There’s so much to see and do on the Internet — we listen to our favorite music, watch videos, share photos and communicate with others.  These advancements (and changes in our lifestyles) are something to journal about in your layouts.  Do take the time to write about the things that amaze in your scrapbook pages (and books); share today with the future.

A designer that honestly amazes me is Irene Alexeeva.  Her hand-painted designs are awesome; her store is at Scrap Orchard.  Irene is also involved in Haiti Charity Kits.  Her blog can be found here.  Here’s some Valentine Cards she’s designed in collaboration with Studio Alana, there’s still time for you to create cards for your special Valentines (check out Irene’s wonderful quick pages, too).

While browsing the MyPicTales website, be sure to click on the RESOURCES tab — you’ll be taken to a page with links to TaleWeaver user guides (for Calendars and Cards, for Photo Books, and the Backgrounds Community) — or — Step-by-Step Instructions (for Photo Books, for Calendars, for Cards, and PDF Guidelines for Other Software Users) — or — FAQs and Blog Highlights!  You’ll also find Video Tutorials to watch and things to download.

Plan some pages or Valentine cards today!  Some things are difficult to create pages about, but journaling is all-important.  I don’t have any pages featured this week; my present project is a PicTales WIRE-O Bound Photo Book that is filled with photos of “stuff” about the history of southern Florida — orange groves, sugar cane, manatees — I’ll share some pages when it’s complete!

Happy Scrapping!
Pam

The digi world has come together with different collab kits to benefit different aid groups who are working to rebuild Haiti. The devastation there is enormous.  I can’t imagine having my life turned upside down like that.  My heart simply breaks for all of the children. So for this week, I made it my mission to find all benefit kits that are available.  If you know of one that I haven’t featured, please drop me a comment and I’d be happy to blog about it next week. 

The first kit is from Designer Digitals and 100% of the profits will benefit Mercy Corps.

The second kit is entitled One Love and is available from ScrapOrchard.  One Love is available as a bundle which includes a huge kit and quick pages, and the quick pages and the kit are each available individually.  Stop by Scrap Orchard to see the complete preview.

The last kit is from Songbird Avenue.  Songbird Avenue is a site who has a kit available for one month and the proceeds benefit different charities.  This kit will be available February 1st.  The proceeds from the sale of the kit will benefit Doctors without Borders.

The layout of the day is one that I did using the benefit kit from Designer Digitals.  It is a beautiful kit.  The template used is from Cathy Zielske and is part of the current Design Your Life class from Big Picture Scrapbooking.

(I know that there is a typo there which I will go back and correct.  I didn’t catch it the first time around.)

Until next Friday - What Stories are You Going to Tell?

Mary

Whoa, were did January go?? I can’t believe in just a few days it will be February already. It seems the older I get, the faster time goes by. Well, I’ve been a busy bee buzzing around all the different digital scrapbooking forums, stores, and blogs doing challenges, chatting, and just scrapping up a storm! I’m looking forward to next month and doing some Valentine’s Day related things.

I want to share with you today my current favorite kit. It seems that every so often I will find a kit that I just love and want to use all the time! Does that ever happen to you? Right now, I’m in love with “Love Monsters” by SuzyQ Scraps. This is such a fun kit and unique too! I’ve not come across anything like it before, and I think that’s why I enjoy it so much.

The colors work well for either boys or girls, which is sometimes hard to find in a Love themed kit. The layout I’ve chosen for Layout of the Day today is one that is made by keyr at Scrap Orchard. I’ve been an admirer of keyr’s work for quite some time. I love every layout she does! Here’s a page she made with “Love Monsters”:

Thanks for stopping by!

**Disclaimer:I was not asked or encouraged in any way to post about this product by the designer. I have received this kit at no cost as part of my CT duties, but I was not compensated in any other way. I genuinely feel this is an outstanding product!

Good Morning everyone,

It seems as though I’ve done this before but it never gets any easier.  That ‘it’ is getting kids ready for school,  although this year that means college.  My youngest two both graduated from high school last year ( very youngest daughter skipped up a grade) so that means twice the fun of sharing a freshman year, lol.  There was so much to do getting those two ready for school this fall.  Compound that with the logistics that they went to different colleges but luckily for us, both in the same area.  DD is living at home, while DS is living at the dorm across the bridge, over the big lake (Superior) and in another state.  He won a football scholarship and coach wanted all the freshman to bond by staying in the dorms.  Well, OK that’s fine but oh dear, so much paperwork and I just love being crazy busy - not. 

They were both home on Christmas break but now school is back in full swing and they are busy, busy, busy.  During a quiet moment this week, I was thinking back to the days when they were younger.  Especially my daughter.  It seemed as though I simply blinked and she grew up - my youngest - my baby - is now in college.  Well there’s an old saying regarding children  ”the days are long, but the years are short”.  So true.

Layout of the Day

Speaking of children, I went looking for a layout that I felt captured a truely special or unique moment in the life of a child.  One that might slip away were it not caught in a photo.  I found this wonderful layout by Angela at Rakscraps.  She captured her daughter in a really magical moment - that of make believe and dressing up.  How lucky she was to have her camera with her at that precise moment! 

Product of the Day

I just fell in love with this kit … Wow!  It looks as though it’s been hand painted, great talent!  You can find it at Scrappity-Doo-Dah by Joelle.

Until next week,

Pictures of my slippers, the dishes in my sink with lotsa bubbles, even my mop in the bucket of suds! I was moving and grooving and my camera went with me everywhere.  No one was safe, no inanimate object was looked at with scorn.  I didn’t take one picture a day, I took hundreds. The excitement to come home, upload the pics, blog on each one and think about tomorrows shots lasted approximately 3 months!  I was doing real good and then it started raining and raining and then more rain.  I couldn’t snap another picture of gray and wet…

BUT!  A super thing happened, in those three months the habit of taking my camera with me was set and I had broken a mindset of only taking pictures of the event and the people at the event.  I began taking pictures of things, everyday things.  These are some of my families favorite layouts.  Eating French Toast, kids doing chores, homework, my dirty windows, new recipes failed and successes!

That being said, I still look longingly at the hero’s of Project 365, that did it.  The layout of the day I have chosen is beyond amazing.  Melinda aka mmbstaley, she not only did the pictures but had it made into the most fabulous book here at PicTales!

I am challenging myself to do a book this year with the folks of SBG, and Melinda posted this as one of the finished results.  I just stared and stared at the clean fresh pages.

I wanted to hold it.  Honestly, I wanted to throw a fit and pound my hands and feet while I screamed…”why didn’t I do this?”  ha ha ha  So, I am bound and determined to do a book this year.  I have committed to making a yearbook for my kids home school year.  I want to hold a book in my hands!

In order not to overwhelm myself, I am taking some of the layouts I have already done that go with the school theme, and adding a bit more journalling and shrinking and laying on top of coordinating papers to keep a theme for the book.  Keeping it simple is going to help me get over that hump and “Get ‘er Done”!

I know we all gain memories over every second of every day but if I didn’t try and group them together I’d go insane in regards to scrapping any of them!  I garnered a plethora of memories this weekend and spent last night trying to get them down in my journal just so I MIGHT remember them well enough to scrap about them one day.  And no before you berate me I didn’t have the time to tackle scrapping them all last night, school is really zapping my free time!  Anywhoooo here is a layout capturing a fabulous memory in someone’s life!  Thanks Reba for doing a lovely layout.  I simply love the simplicity!  It draws attention to the picture and what a great capture in the picture!  Wonderful work!

Layout of the Day!

Eyes 4 U by Reba

And with Valentines Day coming up you might just wanna grab the kit she used to create this fabulous work!  The kit is My Quirky Valentine by Lauren and Amy at Polka Dot Plum Designs.

Product of the Day!

My Quirky Valentine by Lauren and Amy at Polka Dot Plum Designs

Enjoy the rest of your week and by all means get to making more fabulous memories!!!

Are you enjoying this blog?  Be sure to check the archives and tags for previous posts!  Did you see the awesome kit by January’s featured designer?  One lucky poster will win a copy of Kari’s City Girly Girl kit.  Read more here.

My daughter’s daughter loves pink!  She’ll love pages created with Kari’s kit (she’s in preschool and in a dance/gymnastics class).  My goal is to complete at least one book a year for my granddaughter containing special events and every day events — each delightful adventure, from Nana’s perspective.

One of the bestest parts of digital scrapbooking is that you can print as many copies of your pages as you want!  You don’t have to go out and purchase more scrapbooking papers, buttons & bows — you can reuse your kit again and again.  Kari’s kit can be used directly in the Taleweaver software, or in your own software to create scrapbook pages, cards, calendars or other fun projects.

I’ve featured one of my own pages again today; I just love sharing the possibilities with the kits offered.  And I love sharing copies of my printed pages with others– you’ll love the quality of the prints you order from MyPicTales!  The fonts used in my layout are JaneAusten and Papyrus for the title and Calibri for the journaling.   I used a page map (October 2005) to help with the design of my page.

Happy Scrapping to you!

As Ever,
Pam

When I was cruising in blog world today, I stopped by one of my favorite places; Cathy Zielske’s blog.  Many of you might know her from her time at Simple Scrapbooks or from taking a class at Big Picture Scrapbooking.  (I must confess I am currently taking her Design Your Life class and it is amazing.)  Any how, her blog post dealt with capturing the life of her 10 year old son Cole from the perspective of what he is in to.  What a great idea.  I know I certainly don’t remember all of the details from what I was in to when I was younger. I know that I liked Barbies, I loved art/drawing/making things, and I loved to read.  I wasn’t too much into music, and I liked listening to talk radio. I liked to cook,(my dad is an amazing cook and he’s passed his love of cooking on to my kids, too.) and I liked going on vacation to the shore. I’m sure that there are pictures of these things - somewhere.  This kind of makes me sad. I’m vowing to change that for my kids and even for myself.  I want to have these memories documented.

SUPPLIES: Layered Template No. 34 • Krafty No. 7, Stamped Sentiments No. 4 (Katie Pertiet) • Univers font

This is the template that she used and is availabe at www.DesignerDigitals.com.  I love the layout that she did with it.  I know that this weekend, I am going to make it a point to capture in pictures what my kids are in to and then document it.  This will be fun to look back at as they get older and there interests change.

Until next Friday - What Stories are You going to tell?

I spent some time today taking a look around what I call “Scrap-Land” to see what I could find that is designed for use with MyPicTales. Just about any template or quickpage can be used, but the ones that a specifically designed with the MyPicTales specifications in mind are even better. If you want to get an album put together quickly I’ve found just the thing for you. The Life is Beautiful Quick Album at Oscraps is a 30 page coordinating quick album that has room for 105 photos!!

And now for the Layout of the Day. I found this page at DigiShopTalk, and think it’s really pretty. I want to focus more on telling stories and this is a great example of that. I would have never thought to make a page like this. I think I’m also drawn to it because I used to have long hair once, and sometimes wish I still did. So here is “I Love My Long Hair” by joelsgirl: