The last of them plus a few stats

Today is the 14th January 2013 and I am only two days passed my personal TWELVE deadline...yes that means I have completed my 156 layouts (plus there were about 4 or 5 extra layouts not counted), one of these 156 layouts was an OTP (off the page) project and that includes 473 photos in total scrapped!!! Admittedly some photos were triplicates as I created a layout for both kid's albums and ours but I'm still counting them.

Here are the last few layouts...

Everyday Life - gosh if it wasn't for the flair button at the bottom this would have been an embellishment-less layout LOL. But my main embellishing was in the title, by using the different fonts.

People - super easy layout only made to look better because I used some transparent stickers and some rub-ons.

Me - yes this is a photo of me and hubby but the little bit of journalling is how I feel when I look at this photo. This is my first attempt at Steampunk inspired by Finnabair and Nic Howard. While I loved using texture paste with the brick wall stencil and the glimmermisting I didn't like how it was hard to keep everything stuck down so there wasn't a white margin around the elements.

Photos I Love - our old cat Molly who just walked in the door as I typed her name LOL

Seasons - this little positive test was the very beginning of my season as a mother of two! I have the photos of my first pregnancy test (with our daughter) and the layout will look almost exactly the same but in pinks! (I crocheted the large flower aka tiny doily).

Family Stories - this story is one of my daughter's school-family stories. Again a layout with very little embellishment and the skewed photo makes it look weird LOL

My big goal for 2013 is to create travel albums for the kids big holidays and I am going to use the Project Life Clementine and Turquoise kits throughout the albums. I have purchased the digital kits in these versions also just in case the paper kits are discontinued at any stage. 
Wish me luck because already there are over 1000 photos to scrap and I am not sure if they will be in the correct orientation for the pocket pages!

So close to my goal...

Only five more layouts (plus the Photo I Love layout which cannot be created until I have finished the rest) and I will have reached my goal of 156 layouts, trouble is though I only have until midnight tonight and that is in eight hours and I still have chores to do and dinner to cook (I wonder if Ross will oblige there cos its only him and I home for a meal tonight) and I am not great at staying up late. Meanwhile here are my latest layouts...

Inspiration (left side) - Of course I had to scrap about Stacy Julian and how she has inspired me since at least 2007. The 'scrap big' and 'think big' badges were given to me by Stacy when we met IRL in Wellington. The journalling is partially hidden in a pocket (read it below). The background strips were inspired by the TWELVE journal that BPC sent everyone who enrolled in the TWELVE online class (see photo on right side layout below)

Inspiration (right side) - the title spot was inspired by the journal cover (as was the layout background). Journalling reads (long) ...

This lady is a huge inspiration to me and my storytelling!

I met Stacy Julian at a Crafting Connection event Wellington in 2007 and was impressed with her enthusiasm for recording our life stories in a simple creative way. I remember one of the classes even involved some dancing around the tables whilst clicking our staplers to the music! Hilarious! 
 In 2011, I took Stacy’s online BPC Finding Photo Freedom class. I learned how to get some control of my 50000+ photographs and to create a plan to manage stacks of memorabilia, as well as my scrapping supplies and to organise my layouts using Stacy’s “Library of Memories” system. I am still tweaking the names of each of our themed LOM albums but so far I am thinking My Life; School Life; People in my Life; Places in my Life; Enjoying things in Life and Celebrations in my Life. Sorting, purging, collating and tagging is an on-going process.

In June 2012 I created Colour Drawers similar to Stacy’s. My supplies are now totally stored by colour. WOW what a difference this has made to my scrapbooking. In the past most of my layouts were embellished only with buttons because they were close at hand and sorted by colour. Now I can just open one of the ‘colour drawers’ and find several choices of lovely colourful embellishments that could work on my layout.

I have almost finished a year-long class called Twelve (in 2012) where Stacy has taught us to make lists, curate content and cultivate ideas to help us all to become better storytellers. I created over 140 layouts in 2012 as a result and hope to reach my goal of 156 by the end of January. One of my most favourite projects created during this class is the ‘Photos I Love’ album using one photo from each month teamed with patterned paper scraps from the layouts created in that month, simply embellished with a jewellery tag, a heart brad and a title block. I added a simple embellished jewellery tag to every layout created in 2012 as a reminder that the layout was inspired by Stacy and her class!) There were 12 topics to scrap each month: Everyday Life, Family Stories, Fun and Holidays (aka Easter, Guy Fawkes & Christmas as opposed to vacations). I included Celebrations in the Holidays topic also, as well as Inspiration, Me/You, People, Personality, Places. Rituals, Seasons, and Things, plus the Photos I Love topic. The course was full-on inspiration and I’m going to re-read the class materials and re-watch the online videos in 2013 to be inspired by Stacy all over again.

Photo I Love November - yaaay a photo of Ross actually smiling, so it doesn't bother me that you can see all the lines on my neck! The title embellishment is a wooden piece from Typo that I found in their bargain bin, which I painted. This PIL album is the single favourite project I have created in 2012.

