$10 Classes

Everyone knows there are peaks and troughs in your life. Times with things speed up and when they slow down. Right now, I'm in a peak. Constantly going going going. Hopping from this activity to that party. I'm anxious for some downtime. I know it will come soon enough. But right now I just have to go with the flow. I remind myself that I'm living the moments that I'll scrapbook later.

I promise that one day very soon there will be tons of pretty projects to share here. Actually I can guarantee it! It's just not going to be today.

But I did want to share something and so I thought I'd do a round of $10 classes I've just purchased. These are super limited time offers so jump on them today if you can! And then enjoy a weekend of scrapbook learning :)

Boy I wish I could do that too! But it would mean missing my bestie's 30th birthday and that's just not something I'm willing to do. So for now I'll live vicariously through you!

Here's what I've purchased this week:

For a limited time only Ali has opened up here popular Scrapbooking on the Road course. I didn't get this before and always regretted that. So I was happy to see she brought it back! Price: $10

Kelly Purkey has a new class on the Craftsy website. It's a basic course. And for $10 (through today if you click on a link at her blog) I thought I'd give it a chance. I was intrigued by the interface that is Craftsy.

Styling has never been my strong suit. So I was excited to see this e-course on styling put together by Ann-Marie Espinoza. She's adorably pregnant and just reached her 37 month (congrats Ann-Marie!) and so is offering a 37% discount on classes and printables in her online shop. This class only cost $10.08. Click this link to read her blog post, get the code and see about some shopping. It's only good through the end of today (Friday)!

Have fun you guys! Scrapbooking, relaxing, learning, just enjoying the weekend. Whatever it is that you plan to do, I wish you well :)

cheers & besos,

The Bean

Hey there! How you going? It's been a lovely lazy stay at home and do nothing but scrap kind of day. Exactly what I needed after the birthday party that was thrown at my house yesterday. It was only immediate family but still, lots of ruckus in my tiny little apartment.

Today, I needed to do some quiet scrapping. Just me, my paper and my pictures. Here's one of the pages I made.

I used (of course) a Simple Scrappers sketch and a ton of fun embellishments. At first, I wasn't so excited to use this sketch in particular. For some reason it didn't feel me. So I put it aside for a few days and just now got back to it. I gave up on another idea that just wasn't going to work for these photos in this configuration and I'm so much happier for having let it go!

Since I'm taking the SC Stitched class, I thought I'd add some fun colorful stitching to the page. I hand drew a bean and cut it out of vellum before I stitched down the shape and spelled out the title.

Then it was just a matter of making a line of circular embellishments down the side of the photos. That's the part that made it me!

It was really fun to just go to my travel drawer--and yes, I have one of those--pull out a ton of embellishment packs and some ink and just go to town.

Balance is always the number one design element in these kinds of things. I think I made it work out.

With that I'll leave you to your Sunday evenings. I'm off to watch some Game of Thrones and Madmen!

cheers & besos,

Mixed Media: Mostly Ladylike

Pink & purple party over here!! I went for it. Girl-ed it up as much as I could. I don't often do that. No idea why I don't. But I'm thinking I need to do it more often because this was just fun.

This, of course, is another page I made from the Studio Calico Mixed Media class. You can see the Neocolors in action here on the sides, they're the brightest pink you can see.

I'm so glad I opened up the Crate Paper Vellum die cut pack because this "Most Ladylike" one was perfect for this page. I amended it to say "Mostly Ladylike" but I loved that it had a blue ribbon feel to it. Very appropriate for a picture from the rodeo, no?

I added in bits of stitching here and there just to add some dimension to an otherwise fairly flat page.

With just a few lines of journaling and a date stamp, the page was complete.

cheers & besos,

Art + Science of Scrapbooking Review

Y'all know I'm the biggest fan of classes. I'm bordering on being a class-aholic. Technique, challenge, sketches. You name it I've signed up and taken it. So you can imagine how excited I was to hear that one of my favorite classes was coming back around!!!

It's the Art + Science of Scrapbooking at Big Picture Classes. Seriously, one of the most creative concepts I've come across in a long time. Play with any products, use any of those photos you've been wanting to tackle just consider your approach in 2 distinct ways.

Here's what BPC has to say about the class:

Art + Science of Scrapbooking, 16 brain-boosting challenges to strengthen your creative process taught by Stacy Julian and Jennifer Wilson, starts May 15, 2014!

Class Description:

Are you a right-brained person who embraces possibility and spontaneity, thrives on imagination, relies on feelings, and thinks in symbols and images? Are you a left-brained person who practices strategy and order, finds comfort in facts, relies on logic, and thinks in words and language?

