Wordless Wednesday

I'm stealing an idea from a few bloggers...namely Susan Weinroth & Nicole Samuels...but here's my photo for {Wordless Wednesday}...

{Two of my favourite people-Bubba and Mark. They make my summer magical every year.}

Happy Hump Day!

xoxo

K

p.s: I'm actually in the middle of scrapbooking this photo I just needed to put together some journaling for it. I'll post a preview soon.

I forgot...

...how good Dawson's Creek was.

So last night I sat down in an effort to scrap and slid an old favourite into the blue ray player-Dawson's Creek. Ironically it was the season premiere of Season 4-Pacey & Joey's return to Capeside and the introduction of Dawson's new found hobby: photography. Unfortunately, I was less inclined to scrapbook my photography. I got sucked in by the mellow drama and relocated to the couch to reminisce in the old days of 10th grade when Friday nights meant extra-buttered popcorn, Vanilla Coke & Dawson's Creek episodes with my best friend on my bedroom floor.

I did find some pictures of layouts made over the weekend that I hadn't uploaded. More double page layouts for our yearly album!

August-Bermuda, a one year anniversary & the final Cripplers show.

September-Jeremy came to visit, we went to Karaoke, school went back in session & Fall started to bloom in our house and the market.

Maybe if I can pry myself away from Dawson + friends I will get a layout or two done this week. Stay tuned!

xoxo

K

A Sneak peek

I made this over the weekend. It's our Christmas/Holiday card for this year. In the past I've done up to three styles but this year I'm doing one. It's simple. It's cute. It's crisp and clean but super cute! And this is all you get to see!

xoxo

K

I-phone photos are the new polaroids

That's what M said yesterday when we went for a Fall walk on a beautiful day here in the capital city. I realized he was right and made a discovery. Iphone photos rock! All of the photos below were created using the Iphone.

The sun was shining, a breeze was in the air and it was perfectly crisp outside. Boots and Starbucks kept us toasty & warm and away we went...

All collages were made using Picasa

It turns out that I'm not the only one who's ready for Christmas to come. It's already begun at the Rideau Centre. The Hudson's Bay Company had their hallway of holiday decor already open. Chapters had an entire display of Christmas cards for sale already. And People's had Christmas trees all over their counters yesterday. Is it too early to sing 'It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...'? Even I say 'yes' to that one! ;)

We had lunch at The Black Tomato. It was delicious. Crab cakes, jambalaya & a Philly steak sandwich filled our bellies for the walk home. It was a perfect Fall Saturday together.

In other, more scrapbooking-related news, I had a chance to sit down at my table and create last night and early this morning. Using Becky Higgins 'Sketches' book I managed to get a ton of photos on my double page layouts. I hadn't taken it out in a while but it gave me some new ideas for using 14+ photos on my pages.

Each month I create a layout chronicling our activities to remind us of all the things we did. I'm a little backed up though. I had to go back as far as May to catch up.

May. We saw a lot of action in May. We ran a half marathon, my mom came to visit, I went to NY for leadership weekend at camp, shopping in Syracuse & my birthday.

June. A great month too. We went to Toronto to see J (and also saw Miley Cyrus), Wakefield to spend the afternoon, school ended with some awesome graduates and fun activities and I went to camp in NY.

And last but not least I made this layout about summer camp which was my July and part of August so I felt it belonged in our 'yearly' album.

These layouts will join a stack like this one...

Layouts that have yet to find a home in an album. That's a whole other project!

Have a great Sunday. I'm off to eat this. YUM!

Happy Sunday!

xoxo

K

December Daily: Building the Pages

It may be October but my scrapbooking mind is already in December. Yes, I am one of those crazy people who have started thinking about my December Daily album. Last night I put together a few little pages that I knew I wanted to build into my album as elements, particularly for journaling. That of course is this year's goal. You'll notice that there's lots of pockets and envelopes here.

Here's a fancy envelope to tuck some journaling into. It was made with some of last year's Cosmo Cricket holiday release. It reminds me of peppermint candies. I love the ability to close it with the string. I learned how to make this over on Two Peas In a Bucket.

This one is a clear scraps page with the red KI Memories number overlay on it. I love the way it turned out. I'll admit this was not my idea. I scrap lifted from Ali Edwards' December Daily for this one.

I love how this turned out. It's a bingo card by Jenni Bowlin that said 'GROW'. I saw it and altered it to say 'SNOW'. I love the combo of white, red and black.

This is a Prima canvas page via Donna Downey's new collection. I wanted to make a little pocket that could house a little accordion album or some journaling. I stitched a Hambly overlay on it. The Hambly piece looks like snowflakes.

