according.to.kim

November 12 of 12

November 12 was not what I expected. Instead of being at work all day, I was home with the flu, and as a result I got a whole different set of photos -- which was nice, I must say!

Yesterday & Today layouts

I'm not posting highlights tonight because I wasn't at work today and I would much rather write them during my lunch hour at work. I didn't go to work today (or Friday) because I have a crappy cold and cough (and lethargy to boot), but I think I'll be well enough to go back to work tomorrow. In the meantime, I thought I'd share some layouts from the class I'm taking right now: Yesterday & Today by Ali Edwards.

The first two are the digital versions of my layouts -- which are basically the same as the paper and ribbon versions I created later (I like playing with digital, but I much prefer the finished product of traditional and hybrid layouts). The third is a scan of the original paper layout. For that one, I simply copied the things for which I'm thankful that I listed on my blog in January this year. I'd like to do more 6x12 pages like this.

Intro layout (12x12)

Childhood memories layout (12x12 two-page spread)

No-photo layout (6x12)

Layouts and concepts provided by Ali Edwards' Yesterday & Today workshop at BigPictureScrapbooking.com.

October 12 of 12

Here are my photos from October 12, the day I traveled to Las Vegas. What a great coincidence for me! While I was en route, Neil and the girls were having Thanksgiving dinner in Avonlea (second row, second photo). I ate supper at a place called Beijing Noodle No. 9, inside Caesars Palace. The last one is a self-portrait in my room, just for fun. Otherwise, I think the photos speak for themselves!

September 12 of 12

I made sure to get my September page done before October 12, and I just finished it last evening. Deadlines are good! September 12 was a nice day for photos. To sum it up, I tidied up the back yard in the morning, and in the afternoon we visited the McKell Wascana Conservation Park and then Dutch Growers, a greenhouse in our neighbourhood.

I'm taking photos for 12-of-12 again today. I mistakenly tweeted that this is the second month in a row that I won't see my kids all day on the 12th. Just realized that it was August, not September! For today, I have asked Neil to snap some pictures of the girls when he goes to Avonlea to get them (and have dinner with them). Otherwise, I should be set for a good day of photos. Heading to Las Vegas this afternoon!

August 12 of 12

August 12 was a tough day for this project! I had to go to work AND the girls were in Avonlea the entire day. Despite these challenges, I managed to find enough things to photograph and my grid turned out alright. The first few shots are all about going to work and then going for lunch with my coworkers to Saigon by Night; I was really glad this was the day of our lunch date. After work, I did some weeding in the front yard and spent some time taking photos in the back yard. Thank goodness for the garden! Later, I labeled school supplies and we watched Hell's Kitchen. These represent August pretty well, as does the photo of Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, the book I was enjoying at the time.

Looking forward to September 12--a Saturday with my family!

July 12 of 12

I started last Sunday with some yard work (weeding and cutting rhubarb) and ended with some scrapbooking (photo album scrapbook of our 2008 summer vacation). A nice balance. In between, I helped Madeline make cards for the two birthday parties she attended that day, and helped Sophia get some photos for a scrapbook she started working on. Georgia was happy (as usual), our red poppies were blooming nicely, and Neil prepared a great steak dinner that we enjoyed on the patio. I also capped off the day with a Mojito -- so pretty with a sprig of mint from the pot on our backstep.

Fabulous free tutorial

After posting my June 12-of-12 photo grid, a comment from Maureen had me thinking perhaps I ought to write some instructions for creating a photo grid. Hence, I was absolutely delighted to see a fantastic video tutorial by Cathy Zielske on creating multi-photo grids, posted just yesterday on Ali Edwards' website! Not only that, CZ provides a downloadable PDF of step-by-step instructions as well as some free graphics for monthly snapshot pages on her own website. Awesome! Check it out if you're interested in creating photo grids now or in the future. I adore them, as you know. Can't wait to whip up my 12-of-12 grid for July!

P.S. There is another method of creating a 12-photo grid using a png template, also by CZ (which is what I've been using), but the method explained in the tutorial video (and pdf) is more versatile than using the template, so I'll leave it at that.

