Going slow

Oh, I've been going slowly recently, scrapbooking-wise. Just had to spend a lot more time with the boys lately to catch up on their work and prepare for their mid year exams. Ryan is very hardworking so I just need to work with him on approaching his revision in the smart way. Jared has had issues with motivation and I've had to sit beside him for hours daily for nearly three weeks now doing catch up - it's been tough for him (and me!) I'm happy to report he has put in a lot of effort and starting to feel good about his work again. As for me, my maths and science has improved significantly, it's all coming back to me! I may be as smart as a fifth grader soon! lol!

I couldn't believe it, but after years of online shopping, my credit card was frauded :( No idea how it happened, but for now I'm sticking to sites that accept Paypal only so I don't have to key in my card number anywhere. Has this happened to anyone of you?

Did managed to sneak in some shopping over NSD :) and got a few layouts out finally. For the next two layouts, I've intentionally tried to work with a white or near white background, for a change, and to bring out the colors in the photos. I find that this works really well if the multiple photos have many different colors in them, or the photos are dark colored or were taken in dark conditions. Try it! And I like putting in a border of some sort to 'ground' the layout.

Here's us wandering the streets of Harajuku - a teenage haunt and fashionable shopper's playground in Tokyo. We DID NOT fit in. Haha! But had fun anyway!
Credits: Background paper by Denise Docherty (adjusted brightness and contrast), alpha by Lili from ScrapArtist, painted buttons by BrentBoone, painted flowers by Carola Steedman and Miss Mint.
And in the evening of the same day, we made it to Shibuya, another super busy shopping area, we were suitably impressed at its famous super busy junction, the shopping was great of course!
Credits: papers by Ziggles, swirls by Sarah Robinson, dots by Kristen
As usual I've put these templates in the store

On the next few days of our trip, we went out of tokyo on day trips. Here is the first one spent at Hakone on its quaint 'zig zag' train.
Credits: background paper by Vinnie Pearce, sun motive by A work in progress by Vicki
This template is now available as a set in the store HERE