Tag: scrapbooking

Transforming an Altoid Tin into a mini First Aid Kit

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There is a classic scene in the TV show Friends where they discover that hyper-organized Monica has a secret closet where she keeps all the random stuff she doesn’t quite know how to organize but can’t throw away. It is the opposite of the rest of her life. It is messy, overflowing with junk and unorganized. While I don’t have a Monica closet, I do have a Monica bin where I keep things that I come across for which I have sentimental attachment or think “this might be useful for a project someday”.

Someday is now.

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#AtoZChallenge | Origami peace doves to add some whimsy to my windows

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For our most recent GISH hunt, I folded an origami peace dove for one of the challenges. I really loved how it came out and the peace dove quickly became one of my favorite origami shapes.

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I liked the dove so much that I decided to create an entire flight of peace doves and display them in a mobile.

While my first peace dove was a success, it had been eight months and I needed a refresher on how to put one together. I also wasn’t sure on the size of paper I should use so this step provided a nice test run. I pulled out some scrap paper and tried making a few practice doves using various sizes of square paper.

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#AtoZChallenge | Light switch covers with a little more pizzaz

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Camps feel like a uniquely Maine thing. I know cottages, chalets, cabins and other getaway spots essentially amount to the same thing but in Maine we call them camps. As soon as you say camp, it brings up visions of a ramshackled home built in a slightly haphazard way over several generations. People used whatever materials they had on hand for upgrades and repairs so nothing really matches. It’s a mess but in a beautiful way.

That was what our home in Maine looked like when we first bought it. It was our camp on the lake. The smaller, original cottage had been added to over the years without any real sense of design or cohesiveness. What was once likely an outside porch along the lakeside of the house had been enclosed obscuring views of the lake from the main part of the home. The narrow, awkward stair case in the middle of the house didn’t help. The whole camp was covered in vinyl siding and a series of long forgotten satellite dishes dotted the roof.

The attached deck had a bench seat along the outer edge. While great in theory and convenient at times, it left a large gap underneath that clearly was not up to code. The first thing my father did after we moved into the house was add a wooden barrier along the bottom of the bench so his young granddaughters would not fall to their death.

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#AtoZChallenge | E is for Evening and the Creativity it Brings.

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While I don’t have a favorite Mr. Darcy as no matter who plays the role, in the end, Jane Austen’s story will bring me around to the same conclusion as Elizabeth Bennet. I too love Mr. Darcy. I’ve watched every version or homage made, from Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to the classic BBC version with Colin Firth. The latter I watch at least a few times every year, but I’ve learned never to start watching it after 9 pm.

The mini-series is 327 minutes, or just over five and a half hours. And even though it may be my twentieth viewing, once I start watching I don’t stop until it’s done. While I’m sure the allure of Mr. Darcy has a great deal to do with it, in reality the reason I’ll stay up way too late is that I’m a night owl and when fully engaged, whether with a classic like Pride and Prejudice or more typically on a craft project, I just don’t want to stop. All of my senses come awake.

For my One Little Word® project, each month we’re given a prompt and activities around our word. They are usually a combination of writing prompts along with artistic, or creative components.

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Q is for (Mainely) Quilling | I am in awe of these amazing paper creations.

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While my blog and digital photo books have taken over my hobby time recently, my heart is more in the realm of paper crafting even if it’s been almost a year since I tackled a project. The days are just too short to do everything I want to do, so sometimes things get put aside for a while. I know that eventually I will circle back to my paper crafts and put my obsessively over stocked craft room to good use again.

I have always been drawn to other crafters who excel in the field and have an entire bookcase dedicated to books written by fellow memory keepers sharing their tips and tricks. So, when I realized that there was a quilling artist located in Maine, I knew I had my letter Q locked up. I too have tried my hand at quilling, but on a much more simplistic and less successful level.

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