a quick comparison

I know a lot of you print elements you've purchased or found around the web for your layouts and project life spreads so while printing some test prints of my latest kit, I thought I'd show a comparison of how they print on a couple of different paper options.

These cards are printed on the paper I typically use, Kodak Matte Photo Paper. It's just slightly lighter weight than the inexpensive white cardstock I buy in bulk to use for backgrounds and also, a touch more bright white.

Here is a comparison of the photo paper (left) and white cardstock (right.) The cardstock is perfectly serviceable but you can see that with the photo paper, the colors are more vibrant and the details a bit crisper. Obviously the sheet price is a little higher but for the quality, I think it's worth it.

So, if you're doing a lot of hybrid stuff in your crafting, try some test prints to see what works best for you!

12 Tags for Christmas giveaway

Of course you know Nora, right? She has such a knack for simple and lovely projects and organizing ideas and party planning and gift wrapping (that's just as wonderful as what's found inside.) Basically, she's just awesome. And, she's nice to boot! I'm thrilled to be able to offer a spot in her upcoming Christmas Tags class.

Interested? Of course you are! It starts on Monday, November 5th. You can find all of the details here. It's an absolute bargain for a full month of inspiring tag making and holiday planning. So go sign up.

One of you lucky readers will get the class for free! Just leave a comment and I'll choose a winner Wednesday night. It's that simple! And if you want to go ahead and sign up now (you know you do,) you'll get a refund or you can share the class with a friend if you're the lucky winner!

Now go forth. And be merry. Christmas is only 8 weeks away!

loving arrow fabric

Do you ever check out Spoonflower? Custom fabric printed with your own designs...I've been dying to try it for so long now and still haven't actually hit submit but I love browsing the designs available for purchase from other talented designers! They do a weekly design contest with specific themes and this weeks theme, arrows, is obviously a hot design element at the moment. There were so many fabulous entries this week that I thought I'd collect a few of my favorites here so I can go back and hopefully purchase some of them soon! Perhaps you'll enjoy some of them as well - I know a lot of you are exceptional seamstresses.

sharing a random freebie

...because I like to do that from time to time. I have so many projects that I've started and kind of lost the mojo to complete halfway through! This is a little set of journaling cards I created for Two Peas Facebook fans that was never used. Hope some of you can use them!

download here and enjoy!

quick tip for remembering download sources

There are so many amazing designers out there sharing their work and talent for free. It's important to recognize them when you use the beautiful things they create. You probably already have a method for cataloging your sources but I've finally discovered what works best for me and it's incredibly EASY so I thought I'd share.

This kit:

Beautiful, right? Can't wait to use it. So, I downloaded it from here. I know she has smartly included her web address on the preview but I wanted to keep track of the direct link to the actual post so after I downloaded the kit, I went to the post and clicked the little icon to the left of the web address,

dragged it over to the kit folder,

and released the mouse button. Boom. There is the link stored right with my download. This is especially helpful when the download is just a single image file with no identifying info as to the source.

trying something a little different

I've been using etsy for my digital stuff, paper goods and knitted items but I spotted shoplocket on a blog a few months ago as an etsy alternative and decided I'd give it a shot. I'd like to maybe someday set something custom up but for now, I just want to see how this works out. 

There are some people out there that are really, really good at mixing business with pleasure on their blog without it coming off like some obnoxious sales pitch. I aspire to be that someday but marketing and promoting myself has never been a comfortable thing for me. I do really like eating though so I hope that my stuff is appealing to some of you and that for the rest of you, you aren't turned off by me occasionally sharing some of things I make to sell! If it is a turn off, I'm open to you telling me that too. Nicely, please. 

So I've been knitting away making some scarves and cowls for the fall and have a handful of them to share with you today. These are all intended for your darling daughters (or sons :) but I do have some adult versions as well. Those require me to get in front of the camera though and I'm not nearly as cute as this girl...I mean, seriously. 

a layout share

I'm procrastinating. Hence, another layout done. A little crazier than my usual but that's the beauty of digital! The ability to play around with new (to you) techniques with the benefit of the ctrl+z and no clean up!

I found this kit (free!) via Lindsay's blog. So fun. Wood and neon - what's not to love? Grab it here.

chai addicted

I've become addicted to my mid-afternoon chai. I love the Bolthouse Farms version but it's fairly pricey so when I spotted this recipe for a chai concentrate, I jumped on it quickly.

A few months ago, I bought a box that included a variety of Indian skewed spices (and I've made a lot of samosas with that box!) but I had quite a few that I hadn't touched yet. *This* recipe handled that problem nicely. Plus, it made my house smell amazing!

It's not exactly the same but it's close enough (especially considering how much cheaper it is!) I got 4 small jars of concentrate from the recipe and each jar is good for 2 glasses.

concentrate + almond milk cubes + tiny splash of honey

add equal amount almond milk

and a sprinkle of cinnamon

Enjoy.

I used to scrapbook every day. When I started, more than ten years ago, I'd put Jake to bed and make a page. Every day. When Zack was born, I continued the tradition. For probably 3 or 4 years, it was just a given. Carlos would come home from work and I'd share what I'd done. I was proud. I was excited. I was itching to share with someone that loved the subject matter as much as I did.

As time went on and I became more a part of the amazing community of scrapbooking I got so much love and validation from my virtual friends and acquaintances  So much support for doing something I loved and would have done anyway.

I'm getting sentimental. I do that.

Can you believe I have sixty-five pages of layouts in my Two Peas gallery? Sixty-five pages of photos and words and love and creativity (or my version of it.) I still love going through those old gallery pages (I could look through the actual albums but online is so much easier!) The pages I did years and years ago are still my favorites.

I grabbed this gorgeous kit from One Little Bird recently and wanted to make a page. Something quick to design so I could focus on the words and the story. So I went back in my gallery and found a layout, waaaaay back in the 50-somethings, that I made in 2005. Whoa.

(check out those flea market letter stickers! still love those)

Design? Done. This was back when I stuck with primarily cardstock + fonts with the occasional brad thrown in. I'm still a fan or those basic elements. For the re-dux, I added a little pattern (subtle. natch.) and a couple of basic elements but still, fairly simple. The only element I added that wasn't included in the kit were my Dated Brushes.

And I thought if I already had the design done digitally, a design that I still love, I might as well save it as a template and share it in case one of you would like to use it as well. Like it? Grab it. Enjoy!