Photo Albums

When I did LOM I found a company which sold fantastic albums – ring binder albums so you could move the leaves of photos around – at a reasonable price and no packaging.

When I went back to get some more they appear to have gone out of business which is really disappointing.

I have found another retailer that sells them but well they are a small fortune not only to buy but the postage and packaging afterwards!

So needing to get a replacement as photos from last year had no where to live I managed to come across some in Jessops. They were reduced in the sale to £4 and hold 250 photos each. You can not move the photos about but at that price it’s a sacrifice which I am wiling to make.

At the moment I am putting my recent photos in these albums – i.e. photos from 2009/2010. Then as I scrapbook these photos I shall hopefully be able to move photos into fewer albums and/or move them into sleeves of the ring binder albums. I shall have to see how it goes.

But for all albums I do need to make tags to put on their binders so that I know what album holds what year of photos.

Decorate Life

I can not believe it has been so long since I last added things to my blog! And it’s not because I have not done any scrapbooking, just not taken photos of the layouts I have done. Must try to change that this year.

At the moment I am doing “Decorate Life” by Big Picture Scrapbooking Classes. The first week you get told to gather certain embellishments and photos for different “themes”. And then the following weeks, every other day, you get a class layout with a sketch telling you which combination of embellishments and photos to select.

The idea of this class is so that you can quickly make layouts and scrapbook that mountain of photos we all have. Am not very good at fully sticking to using only the embellishments I have selected from the instructions but I certainly do more layouts in a much shorter space of time.

The next few entries will have photos of the layouts I have done to date.

Slow Progress

Was hoping to get so much more scrapbooking done today. But instead I have been down with a horrible cold - temperature, headaches etc. So instead of doing some scrapbooking pages I have been lying on the bed.

Thankfully this afternoon I have managed to make some progress on sorting out photos and putting them into the photo binders. It seems a never ending task though. Serves me right for taking so many photos over the years! Just wish the 7x4 pages I orderd would come into stock as it is holding me up on sorting out last years photos. May just get them reprinted in the smaller size instead. Will see.

Another First

Did this layout a long time ago. I can tell this mainly due to the fact I have no journaling on it. But it is an example (and the only one I could find quickly) of how I have used multiple photos on a layout. This used small printed out photos on my home printer (two to a 6x4 page) but if I had photos taken from a long way away I could of cut them down to get a similar effect.

Could of been a great photo

When I started this layout the story was gong to be different but it kind of evolved with the layout. This layout is very “fussy” for me and took me ages to do!

Used the “gems” from Poundland for the centre. The flowers are proper paper scrapbooking flowers which I had to stick down using double sided tape strategically placed so it could not be seen. But if I did not have them I would of either used images from the computer and coloured in, flowers cut from patterned paper, or dissected a cheap “silk” flower from the Poundland – these I would of probably stuck down in the centre with the brad. I used ribbon for the strips on this layout going across the bottom of the page but normally I would use patterned paper – or you could use colouring pencils or paint to do similar thing or stamps – basically what ever grabs your fancy

Summarising Christophers 2009

I did everyone this double layout, using numerous photos taken throughout 2009 in which they “starred” in and just added their name and the year. This summarised the year.

I used 3D foam pads on some of the photos. But if I did this again this year I think I would not use so many photos and may be put a bit of journaling next to some of the photos. Mainly where they were taken or when.

Botex in the Future?

Botex in the Future Layout used lots of 3D Foam Pads. The letters where from stamps, but could get the same effect using the computer I am sure. Stuck on to the page using 3D Foam pads. I printed to copies of the photo out. Cut one up to give the centre image, mounted on black card and then used 3D Foam pads to stick on top of the flat photo. I did this as I did not want to lose the background but I wanted my niece playing her Nintendo and her face to stand out as this was the subject of the layout.

First Day at School

This was a layout design I got from Stacey Julian and modified slightly.

Silver edging is using acrylic paint. Stamps are used for the letters, I was brave and stamped directly on the page then used a black marker pen to go around to highlight them. Patterned paper was used for the strips. (I cut a larger piece of patterned paper up but you can buy 12x12 Papermania strips of paper packs in a variety of patterned paper ranges – The Range is the best place)

BUTTONS

I have a thing for buttons and do not use them that often. They look much more pretty in my glass jars. But on this layout I used the buttons on the centre of the flowers. Cutting the flowers from patterned paper.

