InstaLove - Modern Masters - Hurricane Sandy

I put this page together tonight while watching the TV coverage about Hurricane Sandy. All I can say is wow. I wonder what long term devastation this storm is going to cause. I wonder how people are holding up right now - as I'm typing this blog post. I wonder what we, in the midwest, can do to help. I wonder what I'll see/read on the news in the morning. As I put the finishing touches on this page we watched David Letterman. Because of the storm he had no studio audience. That was so weird. I wish everyone good luck.

Now ... on a quick scrapping note ... yet another page using Modern Masters. Apparently I'm in the groove. When I saw this template I had an idea what I wanted to do with it. Then, on top of that, Audrey Neal (Audacious Designs) at Design House Digital is having a retirement sale, so this afternoon I did some shopping and purchased her Insta Frames (and the cool Uppity Birdy font I also used on this page). I knew just the pictures I wanted to scrap with these frames ... and that I wanted to use the Modern Masters. I guess I just had to scrap a page tonight.

Now I'm tired and I'm off to bed. Anxious to hear the news in the morning.

Click here for a list of credits.

So much to be thankful for

About two weeks ago, as we were heading out one Sunday morning to go to my nephew's confirmation ceremony, I asked my family REALLY nicely if they'd come outside with me to take a family picture. They're always (ok, almost always) good about that. (I do have teenaged kids though so sometimes they're just-not-in-the-mood to pose for a picture. I can understand that.) We set up the tripod and grabbed the remote shutter clicker (what ARE those things called?) and snapped some pictures. We had some competition over who got to use the clicker thingy (again, what's it called?), but we got a picture of us that I liked. Yay!

I used one of Simply Tiffany's Studio's new Modern Masters templates for this page.  I changed it up up a fair amount to "make it mine" but I love the way the page turned out. Usually, when I use the Modern Masters, I end up with a much more graphic style page. It's kinda fun like this too.  (I LOVE the Masters template series!). I paired my layout with Design by Dani's Softly Falling fall kit and voila ... so much to be thankful for!

For all of you on the East coast. I hope you're staying safe with the storm. We've got the news on now and it's really pretty scary out there. Good luck all!

Click here for a full list of credits for this page.

Our San Francisco Photo Book (vacation 2011)

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly photo books are the new way to preserve your memories. Create your own today.

I just got an email from a friend asking if I'd share a link to a Shutterfly book I created last year using Simply Tiffany Studio's Modern Masters templates collection. (Tiffany has created more templates in collection since then ... maybe I should go on another vacation!) Of course I said SURE. I love to share my photos! BUT ... could I find a link to the photo book? Nope. I was certain I'd posted it on my new blog. I like to have all my albums on my blog so that when I find myself with time I can look back at family photos. (Yup, I LOVE looking at photos every chance I get!) Apparently I hadn't. Hmmm. I'm glad I know it's wasn't there, cuz now it is!

I just looked back over this album. I have to tell you, I've created a bunch of bound photo books over the years and this one might just be my very favorite. First off it was a great trip, but more than that I just love all the scenery photos, etc. (I LOVE San Francisco!) Another fun thing (as digi scrappers can appreciate) ... this was such a FAST book to put together. Seriously, I can't believe how quickly this book went together! Hmmm, my favorite and fast. Win. Win.

So ... enjoy! (As I can too now when I find myself with time to spare!!)

Have a great Sunday!

P365+1: Week 43: October 21 - October 27, 2012

An ordinary week at home, with lots of silliness and laughs. Life is good!

NOTE ... in case you're wondering, read the journaling on the page. I'm not really a lush. LOL! I'm just giving the kids a laugh!

Tips & Tricks for Photoshop and Photoshop Elements: How to Recolor Elements

Just thought I'd share something with all you digi scrappers out there. Every Wednesday Tiffany of Simply Tiffany Studios does a Q&A Wednesday video tutorial. She's on week two and Q&A Wednesday has been great (last week it was on shadowing). Very helpful. This week's tutorial video is on how to recolor elements in Photoshop and Photoshop Elements. Tiffany is an awesome teacher and if you're wondering how to do this particular trick, you might want to check out her video. (I'd check it out even if you're already a seasoned digi scrapper.)

