Finally some scrapbooking stuff

When Charles was 80% recovered from the sickness and finally returned to school last week, I felt ecstatic!  He'd been sick since the night of November 8 after our happy bus-skytrain adventure to Metrotown.  Abigail got her ears pierced on that day, which was another story to tell.  Justin was sick at the same time, but he got on his feet much faster.

Anyway, I was so relieved that I felt like making something my my little studio.

Bella Blvd Projects

Happy Leap Day!!!

As I mentioned on Facebook, we're expecting a good number of new products to arrive towards the end of this week.  While I'm busy preparing the store for this big batch of new products, I'd like to share two little projects with you on this special day of the year.  After all, after today we need to wait for another four years for this day to jump onto our calendar again.

Bella Blvd's Estate Sale collection caught my eye when I bought for the store for the very first time.  I love the colour combo and those little flower patterns.  Couple weeks ago I finally picked them up and had a whole lot of fun to play with this lovely collection.  I created two layouts and completed two projects using the paper, stickers and chipboards.  Today I'll share the projects.

The first one is a mini album for a friend, which I created out of empty toilet paper rolls.  I made a gift cardholder using the paper roll before, and this was the first time for me to try them for a mini which I've seen a lot on the web.  They were truly fun to work with because of the size and the versatility.  And the most fun part of it is you can insert either a journaling card or a photo inside the "pocket".  In my case, a photo is designed to be inserted into the "pocket" with a little tab on it.

I also made a box for the mini.  A piece of paper were folded into a box, and then I covered it using a Printed Transparent Overlay from It's The Little Things collection by Fancy Pants.  A brad and a twine were added to finish off the box.

Stamps, some Maya Road goodies and other fun little things were used to embellish the album.  Here are more pictures of the mini and the box ~~

The second project is a kid-friendly project.  As you may have known, I love to do craft projects with my kids.  For this year's Valentine's Day, Charles and I made some Valentine gifts for his school friends and teachers.

It's a very simple yet fun project: tow punched paper hearts were glued together to form a pocket for a coin chocolate and then was glued to a pencil using hot glue.  Some were added a butterfly at the back.  My 2.5-year-old Abigail said these were Valentine wands (yes, she's watched too much Harry Potter with her brother)! :)

Next time I'll share the two layouts using the same Estate Sale collection by Bella Blvd.  OK, time to get back to work.  Thank you so much for stopping by.  Be sure to check out the Shopped during the weekend as you'll see many many yummy goodies coming in!

hugs,
Yolanda

A Bo Bunny LO to Share

Hope all is well with you!  I've been busy with the inventory lately but still managed to steal some moments to play with paper, glue and scissors.  Busy life is good.  I love being busy as it makes me feel fulfilled, productive and energetic.

I've got several projects done in the past few weeks, including a simple Valentine project made with my kid for his school friends and teachers.  Today I'll share a Bo Bunny layout with you, and I'll share the rest in the next few posts.

It's the Olivia collection by Bo Bunny.  Just love the colour combo of this collection.  Everything you see here is from the collection except the letter stickers for "smile", which are by Doodlebug Design.

I made all the flowers on this LO.  You know how I adore those little rose buds.  I think I'm getting better and better at making the buds now as I've learned to control the strength of my fingers when rolling the petals to create a variety of centre buds.  As for the larger flowers, I am learning to create different shapes by applying different techniques.  It all depends on how you manipulate the petals! :)  So much fun to see a flower slowly blooming in my hands.

I asked my husband what he thought of the flowers.  He said they looked all the same to him.  Well, they are different, each one is unique ... at least to me! :)

Here are some close-ups.

I used some newly learned technique to create this rose.  Love the layers of petals.  On Pinterest, my board of "Crafty Secrets" houses all the tutorials and printables I found all over the web.  It's such a handy place to find inspiration.

This is my favourite of them all.  Love the look of the rose bud in the centre.

I'll definitely make more flowers. :)  Need to make the most out of the dies and punches, right?  It's just so much fun to create them using the paper I love with the glitter and mist I adore.

Thank you so much for stopping by!  Hopefully we'll be receiving more new goodies soon.  We are really looking forward to the new G45, Bo Bunny & Pink Paislee.

hugs,
Yolanda

To-Do List

Too many things to remember.  Too many ideas to get them in actions.

The 3-photo layout has been sitting on my desk for at least a week (that long?), and I still haven't had time to sit down and finish it.  I printed out all the pictures for the Chinese New Year album and even picked the album for the project, but I haven't had time to start it.  I decorated the covers of the 8.5" x 11" chipboard album for my biggest project ever - the Mexico Cruise & Southern California Trip album, and also picked the paper and the embellies for this project, but I haven't had time to start it by selecting the pictures!

Where did the time go?  I feel lost all of a sudden in the middle of these emerging ideas.


I'm always wondering how other people can do so many things at the same time, working, taking care of the kids, blogging, doing whatever they love, going out with friends, etc., etc.  Then I've found out one common thing among these super-productive people.  Women in the scrapbooking world, to be exact.  It looks like they have a kind of schedule or timetable for their daily life, and they commit to it.  The schedule/timetable is their tool to organize their daily life.  I know if I had one set up, my day would be far more productive than now.  Now it looks like I'm doing things in a random order although I do have a daily routine to follow.  I have no problem setting up a schedule for myself, which I'm very good at, I believe.  But the point is whether I can commit to it no matter what.  To be honest, I'm not a very disciplined person.

