Snail Mail Project - Week 1

March 14 - 20

It's the first week after declaring my intent, and I just barely managed to sneak out one card under the wire.  Whew! 
{Note:  I've decided to wait a full week to post my progress, just in case the recipient reads my blog.  Don't want to spoil the surprise!}

Living just over an hour away from Joel's brother, sister-in-law and their 3 boys, you'd think we'd see more of each other, but somehow our schedules rarely ever mesh.  Beth is just starting out as an entrepreneur, so on top of all the time spent at the boys' activities, she's got a full plate of her own to juggle.  I decided to start my snail mail project with a note to let her know how much I admire her courage and passion for what she's doing.

One week down, thirty nine to go!
~ Kathy

Project Life - The Villages Part 1

Here's my first installment of actual Project Life pages, and already I'm off the original plan...  {smile}

The plan was a double page spread per month, BUT we ended 2012 and started 2013 in Florida with our parents.  I wanted to include the time with family in the album as well.  Without further ado, here are some of the pages for our time with my parents at their new home in The Villages, Florida.  Note:  I took the pictures of the pages before I did any journaling... 

Addicted to GOLF - with mom's help (the picture of me), I managed to get photos of each of us golfing (or at least on the course, the best I have of my brother is him taking a photo of our nephew).

Part of the allure of The Villages community for my parents are the abundance of activities.  Executive style golf courses (nine holes, mostly par 3) seem to be everywhere, and my parents have been golfing up a storm.  They sign up just the two of them, and get paired with random people to complete the grouping (great way to meet people, if you're not overly self conscious!), or they go with friends.  And then there's the men's and women's "Scramble" tournaments each week.  What's more amazing?  Until the past year or so, my mother hadn't really done any golfing at all.  She's eating up this new lifestyle in the Sunshine State!  {I'm just a teeny bit jealous.}

So of course, while we were all together we golfed, and golfed and golfed some more!  I think I went out about half a dozen times or so just in the week and a half that I was there.  That's a LOT of golf, especially when lately Joel and I have been lucky to get out once a year!

Christmas -

I absolutely loved how my mom used the extra ornaments in glasses for decor, and spent a good 10 minutes staging the shot.  So of course I just had to blow it up a bit bigger than the 4x6 slot!  Silly me, I didn't have my camera handy when we were opening gifts in the morning, so no "people" pictures.  My gift arrived on Christmas Eve, when Joel flew down to join me! 

Part of the gift from my parents to my nephew was a scavanger hunt riding around in the golf carts so I included some of that adventure instead.  Many residents of The Villages put out elaborate decorations during the holidays, and I just couldn't resist taking a picture of the flying pig (grounded at the time the photo was taken).  He makes me smile!

For each of these pages I used some of the 3x4 cards from the kit.  For the Christmas page I taped the two together to create 4x6 card.  LOVE how the circle pattern on the cards coordiante with the baubles in the wine glasses.

I'm loving the process, the hard part - selecting which photos to include. 

 



~ Kathy

Project Life...

Project Life - a method of memory keeping developed by Becky Higgins that simplifies the scrapbooking process down from full pages to little photo sized pieces.

I debated with myself for few months in the fall of 2012 as to whether I wanted to jump in and try Project Life.  You see, I'm not one of those people who has the camera with them everywhere and takes pictures of everything.  We have a good friend who is always snapping photos, and though we tease him about it, in the end we LOVE when he shares them with us later and we can reminisce!  I like to write...  but have yet to figure out exactly how to journal my story.  I have a ton of journals, diaries - whatever you'd like to call them - scattered around the house.  Many have been started with good intentions but eventually sit on the shelf and begin to gather dust. 

Part of my Project Life debate revolved around this journal reality.  Will this be another project that I start, but leave to collect dust on the shelf with all of the others?

And then, I began to work on the gifts for my brother and nephew.  Small photo albums that I pre-made several inserts for.  Simple title pages, and cards for them to write down some notes on their thoughts / favorite parts of the days.  The rest of the pages we would fill with photos of our adventures together in Florida while exploring my parent's new home and neighborhood.  (my mother is another of those people who carries her camera practically everywhere!!!)

And while working on these gifts I decided that I would just GO FOR IT and begin my own Project Life Album in 2013. 

I wanted to start small, so I ordered a small package of the photo sleeve pages (in styles A and D).  I also looked through the core kits.  I want to make this project as easy as possible, but I want it to feel like us.  As I looked through the options I wasn't getting a warm, fuzzy feeling.  The colors were too bright, or the patterns were too frilly.  In the end I decided on their "Cherry" edition of the core kit - the designs and colors were the closest fit to my personality. 

My kit parts arrived at the end of 2012 and I have played with them on and off since then.  The core kit looks much better in person than in the online photos.  I may have to tone down some of the colors, but what's most important - I CAN WORK WITH IT AND BE HAPPY!  Which is much different than, I can work with it and get by.  The paper was thinner than I had anticipated, but my guess is that it works better in the album sleeves that way.

My Project Life Goal - to complete a double page layout for each month.  Based on the projects that I've seen posted on the web, folks seem to do a double page spread for each week of the year.  This idea overwhelmes me - and I want my Project Life documentation to do more than gather dust on the shelf with the rest of my journals.  Filling eight 4x6 slots and eight 3x4 slots each month seems far less daunting! 

