Starting A New Album

This feels good!  What is it you ask?  Starting a new album.  I stopped working on the family albums for a few years because I was trying to get Kaela's high school albums finished before she graduated from college and with the help of Studio J,  I was able to accomplish that goal.

But that has left me very behind in my family albums.  

2010 Family Album:

Just about finished, the last few pages to go are in kits and in the crop room.  Those will be finished during the next couple of crop nights.

2011 Family Album:  

I started working on this album then Amy and I decided that we wanted to go on a retreat as our Christmas gift to each other.  So I stopped working on the album to make page kits of the remaining photos.  I will take these kits with me to the retreat and play for 4 days.  I have 28 (2 page layouts) kits ready to go.

I was going to use my "trash can" rolling cart but decided that since I am not sure about how much room there is in the retreat crop area it might be better to have a crate that can roll under the table.  I am re-purposing my "retired scrap cardstock" crate for this purpose.  The bin has ALL of my stitching supplies because I can not help myself when it comes to hand stitching on my layouts and a few extra embellishments.  Then of course my tools.  All I have to do is remember to put my trimmer in the cart and I am ready to go.

2012 Family Album:

This is the one that I started last week.  

I have a little work to do because while I printed the photos to scrap, I forgot to do any of the journalling. (gasp!)  Once the house is quite on a night I can not sleep I will sit down to do all of the journalling and print it out on vellum.  That is the plan in my head but knowing me I will also continue to work on a few pages at time and do the journalling  as I go.  But I still like to get the memories  on paper as fast as possible before I have a chance to forget the details that make the event special. 

Some of these photo might look familiar to you.   I used them in Kaela's school albums and saved a few for the family albums since she will be taking her scrapbooks with her when she moves out. 

 I wanted the memories too so I will scrap them again.  

On one hand it is nice to know that I am not going to run out of material to scrapbook  any time soon but on the other hand.....

I also found a vacation album box from 2011 that I organized with the photos, journalling and memorabilia that I forgot to even scrap.  

Nope - I do not think I am going to run out of projects to scrapbook. 

Stamping Technique: Base and Shade Stamping

Well That Is Done

After much hair pulling, teeth nashing and vast amounts of coffee.....

Mike hates doing taxes and most years will wait until April 13th to even start working on them.  This year we had to get our ducks in a row early because of the extra college paperwork for Kaela and the deadlines for those. 

That was a brain workout to be sure.  

I cleaned up my desk area in my scraproom so that we could get our tax information organized

W2 / 1099's

Home / RV interest 

Misc Tax forms (stock stuff)

Kaela College expenses

CTMH tax info

Travel receipts

Donations

While I was getting organized I had to laugh at Kaela because she was watching me gather the CTMH information and asked if I had to keep this information every year?  Yes there were tears from laughter on that one.  Welcome to being an adult my wee one. 

  "Doing" our actual taxes was not the hard part - and we only had a tiny bit of information that we had to stop and look for but it was the Federal paperwork (FAFSA) that we have to fill out for Kaela that is the butt kicker.

Could this website be any more complicated?  

It has to be filled out every year to qualify for scholarships, grants or loans.   It takes a college education to even understand some of the questions... no joke! 

But now that all of this is done - I can have my scraproom back.  

Happy Ground Hog Day....

February Stamp of the Month - Balloon Animals

Do not miss your chance to get your hands on this adorable stamp of the month.

Balloon Animals SET OF 13 $17.95 S1602 

Each month you can purchase a new D-size stamp set, available for that month only, for just $5! 

When you place an order of $50 or more in Close To My Heart products, you qualify for this special Stamp of the Month pricing. 

RECOMMENDED BLOCKS: 

1" × 1" (Y1000), 1" × 3½" (Y1002), 

2" × 3½" (Y1009)

Share The Love

Share the Love
Share some love and help change the life of a child

Share the love this February by purchasing the exclusive My Acrylix® Share the Love D-size stamp set (CC1060). 

Filled with adorable icons and lovable sentiments, this stamp set will be a beautiful addition to your collection—but there is more to this stamp set than meets the eye!

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 Product purchases in US states Alabama and Massachusetts excluded from donation. Offer valid February 1, 2016 (9:00 am MST)– February 29, 2016 (11:59 pm MST) while supplies last. 

Shipping/handling is calculated based on the full retail price of the promotional stamp set.