Too much history

It was History Day at my son's school last week, and I really shouldn't have read Things your History Teacher didn't tell you this year (although it's a great read) as I was especially cynical about the Kindergarten's depiction of the first Thanksgiving, and the third graders singing Yankee Doodle.  My son's class also sang The Grand Old Flag and the Nifty 50 States song.  Sense a theme here?  I'm sure knowing the 50 states in alphabetical order will win him a pub quiz one day but trust me, there will be some serious Kiwi indoctrination going on once we're back in NZ. 
For my last hurrah, it had to be a page celebrating this wondrous event: lots of colour and a slightly haphazard layout.

Last hurrah?  Today I gave into my husband's gentle prompting, and packed up the scrapbooking supplies.  Two big boxes and a small one left over, so I was pretty pleased with that.  Pity the poor men who have to lift them though.  I didn't throw too much out as I went; I'd done a big clean up a few months ago before visitors and donated heaps of the crafty stuff to school. 
I have committed to a scrap relay sometime this month, so have my crop bag packed.  That was the hardest thing: trying to predict what I'd need for a LO I haven't seen yet, but if I started to plan it properly, today wouldn't have happened at all and there would have been more not-so-gentle prompting tomorrow.

Then and Now

Ahh bubbles.  They don't pop like balloons, and they don't leave you soaking like water guns.  A perfect leisurely way to spend an afternoon.
This was a Then and Now challenge: choose a page you like, and do it again to show how your style has changed.  I don't have copies of pre-digital photos (who does?) so I took some more of the same thing.

The captions read: Express Yourself, Be a Dreamer, Imagine.  Husband snorted at the time but he should see the crap I put on now (like the previous post!)  I remember how hard it was to tear perfect circles out of vellum. 

And yesterday.  Scraplifted from Anna White-Sharman: sketch, colours and all.

Back from stress leave

Changes here: I resigned from the design team as I was feeling too stressed creating perfect layouts every time instead of my usual hit and misses.  I still haven't (and never will) get the hang of misting and sewing, but I'll blunder along here and be pitifully grateful for any complimentary scraps that get thrown my way.
Just in time too, as we start packing this weekend to move countries, and even though I'm entitled to take 100kg on the plane with me, I'm not too sure how I can do it with two kids, clothes for a month, a car seat and a mountain buggy as well.  Husband is coming a month later - hmm, how did he manage that?  That's right, I wasn't going to stay on this rock a minute longer than I had to.

Last night I was challenged to use a 'girly' theme for a boy page, and luckily I'd just bought some beautiful Panama Lounge paper from Grant Studios (snaps to Warehouse Stationery).  I tried to tone it down with blue embellishments and it sort of worked. 

I think there's a market for reality titles though - 'Best friends for 30 seconds before going off in different directions for an hour' might be more accurate.

Letting the title tell the story

I was inspired by a title on a layout at Scrapbook Challenges ages ago, One day there was a lion at the beach (thanks Jasmine Lombaard) and I loved the way the whole page was explained right there and then (and the very cute pictures of a boy pretending to be a lion chasing waves, as kids do).  So here is The day we got Puckerman Bear. 

I'd seen the bear in a bin at Cost U Less (commonly known as Cost U More here on island - the place I definitely do not want to be in an earthquake), and there is something special about having a toy bigger than the baby it's for.  The name comes from Glee, which I know is very inappropriate for an 8 year old but he loves the music and I'm hoping the sexual references go way, way over his head.  We thought about Finn, but that wasn't beary enough, and Artie was too beary, so Puckerman got the nod.  Of course the 8 year old plays with Puckerman far more than the 1 year old, although I did catch the baby determinedly dragging P-Bear by its ear back into his room from his brother's yesterday.
The layout is for Sketch 266 at Scrapbook Challenges, and it also fitted the red, yellow and green colour challenge.

The photo that wouldn't

This photo has been moving up and down in my To Be Scrapbooked pile for years.  Many times it's even got as far as the table, but it's never made it onto the page until now.  For many reasons: it's been difficult to match it with any background card, probably because of all those bright moire taffeta dresses (mine was raw silk - classy)!  The photo has also faded so much, and I don't know what the photographer was doing using bronze velour curtains for a backdrop.  Most of all, I just don't like the photo.  It was an awful night, I looked like crap, was horrible to my date, and generally did not have a good time!
But I did it!  I used Jowilna's sketch at Scrapbook Challenges, a background of core-dinations and I controlled my doodling.  The photo did nearly get completely ruined when I was a bit ambitious with my misting, but luckily I was able to unattach it from the original card - says a lot for my adhesive skills!  I've also learnt to sand the cardstock (with a nail file) outside, as I'm going to have to actually clean my table before I do another layout.

The page is more purple than the photo shows.  The journaling reads: Bad Hair, Bad Dress, Good Mates, it must be the 80s.