My title page is a combination of core kit inserts, photos, cardstock from my stash and monogram embellishments from the clearance rack at Michael's...  oh, and I hand stamped the "Our Story" title using some Distress Ink and individual letter stamps I've had for ages.

Whew!  If you've made it this far - thanks for keeping with me through this very wordy post!

~ Kathy

The Snail Mail Project

I think I've been living under a rock - or maybe I've just been along for the ride for a bit...  Apparently people have been coming up with "birthday projects" for years now.  I learned about the phenomena from Elise's blog - one that I started following this past fall.

For those of you who have been under that rock with me, a birthday project is something akin to a new year's resolution.  You pick a goal / project that you will work toward completing by your next birthday.  Often it involves a quantity equal to your age. 

40

My age is now 40.  First thought - how on earth will I finish 40 of anything before 52 weeks roll by???  OK if I made it a simple task of eating 40 cookies I'm certain I could manage that, but I would like my goal to have a positive effect on people around me - my friends, family, even strangers.

I love to brainstorm and create crazy amounts of lists - just ask my mother.  I often run my lists by her - my ever present sounding board!  This time I came up with my project ALL ON MY OWN!  {smile}

The snail mail project

Did you notice - our address and my age match up this year?  It has to be a good sign, right?

OK - hands up - who out there doesn't enjoy getting a FUN card or letter in your mailbox??!!

To me the mailbox is like an unopened package.  It stares at you, teasing you, waiting for you to open it and see what's inside.  My sweet husband, Joel, chuckles and shakes his head at the hopeful enthusiasm I have when I venture out to our mailbox.  Often I come in with a handful of "regular mail", but the next day I'm back out there with that same optimism!  Our two dogs agree - the mailbox is a wonderful place to be!  (of course their excitement stems from the fact that they get to go on a grand adventure out the front door, with the potential to visit with the neighbors, but still the word mailbox is part of their vocabulary, and they know exactly where it is!) 

With any luck, the Snail Mail Project will put some fun back into the mailbox for friends and family as well!

In an attempt to keep my project from overwhelming me I've decided to set up a few parameters (I'll call them anything but rules - who wants rules for a fun project?). 

1. The goal is to send out FUN snail mail during at least 40 of the next 52 weeks.
2. There must be at least two paragraphs of a handwritten message contained within the snail mail.  {really, a card is nice, but a couple of short paragraphs in your handwriting is so much sweeter!}
3. Try and surprise someone new each month.  {sorry mom, you're not going to get ALL the mail from this project!}
4. Write a short blog update for each successful week. 

That's it - what do you think? 

The benefits - I get to write letters...  OK, I already do that, but not often enough.  Those letters will go out to a wider audience (if parameter number 3 is carried out properly).  Recipients will be pleasantly surprised that there's more than bills in the mystery box that sits at the end of the driveway (hopefully).

Who wants to join me???  Help return the mailbox to the happy stop on the way in from work.  And if this catches on and spreads like wild fire, maybe the price of a stamp will hold steady for a while... 

If you've made it this far...  Let's go spread some sunshine!

~ Kathy

Basket Weave

It's National Craft Month, so I decided to have some fun with yarn...

Let me first put out there - I cannot knit - at all.  No matter how many times my grandmother has tried to teach me, it just doesn't stick (I'm sure if my cousin's wife, Lucy, is reading this she is appalled!).  But I have managed to use a crochet hook pretty well.

I tend to veer toward EASY projects.  I can follow a pattern, but since I usually only get to spend a short amount of time in the evenings to do crafty things I  like to spend the majority of the time actually playing, and not deciphering where I left off, and what step is next.

I came across this basket weave pattern through a crochet newsletter which included a link to the video.

The hardest part - counting out the correct number of chains to start the pattern.  Well at least that's been the hardest part for me....  

Right now I'm a few rows in, and I suspect this will take more than just National Craft Month to complete, especially since the yarn I chose is a little pricier than what I usually go for, but oh I just LOVE the colors!!! 

Looks like I'll be making a lot of trips to the local A.C. Moore with my trusty weekly coupon to buy one skein at a time.  {smile}  Each skein seems to add about two rows to the afghan.

Eventually I'll be back to let you know my basket weave afghan is DONE...   for now I'll be taking it one row at a time!

~ Kathy

40-tude!

Well this week I will join the 40 club.  {it's getting easier and easier to say that as I've been practicing getting comfortable with that number}

One day in January, as I was driving home from work I was stopped at a red light behind a car with the license plate simply stating

40-TUDE

I'm pretty sure it was meant to mean fortitude, but I've decided to use it as an abbreviation for 40 attitude or 40 'tude.   And I've decided that my 40 'tude will be something akin to "sassy".  Now I have absolutely no clue what exactly sassy is, but it sounds FUN!

And to celebrate, I've made a fun card using today's OWH sketch #163.

I left the card blank inside to make it a little more versatile.

Have a great week!
~ Kathy

Hello March!

I'm not sure if March has come in like a lion, but I had a bit of time to play with paper today, and figured if she hasn't come in like a lion, then she'll go out like one.  My lion looks a bit odd set off-center, but I really didn't want to crop his tail!  {smile}  My apologies for the dark photo, but I figured if I didn't get him posted tonight he wouldn't make it here.

March has always been one of my favorite months - yes, the birthday celebrations and gifts often caused this euphoria as a kid. But now, as an adult, I'm enjoying the increased amounts of daylight, and looking forward to the signs of spring.

So "Hello March!", I'm welcoming you with open arms.

~ Kathy