Project Life Update - Week of 3/18 to 3/24

WOO HOO!  Who has two thumbs, is still coughing like a fiend, and is all caught up on her Project Life pages?

THIS GIRL!!!

Okay... mostly caught up.  See that big blank space?  I was going to do one of those cards with my week's Tweets on it, but I forgot that my printer sucks and isn't working right now.  Lame.  I'll make the card and then have to wait to print it until I get a new printer I guess.  The thing works, technically, but it won't work properly unless I clean the heads and do a nozzle check first.  If I don't, it leaves black streaky smears on everything I print.  Cleaning the heads that often uses a LOT of ink, and ink for it is not cheap.  It's like $17 a cartridge and it takes SIX cartridges.

Time for a new printer.

The big problem is that I've been making all these cute journaling cards and I can't print any of them to use them!  Bummer, huh?  Then I got an idea.  Make the cards, then use the digital file (since I do save them individually and not just on the pages of six like I post them) to digi-scrap them.  Duh, right?

It didn't hurt that I was laid up sick all week and didn't really have the energy to do much else.  Talk about a great time to get in the mood to play with digital, huh?  Here are a few close ups of some of the cards I did.

I made a file with colored file folder labels.  I think they came out so cute!  They're in rainbow colors so I can coordinate them with whatever, or I can just print them all on one card as a journaling card.

There was some scraplifting involved here.  (Hey, I'm sick and it's sucking all energy and creativity from my bones!!!)  For instance, this card was inspired by this one I found on Pinterest.  I made my own version of her "Tell Me" card  I made this one using the quatrefoil overlays from Mel Stampz.  I am in LOVE with these things!  She has tiny dots, moroccan tile, damask... they're easy and you can make patterned papers to match whatever you're doing.  I love that she offers them for free too.  I was able to make the red perfectly match the text on the photo, which I pulled from one of the book covers using the eyedropper tool.  Everything matches!!!

(Speaking of scraplifting, the week title card is inspired by this one.)

The font is called Batik Regular and is also free, free, free!  If you see a typewriter font on my pages, it's probably this one.

The card with four photos on one 4" x 6" print was inspired by this one on Heather's Homemade Home.

Right side!  Most of the cards were done in Photoshop.  This took a long time because I am SLOW at the digital stuff.  It was super nice though to just get my photo prints back and be able to trim them and stick them on the page.  WORK DONE!  I probably won't do this every week, but like I said, since I was stuck on the couch sick all week, it worked!

The quote card came from Pinterest.  See it here.  The journaling card on the bottom row was printed last year.  I think it was a Becky Higgins freebie but I have no idea if it's something that is still available for download.  It has the journaling for the photo of where Bubba wrote his name on the dry erase board.  I do most of my journaling with the typewriter or on the computer, but I do like to include a little bit of my handwriting on each layout when possible.

I Instagrammed a screen shot of my phone's weather screen, then color coordinated the rest of the card with it.  I'm looking at these temperatures and cringing because it being hot this early in the year means summer is going to be that much more brutal that much earlier.  UGH.

I had to include a little something about Draw Something on there too.  LOVE this game!

This one was totally copied from Seriously...brains.  I just left off the bunting detail.

I figured out digital washi tape this week - reduce the opacity Sara, duh!  I may not have the funds to go out and buy a bunch of pretty tapes, but I can fake it like this!  This card uses Mel Stampz Tiny Dot overlay...

And this card uses the quatrefoil one again!  I made the cards earlier in the week, and then I got the idea of using them and having them printed with my photos instead of printing them at home and pasting my printed, cropped photo on top.  I saved a little paper and some ink.  It all adds up, right?

Here's another example of me playing with the faux washi tape.  I really like how this turned out.  I totally scraplifted it from a card I saw on Pinterest, found here.  She has some GREAT cards.

So why print out the cards individually and stick to a paper page, instead of just digi-scrapping the whole page and printing it that way?  Well, for the same reason I'm not using the fancy sectioned page protectors - money.  It cost me about two dollars to print out all the stuff for both 12" x 12" pages this week.  Sure, I had a few more little things to add, such as the two journaling cards I had printed previously and my Twitter stuff, but overall, I'm imagining that even with the cost of my cardstock bases and adhesive factored in, this still has to be a lot cheaper than having two 12" x 12" layouts printed.  This is pretty cost effective as far as scrapbooking goes!

Don't think I forgot about y'all!  Here's my journaling card freebie for this week:

You can see two that I used on my layout for this week, as well as one made from my file folder labels.  I got the idea to add the days of the week to them when I saw another one almost exactly like it on Pinterest the day after I made my labels!  I made the little labels on the card next to it too.  I've seen a digital kit that has labels like that with numbers on them, but I figured I'd leave mine blank so you could add days of the week, numbers, letters - whatever.  The middle two cards were me playing with the digital washi tape some more.

I think they're fun, and I'm totally loving the bright colors.  Like I said, you can print them out and use them traditionally, or you can cut one out in a program like Photoshop to use in digital scrapbooking.  It's totally up to you.  As always, these are free when you become a fan and "like" my Facebook page.  All I ask is that you don't sell them and give me credit if you use them.

Again, many thanks to Mel of Mel Stampz for not only being awesome and sharing her overlays, but allowing me to make something with them that I can then reshare with you.