just words + photo tells a story

Its amazing, when you remove all the other worries (what goes here, what matches this. etc) how easy it is to focus on your story. After all isn't that the reason why those of us who scrapbook do it in the first place?


To follow along or read more about this, visit one of my fav scrapbooking blogs here.



The challenge was to use just one other embellishment (or none). Since I speak about the pillows that my mom made in the story I added a small piece of the leftover fabric we used for the red pillow shown in the photo. I thought it was a nice addition. Plus every time I go look at the page I reach out to touch the fabric {its a soft. light weight, corduroy}.

The journaling was done in MS picture it! {can also be done in ms word}, letter stickers for the words "favorite spot" and The fabric is on the page using "zots" small, flat, round, adhesives.
strip of patterned paper is from Websters Pages, pink lemonade.

a slide show

Short and sweet for today.

One addition to the sidebar on the right. A slide show tentatively titled, Making stuff :: handmade mini album. Click on it to see all the pictures and captions.

Inspired by this: All week long one of my favorite sites is exploring a great scrapbooking topic...."words + photos". She will do such a great job with this...And I think following along all week will feel like I'm taking one of her famous classes!! Someday, someday. So I am looking forward to the creating her articles will surely inspire.

Like the make a mini album/book challenge.

The handmade mini album is based on an article from her most recent newsletter and on her blog. The challenge was to use stuff {scrapbooking supplies} you already have. The pages are easy to move around and you can easily add extra pages or add other fun things you can punch a hole in.

April Page

"U Play"

Fall Day pictures. With the April Page Challenge papers from local scrapbook store.

Drawing from the colors of the solid paper and the stripes I went with these late fall pictures of the kids that I like so much. I wasn't really finished with the page here -- I was moving the chipboard "U" around and various little cut up words -- and I decided to look at it from a different angle. I turned in the finished page last week but never took a picture of it....so here it is almost finished. It doesn't show the journaling which was done on a strip of paper, labeled with a file tab and then tucked behind the photo collage at the top left corner.

I might have mentioned this before - but I thought picking up papers that someone else had chosen was going to be difficult but instead the opposite happened -- it simplified the process {for me} by removing the overwhelming "hmm, which papers go with these?" I found that it makes you stretch your creative thinking until you use all the pieces of the set. I might not have paired the textured blue with the stripes and orange -- but I learned to go with it and I liked the color combo after all. All in all very fun to work with.

These papers are from the April Page Challenge at one of our local scrapbook stores. {The Paper Garden.}
Double-sided paper (stripes/light green) is from Webster's Pages -- all their stuff is so beautiful.
Included were : orange and brown cardstock and textured blue paper {don't know manufacturer} and a large chipboard U
Photo collage was done at home on my Epson printer {only my third try at this -- I see a few mistakes here and there but I still like this one alot. Photo collages with many photos take practice -- I need more practice} I filled in the empty spots in the collage with the patterned papers.
I added the little boxes with the words "play" and "fun" and the date in the photo editing software.

Paper in the Mail + first communion

This was mail from a while ago....love it when there are papergoods catalogs to browse through.

I'm sure I intended to post this pic along with the inspiration it lead to, but I find that I never did that. We have been preparing the two older kids for their first holy communion so I had the idea to make our own invites, favors, thankyous, etc. I have had a lot of creative time {luckily} for that sort of thing. Just sharing a few pics of how the invitations turned out. Completely inspired by the invitations in the Paper Source catalog {the one pictured above}. The rubber stamps came from a Fancy Pants clear set {the butterfly} and Kodomo {the cherry blossom branch}. The strip of blue Asian paper is wrapped around the invitation and is from Hyatt's Art store here in Rochester.


































That was yesterday! It feels good to finally see it through -- months of prep, special books, special activities, shopping for the special gown, "dressy clothes" for boys, classes and one shaky rehearsal later -- but it all came together - beautifully.
The ceremony went just as beautifully as ever, even the weather cooperated for us as we made our way into the church. I was very proud my two.

The morning of I scrawled a few notes for myself as I reflected on the day ahead {with the intent to read it to our guests as Grace -- but I spaced and completely forgot to bring the paper with me.....duh...then at the restaurant it seemed every detail had to be run by me....so again -- spaced -- and I feel real bad about that}

"dear lord, we want to take this moment to say thank you for all your blessings today. thank you for blessing us with this delicious food; with beautiful sunshine, blessing us with beautiful children and allowing us to be blessed with the company of our family and dear friends. please care for those who were not able to be here today. amen."


On to the goodies... the favors being prepped...a couple of days ago.




















and finished...you can find these cute small cardboard boxes in the wedding supply section at the dollar store {yes! the dollar store, one pkg of 12 for $1.00} They were the perfect size.














And finally, there is always at least one blurry picture that captures my heart.....in this one she is sweetly smiling for the picture taking aunts and cousins, but she is dying to take the dress off. "PLEEESE mommy can I change NOW?" she says in front of some of the guests {who of course think its so cute} But she looked so pretty...I stalled as long as I could...and I managed to hold of the change of clothing until after dinner and the cake....she did wonderful and eventually didn't want to take off the dress at all.
sigh. they are so cute. I wanted the moment and the day to last forever.