Alternatives I could of done was ...

 For the Flowers:  Use flowers cut from clipart and coloured in, Flowers which are stamped onto the page directly, or on other paper then cut out and stuck down.

Examples of alternatives I could of used for the centre of the flowers are: Brads, Gems, Beads

Using the ABC

For this one I took the name of my boyfriend – Christopher and a photo I liked of him. Using 12x12 size paper I first printed the picture A4 size. Then I cut out some letters and wrote down some journaling about him from my view point.

I enjoyed doing this one. Have to say though it was difficult to think of things which where part of Christopher but began with the letters of his name. But once I got started it was much easier.

Songs that mean something to me

These two layouts are about two songs “The Eye of the Tiger” and the theme tune of “Fame” and what memories they spark for me.

Binders

Part of LOM is to sort your photos by event and year. (Done some of that.)

Next you put them into photo albums which you can look through and take out photos to scrapbook. (Or of course you can just use them as normal albums and use the index cards to make comments against the photos – think you may just be able to see where these go in the below photos).

After searching a long time I found “Directfoto”  directfoto shop the best and cheapest place to buy them from.I bought the "Losse Leaf Ultimate Storage Album" (bottom album, £5.99). This album is really sturdy and will take a fair amount of battering, though it is heavy when full.

The binders are ring binders so you can move pages around or add more in. They have a variety of inserts you can use for different size photos so are fairly versatile.

Each binder will hold 200+ 6x4 photos and with the binder and extra inserts (you need around 4 – 5 to fill the binder) it works out at around £11. With free postage that is (I think) good.

Sorting out photos

I started with a pile of photos i had printed off

I then sorted them into events - holiday, birthday etc etc

Then using my time line I sorted them out by year and roughly by month. I found it easier to put the pile of photos into envelopes. Label them up with event and date (using memory and time line). Then when they were all sorted putting them in piles by year.

All ready to go into the binders - when they come.

PHOTO SORTING PART 1

OK so its been a while since I posted and its been a while sine I actually scrapbooked. So what I have been doing? Well all of my spare time has been sorting out photos as part of my LOM class. Now I know that sounds easy but trust me its not as straight forward as it seems! From what I have learned so far I would say:

Do your time line to start with. Yes you are going to be adding events on it as you sort more photos out but having a rough time line to start is a big help in figuring out when different things happen.

1. Sort out your digital photos.
2. Make sure each event is in a separate folder.
3. Have a backup – at the moment I have all of my photos on CDs and on my second hard drive. But I am also investigating some online album storage.
4. Go through each event folder and DELETE photos. I worked on the basis if they were blurry they went (a few exceptions), if there were duplicates then only 1 or 2 were kept.

When deleting photos I would ask myself:

• Could I see me scrapbooking them?
• Could I see me wanting them in a photo frame?
• Could I see them being needed to go into a specific event album or mini book?

If I answered yes then they were kept. If I answered no then they were deleted. And deleting them is so cool. I know I have backup so I know they are not “gone forever”. And the numbers of photos I have for an event have so gone down. I can actually “see” the photos.

For already printed photos I just went through them and picked out the ones I wanted to keep following the above guidelines and then put the rest into "cold storage". (more on that another time)

So many February Journaling Challenges

There are so many February journaling challenges which have sparked my creativeness. Some I know exactly what I am going to do, others I may not do because well I am stuck on them!


Am going to continue to get as many done as I can in the next month. But if I don’t get a chance to I know that I will use most of the prompts at a latter date.

Have to remember I need to get the balance of scrapbooking now and working on the LOM system. (Of course renovating the house should be in there as well but we will forget about that one for the moment!)

LOM Layout Challenge – Lesson 1

I had to go through my albums and identify what subjects I did not scrap the most. What subject did I feel I was missing? Which of the five Ws (what, where, when, who, why) had I not scrapped the most?

My result was "Everyday items" and "where".

This layout is the result. Christopher’s work boots sitting in the hallway of my house and what seeing them means to me.

A story I have been thinking about telling as I passed them but this was the prompt I needed to get it down on a layout.