June 12 of 12

A quick look at my June 12 of 12 photo grid -- the influenza edition of my 12 of 12 pages. The girls had had the flu that week and I was desperately trying to avoid catching it, or at least minimize symptoms if I did get it (see the second last photo), plus H1N1 was in the news having been declared a global pandemic the day before. Nevertheless, June 12 was a lovely day. The sun was shining, everyone was feeling well, and we were all at home all day (I had the day off work and there was no school; we would've kept our kids home anyway). The girls enjoyed having their cousin here, too; they hadn't seen her for a whole week as she had been at home with the flu as well. The four of them played outside all day.

I know I've said this before, but I can't help saying it again: I love doing these pages! I enjoy the process and I love having a slice of life recorded each month.

May 12 of 12

A quick peek into my life last Tuesday, which included going to work, dance class, and soccer. For the curious, the third photo shows Mosaic posters hanging in the Cornwall Centre. Also, I love that light green Sweet Potato Vine in my planter!

April 12 of 12

Glimpses of our Easter Sunday, set up for my April 12 of 12 scrapbook page. I love doing these. So simple.

This evening is strangely quiet. We had no Brownies, Sparks, or dance class due to the Easter break. Sophia and Georgia (and Sherlock) are in Avonlea, and poor Madeline is sick with a fever and cough. She fell asleep on the couch 30 or 40 minutes ago while I was working on these photos.

I'm awfully tired too. Madeline tossed and turned and coughed much of the night, so Neil and I didn't really get to sleep until after 3:30 a.m. (Neil even went to Shopper's at 1:30 a.m. to get cough medicine). I stayed home from work this morning so I could sleep more, but it still wasn't enough. I may actually turn in early tonight... Since I won't be reading bedtime stories in the girls' bed, I won't be having my usual evening nap either.

March 12 of 12

My twelve photos from March 12. It's a good thing Neil and the girls took some photos while I was at work because I would've had a hard time coming up with twelve on my own. Work days can be a bit boring. And this day in particular was not a great day for me. I was in a bad mood for various reasons, but I'm glad the photos don't reflect that. I look forward to the 12th being on a weekend next month!

February 12 of 12

These are my twelve photos from February 12. I really enjoy putting these photo grids together in Photoshop Elements. I use a template created by Cathy Z, available here: 12/12.

This weekend, I realized that another 12th will be here shortly (how'd that happen?!), so I decided I'd better get busy and make my pages from January and February -- and then I went ahead and did that even though it was not on my huge to-do list for the weekend. Oh well; I think it's good to squeeze these things in once in awhile!

I went super simple and created another template for the words. I thought about playing around with letter stickers or stamps for the date/title, but decided against it; I need this process to be fast! Plus, I chose not to go deep or reflective with the text, so it's just a straight-forward list of what the pictures are about. Now that I've done this, future pages will be very quick and easy. Here's the end result:

Related: The 12 of 12 blog and my photos from January 12.

Final batch of hearts

This heart was created unintentionally; Sophia had squeezed mustard on some sliced sausage and then discovered that some had landed in a heart shape.

I decided I may as well make heart-shaped pancakes -- a week after Valentine's. The girls loved 'em!

Either Madeline or Georgia found this heart shape in the stitching on Georgia's top. I could have found many more items of clothing in the girls' closets with hearts on them, but I like this one in particular because it's much less obvious and the little ones found it for me.

I was excited to spot this heart on a billboard on my way home from dance class Tuesday evening! I pulled out my purse camera to get this snapshot.

This little heart was right in front of us every evening when we opened Inkheart, but no one noticed it until this past week. Sophia spotted this one.

I was looking for a final photo to make the collection an even number (24) as I'd like to print a grid of heart photos sometime. I did find a few more hearts around my house, but nothing could be more appropriate at this moment than these hearts on the Photo Freedom/Library of Memories poster hanging in my scrapbooking space! I'm working on week three (of 16) in LOM 2009 (my second time) and I'm so happy to continue working on this system.

It was fun to find, snap, and post hearts for "I (heart) me" month in A Life Well Crafted. It was especially fun to have my kids involved! I look forward to finding out what this class will bring us in March.

