Citrus Twist Kits DT | Project Life

Hey guys!

Here's the last Project Life spread I made with my Citrus Twist kits April kits.

This week brings us back to mid-March. My brother was visiting us for the weekend since he was in North Carolina for work. We had a lovely weekend. :)

Left page:

We've got to love Project Life. Without this album I would have never printed any pictures of that special weekend. This being said, some would have printed only one photo and call it good, but since I work per event and not by week or by month, I was free to use the whole double pages spread for our 3 days together. :)

When my brother arrived in Charlotte, my husband was at work and my kids were at school. So we went and have lunch just the two of us. I'm telling that this didn't happen since 1st grade of high school. LOL  I brought my brother to our favorite restaurant, a fancy mexican restaurant with terrace. The sun was shining and we could sit outside in t-shirt. My brother arriving from  Quebec, Canada (look how white he is. haha!!), it was really fun.

Later that afternoon, we picked up the girls at the bus stop, my husband arrived from work around 5, we went to my girls' favorite playground.

The girls had lot of fun running around and playing with their uncle and I had fun taking pictures. :) We even managed to fit a little bit of geo-caching in there. :) We then went to eat on a terrace (yay for living in the South), had a beer followed by an ice-cream.

A week after his visit it would have been my brother's 40th birthday so we wanted to celebrate with him. Pat bought a cake (a fruit tart) and candles. This was the 2nd evening already so the girls were not so shy anymore and sat on him for the cake + photo. :)

Second day (notice that my spread is not 100% chronological) we started with a banana birthday muffin looking like a rabbit rear. ;) lol

And we spent the whole morning in the sunroom. Arielle had been wanting to play games with my brother for a long time so they did just that. :) That lead us to talk about how we used to play and do puzzles all the time when we were kids. (We only have one year appart and were always together).

We spent the afternoon at the White Water Center.  It was fun to eat there and look at the people fall in the water, to climb the rope and the net with the girls. My brother is a fan of the outdoors and outdoor activities so he was right in his element. (the fruit cake came that night after eating vegetables and garlic pasta I had made myself. I'm such a great cook! hahaha!!

Before leaving on Sunday, my brother wanted to go to Walmart. Yep, that was his wish. So we had lunch in another of our favorite restaurant, Cafe100, not shown here, and we headed to Walmart. We came out with several things like 2 barking, eating and pooping dogs for the girls and Easter eggs for the school egg hunts.  Great haul! My brother bought a couple of things and later forgot them in our stairs... So much for going to Walmart. I was,t shy and took a picture... not so glorious, but it does the job. ;)

After the Walmart stop, we went back home and it was time for my brother to leave. Traditional (can we say traditional if it's only the second time?) with the girls and I in front of the house and gone he was. Oh, I filmed my one second video of the girls running after the car. :) 

Wow, That was a load of (personal) information!! I wish I could have fit all that in the album. That should be the goal, right? I guess I still have to work on that: balancing in a better way the photos and the journaling.

Talk to you soon guys! Hope you enjoyed the little walk in my personal life. 

Marie

Citrus Twist Kits DT | Project Life

Hello everyone!

Ready to see some Project Life inspiration?

What I loved about the Citrus Twist kits Project Life kit this month is all the green!!! It was perfect and so fitting for my St-Patrick's day photos. :)

Left page:

I'm happy I could use my favorite embellishment this month (the acetate words) over one of my photos. The transparency of the word lets you superpose things without making it too crowded. I used the "capture" as a title for the page and I used the gold letters to add subtitles. 

Capture the beauty.
Capture the Leprechaun.
Capture Magic
Capture pride.
Capture Harmony (which is the name of our Elf).

 I used the dark green card to place under 2 little drawings I had found in my daughter's book bag.

And I continued with green cards, but this one as lots of room for journaling. I typed with my typewriter and I added some more details with my pen. The little hearts made me think of when we watch a periscope. :)

I used bits of the label sheet to add more journaling and details.

And I didn't have enough letters to spell out Harmony so I just used a golden hear for the bullet point and that's it. 

Right page:

I wanted to make the right page very soft (in contrast to the left page with all these vibrant colors) and very spring looking since spring and flowers in trees are my favorite things at the moment.

So I used two very neutral card and added very little embellishments. 

I used the yellow but still subtle card to back my forsythia photo. 

Isn't simplicity great?

Subtle colors and minimal embellishing. And I called it good. Very happy with how it turned out.

Have a great day friends! And I hope you can get some crafting done today. 

Marie-Pierre 

Get it Scrapped DT | Using a map

Hi everyone!

Today on the Get it Scrapped blog you will find several ways of using a map in your scrapbooks.

Now, when I was assigned this "challenge" I thought of many many ways to use a map and I couldn't settle down on which one to use. I was thinking to use a map to show our travels in Europe. I was thinking of using a map to show our numerous moves. I was thinking of showing you a layout I made as part of my childhood album where I use a map of where I grew up.... but finally something came up into our life. Maybe you already picked that up on my layouts/PL spreads, but if not, or if you weren't sure, here you have it, black on white:

We Are Moving Again!

