South to Richmond

Beginning this week we move forward to August 2012 to my annual trip to North Carolina with Jim's family. I travel on my own so that I can make stops at some national park units on the way. This year I drove to Richmond. Though I didn't see all of the park, I did see the Tredegar Iron Works and Chimborazo Hospital.

The border for the left page was based on this Father's Day Card. The inner squares use the Creative Memories Postage Stamp punch and then I used their mini car punch to add detail. By mixing up the colors of the cars on the background (sometimes turning them over to get a totally different color) it creates movement on the page. The white square underneath helps highlight the cut out cars in the postage stamps.

The background of the border and the Junior Ranger book on the right are from the same piece of paper. This is an early CM piece when they made papers 10x12. Still, by cutting it and spreading it across 2 pages, you get a lot of use from one sheet. The color block journal box was designed that way, I didn't make it. However, you could certainly use that as a template to make one of your own!

A New Friend

My last stop on the trip was a visit to Albert Gallatin's home called Friendship Hill. Mr. Gallatin was responsible for our treasury set up and for proposing the first National Road. I had a devil of a time finding the place because my GPS kept trying to take me on dirt roads! But I finally made it.

This page is opposite the Turkey Rock page of last week, so essentially kicks off the last section of the book. The page was inspired by this sketch. I like the simplicity of the design, but with the mechanical paper it brings that part of his story out quickly. The edges of the paper were rounded with a paper rounder (like this one) which gives the paper a softer effect.

The main part of my visit was a tour of the house. It was a self-guided tour and I worked on the Junior Ranger program which helped me focus on each of the rooms.

I feel like this is a 2-page layout but when I look at it, it almost seems like 2 pages just next to each other. I liked the wall paper on the left because the chair seemed reminiscent of the older furniture. On the right I used a Scallop Burst Border Maker on the top edge, then chalked the edge with brown ink to bring out the detail (the yellow was a little too light on the Spargo pages I use). The bottom are layered photos which took up quite a bit of space, so the journal box and stickers got the top half of the page by default.

My last page of the album.... I wasn't sure how to finish the journey, but the Junior Ranger book turned to my pledge page seemed a good idea.

The junior ranger book is rather thick, and since I wanted a bit of color I chose cardstock photo corners (a very old Creative Memories kit) in red. The edges of the page use the Medallion border maker cartridge.  A very useful design that has worked in many types of layouts for me. A little journaling about the end of the trip, and the book was done!

I hope you've enjoyed this voyage. Next week we begin my 2012 trip to Atlantic Beach with my in-laws. Lots more stories to come!

TIMBER!

After another night in Oshkosh, I was on the road again, this time with no timeline to hold to. I made a random stop at a Jelly Belly tour, and then as I drove through Ohio, I planned to visit the Fallen Timbers Monument. I had attempted a visit on my way out, but timing was off and I couldn't get the stamps. So, this time I went to the library in Maumee, OH, got the stamps and then used the maps provided to find the monument. This is not a full NPS unit yet, but there is land set aside and some monuments to the battles.

The left is a wallpaper page. Not overly detailed, but I amused myself by using "Timber" paper as the background. The right may seem a little short to you. It is actually one of the 8 1/2 x 11 Portrait Sleeves from the original Creative Memories Line. You'll remember that I used these on the cruise to hold the daily newsletters from the cruise line. Each page comes with a piece of cardstock inside, but I wanted to stick with the brown tones, so I substituted a piece of brown/tan from the Eastern National scrapbook collection. I trimmed one of the maps to highlight the area where I visited and to fit the paper. This was the most difficult decision to make as I couldn't figure out how to appropriately display the map to its best advantage.

The last page of this layout is then the back side of the Pocket Page. Remember I said the paper was 2-toned? The back is this nice shade of tan. This allowed me to use brown stickers from the Eastern National scrapbook kit to highlight the page. It's a cute story if you can read the plaque. I don't often include photos of the plaques, I just take them to remind me of the story so I can journal. But in this case I thought it would make the most sense to post the entire piece.

