Create: Disney pages in my Project Life Album

I had so much fun taking pictures each day that we were at Disney! I knew that as soon as we got home I needed to print my vacation pictures so that I could get them into my Project Life Album. Project Life is supposed to be one picture a day, but since I didn't get the album until mid-January I had pages that would be left over. I decided that for Disney I'd use a two-page spread per day. I counted out my pages and made sure I'd have enough for the rest of the year and then as soon as I got home I printed my pictures at Walgreens (very impressed, btw) and started figuring out which day each picture was.

When I was at Disney each night I downloaded my pictures from my camera to my MacBook into folders for each day. On the last day I picked 8-12 pictures for each day that I wanted to print. Then when I got home I organized them back into days and started laying out my pages. I put all of the pictures in first (after I rounded the corners) and then later added the journaling and other stuff. I'm happy with the pages and even more happy that I'm still on track with my Project Life Album. Enjoy the pictures, I'm sorry for the glare on some of the pages! Click the pictures for a larger view.

Day 1: Magic Kingdom

Day 2: Hollywood Studios

  

Day 3: Animal Kingdom

  

Day 4: Magic Kingdom

  

Day 5: Hollywood Studios

  

Day 6: Epcot

  

Day 7: Animal Kingdom

  

Day 8: Magic Kingdom

 

This post is part of my series for 2010 where I create something every day (if possible).

Create: Project Life

I've been needing to catch up on my Project Life album and also work on my "Day in the Life" from last Friday. I know I say (or maybe I just think) this all of the time but Project Life has been an amazing gift for this year. I'm so glad that I happened upon it. I'm current in my scrapbook for 2010 because it's so easy. Granted, I'm only 1/2 way through my traditional 2009 scrapbook and am on 9mo with Bubby's book (he's 21 months now), but I try not to think about that.

I wanted to show you how the baseball card holder fits into my 12x12 album. I like adding the inserts for Sissy's cards, her point of view and new things like A Day in the Life. It'll be interesting to see how thick my album is when it's all said and done because it's pretty thick now, but it might be okay. It's fun if nothing else!

Catching up on Project Life

I have a great job. I get paid to pray, study the Bible and serve some of our Pastors and Leaders at our church. Last week I was blessed to start a new schedule where I work 8am-5pm and am off on Fridays (I used to work 8am-4:30pm and worked M-F). This enables me to have a 3 day weekend with my family. I LOVE it. Last week was great working 4 days and being off 3 and today was the same.

Today was my second Friday off and we spent the day with Ellie's friend Shelby who spent the night last night. We watched Clifford, ate breakfast, played in Ellie's room, colored, etc. Then we ate with my friend Jodi at Chic-fil-a and the kids played. Bubby was so tired that he fell asleep on the 5 minute drive home! While the kids napped I attempted to make use of my time by making some jewelry (including some new products!),  two decoupage projects and take some pics of the latest pages I've done in Project Life. I am really enjoying this album and how easy it is to document a year of our life. The Project Life albums are sold out right now because they're so popular. It really is a great product!

Since Disney I've only had a week and a half to document so I just have a few pages to show you all. The first 1/2 spread documents the days after coming back from vacation. I wanted to put a picture in of the laundry from our trip because I think that's my least favorite part of coming home after being gone for a week.

This spread included the week of Valentine's Day. While at the sitter both kids made me valentines that I wanted to keep and put in the book. I simply punched a few holes and inserted them right in the middle of the spread. 

Here is the right page of the Valentine's Week spread. Dave sold his first Cessna 400 and so I wanted to make sure that I put that accomplishment in the book. He took the picture for possible inclusion in a magazine and hopefully it'll be on Cessna's website somewhere as well. I'm so proud of him!

Posts with new jewelry and a decoupage tutorial to come soon!

A Day in the Life...

Today we didn't have anything concrete planned which I love. Two of my favorite scrapbook bloggers are Ali Edwards and Becky Higgins. Becky is the designer of my Project Life album that I am doing for 2010. Ali is doing a "week in the life" scrapbook where she documents pretty much everything she does in one week of the year. It's super cool. I love seeing what she's capturing during the day.

