the moments in between

project life // 2012 cover page + week 17

may is always bad for me + project life. the end of the school year brings a flurry of events, and not much in the way of extra time. on the bright side, i know i won't be short on photos once i finally get to those weeks!

the studio calico kits keep me accountable for getting a little project life done... i gotta get some use out of it before the next one comes! this month, i finished a recent week - and then went off on a tangent and did my cover page. for 2012. because may of 2013 is a fab time to do that, right?

2012 cover page // i gathered up some of my favorites from the kits (and some confetti, of course!) and finally filled in that blank page at the beginning of my 2012 album. i mixed in a few of the happy little moments printables and items from marcy's class kit (LOVE her stamp set!!!) as well.

maybe i can get it together and make my 2011 title page now?? anything's possible!

week 17 : april 20-26 // this was one of those cold, miserable and just plain BLAH weeks that don't inspire much in the way of photo taking, so i was glad to have some memorabilia to help fill in the pockets!

to make the confetti pocket, i folded the 4x6 crate paper overlay in half and stitched it shut. break out a swiss cheese border punch or a hole punch and go to town on paper scraps, magazines, catalogs, or anything colorful you have laying around to make the confetti.

on the field notes card, i used a standard hole punch to punch out the lens of each camera. i backed it with one of the map print cards and then filled each lens with glossy accents.

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there's something cool in the works for PL subscribers at studio calico - all PL main kits starting with roundabout will be shipped in these cool storage boxes. they have a magnetic closure and an inner tray to help keep the cards from shifting around. you can see the insides here.

If you haven't had a chance to get the PL kit (crossing my fingers that the waitlist will be gone SOON!), the Cumberland Gap add-on is still available. i'm in love with the basic grey filmstrip alphas. and that grid washi is perfect fot adding a bit of journaling to any photo.

happy wednesday!! our day started with a 7:23 delivery of our new couch. and i didn't even realize that early of a delivery was a possibility. at least we weren't waiting around all day?? i am in love.. it fits the space so much better, and definitely reflects my current style for the house. i've had a lot of ?s on instagram about where we found it - here's a link. if you're in the midwest and looking for this style of couch, i can tell you that 5/5 truesdells thought this one was comfy. ;) now to patiently wait for my new coffee table to come on friday! 

project life 2013 // week 19

week 19 // may 4-10 : ben's birthday. free comic book day. teeball. a lot of pizza. a mother's day brunch, iron man 3 and a dead car battery.

can we talk about how long i've been waiting for the right project for those darling dear calendar pockets to appear? they're perfect to hold a little birthday journaling.

i love the impact of the enlarged photo - it's a good way to illustrate that this is a very important week. hello, 10.

lots of stars and arrows this week. they continue to be my go to shapes. and one nice big flower, courtesy of the name tag sam made for the mother's day brunch.

i used lots of punches this week - check out my challenge on the studio calico blog. =) i'd love to have you play along!

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happy monday! it's the last monday of the school year here..  i'm off to make it count.

project life 2013 // weeks 8 & 15

we're hitting the time of year where i get more and more behind. and where i try my best not to panic about it. between baseball and end of school activities, i find myself with lots to document and little time to actually sit down and do it. i did manage to put together two weeks with the studio calico planetarium kit - and i've got two more in progress on my desk. here's to taking a deep breath and moving forward - and trying not to worry about all those missing weeks!

week 8 // feb 16-22 : ah... gotta love any week that includes swinging in hoodies AND a two snow days. ;)

the dino insert is in a 6x12in page protector that was cut down a bit. this may be my fave insert yet. =) i added a couple of printables to accent the top.

week 15 // april 6-12 : i had a lot of photos and a lot of journaling this week. i typically tuck a tag behind my photos when that happens, but there were so many cute journaling cards i wanted to use! i decided to use my circle punch on a couple of photos to create a notch that i could place the cards behind. love the effect. alex thought i was crazy when i asked for his broken guitar string, but i think it's my favorite part of the whole spread!

these spreads are mostly items from the studio calico planetarium kits + add-ons, with a few other products : 

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happy tuesday!

#NSDatSC

NSD may technically be over.... but we have a whooooooooole line up of challenges over on the Studio Calico blog that are open through next monday. You can find all of the details in this post - there's a $100 GC as the grand prize, so it's definitely worth trying a challenge or three! I took on two of the challenges - it was the perfect way to use up a bit more of my Planetarium kits and play with the new Atlantic collection.

PL team challenge #2 : put it in a pocket | this team

I think we've all been in a position of wanting to record certain thoughts on a page without them beind front and center. For this page, I wanted to jot down some thoughts about how much we love our current ball team, but part of that reflection included some past struggles with teams. Hiding the journaling lets me focus on this amazing team of boys and their coaches.

