Playing catch up...

It seems this month I have been playing catch up, and I am not getting any closer to where I wanna be! I haven't got any challenges done yet, but I have managed to finish some projects. Gotta get out my camera manual, the pics are all a bit blurry and I can't work out why. I have a feeling little fingers may have been playing with my new toy, so apologies in advance.

TC Cortina

I picked up this Kaisercraft kit at Fat Cat just before they closed their doors for the last time (sniff, sniff).

I've never really been one to use kits, since I like to add my own personality to a project, but thought it might be a great way to play catch up.

Cory was a beautiful beast, all original, nearly no rust, complete with vinyl roof and rear venetian blinds. Sadly it wasn't made for baby capsules and prams, but we sure did drive a lot of miles (yes, miles) together.

Little Miss Chatterbox

This is a layout I started many moons ago but never quite got finished. You know how it it, you start a project and don't like the way it is going so you put it aside for a later time and some fresh eyes?

Playing catch up is fun, I just want the layouts in my album so I'm pulling no punches and just going with it. I liked the graphic block style but it was lacking, so I raided the button stash and added hand and machine stitching.

I thought my little chatterbox could talk then, 7 years on she has mastered the art of talking both with  her mouth full and underwater.  Now that takes practice!

Don't mess with these Gangsters

I was very happy with how this layout turned out and have another work in progress with the rest of these photos taken on our holiday. 

 I have used MME kraft from the Life Stories range. It gave a classic old world feel to the layout and blended perfectly with the sepia prints. 

We girls felt really pretty and a little flirty in our costumes, so I went to the haberdasher and picked up some fringe and pearl trim, similar to our outfits. Since you can never have too many layers I got out my Fiskars punch and  went to town with it. 

My flower cluster includes some beautiful Prima and Kaisercraft blooms and some handmade silk flowers. I found a pearl flourish and cut it into smaller pieces and used it to ground them all together.

If you haven't had a go at making your own little blooms yet they are really easy. There are heaps of great tutorials on You tube, try this link.

I found the fabric I wanted in an op shop for 20c and used some buttons from my stash -see, pretty and economical.

If you are ever on the Gold Coast make sure you drop into Old Time Photos and have some fantastic family fun! Not only is it great to dress up in period clothes (they have items to fit everyone, hey, they fitted me!) but they also have amazing sets and the staff are friendly and efficient. Better still the rates are really reasonable and the finished product is awesome! This was the best way for us all to spend a rather wet afternoon and we came home with a very memorable souvenir.

I have come to realise that I have taken more photos since my children were born than may actually be necessary. No - I don't mean they aren't all important, but I do mean that perhaps I need to start deleting from my memory card before I upload. At this rate I am running out of storage very fast and I am not going to print half of them, and then I'd be lucky if I scrapbooked 10% of them. 

I'm sure all you compulsive clickers are like me, we go out for the day and take a million and one photos because we don't want to miss anything. The problem lies when we get home and upload those million pics. It is overwhelming to select only 2 or 3 photos for a layout, or worse still is feeling obliged to scrap multiple layouts from the event.

Well, today I am going to make a stand and say NO MORE! I want my children to be able to flip through an album and remember the places they have been while it is still fresh in their minds, and not have to wait forever for me to get around to scrapping it. I'm gonna work smarter, not harder, and take an Ali Edwards approach. I will go crazy and buy heaps of divided page protectors, slide the photos in and add a journaling/title block.

Please don't make that face - yes, you! - the single person reading my blog! I will continue to traditionally scrap the most important and my favorite photos with lots of pretty patterned paper, fancy new embellishments, AC Thickers and my most favorite Glimmermist and stitching. I will, I will, I promise! But I need to play catch up, and fast, since the To Do list is growing much quicker than the Completed list.