So as an addition to my Project Life album I decided to put in an insert for today as my "Day in the Life". We did a lot today and I took a lot of pictures. It was fun to take a picture from each event and document it for my album. I'm going to put the pictures into a 9-section basketball card holder. The day is not over so I'll add a few more once Hubby gets home but this is our day so far. I think some of the text [color] is going to have to be changed, but I won't know that until I print it out.

Create: Jan. 28-30 Project Life

For the past few days I've been working on my Project Life album. Thursday night I watched the video so I knew how to set it up and boy am I glad! Tammy answered a bunch of questions in my mind about what I was supposed to do with certain components of the kit. I spent the first night getting my monthly markers in place as well as my weekly title cards (where I list what week I'm showing).

Yesterday I printed out some pictures at CVS (not impressed!) and put them in the book for January. I don't have a picture for each day for January, so I doubled or tripled up on a few days and January will probably only have 2 spreads instead of 4 like a normal month.

Then today while Dave was flying I spent some time in Photoshop setting up a template for my journaling cards. It was super easy to do and I'm so happy that my printer would actually work for that. I basically made a template in Photoshop and then just adhered the journaling cards to the template that I printed with photo splits. Then I ran that through the printer and voila! printed journaling cards!

 

  

  

before they went into the printer

So far I am up to date with January and looking forward to working on February.

 

Cover page

 

I only had two events so I journaled on 2 cards and used 2 decorator cards

  

For this one, the card that says "the scarf" can be pulled out and there is a large paragraph of journaling inside of the backstory behind the scarves that Ellie & I are wearing.

This is a single page of one event instead of 4 days. I thought each picture was too cute and couldn't use just one!

For February since we're on our way to Disney I'm doing one spread per day (so 7+ pictures per day). Luckily Project Life came with extra page protectors that enabled me to do this. I'm looking forward to showing you all what I come up with for our Disney trip! Try not to miss me too much while I'm gone!

This post is part of my series for 2010 where I create something every day (if possible).

Project Life is mine!

Today I finally got my box from Amazon with my Project Life scrapbook and accessories today. I absolutely love it and am so excited to get started! It makes scrapbooking simple and quick.

This is going to be my 2010 album. For $50 I really got a TON of product. To buy enough product for a whole year's album would be probably at least $200.

To see everything that it comes with in detail, go to Becky's website and check it all out. Becky has been in the scrapbook industry for over a decade and is extremely talented. These kits have been extremely successful and you'll see why! Can't wait to see what 2010 brings that I can remember always in my Project Life scrapbook!

 

 

 

Project Life - January 2011

I'm so excited to be doing Project Life again for 2011. I love to scrapbook, but traditional scrapbooking just takes me too long with all of the other crafts I like to have my hands into. So Project Life was perfect for me in 2010. When I saw that Becky had two designs for 2011, I jumped right on the Amber Album. It's beautiful and I'm so excited to print my January pictures and get them in the album (as well as finishing 2010). Here are some of my favorites for this month.

Big E loves to play on her Daddy's iPad. I love the glow on her face!

I have many pictures like this, a favorite before-bed pastime.

You think she's like her mother? She loves taking pictures (and self-portraits).

It never fails that I wear my flats instead of boots on days that it snows.

Mimi brought us all Starbucks! Great day!

Making a tent with the kitchen table and curtains.

He wanted to sleep in his tent for naptime. Wasn't sure how it would work out but
he did great. Didn't get out to play or anything. We haven't tried a second time yet.

Big E amazes me. She loves to write and do math. I gave her 7 problems
and she got them all right. She'll do so well in Kindergarten next year.
She adds IN HER HEAD. Not on her fingers. I can barely even do that. :)

Creative Estates {managing chaos}

While at Creative Estates I had a booth at the handmade market and I got to meet a TON of creative ladies.

Source: sandyalamode

I looked up and saw the sweet Megan from Brassy Apple (who I love) walk in with Becky Higgins!! I was so excited because I love Becky and her baby, Project Life. Thankfully I was right by the entrance so as she was walking out I stopped her and thanked her for making such a great product. She took time to have a conversation with me about how I use project life and also my business. I told her my name and she said "I know Amy Cornwell" and I about fell over. THE Becky Higgins recognized my name! Granted, she didn't know WHY she recognized my name, but I choose not to think about that ;) Megan was gracious enough to ask if I had a camera for a photo-op.