The answer to both questions is "yes!" In The Art + Science of Scrapbooking, a mind-bending workshop from Stacy Julian and Jennifer Wilson, you'll learn to harness the creative power of both sides of your brain.

In four illuminating weeks, right-brainer Stacy Julian and left-brainer Jennifer Wilson will help you embrace your natural cognitive strengths. But they'll also challenge themselves, each other, and YOU to find a new sense of balance and power as you explore the other side of your brain.

And also a lil video if you're a more visual person:

But here's what I have to say about the class:
I wonder how these two brilliant ladies thought of the concept because its so very inventive and really just darn creative!

Every week we went through two concepts (challenges). These included: Ideation, Process, Photos, Journaling, Color, Design, Product, Embellishing.

Each of the challenges has two videos. In the first, Stacy the right brained lovely and Jennifer the left brained genius issue each other challenges based on these concepts. Jennifer issues Stacy a left brained challenge and vice versa.

Then the next video is a response to the challenge. They share their page and talk a little bit about how easy or hard it was for them to complete the page. Which to me was the most interesting part!

Sometimes I easily identified with one or the other side of things. Sometimes I had done both approaches before. Sometimes neither felt like what I would do. But this was the whole point of the class! To try something different. I enjoy stepping out of my comfort zone from time to time and this was the perfect way to do that. A bit of a controlled experiment.

The class as a whole is awesome for new to intermediate scrapbookers who maybe haven't spent much time figuring out their own approach. If you fall into this category, the class is a great way to clearly understand how two people with very distinct approaches tackle these specific concepts and to see if you might like to approach it the same way.

But for me, being beyond even the intermediate stage, it was still so fun to take. I find that the longer I'm at this hobby the more the conceptual classes appeal to me. Less of this is how you do it (although I'm learning a lot from all of these mixed media classes I've been taking lately!!) and more of, here's a fun (and different) challenge or way of doing things.

Basically, I'm saying this class is fabulous for everyone, both new and seasoned scrapbookers :)

AND can I just add, you'll probably never regret taking a class from either of these fabulous ladies. Trust me when I say this, they're fantastic!

Have a look at the layouts I made:

7 pages! A few that are double paged and two of my most favorite layouts from the year =)

At the time I didn't have the chance to complete all the challenges. But I will definitely be going back through them. Looking at my pages all together points out that I took on more of Jennifer's left brained challenges and just one of Stacy's right brained. Maybe on this next run I'll focus more on the right!

Because.....I will be joining this class again

AND 

I'm lucky enough to be able to give away a seat to one of you!!

Leave a comment below, before Sunday, 20 April at 11:59 CST, for a chance to win a seat in the class. I'd love to hear how you start your pages, with a photo or a story?

If anything I've said or the video pointed out or you heard about the class has you interested, I totally recommend you to jump into this class. It's going to be fun!

Let me know if you have any questions about the class. I'm happy to answer anything or put you in touch with someone who can :)

cheers & besos,

P.S. In case you were wondering. I'm equally right brained and left brained. Best of both worlds!

Mixed Media: Weekend

I have been hemming and hawing over here trying to decide if I should share this layout, or a bunch of layouts, or a giveaway that's coming up. But no, I just need to not think too much and post!!

Ok. Here goes.

How was your weekend? Mine was lovely. I spent a happy Saturday in a mixed media frenzy. I cranked out three pages using gesso, modeling paste, mists, neocolors, gelatos, stamps and stencils. I was only planning to make the one page but was so inspired to keep playing. Celine's video from her Mixed Media class are what got me started. To note: you can still sign up!

Here's the first page I made in a blue and green color scheme. It was my first stab at the whole thing. And I thought while I was at it, I'd try a new approach. I just went to town on the paper and didn't think about my end game. I don't often create a background page before deciding on photo placement and size. But since this was my first attempt, I gave myself permission to just play and see and how it went.

I ended up really loving the process! I discovered new fun techniques (like playing with Neocolors) and really just lost myself in the play. So much so that when I went to create a "normal" page after this, I just couldn't get it going!

Since I had enjoyed the artistic play so much, I knew I couldn't stop. Creating pages like this is a bit more labor intensive. So I knew that if I had the desire to do it, I'd better keep at it while the iron was hot!

The background paper is the real star of this show, so I kept the embellishing to a minimum. These are so soooo old rub-ons from Making Memories. I'm thinking Heidi Swapp must have worked for them back then. It looks like her handwriting, no?

