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29/05/2015

One Little Word | April Prompts

Today I'm sharing my April One Little Word pages. I was reluctant to do this page, and as I stated in my review, I found myself setting my word aside for a little while and just not worrying about if I was DOING things related to my word, or this journey. I didn't think about it, I didn't stress about my word, I just did whatever and if it was relevant, so be it.

This prompt wasn't hard for me, I was just very reluctant to do it. I don't know why I procrastinated it for so long, but now that I'm done, I can't believe I didn't do it sooner. I love the way it looks, and I'm so pleased with how it turned out. I love the photos and the labels, and I'm surprised by how visible my word became without me trying very hard to make it visible. It's wonderful to not worry about it, and look back and discover how visible your word was without you realizing it in the moment.

I love this circle paper. I love that it's kind of soft,  but not really soft. I've been enjoying adding a little something extra to my pages through patterned paper behind my monthly reviews. It's helping me use up my stash a little bit, and as a paper hoarder, I'm loving that.


Here's a closer look at me making my word visible in my life. I need to stop fighting it, and accept that it will make itself visible without me FORCING it to be visible. I love these photos.

Thank you for coming by to check out me making my word visible, and using some labels from the One Little Word mini kit (no longer available). I hope you have a wonderful day!
-Alexandria

23/05/2015

23 | Things I Love


Today I've decided to share 23 things I love. I wanted to use these in a similar layout to the one Ali Edwards created for this month's story theme. She made one using the text from this post and I loved the idea so I wanted to make a list of "Little Things" that I could use to make a similar layout. Since my 23 | Things I'm Thankful For post wasn't full of the little things, I knew that I wanted this one to be. This list makes my heart happy and definitely deserves to be documented.
  1. When Gracie lays down on her side and stretches, then meows at me so I'll pet her.
  2. The smell of a new book
  3. How the sunshine shines through the crack of the blinds and across the floor
  4. The smell before, during and after a storm
  5. The feel of Gracie's soft little kitty paws when she stretches out and touches my face
  6. The prairies with their blue sky, fields, and wide open spaces
  7. How whenever I kiss Socks on the top of his little kitty head, he licks my nose
  8. The way my niece and I argue about who loves who more
  9. The first sip of coffee in the morning
  10. The grass poking and brushing my bare feet
  11. The way the frosty trees sparkle against the blue sky
  12. The sound of laughter
  13. How Jon's face lights up when he laughs or smiles at something I've said
  14. The softness of my favourite blanket
  15. The joy after completing a project that I'm proud of
  16. The smile that creeps onto my face when Jon says sweet things to me
  17. The feeling of joy when someone compliments my work
  18. Those first few moments before I'm completely awake
  19. Waking up beside my best friend (and sometimes Gracie)
  20. The hot sun and the cool breeze on my skin
  21. Accomplishing a goal
  22. Receiving a compliment from a stranger
  23. The colours of the sky
I hope this post inspires you to create lists of little and big things, and to document them in the form of a layout.
Have a wonderful rest of your weekend!
-Alexandria

20/05/2015

#myselfiescrapbook | Week 4

Good morning! I'm so happy to be sharing the final pages of #myselfiescrapbook but I'm also a little bit bummed that this project is officially over. I had so much fun doing this, and I think it's something that would be fun to do again in a couple years. This is definitely my favourite project I've made so far this year. I learned so much, I "met" some pretty amazing ladies, and I can't thank them enough for creating something so amazing.

In my mini albums, I love adding layers and dimension, and things that aren't necessarily photos, or don't serve any purpose other than looking pretty. For the page on the right, I had a felt doily and a normal white doily in my stash. I knew I wanted to include them in some way, and I decided to cut them in half and make a little 2x4 page between two full 4x4 pages. I wanted to add layers so I cut a little foam sticker from Freckled Fawn in half and adhered it along the edge after I sewed the doilies together. I love that you can see through a little bit to the next page.

 On the back of the doily page, I just repeated the same thing using the other half of all the elements. On the right, another selfie (of course).
The prompt was #seehowIthrive and I used a photo of my breakfast. I'm trying to eat better, and finding things I actually WANT to eat that are good for me, is one way that I thrive. The photo on the right was "doing something little for ME, like taking a walk when the weather is beautiful". I love that it has a tiny bit of my head in the photo, and the way the sun is shining. It was an accidental photo, but I love how it turned out.

