Project Life | Week 24

Welcome to Week 24. Father'sday week. And isn't that photo a gem? I love it when Reuben is overcome with laughter like that. He has a great sense of humour. And so does his brother. Never a dull moment...

Once again I kept things simple, words and photo's. Not only my words, but also a little questionare Reuben completed about his Dad. And pen drawings each of them did about them & Dad. I pinned the freebie I used here.

On the left I have some pre-Father's day crafting- Reuben sewing a mugwarmer. (Pappa means Dad in Afrikaans.) The little photo of the glasses is from Women's group crafting at my house.

And an everyday Dad-moment around here: bedtime reading. Sometimes I read for them and sometimes he does. We read about two books every night, and have done so since they were little. They love their reading time. Don't know if it has anything to do with Reuben learning to read almost spontaneously and being a very capable reader now. I'd like to think so.

The "we" kit card folds open to include some more journaling about the week.

On this side I have some detail from Liam's room. Frost outside as I took the kids to our neighbour (who drops them off at school on mornings that Theunis leaves early to travel to site -4 hrs drive away). A little recital performed for the Dads at Liam's pre-scool, and time spent at a favourite of ours, Delta Park. Love seeing the seasonal changes there, love those trees and how they arch over the playground. Caught Theunis with his engineerig books. The "Happy" card was a freebie from DDE (Digital Design Essentials) in a pack called "Besties" that I received for being signed into their newsletter. I added the "Father's Day" digitally to suit the occasion.

I also made printed some words that I added to these photo's. First thought I accidentally chucked it, and then re-discovered it after taking the photo's. So added them anyway.

Love this week.

I'll be linking up at The Mom Creative on Tuesday.

Project Life | Week 23

Hello and welcome to week 23. I've kept things very simple for this week...

No inserts, a yay for me. I've also moved everthing back into my first album for this year. Looks like I'm going to be able to fit the first half of this year into one album. I like the idea of an album with more stories to it...

So this week :: I prepared for Women's group at my house. I got the idea from a local tv advert to journal "Today I need some dog bathing, garden watering, kitchen spring cleaning etc etc...kinda energy".

Too many selfportraits in the mirror? Probably. Just love the light in our bathroom. The plates are thriftstore finds. (Yes, I'm a brick-a-brac girl when it comes to crockery.) Love that they have "made in England" stamps on the back. Just realised that I must credit Liam for the artwork. Always blah when I rediscover kids art with no details on it.

This page: I had to lean sideways to avoid glare, that's why the album looks a bit scew at the bottom.

A picture in the garden, no two. A snapshot of Reuben. (The circle in the background is a skylight, in case anyone wonders.) Karla Dudley word-art freebie on the photo. Team-effort breakfast-making in the kitchen, and a photo taken at our favourite veggie store (they're in front of the Jelly Bellies and the sun was shining on the sweets). Didn't come out so clear here, sorry. Oh and the "100" documents the nr of blogposts I reached that week, and the percentage Theunis got for his first assignment. The camera card was a freebie. 

Did I mention that I love how simple this week is?

I'll be linking up at The Mom Creative.

PL 2008 | More backdated pages.

Saying hello from a wintry, flu-y Jo'burg. What better time to share photo's from a wayback summertime. A while ago I shared in this post about a backdated PL album I'm doing. Here's some more pages from the 2008 album I'm working on...

Spread one: As you can see there's still some gaps where journaling can go. As soon as I find my 2008 Diary, co-incidentally pictured above, I will fill in more journaling and date periods. If I realize there's nothing to journal I'll add some quotes. 

Spread two: Miss those curls... And really love this album. Ps: The "good stuff" tab was added digitally, and then stapled to convince everybody that it's a seperate element.

Isn't that dog too cute? It was fingerpainted with mud. Life in Hillcrest... Loved that we lived with one foot in the countryside and yet just a small hop from the city & sea...But ahh, TWO in nappies, those were interesting times...

Spread three: What I also like about this backdated album, is that I feel more at liberty to go outside of the chronological Life Documenting, and, for example here, dedicate a full spread on one "photoshoot".

 Loved that I discovered those clothing labels amongst my scrap-booking stuff. I saved them from their actual clothes for "some" future project (little did I know). I have the last five months of Liam's first year pretty well covered in this album, and it might overlap with the Baby album I'm planning to do for him. But will figure that out when we get there.

I mostly used the Clementine kit in this album.

Project Life | Week 22

Hello and welcome to Week 22. A very quiet week around here.

Everyday life right now. The stuff that matters.

 This week I'm happy I captured: Liam at play, finishing my woven wall hanging, more bits of autumn, a new kettle I love, waving the kids goodbye as they leave for school, bare trees, sillyness shared, Theunis handing in a lot of projects, making my own ice-cream, precious times at Sunday School, and us.

Most cards are from the Cobalt kit. Other elements include: "Hello" circle cut from a freebie card, the "Here we go" digital stamp I made, and "Grow" overlay from Ali at Designer Digitals. You can check out my PL freebie board where you should be able to find most of the freebies I use and more.

I'll be linking up at The Mom Creative.

Happy Father's Day

Dad's day is around the corner. A great opportunity to celebrate someone who's been an awesome Dad from the word go.

They've already celebrated "Pappa Dag" at Liam's pre-school this morning.

All the Dads recieved a matchbox (because here in South Africa we love to braai) with fingerprint art on it.

Here at home we've also been making plans and things. Reuben sewed this mug cosy mostly by himself. "Pappa" means Dad in Afrikaans.

I found it on Pinterest amongst some cool Father's day ideas. In the original idea it's a take-away cup warmer, but we made it into a cup (with an ear) warmer by adding a felt strip (to go through the mugg's ear) and attaching it with velcro. We also added a second layer of velt at the back to hide all the sewing.

