Enjoying the children

Last week my parents in law who watch my kids for me while I work went away on holiday, so I took leave and stayed home. Besides the oven blowing and the electricity tripping, and a few near misses while trying out all new recipes, I enjoyed having the boys to myself a lot. I'm not sure the feeling is mutual though, lol, they are not used to having mom watching over them all the time!
I realised although Ryan rarely calls anyone, he receives many phone calls from his friends. His conversations are now full of phrases I never use, like " that is so not me..." and he never says "yes" to me anymore, he says "obviously" instead! I can get him to help me out with the journaling and titles for my scrapbook pages, like the "In the Tomb" layout below. How sweet right?
Jared is still innocent and cute, but such an "interesting" kid. The other day his teacher called me and said Jared left stuff in school which he would need for revision. I went to school and picked up an entire stack of books, files, art folio..!! On Thursday evening, they have classes at a chinese language school about ten minutes walk away. We always walked the distance but he was grumbling and wanted to take a bus or taxi. When Ryan called him a lazy bum, he said " I'm not a lazy bum, I'm a sign of the times." I think my eyes rolled three rounds!! All classic moments I must capture in my scrapbooks! For now the blog will have to keep records for me... :)

Here are the layouts I completed this week. I'm getting to a point where I'm despairing if I will ever finish this US trip, have I started a bigger project than I can handle?? But I love the process and can't speed it up. Oh well, a happy problem!
Another love affair with the art at the MET! We are no artist nor critic but we do love impressionists.
Credits: Background paper by Gina Cabrera, blended with Ami Collofello's scalloped paper, stitch also by Ami Collofello, blue ornamental swirl by Goretta Rocha.
I can't say I greatly enjoyed the armour gallery, but the boys and daddy were thrilled!
Credits: chain and hinge from Miss Mint's Wild Weekend, note paper by Tangie designs, knight sketch by LeslyB, mesh by Kim Christensen, striped paper by Nangy Kubo, folded edge by Gunhild, background paper by A Work in Progress by Vicki.


And the templates are available in the store here thanks for looking!

And us at the Egyptian section of the MET

Credits: Black paper from Lauren Reid's BlossomShine, red paper from BiebelScraps Pyramid Collection, Alpha from Natalie Braxton's Snippy bets
This template will be available in the store soon

Shutterfly printing guides

Thanks Kaylee for pointing out the Shutterfly printing guides/templates to me! How did I miss those before? I understand the allowances required for bleeds and trim much better now. My US trip book will be much easier to make when I get there. Yeah!
So if you are thinking of printing through Shutterfly, do check these out here. Thanks again Kaylee.
Thank you Debra too, you can email me at "yindgs at yahoo dot com dot sg" THANKs!

Comments and Replies

It's been a really busy week after the long weekend, not much scrapping done yet, but I do want to reply to some of the comments and questions you have left for me. Apologies that I only get to them once in a while!

Dear Nikki asked me if I know of any inspirational websites or blogs that might help to make only one or two photos look awesome on a page. Well, Nikki, I've not been around the sites and blogs much lately, but I've always loved Ksharonk's simple stunning pages, her blog is over here, and a more recent I've been loving Liz Tanamaha of Paiseley Press' layouts and designs, she has an elegant and chic style, check her out here. There are some stunning single photo pages out there with lots of embellishments, but i'm not familiar enough to recall the sites where I saw them.

But I have been to DST few days ago and found this amazing thread where everyone shared their favorite new kits or designers. Oh my, the stuff I've been missing out! I'm very tempted to do a lot of shopping! Go see it here!

Now, I got my Shutterfly photo book back and it is the first time I had a double page layout printed in it so I want to show you how it looks:

By the way, I love it! :) As I expected, the portion near the centre fold is slightly hidden, as you can see, Jared and I were in the centre bottom picture, but only Ryan shows up well. But I am so happy that the bigger picture at the top of the beach still looks 'straight' and not distorted, and the whole double page has the centre fold effect.

I just want to highlight this, and remind that in your layout, if you use these double page templates, to be careful to place important photos or faces slightly away from the middle.

