Scrap Girl

Tomorrow I will be switching to the Today.com custom theme layout for this blog.  It will look different, but have the same great information and tips for scrapbooking.  The Today.com host site wants all of their bloggers to have a more uniform look to be able to identify the Today sites more easily.  I have designed a blog header to match the theme and hope I am able to use it.  Tomorrow will be the big test and I may have to play around with it for a few days.  I guess we will be able to do some color formatting to make it somewhat our own, but I won’t really know all of this until I actually take the plunge and make the change.  I’ll tell you all about designing the blog header and the kit I used tomorrow.  I have also designed a new card for using on the Entrecard web site so hopefully everything will be somewhat consistent across the board as far as the blog design and any links to get to it from other sites.  Wish me luck!  Also, any input that you have would be greatly appreciated since the blogging world is pretty new to me.

After sorting through some old black and white pictures, I found a few that needed repairs.  One was creased and had two holes in the picture.  It was also pretty dark and maybe was taken in a shaded area outside.  You can tell from the picture of my dad and his brother that they have sweet looks on their faces so I have been playing around with it a little bit today.  It needs more editing, but I was able to fill in the holes and repair some of the creases using a tool in Adobe Photoshop Elements called the Spot Healing Brush Tool.  I’ve had amazing results so far and if you have this software or others like it, I would encourage trying it out for blemishes, wrinkles, and touching up damaged pictures.  I scanned my picture into the computer and played with the image brightening dialog boxes to lighten up the picture and then clicked on the Spot Healing Brush Tool to try it out on the holes in the photo.  It is pure magic!  What it does is guess what the background was by what is already in the picture and fixes it.  You can also adjust the size of the tool to do big fixes or tinier areas of a photo.  I need to play around with this photo some more, but you can see the big holes I managed to fix in the picture.

Since we are doing a big photo sort (my mom and I) I started scanning some old photos that my mom had gotten from my grandmothers.  It is so amazing to me that there are hardly any pictures of my mom and dad when they were kids.  I have found maybe a dozen pictures of each, but I’m sure that others will turn up eventually.  My mom said her family had a camera, but a roll of film probably lasted two years before they used it up and then developing the film was expensive.  So my scans have been looking pretty good.  Most are from black and white photos so I’m curious to see how they turn out.  My printer isn’t the greatest so I’m going to send them to Shutterfly or Walgreen’s to have some prints made.  I’ll still be looking through pictures and scanning more today like my parent’s wedding pictures of which there are only snapshots.  I may load a few into my photoshop program to do some tweaking as some are kind of dark or creased and ripped.  If I come across anything enlightening, I’ll be sure to list some tips. 

My mom and dad are visiting for a couple of days and I asked my mom to bring one of the many totes she has of pictures so we could do some sorting, labeling, etc.  I’m also going to scan some of the really old ones and ones I want my own copies of.  So far, we have mostly been sorting 80’s and 90’s photos and tossing out all of the bad ones.  We have had quite a few laughs so far and have had a hard time distinguishing what year some of them were taken.  At least we are doing them now while my parents can remember who’s who and where the pictures were taken.  We are taking some of the old pictures out of the frames too.  She used to display them at their house when they were new, but has since put out more recent pictures.  I’m planning on doing a mini-family history book and these pictures should help me out a lot.  Wish me luck on my huge task of sorting out the past!

Since I’m going on a retreat in a couple of weeks I’d thought I’d point out a maybe not so obvious reason to go.  Most scrapbooking retreats are run by people just like us that are scrapaholics so they make sure their guests are happy.  The retreats I have gone to have a Sissix Machine for die-cutting, an assortment of punches, fun computer software to use for scrapping and bigger printers so you can print right on your 12×12 pages, and many other assorted tools and supplies you may not have or may not have the money to buy for yourself.  Last year was when I was introduced to what is now my scrapbooking best friend, the Cricut Electronic Cutting Machine.  Besides all of the great tools at the retreat, you will have access to all the things your scrapbooking friends bring along.  Because as we all know, scrapbooking is a share and share alike hobby.  If you don’t have the right tool, paper, ribbon to help your project along, someone will.  It is also fun to try new tools to see if there is one you might like for your scrapbooking collection. 

