Scrapping Small - Ring Bound Mini Pages

So... we are just going to pretend like it hasn't been a year since I've updated.  Life happens.  Moving on! 

I'm so happy to be making things again.  It's hard to imaging going so long without it, but things just worked out that way.  I was living with my parents while we built a little house for me and McGee and there just wasn't enough room.  But we are living in that house now and my crafting space is all set up and things are back in order.

Felicity Jane kits mix and match so well on this new project.

I've been trying something different and just for fun.  I love looking at all the travelers notebook documenting that people are doing right now and I've tried it myself a few times but it never seems to work for me.  This last time it went a bit better but my pages were too three dimensional.  So inspired by some of the projects I've seen on instagram, I chopped my TN up and added rings.  So the size is still that of a TN but I'm not limited on the thickness of my pages.

I'm loving it!  

Here are a few of my first few pages featuring my nieces on Easter.

Glad to be back!

Shellie

Shellie - A Christmas Story

I think that I've come up with a new plan for documenting my holidays and I'm really excited about it.  I've been toying with the idea for a few days now and tonight I added it to my "project list".  When I wrote down Christmas Memories on the list next to it I wrote what I planned to include - memories of the past, present and future and I had a moment...  Scrooge! I yelled and startled my poor dog. 

I find that when it comes to projects I truly want to participate in (Project Life, December Daily) I really have a hard time because I just don't have the content to fill them up.  Being single and childless, I don't have day after day of "moments" to capture so I start out strong and end up discouraged soon thereafter.

But I love the Christmas holidays and I definitely want a way to document them.  Lately I've also had a strong desire to scrapbook about my past - childhood memories and family members.  So I wanted a way to incorporate those into my Christmas project as well so I've decided to create an ongoing, all encompassing Christmas Memories album. 

It will be in 6x8 pocket style format and it will be an ongoing project that I add to year after year.  I plan to include memories from this year, the pages I created last year and I plan to dig out my mother's photo boxes and include some pages and stories from my childhood.  I'm going to call it - wait for it - A Christmas Story because... well duh.  Scrooge!   Past, present and future!

...

Fast forward several weeks.  It's January and Christmas is done along with it's crafting.  It's both a sad and happy thing for me because it's my favorite holiday by far.

Over the holidays (I had 11 blessed days off of work in a row) I spent a day setting up my Christmas Story album and working on this year's pages.  I also added in the few days I made last year for my first attempt at December Daily. 

For this year's pages I used a collection I bought in September(ish) and have been hoarding ever since, anxiously awaiting the day I got to use it.  You know how every now and then someone will release a collection that you just love so much it's hard to actually use it because then it will be GONE and what if you want to use it later?

The Christmas on Market Street designed by Jen Allyson for My Mind's Eye just did it for me.  So I used it over enthusiastically on my pages for this year.

I ended up with 6 spreads total and they are just enough to commemorate my family's celebration without me trying to make up enough "memories" to fill up 25 days of... stuff.  My decision to not do December Daily was such a big relief.  I love, love to see everyone's albums.  They are always so beautiful and I want one.  But I just don't have enough going on to fill one up.  It just ends up being a bunch of meaningless fluff.  This new direction I've taken allows me to have my fun without turning it into a big lie just for the sake of making an album that doesn't fit in with my life right now.

I made a few dividers (tabs are my favorite thing right now) and added in the few days worth of pages I made last year.  I also went through Mom's "Shellie" box of photos and pulled out the Christmas ones so when I feel moved by the Christmas spirit, they will be ready for me to think on and create around. 

I'm super glad I've decided to go this route and look forward to adding memories - new and old - as time progresses.

Even though it's late, I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and that 2016 will be your best year ever.  Here are RED we hope to do whatever we can to make it positive for you and for us.

See you real soon...

Shellie

Shellie: Disney Travel Journal

Disney Vacation Travel Journal - "as it happens" but not really.  :)

In July, Gina and I went to Walt Disney World in Orlando to celebrate my 39th birthday.  It was hotter than the blazing fires of hell, but we still had an amazing time.  I lived in Orlando for more than 12 years and even worked there for several of them but this was still one of the best times I've had at the park.

Gina drove down from one of the sites she visits for work and then we road tripped it from my house.  I do live in Florida, but most people just don't realize how long it actually is from one end of Florida to the other.  From where I live to Orlando, it's about a 7.5 hour drive.  (Depending on how fast you drive and how often you have to stop to pee, of course.)

This is what the welcome sign looks like at full speed. :) I love how this picture came out.

We arrived about 10:30pm and the very first thing we did was set up our on the road crafting space on the hotel table.  We both brought a crap load of supplies that we had such good intentions of using.  Little did we know.