And last but not least I stitched this page together out of an old Making Memories patterned die cut paper. I'm not sure I'll use this yet. I'm not certain I LOVE it but I do like the aspect of the pocket and the little chipboard mitten I stuck inside it.

xoxo

K

5 for Friday

1. Today's spirit day 'break out' was a hit! The kids were excited about this year's Survivor theme and their buffs.

2. I uploaded some of my recent iphoto photos this week. Here's one of my favourites of M & our friend J. Gotta love the looks...

and one of the four of us (sorry it's very fuzzy) at the 'awkward wedding' Thanksgiving weekend...

3. I made an awesome apple pie this week. And by 'make' I mean "put a fresh homemade pie made with love by many Grandmothers" in the oven.

4. I discovered a new blog: Pandemonium by a woman named Sande Krieger. It rocks. She rocks. I found her at Two Peas. She has some awesome layouts in her profile.

5. In my efforts to 'Zen Scrapbook' I am working on journaling for a special photo from camp this summer. I am heading in this direction with the layout. I love the simplicity and the journaling with the sharp photo.

Have a happy weekend!

xoxo

K

The Zen Art of Scrapbooking

So while listening to the "Paperclipping Roundtable" I listened to some of the participants ideas and made some decisions.

1. This weekend I am going to stop worrying about catching up-I don't normally look at scrapbooking like that anyway but lately I've been feeling pressure to get a bunch of projects done. It's not like there's a due date for them or anything...

2. I'm just going to pick the pictures I'm totally inspired by in the moment and scrap them-and take my time telling the story and focusing on the words.

3. All this talk about 'not being chronological' makes me realize it's never too early to make some Christmas cards.

Tomorrow...

*I have to get some pics developed before school

*I am getting Starbucks on the way to work-Peppermint Hot Chocolate here I come!

*I am going to wear my new boots

*I am going to (attempt) to finish our kids autobiography scrapbook-only the cover page left!

*is pizza day at school which means I don't have to make a lunch

*'breaking out' spirit week at school-Survivor Theme!

xoxo

K

Weekend In Photos

M & I had an awesome time in Syracuse this past weekend. I've always wanted to see a college football game so he bought tickets back in September for the Syracuse Orangemen vs. Pittsburgh Panthers on Saturday afternoon.

Our road trip started Friday afternoon with a 3 hour drive to the mall for some shopping and then a pit stop at HEID'S. M is obsessed with Man vs. Food on the travel channel (outdoor life in Canada). He found out that this place was on one of the episodes and had to go and have a few of the hot dogs. It's a little, old, drive-in diner that's specializes in crazy hotdogs. We went, we saw, we ate.

We usually stay at the Comfort Inn in Carrier Circle and this trip was no exception. Except when we got in our room we found this...

Which was pretty hilarious! Seriously?! A jacuzzi in our room...So funny! Ahhh romantic Syracuse!

Saturday being game day and all meant we had to go to the university pretty early to check it all out. I was totally jealous! I wish I had gone to an American college. It was homecoming weekend and it was AWESOME!

Note: I have no idea who those guys are but I wanted to show you the mascot-he's an orange.

There were cheerleaders, a big marching band, lots of snacks, almost a fight in front of us and it was lots of fun despite the fact that Syracuse got creamed 45-7.

After the game we went to the scrapbooking store and the outlets where M discovered his love for J Crew. He had never been to their outlet stores.

Then yesterday we went to the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse. Who knew Syracuse had a zoo? The best exhibit was the elephants. They even did tricks!

Then after a long drive home-and one detour through Watertown for lunch-we made it back in time to catch up on some t.v and eat waffles for dinner.

All in all it was a pretty awesome weekend! I hope you had a great one too!

xoxo

K

Weekend Update

Here are the highlights:

Note: Five for Friday did not appear last week as I was headed out of town with M. Here's the 'weekend update' instead.

1. Bailed on 'LOAD' on Thursday, October 15th. I knew it was all going downhill when I had to do a digital layout on Wednesday night. New goal: 31 projects in October. So far I have 13 done.

2. Had the greatest weekend with M. Our road trip to Syracuse was AMAZING! We had so much fun. Look for a weekend in photos coming soon.

3. Made these tonight for dinner. Do you like waffles? Yes, I like waffles!

4. Bought supplies for my December Daily album at 'We B Scrappin' in Cicero. Their name cracks me up!

5. Reading Water for Elephants. LOVE it! Note: this also makes "serious book" number 13 for the year.

Bonus: Modern Family is an awesome show. Favourite quote this week was when Claire tells the audience/camera: "I was laughing with my mouth but not my eyes" when referring to Phil's jokes. So funny!

xoxo

K

Load-Day 13

Here's today's LOAD. It's digital. It also doesn't show the white edges well but what the heck?! You get the idea, right? The template is from Cathy Z's digital monthly layout kit at Designer Digitals. It's quick and easy to do. There's a few more pages that go with it but you're only getting one.