In fact, the only thing I was disppointed with the printing was that the outer edges got slightly cut off, which I did not expect. Sarah G shared her tips with me recently which I find so good, here's what she does: "I use Elements 5.0 and have been having trouble figuring out the gutter for the two-page layouts when I print my books at Shutterfly. I realize not everyone uses that service, but I just got my 2007 book in (I used a bunch of your templates), and I finally solved my problem.
I have a tool that I can use to set my own guide presets. I set them at vertical .125 inches, 11.75 inches, 12.25 inches, and 23.825 inches, horizontal .125 inches and 11.825 inches. I don't put important details from photos or words in the 1/2" gutter in the middle or on the outside edges, and it worked perfectly! Even though details were lost, nothing looked distorted like it did when I just "eyeballed" it. Thanks Sarah! I've been using your idea since you shared it with me with my latest layouts. I now realise I have to go back and re-do the journaling on my Ground Zero layout before I send to Shutterfly for printing! Just to illustrate Sarah's method, for template 53 below, avoid important details in the edges and middle as marked.
Here's the part of the guide in case you haven't seen it, and Paula B has kindly told me that in PSE 6, you have to simplify the layer before you can "group with previous layer". Thanks Paula!
Well, that's all for tonight, I'll be back in a few days with more layouts, I hope :)

A grand weekend!

It's a grand long weekend for us, we celebrate our nation's 43rd year of Independence (yes, we're young!) tomorrow, tonight the Olympics starts, and the boys have two birthday parties to go to, and we an old freinds' get together BBQ.. phew!

Weekends are so precious. Recently dh and I have been recalling how when we first got married, we were working so hard at our young careers, that weekends were all we had time for each other. One day back then we calculated how many weekends we'd have, if we lived to a certain age, and were shocked to find it was only about 2,500 weekends!! And now we only have 1,700 or so to go!! Besides worship at church and visiting my mom every sunday, at one stage we used to bring the boys out somewhere different every weekend, at another we had a schedule of speech & drama and Mosaic classes, hhmm... now we are basically doing the library and piano class routine... still, as long as it is family time, I guess it's time well-spent. How do you spend your weekends? May we all spend them thoughtfully. :)

Finally got the layouts done. Was not 100% pleased with them, but Im stopping myself from being too perfectionist, and focus on scrapping and recording memories. I still have Orlando pictures to go! And then I would have spent the entire year just scrapping last year's trip!!! Urgh! I'm glad I did the Everydaylife album (by Ali Edwards) starring our everyday life circa 2008, that covered a lot of ground quickly!

Here's all our night shots in NY, I had great fun putting the fun, whimsical touch to this!Credits:Skyline by IKDesigns, everything else from "Paint the sky with stars" kit by Lazy Kitty, loved it!


And this is us at the Natural History Museum.. i'm trying out a 'straight' style, hehe, I'm actually a linear and minimalist girl at heart, though I have recently been having lots of fun with 'skewed' photo layouts. :)
Credits: Green paper by AndreaDesigns, Brown paper by CorinaNielson, flower petal by HeatherAnne Designs.



As usual, the templates for these layouts are available in the store here Thanks for looking!

And finally, here we are at the top of the world....


Credits: Journaling tag by RetroDiva, Foil Stars by DaniMogstad, and gold pewter alphas by DirtyFeetsDesigns.

Oh, and HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEKEND EVERYONE!!!
This template will be available in the store soon

Bit of Blogging and Lots of Inspiration!

I've started 3 layouts but none are completed, so sorry, no template today! I need to focus on scrapping, so I tell myself the only templates that get out are from my own layouts. As you can see, I'm still scrapping my trip from last december!! LOL

One reason I'm slow in scrapping this week is that my dh did some scrapping! He's a teacher and had some photos of trips with his kids and I persuaded him to use one of my templates! Woo..can you tell I'm thrilled??