When you go on a scrapbooking retreat you sometimes have the option of having food provided or doing it yourselves.  The first year I went on a retreat we opted to have meals provided.  You won’t believe this, but every time the host came to feed us, she took our leftovers.  I found this out when I went looking for a late night piece of leftover pizza and the refrigerator was bare.  I wasn’t pleased to know she was charging us for food and then using the leftovers for her family.  Needless to say, we haven’t returned back there and have decided our group will take care of the meals.  Since I’m in charge of organizing the retreat, I just break up the twelve of us into four groups and we all get a turn to pitch in.  For Friday night, we usually eat on the way or order pizza.  Saturday morning three ladies make breakfast.  Whoever is in charge of the meal gets to choose what we will be eating.  Sometimes it’s an Egg Bake, sometimes muffins and fruit.  Another three make lunch which has been soup and/or sandwiches.  We go out for supper on Saturday night.  We just keep taking turns with the meals.  Sunday lunch is leftovers and I usually buy one of those pre-made lasagnas for those staying over Sunday night.  I usually have someone bring water and pop and I usually bring all of the plates and cups.  Sometimes we use the dishes at the retreat house, but who wants to do dishes?  We basically keep it simple so we can spend as much time as possible scrapbooking.

Have you ever thought about taking your favorite hobby on the road?  Scrapbooking retreats are a great way to get a lot of scrapbooking done and relax and rejuvenate.  In a few weeks, I’m leaving to go to a scrapbooking retreat cabin in Wisconsin with eleven other scrapbooking friends.  This has turned into an annual February event for us.  We love it so much because up here in the Midwest we start getting “cabin fever.”  We get a little stir crazy from the cold and snow and being cooped up for most of the winter.  So far we have gone to three different retreat places and have decided to go back to the same place we were last year.  We all come from all over the state and most people are within 2 hours driving distance from this place.  If you don’t have a big group already, you can grab a girlfriend or you can even go alone.  A lot of the retreat places for scrapbooking will have a hosted weekend where the owner stays and groups of two or more can come and stay for a special rate without having to worry about finding enough people to cover weekend rates.  Speaking of rates, I’m sure they vary all over the country, but if you look hard enough you can find great deals like I did.  For this retreat, we are each paying around $80 for a two night stay and if we want to add Sunday night also, we can pay an extra $25 each.  This is a steal!  I would look for retreat locations online and on scrapbooking website message boards to start with.  Good luck with your search!

This week I put a Scrapbook Challenge out there to scrapbook a page about yourself for a change.  I had two ladies actually take me on for the challenge and it was so fun to see their pages.  I got to learn a little more about my online friends this week.  They also made mention of me and the blog challenge in their blog which was very sweet.  I’m just so happy that someone is actually following my blog.  If you happen to do a page about yourself, email it to me or make a comment on the blog and you too can be the recipient of my Scrapbook Challenge award.  The award this week goes to Cheryl and Sheila, the scrapping sisters at 3 Scrap’n & Stamp’n Ladies.  Congratulations on winning my “Queens of the Crop” award!

This week is “Scrapbook Yourself Week.”  I’m so excited that my friends over at 3 Scrapbooking Ladies decided to take on the challenge to do a page about themselves.  Their pages turned out very nice, so check them out for great ideas.  My favorite idea for scrapbooking a page about yourself is to do a “Things I Love” page.  First you need to brainstorm a list of things you love and jot them down.  It’s up to you for how many things to list.  A good number would probably be twenty.  For the layout I did I took a picture that had been taken on my 37th birthday(don’t tell anyone, or tell me I look much younger).  So I decided to list 37 things I love.  Needless to say, my one page layout turned into a two page deal because I couldn’t fit all 37 things on one page.  It even came together rather quickly which sometimes doesn’t happen for me.  So once you get your list together you can either handwrite it out or type it up on your computer(what I did).  Lastly, find a recent picture of yourself to put on your page.  My picture was kind of one of those fluke things where I brought my camera to take pictures of my oldest daughter playing tennis and my youngest asked if she could take a picture.  I told her sure take one of me today since it’s my birthday.  I don’t usually like pictures of myself, either, but I like this one.  Take your “loves” words and cut them out.  I ran them through my Xyron sticker maker and then they were ready to go on the page.  Most of my papers I used were scraps but I did make a note of some products:  red patterned paper(Daisy D’s), Hot Pink Dots paper(My Mind’s Eye), “Things” in the title(Basic Grey Rub-ons), Uniquely You stickers(7 Gypsies), Cricut Printing Press Cartridge used to cut out the title. 

It’s quite funny that the week I’m discussing how important it is to scrapbook a page about yourself every once in a while, I actually was asked to do an “About Me” page.  I was asked to be on a digital scrapbook designer’s creative team and everyone on the team has to do a page with seven facts about themselves using items from one of the designer’s digital scrapbooking kits.  I have to do three pages with her kit and also design a digital freebie to give away on this blog, you lucky ducks!  I will be scrapping the quick page to use for your valentine, wedding, and/or anniversary pictures as the main colors in the kit are red and black.  You can find the kit called “Temptation” at digitalarts-cafe.com under Designs by Karyn.  The quick page from me using her kit will be available on the blog the first week in February, so keep a look out.