This is easily my favourite 2 page spread in the whole album. I decided that I didn't just want selfies in here. I wanted to include things that inspired me. I have the quote at the start, and I knew I absolutely wanted to include more of them. I feel like this quote fits perfectly with the photo next to it. I make weird faces ALL THE TIME, but I never document them because I think I look ridiculous. I also have bad hair days more often than good hair days, and I wanted to include both of those things. Of course they happened to be in the same photo, but I would have been fine with them being in separate photos too.

My favourite element of those pages is the buttons. I knew I wanted to leave the extra bit of the pocket attached, and originally I was going to add sequins, but happily added buttons in rainbow order instead. I love the way they look. The pattern was completely accidental, I was just pulling buttons from my stash and I wanted them to be coloured on both sides so I chose these ones.
The next pages were about #lovingyourself and it's one thing that I wanted to work on after the stress of the last couple weeks. It started with a good hair day. I love good hair days, and I need to document them more. Loving myself means embracing the good hair days, even if they end in bad hair days. The photo on the right was about loving myself, even when I'm wearing pajama shorts and I haven't shaved my legs for an embarrassingly long amount of time. It was about loving that I can eat yogurt straight from the container, and not feel bad about probably eating a little more than I should.

This page was about trying to inspire myself to continue working on something, even when I wanted to quit. Loving myself means that even when I wanted to quit because things are hard, I find a way to get through it and keep trying. It means finding something that inspires me to be myself, and do the best that I can, even if I don't want to.
 
I love this song. It's almost like my anthem at this point and I play it often. It's not only empowering to me, but it's inspiring. It helped me to keep trying when all I wanted to do was snap under pressure.
This next bit is about being kind to myself. As human beings, we're so very critical of ourselves, and it's such a shame. I usually hate selfies with my whole face in them, and I'm always picking out the flaws I see until I eventually just delete it. But with this photo, I thought about all the things I liked about it. The quote along the bottom says "Create a life that feels good on the inside, not one that looks good on the outside". Things I liked about this photo included my good hair day I was having, but also how I felt. I felt like a million bucks. I was wearing my favourite shirt, my the sun was shining, it was so beautiful outside, I had some time to work on my own creative projects, I got all my contacts and some photos back from before my phone died (but still lost 2 weeks worth of photos). It was a good start to my day and I was happy. The right side is just some cards from the Farmer's Market kit by We R Memory Keepers, some wood veneers, a chipboard flower from an old My Mind's Eye chipboard sheet and a vellum flower from Maggie Holmes Open Book.

I wanted to add some dimension and something different to my book, so I found this old Heidi Swapp chipboard frame. Part of #bekindtoyourself was doing something that made me happy. I bought a TON of new books recently, and that was one way that I was kind to myself. I love reading, and my to-read shelf was getting empty, so I bought some books that I really look forward to reading. I'm rushing to finish my current book so I can pull one of these beautiful books off the shelf!

On the back of the frame, I adhered some patterned paper and a foam sticker. I'm kind to myself by relaxing on the couch with a book, under my favourite blanket EVER (Jon's mom made it for me). The photo on the right is another selfie. This one is probably my favourite from the whole album, and I said as much in my journaling. I used a stamp from the most recent Studio Calico kit, and wrote some kind things about myself and this photo. It was the perfect selfie to end the album with.

The very last page of this album is this photo I found on Pinterest. I loved the quote and I loved that it had some white space on the left side. This quote is one thing I want to remember now that this project is finished. On the left side I journaled about a few things I learned by doing this project, and just ended the whole thing on a happy note. I'm so pleased with how it turned out. I love that adding the lines to my journaling made it look like a separate piece next to the photo.

 My album is full and I love it. It has layers, and embellishments, and photos, and things that matter to me. This is definitely one I'll flip through in the future.
I added a mint tassle to the spine of my album along with the other two and the little charm. I haven't decided if I'll add a title to the spine yet or not. Maybe I'll just add the date.

Thank you for coming by to see the last few pages of my album. This was probably the most fun I've had in a long time, and I'm so grateful to have all these selfies and have them all in one place. I tried a lot of new things, I learned a lot, and I'm grateful for all the people that this project has connected me with. It's definitely been a wonderful experience!

If you haven't done the #myselfiescrapbook, I definitely suggest that you do. It's so much fun, and you definitely won't regret it. Just do it!
-Alexandria

16/05/2015

A Little Bit of Crazy | My Life Lately

I know it's a Saturday, and I don't ever post on Saturday, but life has been a little crazy lately. I've been working on wedding invitations for my sister-in-law and it's been extremely stressful for me. It's definitely making me rethink a creative business, which is unfortunate because I love creating things. I've had to put a lot of my own projects on hold, including #myselfiescrapbook (which I was having a TON of fun creating).