Been wanting to update my blog on the computing situation with my boys. If you have been reading the blog, you would know that we have huge tussles regarding computer gaming time. For a few months, dh and I resorted to removing the computer cable everyday before we left for work!! Finally 3 weeks ago, Jared asked, " If you never leave the cable in, how will you know whether we can now be trusted to keep to the rules?" So we tried, and true enough, the boys kept up with our rules, and we had not removed the cables ever since. I know for a few times, when I'm home later than usual, Jared checks on his Insaniquarium game and Ryan surfs, but they did not play the computer games, so we're quite thankful and really hope it keeps up!

And here are the inspiration. I do love seeing how the same templates can turn out so uniquely differently in each one's style.

Here are ones by Nikki, I love how she uses her photos as backgrounds. Of course, you need super photos like hers! Aren't her embellishing just beautiful?


Super cool layout by Livia, I must try black and white photos with colorful embellishments.

And have you ever seen Chicago like this? Veevs, awesome layout!

Isn't that fantastic eye candy? Thank you ladies sharing so much inspiration with us!

Soaking it Up

I'm really enjoying scrapping through our trip to the US, remembering the sights and how we felt with the boys and dh. But this week's layouts especially was about soaking it up. But more on that later.

Just want to say a BIG thanks to all your feedback about how you organise! I had so much fun reading (especially Donna's !) and am slightly embarassed that some of you actually think of trying out my very non-digital way of organising.. lol... I stuck to it because I started before I was aware of any software, and also as Sara said, I like to thumb through it, and carry it with me around the house. To answer some one who actually asked me to elaborate, I copy the kit previews into a Word document, along with the name the kit is listed in my folder (when i download, I make sure I name it along with the designer's name so it is easier to give credit later). When I'm doing a layout, I flag out potential kits with a post-it (yeah!) and then go to my folders at one go to try them all out on the layout. Actually I'm so impressed by Donna and those who actually tag each kit and each item in each kit in ACDSee, I WISH I had that! I'm seriously interested in Christie's way of organising the previews in iphoto (I could probably do it in Bridge), then I could save lots of Ink!!
One last point, I am trying to cut down on my freebie downloading and kit buying - both for time sake and for organising sake .... it's not easy ! :>

Now about the layouts. This first one was very difficult to do. How do I give the right feeling to a layout of Ground Zero?? Dh gave me the idea of turning the photos black and white leaving a hint of color. What do you think?

But mostly doing this layout brought much thoughts. Here's the journaling for my layout:
We will never forget turning on CNN that night, and thinking is this a movie, hearing the unbelievable news, then watching as the second plane hit the towers, live. The boys were babies then, but we were determined that all of us visit Ground Zero.. When we got there, I remember thinking the place is so huge. It seemed so unreal that this is where it all happened, and now everything is going on around it, except for that gaping space. We read all the words at the temporary memorial, then proceeded to St Paul’s Chapel Church. How movingly and simply the human spirit is captured here. The victim’s photos, their family’s words, the badges of helpers, teddy bears donated, pews with marks that they slept on, paper cranes from japanese people,, including survivors of Hiroshima, and posters, caps, from all people over the world to say how they feel.. We savored every bit to keep in our hearts, the boys spent more time at the information booths. So glad we made it.
Credits: Background papers by Matahati Designs’ It’s a Charmed Life, (so sorry, I can’t recall which kit I got the overlay from !), word tags from Kasharonk’s Grunge City, swirls by Nkubo, metal charm and brads by Lisa Sisneros, flowers from Mary’s Scrapgalerie, vintage heart by Gina Cabrera, flower by Lisa Hankins.

This second layout is of random photos of us wondering in NYC. We were just soaking it in. Many times when we were there dh said to us, 'soak it in!' or 'suck it all in!' and Ryan would take a literal deep breath of the air and everything, so we won't forget....
Credits: background paper by Sarah Belle, orange heart and ring ribbon by Mira Designs, black alpha by Gina Marie, hanging tag by GG Digital Designs, floral swirl by Melanie Johnson

As usual, the templates for these layouts are available in the store here Thanks for looking!