Think he'll love it.

 I also recently made these bottles for a craft session, that can be a nice Father's day gift. Found them here.

Planning to print out a few of these Dad book freebies for Project Life. And I'm hoping I can convince my boys to make these Father's Day ties. Adorable. Looking forward to a happy Dad's day!

Project Life | Week 21

Welcome to week 21. Capturing the last bit of autumn around here. I'm still a bit new to Autumn, having lived in sub-tropical Durban for most of my life. Beautiful, even if it means Winter is next...

This week we had school Fete, so an insert was ..unavoidable. But I decided to go for a Design E cut in half this time, and made four square blocks about the Fete.

But first a look at page one: My husband contributed a photo from an overnight work trip to Mpumalanga, and I also added a note he left for me on my computer. "His" & "hers" breakfast photo's had letter stickers added to them. The "This is now" tab actually read "This is me now" so I cut the "me" out and rejoined them. The "me" was then added to the selfportrait below.

I also got more milage out of the wordstickers I used for the "Fete", by cutting out what remained after the letters inside was already used somewhere else. It was a fun day. Liam's pre-school had a Disney theme and he went as a Pirate. Loved their chant and the little hands shooting, blowing their "guns" and putting them back in their belts afterwards. They actually won the competition and each got a KFC kiddie meal this week. Reuben's entire grade went as cats.

Here is the other side of the insert, and more about the Fete. Liam's first chance to compete with real go-carts (the younger kids use push along wire cars). He totally went for it. Loved that the teachers also did a lap on the go-carts. Reuben also got to ride the horse he used to ride at riding lessons. Still very comfortable in the saddle. Right side: recording a visit to Wolmart in Pta, funny because it plays on Wallmart in America. Lots of wool. I used a lined piece of Vellum for some transparent journaling.

I also documented a great afternoon taking Liam to a toyshop to spend a Birthday voucher. So fun looking through everything, and then coming across the Hotwheels cars, and see him get really excited about it. We ended buying handsfull, and a truck to transport them all in. The circle journaling was inpired by Ali Edwards. I played with some paint on the yellow circle. And lastly Sunday at Emmerentia we came across the remote control miniboat club and they let the kids try out one.

Quite happy with this week.

I'll be linking up at The Mom Creative.

Edited: This week was done until I sorted out my study today and came upon a pumpkin painting by Liam. It recently came home with a bunch of other stuff and I somehow missed it. Realized it can totally go into this page...

I slipped it into a 8x8 page protector that also surfaced in the clean-up.

The back is just white with "Liam P" (the P facing backwards) written on it. Love it.

Looming possibilities

We recently completed this Wall Hanging, and I love it! And when I say "we", I mean that I had two little helpers who was comfortably managing the weaving process, that's how easy it was. I love that it was made by all our hands.

It started with me seeing this gorgeous woven wall hanging on Elise's blog. It had a link to Rachel's blog explaining the process.

Instead of a drawer I used an old picture frame that happened to be the perfect size. It will also be the perfect size to make this rag rug placemat, which I badly want to try. I think it can also work great as a tray mat. DH was kind enough to put all the pins into the frame (so he also helped making it) and put the string around each pin. But I think it's easy enough to do yourself. I didn't read Rachel's instuctions well enough and started weaving a few centimeters from the frame. Make sure you start directly next to the frame, as this will be the top side. I was able to move the entire weaved piece up to the frame, but best to just start right. Initially I cut a long piece of yarn, and weaved it through by hand, but then remembered something I saw somewhere, an easier way:

Roll the wool around a pen (the end of the wool can be slipped under the pen's "arm"). It is then very easy and quick to weave the pen through the treads, or pass the pen from one hand to the other, either side of the string, you'll find what works for you. This is my six year old's little hands doing the weaving. I was amazed at how much they loved participating. Don't worry about a little mistake here and there, it mostly dissapears, or give character. I also found than mine hourglassed a lot, in spite of trying to avoid this. I think you have to weave it really loose for this not to happen. But once I took it off the loom it hung quite straight, as you can see in the top picture. I used a sosatie stick to hang it from and tied my loose ends at the back two by two.

When I started it, I told Reuben I'm making it for his room. Regret that a bit, as I really love it somewhere else in the house. So don't promise it to anyone before you've finished it!

Project Life | Week 20

Welcome to Week 20. I'm very excited to be photographing PL with a "new" lens. A 28-80 mm Canon lens bought at a second-hand shop for just R250-00. It actually came with an old Canon film camera, but works perfectly on my Digital Canon. The best part: I no longer have to climb on a bed and stand on my toes to photograph my pages with my 50 mm lens!

I forgot to add in the dates, but this would be 13-19 May 2013.

This week I documented: Monday moment with a favourite magazine and chocolates, going on a breakfast date with my husband (whose idea it was to try the lens on my Canon), and an everyday at home moment. All the cards are freebies, hopefully found somewhere on my PL freebies board on Pinterest. "Hello Life" overlay on the bottom photo is from Ali at Designer Digitals (I altered a it a bit, removing a line).

This side has (surprise!-not) an insert. Design A cut in half. It's mostly photo's I took over a slow week-end at home (recently blogged about it).

And here is the insert turned open. It shows Liam working on a homemade loom, playing charades, and a wolf beanie that I made for Reuben. And more freebie cards. I also liked recording the little rhyme I exchange with the kids every night at bedtime (the top photo shows it clearer). Do you have something that you regularly say to each other? Ali's post "Right now | The words" has me inspired to record more of the things we repeatedly say around here.

That's it. Another week of life recorded = happiness.

I'll be linking up at The Mom Creative.