NEWS!

Some of may have already seen this on Facebook or Twitter, but just a quick note. The adoption agency called and we are part of the intake of adoption families they are doing for this year! Our orientation is Saturday. Woot! I 'll keep ya posted.

Explore

So I am taking Shimelle's Explore class. This class is a little more free and introspective. It is a class concerning the ideas of exploring and adventuring. I am enjoying it. This a bit from our first week:

We were asked to do a self portrait

Then we were asked to make a playbook, that would become part journal, part collage book to store our ideas about us and our crafting philosophies.

The we were to write our greatest adventure on a post card and mail it to ourselves. I chose one of the Griffin and Sabine postcards. If you have not read this series of books, please do so they are beautiful. I wrote about studying abroad in college and how that effected my life and outlook.

Then we started talking about the idea of maps and the various journeys we are going on in our lives. This led to using maps on scrapbook pages and writing about more than the obvious on our pages.

 One idea was to make circle embellishments using the maps. These are the ones I made above.

Then we were asked to explore the idea of perfection and get a picture that represents it.  I choose this one above. It's kids responding to bubbles being suddenly blown into the air at a birthday party. When the bubbles arrived there was a collective gasp and just...well pure joy at the curiosity of it all. To me this was a perfect moment.

All of these assignments culminated into a project or scrapbook page. Here is mine. The picture is of my sister exploring the river in Concan, TX

Notes for Today

1) I got an email from the adoption agency and they said that they would let us know this week if we are part of this year's intake of adoption families. I am excited and hopeful. We have been waiting a long time, folks~

2) Funny bumper stickers on a car at Infusion Center:
     "Drop tuition, Not bombs"
      "Love = <3+<3"
      "No, I am pretty sure guns kill people" (This is in response to the many bumper stickers around Texas that say, " Guns don't kill people, people kill people" )

3) Taking Shimelle's class called Explore. So far it seems very free love and introspective, which is kinda what I need right now. Yea.

4) People, it is raining! We have been in a serious drought for some time now. The upper part of the state was on fire it was soooo dry. Down here in the south of Texas its just hot. Like 100+F kinda hot! The rain did cool us off a bit. I love it and I had almost forgotten what rain smelled like.

More 12X12

Shimelle is doing a class all year over at 2 peas called 4X6 Photo Love. I just now started doing it with June being my first entry. I have now been going backwards to complete the assignments just for fun. Below is one I completed based on the May layout.
The layout below is from a beach trip some friends and I went on several years ago. One of our friends brought her daughter. It was the first time she had been to the beach.

Scrapbook Sketch

Over at Shimelle's blog she does a weekly scrapbook sketch. It is a no stress and just for fun type thing. This week I gave it a try. I shrunk it down to a 8X8 vs. 12X12 layout. The reason is because my pictures were a small photo booth-esque strip. I actually printed the strip from a program from Shutterfly called Wink. I think they stopped it as of June 30th, so tears for that. In my previous post, I used my ASB trip for my 10 Things on the 10th post. That reminded me that I had a photostrip somewhere of the ASB pictures. I did indeed find them and that was the focus of my layout. Does anyone know of a new service that will print photos to look like photostrips from photo booths?

10 ASB pictures

It's the 10th and I am following along with Shimelle and crew. 10 things on the 10th. The pictures below are from an Alternative Spring Break trip I took with some university students. ASB trips are where students give up their break to have transformative experiences through volunteering. Lives are changed forever. At the very least they help and change a community through volunteering and relationship building. This was a while ago, but it is a trip I reflect on a lot. We went to Mexico and worked in orphanages. Head on over to Shimelle's blog to link up if you would like to share your 10 Things or to see others 10 Things!

We made jewelry

Singing and dancing

Jewelry making

There were sweet babies! Here I am holding one.

Hanging out and posing for the camera

The group including the nuns that ran the place and the kids that were around that day

Hanging out in the stairwell

Someone said, "Let's make fish faces!" so we did.

We made art

Blowing bubbles

YEA! Layouts

OK, I finally got around to doing and photographing some layouts. I am still trying to figure out the best way to photograph a layout.  I always seem to get reflected light in my pictures and have to take many shots, until I get one without reflected light. Also, my layouts seem far away. This may be because I am use to zooming in when I take photographs. You can't exactly do that and get the whole layout in the picture. I may have to re-visit Shimelle's class. I believe one of the lessons was on this very thing. Any advice blog readers?

I was experimenting with some washi-esque tape here. I found it in the dollar bin at Michaels.

This one I actually did some journaling. Woah, woah. This was my first Alternative Spring Break trip I took with university students as the acting advisor. ASB trips are when you use your school break to volunteer. Here we are in New Orleans.

This is the first 12 X 12 layout I have done in a long time, much less a double pager! I was following Shimelle's 4 X 6 Love class on Two Peas. I was going off her sketch/layout. I tend to freak out with all the space a 12 X 12 has in front of me. Hence, my favorite layout size is 8 X 8. However, I did enjoy making this 12 X 12 layout a lot. Maybe sketches can help with the fear of negative space issues (:

Journaling on above layout:  On the journaling block: "UT forgot to order robes for their first graduating class of law students. The students at the time decided to wear white and sunflowers." On the brown strips below: "Tradition continues to this day" On the brown strips above the Four Seasons picture: "brunch before graduation" On the brown strips by the wilting flower picture: "someone froze all the sunflowers and they wilted!"