See also: On the lookout for hearts, Surrounded by hearts, and More heart discoveries.

More heart discoveries

Welcome to the third installment of heart pictures...

This muffin baking dish hangs above our stove. We received it as a wedding gift, which reminds me, our 10th anniversary is this year! We'll be attending Mosaic that day (which is fine!).

This t-shirt is one of Sophia's favourites and she wears it often.

These are the invitations we made for Madeline and Sophia's birthday parties in January. We didn't intend to have hearts on the invitations, but the colouring pictures we found on the internet just happened to have hearts on them!

These heart magnets are for the kids' responsibility charts (which we should start using more consistently!).

All of these wonderful concentric hearts were painted by Madeline in kindergarten. They were the first ten paintings she brought home from school in the fall!

Here's a beautiful heart formed by Madeline and Sophia. Hey, I just noticed a heart shape in Georgia's legs and feet, too!

See also: On the lookout for hearts and Surrounded by hearts.

Surrounded by hearts

Apparently, it's pretty easy to find hearts in my surroundings, especially with my girls eager to help me look for them. This has been a fun exercise for us! Here are the next six hearts we found. And I know I'll have more to show you next week!

Not even five minutes after I finished posting heart pictures last week, Georgia picked up this book (Sophia's library book from school) and set it down beside me, upside down, revealing this cherry wood heart on the back cover.

These hearts represent the month of February on the 12-block Thimbleberries quilt I made. I suppose that means they're Valentine's hearts -- but who cares!

These hearts are on the tassel of Sophia's bookmark, made at her birthday party last month.

Sophia found this heart in her kiwi last evening!

Madeline spotted this heart formed by hangers this morning.

And Georgia asked for a heart-shaped sandwich at lunch today.

P.S. Happy Valentine's Day!

On the lookout for hearts

It's "I (heart) Me" month in my BPS class, A Life Well Crafted. One of the projects is to look for hearts (non-Valentine hearts) in our surroundings and take pictures for a mini album. I think the project is more for the full-version students than the audio-only students (like me), but I thought I'd play along in my own way by simply posting pictures to my blog. Here's what I've found so far:

This heart is hanging on one of my walls at work. It's from Georgia's heart checkup in January. When Georgia had her ECG done, she thought she was going to be able to see her heart (and of course she couldn't), so the nurse quickly cut a heart shape from the ECG printout that she wasn't going to keep for Georgia's file (because she had captured a better one). I love it, and I will either use it on a scrapbook page or put it in Georgia's treasure box someday.

This picture is hanging in my office as well. It's a "love bug" that Sophia drew for me last year.

This frame is sitting on my desk at work. Madeline gave it to me for Christmas in 2007. (The shell is from my coworker who brought it back from New Zealand.)

This heart hangs on a wall near my home computer. It was hand-painted by a friend of mine and I received it by winning a draw through her blog last fall.

Sophia and Madeline created this heart for me (for this project) at bedtime last night.

This is Georgia's beautiful quilt with a heart applique made by her paternal grandmother. I enjoyed taking pictures of Georgia with her quilt this afternoon.

I hope I'll be able to find (and post) more hearts this month. I could always make something up, like heart-shaped pancakes, but I'd love to find something natural like a rock (or potato chip!) in the shape of a heart.

Scrapbooking day

This is my grid of 12 photos from January 12. It depicts a pretty typical Monday for me/us -- work and the girls' dance class in the evening. The only exception was Sophia getting her birthday party invitations ready to distribute.

In a couple hours, I'm going to a friend's house for a day of scrapbooking. I thought I'd post now since I may not get home before midnight. I still have quite a bit of work to do to gather my projects and supplies, as well as food to share, so I'd better get moving! My goal today is to finish or at least get further ahead on projects I have already started, so even though I'm behind on a lot of regular household stuff, it will be great to get these things done too.

