the moments in between

Last Chance | Inked 2.0

Learn 20 new ways to get more from your stamps with Inked 2.0! Lisa Spangler and Tina Aszmus will show you the secret of skillful stamping with a series of videos and in depth tutorials sharing their favorite techniques. Spend 4 weeks exploring twenty new and inventive ways to add unique patterns and designs to any paper project.

Registration for Inked 2.0 closes on June 30th at 11:59pm EST. Class will start on July 1st, and 1 video and 4 tutorials will be posted each Tuesday through the 22nd.

Here's a peek at one of my class projects..  I have to say I'm pretty excited about everything that's come in for the class. You can see more sneaks on the Studio Calico blog. See you in class! =)

Jubilee

As part of this month's Last Call at Studio Calico (it's a special 7th Anniversary edition), you can pick up the Jubilee E-book (it features 100 exclusive projects) and kit (it features a whole lot of fun stuff, including a mini mist and a 4x6in stamp set that still has a place in my list of faves) for... $9.99. Yes, seriously.

Here's a peek at the projects I have in the book - I hope you'll check it out!

 

Happy Sunday! We're off to have a movie night - Sam and I just finished reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, so it's time to rewatch the movie!

capture your summer

As crazy and hectic as summer can be, it offers a much needed time to recharge and reconnect. We made a summer bucket list last year, and it proved to be a great way to shake up our usual routine and to get us out and exploring some of the fun our city has to offer. I recorded that list with a two page layout at the end of the summer, but wanted to capture out adventures in a mini album this year. 

As I set out to plan the album, I knew it needed to be quick and easy. I didn't want recording our summer activities to become a burdern, and I didn't want it to take any time from enjoying them. I came up with a formula that will let me add new pages to my album in the time it takes for the boys to track down their goggles and towels so we can head to the pool.

I started by gathering my supplies together. I chose a WRMK 4x4in album - this small size is so fun, and I've been looking for an excuse to pick one up. For the inside of the album, I'll be using the Studio Calico Penny Arcade Scrapbook kit - the colors are perfect for summer, and I love the idea of limiting what I use in this album so I'm not getting hung up on choosing product. I also printed out a sheet of Hello Forever labels - I'll be using these to caption the photos in my mini book.

Even when I'm doing a quick & simple mini, I love to spend a little extra time on the title page. It's the first thing you see when you open the book, and it will set the tone for everything else you add. I used one of the 2x2in page protectors and added confetti punched from the kit papers to two of the pockets, then finished the other two with a floating metal circle embellishment and a tag left over from a set of In A Creative Bubble Printable. You can peek through this page to the next one, and it's a great invitiation to keep turning the pages to see what comes next!

I wanted to start this album with our summer bucket list. I typed it out on a sheet of paper, and am marking our completed activities by stamping with Color Theory Ink and a clean pencil eraser. I used the cloud mask from the Penny Arcade kit and  Gold Brilliance Ink to make a piece of patterned vellum to layer over my list.

Now the inside. SIMPLE SIMPLE SIMPLE. These are the pages I'll be adding over the summer, so I wanted it to be crazy easy to add to it. Each page is a 3x4in photo and a strip of patterned paper, with a label to add a caption. I've added some small embellishments - stickers from the kit, little accents from printables - but these are entirely optional. I tend to have a messy desk, and when I'm working on projects like this I tend to add in bits and pieces that are laying around. It saves me from having to put them away. ;)

And that's it. At the end of the summer, all of our adventures will be in one place. If I don't get photos for everything, or don't have room for all of them, I'll just mark them off on the bucket list page. Some of the longer stories from this summer will go in my Project Life® album, but I'll be scaling that back to the bare minimum as well. 

If you take on capturing your summer, I'd love to see it!

 

Studio Calico's Penny Arcade

It's Penny Arcade reveal day at Studio Calico - which means it's time to do a little shopping. In addition to my every month recommendation to grab the SC Grid paper  (I found a pack while I was cleaning, and felt like it was Christmas!) and to double check your adhesive stash (I need a new Martha Stewart glue pen), here are some products that I think are must haves : 

1) The Attacher Die. Perfect for adding anything and everything to your albums. The Lego Movie has been watched approximately one zillion times since we got it, so it obviously needed to go into my PL book. 

2) Gold Brilliance Ink. On vellum. I may be obsessed with this, and will be gold stamping more vellum in the future.

