Two weeks ago I had an all girls night out with my primary school classmates! Yes, we were classmates from age 7 to 12, and met up recently after nearly 30 years! There were more than ten of us, and we had a fantastic time reminiscing about the past, filling in the gaps, updating each other, laughing so hard all night long. It was a wonderful time, amazing too, that despite all that we had experienced these years, between us we have career women, business women, homemakers, mothers of one to mothers of four, mothers of ages 21 months to 17 years, married, divorced, chosen to be single, and so on, but it didn't matter, we were all genuinely happy for one another, there was no need to compare or wonder what could have been (something we might have done if we were still in our twenties), or might have been, at our age we know it is just great to be alive and well, and to have tried to live the best we can, and that we are all blessed with our lot in life, and all agree we definitely look better than we did all those years ago! I felt so great thinking about this that night and just wanted to remind us all to celebrate every age we are at! We are blessed! (hint: it's a great thought as I'm celebrating another birthday this week, :))
And oh yes, some news, Ryan has been accepted at one of the High Schools that he applied to, we had prayed for God's clear direction, and He answered clearly! Though we are so proud, we are also worried if he could cope with this prestigious school's rigorous standards, but God has shown, and we will and can trust and walk in faith!
Managed to complete two layouts continuing with our Japan trip photos, these are both layouts of our day at Disneysea. I'm loving the one big photo as background format again! And here are my cowboys ;P
Did you read Katie the Scraplady's article on Power Scrapping on The Daily Digi? I love what she wrote, it is how I scrap too, and she puts it so eloquently! I usually work on 2 to 3 layouts at the same time, doing each stage for all 3 layouts at the same time: gathering photos, deciding which photos go into each layout, arranging them, looking for background, elements, alpha, and so on, it moves really quickly as I can work on each little step each day with the little time I've got!
With the help of wonderful ladies Lois B and Natalie Hill (sending the templates I had lost back to me (!)) I was able to put together the old freebie 12X12 template in a pack in the store. These would be from templates # 5,7,8,9,10,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,23,30,33. They are here in the store
I've also reposted this old freebie desktop from when I just came back from the US trip. I think almost all the ones taken off file front previously are now all reposted! If you haven't got it yet, get it here
I have had requests for the older freebie templates that were taken off when Filefront close my account with them. Finally I have put all the double pages up in the store Here. Don't forget to take advantage of the sale! The templates included in this pack are templates # 20,21,22,24,25,26,27 and 36
I'm sorry I seem to have lost some of the single page templates, so will have to re-create them from the layout files again, that will have to wait!
For now, I've also put up two old freebie templates in the store page. Will work on the rest as I have time. You can download it here
On 9 August, we celebrated our nation Singapore's 44th National Day! Yes we are a very young country, and a very small land, we are a richly multi-cultural society, a modern city, cosmopolitan if I may say, we have our share of problems and grouses, we may not seem particularly patriotic, but we are proud of our young heritage, we have our unique and Singaporean ways, food, even English (which we endearingly call ''Singlish")! And most of all, this is where we call home. I'll like to share this song we love, written locally and sung by a Singaporean singer, Kit Chan, called, "Home". I'm sure you feel the same way about wherever in this world you call home. Enjoy!
Here's the lyrics:
HOME
====
Whenever I am feeling low
I look around me and I know
There's a place that will stay within me
Wherever I may choose to go
I will always recall the city
Know every street and shore
Sail down the river which brings us life
Winding through my Singapore
Chorus:
This is home truly, where I know I must be
Where my dreams wait for me, where that river always flows
This is home surely, as my senses tell me
This is where I won't be alone, for this is where I know it's home
When there are troubles to go through
We'll find a way to start anew
There is comfort in the knowledge
That home's about its people too
So we'll build our dreams together
Just like we've done before
Just like the river which brings us life
There'll always be Singapore
( Repeat Chorus )
For this is where I know it's home
For this is where I know I'm home
On National Day we went to the beach in Sentosa with our friends the Wong family and had a wonderful (and hot and crowded :)) time. This year, we had a thing going nationwide to have everyone say the Singapore pledge at 8:22pm, (where the parade is estimated to end) wherever we are. We were having dinner at the time, and some young people in the next table burst into it, and our boys followed suit (I am afraid we adults embarassingly can't remember all the words of the pledge).
This is our pledge: We, the citizens of Singapore pledge ourselves as one united people, regardless of race, language or religion, to build a democratic society, based on justice and equality, so as to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation.
It was quite a nice moment, watching our children say it with so much enthusiasm. :)
Hope I've done my little bit in introducing you to our Singapore!