Places - this is one of those page kits that I have had sitting in a folder for simply ages! The only thing I added to the kit was the jewellery tag and plastic embellishment. I am hoping to get help from the family with the journalling/anecdotes about living in and around this place and will either add it on the back of the layout or in a 12x6 protector

Personality - I know it is a boy thing and not just TJ's personality to enjoy getting muddy! The title isn't so easy to see in this photo but it says 'all you need is mud' and is made with a re-purposed chipboard element and chipboard thickers and lots of muddy looking ink!

Rituals - oh yes what dog wouldn't want all the attention on a regular basis. These are old photos, the background paper is old and the title alphas even older! Again an older kit with the jewellery tag and embellishment added.

Things - I was so happy when I found the plastic jandals/thongs embellishment in my colour drawers and glued teal cardstock over the green stripes in the top patterned paper to match it LOL. I will add a wee bit of journalling along the bottom but the photo of the display board is the main journalling on this layout.

Holidays - (Port Douglas 1990) a favourite photo of me with both my parents for many reasons firstly because I don't have many photos of us together, secondly because I loved my 'mullet', yep I really did and not too many days after this photo was taken I got a very short haircut and regretted it, but never grew a mullet again, thirdly because we looked so relaxed and fourthly this is a favourite photo because I am so slim and tanned! I think this is the wording I will use on the layout and simply write it around the outside edge.

Fun - a super quick and easy layout using some funny photos (can you tell what the painting is of?) LOL

Best get on to the last few layouts, so check back again in a day or two.

Up to date till end of November...

so only a wee bit behind. The journalling it yet to be completed on most of the following layouts, but for now I just want to get the creating done and will make time for the journalling in the new year. These layouts will take me up to the end of November with the page kits are all ready for the TWELVE class topics for December, which I hope to have created and in albums by the 12^th of January 2013! That is my goal anyway. All but four of these layouts were created in the last two days while house/pet/garden sitting for friends in Wellington.

Everyday Life – some very old photos of our old orange sofa. Firstly owned by my maternal grandparents, then handed down to my parents then to me when I went flatting. This is one of those ‘connection’ sets of photos that Stacy Julian talks about in her Finding Photo Freedom class.

Family Stories – I was dreading creating this layout simply because of the number of photos and the odd sizes of the photos, but once I started sticking everything down and tweaking the sizes a little here and there it sort of fell into place. Again the design is very simple but again the story is scrapped! The journaling is two A4 pages long and will be reprinted and included in a back-to-back 6x12 page protector.

Holidays/Celebrations – this layout was created in the 8.5x11 size to fit into the page protector which is home to Alyse’s 16^th birthday layout (birthday albums are always in chronological order). I’m not sure if a 17yr old Alyse would have approved of the ‘cutie’ title but the colour matched my layout perfectly haha! 

Inspiration – this layout design was inspired by Nic Howard but to be honest she may not recognize it as I have made it in my typical K.I.S.S style. I have a fear of cattle and especially bulls, but Alyse’s friend Sarita was my heroine on this day, this beast is huge let me tell you!

Places – I have had these photos waiting in a page kit for years but didn’t like the layout design so recently re-created the kit and even though it is a simple design I am glad this story is now scrapped.  (on a side note: I recently shared that photo of the red and white donut cart in the bottom left of the right hand layout on the ‘Old Napier’ Facebook page and at last count it had received 7776 views and 49 shares; crazy!)

Seasons – some really crappy photos of Alyse’s final prize-giving at primary school. These year 6 students were a great bunch of kids and all stood and swayed together as they sung “United we stand” (not a dry eye in the audience). I am quite a fan of the heart pins from Typo and may have to look out for some more on my next trip to town.

Personality – after years of saying cellphones are for phone calls only Ross has now relented and is learning to text, he is not fast at it but has been fairly quick to learn. (see another one of those Typo heart pins? The ‘awesome’ sticky tag is from Typo also and the 'man icon' button is from an etsy store ‘aflairforbuttons’)

Rituals – using some of my old favourite Scenic Route patterned papers and several buttons. This group of ladies (one is absent in this photo though) meet several times a year to celebrate our birthdays. Almost every time we get together there is much loud laughter and we are usually the last diners to leave the restaurant!

Things – I cannot find the name of the sketch designer for this layout as I am on my laptop, it is a simple design but one I have used a few times before.  The embellishing is very simple also but I may add some patterned paper strips along the top and bottom of the photos yet. Meanwhile I  am happy to upload it to this blog post as a WIP (work in progress). Alyse had to do a slideshow presentation to her tech class about her placement so I have included that on a CD along with the written notes and businesses brochures in a pocket on the reverse of layout.

The following layouts are for my PHOTOS I LOVE album and are created using scraps from layouts I created in July, August, September and October). I really like how such an eclectic mix of patterned papers can still look great when used together in small pieces. I think I will continue this type of design in 2013 with my favourite photo each month but as I'm not intending to carry on with the TWELVE layouts per month I may just randomly select scraps from my stash…