The crafting spot.

See we planned to make little travel journals during our breaks and in the evenings.  And we did... for about half a day.  But then sheer exhaustion kind of killed our plans and our beautiful little crafting area just sat abandoned.

I did a few pages of journaling while I was there.  I may have made it through the first day but maybe not.  The rest of my journaling I did from home.  But I still wanted to make the book so I continued on the same path I'd intended to take while I was there.  I journalled about each day and tucked and clipped in the corresponding photos.  I didn't want a neat and organized book, I wanted it to be very cobbled and clipped together.  Collected.  And I think that in the end it came out as I'd hoped.

I use bit and pieces from a lot of sources and I'm not going to look at each piece to try and determine where they came from.  But for the major pieces I used 3 main sources.

And so it begins...  Notebook by Heidi Swapp and the Sn@p Pack by SN@P.

The notebook was by Heidi Swapp and I bought it on sale at JoAnn before the trip.  It says Notes on the front in gold lettering but I covered that up.  It turned out to be exactly the right size.  In fact, I think that I only ended up with the back side of the last page blank.  It couldn't have been more perfect. 

I used a Simple Stories Sn@p Pack that was Disney themed and I bought at Michael's.  Most of my stuff came from this.

I also used a few prints and cuts I made using two digital kits.

1. Project Mouse from Sahlin Studio that I purchased at The Lily Pad online store.

2. Dreams Come True from Scott Girl that I purchased at The Digital Press. 

I used a ton of different clips and after doing the journaling for the entire trip, went back and printed and just clipped a bunch of photos into the book.  It came out fat and jumbled with stuff sticking out on all sides and I love it.  The only thing I don't love is my cover.  It needs something else and I just don't know what that is.  So for now I'm calling it done and moving on.

Gina (left) used YouTube for a quick lesson on how to use chopsticks.  And (right) there was a total tool making a fool of himself in front of the Mexico spot so I covered him with the geotag.

Gina and I took literally thousands of photos on this trip and I'm going to do a mega mega Disney trip book with them and so I'm not going to go back and worry about this one any longer. 

Next trip I hope to do better at my on the spot journaling and since we hopefully won't ever do Disney again in July (LOL) then it shouldn't beproblem in the future.  Sorry for the picture overload.

Shellie: #1 "Roots" - Transforming 6 Ali Edwards kits into 6 mini books

Using the Ali Edwards "Roots" Story and Stamp Kits in a Mini Album - Project 1 of 6 in this Series

In March I signed up to receive both the Story Kit and Stamp Kit from Ali Edwards.  They come in these cute little envelopes and have all sorts of fun things inside.  Each month I would get my kit, open it up and smile and pet all the pretty pieces.  Then I'd pack it all back up in the envelope and set it aside to use "later."

6 months pass and instead of awesome projects, what I have is a pristine collection of kits that have never been used.  Not one single item.  It's a problem.  So I officially paused my subscription and pulled out all of my kits. Time to get busy.

All 6 Ali Edwards kits laid out in a row.

I've challenged myself to use these 6 kits and turn them into 6 mini books based on their themes: Magic, Click, Roots, Build, Go and Little Things.  I think this will be a fun way to kill two birds with one stone - use up the kits and get back into the groove of making my mini books.

I picked one of the more recent kits to start with, "Roots".  Ali Edwards describes the reasons behind this kit in this way: "Roots have been planted by past generations and are being planted by you today. These stories give insight into the who, what, where, why, and when of our existence."

I was immediately drawn to it.  It made me think of my parents and my grandparents and I wanted to celebrate them in this mini book project.  I'll walk you through the process I used to complete this album.

First I pulled out all of the pieces in this kit and laid them out on my desk to really take a look.  I wanted to know what the available sentiments were when I started mentally planning the book.  I flipped through the cards and begin to assign photos to each with small post it notes. 

Next I reordered the cards until their message and the photos I selected were in a cohesive order.  Then I considered how to hold them together.  I knew I wanted to use the Tim Holtz (I think) book cover as my cover but my original plan was to use twine to tie the covers and pages together through punched holes.  But while looking through my box of mini book supplies, I found these 4x6 pocket pages by We R Memory Keepers and knew that they were the way to go for this project.  It didn't include any 3x4 pockets which was a bummer, but I decided to sew a couple of the 4x6 down the center to create my own.

Next I slipped my cards into these pockets and added pieces from the chipboard sticker card included in the kit. 

I had to take a break in the middle of this project because I needed to go and get the pictures I had planned from my mom.  I knew I wanted to include photos of them as children and of their wedding and of my grandparents.  I took quite a few from her and brought them home and scanned them and printed my own out on my Canon Selphy so I can return the originals to her.  They came our really well.

