A Peek Between the Pages

I love love LOVE to get happy mail in the orange box (from Shutterfly...if you've never gotten happy orange box Shutterfly mail, you SHOULD...it's good for the soul). Just like every other year, I'm NOT caught up on my albums for the year. I'm totally okay with that. I live a real life. I don't have tons of free time. And when I do, I don't always feel creative (go figure).

I find it better to celebrate the accomplishments rather than focus on what's not done yet. So here's a little celebration of my most recent happy mail. I got my 1st quarter 2015 album in the mail! Wanna see?  Here' a peek at a few pages...



A few albums ago, I discovered the concept of including 1/2 pages in my bound albums. Yes, at first, I did have to overcome the fear of CUTTING the bound pages... but it turns out, it's not all that scary once you just do it. I love the end result - these little 1/2 pages are some of my favorites. I love that they add texture & interest, and give a little extra space for the overflow of photos and stories to tell.




Here's a peek at a plain ol' pocket-style spread. The colors on this make me happy, even though this was a scary week for us. We almost lost Dublin this week. :(  The ding dong ate a knee-high soccer sock, and got it stuck. He was in ROUGH shape. So glad he came out on the other side ok.


Inspired by a focus on the photo, I included a few 2-page spreads of one giant picture. Here's an example.




I also feel free to include a "regular" layout -  a more traditional approach to scrapbooking, I guess you could say. I figure there are no rules to how the album needs to be put together. If I feel like doing a layout every now and then, into the album it goes. :)


This half page tells a specific story. Everything related to this one memory is included on this 6x12 insert. Meagan dreamed up the idea to make a peach tart (???). This was the result of that idea :)


Sometimes the 1/2 pages are perfect for one larger photo.


And the back cover. I'm planning to keep the cover the same for each quarter of this year... just changing out the 3 months on the front cover that are included in the book. Keeping it simple and cutting down on the amount of work I have to do to call a book DONE.


Just a note... Last year I ordered Shutterfly's lay-flat pages to try them out. I was tired of things falling into the abyss between the pages. Turns out, I LOVE the lay-flat pages. They are a great solution for maintaining the integrity of the content toward the center of the layout. As for the impact of the pages on the album itself... the album is thicker for sure, but the pages are much sturdier as well. The one real drawback is the additional cost. If you don't want to splurge on the price, then it's just as doable to avoid adding details to the center of the layout.

Layout Dump

There are tons of layouts I haven't shared on here... let's be honest, there are tons of everything I haven't shared on here. I won't drown you in them by posting every one I've skipped.... but I WILL share the recent ones. I have done a few in the past few weeks. Plus, today is a HUGE new release day at The Lilypad, and I actually had time to get some pages done. So here goes... 

I'm still working on my Project Life for 2014, although I've fallen WAY behind! I currently do not have a strategy for catching up, but we'll see what I can pull off... I've been trying to do an intro page for the start of each month, showing our current fave's and habits and activities. It's been fun to look back at them as time passes. This is one thing I'm definitely glad I started and stuck with!

And to get in the Halloween mood, here's a page from last year's festivities! Meagan was the only one to dress up last year (as she will be this year... the boys are going to hang out and pass out candy with our neighbors). Since it was just her, I took the liberty of girlying up the page a wee bit. :)

Here's a page I did with a Halloween kit that has nothing to do with the holiday. I had these pics of Dubby from last fall... He would just lay in front of the open door and soak up the sunshine. Sadly, now he is a bit too neurotic to enjoy this activity, as he feels he needs to bark at everything that moves outside. *sigh*

Part of my falling behind this year has meant that I have failed to do much of anything with our birthday pics... until now. This week a perfect birthday kit is being released at TLP, so I took advantage of the chance to get at least a few pics into the album.

Also from Meg's birthday this year... a 1-on-1 back yard lacrosse game.

And finally, last Sunday Meagan and I took a bike ride to the park nearby. We stopped and played on the playground for a bit before riding home. It was perfect weather, with bright blue skies and falling leaves. And Mommy-Meagan time... it doesn't get much better!

It's a 2-page spread. Here's the left:

And the right:

and the spread:

Okay, that's it for now. Have a great day!!! 