FYI, I've been been digi scrapping for a years but I'm ALWAYS open to new ways of doing things. I've been recoloring my elements for a long time, but Tiffany demonstrated a way that is a bit different than I do it. I like her method better than I've been doing it so I've got a new trick to add to my tool box. Yay!

So ... if you want to check it out. Click here and you'll be linked up to her blog post!

P365+1: Week 42: October 14 - October 20, 2012 + MEA weekend getaway

Sharing a bunch of photos from last week as well as a bunch-o-photos from our family getaway weekend last weekend over MEA. What fun!

A weekend at the lake ... Cedar Point Resort

I looked out my window at work today and what did I see? Snow. Yup. Snow. OK, it is the end of October so it's completely reasonable that we'd have snow but I'm JUST NOT READY FOR IT! So ... putting this page together and looking at this random collection of photos that I took one weekend this summer that we spent with the family up north at Cedar Point Resort makes me even less ready for winter. I want just a couple more weeks of summer! That's not asking for too much is it? (FYI, the snow is gone already so it didn't last! I knew it wouldn't. Yay!)

On a scrapping note ... Tiffany Tillman (Simply Tiffany Studios) just came out with another set of awesome Modern Masters Templates. She never ceases to amaze me with these templates. I love this clean blending/masking style. I think I might be drawn to them because so often I use a large photo on the page and I LOVE LOVE LOVE large focal photos.

FYI, talking about Modern Masters ... last year I created an ENTIRE book for our spring break vacation to San Francisco using the first two collections of modern masters and I have to tell you, it might just be my favorite photo book. Anyway ... check out the whole Modern Masters collection at Design House Digital!

A full list of credits can be found here.

The lazy days of summer ... Relaxing on the deck at Cedar Point Resort

I absolutely love the beautiful fall weather we've been having. I have to admit though that as I created this page last night I was missing summertime already!

On a scrapping note ... Tiffany Tillman (Simply Tiffany Studios) just released a bunch of awesome new templates. I created this page using her Peppermint Twists Set No. 2. They're great. I'll definitely be doing more pages using them! Tiffany has also got some new Modern Masters coming out too ... my mind is working. Whatever should I scrap using the Modern Masters? Good thing I've got so many photos to choose from!

The summertime vintage-y kit I used for this page was the Hello Sunshine kit by Dani Mogstad (Design by Dani). I love the muted colors!

Click here for a full list of credits for this page.

Just us girls (MEA weekend)

We enjoyed a fun family getaway weekend in southern Minnesota this past weekend. I've got a bunch of photos to scrap, but to start off with I thought I'd put together a page with this photo of me with my mom and sisters.

Splendid Fiins (Nisa) is pure genius. Next week she's coming out with a couple of "BYOB - build your own background" - chevron masks. They are just so fun! I loved playing with it for this page! Pink Paislee is also coming out with an awesome fall color themed kit on the 5th called Prairie Hill. I loved combining all the colors and patterns for this page.

I'm getting in a bunch of scrapping this week. Love it!

Have a great day!

Click here for a full list of credits.

It's all about the shoes - my daughter's new boots

It was a happy day for my daughter ... she got the UGG boots she's been wanting for YEARS! It was fun to see her so happy! It's turning out as I expected it would ... she wears them EVERY single day. No need for any shoes other than tennies for sports. Fun!

You can find a full list of credits here.

It must be a guy thing

Happy Tuesday all. I'm sitting here writing this post at Caribou Coffee. Just a little change of scenery. I was out and about, had some time to kill and decided to get a cup-a-coffee (OK, admittedly a high calorie coffee ... a Turtle Mocha ... yum!), and finish up a layout I started last week but didn't have a chance to finalize. I'll head home soon, but I'm enjoying my quiet time for a little bit.

For this page I played with a TON of Splendid Fiin's super fun kits. I can't say enough how much I adore Nisa (Splendid Fiin's) playful style! Click on the link below my page to get a full list of credits!

You can find a full list of credits for this page here.

P365+1: Week 41: October 7 - October 13, 2012

Happy Monday everyone!