I had a little extra room at the bottom of my glassine bag and was going to just trim it down and stitch it shut when I decided it would make an awesome place for some confetti.

Scrapbook team challenge #2 : break out the buttons | PL 2013 wk 16

Once upon a time, I couldn't finish ANY project without buttons. Time went on, and decorative brads, enamel dots and sequins came into my life, and my poor button stash has spent a lot of time on a shelf in a jar (where it looks super cute, so at least it has that going for it!). As I worked on this PL spread, I realized that buttons fit right in with my beloved enamel dots, and I really like the two of them mixed together! They're also not too bulky in the pocket pages. Maybe I'd better move that button jar a little closer to my desk...

This is half of my week 16... I'm working on finishing it up this week. =)

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happy monday! my week is off to a rocky start - sam and i went out to leave for school and realized the car battery was d-e-a-d. sam's enjoying the unexpected day off. i'm trying to not be too frazzled by it. ;)

project life 2013 : week 6

 

i am slowly creeping towards caught up. i started a list in teuxdeux JUST to keep tabs on where i am and am finding it makes it less overwhelming to be able to see what's done and what needs to be done on my missing weeks. 

week 6 // february 2-8 : sick ben. sick mom. a lot of movies. a little legos. breakfast at jimmy's egg and baseball.

i was going for quick and done with this week. there's not much embellishing and a lot of label stickers. =)

i used a small heart stamp over the amy tangerine date stamp to mark off the week. and then stamped out the week's dates on the "currents" card because i thought i hadn't done it anywhere else. oops.

i love hat heart from sam. he made me two - one is pictured, and a different one is included.

oh, alex. he did this again yesterday. what is it with the coat aversion?

i used a lot of cards from past studio calico PL kits - but here are some of the other bits & pieces : 

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happy tuesday! the sun is shining and i'm craving chinese food. yes, at 10am. i blame bridgette's instagram from last night. how's that for a random sign off for today? ;)

project life 2013 : week 14

ah yes,  the end of march. when we went outside without coats and it wasn't snowing like it is now. i want spring to come back!!

week 14 // march 30 - april 5 : easter. sunshine & swinging. baseball. a movie. 

hangers in pillows and soap tied to the faucet. good times on april 1st. =)

i may be a SMIDGE bit obsessed with the discovery that i can use my typewriter directly on photos. love the look.

that photo of sam looking down at me at the playground is a definite favorite. and i love any year we can easter egg hunt outside.

i loved this printable from tina - graphic and simple and perfect.

a lot of what i used this week came from the spencer's kits + add-ons - but here are some of the other bits & pieces : 

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happy thursday! i've decided today is going to be a puttering at my desk sort of day...  i don't know of a better way to deal with this weather!

getting the upper hand on my photostream

the awesome thing about apple's photostream + icloud is that every single photo i take with my iphone automagically appears on my computer.

and the absolutely overwhelming thing about apple's photostream + icloud is that EVERY.SINGLE.PHOTO. i take with my iphone appears on my computer.

i love that i can capture moments on the go, and i love that they beam to my laptop, where i can add them to lightroom and print them for projects with very little fuss. but for every photo that i'm so glad to have there are many more that were accidental photos of the inside of my pocket or the floor. there are the blurry messes. there are the screenshots of this or that grabbed to text to someone. and while i'm good about deleting those off my phone, those photos also beam to the laptop, where they sit. in a big folder with thousands of other photos from my phone. it's a bit of a hot mess, really.

when i download photos from my camera, i import them via lightroom, and they all go into folders by month. i debated moving my phone pics into those folders, but decided that i really do want to keep them separate. i don't put all of my phone pics into lightroom - just the ones i want to print - and i have found that one of the longest parts of my printing for PL process was finding the right week's photos so i could choose which ones i wanted to use. 

yesterday, i sat down and started sorting my photostream out into weekly folders. my goal is to filter through them as they are added to the photostream, and determine what should go into the weekly folder and what needs to be deleted. this also gives me a good way to do a photo check during the week and see if i need to be more snap happy (or more likely, determine which of the bigs has been hiding from my camera ;)). 

when i sit down to print, i can open up the weekly folder and import anything i want to use to lightroom. my photos are sorted in lightroom by date, so they'll mix in with photos from my camera and i'll have an easy overview of what i want to print for the week. and i'm *really* hoping this will streamline that part of the process for me, because let's be honest - it's way less fun than the playing with paper part. will it work? i'll keep you updated. =)

 

 

project life 2013 : week 13

14 weeks into the year, and i'm 6 weeks behind. i'm creeping towards caught up. i've jumped to current, and will be working backwards as time permits. week 6 is printed, and i'm hoping to knock that one out today.

week 13 // march 23-29 : alex's birthday week. i opted to continue with last year's plan of the bday kid getting a full page feature. 