A smattering of patterned paper and a Two Peas flair + tape, an enamel shape and some stamping around the photo are what did the trick.

...and I made it through there relatively unscathed. I have no idea why the hemming and hawing over the what and the when was taking up so much space in my brain! I have to remember to just let go and dive in sometimes.

With that said, I'll be sharing the other pages I concocted through out the week and I have a fabulous giveaway coming at you as well! Check back for that.

Ok back to real life. Off to shower before Game of Thrones starts!

cheers & besos,

January Review/2014 Planning

How is it already February? I feel like I say that every month. But time flying by never ceases to amaze me. 

Already one month into the new year, and I’m just now getting around to sharing my plan for the year with you. I actually kind of planned it that way. I decided on the easing in approach. I didn’t want to over stress myself by trying to come up with all my plans during the busiest month of the year.

PLUS

I knew I’d be taking the Simple Scrappers Start Fresh class. I figured it would be helpful, but I really didn’t realize how much! I love my little planner with its dividers and neat little lists. I’ve already referred to it so much over the past few weeks.

So! What have I got planned for the year? Well let me tell you. [Imagine me licking my finger and flicking through my workbook pages just here]

There are some basic things I would like to accomplish in 2014.

First on the list is keeping up with my Project Life. I’m somehow managing to do this already. And that’s leaving me feeling very accomplished. It’s the batch tasking, tackling a little bit at a time, that’s helping me the most.

I decided on the Handbook approach again this year. I just love the look of these great little pages. Why mess with a good thing, right? I’ll be sharing my finished January pages and a bit about my process later this month.

Each month, I’m also planning to tackle a project. One of my unfinished projects or a new idea I’m really excited about. For the most part, these projects are a whole mess of mini albums. I have a lot of ideas for these but not a lot of time spent getting them done. There’s also a bit of catch up on older half started projects.

For the blog specifically, I’m planning to do one big card post a month. I drew up some sketches on the plane today (or was it last night....I have no idea the time’s all wonky right now) that I’m planning to use and re-use throughout the year. I intentionally made them basic so I could interpret them in a multitude of ways.

 
I’m also planning to do at least one process video a month. I have fun looking back at these. Making them just takes time. I’ve worked them into my plan so they’ll actually get done!

Since I just invested a chunk of change on Lightroom, I’ll be doing a lot of work this month specifically, on getting acclimated to the software and trying my hand at editing. It will also be part of my monthly process. I plan to edit photos for upcoming projects throughout the year.

Finally, I’m tackling all of the ephemera I’ve let pile up. It’s just sitting there in three different boxes, an unorganized jumbled mess. It’s time for me to do something about that. I’d also like to use it for one of those projects I have on the list. Incentive, right there!

So that’s where I’m going. And I have to say I’m really excited about it, as droll as those plans might sound to you. Not to worry, you’ll be excited about them each as they’re done!

And just as marker and a little recap for myself, this month I made 6 layouts, 19 cards and 36 Project Life spreads. That last number might seem like a lot, but they’re all of my December pages. I did not count them last month because they weren’t all finished. And darn if I’m not going to give myself “points” for the effort.

Do you have any big plans for your scrapbooking year? If yes, I’d love to hear ‘em!

cheers & besos,

Scrapbooking from the Soul Review

[ETA: Giveaway closed, Winners announced here]

Wow, almost the end of summer. Time never ceases to amaze me, as it flies so quickly on by. 

Matt and I drove out to Austin in July to celebrate Tara's birthday. We floated the river in San Marcos; relaxed, laughed, nearly drowned (at least Tara did) and really just enjoyed the experience. 

I bought an old school water proof disposable camera to document our drifting and only just yesterday picked it up from the developer. (BTW, its so crazy to me that not very long ago, 1 hour film developing was the norm. Now you have to send them away!).  

It was fun to open up the package to see how the prints turned out. That was the awesomeness of film photography, you never actually knew what you were gonna get. Not all of the pictures were great, lots ended up blurry and hazy. But I love them anyway. They still captured that day and these memories.

On the surface, the page and photos are about the day we spent on the river. But the journaling was all about how this is life now, none of us are married or have kids. And how carefree and lacking in responsibility our lives are--which is lovely for now!

It's like that for all of us on this page. But we're each getting older. I'm sure one or all of us will take the plunge into marriage and parenthood eventually. But for now, I'm personally content with the life of a single (marital status) childless person.

The part of my life that includes marriage and babies may or may not be very far away in the future. And one day I imagine I'll look back at these pages and remember what life was like back before the husband and the kiddos.