February Challenge 7

"Tell your story through writing a letter to someone"

I thought that this challenge would be really difficult to do. Use a letter to someone as your journaling of the layout. Oh my goodness how an earth am I going to do this? What topic can it be for? Who do I want to write a letter to?

Then we visited the Big Pit in Wales and I had the perfect subject. I wanted to tell Josh how brave I thought he was for going down the mine – something he was very scared of doing and a letter just seemed to fit it perfectly.

Josh has not seen this layout yet. We are saving it for when he gets nervous about something so hopefully he can see he overcame a fear once and get the courage to overcome another.

I am terrible..

I am terrible in not taking photos of layouts when I have actually completed them. So please be warned that this evening I have actually photographed a whole load of layouts I have been doing from challenges and prompts. These photos of the layouts with a descirption of the challenge and why i did the layout are all going to be posted on my blog this evening.

Maybe tommorrow night I will get around to posting them in the various galleries to show I have actually completed the challenge.

Valentines Day

I wanted to do something different to give to Christopher for Valentines day. I heard years ago of people altering thick paged children’s books for mini albums and decided to give this a go as it seemed the perfect thing – a book of “I love you ...” and then naming the reasons why. I decided to illustrate the top ten reasons so had to make sure that the book had enough pages to cover this – a harder task then you may think!

I covered the pages of the book in black paper, using brown paper to act as the binding part of the both inside and out (hiding the gaps where the black paper did not meet).

I used the same four sheets of patterned paper through out the book, cutting some of the “flower” shapes to use as embellishments.

I cut the numbers out using a Cricut cartridge – think it was George but couldn’t be sure. Journaling cards where a stamp which I hand wrote in.

I then collected a range of ten photos which illustrated the points I was trying to make and then added a journaling card (which was a stamp) hand writing the reason.

I added a few embellishments on the pages but did not want it to get too fussy or be too bulky so these where kept to the minimum.

The completed book went down very well and lives on the bedside table next to Christopher.

No Sure's (LOM)

As I was processes all the things I now will do and still do it also made me think of a few things which I have yet to do or grasp....


I still have hundreds of photos to get printed which I am going to have to do in batches as Bonusprint has offers on. But I have just done the first batch so am hoping I have enough for the rest of the class.

I still need to check the quality of my first binder to see if they are good before I order some more. If not its of to the internet to search again.

I am still investigating storing my highlight folders on the internet. I like the idea but Shutterfly is an American site which means I would be storing them on there but then printing them on another site in the UK (postage to high to get shipped from USA to UK). Think Bonusprint may do this by need to look into it more.

I still have to figure out why I need to split photos into quarters of the year (Jan – Mar etc). Keep on asking myself if that really matters to the photos I take, my main concern is the year they were taken in. Hoping the penny may drop on this one soon.

I still have to figure out the tagging, star system and moving photos into the “US”, “PLACES WE GO” etc files. Not got my head around that by a long shot! (Either how to do it or how much use it will be)

I still have lots to learn about the Photoshop organiser to make it a more effective tool. To date I have kind of figured out the people recognition tool– totally cool function.

I am unsure what the response to my journaling cards is going to have. Should I be using them or should I not? Not sure how I would “cope” if I did not have them but is it totally against the LOM principals?

Is it not always the way when you learn something new it brings more questions.

LOM, Lesson 2

I am now in the second lesson of Library of Memories (LOM), third week of the course. I am so glad that I have had an extra week to processes the information we have had to date as its been a lot to take in and work through. Have to say though it has been really interesting to look at how I processes photos, store them and then scrapbook them. I mean it’s not a system you really look at to see if it is “working” do you?

I have learnt lots of things about how I process them and how I would like to change things. At this moment in time:

1. I still plan on saving ALL the photos I take onto CDs “just in case”(may be one day I will get out of this habit). 
2. I now make a copy of the photo file I copy onto the CD, store it on my 2nd hard drive and delete those I know I am not going to use to scrapbook either in 6x4 or smaller and make “highlight” folders.
3. I now have the above “highlight” folders linked to Photoshop Elements Organiser.
4. I now understand how much better having real life photos in your hands prompts you to think of stories you want to tell. (When I was sorting through files I found so many photos I remember taking but the stories I have completely forgotten about translating in a layout). I am in the processes of waiting for my first binder to arrive and am looking forward to sorting out my photos.