Earlier this week Jon and I took a much needed mini-vacation. We went to Calgary for 3 days to celebrate our 3 year anniversary. We're such weird people (or maybe we're normal), and it was such an amazing few days. We shopped, played arcade games, saw Avengers, slept until noon, went to the zoo, shopped some more, saw Age of Adeline, bought me a new phone (my other one died before we saw Age of Adeline), and just enjoyed ourselves. Jon told his parents not to call unless work was on fire or someone died, and we didn't talk about his sisters wedding invitations, and we just enjoyed ourselves. We definitely needed it, and when we got back we dealt with all of our work drama and creative stress. Jon picked up a few new board games, so we had my sister over to try them out when we got back.

I'm reaching the end of these wedding invitations, and I'm looking at all the things I need to catch up on, and I'm thinking that there's going to be a little while where I likely don't have much of anything to post. I have a few projects on the go right now including 3 mini albums, my weekly project life, a travel album for my sister (format to be determined), a travel album for my grandma from the 90s, (need to organize the photos and put the cards in). I haven't worked on a Studio Calico card kit since the November kit (which I think I did after Christmas) and the December kit is open on a shelf somewhere waiting to be used and separated into my stash. I'm also trying to catch up on Ali Edwards' Type workshop, I've gotten through the first video for Week 1, and that's it. I'm also behind on my One Little Word prompts (I haven't done anything for April). Overall, I'm just behind. It's almost my own fault, but given the tight timeline on the invitations, they took priority over everything else I have going on, but this plays right into my OLW; I need to "do what makes [my] soul happy" and that means taking some time for myself, to work on my projects.

That being said, I'm finishing the invites this weekend (after I get different string - long story), shipping them out Tuesday and going back to my own projects. I'm so excited to catch up on my Project Life. I feel like there's nothing more fulfilling than completing 4-6 weeks of life in an afternoon.

Please go take some time for yourself and de-stress. I've been trying to do little things that make me happy, like sitting on the couch and eating a bowl of yogurt and just enjoying the peace and quiet.

Have a great long weekend!
-Alexandria

11/05/2015

Project Life | Week 12

Good morning! Today I'm sharing my spread for week 12. This week I tried something a little different, and used a set of digital cards that I won in a giveaway last year. I printed these cards a long time ago, and had wanted to use them, so when I saw that she was having a Design Team call, I made this spread with her cards to submit. I didn't get it, but if I didn't try, I wouldn't know right?

Here's my spread for Week 12. I'm in love with these cards from Little Lamm & Co. These cards are no longer available, but she has some super awesome designs in her Etsy shop. I love her designs, and definitely need to buy more!

Here's the left side.  I added plain black alphas to my title card, and stamped the date. I used the card with the label next to my photo on the top right. I taped them together on the back and then journaled. I used a Studio Calico stamp on the pink 3x4 label card and journaled about Gracie. I journaled about house of cards on the lined card and used the pie chart as a filler card. I journaled about the books using a label from my stash that matched the orange in the title card.

Here's the right side. I included close ups of my AM/PM layouts. The colours went well with the cards in my spread. I finished two more books this week and journaled about those on the yellow label card. In the label spot I wrote in the hashtags that I use when sharing my books on Instagram. On the polkadot card on the right, I journaled about Jon being in Chicago, and my AM/PM layouts. I used the Pie Chart card to journal about how I spent my time this week. Lots of work, reading and creating. It was a good week, but I did miss Jon terribly. He had a blast in Chicago.

Thanks for coming by to see my spreads for this week. I hope you had a wonderful weekend!
Have a great day!
-Alexandria

08/05/2015

Craft Haul | Michaels, Ali Edwards, & A Little Scrapbook Shop

Good morning! It's definitely been a while since I shared a craft haul on here. It's also been a while since I picked up as many supplies at one time, as I did when I started these posts. I feel like I have enough stuff in my stash at this point, that there isn't a lot of things that I NEED or have the space for. I have subscriptions to the Studio Calico card and Project Life kits, as well as a subscription to the Ali Edwards Story Kits & Stamps. With all of that, and my lack of crafty time lately, I have a huge stash of things I need to use, so I've been trying to buy less.

Despite all of that above, I can't go into Michael's and NOT buy something that I probably don't really need. I picked up some little metal corners from Tim Holtz, some jump rings, and some black tags.