Water bugs

It seems my creative time comes in spurts lately. There will be a big empty space full of nothing but stuff that strongly resembles responsibility. And then all of a sudden, I'll snag a blip of free time to create and play. This week, free time came late Thursday evening, just in time to play around with this week's new TLP releases. I managed to get 3 layouts done rather quickly. Love it when that happens! I had a group of pictures from the pool last summer that I wanted to get done. Rather than shove them all on one page, I split them up... each kid gets their own page this time around! You can click on each layout, and it will take you to a post that shows the list of products I used for each page. 

These pictures sorta kinda make me want to go swimming every day.

almost half way there!!

Here we are, just one week away from the end of the year. And here I am, still 29 weeks away from completing my 2013 Project Life. *siiiiiigh*  I've not given up. Not yet. But I do know myself well enough to know that if I am too far away from DONE too far into 2014, this project will never get done. I've seen it happen - with 2010, and 2011, and 2012... I'm sensing a pattern, no?

So yesterday I sat down and made a list of the weeks that I still need to finish. I'm not sure if you remember, so I'll tell you again, that I am printing (okay, let's assume  I get done) 4 books for the year... one for each quarter. I've actually finished and printed the first quarter. And when I wrote out my list, I only had 6 weeks of the 3rd quarter left to do. So I figured third quarter would be a good place to start up again. At least MAYBE I can get one more book printed before the end of the year. That might actually be doable!!

After I made my list and formulated my plan, I set to work, and actually managed to knock out 2 weeks yesterday evening!! This is looking good folks! If I can get a week an hour done, I might have a shot here!! True, that's still 30 hours of scrapping, but hey! One bite at a time, right?!

Okay. So here's week 29. Just LOOOOOK how tiny she was!! Man, time flies!! This was the week that we went to the lake to go swimming, Jane came to stay for a day or two, and the kids left for vacation with Grandma & Grandpa H. This week the puppies continued getting used to each other, as it had only been a few days of being a 2-dog family at this point. Also this week, our good friend came into town to interview for a position at the plant here. It was exciting to even consider the possibility of living close to our friends and getting to hang out again like we used to!

page 1

page 2

both pages together

(Click to view credits)

Week 30... This week Lucas and I were kidless. He took a few days off of work, and we painted like crazy people. We got both Isaac's and Meagan's rooms totally gutted, repainted, reorganized, and put back together. Also, we got Sebastian's closet cleaned out and organized, which was no small task (he's a pack rat). Lucas and I had a few dates while the kids were gone... Uptown Cafe (see week 29...it's that yuuummy breakfast sandwich), YogoLand (see below....yum as well!), and walks in the park. We stopped at one park in town we had never been to and checked out the covered bridge. We had only ever canoed under it (last year while the kids were on vacation), so we decided to see it from the top side.

Page 1

page 2

both pages together

(Click to view credits)

And just a note, here I am half-way (almost) through the year and finally I've worked out a format that works best for me for Project Life. I like the big photo on one page, and blocked photos and cards for the rest. I like simple, not cluttered. Just tell the story and show the pictures...nothing fancy. So I'm planning to carry this format through the rest of 2013, and probably continue with it in 2014.

Back in action...again.

I feel like a stranger to my own blog... like I've managed to sneak backstage, but I really don't belong here.
Since I last posted a month ago, I figured it was time. I'll ease back into things, and share some layouts with you today. But I AM now operating with a new planner (I'll try to come back and share about that), so perhaps I can actually begin to plan some blog time into my craziness that I call life.

Anyway.

Can I tell you something? I love Halloween time. I love the colors. And I love the decorations. And I love the candy. Oh, sweet candy! And I love the digital kits that come out at Halloween. (No, I'm not saying this to be a sales person... it's the truth!)  Something about the kits - the black and gray. The purple and orange and green. The angsty moody kits, the fun and kid-friendly kits. They all make me happy.... maybe because I have a very complicated personality that is both fun and kid-friendly as well as angsty and moody? I digress...

So anyway, that being said, this has been a good week for me. TLP's designers have been releasing tons of fun Halloween goodies this week, and I WANT.THEM.ALL!  I have already snagged a few of them, and have major plans (maybe next week while Lucas is traveling... I always seem to think that's when I'll get to play, and it always seems to turn out that i have ZERO free time when he's gone) to go back and grab a few more. For real, you should go check them out. They're having a big Halloween bash, with giveaways and games and prizes and whatnot.  Fun times, my friends.

Okay, so I managed to find time yesterday to finish 2 pages! What?! Two pages in one day is unheard of anymore. So, yes, I was pretty excited about that.

