Committment: Scrapping in the moment

Generally, my scrapbooks tend to be of specific events - birthdays, vacations, or holidays - but one of the changes I want to make is to spend more time documenting the every day things that happen.  I want to document who we are and what is going on in our lives around these moments in time.  To do this, I must follow through with two things.  First, I must be committed to doing this and staying on top of it so I don't lose any important details that I may want to remember.  Second, I have to bring my camera!  The second is by and large the biggest reason I don't have pages devoted to the normal things in life. 

One creative idea I wish to embark upon in 2011 is to do pages that make me stop during the year and focus on the "right now".  Hopefully I will remeber to do this, but as of right now the plan is to devote a page to each family member in the beginning, middle, and end of the year to focus on what our thoughts are at that time.  I have yet to come up with a template of questions as this idea is still sprouting but I'm getting excited about it.  On that note, I thought it was high time that I put at least some of this idea into practice!  So, since our pup just turned one year, I thought I would take the time to devote a page to him and what he is like RIGHT NOW.  :)

Page elements are from Jessica Sprague kit "You & Me".

Final Collage Work

Well, I *think* it is finished...that's kinda the thing that's both good and bad about working digitally.  You can forever change things!  I've been spending a lot of time trying to get the background colors just right. I wanted a pinky-peachy blend of colors.  I think this is what I like, but time will only tell.  Well, here it is to enjoy.  Overall, it was a great exercise and I think I'll keep trying it out.

Fun with Fonts!

This week I've really been having fun finding new fonts to use in my pages.  Some of the websites that I have loved visiting are http://www.urbanfonts.com/ and dafont.com.  They have so many fonts that you could spend a long time there and be SO tempted to download them all so I guess it's good that I'm just looking for a specific page.   Here's my latest page, with a new font!

All the materials are from Jessica Sprague's class 'Now we're Rockin'' for digital scrapbooking.  In that class I learned how to make the great sticker appearance that you see on the letters in "training" here.

More time to scrapbook!

Well, with the house clean and many other to-do's completed, I've had a bunch of time to scrapbook today!  Well, guess it's not all due to my hard work...it's mostly due to the pup waking us up at 4:20!  I was able to do several household tasks and create an entire scrapbook page before breakfast.  Well, time well spent I guess.  I'm excited about today's pages - using a theme of "birthday" and "this makes me happy."  So fun to have a theme to scrapbook to.  I've never really done that before.  Generally, I just take pictures of events and scrapbook those specific events, but there really is so much more that can be done.  Sometimes a theme makes you look a little differently at your pictures.

 Well, "birthday" is not a hard theme but it was great timing since I had yet to scrap pictures from Matt's birthday this year.  I learned how to make this circle with cutouts for photos too!  I tried to do this with another shape but PSE was not cooperating with me!  I know it will work later, so hopefully I can post another layout using something a little different another time.  I didn't have any really great pictures from the event so a collage like this was somewhat helpful since you don't need to show a lot of background.

The other theme of "this makes me happy" was a perfect way for me to scrap about my favorite time of year - fall!  (Early fall to be specific - where the sun still shines and warms you)  Anyhow, this was great inspiration for a random Sunday afternoon walk we took around town on a nice day. (Elements from 'When Autumn Comes' by Fannette Design, Papers from 'Autumn' by Galiscrap)
I'm having so much fun!

Today Challenge

I was challenged to make a simple layout in under 30 minutes under the heading "today."  Well, it took only about 25 minutes and that even included time to stop the pup in the picture from chewing a blanket, chewing a rug, and licking the floor in real life!  I'll call this a success! (Papers and Elements from "Sunporch" by Amy Teets)

Back to Scrapping!

I've been consumed lately by my collage work and while I'm still working on my final piece for the class, I decided that I needed to do some good ole' digital scrapbooking!  Via a tutorial on jessicasprague.com, I put together the following page using materials provided there.  After all that collage, I felt I needed someone to guide me into getting it done.  So happy I did!  I've been waiting to make a page from this evening in September.

Another collage

Today I finished another collage for the class I am taking and I think it turned out pretty well.  I had a lot of fun making this background a few weeks back.  I basically started with a blue - a robins egg blue to be specific.  I bet you wouldn't think that now.  I blended that background with a photo of my linen curtains...ah, I thought that looked pretty neat.  Then I added some brushes by Anna Aspnes and ta da!  Here is my background.

The next weeks assignment was to make it into a mini collage so I added a few pictures and wording and here it is!

I call it "Live in the Moment."  The idea behind it was to put a young girl imaging what she would be like as a young woman and an older woman reminissing about what it would be like to be young again with a reminder to that beautiful, young woman to "live in the moment."

Collage Fun

I'm currently taking a digital collage class at reneepearson.com and it is great fun.  Needless to say I've been working with blending modes and filter effects.  It is simply amazing as to how carried away you can get and how very different the end result can be even when you start with the same items.

This class has taught me many new tricks and has challenged my creativity.  For example, in Photoshop you can change the color of the shadow you apply to your objects.  Generally, I simply apply the desired effect but haven't spent much time thinking about changing the color of it!

I'm posting my first mini collage that I just completed for the class.  The papers and butterfly are curtesy of the Anna Aspnes kit we received with the class.  You'll see I even changed the shadow of the little girl in the bottom corner to purple!  Overall, not bad for my first attempt at collage.  I call it, "Dream in Color."

Using a Clipping Mask.

So, not really a "trick" but just a more simple way of getting something done.  I'd previously learned how to take a shape and change it to a new pattern via this long process involving the magic wand tool and a series of steps and layers, and are you still with me?  Yes, neither was I.  I've always had to open that book back up. 
But today, today I learned of "Ctrl-G" and I'm never going back.  It's so simple!  And so fun!
The basic instructions are:
1. Draw shape on open file.
2. Create new layer to put the color via Paint bucket or to Place the patterned paper you want the image to be filled with.
3. Use Ctrl-G, and ta-da!

Now how simple and very fun is that!  Then it hit me - I can use that to cut my photos into shapes which is how I finally learned to use a photo mask in PSE.  Now I'm not just limited to the crop shapes menu (although the one above is on that menu).  Here's a very fast example of some shapes and a picture that is masked.  This may be simple to those more experienced but wow, did this just open some doors for me.

My very first post!

Growing up, I always enjoyed doing creative and crafty things!  Although it's never been more than a hobby, I have always needed a creative outlet.  As an adult, I've mostly been into scrapbooking and this is truly my first love.  I LOVE documenting through pictures, words, and images.  Althought I truly enjoy paper crafts, I've recently began scrapbooking digitally and it is so awesome.  The creative potential is unlimited!  But I'll try my hand at most anything. 

In order to keep track of my projects and get feedback on them, I've decided to start up this blog and use it to do just that.  My hope is to connect with other crafty people and to try out some new things!  And maybe even inspire someone else to get crafty.

And FYI...this is my first blog and I've tried to make it look pretty but I have to admit this is all new to me so I'm sure it will continue to change in appearance as I learn more. ;)