So next I went back through the pages and tucked the photos into their planned pages and looked for places where I needed more photos and repeated the scanning and printing process until I had filled all of the photo spots except one, the collage I wanted to include in the front.

Page by page I pulled the cards, embellishments and photos out of the pockets and begin to assemble my pages by attaching the photos, chipboard stickers and and the phrase stickers.  I stuck almost completely to the kit itself, only adding a very few pieces that did not come with this collection - part of a doily and a few pieces from what I believe is the the Oh, Darling vellum die cut pack.

I saved my inside title page for last.  When I'd pulled out the kit contents originally I laid the little word veneer pieces one on top of another for fun and liked the way they looked so much that I decided to use them that way in the project.  I created their background by cutting a 4x6 card from a wood grain print paper and then attached the words to the front one on top of the other as they'd been before.  For the back of this page, I knew I wanted to use the clear acrylic printed card so I took my favorite pictures of my family and made a collage from the photos and then printed it out and attached it to another piece of wood grain paper.  I did not attach the clear sheet to the collage, but just tucked it in the pocket on top so that it can be removed and the photos can be viewed uncovered.

Finally I assembled the book, using an awl to cut the holes into the cover.  For the cover I want to attach the plastic word that Ali includes with each kit.  It's so white and new and modern looking though, that it doesn't go with the look and feel of the rest of my book, so my intention is to paint it gold before permanently adhering it.

And that was it.  Finished mini book #1 of 6.  I loved making this book and the meaning behind it.  Looking through the old photos and choosing ones that meant something to me or that I didn't even know existed was the best part. 

I look forward to seeing what else I can create with the remaining 5 kits.

Mini Book: NYC 2004 (Imported Post)

Cover shot of NYC 2004 Mini Album

(This blog post was imported from shellieglass.com and was originally posted on July 13, 2014. ) Ever since I received my June Scraptastic kit I've been considering the idea of using parts of it to make a mini book using the photos I took of my two trips to NYC.  Much of the kit came from the Capture Life collection from Echo Park Paper Co. and I liked it so much, I went online and bought more papers and 3x4 cards to add on to the ones I received in the kit.  It has  several cityscape scenes on the papers and cards and the kit had a wood veneer cut out of a city skyline that just make me think of New York.

Sets of Post Cards and 3x4 cards from June Scraptastic Kit

When I pulled down the photo box to search for the photos from my NY trip I discovered something I'd forgotten I had... 3 sets of gorgeous post cards I'd also purchased during those trips.  I'd bought them to use in something like a scrap book, or possibly framed but never did anything with them.  Once I found them, the mini book was a definite, and immediate, project.

I contemplated how I wanted to make the book and decided to go with a single large ring.  I also decided to use the backs of my post cards to hold my photos and I really like the way it turned out.  The photos fit perfectly with just a little trim on one side.  I had three sets of postcards to choose from and decided not to use the panoramic set.  Since I had both color and black and white photos as well as color and black and white post cards I decided to mix them all together in a single book.  The book is pretty thick but I really like how it came out.

A few of the supplies I started with...

I will admit that having so many photos (including the postcard photos) made it harder on me while embellishing.  I kept flipping through the book over and over unable to decide where to put my favorite embellishments.  I was concerned that once I used them, then I might find a better spot later in the book.  (This is a problem I have on every project.  Commitment issues.)

So finally I went through and tabbed all of the photos that were most important to me and then set them all face up side by side on my work space and embellished them first.  That way I could use up my favorite items and see all the options for placement at once.

I embellished my favorites first...

Then when I had finished with those, I stacked the book back in order and continued my embellishment as usual.  The book did take a lot of "stuff" but it was fun to mix and match.  And of course some of the post cards were just too beautiful to cover up so I left some as they were.

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I used some add-in 3x4 cards and cut files from my Silhouette on their own throughout the album as in-between page treats.  I love the Big Yellow Taxi Cab one shown here.

Embellishment between pages…

I really love the final result.  Mini albums are something that I have always admired but have only recently started actually making and each time I begin I fear that it won't turn out as good as the previous ones have. So far I've always been pleased with the result.  My natural "style" is very neat and clean and straight but I love the mini books that are all a mess of fun sticking out in every direction, so I have to make a conscious effort to break out of my comfort zone.  I think this is healthy creatively and I'm glad that I've been doing it.  It's still hard at times but the results always make me happy.

central-park

These photos have been sitting in a photo album on a shelf in my bedroom rarely seen for 10 years. (I can't believe it's been 10 years since I went on these trips).  Now they are in this new format that draws me to pick it up and flip through the pages and remember the moments and I find that it's an even bigger gift to me than I'd ever expected.