Journaling Reads:
I love summer for its lazy carefree laid back vibe. I love the long summer nights. What feels like all kinds of time to just breath and relax. It's not going to be like this always. One of these days we'll all get married and start having babies. Not that life will be over then. But gone will be the days of minimal responsibility, of picking up and going wherever/whenever I please. For now, I relish this time. Still not married, no babies. Still carefree.

The journaling is a bit of a departure from my usual style. That's not to say that I've never made connections or done more introspective journaling before. But this was a totally different approach for me. And I have one person to thank for it, the incredible (not so edible) Jill Sprott.

Jill has long been a favorite scrapbooker of mine. Her pages are always gorgeous and full of masterful design. But I think the subjects she chooses and the connections she makes are what have always drawn me to her layouts. She transforms pretty portraits and still photographs, into poignant and meaningful visual stories due largely to her journaling. 

Let's face it, she has a bit of a leg up on all of us in this department, being a high school English teacher and all. So I try not to be too intimidated. But it's so hard to look at her pages not feel a connection to the lady herself. Her voice (she uses her words!) come across so brilliantly in each of her creations.

As if all of this isn't amazing enough, she sat down and created a class to help each of us achieve what she does so beautifully, meaningful journaling on gorgeously designed pages. The class is aptly named Scrapbooking from the Soul and is available at Two Peas for such an insanely low price. I bought it last week and was only able to dive in yesterday afternoon. Let me tell you, the first two lessons have me completely reconsidering the foundation of my entire scrapbooking process. That's how profound the class has been for me already!

Want another example of how awesomely talented Jill is? After watching the class videos and reading through the .pdf's I felt like I'd just had a conversation with her. As if she and I had sat down to chat (over a cup of tea I'd imagine =) about this thing called scrapbooking and how meaningful it can be.

I have to admit, Ms. Sprott has an insanely huge soft spot on my heart. She has been one of the best creative cheerleaders a girl could have asked for. She actually follows this blog! She even looks at my layouts. And if there's a comment on a post here, there's a 50/50 change Jill is the one to have left it. It's the little things, right? It takes her not so much time, but it always means so much to me, to read her sweet comments.

After reading through this post, I think its safe to say that I'm an avid Jill Sprott fan. And I'd love to honor this sweet lady with a giveaway. I believe so much in what she's taught me already, that I'd love to give away to two readers, access to her workshop.

To enter to win, please leave a comment below (with your 2Peas name). I'd love to hear which scrapbookers are super stars to you! I'm leaving this open through Saturday, 31 August at 11:59 CST and then I'll draw and announce two winners! Best of luck to you all! And even if you don't win, really consider taking the class. It will be worth each of those 1,200 pennies!

cheers & besos,

Camp Scrap Review

Evening everybody! I hope you all had as awesome a weekend as I was fortunate to have. Like I mentioned, I was off in Austin celebrating my bestie. We had sooooo much fun! Added a ton of awesomeness to our memory bank. And a hoard of a new photos to my scrapbook pile! Unfortunately, back to the real world tomorrow....

It's not all bad. In the morning I get new content from an awesome class! I'm in the midst of Hello Story with Ali Edwards. Sooo good guys. So seriously good. Consider it if you haven't already, will ya?!  

Until then, I wanted to post a quick review on another Big Picture Classes workshop, Camp Scrap with May Flaum. 

Those are all the projects I completed during Camp Scrap (see them all using this link):
6 Layouts
4 Cards
1 Daybook
1 Mixed Media Piece

For a 4 week class, I think I did pretty well! Especially considering I really didn't have a lot of time to do any of this in.

So here are my quick thoughts on Camp Scrap:

• The class had tons of prompts and daily e-mails. (Initially I thought I'd get overwhelmed, but May was great about focusing on only one thing at a time, so I never felt inundated.)
• There were lots of mini classes with a variety of topics. 
• It was a fun positive atmosphere. 

Maybe I should back up a second to talk about my motivation for taking this workshop. Of course, I wanted to learn but mainly I wanted to participate in a community, pick up a few tricks or techniques, and really just use some stash! I managed all of those things and got to tick off a few items on my list of summer goals =)

Most helpful was the all of the mixed media content May provided, which was fairly new to me. I also learned to appreciate the full suite of Tim Holtz distress products. I'm in love!! But back to the class....