I know I probably have learnt more than this but those are the things that spring out to me at this moment in time. I also know I have so much more to learn.

February Challenges

The February challenges that Log your memory are currently running is getting the creative journaling juices flowing and I have ideas buzzing away in my head. But not being the fastest scrapbooker I have only completed two of the challenges to date, a third in the processes of completing. Once the third one has been completed I shall post some photos in the next few days. :)

Totally Cool

Well you may or may not know but I love my buttons. So when I was reading Imaginisce blog and I came across them telling me of a cool article Robyn Schuab had done using buttons I just had to follow the link to Clip it Up’s website to see how it was done in more detail.

I love the idea and the effect it has. Now trying to think how I too could use this idea in one of my layouts. Only thing is would I have to use some of the buttons I already have or could I go and buy some more?

Join Me For Some Sweet Talking!

We’re kicking off a month-long challenge at one of my favorite sites today … the Sweet Talk Journaling Challenge at Log Your Memory!  http://logyourmemory.com/

I hope you’ll come on over and check it out today … there will be an entire month of scrapbooking challenges with a focus on “real life” journaling, plus the chance to earn points and prizes along the way! And if you’ve never visited before, you’re in for a treat! We have a wonderful group of friendly, helpful scrapbookers just waiting to say hello and show you around!

Get started by visiting the Log Your Memory Blog HERE http://logyourmemory.com/2010/02/01/sweet-talker and get ready to journal your way to becoming a Log Your Memory Sweet Talker!

(And tell them hsanders sent you!)

Natures Inspiration

I am not sure when it was but as part of the “Inspiration” course at BPS Elizabeth would send us daily emails to prompt our thinking in a different direction than normal and inspire us. One of these emails had a picture of a crocus. The aim (if my memory serves me correctly) was to look at our environment today and use those colours to inspire a scrapbooking layout.


Well I confess that I have not done this. But the picture and the prompt made me remember over the past few years I have taken various pictures of flowers as I have gone around gardens.

When people ask me what colours do I like I always say “Natural autumn colours”. As if autumn colours where the only natural colours there were. So I had started to take various pictures of flowers as I visited gardens.

Had I done anything with these photos? No.

Had I remembered the variety of colour and shape combinations that naturally occur? No

So sorting through some old patterned scrapbooking paper I came across this “notice board” style. I cut the "ribbon" onthe paper so that photos could be slipped under it as if it was a real notice board. Grabbed a whole load of photos and hey presto.

I am really pleased with the results. Not because it is amazingly artistic, but because it serves as I reminder to me that nature is a wealth of colour and shape inspiration.

I promise

I promise to update my website links and blogs soon. Lots more blogs and websites should be on my list.

All organised (for the moment)

All organised for the moment. Yep that is my scrapbooking room.


Due to the rooms size, power points, doors etc the actual layout of the room can not be changed. But I did have to think long and hard before I decided exactly on the final layout as some of my scrapbooking furniture had to be cut to make the most of the space – giving me the optimum storage and work surface possible. Thankfully all of my white furniture is cheap desks etc that you can get from Ikea and has had a few years wear and tear before it all got modified.

The following Ript pages show how my scrapbooking room is laid out.

Inspiration all around me

Undertaking the “Inspiration” course I did on BPS coincided with me also sorting out my new scrapbooking room. How I wanted it to look. How I wanted things to be stored.


Using Ript I created these pages which showed how I finally decided I should create my scrapbooking room to inspire me.

Transformation

Mum and dad bought these chest of drawers many many years ago. Dad had them in his garage for a while until they started being passed around the family as each of us bought out own houses and had little furniture.

I have probably had them the longest, sometimes I have needed the chest of drawers in my house, other times they have remained empty in the garage.

But while I have been renovating the house and its been really dusty and my furniture has either been in storage or piled up in the spare bedroom this chest of drawers have been a real blessing.

Looking at the furniture I had for my scrapbooking room and what I needed to store in there I decided they would be a perfect storage solution but they needed a serious face lift from the tired white paint.