Back in the groove

I'm back!  We had a wonderful holiday, took over 250 photos which I've whittled down to 150, not counting the many, many shots of fish #1 son took at the Seattle Aquarium, and I have the mini-album all sorted in my head.  I'm sure it will come out of there and on to paper sometime soon.
I did make the mistake of leaving two half done layouts on the desk, and they bugged me for the first week until I put them away (hid them under pillows on the spare bed).  I will come back to them one day.  To get back in the groove, I did a typical Sharyn page for the Y page of the ABCs of Me (thank goodness that's nearly over).  Lots of co-ordinating patterned paper and some misting.  The journalling reads : The last time I enjoyed doing housework.

A philosophical journey or Why I could never quilt

Thank you to Isabelle who left a comment on my last post, (not that I blame anyone as I keep trying to leave comments all over cyberspace and I can't for some reason) but she was curious about scrapbooking, which made me curious.  Also thanks to modern technology, I could see she got here from my sister's quilting blog.  Now quilting, there's a funny thing to do.  I can appreciate the effort that goes into it, but all that randomness really doesn't do it for me.  That's why my sister only makes me clean, geometric, co-ordinated quilts (thank you!).
Even though I spend a lot of time scrapping, and I'm quite proud of my efforts, I'm still a bit embarrassed about it.  This blog was just about called sharynscrap, pun intended!  I guess because it's not productive in a Put this on the bed kind of way, or make all my own birthday cards and save heaps of money.  And my initial perspective was that scrapping is overemotional. I really don't feel the urge to write down all my innermost feelings for everyone to see (maybe I should, but that's another post!)  Scrapbooking does fit my attention span, limited artistic capabilities and non-perfectionist core; 3 good reasons why I could never be a quilter.
And I like playing with paper and being colour-coordinated!

Attack of the nerves

As part of being on the DT at Scrapbook Challenges (I just like dropping that into the conversation - I'm very proud!), I have to provide a sketch.  Just one sketch and it's not due until October.  So why am I spending hours on the computer, fiddling with boxes and lines and fills and shapes and ...?  The trouble is my sketch, that I quite like, has 5 elements total: one circle, three boxes and a title.  Nice and simple.  The boxes don't even have rounded edges.  But then I go onto other sites and there's swirls and flowers and splotches and Write 120 words of Journaling in this 3x4inch block HERE, and so on.  I look at what people do to sketches, and they take one look and go nah I'll do it my way thanks, so a sketch is only a very, very gentle nudge.

The effect I really want to put in my sketch and force people to follow, is some sort of disappearing circle, where it's more saturated in the middle, fading to a memory (!) in the corners!  No idea how you'd actually do it, but I like the idea.  As long as it doesn't use mist - I am so over that but it keeps creeping onto my pages.  

I'll start working on examples now, as my success rate at the moment is fairly sucky.  I have two layouts sitting on the spare bed saying Kill Me Now, but I will make them work dammit.  Or maybe just print the photos over and start again.  Actually, both pages are my efforts to do a specific style: pinky-princessy, and grunge.  The grunge has got too many colours, and the two sides aren't connected, and the frame should have either been wonkier or straighter - it just looks like I got it wrong.  I'm still playing with the layout for the pink page but it definitely needs some oomph. 

I'll let you know how I get on.  And apologies to the ladies whose sketches I've mangled!

Just open the box

I had to laugh at American Samoa Customs holding up my order from Scrapbooking.com because of the inks (two spray bottles, 2oz each).  The box was addressed to my husband's work, and the officials looked at the packing slip, saw the ink and presumed that they were for commercial use and therefore subject to duties.  If they only read the rest of the quite lengthy packing slip, they would have wondered why the local bank needs corner stencils, coloured card stock and a photo album, and passed it on.  But no, officialdom strikes again.  They think I'm crazy anyway for ordering an espresso machine (what does it do?  Makes coffee.  Why?  Because the coffee here is awful).
The rest of the box wasn't very exciting, mostly essentials like adhesives and another attempt to find the best white pen.  I do like the new inks (Inkadinkado) particularly the Royal Blue, which is a lovely purply-blue.  I've also got the Sew Easy mat, so hopefully I can do better with that, and a very cool paper holder in funky black and white swirls.  Once I tidy up after the latest project I'll take a photo.
I did forget to order plain white cardstock.  Everytime I go online to shop, this is the first thing I go looking for, but I'm never satisfied with what's on offer and get willingly sidetracked into pretty stuff.  I have plenty of album liners, but they're not very thick and tend to wilt in heavy duty projects.  Just an excuse to do more shopping really!

In his own words

I've just finished Sharyn's Theories of Journaling (coming to a site near you soon!) and it got me thinking about the one and only time my son wrote a story for me.  The layout design is totally scraplifted from someone, somewhere (it was three years ago!) but I remember that the journaling was my original contribution.  I so miss my scanner.

