that sarah's wearing look out of place with these papers and products. or the blurry photos, that didn't turn out great. i just tucked all those photos inside, and worked the favorites onto the main part of the page.
want to know another secret? i actually scrapped our 2007 christmas this weekend. and because of all the color issues, i changed everything to black and white. you'll see it on friday 😉
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my christmas tree is not only up, but it's decorated as well. i have a few decorations sprinkled around the house, and a wreath hanging on my front door. it's starting to feel a little bit like christmas. so, how about a christmas project share. i created these for making memories, last summer, when the new christmas collection was announced.
i used the noel collection for this set of wood frames. i found these frames at joanns, and thought they were so cute. they are unfinished wood, and about 4 inches by 4 inches in size. the backing does open, but there is no glass or front piece to them. so i loved that they were sort of like shadow boxes.
i started by painting them with a sage green acrylic paint. then i choose my pattern papers. i used a solid piece in the back of the frame. and for the front, i used a pattern paper, which i cut to fit around the frame. i adhered these to the frames with mod podge, and then painted another layer on top to give the frames a nice, shiny look to them.
for the centers of two of the frames, i simply added some paper flowers. i adhered the green flower to the back of the frame using a pop dot. then i adhered the music flower on top of the green flower, using a few layers of pop dots, all stacked up. since these are shadow box style frames, i had plenty of room to "pop" out the flower. i finished them off with a threaded button.
i wanted to add a word to one of the frames. i went with "noel", since it was a short word, and would fit nicely in the frame. these are chipboard alphas, and i used mini pop dots to adhere them to the backing of the frame. i'm almost positive i used 2 layers of the pop dots.
such a simple and easy project. i really need to head back to joann's, and pick up some more of these wooden frames. they'd be cute for any holiday.
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someone recently asked me where my printers and computer are, after seeing photos of my scraproom (where they were NOT located). and recently, i shared a great deal on my favorite photo paper on facebook, which started a conversation about photo paper. so i thought i would share about these on my blog today.
i have a desk upstairs in the loft, where i keep my printers and where i could work on my laptop. this was great when i had my scraproom upstairs. when i moved my scrap stuff into the downstairs bedroom, my desk stayed upstairs. mainly because i just don't have any room downstairs for it. i would still sit upstairs a lot and work on the computer, since the girls are up in the loft all the time. but, it's not the most ideal spot to have my printers, since i spend most of my time downstairs these days.
i was racking my brain, trying to think of a spot where i could put my printers downstairs. then it dawned on me. this red cabinet. it was from my scraproom upstairs, and we moved it into the playroom downstairs. it's a great spot to put all the large, and bulky toys for the daycare kids. it's great to be able to close the doors, and not have to look at toys when the kids aren't here. it wasn't all that full. so i moved some things around, put some toys in another TV cabinet we have in the same room, and cleared out one side of the cabinet.
so, half the cabinet is for my printers, and supplies. i keep a lock around the knobs, when the little ones are here. i had my mom come and make some holes in the back, so i could put the cords through the backside, to the outlet behind the cabinet. i love that i don't have to take my laptop upstairs to go print something. or send something to the wireless printer, and then go upstairs to see if it really did work. all my stuff is right here, and much more convenient.
on the bottom shelf, i have a plastic drawer unit that's about 13×13. i already had it, and it fit there. the black boxes are about 13 inches deep, and i had those already too. in the drawers, i have extra ink cartideges for the printers, my external hard drives, my external flash, card reader, video camera, camera batteries and memory cards. pretty much anything related to my printers and cameras. in the boxes, i have misc stuff. a box of folders, notebooks, envelopes, report covers. a box of office type stuff, like staples, paperclips, labels, tape. a box of tools and hardware, that i keep in the house for easy access. and a box that is filled with instruction manuals for just about everything in the house, and that i have never looked at, but feel i need to keep. lol!
on the sides of the printers, i have just enough room to store a few things. on that top shelf, i have printer paper, white cardstock for printing journaling, and photo paper. on the middle shelf, i have my binders that hold all my paperwork for making memories, creating keepsakes, and a third binder for all other design teams and scrap related work.
this is my regular printer. it's a kodak, and i actually wouldn't recommend it. lol! i really liked my old printer, but it wasn't compatible with my new laptop when i got it. and no drivers or anything available, to make it compatible. this printer came free with my laptop, so it's what i'm using. i DO like that it's wireless. even though it doesn't always work. i take a chance, any time i print. it also does NOT want to scan. i have never found a printer/copier/scanner that actually did scan. no idea why. and this thing seems to suck up ink. not big on that fact.
this is my photo printer. which i would recommend to anyone and everyone. LOVE IT! but. it's an older printer, and not easy to find. it's an HP photosmart D7300. which is basically the same as THIS ONE. and THIS ONE is an even newer version. i bought this printer about four years ago, when i first started doing my own collages and wanted to be able to print at home. i have never, ever had a problem with this printer. excuse me, i'm going to knock on a bunch of wood now. ok. i'm back. lol! i do have to plug in my laptop, in order to print. but i keep the cord right there on top of the printer. so i can just set my laptop on top of the cabinet, plug it in, and print. this prints exactly what i see on my computer. what i edit my photos too, in photoshop. i still order lots of prints from costco, and they look good. even great sometimes. but this printer prints my photos wonderfully.
and THIS. this, my friends, is the most awesome photo paper out there. HP premium plus photo paper, in soft gloss. it's just like a matte finish. but nicer. it's thick, and just has the nicest look to it. it's usually about $35, for a 50 sheet pack. i used to wait and wait, until i could find it on sale. you could often find it buy one, get one free. last year, i found a great deal on amazon, and stocked up. but the deal i found about two weeks ago, was the best one yet. they have it for $7.99, for a 50 sheet pack. AWESOME! i bought a ton of it. i had a few friends that took my word for it, ordered it, and said they loved it too. and they went back and ordered more. and i know for sure, that one of them wasn't printing on an HP printer, but an epson. so, if you're looking for a good photo paper, you have to trust me on this one. i would not steer you wrong. and this is the newer packaging that you will see, if you order it. but it's the exact same paper that you see below. i promise 🙂
Laura Vegas 