Sweet 16!

Hi! I have a minute between being busy and very busy to post a new card I made for my baby girl who turned 16 this week, which is a whole another story...

I made it in bold colors with a lot of sparkles to match her character a little. For that large flower I layered a few pieces of flowers that were cut out from Teresa Collins paper.I also used two 3x4 journaling cards from Project Life Midnight Collection (they were cut to smaller size).

I can't even begin to tell you how unexpectedly fast this day came... I still don't believe she is 16 already. It was a great day filled with happiness, laughter, flowers, balloons, sweets, cake, friends, presents and emotions...

 I don't want to say much, because my words can't express my feelings. All I can say is "Thank You, Lord, for picking me to be her mom."

Got to run now! I have a big project to do ahead. Thank you for stopping by and I'll see you soon!

Until next time!

Welcome Fall...

Good morning! It seems like every time I post something here, it's either a beginning of a new month or even better -  a new season...

And weather I like it or not, fall is here... I better like it. There's so many good things about fall. I try to concentrate on all the blessings in my life during fall...

We went on our first trip to apple orchard last week. I just love the look of that place! It kind of reminds me of my childhood. And I like everything that reminds me of that time!

These apples were SO good! Of course you can't compare the ones from the store to the ones that were hand picked fresh from the tree...

These particular ones seemed a little to big for this little man; he kept dropping them to the ground...

Today I can finally share a fall layout I did a while back. It has some of my favorite photos of my daughter when she was three. Despite the bright fall colors in these photos, her blue eyes still grab my attention, and that's what this page is about...

I started this page by basically copying the base of the layout from one of the Stephanie Dagan's page. I love to learn from other artists and she is a pro at layering.

I decided to use a very subtle title on this page, so I don't take attention away from photos. I used random papers from different brands and a five Project Life cards. They are one of my favorite things to use on a page!

Thank you so much for visiting!  Always love hearing from you!

Have a great day and I'll see you soon!

"Observations"...

Hello! How come is it Wednesday already? My little ones finally feel better, so I can go back to blogging now. I didn't make anything new, but I finished journaling on one of the pages I did earlier this month.

Remember I was talking about a page with 9 pictures on a 8.5x11 format? This is the one. Since photos on this page don't have people in them, this tiny size of pictures worked just fine. Also, my goal was to use little bits and pieces that were left form Les Papiers de Pandore collections.

I need to remember to leave enough room for journaling. At first I thought there will be just a few words for each picture, but after I tried to put it into sentences, I ended up with a whole lot more then expected. It took me longer to figure out what can be deleted then to write actual journaling.

 

I tried to remember what was the biggest number of pictures I did on a page. I looked through my gallery and found this one from September, 2011 with 16 photos... in case you were wondering :)

 

Today's page has a very summery feel. Yesterday I stopped at Michael's to get a new corner rounder punch, and was really inspired by all the fall stuff in the store! I flipped through a few fall collections and now I can't wait to create something in fall colors. 

Thank you for stopping by and I hope to be back soon!

Have a great day!

Fresh color combination...

I didn't expect September to be so busy... Or maybe I'm just not used to having older kids in school for so long every day. Whatever the reason, time just flew by this week so fast! I love blogging and really missed coming here with a new post.

Sharing a new card that I created last week in a little unusual color combination for me. I got inspiration from one of my pins on Pinterest:

And here is my card:

I added a little bit of black for the contrast. Actually, it all started with that tag, if I remember correctly :) I've been wanting to use those for a while...

There was a piece of paper that I placed in a "give away" pile. I was looking though it and suddenly realized, it was full of these beautiful leaves that I could cut out! I LOVED using these! It's my third card in a row with them and it makes me sad that I'm getting low on them... btw, the paper is by SEI. The rest of the papers, including flower is by Prima. The teal background paper was dry embossed with wood grain embossing folder.

Just a few pictures of a summery September...

Just like with scrapbooking - there are new fashions, new trends and new favorites. Seems like Frozen Yogurt places are on the hot list right now. Every time we stop by, there are plenty of people in there.

There's a Sweet Frog, by the music place where Alyona takes piano lessons, and it seems like a new tradition now to stop there. I've heard that YoFresh is a very nice one too! Can't wait to try it, since there's one coming soon close to us! My two very best flavors - Original Tart and Salted Caramel! They are SOOOO good! What are your favorite flavors?

Big "Thank you!" to my new followers!! Thanks everyone for stopping by here!

Always love hearing from you :) Have a GREAT weekend!

Scrapbooking on a Budget - 8.5x11 vs 12x12

Hi! Today I wanted to share a new page and two more secrets for scrapbooking on a budget.

It has been a big dilemma for me to decide which size I want to scrapbook. Like many of you I started scrapbooking with 8.5x11 size. Then I completely switched to 12x12. After reading Ali Edwards's blog, I realized it was totally fine to do both sizes and I did that for a while. About 90% of my pages were 12x12 though. But this year I switched back and now about 90% of my pages are 8.5x11.