While at Creative Estates Becky, Megan, Melanie (Above All Fabric) and Becki (Whippy Cake) were on a panel talking to us about balancing motherhood and your business. It was such an informative talk and I wanted to share a few takeaways from that session because I know almost all of us business owners (and just moms in general) deal with how to balance and DO IT ALL.

Source: sandyalamode

Here are a few nuggets from the session called "Happy Chaos":

• one family calendar - on the Mac so that it synchs on iPhones, iPads, etc (Becky H)
• share your talents with your children - if you need to craft, let the kids craft too (Megan)
• plan meals for the week on Sunday (Melanie)
• achieve your own level of success, it'll come in its own time - "It took 5 years to become an overnight success" (Megan)
• don't be hard on yourself for letting your kids do what other parents don't (i.e. TV). be true to yourself. (Becki)
• one notebook for everything: task list, ideas, etc (Becky)
• rewards to stay motivated - date nights, family outing, pedicure - when you complete a goal (Becky)

These ladies know their stuff and had some great ideas for us all. The great thing is that they're not perfect and don't have all of the answers - they're just like us. But I'm grateful for each of the 4 ladies for sharing with us and making me think outside of my box that I've built. Thanks Becky, Megan, Melanie & Becki! 

inspired {blogs}

There are so many blogs that I'm inspired by...it always amazes me the awesome people out there and the fabulous things they blog about. So much creativity, inspiration, wisdom and love. It's one of my favorite things about the internet. There's quite a lot that has inspired me in the past week so here's my list with all different topics & themes:

Sam & JT Plus Three - Samantha is a local mom that I know IRL and in addition to her three adopted children (ages 2, 3, and 4) she's recently taken in a baby that came to them in the middle of the night via Safe Families. Her most recent post is a wonderful example of her heart and love that she has. She's younger than me, but I have learned so much from her. She has so much love and she is just about the closest I've met to a person who lives like Jesus. She's truly an inspiration to me.

My Top 10 Tips on Running A Business via Becky Higgins - Anyone who's followed me for a while knows that I love Becky and Project Life. Her scrapbooking system is revolutionary and I'm so grateful for it (even though I've done horrible with the start of 2012). Last week she put out a post about tips for running a business and I have to say that all 10 are SPOT ON. She shares so much wisdom and even though I've been in business for 9 years, I've learned a lot from this post.

Autism Awareness: Helping a Friend in Need via Sew Chatty - My friend Elizabeth is paying it forward. A while back she was gifted an iPad to help her autistic son with wonderful results and now she's helping to raise money to help a fellow blogger with 4 children that has Asperger's. I love Elizabeth's heart...can you help?

Discerning Your Strengths via Tiny Twig - Hayley is doing a Passion series on her blog this month and this post really resonated with me. Sometimes I feel like I'm pulled in so many different directions and just plain tired. I'm pretty sure it's because I'm not focusing my energy on only the things that mirror my strengths. I'm thinking that this book is going to be on my "purchase" list the next time I order books!

Dancing in the Rain via CaronlineG - Carrie is so inspirational. She's a dreamer and is living out her dreams right now. I'm so amazed by her, her enthusiasm for life and her desire to help others live out their dreams. This post talks about how the rain comes and how she's learning to dance in the rain instead of letting negativity consume her. "Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass, but learning how to dance in the rain." I love this girl!

What blogs are inspiring you?

Please share - I'd love to read them!

Hubby's Valentine Card

Dave told me to make him a Valentine card this year, so I did! It's simple and manly (I think) - that's why I didn't use any ribbon or glitter or girly stuff. I love the red and gray together and the mini file folder is from the stash that I pulled out of the garbage at work last week :).

The Loving Life and bottom stamps are from Ali Edwards

I added the hearts by hand to add some color. Paper is leftover from Project Life.

I love this man!

Did any of you hand-make your valentines this year?