Phew.
So, why all the jumping around? Well, first of all, I actually like being a few weeks behind on assembling my Project Life album. Since I like to use a different paper collection every week (because I'm just fickle like that, yo), it lets me choose the week that has photos that best match what I want to work with at any given time. And, while I do keep up with editing photos and planning my pages each week, being a few weeks behind on putting them together means that I can build up lots of photos that need to be printed and then send them off when either Snapfish or Shutterfly has a coupon code. So, both frugally and creatively speaking, being behind is a very good thing for me.
And that's the roundabout path that leads us to Week 16 (incidentally, every week before this one is done- yay!!- and I've already completely filled one album for this year with just Project Life pages) which included our anniversary weekend trip to the aquarium in Chattanooga.
I still had all those pretty new DCWV stacks (that will soon be hitting the store shelves at JoAnn) sitting out on my scrap desk when it came time to pack for a crop last Friday night, so I tossed all of them along with my Project Life album (which is where I keep photos and ephemera stored, organized by week, even if I haven't assembled the page yet) into my scrapping bag before heading out. I also added the May 2012 Studio Calico kit on a whim, along with some of the new Studio Calico/Hero Arts stamps. All in all, it was pretty minimal packing.
I chose the Stardust Stack for this week because of all the blues and un-earthly looking blobular sea creatures in the photos. Since I haven't been to space recently (though I am headed to Orlando in August for Star Wars Celebration VI), deep ocean-y type photos were the next best thing. :)
I had so many pictures that I loved from this week that I also added an insert with more Tennessee Aquarium photos. It's really pretty simple- mostly all photos (and undecorated) and just a single journaling card.
I mentioned that I packed my March Studio Calico kit at the last minute on a whim, and it turned out to be a really, really lucky decision- you see, I'd neglected to pack any alphas to use on my weekly title cards. ::gulp:: so I would have been in trouble at the crop without the Thickers included in my kits! And the extra washi tape didn't hurt, either.
Thickers also helped me cover up a little writing boo-boo here. For a minute I thought about tossing this card and making a whole new one, but then decided, "naaaaah," and threw a couple of silver glitter >> Thickers on it. Life is not perfect. Project Life is not perfect. I'm so good with not perfect!
Speaking of not perfect- my feet after ice skating!! I wear a size 6.5-7 normal shoe, but ice skates are always sized quite a bit lower, and I wear a 4.5 narrow boot. The tighter fit really is better for control, but they do tend to mangle the feet a little...and it didn't help that I hadn't worn my skates in years!
The stamps above and below are from the Adventure stamp set in the Studio Calico shop, though it's sold out now and I don't think they'll be restocking it. :(
The chevron instagram stamp is totally available, though, in the Two Peas store! It's in an exclusive Studio Calico set that they're carrying, and I've been using it a lot lately. It's the perfect size for framing up a 2" square photo.
Back to the Stardust Stack, which I used in several placed to dress up jounaling cards on this spread...I've settled into a nice little rhythm with journaling cards for this project- I either add a strip of patterned paper (pretty much all of the patterned paper on this page came from the Stardust mat stack) to the top or side edge of one of the Becky Higgins grid printed journaling cards, or I add a snippet of journaling card to a piece of patterned paper. Either way works, and I tend to use both options several times each week. There aren't a lot of embellishments this week because I wanted to focus mainly on the awesome papers, but brads, buttons, and other little bits often make their way onto journaling cards, as well.
The Stardust mat stack also contains a sheet of cut-apart borders in a Project Life-friendly 4.5 x 6.5 size, and I cut a little snippet of one to dress up the photo collage card below.
DCWV collections (and especially the Mat Stacks if you're short on storage space) are a great match for Project Life. I still have pages made with the new A Type of Art and Gilded Orchard to share in the coming weeks, so stay tuned for that!
Supplies (click on images for product links):
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