Category Archives: inspiration

Jul27

Inspired by Alcohol

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Inspired by Alcohol

Many scrapbookers out there love to unwind at the end of the day with a glass of wine or a beer and their scrapbook supplies. I’ve been known to do that myself on occasion. Somehow that seems to make a relaxing hobby even more relaxing.

But that’s not what “Inspired by Alcohol” means.

Have you ever really looked closely at a bottle of alcohol? Have you ever noticed the design and said to yourself, “that will make a great page?” Maybe it’s just me.

My husband likes to have a drink after work every night, and he likes variety. Sometimes he’s drinking a gin and tonic, sometimes it’s his current favorite beer, sometimes it’s something else. As a result, theres always an interesting bottle in the house.

Take, for example, this bottle of Vesica vodka:

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It’s an odd shaped bottle, with its fused two cylinder shape, but what really appeals to me is the label design. If you can’t tell from the picture, it has a circular flowere-like pattern that’s very faint, behind the brand name. Above the brand name is another circular flower-like element that calls to mind both the shape of the bottle, and the background image.

Personally, I think it’s lovely, and definitely scrap-liftable.

What would you make based on this?

I’ve made a few layouts for my next scrapbooking book on how to master sketches based on this bottle. (More about that later!) My favorite has to be this one:

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So, the next time you have a drink, take a look at the bottle. Maybe you’ll find it scrap-worthy. I’ll be doing the same, and sharing the results. And maybe even joining my husband in a glass or two.

 

Mar10

Wait. It’s March?!

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Wait. It’s March?!

The best laid plans have a habit of falling through around here. I was so pumped for LOAD. The last LOAD led by Lain. A reason to scrapbook every day. I was going to get so much creating done.

Well. That was the plan. What actually happened?

Four paper pages done, one digital page done, and one more page begun, but not finished.

I didn’t even make it a week people!

I blame my job. It’s emotionally draining.

But you know what? That’s a terrible excuse. And we don’t make excuses around here.

Plain and simple, life got in the way, and I let scrapbooking slip into the backseat again. And that’s okay.

I’m not into guilt. I’m not going to make myself feel bad because I didn’t scrapbook as much as I wanted to during February. Life is to short to feel guilty about not making as much time as I would like for a hobby that I love.

And that’s the thing.

I LOVE scrapbooking. I love all the bits and pieces that it’s made of, from paper and tape runners, to glitter glue and photos, and most importantly stories I want to tell my family.

My youngest asked me the other day why I don’t tell stories like my husband does. The thing is, I do. But it’s on paper. I am terrible at telling a story verbally. But give me a piece of paper and a pen, and I’m off.

punch buggy red||noexcusescrapbooking.com

My favorite page from February

Bonus: Ten years from now, when my husband can’t remember the story he told so engagingly last night, I’ll have a record of at least part of it in my scrapbooks, where we can relive the moment, all over again.

 

Oct1

Making Time

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Making Time

This past month has been one huge adjustment after another. Getting up every day at 6 am to make sure the big kids make the bus in the morning. Prepping every day to make sure I have a full class’ worth of information for the classes I’m teaching. Constantly reading and planning for said classes.

Scrapbooking and writing seem to have fallen off the radar entirely. At least from the amount of updating that’s been going on here.

But that’s not entirely true.

I’ve made a few pages this month.

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I even got a little crazy, and turned the right hand page into a pocket.

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Project Life through the beginning of September is almost done. Today or tomorrow I’ll print up September’s photos, and add those in.

I took True Scrap Planner Love and hung out with my friend Colleen while we watched it. I still don’t get the point of decorating a planner, but I did add days of the week stickers to my school planner. Some people might call that progress.

And LOAD begins today. That makes me very happy. Today’s prompt asked, “How are you legendary?” and after a quick text message exchange with my sister, I’m going with bossy.

I LIKE being bossy. As soon as I can find a picture of my sister and me, that’s what today’s page will be about.

And then I’m going to wander the interwebs looking for pictures of castles in the mountains. I’m playing today. No school work, no house work, just research for a story idea. I’m dying to write. Maybe if I get a bunch of research done this month, I can participate in NanoWrimo in November. Then again, maybe I’m just insane to even think about it. On the third hand, nothing’s going to get written if I let school planning hang over every day like a cloud of gloom.

So, even though today has had a less than stellar start, it’s still a new start, and I’m going to run with it. Got any cool pictures of castles in the mountains for me?

Apr6

Retail Inspiration

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Retail Inspiration

My mother and I have been doing some mall walking while waiting for the weather to break. I haven’t been to the mall in a while, so was interested to find window displays that echo some of the trends we’re seeing in scrapbooking. Most notably the gold foil trend:

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This was too cute not to try to recreate myself. After digging out a couple of batches of Making Memories butterflies, and punches from Martha Stewart, EK Success, and Fiskars, the background came together fast.