Oshkosh Air Show

On Monday morning I awoke early and went to the Oshkosh air show, which is a HUGE event. It was still hot even that early in the morning but I was able to last until 2:00 PM. The reason for the visit is seen on the page below. Dayton Aviation hosts a booth in the government pavilion each year and has a special stamp which is ONLY available at this show. Since we would be driving past, the club arranged a time and place to meet to get the stamp.

This is a very basic page. Unfortunately I tried to improve my photo of the page and made it sort of grainy. But essentially it is a plain page with just some matting under the photos and a border made with one of the original CM cartridges. I made a couple in green and tan (NPS colors) and wove them for the border at the bottom.

You can see that I'm using another peekaboo pocket. This time the journaling is on top and you lift it to discover the 2 photos of the group. (Sorry, one got cropped off.)

This was my last stop in Wisconsin. Next week, we start the trek home.

Raspberry Island Lighthouse

After grabbing some lunch, I boarded another boat for a trip with the club, this time to Raspberry Island. The island is still used as a place for a lighthouse, but the maintenance is MUCH less than when lighthouse keepers lived there year-round in the 1800s.

This layout was one that I made during my year of classes at Enchanted Memories. This is the Graphic 45 Place in Time paper. We made a layout for each month and the idea was to have a single album with all the layouts in one place. Since I'm such a free spirit (😊) I chose to use the layouts throughout my albums. So, it was July of 2012 and I was heading to a historic area on a lake where nautical/beach paper makes sense. It was the perfect opportunity to use it! I didn't have to edit the photos much to fit the page surprisingly. And the post card became the perfect place to store the ticket from the trip!

As we arrived, we found a rather long climb to get to the house on the bluff. But it was worth it as we got to see the house and storage sheds for the light.

This layout is similar to the first, and I wanted to create it for that reason. It provided a little continuity in the book. The paper is from Graphic 45's By the Sea collection which has been retired. However, I still had the paper and a link to the layout directions, so I was able to piece it together. This time the postcard became my journaling box.

Out in the yard, there were gardens and sports equipment featured. This is how families who lived in the house would spend their leisure hours in the summer.

The left page features some stickers I had been holding onto for YEARS. It's so rewarding when you can finally use something, and the croquet balls were in that category. I found paper that had multi-colored polka dots and I thought that a good background. But I didn't want to interfere with the border, so I cut it down to a 10" square and just mounted it in the middle. The bottom border is a retired Creative Memories border maker cartridge called "rustic fence". For the right page, it is wall paper. There actually is a pattern to the paper, but it is so light it isn't visible in the photo. To match the red tones of the left page I chose a border sticker and some flowers in red/pink to set off the natural beauty in the photos.

Next our tour took us into the home. We started in the kitchen and worked our way upstairs to the bedrooms.

These are both Fast to Fabulous pages from the Gallivant line. On the left I simply matted the photos in a rustic red. On the right I added borders which sort of looked like old wallpaper. It was too difficult to mat the photos since I took panoramic versions and glued them together. But I did like the look of seeing the whole room that way.

Our last stop was to go out on the walk surrounding the light (which is actually in the house, not a separate structure). I didn't venture out because the port hole exit was REALLY tiny. But I did capture some of our tour group as they looked across the water.

Does this page look familiar? 😀 This page featured photos of the entire house and I really liked that lighthouse paper. This ended the convention trip, but there are still parks to visit as I drove home. Next week a big air show!

Something's fishy

Sunday morning I drove out to the Little Sand Bay visitor center in Apostle Islands for a group tour of the Hokenson Brothers Fishery. This site keeps alive the hardships endured trying to make a living fishing in Lake Superior. The tour covered multiple buildings and sites.