Now I don't know why all these layouts turned out to be on black background! I'm just going through a phase I guess, lol. This one is self explanatory.
Credits: glittery letters by Emily Merritt Designs, squares overlay by Robyn England, background paper by Laren Reid, word art by Jackie Eckles

This template will be available in the store soon

Organising

Am taking a break to organise my gigantic stash of digital kits. It is very important that I can see quickly what I have, so that I am able to maximise the use of all the papers, elements, alphas, etc on my layouts. You might have noticed that I mix stuff from all kits on my layouts depending on the color and look I have in mind. And I've a good old system of organising them: I print out all the previews and put them in a ring file! haha, sophiscated right? This is what it looks like:


I know there are programs to do this, but I guess I'm stuck in my old ways. It works for me! But it takes me a while to do all the previews, so I tend to let it run a few months, and then do them all at a go. And because I'm also a great freebie hunter, plus I do buy kits I really like (I think more than 80% of my layouts are from free stuff though) my ring file is now 1 inch thick!! It's my treasure trove :) !
How do you organise your digital kits ?
Last week I posted the wonderful poem by Mother Teresa, and Christie shared with me this lovely layout she made. I just love it! Thanks, Christie!

And here are some layouts by awesome ladies that I must share with you: These first two are by Sarah Belle of the moms of multiples club that she is in. Aren't they absolutely darlings? And Sarah makes awesome kits that she generously shares on her blog, check her blog out here
Here's an awesome layout by Livia who made this layout of her hometown Brazil - breathtaking, isn't it? And finally four layouts by the talented Melinda Staley, see the wonderful and rich details on all her gorgeous layouts!



Thanks ladies for allowing me to share your talents with us, and encouraging me. It really makes me very happy to see layouts made with my templates, you know :P

Anyways I was thinking to make you a quick template by tweaking one of the earlier ones, and then got carried away using it to make a layout for myself. (So far I've always made the layout then the template). It was fast! All done in an hour! So here is my latest layout and a 12 x 12 template for those of you who prefer them. Enjoy!
>Credits: paper by Chere Kaye, alpha by Natalie Braxton, chain, stamped star, and denim star, all from Miss Mint's WildWeekend This template will be available in the store soon

Living

Last week's post was on Firsts. Our first experience with snow was so exciting, we took nearly 100 photos, during that one day, and in fact that two hours or so we spent at Central Park. lol. See how I filled 3 more layouts with them below. My friend Kate wrote me and said "It's always magical!" I love that! I hope Ryan remember the joy of his first ride, every time he rides. And so far I see Jared still excitedly openning his Lego Mindstorm box the moment he gets home from school. And I still get very happy every time I think I nailed it on a layout! May we all enjoy our joys as if they were the first time!

But try something different as well, I loved Ramie's firsts: 'Some recent firsts here: surprised hubby at the airport with a weekend getaway, and got to show him (for the first time) the landscaping we had done last spring (he was deployed)' way to go Ramie! How special is that? And if you need some lifting up, and haven't seen Matt's video, check it out here

The other day I went over to my friend Tink's Blog and her blog prompt for the day was 'If someone asked for your advice on life, what ONE WORD would you choose to share with them and why?' and her advice? LIVE .Got me thinking. And I found this, by Mother Teresa:

"
Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.
Life is beauty, admire it.
Life is a dream, realize it.
Life is a challenge, meet it.
Life is a duty, complete it.
Life is a game, play it.
Life is a promise, fulfill it.
Life is sorrow, overcome it.
Life is a song, sing it.
Life is a struggle, accept it.
Life is a tragedy, confront it.
Life is an adventure, dare it.
Life is luck, make it.
Life is too precious, do not destroy it.
Life is life, fight for it.
" — Mother Teresa

For me, this verse from John 10:10 has been so true for me: Jesus said, ..." I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly." and John 7: 37,38 ..." iIf anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him."

Whatever it means to you, take Tink's advice, live!

And here are the layouts I completed this week:


Credits: Credits: Background paper, ribbon, jewelled snow flake, snowborder, all from Miss Mint’s Winter Snowflake kit, the tinier snow flakes are by Pam Lefors’ winter in july kit.


Credits: Background paper from Bluesies by Shawna Clingerman, paper trees by Nathy Geuens, snowflake border from Miss Mint’s Winter snowflake, ‘perfect’ word by Chantal.

The templates for these layouts are available in the store here


This template will be available in the store soon