Christopher and I had been reminiscing about our childhood and the comics we read, and we both decided Beno was the best. It was after this conversation I came up with the idea of decorating the chest of drawers in pages from Beno comics. But the question I had to ask was where an earth was I going to be able to find cheap Beno comics?

On a trip to a charity shop I was really surprised to find a big stack of old Beno comics which I purchased for a bar gin price. With my comics in one hand, sandpaper and PVA glue I set about transforming this tired chest of drawers. It was great fun to do and I am really pleased with the end result, adding storage and colour to my scrapbooking room.

Its also the perfect size to fit in the gap between by computer and craft desk, and the perfect size to fit both my printers on.

I still have a pile of Beno comic pages left and am itching to find something else to decorate them with!

Time

During the Christmas holidays I set about transforming some old wooden photo frames with a lick of acrylic paint. The idea begin they display inspirational photos around my scrapbooking room. Five of the six photo frame transformations were successful. But the photo frame I tried to paint orange went horribly wrong.

It was around about this time when, leading on from my word for the year (Opportunity) I realised that how we actually used out time assisted us in utilising the opportunities that there are available to us.

So never wanting to waste anything if possible I decided using the messed up photo frame, paper, rub-on sayings and some flat embellishments relating to this theme I would do a picture to remind me how important utilising out time is.

As the photo frame was already messed up from my initial paint job there was nothing for it but to go for a distressed look. Well all I can say is it took me hours and hours to do. And the whole distressed look distressed me to the extreme. I am sure that in the processes of getting to the final product you see I looked more distressed!

I am really happy with the results. And this photo frame stands along my picture of my word of the year, on top of my scrapbooking storage unit where I can see it in my scrapbooking room and when I am walking in the hallway.

Have to say though I am in no hurry to attempt the distressed look again!

My Word of 2010

For several years I have followed Ali Edwards blog where she has chosen a word for her year. Each time I have seen it I have thought I must do that – but like so many things we say we must do I have never got around to it. This year I decided I would definitely do a word for the year. So my word for the year is OPPORTUNITY.

Why opportunity? Well last year I did not think I made full use of the time I had available to accomplish things and by doing this I missed opportunities which were available to me.

So this year I want to take the opportunity to complete things, gain knowledge, make positive choices, Laugh and smile, progress, compromise, read and explore my beliefs and environment.

I want to take the opportunity to be positive no matter what life throws at me, to be strong no matter what, creative, caring and loving.

I want to take the opportunity for scrapbooking more, new experiences and adventures, challenges, improving and taking more photos.

To help me remember my word of the year, to trigger the reasons for its choice and to do my best to encompass this word in my 2010 life I created this “picture”. It sits on top of my storage unit in my scrapbooking room. Angled so that I can see it both in my scrapbooking room and when I pass the door in the hallway.

(I got the black from Marks and Spencers and used my 2.4” square punch to cut old Basic Grey pieces to make a patchwork effect for the background(Had to ask myself when I was doing this exactly how much of the same series and pattern did I actually buy when I first started scrapbooking!) The black letters where cut using my Cricut – sorry can’t remember the cartridge I used.

Following on from Tublr

Following on from being introduced to Tublr I am pleased to find out I was not alone with my problems using it. Liza on the Inspiration class message board shared a great tool for "clipping" online pictures and storing them and its a free too!

You can download from: http://www.ript.com/

Unfortunately I believe its not available for MAC users yet.

Its really easy to use, if you see a picture online or have a selection of photos you want to compile you just drop the picture into your "ript" pile and later go to your "table" and place your pictures on a page. You can then add text if you want.

I know it sounds really complicated and I was scared to start with but I gave it a go and honestly its really simple. I played around with some photos I took when I visited Westonbirt Arboretum and you can see below what I created.

Tumblr

Elizabeth pointed us to a tool on the internet which allows you to link to photos and blogs and all sorts. Its called “Tumblr” and is meant to be a “free online bulletin board” If you want to give it a go this is the link tumblr

Unfortunately I did not get on with it at all! Totally overwhelmed me and I decided, after several hours of TRYING to understand what I needed to do that I would spend way to much time trying to figure it out. Instead I was better of using my blog or printing photos out or writing down quotes or poems in the various notebooks I have around the place. (I must not buy any more notebooks!)