BIG birthday photo, a bit of wrapping paper, some packaging and a couple of stories.

he looks too old. sigh.

sam with his house / robot / submarine reminded me of a fave kids book - not a box - so i had to use that as a title on that card.

this seemed like a good excuse to use this stamp. ;)

a lot of what i used this week came from the spencer's kits + add-ons - but here are some of the other bits & pieces : 

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happy tuesday! i'm off to finish up week 6 and then decide what week i want to print to use with the studio calico may PL kit. ;)

project life : 2013 wk 9 & 10, 2012 wk 26.5

at week 9, i was 5 weeks behind and at the end of week 13 i'm 7 weeks behind. so..  progress? i've got a crazy weekend ahead but i'm thinking next week needs to include a couple weeks of PLing.

week 9 // feb 23-mar 1 : i *may* have gone overboard with the clock stamp on this page. and to be honest, i had to stop myself after using it 3x!! it's a fun one to use on "routine" type photos to mark the time.

i wanted to come up with a way to use the FP envelope so that it could be opened without pulling it out of the album. I ended up cutting it down to be 4x4 and stitching the bottom shut. i layered my 4x4 photo over it, then i slid it into the pocket. i attached the "rad" badge to the outside and left the envelope flap out of the pocket - the cord winds around the badge to keep it closed. inside there's a journaling card w/ the story of how sam is reading *everything* these days.

week 10 // march 2-8 : i tried to stick with most the spencer's PL kit + the latte PL addon + the today noted stamp set here, but a bit of paper from the main and some of the rainbow washi from front porch blend found their way in - i am weak when it comes to patterned paper and pretty colors! the today noted stamp set has a lot of phrases and shapes that can be mixed together - i love the fun label-y shape + little words (see the "right here" stamped on the photo. i also love the "in one word" with the arrows - it's a great way to sum something up!

i am definitely seeing a change in how my weeks look since i started using the pictapgo app to edit and preserving the rectangle instead of cropping into the instagram square. as a bonus, both printing and putting this week together went WAY faster, and i'm digging how it all looks! i also am making more of an effort to set aside fun bits of packaging and the like - this week i had the eat envelope, the TJs pb&j bar package and a fun target gift card (i just asked for it back after they spent the $$ on it!).

week 26.5 (2012) // june 29-july 2 : 

i have a ZILLION photos from our trip to lake edward, and the trip happened to span the break in vol 1 and vol 2 of my 2012 PL albums. as i was looking at weeks 26 and 27 and wondering HOW i was going to get it all in - i realized i could do my favorite photos as the end of vol 1 and the beginning of vol 2, and then include less in each week while still covering the trip. as a bonus, this gives me an easy way to fill in the last / first pages of those albums!

i photographed these together, but they will live in separate albums. the big photo will finish off vol 1, and the one with a mix of photos will start vol 2.

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happy friday! the sun is shining and we have a high of 60 - spring is finally here! =)

 

project life 2012 // week 47 - november 17-23

week 47 // november 17-23 : this week covered our thanksgiving trip to chicago - and while we didn't leave till tuesday (my weeks run sat-fri), i opted to dedicated most of the spread to the trip. only two pockets cover everyday events of the week, and i'm okay with that. i have done (and will do more) some layouts about this trip, but i really love seeing all the photos together - it gives a great condensed overview of what we did.

working on this week was a good reminder to use more big photos. this week was a pretty good mix of iphone and real camera shots, but most of the iphone snaps were edited in the vsco cam app rather than cropped down to an instagram square. i'm loving the effect of this size filling a 4x3 pocket, or two together in a 4x6.

this amy tan wood tag from the studio calico neverland PL kit was what pushed me to finish this week - it was the perfect accent for our trip.

if you look reeeeeeeeeally lose at the photo of the boys looking down at the chicago river, you can see "love this" between them. that's one of brushes from the upcoming this is me class w/ lexi bridges at studio calico. i LOVE these typewritten phrases, and will definitely be using them a ton.

this love this day card is a printable from the same class - i did a little misting over it with the mask and mini huey from the neverland kit. 

i recorded a vine video on how it went together, but the upload failed. thankfully it saved to my phone and i was able to upload it to youtube. here's how this card went together : 

 

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happy tuesday!! i am currently in the process of trying to rescue my scraproom from the realities of last year..  i made too many pages and didn't do enough keeping things in order. i'm very much in the "making things worse" phase of the operation and hoping i hit the part where i can SEE improvement soon. i'll share some pics when it starts looking less hoarders-ish. ;)