***
Today I'm thankful for:

• my hobby
• Photoshop Elements
• Neil's willingness to do laundry

Design Your Life, Weeks 10-12

Here's what I made during the last few weeks of DYL (layouts and concepts provided by Cathy Zielske's Design Your Life workshop at BigPictureScrapbooking.com). In week 12, instead of making two layouts using favourite designs from the class, I went back and did two layouts I hadn't done from weeks 5 and 10. Altogether I completed 25 layouts (single and multi-page) in this class and I've very pleased with that!

Related posts: Design Your Life, Weeks 1-3
Design Your Life, Weeks 4-6
Design Your Life, Weeks 7-9

M's first scrapbook pages

Madeline and Sophia made the first page about Sherlock the same evening M received her scrapbook kit, and Madeline made the other three pages on her own over the past week. She loves seeing baby photos of herself, so that was a natural second choice for her. The other two pages are about Will and Zoe, dogs that belonged to my aunt and uncle in Victoria and their neighbour, respectively. The girls adored these two dogs when we stayed there for five days in the summer. Will passed away in October. (I only had the photo of Zoe because the girls had used our little camera to take a few photos which hadn't been uploaded to the ill-fated laptop hard drive. My aunt provided the lovely photo of Will.)

Looking forward to 2009

I don't recall ever being so eager to start a new year. Over the past month or so I've been thinking a lot about some things I want to accomplish in 2009. I've been making some plans for next year and I can't wait to get started! Most of my plans revolve around reducing clutter and chaos, getting organized, and maintaining a positive outlook on life. I look forward to:

• Taking A Life Well Crafted - Audio only (Jan 1-Dec 31) and learning all the good stuff this class has to offer. I'm sure I'd enjoy the craft projects in the full version, but I want to focus on some other things this year. The audio-only version will be great because I can listen on my iPod when I'm away from home and it won't be too time consuming for me.
• Taking Organizing 101 (Jan 13-Mar 3) and working on purging and organizing some seriously overcrowded and and disorganized spots in my home throughout 2009 and beyond. This will be a major focus for me. I NEED to reduce the amount of stuff in this house! I think taking this online class will help me stay motivated and provide some great ideas.
• Taking A Library of Memories (Feb 12 -Jun 3) for the second time (for free!) (which means I've already done a lot of the initial learning and set up) and continuing to manage and filter my digital and printed photos and memorabilia. This is such a great system. It has already helped me immensely and I'm nowhere near finished dealing with my backlog of photos, etc.
• Starting to learn hard shoe Irish dances beginning Jan 6. I was thinking I would start later than that, but I finally learned the Slip Jig "good enough" in December. My teacher is so eager to get me started on hard shoe, she made me agree to get hard shoes and start learning right away. I'm getting excited about it now. My classmates say hard shoe is FUN!
• Getting five weeks of vacation!!! I will mark fifteen years with my company in 2009 which means I get an extra week of vacation starting in January. I have been looking forward to this for a long time!

I have a couple of scrapbooking projects in mind for 2009 too. None of the online classes I listed above involve making scrapbook pages (except the last four weeks of LOM) -- which is great because there are a lot of other things I want to get done in 2009, but... I still love scrapbooking and I don't want to put it on hold completely.

I like doing things that have an element of routine or commitment to them. It helps me stick with it and I find it very satisfying to complete projects like these (e.g., my photo-a-day project in 2007, September 2008 daily album, any online class I have paid for). So here's what I have in mind for 2009 (either one or both; haven't decided yet!):

• Gratitude journal. This is a project that involves making one scrapbook page a week (or bi-weekly or monthly) featuring one photo and a little journaling about something I'm thankful for. I would use the same layout each time, so there would be no thinking involved in the layout itself. I got this idea from Cathy Zielske's Design Your Life workshop at BPS.
• Twelve of twelve. This is a project that involves taking 12 photos on the 12th day of each month and making one scrapbook layout using those photos and some journaling. This sounds like a good way to capture one year of "everyday life" in my family and I think it's pretty doable. I got this idea from Cathy Zielske and others. Again, I would use the same layout to reduce the thinking and time involved.

Okay, I guess that's enough thinking about 2009 -- for today anyway! We're hosting Christmas dinner tomorrow and I have lots of work to do!