This time we are going not further South, but rather east.... Overseas again, just like we did when we came to the United States from Switzerland, 5 years ago. We are moving because (or for) my husband's job. It's the kind of sacrifices we have to do to stay together and to continue to grow as a united family. It doesn't please me so much. Going again through the physical move is no fun. The boxes. The puzzle of what to bring and what to leave behind.... but even more than this, the fact that we have to adapt again to a new culture and country scares me a little. Speaking 4 languages is not enough.... now we'll be confronted to Czech. A difficult language to learn, so I heard. And I know from experience that going to a country where you don't know the language feels like you would be in a prison. Can't read, can't listen, ... In Switzerland I often felt like I landed on the moon. Wish me luck this time around. We'll put Arielle and Maya in charge of the language teaching at home.

So anyway, I'll stop talking and show you the page I made using a map:

I found the map using my friend Google. I print screened it and photoshopped it a little and printed it on white cardstock using my wide format printer. I then spent 5 minutes water coloring some of the countries in tones of yellow, oranges and pinks.

I found that little puffy airplane in my stash. It's from Amy Tangerine. I stitched a pink line from North Carolina to Prague and added 2 small chipboard stars.

I added a chipboard piece (Heidi Swapp) and a few stickers that I found in my stash (Amy Tangerine). I finished by adding the "amazing thing will happen" and "be happy" from Dear Lizzy. The words are just right on!  I added a small yellow start to balance the color.

I added the title up there (Heidi Swapp) and stitched again with an aqua thread. I should have done that at the very beginning since I destroyed my page quite a bit but I was capable of salvaging it ok.

I had a lot to say so I free journaled right where there was space, in the middle of the Atlantic, going around the embellishments I had already adhered. I stamped the date and called it done!! It took me about 30 minutes to do all that. A page doesn't have to be anything complicated. It's just a way of recording a memory after all.

Thanks for coming by!!

Marie

Citrus Twist Kits DT | Maya

Hi everyone!

Yesterday I had a page on the Citrus Twist Kits blog. I made a 12x12 layout using my April 2016 Project Life and my Sprinkles kits. I already told you that it's my treat to make a traditional layout after I made 3 project Life spreads. :) And this time even more so since I thought the acetate words were over the moon gorgeous and I couldn't wait to pair them with one of my favorite photo of the moment.

I started my layout with a white cardstock so that my acetate words would pop out of the layout!

I then paired the patterned papers wit the colors of the words and I layered them + stitched and distressed the edges under my photo. I really love the dimension.

So that the colors could stay the focus of the page I played with some white on white for the title.

And I repeated  the same white on whit at the bottom with white stitching. I added a cluster of embellishment at the bottom of my photo.

And sprinkled wood veneer here and there (I formed a diagonal line going form the bottom right to the top left). I love that the wood veneer are a neutral color. They don't compete with the colors of the layout, they only add to them.

Voilà! Short and sweet. :)

Have a great day my friends!!  And if you like my page, go ahead and pin it for me. :)

Thank you!!!

Marie-Pierre 

Hip Kit Club DT | Project Life 2016

Hi everyone!!

Today I'm showing you my last project as part of the Hip Kit Club Design Team. The end of my DT term came at the same moment as my move to Prague so I had no choice to step down from the team. Boo :( I had a blast creating for them for the past 6 months. Their kits are absolutely fabulous and I will for sure miss them. Let me tell you one last time that if you are looking for a kit packed with goodies, you might consider this one! :) So anyway, a HUGE THANK YOU to Kimberly who was so kind and generous to me. xox

And here's my spread:

I really love the light and airy look.

I often have pictures in the middle row, but not this time. This time I used the middle row to journal about the 2 stories represented, for one title and for embellishing.

Sometimes, less is more. I really liked the light on this picture so I kept the embellishing to a minimum. Neutral colored embellishments are a good way to embellish in a subtle way.

I love this photo!! My little one had decided her first wiggly tooth was coming out that night! And Big Sister was so happy and intrigued. I really love the complicity between the two sisters. I always have my iphone with me when it's bath time (I use the music to put them to sleep afterwards) so it was easy to pull it out and snap this not so perfect picture. I was really close to them and had to act quickly. It totally works.

These 2 cards, under the nice photo of my girls in the sun room are explaining that they are writing a paper for the inscription to their new school in Prague.

Here's the story of the wiggly tooth and some embellishing. I really love what's written on this cork sticker.

I used the two bottom photos to write another title. When reading both of them together you get "friends forever". 

I added this bis die cut to write more of the story and to hide the wide wall area that was taking away from these two cute little faces.

The *, the enamel dots and the wood veneer heart are tying this photo with the previous one.

The right page is less white but still has the same feel as the left page. 

I used embellishments to hide several things on the photo that were distracting and plain ugly.

I love the cozy/homy look of the wood veneer. It's very "warm"...

I embellished much less on this spread than on other spreads I've done before with the hip Kit Club's kits but maybe that's what brings my page to breath more. I've let the colors of the pictures shine.

Love this fairly lare cork bird sitting on a branch die cut and surrounded by enamel dots. The stitching up there adds lots of texture and interest. I love how this card turned out.

That cute green heart was just perfect on that card!! I really love how the yellow of the enamel dots make the yellow from the card pop out.

Big numbers are great to use for dates, ages, of here for temperature.

And I finished my spread with a simple pink puffy sticked and a couple of pink enamel dots.

Voilà! :)
I hope you liked what I did with the Hip Kit Club kits and I hope I could inspire you a bit, or a lot!! :D I sure hope that you will still follow me even though I won't be using the kits anymore. You can certainly easily translate my embellishment ideas with anything you have in your stash that's for sure!!

So if you like what you see here, go ahead and become a member. :)

I hope to see you around!!

Marie