What I liked:

• Loved that content was released on Thursdays. Perfect intro to the weekend!
• Loved the anything goes with regard to projects 
• The variety of the content was great and very diverse
• May herself is so enthusiastic. She makes you excited to participate 

What I wished was different:

• Content more evenly dispersed as opposed to a huge influx of "bonus" material all at the end
• Make and take handouts! Could have used a few of these, especially for the more detailed ones
• Maybe a variety of styles? I appreciate May's particular aesthetic, but would have liked to see other approaches. I think guest contributors would have been fun!
• Super picky and not anything to do with May's class specifically, but I wish the thumbnails on the BPC site were bigger! It's hard to see the images easily.

All in all, I really enjoyed the class. I did pick up some tricks. I did use up some stash. I did have fun! I'd probably take this class again, if it had new content. It' was a great way to start a season of summer crafting that's for sure. It helped kick off my summer scrapbooking and still has me excited to play!

Did anyone else take it? What were your thoughts? I'd love to hear and to see any projects you might have made! I always enjoy seeing different takes on the same prompts!

cheers & besos,

Mini Book Class

Guys have you seen this?! Celine has a Mini Book Workshop at Two Peas in a Bucket!

Since my summer goals consisted of a fair amount of mini books, I couldn't not get this class! Just signed up and am diving into the materials now =)

I'll be sure to report back on this and the other classes I'm taking this summer, soon!

cheers & besos,

Yaya-Dear Lizzy Mini

Remember how weeks ago I promised to share my completed Dear Lizzy mini? Well today I'm finally doing that.

It features Crate Paper gorgeousness and my favorite photos of one adorable little man!

Thank you for stopping by =)

xxbesos

Sketchbook 3 Review

I have just one photo to share with you tonight, and this is it...

All 13 of the layouts I made using Kelly Purkey's Sketchbook 3! So before the next Sketchbook comes out, just wanted to throw out my review.

This is the 2nd Sketchbook class I've taken, the first (original Sketchbook) I won as a commenter on Lisa T's blog! Which I thought was super nice, wicked cool, awesome! =)

What made it even more awesome was that the class was done in April! And that was just too perfect since Urijah's birthday is April 20th. Which gave me the chance to make my way through the hoards of photos I'd let creep up on me.

Back then the class was 12 days long, which meant we got a sketch every day. Eeep! I fell behind but did catch back up. (Full disclosure, I wasn't working at the time so this was much easier to do).

What I liked about the class wasn't necessarily the sketches, those are abundant and free all over the web! But I did like the community and how I was "held accountable" or at the least, I wanted to be able to join in on the private message board that's up on the Studio Calico site. Getting to link up my layout based on the day's sketch was very motivating for me.

And it was the exact same this go around. I wanted to share along with everyone else! But this time, we had 3 days between sketches which was a genius adjustment.

This time also, the sketches were good, but the inspiration was awesome! Ali Edwards, Liz Kartchner and many other very talented ladies joined in on the Sketchbook fun. I found myself lifting layouts more so than following along with the sketch.

But no matter, I came away from the class with 13 lovely layouts! 8 more for Urijah's album and 5 bonus travel pages =)

I do have to comment that the $28 price point is very high for what you get. I wish it were closer to the $20 range. But there's not much to be done about that. I guess you could say I paid $2.15 per layout for inspiration. On top of my supplies! Yeah it adds up. But the inspiration is good and the community fun.

I think that I will probably only take the class if/when it's held in April. It's helps to push me over the edge when it comes to Urijah's yearly album.

So in summation, Sketchbook is a good, albeit slightly over priced class with lovely inspiration and a great community.

Perhaps see you next April?!

xxbesos

Travel Album *Debby Schuh*

Arizona Travel Album

Last year I had the chance to take one of Debby Schuh's amazing classes over at Scrapbook 911. This is what I came away with. It only took me 2 months to actually fill it with photos. Thanks to the 2Peas Archiver Crop last weekend, I got it done!

Debby introduced me to a lot of new techniques and ideas I hadn't used before. She was great about utilizing both sides of this amazing October Afternoon travel line. And she included a lot of pockets and places for hidden journaling.

I also got around to learning how to "properly" distress paper using Tim Holtz distressing ink and an ink blending tool. This already has made its way into my scrapping regime and won't be going anytime soon.

Mainly, I was just happy to scrap these photos from Becky, James and my road trip to the Grand Canyon. I got to spend an awesome weekend with two of my favorite people in the world. And I got to see one of the most spectacular sites this world has to offer!

If you ever get the chance to take a Debby Schuh class, I'd highly recommend it. Which is why I'm so beyond excited to take one of her new classes! The Anthropologie Album: Voyages is next on my class list. Can't wait until February 20!

xxbesos

j.leija