3) The Kit Alphabet. (with a runnerup nod to the Maggie Alphabet, as I may be alpha stamp obsessed). Love the font, love the size, love the open letters. I love that alphabet stamps never run out of Es.

NOTE : If you are a SC subscriber, you can shop for add-ons now. (If you're not, kit links will work after midnight EST) Remember, if you see "temporarily unavailable" under a kit, keep on watching. The SC shopping cart holds your items for 10 minutes as you shop, so many kits will become available as shoppers make their final decisions and check out.

With the shopping out of the way, let's talk about the kits. 

Hi | Studio Calico Penny Arcade Scrapbook kit + Color Theory Clean Slate + SC Grid paper + Tiny Attacher + Hello Forever Printable

The best & the silliest from our end of summer photoshoot, all together on one layout. I went BIG on the left page, and printed my favorite photo as an 8x10. The second page has 2x3s with some of my favorite papers and stickers from the kit. 

 

You Two | Penny Arcade Scrapbook kit + Spun Sugar, Fortune Teller & Skeeball Add-ons + Tiny Attacher + Color Theory Deja Blue and Clean Slate Ink + SC Grid paper + Printable Labels

When someone (ahem) has tired legs, they can almost always con their biggest brother into a piggyback ride. This may be my new favorite photo of the two of them together. =) I loved the graphic impact of the Heidi Swapp Rubons in Fortune Teller and decided to use most of the package as a big block to anchor the left side of my page.

Pi | Penny Arcade Scrapbook Kit + Spun Sugar & Fortune Teller Add-ons + Tiny Attacher + Color Theory Clean Slate Ink + SC Grid paper

We found the PERFECT restaurant for my pizza obsessed, math loving middlest. You can tell he loved it because he posed willingly for this pic. ;) I am obsessed with the die cut washi in Spun Sugar, and loved how the circles echoed the restaurant's sign, so I went all in on the circles and made an irregular grid out of them. I added some watercolor circles and embellishments to break up all the washi tape, and ended up with a very colorful layout.



Summer Mini | Penny Arcade Scrapbook kit +  WRMK 4x4in album + Vellum + Gold Brilliance Ink + 4x4 & 2x2in page protectors + Tiny Attacher + Color Theory Clean Slate Ink + Printable Labels + In A Creative Bubble Printable + Hello Forever Printable

I'll share more about this mini tomorrow, but wanted to include it here as well. I love this 4x4 size, and it will be a perfect way to capture all of our summer adventures. 

Happy reveal day, everyone! Please ask away if you have any questions about this projects. =)

Studio Calico offers three types of monthly kits - Scrapbook, Card & Project Life® - as well as add-on kits and shop items to complement them. A new kit is revealed on the 27th of each month (at noon EST if you're a subscriber, at midnight EST if you aren't). For more information (or to start your own subscription!), click here. 
 

an open thank you to two peas

Yesterday, Two Peas announced that they were closing. And I've felt a little off kilter ever since. 

I've struggled with just what to say. I found Two Peas ten years ago, and they became a part of my daily routine. I was a stay at home mama to two small boys, and the time I was able to steal to scrapbook and to share my love of memory keeping with a community of like minded people helped keep me sane. I made friends at Two Peas, many of whom are among my nearest and dearest to this day.

I have 79 pages of projects in my Two Peas gallery. 17000 posts on the message boards. I was a member, I was a Garden Girl, I was a shopper, I was a teacher. I shared so much of my life on that site, and it's hard to imagine it just being.. gone. 

I've found myself struggling for the right words, but I think what it comes down to is - thank you.

Thank you, Two Peas, for helping me fall in love with paper and glue. For helping so many people fall in love with memory keeping.

Thank you for the friendships. 

Thank you for helping to shape this industry, and for helping me find a place in it.

Here's to the inspiration & the memories - thank you, Kristina and Jeffery, for everything.

Studio Calico Penny Arcade Sneaks

We're four weeks into summer, and I've sort of lost track of what day it is. And since it seems the 27th (and the next Studio Calico reveal) is two days away, it's time to take a peek at what I made with the kits!

