Have you always wanted to make an album and incorporate your family history into it? Well grab a 12x12 binder style album and let's get started! Leave your email in the COMMENTS if yu want to purchase one or more kits. New kits will be shown as they become available in 2011. I recommend ordering as we go along because supplies are limited to 50 and under of each set. "My Story" title page for Genealogy 101 in 2011 at the store where I work. ($7.50 plus shipping) I think I will upload it to the Basic Grey gallery too. They need more genealogy pages up on there. :) The girl at desk silhouette is from Cricut cartridge "Sentimentals." "Original Me" January month --first set --a two page layout about yourself. ($14.50 plus shipping) I love this one because it is blue! My favorite color. :D Always start your record keeping and genealogy work with a few of your own pictures and statistics. Lecture notes and chart included. "Mom and Dad" ...

Baby Girl card on left with plain wax paper Baby Boy card on right with embossed wax paper "leftovers" from wax resist Batik process Hurray! I finished the Feb. card swap baby cards for the local store where I work. I repurposed my leftover embossed wax paper sheets from the wax Batik resisit technique for the sympathy cards in the post below. I then used a scallop circle Spellbinder on the wax paper peices to cut them out. I added these scallop circles into the baby card layers just as if they were a vellum layer. They were more fragile than vellum would have been at this point due to the embossing. But I think if I had used a thicker grade wax paper in the beginning for the wax resist Batik process, these pieces would have help up even better. Either way, I was glad to put them to use --instead of into the trash can. As it is, they are perfect for greeting card use. Reduce, reuse, and recycle--especially when it is something lovely like these pieces!

EMBOSSED WAX RESIST ON PHOTO GLOSSY PAPER Doesn't it feel great to get something creative done? I made 19 sympathy cards today pretty much all identical. Just a slight ribbon change for the last three. Otherwise, I used Copic markers, one of my daughter's sketches (photocopied to multiply the quantity), and a set of my Spellbinders. I am drooling over this card background technique! I was also super excited to incorporate a NEW technique (to me.) Wax paper resist on glossy photo paper with Distress Inks by Tim Holtz! I had the wax paper. I had a craft iron. And I had the 4x6 HP photo paper by the bagful! I have several Sizzix embossing folders. And of course big Tim Holtz fan that I am, I had the ink! It worked so well. I love the delicate distressed look it gives my card backgrounds! The bonus is that I even plan to use the remaining "used" sheets of embossed wax paper itself on baby cards for next month's Baby card swap! No way am I wasting such a beautiful em...

I just read about this today in the Simple Times newsletter and also here http://creatingthehive.com/blog-post/57968/project-365-personal-challenge Apparently it has been going on a few years now. Challenge yourself to do ONE crafty thing each day from your "projects to do" list. So far in 2011 I have actually managed to do this by default because it was important to me to really get moving this year --and keep moving--on my goals one by one. I am genuinely excited to do this Crafting 365 Challenge as well as the sister challenge Photo Project 365 which is to take a photo each day. I have been keeping up on that. It's hard, but I have been doing it! I have a folder on my computer for my digital photo uploads. Each week I should update the craft projects completed here. A sort of accountability, right? Here is my month so far. Think I can keep this up? Jan 1-8 gift clean up, daughters room cleanup, closet sort, wrapping paper organization, work class boxes emptied, page k...

Just sitting here in my favorite old chair listening to Josh's new cd and waiting for the day to get moving. My husband has gone ice fishing bright and early. So bright and early that this light sleeper (me) didn't even hear him head out the door. Cinnamon rolls are almost done baking in anticipation of my daughter and her visiting friend getting up soon. Her friend has come down from the crisp cold northwoods near International Falls, MN to help her with some fun wedding plans and projects. Such a happy sound yesterday to hear these two girls kibitzing. :) It's quiet now though. It is so nice to just sit here and relax after the past weeks of hustle and bustle. Oh we love those too. Christmas is my favorite holiday. New Years is full of promise and goals and change. I have time to think and then to do. Why even this morning I actually dusted my keyboard! I would not have had time for that last month! LOL Remember to take time for you. It is the best reward.

January is Get Organized month on Scrapperschallenge and we want you to GET BUSY and get organized. Starting with your photo backlog.... Let's face facts. Everyone is basically "behind" their scrapbooking from where they would like to be. We know that. LOL We very rarely hear of someone who is all caught up to wherever they would like to be. I am not about problems. I am about solutions to problems. If your backlog of photos is bugging you then let's do something solid about it. Lets think of ways to get your wonderful event and family photos out of storage boxes and developers paper packets into ALBUMS! Have you considered speeding yourself along with these types of sleeve pages/protectors? They are made by a couple companies but these shown are from We R Memory Keepers They are even on sale right now HERE! Good deal! We advocated using these in 2006 with our Unit by Unit challenge. I think Ali Edwards? shared the general idea a few years ago in some narrower 2...

HAPPY NEW YEAR to each of you and I hope you will enjoy this year 2011 here at My All and over at Scrapperschallenge ! We will be setting our own scrapping goals this year--one per month! You determine what you really need to work on and then YOU make it happen! We will show you how --and encourage you onward too! We will still have the Club for recording our page creations in 2011! We always and continually want you to try to get more pages done! Plus, I am going to post some monthly IDEAS for your organization goals on the Scrapper's Challenge yahoogroup if you don't have any set ones yet. This is either to give you ideas or certainly you can use these! I will be posting ideas for each monthly goal throughout that month and hopefully it will help you keep on track! JANUARY - Planning and your Photos and Digital photo files-so you can get a grip on WHAT you want to do and how much of it you really have time for. Also layout sketches and great sites for those so you can pl...