The text reads: In Picton I played minigolf and I went on a rocket ride and I had a double ice cream with two flavours goody gum drops and berry and ... mucky.

Pretty much sums it up from a 5 year old's perspective!

Can't resist a dare

Natalie at Scrapbook Challenges scared me with her sketch, then dared me to take it on!  She very kindly offered a tutorial, and I did the first two steps then took it away in my own direction, as you do.  I was actually working on a very serious, elegant page at the time, so it was nice to delve into primary colours for an hour or two.
Again, my misting is improving (need to get some more colours though) and it was nice to get Natalie's encouragement to doodle.  Quite restrained doodling for me; I am learning when to stop.  The story is actually true and unembellished, and I'm pleased I put the whole story on the page.  I would love to get a 12x12 printer (do they exist?) so I don't have to do the whole print-on-vellum-then-pretend-I-didn't thing.

Ditch the spritzer

I've had a lot more success with misting once I transferred the Smooch Spritz from its original spray into the mini misters.  I love the idea and look of successful misting, but mine always went lumpy and gluggy, with big splotches leading to strategically placed embellishments! 
This layout is based on a sketch by Sookie at Scrapbook Challenges.  I'm really happy with how the blue background to this layout turned out.  I considered doing a mist/shadow with the butterflies but that may have been too much of a good thing.  The frame was created with the leftovers from one of my son's games, where we had to punch out all the tiles before we could play.  Knew they'd come in useful one day!
As you can tell, I haven't done any journalling on the page, despite my resolution last week.  Maybe next time.
Next step: going round corners with the Sew Easy (still waiting on the mat, hoping that will solve all my issues).

To journal or not to journal?

My father has just been to visit, and he spent one evening looking through ALL my albums (bless!).  One comment he made was how little I journal now compared to what I used to.  I guess I've been focusing on layering and embellishments recently, and trying to use more white space.  But I have a couple of ideas about theme albums for the boys which need to be started soon (no point in doing The Summer I was 8 in the middle of winter!) and I will try to include more journalling in those. 

I think the title and subtitle (Boom, Bang, Fire Power) of this LO are self-explanatory - no journalling required!  Orange is another unusual colour for me.  This t-shirt must have slipped by the matching clothes to the furniture phase.



Scrapbook Challenges Blog Hop

Welcome to my page of the Scrapbook Challenges' Bloghop! If you've just stopped in, please start from the beginning at Brynn's blog http://bzb-designs.com/blog and I'll see you soon.

I'm a new member of the Design Team, and I'm very excited because I didn't think I'd ever be confident enough to get there! My name's Sharyn, and I live in American Samoa, married with two sons. I enjoy scrapping because I get to be creative, and I enjoy creating albums for my sons to look at and talk about.

Here's the sketch that was given to us:

And here's my version:

As soon as I printed the photo, I thought of the spotty paper which also gave a great colour palatte to work with. The maroon background is an unusual colour for me to use, and I don't think I'll use it again in a hurry. And I am getting better with the Sew Easy, but I hope the mat arrives soon as the carpet's taking a bit of abuse.
And here are some of the great RAKs to be won on the Blog Hop! (Can anyone tell me what RAK stands for? Real Awesome Kit? Really Adventurous Karate? Ride a Kangaroo?)
1. For one person who leaves a comment on all the blogs in the hop, they will get the Salt Air Collection from Cosmo Cricket.
2. For one person who does a layout based on the sketch and posts in the HOP ON section, will receive a $20.00 USD Gift Certificate to Scrapbook.com.

3. For inviting people to join the group one person will receive a mix of alcohol ink goodies from Ranger.
4. One new member over the weekend will receive a mix of alcohol ink goodies from Ranger.

Thanks for stopping by. Your next stop is Marilyn's blog at http://marilynrivera.blogspot.com/. See you there!

The perils of late night shopping

It's 10pm and I've been shopping at scrapbooking.com for the last half hour. You know you've spent too much when the postage is nearly half the value of the contents. Or is that you haven't bought enough and need to spend more to get cheap postage? I tried to be good and get essentials, the boring things like white pens and adhesive, but I am quite excited about some new storage for card stock. Anything that helps me to be better organised! That's one thing that I've learnt about scrapbooking as I go on, that it is worth investing in the basic tools and not trying to make do with cheap 2-dollar shop rubbish (do they have those in other countries? As the name suggests, everything is $2, although I've noticed recently they've tried to subtly up their prices. Bit difficult when your shop has such a specific name).
So, in about 4 weeks, my husband will come home very grumpy because a big box has been delivered to his work and it's full of my "junk". I really need my own PO Box number. And credit card, but that's another story.

Here I am

My first Scrapbooking post! I resisted for so long, thinking who wants to see my photos, but the lovely ladies at Scrapbooking Challenges convinced me that someone did!

I will put more on here later, but now I'm just trying to get my head round my new role. I think some chocolate may help.

Sharyn