The left side of the layout is a remnant of a piece of Club Scrap paper with a border below made of cardstock and a shiny/iridescent marine themed paper.  The right page starts with wallpaper, but the sheet is an old version of Creative Memories and their pages used to be a little less than true 12x12, so their "perfect fit" pages run a little short on the newer, true 12x12. To fill in the gap, I used a rope sticker since the theme was "Twine Shed". I thought it quite clever!

The real highlight of the left page though, is the use of the peekaboo pockets again. This time I secured them to the page and then brought them outside the edges of the page protector so no cutting was involved. This allowed me to include the large paper brochure and still have room for photos and journaling. You can see above that I have 2 photos covering the bottom of the paper. Below, if you turn them over you can see the whole brochure, read the journaling, and see 2 more photos! I wish I had added a little something else on the left and right of the journaling box, but other than that I am very happy with this page!

Another stop on the tour was the Ice House. The tools reflect the growing technology as it moved from hand saws to power saws to cut through the ice. It wasn't for ice fishing, but to keep the ice so they could use it to pack the fish through the spring and summer months.

Both of these are wall paper pages. On the left is an older piece of Creative Memories from their Earthy paper line. I chose a wintery theme and then added a variety of snowflake stickers to make the print stand out. I find the Earthy line to have a bit of a rustic or heritage feel and it worked perfectly here. The right page is paper from Club Scrap. Since we were in the fish processing area, I thought the print of fish along the right side appropriate. The stickers are from the Creative Memories NSD kit from several years ago (actually the same kit I used for the rope sticker above). I didn't realize that I had so few photos including the club members on this tour.

The last photos from Little Sand Bay are of the larger pieces in the yard. The rigs were used for hauling boats and nets or for driving posts into the area for a dock. After Little Sand Bay I had time before my next excursion so I stopped at the Visitor Center in Bayfield. I was impressed with the Fresnel lens which could generate a wide and bright beam for nautical safety.

The left page again has a remnant of paper with a nautical theme. The top border is the same border I made for the opening page but this time I added some fish stickers. Those stickers as well as the bottom shoreline border are from an older CM sticker pack. The right page is wallpaper. Since the focus of the photos was the lighthouse lens, I chose a lighthouse themed paper to highlight the photos. More lighthouses to come next week!

At the Convention

Saturday morning I drove to the visitor center in Ashland to look around before our meeting. It's a rather new building but already has nice displays. You can take an elevator to the top floor to look out on the surrounding area. That's what you see in the 2 photos on the right.

This layout is one of the 1-2-3 sketches by Noreen Smith. She has a lot of ways to take 1 piece of double sided paper, 2 scrapbook pages (or cardstock backs) and with just 3 cuts of the trimmer, you have everything you need to decorate the page. If you look at her sketch, you'll see I didn't use the banner cuts on the right page. But I was able to use the unigrid and the park entrance sign to completely fill the space between the coral papers. It really helps you stretch your supplies! Likewise, on the right I used the center brochure and a journaling square to fill in the left side of the page. I added a couple of stickers to the top left and the page was done in a flash!

We had lunch in the center and then started the meeting. On the left page is the registration area and on the right are a couple of photos of our speakers.

This layout is part of the 2017 Creative Memories National Scrapbook Day pack. Each year NSD is celebrated on the first Saturday of May and around that time, Creative Memories offers special themed papers and project recipes. I don't have a copy of the recipe used for this page, but check with me about a current offering! I know one complaint people have about pre-designed layouts is that their photos don't "fit" the design. But you can see here that I simply use the photo mats as part of the background. Although some do fit as indicated (like the 4x4 photo in the bottom right) others extend off the mat or I use them for journal squares. You should always make a layout work for you, don't feel you have to adjust your photos to the page.

This year our break during the meeting turned into a party! I was thrilled to see Smokey the Bear usher in the cake!

I went pretty simple for this page. I thought the brown background fit the bear theme. The bear in the corner is an old Mrs. Grossman sticker that I still had and I topped him with a Mrs. Grossman party hat (which is probably just as old). A mat and a journal box are the only other embellishments for the page.