Well, to make things easier and have a quick fix just for now. It seems a good idea to get these emerging ideas down so that I have a clearer picture of what I want to do next.  Really don't like the feeling of being lost, not to mention being out of control.

1. Scrapbooking pages - I'm planning to create 1 - 2 pages per week.  Recently I've found myself more productive when creating layouts.  With a good sketch on hand, I can complete one in 2-3 days if I am able to have 1-2 hours a day to play in my little studio.  Although I love making mini albums, layout is still my favourite because it gives me lots of room to play around.  On the other hand, mini albums, for me, are like tools to keep records.
2. 2012 Chinese New Year Mini Album - I spent relatively more time than before with my family in this past Chinese New Year.  Lots of pictures, too.  From making the turnip cake to watching Chinese New Year parade, I found myself truly involved in this occasion this year, a lot more than before.  A nice little album will make the memory last.  The kids will love it.
3. 2011 Mexican Riviera Cruise & Southern California Trip Album - This is a VERY special trip to us all, and I'm planning to make an "amazingly beautiful" (a.k.a. big fat) album dedicated to this trip.  The album will be a mix of my usual mini album format (ie, full-page patterned paper as background) and a Project Life album format so that it can accommodate lots of info and pictures.
4. 2011 Portland & Seattle Trip Album - As this is the first road trip we had with the kids, I would like to document it by creating a simple album.  Making use of a photo album picked up at Winners is my plan.  It's a really beautiful album at exceptional price!  I'll be trying to use scraps of paper and simple embellishments.  The goal here is to document the first road trip of the kids.
5. 2010 Beijing/Guangzhou Trip Album - This trip has lots of "first" in it: the first time for me to go back visit in 10 years; the first time for Justin to go back visit since he came to Canada in 2001 (and his first time to go back visit Beijing since 1997); the first time for my dad to go back visit since 2002 (and his first time to visit Beijing again since 60's); and, of course, the first time for Charles and Abby to go to China.  Again, I've decided to make this album as simple as possible by utilizing another photo album I picked up at Winners.  I think I'll just use scraps to finish this projects along with some simple embellishments to add some interest.
6. Sweet Mini Album for my friend - This will be a small project, and the empty toilet paper rolls that I've been collecting for some time, will be turned into a sweet mini album. :)  It's a token of thank you to a good old friend of mine.  He's a lifetime good friend to me and Justin.  His little girl's pictures will be tucked into the album.  I bet he's never seen anything like this before!
7. 2012 December Daily - This year I'll definitely scale down this project.  What I have in mind is the Project Life format that allows more room for pictures and journalings yet in a compact size.  To add more interest, I think I'll use various formats of the protectors instead of just one throughout the album like the real Project Life album.

That's all I have in my mind so far.  But if we'll be going on trips later this year, the list will go on.

This gives me things to do.  This is what I love to do.  This gives me opportunity to sit down and be myself although it may be just a little while.  This is really therapeutic, at least to me.

December Daily 2011

Hello everyone!  Hope all is well with you.  Today I want to share my December Daily (yeah, finally) just before the weekend.  After the weekend, I'll have some new stuff up in the store for your shopping pleasure.  If you haven't used your Rebate Coupon, it may be an opportunity for you to use it. :)

I finished it a while ago but didn't have any chance to take some good photos of it.  As I mentioned before, this time I used some chipboard as the base of each page and therefore made a super thick album.  I like how the pages have turned out as I added some "paper engineering" this time to add more interests, but I honestly don't like the thickness of it.  Anyway, let's jump right into it and see if you have the patience to go through them all. :)

I personally like this intro page a lot as it looks like an art journal page to me.

On December 4th, we went to watch the Santa Parade in downtown.  I wanted to show more pictures of this and did this ~~

This is how it looks when the page is opened~~

Neat, right?  There's more of this kind of hidden pages to come.

I used a journal page to create this ~~

This is what's inside~~

On the eleventh day of Christmas, dear Kathy and Izzy gave me two gorgeous handmade cards and a bag of yummy cookies.  I wanted to include these cards in this album and made a pocket for them.  The above card was made by Kathy, and the following was made by Izzy.

And this is how the pocket looks~~  The tag is for the cookie bag.

Here I used a Fancy Pants Tradition Printed Transparency to show more pictures.  Love the swirl at the top.

The picture is actually a pocket for the receipts from the shops we visited that day, including Michaels.  Believe it or not, with tons of stuff for me to play with, I still shop at Michaels ... well, sometimes. :)

Another pocket here to house the grocery shopping on that day.

I wanted to include so many pictures on this special day and really gave some thoughts of how to display them beautifully.  I love how the next two spreads turn out~~

This is the inside of the extra little page, including pictures of the kids opening presents.

See where I put my journaling of the day :)

Same concept here.

Finally the last page!  I actually don't like this page because of the colour.  But, well, I've done it again for 2011 - another December Daily.

Here are some other looks of the thick album.

Four binding rings are used to bind the album.  I'm still thinking of other ways to bind it better.  If you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

I really enjoyed the whole process.  When seeing my kids busy flipping the pages and singing Christmas songs at the same time, I feel so happy and content.  If you're still here with me, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your great patience.  In case you're curious, I used mainly Authentique Paper's Wonder collection and Bo Bunny's Noel collection to build this album.

Thank you so much for stopping by and reading this long post to the end!!!!
hugs,
Yolanda