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!

art for Izzy: beautiful AND inexpensive (you can do this!)

You all know I dig paper cutting. I have a hard time committing to design-y stuff around the house so this project is a perfect quick and cheap addition to Izzy's room.

I got SO many nice comments on instagram yesterday when I shared this image. Honestly, the cutting is the easy part...designing this beauty takes skill though! That's what I need to work on next :) As I mentioned in my last post, I downloaded this template from here. I just enlarged it a bit so it filled an 8.5 x 11" sheet of cardstock. (You need to browse this blog - such lovely work. I adore Wynken, Blynken and Nod, Paper Moon (which would be an AWESOME starter project if you are hesitant to try this out) and these Zombie templates which I planned to use last Halloween but ran out of time on. This year for sure - and there are some other Halloweeny templates as well!)

LEFT printed template + glass mat // RIGHT after cutting the small letters and script letter centers

LEFT these big chunks? so gratifying. // RIGHT starting to get a little hairy

LEFT I'll admit, this part freaks me out just a little // RIGHT finished and ready to hang

In situ. Just hanging in an out-of-the-way corner where she can't really get to it.

new in the shop

I've been playing around with some new things for the shop...both digital and physical paper stuff and some knitted goodies) I need to take photos and create the listings but I thought I'd share a little here in the meantime.

I did add a new kit yesterday - a brush set to date your photos - just $2!

I also have small notebooks and blank greeting card sets ready to be listed...kraft handcut geometric shapes + glitter + grid paper inserts. I'm loving how these turned out and have pieces cut to assemble more in a variety of colors.

These are veneer tags with glitter designs...working on different colors (hot pink, matte gold) and thinking of doing different sizes as well. Still in limbo on these. I'm thinking this size would make perfect tags for the holidays!

No photos of the knitted items yet but I hope to knock those out this weekend and list them the first of next week.

Today though, I'm working on a hand cut piece for Izzy's room. I saw this yesterday and immediately printed the template. I'll share a photo of the finished piece once I figure out where to put it...excited to pull out the exacto today during quiet time...so meditative for me.

project life: week 27

I'm almost caught up with sharing what I have done...now to move forward and get completely caught up!

products used: Adrienne Looman papers Petunia + Mustard Sky // Ticketed Tabs // 4x6 Layers

project life: week 26

products used: KP stamps // honeycomb pattern from Pugly Pixel  // blinks of life cut files (used digitally) // chalkboard card - my own (using vintage image from here) download here if you'd like it :)

project life: weeks 24 + 25

Moving on...here is what I came up with for weeks 24 and 25. Definitely loving this process a lot more (though I did enjoy adding the tiny bits and baubles - this is working so much better for me!)

products used:  Card Creator from Bananafish // Fleetwood (woodgrain paper, adjusted) from Sahlin Studio // "you" printable from Paper Coterie // this fab icon set (for the heart and speech bubble)

I'm still playing around with a glitter effect but I'm semi happy with it for now. If you want some really fabulous digital glitter letters, grab these from Design Editor.

products used: Kelly Purkey stamps // Persnickety Prints Bird of a Feather

Obviously I didn't have a lot to work with this week but that's OK because I LOVE that picture of Izzy and was more than happy to showcase it. I mixed a little vintage/grungy look with a more graphic look by combining the Persnickety stuff with the KP stuff. I'm good with it :)

project life: weeks 22 + 23

So I've been a project life fool the past couple of weeks. I think I've done eleven weeks? (and yet, I'm still only in mid-July) Once I caught up with the pictures I had already printed (weeks 18 - 21) I decided that rather than print pictures and then embellish and journal, I'd complete the spread digitally (using the templates I created previously for planning purposes) and print the completed slot fillers to simply slide into my page protectors. I know I could do it all digitally and print as a book but I do like the idea of staying "caught up" as well as being able to add extra page protectors between spreads for school work and art. I also want to have the option of adding embellishments after the fact if I really, really feel the need.

I'm just going to skip sharing those last few pre-printed photo weeks because frankly, they aren't my favorite. Plus, it is a pain in the ass to photograph and I'm never happy with how they present on the blog. With this new approach, I can share the digital image - much cleaner!

I have about 6 weeks done and ready to print but I'll spread them out a bit. Here are weeks 22 and 23:

products used: Let's Go Mini from Robyn Meierotto // Card Creator from Bananafish

I created that tweet image to use as an overlay. I used a card from the Let's Go mini, a screenshot of my tweet (changed the layer mode to "multiply") and then added the image (color changed to white, opacity lowered) If you'd like the png, just click and save :)

products used: Digitally Smitten from Digital Design Essentials

Wanna see what my prints order looks like? For the 3x3, 3x4 and 4x4" slots, I obviously mix and match. For the 12x6" slot, I broke it into 3 sections. I've done this before and honestly, when you adhere them to a sheet of cardstock, the seam isn't even noticeable.

I think this is going to work much better for me. At least until I can call myself caught up again!

tutorial: using vintage images to create a digital chalkboard effect

I've been creating some chalkboard type digital elements for my project life album and thought I would share how I do it in case you'd like to do some yourself. Here are a few examples I've done just kind of playing around. The images I've used are from this site (lots of copyright free vintage images) and this fun free printable from Fifth and Hazel.

OK, for the tutorial:

open your chalkboard background and the image you'd like to use

with your image file open, choose your rectangular marquee tool (M)

draw a selection box around the portion of your image you'd like to use

choose edit > define brush from selection

name your image if you'd like, then click OK

switch to your chalkboard image and create a new layer

activate your brush tool (B)

and choose the brush image you just created

stamp your image (make sure you have the new layer selected...not your chalkboard background layer)

add another new layer and while holding the control key, click on the thumbnail of the image layer

the previous action will create a selection area based on the image...hide your image layer and you'll be able to see. choose your brush tool (B) again and select the default chalk brush (I use the 36 px size)

now simply draw over your selection with the chalk brush. the drawing will be limited to the selection you've created with the image to create a chalky finished product. remember the more times you go over an area, the darker and more filled in it will become so try to go sparingly and cover the are in as few passes as necessary. playing with the opacity a bit might help blend the image as well (I think I used 85% here)

If you'd like to use the chalkboard image I used, grab it by enlarging this image and right clicking to save. Enjoy!