Penny Arcade is a great mix of cute and graphic and funky. Cute? That cloud you can see below. Bold? Some black and white brush script. And funky? The designs by Ashley Goldberg definitely add that. =) I made a two page layout, two single pages, a PL spread and the start of a mini book with this month's kits, and am now mixing in the leftovers of my Hello Hello kits to work on projects for Inked 2.0. Here's a few sneaks of what I made with the kits : 

I try to keep posed photos of my three to a minimum - opting to only force them into them on special occasions. Like the last day of school. After a few "normal" shots, I let them loose, and that's generally when I end up with the best photos. I used the Penny Arcade Scrapbook kit to share my favorites from this year's end of school pics.

Every year, I have a grand plan of recording our summer...  and I've never actually done it. Well, okay, last year I DID do a quick summary page, but my plans for a mini have never panned out. Until this year. A WRMK 4x4in album and a super simple format let me start a book that I'm certain I can finish. PS : Gold Brilliance Ink + Vellum + the cloud mask in the Penny Arcade Scrapook kit = perfection.

The next two projects both had their design driven by product love. In this one, it was the die cut washi in the Spun Sugar add-on. I love how the Pi Pizzeria sign fits right into the circle theme!

And for this layout, I fell in love with the number add-ons in Fortune Teller, and went with my first instinct to use them in a big block.

Over in my Project Life® album, the "time to be awesome" stamp from the Penny Arcade PL kit and that photo of Sam were meant to be together.

If you're loving what you see in Penny Arcade, you might want to check out Studio Calico's latest release - Brighton Pier. A few of these papers are making an early appearance in the July kits, but if you want MORE (and I wouldn't blame you), this line is shipping in late July. You can preorder a bundle of the line to get it first - for more information, click here. 

My absolutely favorite item in the line is the Handbook - I'm already daydreaming about what I'd record in it. Maybe this year's Disney trip? If you're obsessed too, hit the "notify me" button at Studio Calico so you get an email when it's stocked! 

Happy Wednesday, everyone! (and yes, I totally double checked my calendar before I typed that)

Studio Calico offers three types of monthly kits - Scrapbook, Card & Project Life® - as well as add-on kits and shop items to complement them. A new kit is revealed on the 27th of each month (at noon EST if you're a subscriber, at midnight EST if you aren't). For more information (or to start your own subscription!), click here. 

 

Tutorial | Altering a Studio Calico Digital Template

In the weeks since I made this layout, we've gone from "ALMOST" to being knee deep in summer. Hanging out with friends, going to the pool, lazy mornings, and most recently, The Lego Movie on mega repeat.

I wanted to share how I tweaked Shanna's template to make it fit what I wanted for this page. I love the look of templates, and it never occurred to me to alter them until I started working with Shanna Noel on her Digital | Beyond the Basics class. It really opened my eyes to just how versatile these files can be!

I started this page with Studio Calico's Hello Hello Scrapbook kit and it came together quickly - but the background was feeling rather plain. It really didn't have the energy & excitement that I wanted to capture, and when I saw this template, I knew a starburst was the answer. I could have pieced it together with patterned paper, but I wanted to try something new and see what I could do with Shanna's template! 

Here's what it looks like when you first open it. I hid everything but the starburst rays, and then rotated it so the starburst would be on the left side of the paper.

I then resized the canvas to 11x11in.

And then cropped it to 8.5x11in.

I wanted the blues to be on the bottom to echo what I'd already done with the punched stars, so I flipped the template.

I selected all of the pieces of the ray and resized them to be slightly wider than the original design - I wanted to be sure the point would be under my photo once I printed the burst.

I printed the template onto Studio Calico's grid paper - it adds a subtle texture to the background that would be missing if I had used white cardstock.

 

The starburst echos the stars on the opposite side of the page, and brings the perfect amount of color to my background.

Have you given digi a try? If you're new to it, check out Studio Calico's Digital Basics and Beyond the Basics classes - they are a great resource for using these fun files!

currents

(gargoyle faces at the City Museum)

eating | SO.MANY.CHERRIES. so glad they're finally in season.

loving | 70-80 degree days.

wondering | when we're going to actually make it to the pool (I'd like it to be about 10 degrees warmer!)

writing | our summer list.

enjoying | the fact that my kids have been watching Leave It To Beaver nonstop, thanks to Ben's teacher last year.

struggling | to get caught up on work and real life after a spur of the moment trip last week.

marveling | that my kids are old enough that a spur of the moment trip is totally doable.

HAPPY FRIDAY, everyone!!