Click layout to view credits

Click layout to view credits

Sandy Bottoms

Last weekend we made a trip to Ohio for a day with family. While our schedules have been crammed full lately, I'm SO glad we made the time to get there. We had a great time!

It was the first time we had traveled with both dogs (other than to the vet). It was also the first time either of the dogs had had a chance to play in water. While Weimaraners are water dogs, apparently Dublin did NOT get the memo. He's not such a fan of water. Translation....hates it.... so much so that when we go running, he will run around rain puddles so he doesn't get his feet wet. Seriously. He's not a fan. So we weren't sure how this pond playtime was going to go. As it turned out, it wasn't so bad after all (although I'd say he's still not a big fan of water).

First things first... right away he and Arya sniffed out a dead crayfish under the dock. Dublin snagged it, tossed it up on the beach, and proceeded to roll all over the dead fish like it was his long lost friend (see its claws sticking out under his cheek here? Ewww). Weird. And gross. But apparently it made him happy (just look at his goofy smiley face in the 2nd picture)

For the longest time he watched safely from the dock as the kids splashed and played. He wanted so badly to play with them, but he just wasn't willing to get wet in order to do it. So he looked on longingly, wishing he could be part of the action.

This is my niece, C.

And goofy Meagan, of course!

 

And C's little sister, D. The girls had a great time playing together all afternoon! 

Finally, at some point, Dublin decided that  he would test the waters. There was a football that he wanted, so he very cautiously tiptoed in. He never dared to go out far enough to where he couldn't reach and was required to swim.... that is until I scooped him up and plopped him out into the deeper waters. He swam just fine, but wasn't too happy about the whole thing.

Let's face it... this is NOT a look of joy on his face. But hey, at least he retrieved his football!

Arya seemed to have less of an opinion on the water in either direction. I think she was okay with it, but she didn't go in because Dublin wasn't going in. Plus, she had quite an affinity for the sand and was perfectly content to dig down into the sand and make a cozy little spot for herself.

Cracks me up!!! She looks like a cartoon character!

So, that, in a nutshell was our day with family. We went to the park and did family photos. We cooked out. We went swimming. The kids played on a big giant water slide. And the dogs ran around outside all day in a cloud of happy puppiness. It was a great day! So worth making the time to get there!

Of course, I had to get the memories into my 2013 album. Here's my 1st page... Dublin and his crayfish.

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The 1225

These are OLD photos - I pulled them out of the 2009 archives (and I can't beleive it's been that long since we took this trip)! I was prompted to go digging for these pictures based on the fabulous train doodle (see it there in the photo strip?) that Mirjam of Pink Reptile Designs released this week! I saw it, and instantly this fall colors tour came to mind. What a great day! I will never forget how awe-inspiring those 2 steam engines were as they rolled into the station rainy darkness of early morning. Indescribable really. So anyway, I dug out a few of my favorite photos from that trip and put together a quick layout. I think I need to go back and properly document that trip. Perhaps this is the first page of that. (If only I had infinite free time *sigh*)

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Lots o' Layouts

The kids were on vacation with their grandparents for a few days, which meant two things... 1) my house stayed clean, and 2) I actually had time to scrap.... yes, even with a new puppy in the house. 

Rather than doing one post for each layout, I'll just dump them all here in one post. 

Ride the Waves... These pictures were from last summer and our days out on the lake in Ohio. 

 (Click here to view credits)

Family Snuggle Day... This is an insert for my album. I had a bunch of pictures that I took one day while we were being lazy bums around the house. They aren't stellar photography, but the pictures say a lot about our life and our family. I loved the details that can be pulled from them... like Dublin's frog Pillow Pet on the couch (that he has since dismantled), and the fact that he chewed hangars like bones for quite some time. I also love the fact that these pictures ooze with love and comfort. How can you not love that?! So, great pictures or not, I wanted to make sure they were included in the album.

 (Click here to view credits)

Hey Handsome... Another insert page for the album. I had this funny series of photos of Dublin and his football (yet another toy that he has since dismantled). His expressions and playfulness are all over these photos, and I couldn't bear to leave them in some dark dusty corner of my computer files.

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Tacos... Snow day, March 2013... We celebrated the day off of school with lunch at Taco Bell. Just one of those fun moments that build up life's memories.

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Summer Vacation... Just a quick page that I threw together to document our first evening at the cabin on our vacation this year. Roasting marshmallows was on the top of the kids' priority list! And, of course, s'mores!

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