Liberate Your Art Postcard Swap

I'm so excited!  I received my first postcard this past Friday for the Liberate Your Art Postcard Swap.  This postcard is from KC from Oregon!  My photo of the postcard does not do the postcard or KC's photo justice.  I had a hard time with the lighting and not getting my shadow in it!  KC took the photo at the Oregon Coast Aquarium and the background is such a vivid blue!  My favorite color!  KC has just started a blog and you can find her at http://kcscamera.blogspot.com/  She is currently taking an online photography class and you can find the info here http://www.kateyeview.com/p/find-your-eye-e-course.html
I've also received two emails from people who have received my postcards!  This is so much fun!

Angela was the first to let me know she received one of my postcards and her blog is here http://www.sassyangelac.com/

The second person that received one of my postcards was Marji from Seattle and her blog is here  http://www.sunbreaksintheforecast.blogspot.com/  I might actually get to meet Marji sometime in the future as my youngest son and his family live in the Seattle area.  That would be great!

I want to thank everyone that participated in the swap and especially Kat (www.kateyeview.com/p/liberate-your-art-postcard-swap.html  )  who organized the whole swap (can't imagine what a job that was!).  Hopefully I will get 4 more postcards and hear from 3 other people who got my postcards so I can share that with you as well. 
Hope you're having a great weekend - the weather here has been amazing!

Flip Flaps Part 2

 I've shown you Close To My Heart's Flip Flap Memory Protectors before but today I wanted to show you a new way that I am using them.  Nothing earth shattering but solves a problem for me.  With my Project Life album I'm regularly finding that I have one or two vertically oriented photos each week or so.  When I have more than that I put them in a vertical pocket page protector.  I have several varieties of those.  But with 1 or 2 I didn't know what to do...until now.

 Here is the acutal Flip Flap.  Clear pocket for one or two photos front and back.  The white strip pulls off with the adhesive strip underneath.

I cut a piece of cardstock approximately 5 1/2" x 7"
and punched holes in the left hand side.

I slid my photo into the Flip Flap.

Adhered the Flip Flap with photo onto the cardstock.

Placed the Flip Flap with photo into my album.  How simple is that!  I love simple!

The best part is that this photo is now able to be seen along with the other 3 photos taken at the same time! 
I still can add another photo to the back of this one and it would just flip up to see it.If  I don't have a second photo I can put cardstock with some journaling, stamped images or embellishments on the other side.

Projects update

Layout for Finding Photo Freedom and MotherLOAD
(photos are from 1975)

 

Photo Central has moved from dining room to living room



Dining room is now Layout Central

I'm keeping up with Finding Photo Freedom and MotherLOAD fairly well.  I don't get all of the tasks done in the week they are assigned but I'm working consistently on my digital workflow, still organizing straggler photos (like bunny rabbits more keep popping up!), and just getting a good sense of what I have, what's done, what needs to be done and beginning to work on creating layouts regularly.  Right now my 2009 photos seem to be missing (there's only 97 from that year but still what could I have done with them?  They should be in a storage binder but it ends at 2008 and I just realized this.  I have then on CD so I can reprint if need be but....I don't like mysteries like this!  Earlier this week I was having problems with Picasa and as typical I just needed to let it sit for a day and come back to it.  Problem solved and everything is sorted properly.  I was pleasantly suprised this week when I got all my albums in one place and went through them page by page that so many were actually finished and the others only need 2-4 things done in them.  I also found a large number of layouts that were completed but had no home - I hope to remedy that soon. I've made a list of what needs to be completed in which albums and where gaps in albums are.  I will be taking all my pages out of these albums and moving them to We R Memory Keepers Classic Leather 3 ring albums as time and money allow.  I just ordered my first 3 in cobalt.  We're in Week 7 in Finding Photo Freedom and we actually have 2 weeks for this task list.  MotherLOAD is in its 3rd week and is starting out slowly and will build as we get to the Marathon part in September.
So as things shift I've moved all my albums, my storage binders, category drawers, cold storage box, memorabilia box, family tree drawer, 2 piles of more things I just found this morning and a box with all my film cartridges, index prints and negatives are now in my living room,  Lily, our dog, is not happy as that corner is where her doggie toybox used to be.  The dining room (previously Photo Central) is now Layout Central.  The dining room table has all my Project Life and A Week in the Life stuff in the far end and this end is ready for layout making - I have 2 double layouts in the making right now.  I do need to do some catching up on my Project Life album. I just picked up some photos I was waiting for this morning and should be able to work on that tomorrow.  So that's where I am for now....