Here's more layouts I completed, some 12X12s to add to our 2009 album. I've decided to add them into my 365 album for the year, rather than make a separate album. There will be lots of white 365 pages, interspersed with these, I think it will be interesting (!)
This first one is from our first rock concert in many years! (I think I've attended only 3 in my life, one of which is to Michael Jackson's concert in Singapore more than 10 years ago!) Credits: Background blended from papers by Vinnie Pearce and Lisa Sisneros, Greatest hits record & Super Star & RockOn stamp by Dani Mogstad, foil paper, and title stamp by Studio Mgl, Let's Rock strip by Susan Fitch.
And this one is from a day visiting the science centre and Marina Barrage - which is this amazing engineering thing they did to build a dam across where the Singapore river goes into the sea, making it like a reservoir, to provide water supply, flood control and a new area for water sports! Credits: background paper by Redju, journal mat from Brandy's project 365, Smile by Leah RIordan, earth and flower by Lyndsay Riches, journal strip by Misty Cato, Border word art by Weeds & Wildflowers, alpha by Brittish designs
Here is an example of how Jared's daydream finally became a reality. He is a persistent child, and a very curious and imaginative one too! Love the boy. :) Credits: background paper by Cher Pea designs, blue paper by Weeds&Wildflowers, fishing rod by Jady Day Studio, alpha by Suzy Q Scraps, fish element from Seni's little sea, daydream workart by Sahlin Studio
Here's the record for posterity of my (still) nearly a teen. (can you believe he is still twelve and about 5'8''?) He will tell me loads but if I try to pry, then I get the strong and silent type. lol. Love the boy too! Credits: background paper by Mira designs, title mat by Lisa Marie Hankins, speech bubles by Miss mint, J Crowley, Ksharonk, Mel Wilson, Simply Scraps, word art by Chantal, 'special' by K Pertiet, red alpha by Suzy q Scraps, painted alpha by Weeds & Wildflowers.
And now here's my most enjoyable 365 layout yet, I think! I got this idea off a Jounalling off the edge book, and had so much fun adding bits and pieces and paint strokes to create this. Think I'm gonna use the template more than once for sure! You can download it further down! Show me what you did with it!Credits: flower doodle by Emerritt designs, yellow paint strokes by Rachel Young, plastic paint dots by Sugar Plum Paperie, blue paint stroke by Carrie Bombria, alpha by Weeds & Wildflowers, Days words by Mel Wilson, Girls word art by Miss Mint, doodles by Scrapkitty designs, Britt designs, Megan Turnidge, Lyndsay Riches, blue circle stamp by Jackie Ecles, family element by Jay Day Studio. Download here to play. Show us what you did with it by leaving a link to your blog/gallery or send it to me at yindgs at yahoo dot com dot sg
And here is another painterly layout I did of the short trip me and dh took to Bintan (it's only an hour away by ferry). I love the graphic look I got, digging through my stuff to find these doodley pics. We had such a good time there, it's really great we still have so much fun, so much to laugh and talk about, still best friends, after 27 years of friendship and 15 years of marriage. We know we are really blessed. Credits: Background paper by Eclectic Designs by Gabi , heart element by Zazou, doodle frame on right by Traci Reed, doodle on left by Julia Can Der Werf, red dot stamps by E.M. designs, love actually word art by Faith True This template is now available as a set in the store HERE
Masv asked how do you get the words to go around the pictures? - I use the Ellipse shape tool from the toolbox in PS CS2 (press shift-u until you get it) then select the paths icon on the top toolbar that pops out. You can now draw a circle path by holding the shift key and clicking and dragging out the shape. Once that's done switch to the type tool click on the circle path and you can type away! I've included the type path in the template 133 to make it easier for you!
Alessandra asked about how to use clipping mask in psp. I'm sorry I'm not familiar with psp, I do have a link in the post here to a psp tutorial, hope that helps. (Update: Linda has posted this in comments: "PSP users can find a great free script that acts like a clipping mask in this thread at DST: linked here It works great - I use it all the time!" (thanks so much, Linda!)
mother of 2 (thanks for your lovely words!) asked if I would be having a sale soon and if the earlier freebie templates will be in the store soon. Well, yes, as soon as I can find the time! :) Actually I was mentally planning to have a sale when I hit 150 templates, but that does not look like it would be in the near future at all, so let me try to make it within August. thanks for asking!
YGS asked if I would consider selling the action I use to make the photo frames/shadows - I'm sorry, I do not use actions, but make each frame/shadow from scratch! I did try to make an action for it, but it did not work because I wanted each shadow to have different angle / lift / size depending on where it was on the layout arrangement.
Just want to thank everyone for your lovely comments and feedback and questions, greatly appreciate them, you always make my day and keep me going!
If you haven't got it yet, get it here