It was another busy and fun week. Some of the highlights were:

• Homecoming!
• New UGG boots for my daughter. She has wanted UGG boots F*O*R*E*V*E*R it seems like and I can't express to you how happy she is to finally have some. Until now we told her they were too expensive and she had to wait until her feet weren't growing anymore. (We told her we couldn't justify buying expensive boots that would only last a couple months or a year at most before she'd grow out of them. She's a size 10 now and is very much hoping her feet are done growing!) FYI, we want her to understand the value of a dollar so she has to pay for half the price of the boots and is working off the money. She was very willing to do that if it meant she got the boots she's been wanting.
• My husband was gone all week to Europe for a business trip. With the time change and the busy-ness at home we didn't get to talk to him very often.
• The kids and I, along with a friend of my son's, volunteered at Feed My Starving Children. Packaging food at FMSC is always a very moving experience. We packed food at FMSC the same evening we bought Lauren's boots ... which got us talking about the fact that there are so many people in this world who are literally starving and here we are buying boots and that we should appreciate how lucky we are. It got us talking that it's great that we're packaging meals but that we should also donate money to buy the food tonight as well. It was a very good - productive - conversation. (On a side note, as I type this, I think I'll chat with my daughter and suggest that the money she earns to pay us back for her portion of the boot expense should be donated to FMSC as well.)
• My son volunteered at our church on Sunday for fall clean-up day and that evening he also helped prepare and serve meals for a big community night. (His 10th grade health class required the kids to do a minimum of 5 hours of community service as part of their health grade. I believe it was to help them with their mental/social health. What an AWESOME homework assignment!) He had fun volunteering by the way!
• Volleyball practice and tournament
• Reffing soccer games
• Just regular stuff ... 

Have a great week!

Grandpa's Car

I love scrapping some of the little moments in life ... Grant and Grandpa driving down the highway together for the first time is one of 'em. Great job guys!

I used Dani Mogstad's (Design by Dani) Dapper Dan kit. I loved all the retro masculine elements and fun papers! You can see a full list of credits here.

I want to remember ... (Valentine's Box)

I want to remember the little things. Like this awesome Valentine's box that my daughter made for her 6th grade class. What better way to "remember" than to put it in a scrapbook page?! I know these kinds of projects are normal now-a-days at this age (well, actually, it's really tapered down now that she's in middle school), but down the road I'm not going to have all these fun things sitting around. I want to remember!!!

I used a TON of Splendid Fiins products for this page as well as Nancie Rowe Janitz's watercolor splat brushes. If you'd like to get to links to all of these product, click here to be taken to my Jessica Sprague gallery.

Us ... my DH and me

A super quick page of my husband and me.

Credits ... a gorgeous quick page by Jessica Sprague and a few personalizing touches of my own added in for good measure!

Happy scrapping!

1 event - 4 pages - 4 completely different styles

I made 4 scrapbook pages for our one camping trip this past summer. I just looked at them together and - hmmm - could their styles possibly be more different? Good thing I'm not one who feels that my pages need to match next to each other in my scrapbook, or really coordinate at all for that matter. I like my pages to be individual - just depending on my mood at the moment. I guess that's exactly what I got! Ha!

For fun I'll show you all four pages. Most of the pictures are taken on just one day. Yup, from this you can probably also determine that I love to take pictures! 

I love digi scrapping!

Our family camping trip to Mystery Cave State Park

We had a busy summer for some reason (I'm not sure why) and only had time for one camping trip. It was kinda sad. We usually try and go three times every summer. Good thing we had such a fun time on the one trip we did make! I suppose you can say we packed 3 weekends worth on fun in one!

We went with my sister and her family to Mystery Cave State Park in southeastern Minnesota. We'd never been there before and we wanted to explore the caves (we went spelunking - don't you love that word?) and visited some of the nearby towns. It was a great time! Since we were going to be away from the camp site so much of the time, we decided to kennel our dogs. You know, I love having the dogs with us, but it sure is a lot easier without them. Besides, I think that for Maggie, going to a kennel is like us going to a spa. She's so happy there. Plus ... we woke up to rain on Sunday morning. That makes packing up the pop-up camper (and my sister's tent) much more difficult ... PLUS the dogs would have been a muddy mess. Good thing we had just us to contend with. (FYI, we still had a good time on Sunday despite the damp weather!)

Anyway ... here's my general camping page ...