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A few items of note: mirror cardstock works well as a substitute for gold foil. It’s so bright and shiny and happy, don’t you think? Also, I accidentally reverse punched a gold script love. Rather than tossing it, I paired it with a correctly punched love, and made a rorschach blot butterfly that way. At least that’s what I kept telling myself while punching a couple more in different colors.

It was hard covering up the background with photos, but I went ahead and did it anyway.

metamorphosis || noexcusescrapbooking.com

The journaling is on a pull out tag behind the large picture. After initially cutting out the title letters with my silhouette, I debated cutting them larger, but then decided to just use what I had already made. No over-thinking going on over here.

This was a clear case of the product (aka all the butterflies) influencing the topic of the page. These pictures are of my eldest, from the past three summers, and shows the subtleties of how he’s changed and remained the same as he’s grown. Sometime this summer, I’ll have to take a picture of the two of us back to back. He’s just barely taller than me now. He’ll probably be even taller by then.

Metamorphosis indeed.

If you want to make something like this, here are some supplies you could use: (affiliate links)

Mar30

A Huge Pile of PL Pages

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A Huge Pile of PL Pages

When preparing for a crop, I prefer to bring projects that don’t require a lot of thinking. I can NOT journal in company. Just having people around thinking is too loud for me.

For the crop two weekends ago, I brought Project Life pages with me to assemble, thinking that they would be easy to do while chatting. So not true.

Project Life was intended to make scrapbooking simple. It really doesn’t work that way for me. The simple arranging of photographs and choosing of journaling cards takes much longer than creating a page. Although, PL does allow me to cover more volume quickly than if I were to make a page for every story covered in my PL album.

But then again, I will probably use these photos again to tell variations on these stories, because I’m crazy like that. Who said you can’t repeat yourself? I apparently plan on doing that!

Heh.

Anyhoo… How about a few photos of PL pages for you? Or should I say, 20 zillion?
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Welcome to January. And lots of iPhone photos! (In fact all these photos are from the iPhone I got for Christmas. Very cool birthday and Christmas  present from my family.)

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You know how you plan on doing something, and then midway thru it, you forgot what you were doing? Yep, that’s what happened with the journaling labels on the star card. There was going to be a rainbow of labels, but I forgot I was doing that while writing. Literally decision made and forgotten within 10 seconds.

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I brought an old Studio Calico kit with me to the crop, just in case I wanted to switch gears and make a regular page. I found all sorts of things I could use on my PL pages. Including these stickers. Also, the love is a punch from mirror cardstock. My cheap, use what I have, version of gold foil for the day.

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Before I put myself on a spending freeze, I treated myself to the mini superheroes stamp set from Mama Elephant. I love their stamps!

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I have a little jar, filled with tiny flat or almost flat things to use on PL pages. I think it’s time to replenish the jar. I used a lot of bits and bobs.

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I am loving playing with the filters on Instagram. Also, we’ve made it to February!

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I tried a watercolor technique on a Heidi Swapp card, but it came out very subtle. Not a bad thing, but hard to see here. Also, a bit of stamping, and the ink wasn’t completely dry when I slid the card in the pocket, so there’s ink transfer to the pocket itself.

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I found the Creeper Valentine’s card on Rebecca Cooper’s blog. I love being able to use something from an awesome scrapper.

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Using up some more stickers and chipboard and overlays. And, the super cure kitty from the Mama Elephant stamp set.

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The month at a glance cards are from the old Turquoise PL set that I am still working on using up. Fit perfectly to point out when winter vacation was.

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A few shots of the paint I put on the walls at my sister’s house. and on my hands as well. The splats of distress ink on the Heidi Swapp card really seemed to emphasize the theme.

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A last day at my sister’s and then back home to try to get some work (at least planning) done.

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I don’t know about you, but I am very tired of the cold at this point. And getting sick didn’t make it any more fun.

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Shhh… Don’t tell my husband there’s a picture of him sleeping on the interwebs! Also, hello March!

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My mother and I have been walking more. Laps at the mall when it’s yucky outside, neighborhood walks when it’s nice out. You’ll be seeing that window display again.

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Big fluffy snowflakes at the beginning of March and my son dressing up for school. He actually was looking forward to school that day. I wish that was the case all the time.

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How about some funky food holidays? Pumpkin pie for Pi day, and very green deviled eggs for St. Patricks. Maybe I should do something funky for Easter and Passover too. (The only traditions we carryover from my Jewish Grandfather, Jewish food on Jewish holidays. Which means latkes and matzos and occasionally matzo ball soup.)

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Which brings us to the middle of March, when I went to the crop. The bottom card has space for a photo, and then I’ll finish out the month on the next few pages.

One of the big reasons Project Life takes me a bit longer to do than average, is because I do not consistently take horizontal or vertical photos. I’ve been taking photos for a loooong time. I’m used to turning the camera to suit the composition and topic of the photo. I don’t think I could stick to one orientation to save my life.

How about you? How do you usually take photos?