Time again for the Amazing Digital Scrapbooking Race – and this year Sondra & Asa have teamed up to take part in it.
Their first challenge is already completed and you can follow them here – remember to drop by and leave them some love.
Sondra has done an awesome job with the blog and blinkies etc, so they’re all ready to take this competition by storm.
Hi all, I hope your week is going well. It’s been a frantic one for us with lots of visitors and family get togethers.
I just wanted to touch base and show you Ann’s very first hybrid layout that she created for the BOM challenge. Ann is a hugely talented ‘paper’ scrapper who is fighting the call to the ‘dark side’ (better known to the digi scrapping world as “this really cool place with unlimited possibilities and never ending FUN”).
I’ve been taking yet another Jessica Sprague class. This one is on how to get the best out of our Pen Tablets and its been great so far.
Here is my layout from the first lesson.
ok – thats it from me…I have to get back to work.
One of my favourite designers is having a CT Call, so if you’re interested, please drop her a line at decadesigns@ hotmail.com.
Check out her store at Two Little Pixels
I look forward to seeing her new team.
Re the BOM layouts – remember to send me a link in the comments section so I can add the to the gallery. I’m looking forward to seeing your take on this challenge.
Here is Susan’s layout for the BOM – Top 10 Places she would like to visit..
I love your take on this Susan.
Thanks for playing!
It’s been a while since I’ve released a new Full Paper & Elements Kit and I enjoyed working with this one. It’s a fairly versatile kit that can be used for Home, Family, Love etc due to the word art and colourings.
You can find this here at Two Little Pixels
Papers included
Elements included
and here are some layouts –
first up – 2 gorgeous layouts by Asa
The following layout from Sondra shows
just how versatile this kit can be…
who’d have thought it would be perfect
for a football photo?
I love the outcome!
Home from Margote – thank you!
Heavy Stuff by Sharon – good luck to
your son for his studies! That certainly does
look like heavy stuff!
and finally, one from me.
Don’t forget all new releases are 25% off
for the first 24hrs. Home Sweet Home
Thanks for looking – have a great weekend.
Michele
Just a quick post tonight coz I really, really MUST get an early night (she says at almost 12.30am lol)
Firstly, thank you for the comments – I can’t wait to see your layouts!
Liddy was first to complete a BOM layout for this month with this stunning layout. Thanks Liddy for playing
We’re having a busy week with lots of visitors, but I finally got to have a play with this tonight.
Here is my layout – Top 10 Places I want to Visit
Credits: Paper & elements – Michele Stone Designz – Home Sweet Home (check back Friday night for link)
Template: Yin Templates
I hope you’re having fun with this challenge. I’m hoping to create another layout or two based on some of the other prompts. I’ll have to see how the rest of the week pans out!
Righto – off to bed – walking again at 6am and desperately need some sleep.
Catch you soon!
I’m a big advocate of the Book of Me idea but we always seem to be the last person we scrap about. A while ago, when I was still paper scrapbooking, I started my book of me.
Check out the cute door handle on my BOM!!
Anyway, friends and family have often glanced through my BOM & even though I haven’t created a lot of pages, I know from their reactions, that they love reading my stories.
I’ve created a few digital pages as well and tend to do something as the mood fits, rather than follow a chronological process. Some funny, some a little more moving and some quite random…but they all include a little slice of who I am, so that my kids – and their families will know a little something about ME!
Anyway, as a challenge to myself and to you…I thought I would run a monthly “Book of Me” Challenge on my blog.
All you need to do, is complete a layout & upload it to a gallery, then leave a link here in the comments. I will post the layouts here so that we can all enjoy them & use them as inspiration. Each month I will choose a random person and they will get a $5 coupon to my store. (If for some reason you don’t want your layout posted here, let me know. Sometimes the content may be too personal to share & I would hate to stop you recording your stories because of this).
Anyway…my first challenge to you is an easy one. It’s the proverbial Top Ten list.
Making lists is an easy way to record memories – and we don’t have to think too much about how things sound etc.