I'm looking forward to going more places and taking more photos and making more memories that I can record in this way and remember fondly as I make the books and flip through them again and again.

This is the back cover of the book.  It was probably my favorite postcard of the bunch and didn't think it needed any added embellishment.  So I left it like it is.  I'll end with it again here.

Back cover shot... too pretty to cover up.

Shellie: Mini Book using PL cards - Stitches South 2014 (Imported Post)

Cover of my Stitches South mini made from a Project Life mini kit.

(This post was imported from shellieglass.com.  It was originally posted on May 27, 2014.) The other day I was sitting at my desk, wondering what I could make out of the May Scraptastic Kit contents.  I'd received it that day and its my first scrap kit ever.  I love the contents but I felt a little overwhelmed by it and the pressure it put on me to make something fantastic right away.  I didn't have any ideas in that area so after I loved it all for a few minutes I packed it all away and sat.  Somehow I started thinking about Project Life cards and the many many cards I bought when I had plans to do the week by week scrapbooking for 2014.  Since I've since changed my method for Project Life, I had a lot of extra cards and mini sets available.

I have always thought I'd use them to make mini books or at least to include in my mini books and I thought... I'll pull out that packet of Road Trip themed cards I bought and just make a little test book.  Well... I couldn't find that set, it wasn't where I thought it would be, but there was another one there so I used it instead.  In another post I plan to write about the process of making the little book, but now I'll just talk about the end product.

Love this panoramic photo.

I made the book.  Let me explain here that I never do this kind of stuff spur of the moment.  I plan it out forever and buy stuff and buy more stuff and think about it and usually, never actually end up doing the actual project.  But I just starting sorting cards and punching holes and suddenly I had a little book.  I'd only meant for it to be for practice for now, but once I had it in my hand I had to try to find something to put in it.  I needed a series of photos and of course my most recent collection was from my Stitches South vacation in April.  I decided I was going to go for it but I needed some alpha stickers and maybe some embellishments and I'd be good to go.

The next night I stopped by Joann on the way home and picked up some alpha stickers and a pack of little buttons and embellishments that matched and by golly, I went home that night and finished my little book!  I even successfully printed out the photos - which was an accomplishment considering my printer is out of cyan, magenta and now yellow toner.  Grrr.  But I had enough to make it work.

I cut and taped and sorted and embellished and about 11pm or so I had a little memory album from my trip.  I just love it!

Shellie: My first mini book. (Imported Post)

This is a close up shot of the front cover!

(THIS POST WAS IMPORTED FROM MY PREVIOUS BLOG - SHELLIEGLASS.COMIT WAS ORIGINALLY POSTED ON APRIL 30, 2014)

My first mini turned out so great.  Clearly this is just my biased opinion but I loved it so much that I had a hard time packing it up and sending it off.  But I made it as part of a Christmas present that was already 2 months late so I packed it up and shipped it.  I took a lot of pictures first!! The book was for my friend Dyanna who lives in Fort Lauderdale.  We've known each other for a really long time now and now that I'm back in Pensacola, don't get to see each other often at all and that makes me sad.  The book covered many of the fun weekends we've had together over the years plus the cruise we took for my 30th birthday. I bought the shaped chipboard pages wth rings included at Hobby Lobby months ago.  I think I may have used more than one pack, I'm not sure but thee were 9 chipboard pages included.  I covered them all in patterned paper (all from the same pack and also from Hobby Lobby).  I went with a wood look for the cover and back.

This is how I always want to live my life.  Having a laugh and a good time with good friends.

Most of my embellishments were by Heidi Swapp and I bought them at Michael's.  There were a few other embellishments I used but not too many and they were from Michael's as well.  I pulled some Recollections glitter letters but I think I only used one color - hot pink.  I also used my Cameo Silhouette to cut out some pieces for some of the pages. I have taken a few workshops on Mini books online.  My favorite was by Celine Navarro on the Two Peas in a Bucket web site (no longer exists).  I love to listen to her talk and I like the way she put her mini together.  It made something that I'd imagined to be daunting seem less like a big deal and way more doable.  Before that class I would have focused on each page one at a time and I would have never made it through.  Instead, I printed out all my pictures and begin placing them and my embellishments right away. I love love love how it came out.  It made me miss my friend and reminded me how great our friendship has been over the years. I'm hoping to get started on my next mini book ASAP! Love this unique way to showcase images and embellishments. Below are quite a few pictures from the finished book as well as a few shots of the items I used in the project.