At some point, I'm making a scrapbook for my sister to document her trip to Ireland over her Easter break this year, so I bought some stickers to hopefully use in that (though probably won't). She had a blast, and I'm so excited to help her document her trip.

I found these beautiful frames (and some other larger and more expensive ones!) and they were buy one get one free, so of course I picked up 2 sets. I wasn't sure what I was going to use them for at the time, but I knew I'd figure it out after I got home. These frames aren't very big, the picture slots are 1" - 3", so they're not very big.

I decided that I'd put photos of our nieces and nephews in them. Jon's sisters each have 2 kids (his one sister has 2 boys and the other has 2 girls), and my brother has 2 kids as well (a boy and a girl), so they were perfect for that.

I also picked up these super cute recollections frames. They will look so cute on the front of a mini album, or on a little gift box. I might pick up some more next time I'm in Michaels. They're just so cute!

Of course I also had to pick up some Project Life cards as well. On the left is the Trinkets value kit. The gold foil made it jump straight into my basket. I've been looking for the Gold Foil kit (center) for a while now. I'm so glad I finally found it! I'm like obsessed with gold foil, just like pretty much everyone else! And I also picked up the Chalkboard kit. I love that it's more than just black and white, it also has some other colours on the black paper.

I picked up a variety of other things from Michaels that I didn't include here. I picked up some metal letters to put in the livingroom, some cork sheets for Jon, and some large gold and silver foil letters from MAMBI. 

A couple weeks ago, Ali Edwards had a sale on her sight. I bought a TON of digital files, but I also bought these three stamp sets, and some white embossing powder. 

While I was in Manitoba, visiting my Aunt & cousins, we visited her local scrapbook store. I found these Tim Holtz lightbulbs I've been looking for online, and I also picked up some little clips. I could have spent an entire day in that shop looking at everything, but we had to pick my cousin up from school, so I reluctantly left the shop with just these items.

I can't wait to share projects using some of these items! I'm so excited to get crafty, I wish I had more time to do crafty things. So many ideas rolling around in my head now. Gonna go write some of them down.
Hope you have a wonderful day!
-Alexandria

06/05/2015

#myselfiescrapbook | Week 3

Good morning! Today I'm sharing Week 3 of #myselfiescrapbook. I didnt take as many selfies this week as I thought I would. As it is, I've already taken more selfies this year, than I ever did in the entirety of last year. That's pretty crazy, but also super awesome!

This weeks prompt was to take 1 selfie 4 ways. Basically it means to take 4 selfies of different things. The example was 4 shades of lipstick. I chose my 4 go-to hair styles. I've never really noticed the differences of the different ways I wear my hair, so it was cool to see how it changes with a few bobby pins or a hair elastic. I used a divided pocket page, and added some gold number stickers to the right hand side. I trimmed a piece of clear plastic and stuck the numbers back to back on the plastic. I love that it adds that bit of gold I've had throughout this album. I chose not to do any journaling on this page and just left it as selfies and numbers.

On the back side, I have the other two selfies. I love that you can see past the numbers to the page before/after. All the see-through elements are my favourite in this album! There's a lot of them. On the right, I included a selfie with my favourite child ever. We were coming home from my sisters band performance, and we were laughing and singing along to Taylor Swift. It was so much fun, and this picture isn't a good one of either of us, but I wanted to include it because the memory is important to me, and there will always be embarrassing photos of us out there somewhere.

On the back, I adhered some pattern paper to the back of the frame to make it a little prettier. It was just plain brown kraft and I hated it. I had to include another from where I stand selfie because I was wearing my favourite shirt and carrying my favourite otter bag.

Thank you for coming by to see my pages for week 3. I've been having SO MUCH fun with this project. I hope you have a wonderful day!
-Alexandria

04/05/2015

Project Life | Week 11


Good morning. Today I'm sharing my spread for Week 11. This week was a busy one, so I have two full pages, and 3 inserts of varying sizes. It was fun to create some inserts that allowed me to see all the pages at once.
 

Here's my spread for Week 11. This week I used the Rain Edition from Becky Higgins. It went pretty well with the colours of my cousin's wedding, so I felt that it was a solid choice for this week. PLUS, I haven't used it much lately, and I needed a lot of cards in similar colours because I had a lot of pages/photos this week.

Here's the left side. I didn't take many photos at the start of the week, so most of these are from towards the end of the week. I made cookies for Jon's get together this weekend, and snapped some cute photos of Gracie, and Jon. We finished watching Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. So funny! The theme song is still stuck in my head. I read The Opposite of Loneliness (a must read!), and finished my vision board for One Little Word.