A Week in the Life preparation

Notice the Details

stamped images

stamped images ready for A Week in the Life project

As I mentioned in a previous post Ali Edwards' A Week in the Life project will be coming up July 25th-31st.  While you can do A Week in the Life at any time most people do the same week that Ali does.  I'm putting some supplies together for my Week in the Life which I may actually do next week while we are on vacation.  It wouldn't be a true representation of a week in my life so I haven't decided for sure.  I may see how the week goes.  One of the items I plan to use (since I'm not yet into digital stuff like Ali is) is this stamp set (see photo at top) from Close To My Heart.  Notice the Details (D1378) has 41 stamps in the set.  The  wide variety of stamps will have many uses besides A Week in the Life.  The set is $22.95 and can be ordered from your Close To My Heart (CTMH) consultant. 
As you can see in the middle and last photo above I stamped the images on CTMH's Kraft Cardstock (Z1375).  I really like the look of the images on this cardstock.  It did not take long to cut the images out - a good project while watching a movie! 
I also will be using another CTMH stamp set called "On This Day" (see photo below)  Its D1468 and I believe it is also $22.95 from your CTMH consultant.  You can use the consultant locator on the Close To My Heart website to find one if you don't have one.  Many of them also have their own websites and you can order online through those.  I'm posting a photo of On This Day below. 


On This Day

I liked Notice the Details so well that I ordered a second stamp set before I found the first while looking for things I already had for A Week in the Life!  I'm selling the second one (brand new, original packaging) for $15 plus postage.  Email me at laew@aol.com if you are interested.

I'd like to hear if you are planning on doing A Week in the Life this year and if so are you making any plans for how you'll do it.

SMASH Book vs. Ditto Collection

I recently purchased a SMASH Book and a few of the little extras to get started.

SMASH Book by K & Co/EK Success
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PFsArr4Z1s

http://www.smashstoriesblog.com/

http://www.eksuccessbrands.com/kandcompany/SMASH/

and then I heard about the Ditto Collection by Hampton Arts from http://www.creationsbychristine/
so I wanted to find out more about both.  I'm sharing the links I found for both so you can check out these two great products.

Ditto Collection
3 ring binders (kraft cover with linen binding) with inserts; 2 sizes 8 x 8 or 8 1/2 x 11
http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/userblogpost.asp?id=52737

http://www.hamptonart.com/Product_Details.aspx?prodid=314   This is the product list for all the various components available for the Ditto Collection

While these items are similar the inserts for the Ditto Collection include calendar pages where the SMASH Book has more of an art journal feel.  However, either product can be turned into what you want it to be!

Let me know if you have either one or are planning to purchase one!  I know I'll be getting more little goodies for my SMASH Book but I'll be ordering the Ditto Collection as well.  Both collections have items that I will use for A Week in the Life - especially the Ditto Collection stamp sets.

One Little Word July 1st Blog Hop starts 11am ET

Illuminate

Thank you for stopping by!  Ali's prompt for June turned in to a fun and messy project!  We were asked to make a series of multimedia canvases.  It was up to us to choose how we wanted to do them in terms of ourselves and our word.  My word is Illuminate and I tried to reflect that in my 9 little canvases.  I had the opportunity to use some products that I hadn't had a chance to use yet - its alway fun when you can use stuff from your stash! 

In June I was also taking Claudine Hellmuth's Composition for Collage class and found that my 9 little canvases collectively made a grid compositional structure for collage!  So in the photos below you will see the canvases as a collage and also as they look in my One Little Word album. 

As a collage

 

In the page protector




In my OLW album

  Next stop on the blog hop is Jenn at www.studiojenn.blogspot.com
The entire list is below so that you don't miss any stops along the way.  Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you'll leave a comment!

  

Margie               http://xnomads.typepad.com/blog    

Rebekah         http://istampscrapcraft.blogspot.com/

Kelly                        http://kellyxenos.typepad.com/

Julie Ann            julieannshahin2.blogspot.com

Jill                          http://jillconyers.typepad.com/

Jamie                        http://jmpgirl.blogspot.com/

Cherie                        http://cheriandrews.blogspot.com/

Nikki                  http://www.inkyart.com.au/

Amanda            http://scrappnbee.blogspot.com

Melissa S         http://blog.mshanhun.com

Monica B         http://questtoperfectimperfection.blogspot.com/

Lisa A                        http://backtoallen.com/writers_blog/

Sam                  http://learncreatedo.wordpress.com/

Karen                        womenontractors.blogspot.com

Lynn                  http://www.crafty-creativity.blogspot.com/    You are here

Jenn                   www.studiojenn.blogspot.com

Kathryn         http://www.katlodesigns.com.
Cindy                  http://seriousplay.typepad.com