I went swimming last night. I haven't been in a while. My arms were hurting on my warm up. I'm trying to go once a week to combat the running. I did that for three months in the spring while training for the half marathon and it seemed to loosen my joints well after all the pounding on pavement. I'm trying to build my distance and endurance. Once upon a time 1000 m was just a warm up. Oh how times have changed! I went easy on myself tonight.

While fitness seems like just one more thing to add to my already full plate I think it's important to take 30 minutes out of each day for some stress relief. Truth be told it makes me sleep better too and with everything that's been on my mind lately getting my brain to shut down and just sleep hasn't been easy.

xoxo

K

Tuesday Tinkering

Here's the latest...

1. This cool envelope. It's handmade. I saw a video on Two Peas that gave me the idea to create my own using pattern paper and some thick cardboard. These might come in handy for my December Daily.

2. I put together my Christmas pile of products and all the pages that my album would contain.

3. Yesterday my Studio Calico October kit 'On the Easel' came via UPS. I have a love hate relationship with them. I love that they bring me goodies. I hate their methods!

4. I also got some extra stamps and some navy jute to try out!

5. I made a two page layout last night for LOAD day 12. This is all you get. It's a layout from May/June of the school year last year. It's not fair for me to show those photos to the world without permission.

Happy Hump day!

xoxo

K

Mumblings from Monday

Yesterday's lame excuse for scrapbooking (Day 11 of LOAD) was completing the journaling for my 'Week In The Life' album. Here's the visual evidence.

And here's a visual of how it tucks behind the photos.

I used Ali's journaling blocks from Designer Digitals which I may also incorporate into my December Daily album. If you haven't visited her blog in the last few days she's outlined her process for creating her cover. It's beginning to get me very excited for the holiday season. Now I have to pick out my Christmas pieces and start piling it all together.

In other news, you may have noticed in early September I recapped my efforts to complete 12 goals for 2010. One of them was to read 12 'serious' books. In that update I had 11 done. Last night I finished reading book 12. I finished reading "Run Like A Mother" by Dimity McDowell & Sarah Bowen Shea. It was AWESOME in a word. It was inspiring and honest and most of all funny. It's a book with the subtitle "How to get moving-and not lose your family, job or sanity'. While I don't have children I do have lots of things standing in the way of 'getting moving' these days. It was a great read and an uplifting way to finish my list. Here's what I read:

1. The Memory Keepers Daughter

2. Still Alice (loved)

3. Lullabies for Little Criminals

4. Pillars of the Earth (loved)

5. The Red Tent

6. Eat Love Pray (did NOT love-still haven't seen the movie)

7. Night

8. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (loved)

9. The Girl Who Played with Fire (loved)

10. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Next (loved)

11. Choosing Civility (very insightful)

12. Run Like A Mother (loved)

Inspired by my final book I've decided to participate in a 5k race called the Santa Shuffle here in Ottawa in December. It will be my 5th race. It would be even cooler if it were on the 5th of December but alas it's on Saturday, the 4th instead. Secretly I would also LOVE to run it in under 30 minutes. I haven't been under that time in a while. That means I've got to get moving. As an added bonus it's in December so it will make an appearance in my December Daily.

When one goal ends another one begins. I'll keep you updated on my progress. Wish me luck!

xoxo

K

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you're enjoying your turkey dinner today if you are Canadian. Today is Thanksgiving here in Canada. That means a number of things: 1. I have a lot of be thankful for today-and everyday 2. There's a lot of turkeys cooking in ovens today 3. tomorrow is a holiday. All good things.

Here's a run down of just a few things I'm thankful for:

this guy...

all of my family, especially these guys...

3. My awesome jobs: both teaching during the school year and camp during the summer

4. An overall happy, healthy existence in a safe, loving environment.

There are many more but that would be a very, very long post so on to other details of my life instead.

Yesterday we went to an awkward wedding. We did not know the bride and groom-not even a little bit. But, I did manage to scrap a quick card making Day 9 of LOAD complete.

In other news today we went for brunch and then a walk downtown. It was a beautiful day here in the capital city of Canada. I took advantage and made M take some pictures. I love Fall.

I also developed photos from last week's 'Week in the Life' assignment. I've put the album together but the layouts are sitting on my scrapbooking table waiting for some better lighting to be photographed so you'll have to wait until tomorrow.

Have a wonderful Sunday!

xoxo

K