Master Forger Journaling Project

Thanks for hopping to the next stop on our special blog project today!  You've likely arrived from Milissa's blog, and I am the final stop for the day:

Angela http://colestoucan.blogspot.co.uk/ 

Jemma http://just-jimjams.blogspot.com/

Jennifer http://www.jennifersjumbles.blogspot.com/ 

Julie http://www.hisglorygirl.blogspot.com/ 

Lisa H. http://lisahausmann.blogspot.com/ 

Lisa J http://thesimplelifewithlisa.blogspot.com.au/

Lynnette http://sassyscrapper2010.blogspot.com/ 

Milissa http://millermall.blogspot.com/

Rebecca http://howiburb.blogspot.com/

In case you are starting from here, the details of today's project are included in today's post on the Counterfeit Kit Challenge Blog.  One last big thank you to  Christie Zimmer at Grace is Overrated.
I approached Christie a few weeks ago about this vague idea of a project, and she was so gracious to let us use her journaling sheets as a part of the project.  Thanks, Christie!

So, here are my journaling jots, completed around Valentine's Day. You can tell that I had vacation on the brain and was coming down to crunch time on what was going to get done before I left the country (including this project :)).  If it wasn't for the last minute, I'd never get anything done at all!

I had several stories that came to mind after a bit of journaling, but one of them stuck out for my project. I had a clear winner for the "favorite part of my day" prompt. The greeting I share with my dog when I get home each day gives me a few moments of pure joy, regardless of the kind of day I'm returning from. I had an extra copy of a favorite picture of Junior, so I thought I'd do a page that captured this story for us.

About this page layout: I've recently noticed a trend (maybe not new, but new to me) toward un-clustering and un-layering embellishments and photos. You know, the way we used to do things back in the days of the sticker sneeze, just updated with today's embellishments.  Everything old is new again!  I started a Pinterest board with a few examples if you're interested. I'm no trend setter or definer, but I think the divided page protector "movement" is influencing the way people are doing their regular 12x12 pages, too.  Anyway, I wanted to try something similar and used this page by Robyn Weirlich as my scraplift/inspiration here.

Thanks again to all of you that are hopping through our projects today. Hope you learned a little more about some of the Master Forgers and found a couple of good tips along the way.  Stop by the Counterfeit Kit blog today and take one last look at this month's Mr. Linky.  It will disappear in a day or so, to be replaced with a new link for the month of March. And please stop back on Friday to see the new inspiration kit, meet this month's guest designer, and take a look at the Master Forgers' kits for the month, too.  See you then!

Post-Vacation High: Bring on March!

We're back from our vacation to Mexico.  It had its highs.....

Hello down there, Gulf Coast!

 And it had its lows:

 But the highs definitely win!

Used a few scrap supplies to decorate my Bubba mug for the week.  This one happened to be full of Miami Vice.

 But that vacation high really wears off quickly, doesn't it?  I'm already tired of being back to work, the weather stinks, there's no one to bring me drinks/food on demand,  and I don't have much motivation to catch up on much of anything around the house. Boo hoo.

Ugh.....back to work stinks!

A public shout out to Crystal, though, who stayed home from work because she didn't feel good on Monday and Tuesday but went ahead and did all our laundry and suitcase clean-out anyway.  That's called "being a trooper" around our house, and she was definitely a trooper.  

And here we are, about to start another month......I think I need some blog goals to lift my spirits and to keep me busy for the coming weeks:

• I left off with some Instagram and app related posts earlier this month.  I will get back to posting about more app uses in March.  I actually just loaded a couple more options to my phone and iPad, so I may have some success stories to share there, too.
• I almost exclusively used my phone for this trip's pictures.  I'm anxious to dig in and start a project with them, but I think I'll wait a bit.  I'm not doing a big giant album - I feel like I just finished last year's trip.  And I don't have nearly the volume of pictures that I usually have.  So I need some time to plot and plan how I want to tackle this project.
• After getting caught up on several project life weeks, I now need another round of catch-up.  I'd like to stop "catching up" by the end of March so I can finish the last few months of the project in real time.  I think it's an obtainable goal!

I also plan to share some travel stories throughout the month as I play with the pictures.  Like the one about my spider monkey bite.

No, really, I got bit by a spider monkey! That's a story that will never get old for retelling. The one in my arms above was not the biter, though.  This one climbed up in my arms to cuddle, and she made the cutest grunting noise that's apparently the equivalent to a cat's purr.....amazing life moment!

Tomorrow I'll be back with a special Master Forger project, and then Friday with a new March kit. So bring on March......a little looking forward, a little looking back, and probably a lot of living in the moment!