I’ve made this little card which you can use if you want to, but you don’t have to.
I want you to make a layout using the Top 10 idea, and if you want to, you can use one of the following prompts.
1. Places I want to visit
2. Things that make me smile
3. Pet Peeves
4. Favourites – ie movies, or books, or tv programs
This can include photos or not…the whole idea about a BOM that it’s about you! So it’s your chance to have fun with it…be creative!
OK – this challenge will run until the 15th February and I will have another challenge for you then. On your marks, Get Set….GO!
Back to work this week…and man, you wonder why you go away don’t you??
Unfortunately we don’t have any little fairies at our business that work frantically while we’re off enjoying the sun, and then leave our desks spotless and free of clutter, ready for our return. It always takes so long to catch up after a break away.
Walking has been a non event this week. To be honest, I had a couple of days last week where I slept through the 6am phone call, and then another day I just could NOT drag myself out of bed. To be fair, we were still in cruise mode and didn’t have to be up at the crack of dawn….and had some fairly late nights.
Anyway, I was ready to start again Monday…but failed to let my walking buddies know. I figured it must be raining every morning – until today! I thought it was about time I checked to see if they’d given up on me and crossed my name off this list of suitable walking buddies (like we all have those lists lol).
Anyway, no I hadn’t been dumped officially, I think they were waiting for me to get back to them…so I’ve missed two walks this week. Tomorrow it’s all back on again. REALLY have to get an early night I think.
Our social calendar is rapidly filling up and I think we have things on most weekends now until near the end of February.
Our girls are off to Aussie next week and Lisa is driving me nuts at work with constant chatter, planning and questions about shopping, fun parks and anything else she can think of so she can avoid the piles of work.
Arthur’s mum and Aunt arrive next Thursday, Ash’s birthday is Friday and they leave for Brisbane on Saturday. They’re only away for a week but it will be a nice break (for me lol)
Anyway, I’ve been working on a new kit this week, and although it won’t be released until the end of next week, I thought I would give you a sneak peek ….and then I figured that it would be much better to make a Desktop for February so that you could actually have something usable.
So, without further ado….here tis!
Enjoy!
Two Little Pixels is now going to put out a Weekly Newsletter (previously monthly)so be sure to sign up.
I’ve been having a bit of a play tonight on a layout/photo to use as a cover for my diary. I’m loving playing with brushes and textures etc at the moment.
The photo was taken at the beach here in Dunedin. When I took it the weather was grey and overcast. There was a rainbow perfectly positioned in the background and just as I was about to take the shot, this lady came and stood right in the middle. By the time she had left, so had the rainbow! *sigh*
Well I think that’s about it from me today..have a good week and I’ll catch you soon.
wow – I really need to give up my day job!!! I’ve had such fun this week! Sleeping late, lounging around in my dressing gown and finished some kits that have been on the go for a while, completing a couple of lessons of my Illustrator class at Jessica Sprague…and……..I’ve even scrapped!
New releases for this week include
and my layouts -
Using MSD Template 3
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Using MSD Template 5
with Paper & Elements from Gwenifer by Jopke Designs
- this kit was awesome to work with – I love the soft subtle colours.
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and a layout from Sondra using MSD Template 6
and one from me using the same template
Papers & Elements – Just a Little Smile
The next layouts are from my time at the Whanau Reunion, so although it doesn’t have all the fancy papers & elements – it certainly has the photos and soooo many memories. I ended up doing a double – but even then it is just a slice of my time at the reunion.
Using MSD Template 4
and one more using the same template but with a totally different look.
I think we’re going to have to make a book just to record all the memories over the 5 days.
I’ve spent the last two days copying all the photos to dvd…I was the official photographer (volunteered by Arthur – thank you!!) but I also got photos from others as well so we have a great selection. Over 2000 photos….(it’s going to have to be a BIG book). I have definite favourites but to be honest they all have a little memory or story to go with them, so I will have to get all the stories down while they’re still fresh in my mind.
Can I just say that I’m buzzing after making these layouts – they bought back so many memories……….Love that feeling!
Can I also say that after melting in the heat up North and not thinking I could cope, we’ve had nothing but torrential rain since coming home…ok today was not raining but it wasn’t HOT (yes this is our summer)……..remind me again why we live here!
Back to work sort of today………definitely considering giving up my day job! This work thing definitely cuts into my scrapping time!!
We haven’t been walking this week due to atmospheric conditions – but I find myself hoping that tomorrow will be fine so I can actually get up at 6am and go for a walk…….for a couple of reasons……..
1. I want to catch up with my walking buddies and find out what they’ve been up to…(might need a two hour walk for that lol)
2. I desperately need to be organised and ready to start the day early – at the moment I can’t get out of ‘holiday mode’ so I’m lucky to be organised before lunch time.
3. Even though the reunion’s are often about eating, eating and more eating – somehow I managed to lose almost 2kg…(secretly think it could be the no alcohol rule) so I NEED to keep up the walking!
I’ve had two days rained off this week so I feel like I”ve had a holiday…Now I’m ready to go walking!….I know…who would have thought… (edited to add that I did walk one day this week – and 20 mins into it the rain came down, so we got home looking like drowned rats lol)
Other than that – I’ve been listening to my Christmas/Birthday CD all night – Stan Walker IS the MAN. He has such an awesome variety of music that I just play it over and over again.
Here is the official Stan Walker website – and nope – I get nothing for pointing you in that direction,except the pleasure of sharing…
OK – I have my newsletter coming out this week with a 25% discount voucher – so if you want to be in on any “Newsletter Specials” then I suggest you sign up NOW.
enough from me…outta here!
It’s been just over two weeks but it feels like so much longer.
Our flight to Rotorua for Xmas was at 6.50am and I woke at 6.59am…hmmm not a great start! I set the alarm on my phone but forgot to press the ON….duh! We managed to book another flight for 11.20am so it worked out well and we had a relaxing morning in the end.
Rotorua was SO hot…I thought I was going to melt! In fact after two days I was ready to come home because I didn’t think I would survive the heat. It’s amazing how different the weather can be considering we’re really not that far away from each other (in the big scale of things!)
Christmas day was awesome – very relaxed, mega amounts of food and a few wines…spending time catching up with family…..and avoiding the harsh rays.
Boxing day was relaxing too and we decided to head over to Waihi Beach about 6pm to catch up with friends. We had a great night with Lynn & Steve and went for a walk along the beach in the morning before heading off to Whakatane for the Whanau (family) Touch Tournament (Touch Rugby).
This is a yearly event and Arthur’s family have won this on a regular basis for many years. The older ones are now stepping aside to let the young ones take the lead roles and it’s amazing the talent that this family has.
Lisa and I didn’t stay for the whole day – we went into town and had a look around the shops – trying hard to stick to the ones with air conditioning as the hot weather was still taking it’s toll on these Southern chicks…(weather report from home was that it was cold and horrible for 90% of the time we were away…)
Arthur had a pre reunion meeting the next day so the girls went to the beach while I caught up on washing, then we all had a swim in the pool at the motel which was awesome…finally refreshed and ready to face the 5 day reunion on the marae.
I’ll try not to bore you too much about the next 5 days except to say that all the things I was dreading the most, were my favourite things!
Day 1 was the trip around, learning the history of the family and where they came from, plus visiting the cemeteries etc. It was awesome and Williams commentary on the bus was hugely informative. It was hilarious listening to the aunties and uncles as they reminisced on days gone by. I even came back with a few stories to tell Arthur that he didn’t know about his family. We met Arthur in town near the end and had a few drinks in the sun at one of the local bars…it wasn’t long before we were joined by all of his brothers and some of his nieces and nephews so it was the perfect way to finish the tour.
Day 2 We had two unveilings – ….it was also my birthday and my group was on kitchen duties – which meant that I had to get up at 5.45am to have a shower so that I could be in the kitchen at 6am to start breakfast…hmmm Happy Birthday to me!!! LOL
I did get Happy Birthday sung to me during breakfast which was really nice and a good break from the chores ahead. It’s all hands on deck while you are at the reunion and with over 150 people, it really has to be.
