Rocky Mountains

This layout gave me more Cricut practice! The photos depicted are of the Rocky Mountains in western Canada, between Calgary and Banff (in Alberta). It is really, honestly, one of the most beautiful drives I have ever seen (even after having lived in Switzerland!). I love it out west.



The day these photo were taken was a beautiful, sunny, clear, crisp day. I chose navy blue card stock for my page base because I really wanted my photos to stand out against the dark colour. The layout is quite simple, allowing the photos to be front and center. The snowflakes on the right hand page were cut using the Cricut, and then were run through my Xyron and covered with glitter (from SU!). The snowflakes on the left page are card stock stickers.


The journaling block was made using my Top Note die from SU! (yes, again). The silver ribbon is from Michaels. The letters for the title were cut using my Cricut. The patterned paper is SU! as well.


The words on the right hand side of the above page are clear stickers.

Check out those mountains....breathtaking!


Here you see my journaling up close. Yes, by hand again! As I have mentioned before, I am working on including my handwriting in my albums more. It is so much more personal than typed journaling. I know that I love finding my grandmother's or my aunt's handwriting on old recipes, now that they are no longer with us. It is a little piece of them that I still have with me. I challenge you to do the same. Let go of the need to have everything lined up and perfect, and just write!

Silly Boy

I have been fortunate enough to attend CKC Cincinnati for the last two years running. Both years, I convinced my fun loving friend Carol, to be my partner in crime, signing us up for ridiculous numbers of classes and dragging Carol in my wake. She has been a good sport!

This layout is from one of the classes we attended together. The class was by Piggy Tales Academy and they provided all of the papers and supplies.

The photos featured are of my son, Noah. He used to be so photogenic....but as he gets older, he seems to feel more awkward in front of the camera. He gives me these forced, fake looking smiles that never really look like him. My best bet is if I can catch him unaware....then I may get a laugh or a giggle that is genuine. The photos below are Noah's attempts to smile for the camera. When I began to laugh at his silliness, it segued into a game of silly faces.



Closer shot of the right hand page. You can see some of Noah's 'forced smiles' in action here.


These photos were some of the ones that I got as part of our fall photos. Each year in the fall when the leaves are changing colours, I take the kids out and try to get some photos of them with the leaves as a backdrop. It has now become a family tradition. The colour palette of this layout worked really nicely with the fall colours in my photos.



Here is a close up of my journaling. I know that journaling in your own hand is tough for a lot of people....especially those of us who are critical about our handwriting! This is an example of where I included my handwriting on a layout, mistake and all! You can see that I made a 'typo' and attempted to fix it. I really and truly had to take a deep breath and tell myself that it was OK to leave the mistake. The perfectionist side of me really wanted to re-do the entire journaling block, and the entire page if that's what it took, to fix things. *deep breath*


Well, I'm off to upload some more photos. Have a great weekend!

Dream

I can honestly say that I rarely....actually make that never.....as in, this is probably the very first time, that I have ever scrapbooked a page about myself. Why, you ask? Well, I am the one behind the camera 90% of the time. I think that often happens with scrapbookers, because we are the ones who are recording the memories, and therefore we are the ones who want the photos taken!

I am also very self critical when it comes to photos (aren't all women?). Oh...that was a bad hair day. Hmmm....my face looks too fat in that photo. Yikes....look at those wrinkles! People call them laugh lines to make you feel better, but in fact, they really are just wrinkles. Yes, I am guilty of all of the above!


So, it was very out-of-my-comfort-zone to create the layout below. I decided though, that some day when I am no longer around to annoy my kids daily, they may (0r may not....who knows?) want to know more about their mother and what made her tick. So, this is my attempt at leaving a legacy for them.


This is one of the few photos that I actually quite like of myself. It was taken in Calgary, Alberta at the children's museum. There is a fun house, type exhibit used to teach children about perspective, and it was in that exhibit that this fun, colourful photo was taken.



I used my Cricut to cut out many of the flowers that are tumbling down and around my photo. The small green flowers are actually from Michaels and are found in the wedding section. They are meant to be decorations to use in the centers of tables, etc. The one red flower on the corner of my photo with the button center is a random one that came from my jar of miscellaneous blooms. I couldn't tell you where it originated from.



Here you have a close up of my journaling. That is another 'something' that I am working on. I am pushing myself to tell more stories....the stories of our famliy (thank you, Ali Edwards!). This, for me, means journaling and telling stories, instead of just recording dates and facts. Generally speaking, I hate the journaling part. It always comes out sounding corny or somehow wrong. I am a work in progress in this department!



And here you have a close up of my blooms. I used pop dots to raise some of the flowers to give the page some dimension. I prefer when everything isn't just flat.

In case you have seen a layout like this before, that is because I did find this inspiration somewhere. I wish I could remember where, in order to share it with you. See, that is a lesson to keep up to date on my blog, and then I wouldn't have this problem! I also have a habit of intending to scraplift a layout, and then I change so many things that it looks nothing like the original anyways! So, maybe you won't have see it before after all! :)