It's a New Year

And definitely time for a new calendar.

I love, love, love Basic Greys annual calendar.  But every year it gets harder to find especially with so many LSS's closures.  So this year, I decided to use my hoarder sized stash to make my own. 

With the decision to make it myself, came even tougher design & logistics decisions. 

• How do I display it?
• Do I print the calendar pages myself?
• How am I going to incorporate it into my families albums?  Am I going to incorporate the calendar pages?
• Will I put pictures on the layout as I make the pages or take a picture during the month of the album?
• What size do I want?
• Where am I going to put the blasted thing?
• Can you see the frustration starting to build?  This is why I always purchased a premade one!

But, I finally stopped aggravating myself and just did it. 

• I picked up a paper pad from AC Moore and a calendar from the dollar spot at target. 
• Sketched out my basic page design.  Somewhat.
• Decided to display it in the office on a large 3 ring binder that I can reuse year after year.  This is still not set in stone.  The calendar I picked up is pretty big so I may have to have my husband rig something up. 
• And, I will make my own binding to save the pages in.  Because my calendar is huge, it won't fit in the 8 1/2 by 11 album I purchased for it and I don't want to put it in a 12 by 12 album.  Don't know why not, I just don't. 

This is the calendar I picked up at Target. 

 

The paper is really thin.  It is definitely worth all of the $1 that I spent on it.  But no worries, I plan to reinforce it with layers of cardstock and very strong adhesive......

And my first page. 

I love it!  I can't wait to put a photo on it!!

I plan to follow that basic design plan for all of the pages.  Each will have a patterned paper background, with an 8 1/2X11 foundation on white cardstock.  The patterned paper background is cut to the size of the calendar page and because I am leaving that top part mostly blank, it won't interfere with whatever binding I decide to use.  Right now I am thinking ring because I would like to keep the actual calendar pages that are on the back of each layout. 

The details are what can make a page really special for me.  I added a lot of small touches to the pages in the calendar because I felt that a lot of big elements might take away from the calendars simplicity or the photos by having too much presence.  Plus, a lot of stuff is bulky and my calendar wouldn't have laid as flat as I wanted it to once it was on the wall (I have made one in the past that looked a lot like a shelf once it was on the wall, it was so fat :)). 

 

I used the arrow washi tape here and on another spot on the layout.  If you look closely, you can see where I changed the direction of the tape so that the arrows point at each other :)  It is almost embarrassing how happy that makes me....

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making time to scrapbook/create anything is a real challenge for me nowadays.  With a busy travel schedule and an even busier high school homeschooler, I found that in order to be productive with my crafty ideas, I have to make creating a conscious decision or I will not do it.  I really won't.

There will always be dishes in the sink.  It's true.  So I may as well use some of my time to do something that will not always be there waiting on me.  Creating everyday is liberating.  Lovely.  Relaxing.  With that being said, take a look at my latest stash buster.  This is a scraplift of a baby card that I found on pinterest

Here is the link to the original card.   I know right.  Doesn't look anything like it.  The worst scraplifter ever lives right here.  The card was created by Lisa Martz and I found it thru pinterest.  She does wonderful work and I really loved visiting her blog.

The pictures of my little guy with his face all painted up like Dracula are perfect for this layout. 

These pictures crack me up.  They were taken after he had come back and he was a wreck!  His makeup was all over his costume, his teeth were falling out and he had eaten all of the "blood" that was on his lips and around his mouth.  He could not have been happier, lol. 

 

 

So happy with how the beat up glitter brad came out.  You can see, just a little, the lightly distressed edges of my photo........

 

 

 

Google eyes anyone?  I placed them right in the corner..........

 

 

 

 

 

All of the thread is from where I clipped danglers after I sewed my edges.  It was laying in a big pile on my desk so I threw it under the mat........

 

Okay, so I was looking at my stats and saw that I made one post in 2013 and one in 2014.  Prolific I am not but if blogging is something that I want to keep doing, and I do, I have to do better.  I will do better.  What is a good blogging goal?  I don't know but 20 post a month sounds good.  Lets do this. 

How about you?  Are you a blogger who needs to post more or are you a reader who is only interested in reading?  If you're a blogger how do you decide on how much to post and when?  Just curious but I would love to hear from you.   

Thanks for stopping by!