Lawnmower man

There were various techniques I said I wanted to try and here is the result of

• Using ric-rac to frame a picture
• Cutting out gears on the Robo and using them for a boy LO
• a monochrome colour scheme

AND I used my brand new foam stamps and 15-year old paints to try a foam stamped title for the first time since I tried it once at my first crop - a class that Lorna taught.

OK, so I got one of the letters upside down! Not perfect
But I'm quite pleased with it. NICE new foam stamps!

Techniques I’d like to try

Just a few...

• Using ric-rac to frame a picture
• Using just cardstock, photos and stamps (although this actually has a blossom in it too!)
• Cutting out gears on the Robo and using them for a boy LO
• Using cardtock for backgrounds, e.g., cardstock lace or something like this
• Use more buttons ...
• LOTS of white space and a monochrome colour scheme
• Try PBear’s example of “drawing” from a photo (even though I’ll probably be pants at it!)
• Create a whole LO on a slant
• Using LOTS of ribbons in circle or half circle
• Try using lots of patterned papers!
• Use one photo cut into three panels
• A really fast LO – just throw it all together...
• Crop a photograph that’s already printed (rather than resizing and taking ages in Photoshop and printing out the final result)

Top organisation tips

I've been surfing for "get organised" tips again. It's what i do to avoid having to actually deal with the big problem of (mostly paper) clutter. And with the craft stuff and my home office being at the top of the list to organise, I procrastinate as much as possible!

Today's tips:

• Assign various projects color-coded work folders. When papers cross your desk, mark them with the color of the folder in which they should be kept.
• Record mail you need to act on in a daily planner along with the list of jobs to do - although, it's better to have a "Will Do" list not a "To do" list!
• When establishing a filing system use plastic carrier bags to sort out things into categories. It's difficult to estimnate at first what categories will be biggest - this way you "file" until everything's sorted then you know exactly what's needed and can subdivide.
• Plan meals at least a week and preferably a month in advance (I have meal plans dating back years - I can just recycle!)
  

Ali Edwards' forthcoming book

Oo-er - think I might have to buy this one when it comes out! I think I am becoming the world's biggest Ali fan. She really seems to speak to me!

Lots of scrapping

I did several LOs over the weekend. But I can't post most of them - they are too personal.

I did try several new techniques as well - one DLO has 13 pictures on it - it's about my first business trip to the US so it wasn't worth more than a couple of pages. I was going to put on a postcard when I realised that the back of the postcard was more interesting because it was one that I sent to my husband at the time and it really tells the story. This is the other half of that LO.



I've set aside most of the other pics from that trip, but I'll keep two small sets for two more LOs - a lovely pic of me all dressed up - all ready for a "What a difference 23 years makes!" layout - and some pics of me.

Transitions and changes

Ali Edwards, in one of her Studio A columns (PDF file) for Creating Keepsakes magazine talks about documenting transitions in one’s life. Every one of Ali’s layouts set off a lightbulb in my head. I’ve never been a chronological scrapper and I don’t stick to albums of particular people either. Ali’s attitude exactly suits the way I want to document the essence of the moment, the feelings, the traditions, the way we are or were at a point in time.

I am at a point of transition now. It has been crystallised by Scrapdolly’s All Work and No Play challenge. I just can’t do the challenge – the prompts are too painful. My work situation is uncertain and I’m not sure what to do for the best. I am so unsure that I took on a career counsellor, and I couldn’t even begin to answer the first set of questions she sent me.

So scrapping and journalling other times of transition in my life are strangely comforting in helping me decide where to go from here.

Here are some titles:

Transitions
Changes
What a difference a year makes
From X to Y
My new XXX
A tapestry of changes
Transformation
Differences

And some quotations to inspire:

"It is not the years but the changes that make us grow." - Neal Maxwell
"All appears to change when we change." - Henri-Frédéric Amiel
"BE the change you want to see in the world." - Mahatma Gandhi
"Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." - James A. Baldwin
"Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me." - Carol Burnett

Here are some journalling prompts to add to Ali’s great article.

What was the most significant transition in your life?
I changed when ...
What I wish most was different is ...
When I look back, I see I coped with change by ...
If I could go back in time for just one hour and change something it would be when...

Ali Edwards Archives

I'e just discovered via Ali Edwards' blog that she has an archive of wonderful articles - her Studio A articles from Creating Keepsakes magazine. I rarely get to see the magazine because it's American and I rarely go anywhere that I can buy British scrapbook mag (s) let alone American ones. So this is a really inspiring find.

The only thing is - I want to rush off and start scrapbooking and that isn't possible right now.

Vertical titles

I saw some stamps that had interesting vertical titles, so I started creating some of my own.

Here are the ways these images can be used:

1) Print backwards on a transparency and use as a home-made rub-on
2) Trace for craft robo - (GSD available as soon as I get the chance...)
3) Print on card or patterned paper and mat onto LO
4) Print on base cardstock (print on a strip and cover the join with ribbon/paper etc.)

A Dragon for the Craft Robo

I needed a dragon to match one on my husband's T-shirt, so here it is for anyone else to use!
The GSD is at UKS

Keeping track of those useful sites

You know the feeling... you know you saw that information, that layout, that sketch, but can you remember where it is?

Use your blog to keep track of these sites! Not only will you be able to find them again yourself, but you are also providing an inspirational service for your readers.

For example in this blog I know there are links to Matching Bazzill pages and an interactive colour picker widget.

The next thing to remember to do is to tag your posts appropriately so that you can find them again without having to look through every blog post.

Sayings and poems for couples

Suitable sayings and poems for weddings, anniversaries, engagements and civil partnership ceremonies

A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person. - Mignon McLaughlin

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments: love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds.

- William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), Sonnet

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances:
if there is any reaction, both are transformed. - Carl Jung

To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides. - David Viscott

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.
- Khalil Gibran

My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for another given:
I hold his dear, and mine he can not miss,
There never was a better bargain driven:
- Philip Sydney

i carry your heart with me
by e. e. cummings
i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

We must not sever, you and I,
The world is cruel, friends are few;
Let us be steadfast faithfully,
I and you. - JJW

May you have laughter to cheer you
And those you love near you,
And all that your heart may desire
May you be poor in misfortune, rich in blessings.
May you know nothing but happiness
From this day forward

A thousand welcomes to you two today, may you be healthy all your days. May you be blessed with long life and peace, may you grow old with goodness, and with riches.

Some quotes and sayings about aging

I'm often looking for quotes and verses to put inside cards for the older generation. Or indeed, to put on a scrapbook LO about older relatives. Here are some I've found recently:

Some people, no matter how old they get,
never lose their beauty - they merely move
it from their faces into their hearts.

So Life's year begins and closes;
Days, though short'ning, still can shine;
Though youth gave us love and roses,
Age still leaves us friends and wine.

Wisdom doesn't necessarily come with age.
Sometimes age just shows up
all by itself.

Like a beautiful rose unfolding
as the summer day begins...
may your special day unfold into happiness.

A birthday is a time to plan ahead and to dream
of all the beautiful things that life has to offer.

Anyone can count the years... it's much more fun to count the joys along the way.

Birthdays are Like Bumper Stickers
You enjoy other people's, but you don't really want one for yourself.
Happy Birthday!

The great thing about getting older is that
You don't lose all the other ages you've been. -Madeleine L'Engle