(FYI, I used Splendid Fiin's Life in a Nutshell templates and journaling cards. Super fun stuff! I love her whimsical style!) Here's a link to the full credits.

Spelunking at Mystery Caves in Spring Valley, Minnesota

Journaling reads:
We had fun exploring the Mystery Caves with the Johnsons during our camping trip to southeastern Minnesota. We enjoyed the tour, but I have to admit, for some reason walking down slippery steps and trails underground really made me nervous. I grabbed Rachel’s hand for support and she gave me a look that clearly said: “Really? You’re holding my hand?” I reminded her who rescued her from the “terrifying haunted trail incident of 2010.” Needless to say she held my hand!


Thanks Rachel by the way!

I have to say, looking back at my more recent pages, I really do seem to like multi photo pages. Maybe it's just because I have such a hard time deciding what photos I am not going to put on my pages. I always try and make sure, when we're doing something with a group, that everyone (or at least as many people as possible) are in the pages so years down the road we can look back and see everyone in our younger days! That's important, right?!

Credits for this page are here.

Back to scrapping...

Amish Country - Part Photo/Part Sketch Technique

I have to tell you that this page was really fun to create! For a while now I've been wanting to create a page using part photo/part sketch for the focal photo. I've been holding off though because I just didn't know what kind of photo I wanted to try it on. I finally decided tonight that the scenery/setting photos I took during our visit to Amish Country in Harmony, Minnesota this past August would be perfect. Seriously, what a fun technique. I'm sure I'll be using it again on future pages!

FYI, for those of you wanting to try out this technique, I'll link you up to the short tutorial I used to create this effect. I found the tutorial at OScraps. (Ok, in truth my friend Miki found the tutorial and sent it to me. Thanks Miki!)  If you want to give it a try, click here for the tutorial.

FYI, the only supplies I used on this page were a nice soft white paper from the Shabby Princess Occasions kit as well as Katie Pertiet's Matte Black Vintage Frames No. 1 and Carina Gardner's Essentials Frames for the inked edge border.

Happy scrapping!

Our awesome new neighbors

We've got new(ish) neighbors. They moved in last fall. We really like them a lot and they've got two absolutely ADORABLE little kids. They completely remind me of my kiddos when they were little like that. Ahh ... trips down memory lane.

My daughter adores these kids and they have taken quite a liking to her as well. It's so sweet, they come over all the time and play with my daughter in the driveway. It's almost guaranteed, when they have to go home, they're sad and there are tears shed. They're so sweet. I love this photo and want to have it in the scrapbooks. I imagine in a few years it'll be fun to look back at how little they were! The same will be true of my daughter too I'm sure!

This page is scrapped entirely with Design by Dani's (Dani Mogstad's) Playdate kit. The Playdate kit is the same kit I used last night for my "Siblings" page about my husband and his brother and sister. Quite a versatile kit!

Who says we celebrate birthDAYs? I think it's more like a birthWEEK for the kids!

A fun celebration of my DD's 13th birthday!

For this page I used Dani Mogstad's (Design by Dani) super fun "Hootenanny" kit. Such a cheerful birthday kit!
For this page I want to say thanks to my friend Liz. This page is a lift of a super cute page she recently posted. If you'd like to see Liz's page, you can find it here.

Siblings - My DH with his brother & sister

I love this photo of my husband and his siblings. I snapped this photo when we were all in Bemidji celebrating September birthdays. It was fun to have everyone together for a weekend. Usually I'm getting photos of the cousins all together ... it's good to get photos of us grownups too sometimes!

I used Dani Mogstad's (Design by Dani) Playdate kit for this page. The colors are so bright and fun ... perfect for pages about little kids and grown up kids alike!

You can find credits for this page at my Jessica Sprague gallery here.

P365+1: Week 40: September 30 - October 6, 2012

Week 40 already. Wow. This year is sure going by quickly!

Happy Sunday everyone!

A day at the beach ... the final hurrah of the kids summer vacation!

The last hurrah of our summer vacation ... a day at the beach with friends the Sunday before school started. What fun!

You can find the credits for this page here.

My DD's 13 year old portraits

I had fun this morning scrapping the photos I took of my daughter last weekend. I love these pictures! She looks so darn grown up though. I'm not sure if I'm ready for that!

Credits for the layout are here!