I made that choice based on two reasons. One - I noticed that each time I wanted to share an album with a guest, I felt more comfortable pulling out a smaller album. And two - the person who is most interested in these albums right now is my 5 year old. She loves flipping through the pages of my scrapbooks.

 But 12x12 album looks just a little too big for her...

It may be ok when she is sitting down, but taking such a large album from the bookshelf and placing it back is always a problem. She can handle the smaller one herself, but with 12x12 album she usually needs assistance...

That was my main reason to switch back to 8.5x11, the other benefit of it was - it was fitting my budget so much better! Yes, that's my next secret.

Secret #10: Scrapbook 8.5x11 size.

There's still plenty of room to play on this size of paper! It's an ideal size for one photo layouts. For the rest of them I just use smaller photos. I often print two photos on one 4x6 print as shown here. Most of my pages have 1-3 photos on them but I did manage to fit 9 photos on 8.5x11 layout before. Yes, they were small, but they seemed perfectly sized when served as a supportive element on a story based layout.

By making 8.5x11 scrapbook pages, you don't just save on paper that goes on the page...

... the biggest money saver here is in a storage solution for our masterpieces! Here is a rough example on storing both sizes of scrapbook pages. Sorry, we have to do a little math here :)

An average 12x12 scrapbook album costs $22. They usually range from $15 to $29. A pack of ten 12x12 page protectors are about $5. One 3 ring binder can fit 20 to 30 pages. To store 30 scrapbook pages, will cost you approximately $37.

An average 8.5x11 scrapbook album is five to ten dollars cheaper. If we talk real budget, you can get a plain 3 ring binder in an office supply store for under $5. I bought mine for $3.99. A pack of 50 sheet protectors are around $7. To store 30 scrapbook pages, will cost you approximately $9.

Both of my albums here have 30 pages in each.

I know this would not work for everybody. Some of you prefer larger square format. And that's the beauty of this hobby - we have so many choices! I'm not trying to convince anyone to scrapbook 8.5x11, but if your budget stops you from recording your memories, that's the way to go! My decision was made on how these albums were used, after I spent all those hours making pages and money saving came as a bonus :)

Here are a few links to blogs of some of my favorite scrapbookers who do a lot of 8x5x11 pages. Check them out: Jen Gallacher, Jen Jockisch, Geralyn Sy, Sasha Farina.

Secret #11: Buy 6x6 paper pads instead of 12x12.

Buying 6x6 paper packs instead of 12x12 is another money saver. And these papers work perfectly on 8.5x11 layouts.

Sometimes we like to have it all! But I know what I use, so I have to be very selective. I buy only a few pieces from collections I like, but when I like the collection a lot, I get one or two 12x12 pieces of paper from it and a 6x6 paper pad. This way I still get every pattern that was there, still get to enjoy the entire collection, but for a lot less money. A full size paper pack is usually around $19, when 6x6 size is $5 to $6.

 

The page I shared today was made completely of 6x6 papers by Echo Park, except for one strip of paper by Basic Grey on the left side of the page.

Here are a few links to my favorite 6x6 paper packs that I would like to add to my collection: by Teresa Collins Santa's List and Memorabilia, by Echo Park Paper Beautiful Life and by Basic Grey Hey You. 

Thank you so much for stopping by! Have a great weekend and I hope to see you soon!

Always love hearing from you :)

Hello September!

Good morning! Hope you had a great holiday weekend! I have a proposition to make, how about we make all Mondays off! Most of the holidays fall on Mondays anyway. If you agree, raise your hand. I know I can't see you, but I can feel that most of you would've supported this idea. By the way, now I know what happened with the weather - August and September decided to switch their weathers. It's hot and humid again...

 Anyway, instead of  going back and finishing my mini book, I made a few more cards. I get these different creative waves, and yesterday I just had to make some cards...

You would think that my cards have to be school related. Well, I wanted them to be, but I'm not that organized... Instead I was making all kinds of cards except for the school related ones. 

For the first one, I wanted to use these flowers that were cut out of Crate Paper pattern paper. I also used a white doily, that I designed in the Silhouette studio :)

I used the same green flowers in a different color palette for the second card. Here, I used another piece that I created in the Silhouette studio. I guess it's called a decorative frame. I embossed it with swiss dots and backed it up with a slightly larger size of the same frame. 

I enjoyed working with the soft teal  palette, so I made another card using those colors but added purple here. Also, I redesigned the shape of the rose. Instead of an even scallop edge, I made it a little more organic. ( I was going for the look that you can get with manual die cut by Spellbinders)

I had a lot of fun making these cards! Oh... one of my family members doesn't smell very good... I guess we need to go now. I'll be back soon!

I love hearing from you!