We did go out for New Years Eve though and had a brilliant night – 3 generations celebrating together – then the young ones took off to town, the older ones went home, and we foolishly went on to another house and didn’t get home until 4.30am (let it be noted here that the ‘young ones’ got home earlier than their parents – hmmm – seemed like fun at the time). Not such a good thing for us though when once again, breakfast was at some crazy hour like 7.00am – ummm pass on that one….eating is over rated!
The 1st Jan was Bowls day – and I have to say that I have never met such a competitive family as this one…EVERYTHING they do is a competition! …and its pretty funny to watch from the sidelines! I was the photographer, so I spent most of my time recording the events and didn’t take part in the competition.
Bowls is another annual event…teams of 3 – playing off against each other until they reach the semi finals and then the big final. There is a trophy at stake – the Harry Merito Memorial Trophy. (which is one of Arthur’s beloved uncles)
The next day was the Sports Day – and yes – if you didn’t realise this by now – the family is BIG on sports. It was hilarious to watch the competition once again with teams splitting into their ‘working’ groups and making their way around the circuit of different events. The main event was the Tug of War – and to see the teams compete in this was an honour….there was not one team that competed that did not put their heart and soul into this. (and the photos are amazing). Lisa and Ashleigh took on an official role this day with both of them running one of the events. Even they were stunned by the competiveness with everyone trying to work out what score they had to beat and how they could best achieve this.
What amazed me was that the minute the sports events were finished – the kids – and lots of the adults were out playing scrag and cricket. Then after a BBQ tea and prize giving, it was off to the pool for yet another competitive game or two.
This was the final night so it was only fitting that our working groups got together and\ did skits for entertainment. This was another event I was dreading and I had hoped to use the ‘official photographer” card once more, but unfortunately, my team was over that excuse. We were first up and did an awesome couple of skits and thought we totally had the competition in the bag. But, true to form – as each group came on and did their thing, it was obvious that everyone had put a lot of time and effort into their acts. Even after such a long day, it was awesome to watch every one with groups of all ages, come out and perform for the rest of the family. A truly fitting end to an awesome 5 days.
A sad farewell followed the next morning as we said our goodbyes and took off to Rotorua so the girls could catch their flight home. Arthur listened quietly as the girls and I talked non stop about our favourite things over the past few days. Considering that the 3 of us were dreading the reunion and it had felt like our whole time was planned out for us, we enjoyed it so much and wouldn’t have changed a thing.
We spent the next couple of nights in Rotorua, catching up on sleep and generally just relaxing before heading off for two nights in Hamilton to catch up with friends and then on to Auckland for a couple of nights with Tracy and Walter and their adorable family. Very relaxing, lots of catching up and the perfect end to our holiday.
Reality struck as we hit Dunedin. Temperature has dropped somewhat and rain off and on all evening. Lisa and Chase stayed for tea and we’ve had a good catch up. Apart from the weather, it’s good to be home.
Now I have to spend the next week burning over 2000 photo’s to DVD’s to send out to everyone. Between a few of us, we have managed to get an awesome selection of photos and memories to capture the reunion and I’m sure a lot of them will be treasured for a long time to come.
Above is the group shot and then below that are the generation pictures starting with the 3rd Generation (middle left) 4th Generation (middle right), 5th Generation (bottom left) and 6th Generation (bottom right)
I’m hoping this week to get on to some designing again after such a long break. First priority is to burn the photos to DVD and then I will get onto a new kit – or some new products of some kind.
I will have to go into work at some stage, even though we don’t officially start back until the 18th. Its a good time for us to get some bits and pieces sorted before everyone starts back.
In the meantime – thank you for your patience. Here are another couple of papers from my Mystic Magic Paper Set
Download here
Download here
Don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter – I’m going to send out the first edition soon.
I hope you all had a great christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!