Here's the front of the first insert. I took a Design A page, and cut the top 4x6 slots off, all the way across. I considered keeping the strip along the left edge with the holes so it wouldn't slip down on the right side, but decided not to. So far it hasn't stuck out the bottom of my album, but if it does, I could always move it up to the top 2 rings to keep it from getting ruined.
Here I included the three movies I watched this week. I journaled a bit about all three of them on the card between Gone Girl and The Best of Me. I also included the photo from my 7AM layout. I've changed up the make up I use recently, and I really wish I had a photo of the make up I've used in the past. I think it'd be cool to see what I've changed, and what I've kept the same (though most of it has changed recently). I stamped and journaled on the bottom right photo.

 
Using a stamp from Freckled Fawn, I stamped "Here we go" on this photo. It was taken rather early in our trip, and I wanted to document that I went with my parents and my sister to my cousins wedding. I used black Staz On ink, and just used my fine tip sharpie pen to journal on my photo.

Here's the back side of the insert, and the beginning of the next few pages. I included the program from the ceremony, and just put it into a 6x8 pocket page that I sewed and trimmed a little smaller to fit the program.

Here's the back of the first insert. I finally won something from Roll Up The Rim at Tim Horton's. In the same day, I won 2 free regular coffee. My dad ended up using them both (I prefer mochas), and it was the least I could do since he bought both of my winning drinks. I snapped a couple photos of the guestbook table. Their guestbook was the posted with two wood slices on it. It was so cute! They also had some envelopes on the table with clothespins. They asked guests to write their address on the envelope and clip it onto a tree they had placed near the front of the church, and they mailed their thank you cards out in the pre-addressed envelopes. It was a great way to get addresses they didn't already have!

Using some more Freckled Fawn stamps, I stamped "Pure Joy" onto my photo, and "Yes" onto my journaling card. I stamped a little cup that says "Yum" on a scrap of paper, cut it out and used foam squares to adhere it to the card. I definitely need to stamp in my Project Life more. It adds the perfect little touches to cards and photos.

Here's the front of the second insert. I trimmed the right half off of a Design F pocket page. My sister took a few photos during the ceremony and then sent them to me. They're so cute together! In the little sequin pocket I included a couple of the fake flower petals that Tori picked up off the floor and handed to me after the ceremony, and the little tag off of their S'more wedding favours (so cute).

Here's the back of insert 2 and the front of insert 3.

On the back of insert 2, I used a couple cards from the Rain Edition to document little things about the day. They were the perfect cards to document what the day was about, and journal a bit about all the photos on this insert. The top photo on the left was them braiding a rope. It was a tradition I'd never seen before, but it was interesting. As she was braiding she said "I tried to teach will how to braid, but he still can't, so I guess I'll do it". I love when they can make jokes during the ceremony. Her dress was beautiful! She looked amazing!

Here's the front of insert 3. I cut the right hand side off of a Design D pocket page. During the lunch after the wedding, Tori stuck her glass on her face and was laughing about it. Cutest thing ever! With the help of her dad, and her bridesmaids, Kate made her center pieces. They're beautiful! There were flowers in the jar on the top.
After the lunch, Kate & Will had some photos taken with their families, and while Will was having his family photos taken, Tori asked if I'd take a picture of her and Kate. She thought she looked like a princess. It was sweet!

Here's the back of insert 3 and the right side. This spread is all about the trip home, and some failed attempts at selfies. Lots of journaling on photos, and a bit more stamping.

Here's the back of insert 3. I included my 7PM photo and some journalling about where we were and what we were doing.
The selfies. Oh boy. They're a little embarrassing, but I wanted to include them because they're an important part of the story, plus we laughed about them for AT LEAST half of the trip home. Also caught a picture of Tori colouring. Her dress was so cute! We sort of matched.

Here's the right side. I have a thing for taking photos of the country side while we're driving. I was trying to get a good one of the pink sunset, but it was too far away so it doesn't show up well in the photos.
More selfies, only one of them turned out really well (the second last one). I also made sure to take a selfie of my dress. I love it so much I almost didn't take it off. I also snapped a photo of a terrible park job because I was on the phone with Jon after we finished supper and I mentioned the terrible park job, and promised to send him a photo of it.

Of course I had to stamp on one more photo. Another Freckled Fawn stamp, and I journaled about the trip, and how we laughed ourselves to tears. I think I'll use that stamp more
often!

Thanks for coming by to check out this photo-heavy spread for Week 11. I'll see you next week when I share Week 12.
Have a great day!
-Alexandria