Tried-and-True-Pin for Valentine's Day

I've never been a big Valentine's Day celebrator. It's so close to my birthday that I'm usually focused more on those plans.  And this year I'm more focused on how to make all the sunscreen and beachwear fit into my suitcases than anything else.

But I thought it would be good to pause and say Happy Valentine's Day today! So, in case you're like me and are looking for some little way to celebrate, without a lot of commitment or to do, I thought I'd share this pin from my Printables board:

Maze printable available at Printactivities.com and pinned here on my board.

Print it for someone else or spend ten seconds alone in your head and solve it yourself.  However you celebrate (or not), there's nothing wrong with sharing a little love today.  Happy Valentine's Day!

Dragons, Paczki and Packing

Happy Fat Tuesday!  Or, around here, Happy Paczki Day!

I had to stop at Buckeye Donuts to pick up a receipt. Darn.  So I had to get a Paczki, since it's Mardi Gras and all. The receipt wasn't ready, so I have to make another trip tomorrow morning.  Double darn.

And Happy New Year!

The Dragon team from Crystal's Tai Chi school.  It was a fun show. They performed 30 shows over the past few days. The New Year holiday keeps them busy!

The year of the Snake....Not sure what it means, but so far I think it's lucky for me: We left this Chinese New Year celebration on Sunday night, and I found a $20 bill! 

It's a busy week of anticipation around our house.  Vacation is coming, so most everything we do is in preparation for packing and traveling.  As I expected, between getting over a cold and the travel plans, I haven't accomplished any scrapping, so you won't see much work around here for the next couple of weeks.  I like my house to be pre-vacation clean , including my scrap room.  Now that it's clean, I don't want to make a mess.

So for now, we're just living life, and I thought I'd share a few Instagram pictures from the past week.  As I've mentioned before, I'm trying to use Instagram more regularly this year, and I'm hoping for good enough wireless reception at our resort to be able to post a few photos from Mexico.  If you'd like to follow along, I am Rldelo on Instagram. Also, you can now follow your Instagram feed from a desktop computer; Just log-in to your account to see that feed.

Until then, this is about as exciting as it gets around here.  Gas station news.  Anyone else as saddened by this news as I am?!?!

One last picture for today.  I have several posts to do regarding photo apps, but this one is quick and easy to share. The InstaWeather app will add a weather overlay to any of your pictures.  I paid the $1 for the pro version, which gave me several options for placement of the weather info onto the picture.  

This one worked perfectly on this picture I snapped last week.  I pass this sign at an art building on my way to work every day, and I finally got out of the car to take a picture.  Anyway, the weather overlays can be placed wherever they fit best on the picture, in several different formats.  Lots of fun for a Project Life picture, don't you think?

I'll get back to the scrapbooking related posts later this month, but thanks for reading today.  Have a great rest of the month!

February Counterfeit Kit

Welcome to February! A new month means a new Counterfeit Kit Challenge. 

Update: I just rearranged this post's text and pictures this morning, so I'm back in action.  My complaint for the day: Blogger is pretty user friendly from a desktop, but the Blogger app for mobile devices, frankly, stinks.

Now on to the kit!

This month's inspiration kit is Chasing Pavements from Scraptastic Kit Club.

The inspiration kit.....full of greens and blues.

I had none of the Chasing Pavements contents, but I had some very similar papers, so I went from there. I've put together a lot of stuff (you might actually find a kitchen sink in there somewhere) just because I couldn't stop pulling these blues and greens from my stash. I used my scrap bin and Cricut to make a bowl of arrows and confetti, too.

My kit - papers are mostly from years of collecting Jillibean Soup, with a few other pieces thrown in there, too. I guess those colors have been popular for awhile! I pulled scraps from my red, yellow and orange scrap bins to cut the arrows with my Cricut, a counterfeit of that sheet of Studio Calico arrows.  I added lots of other bits and pieces that included the colors of the inspiration kit, so I have plenty of stuff to work with this month!

I usually pick pics first, then kit. But this month i have no idea what pictures I'm going to scrap. That's pretty scary for me!  But my biggest challenge for the month? We fly to Mexico in just a few days, so I imagine this big kit will be a work in progress for months to come. Who knows, maybe it will end up being the start of my next Mexico album.

Oh, almost forgot to mention that I made my collage picture with the PhotoGrid app that I mentioned last week on a post about photo apps. Last night at 9pm, when I was in a mild panic because of some laptop issues, I had to figure out how to get my pictures into this post with just the use of my phone or iPad, and that PhotoGrid app saved my night.

I am the last stop on the Master Forger hop today, so please visit the CKC blog for this month's challenge info and the new Mr Linky page for links to all your kit work.and I'll be back later this morning to clean up/rearrange my post a bit. For now, my kit pics should be below: