Top 10 for 2013

I blogged my top ten layouts last year and thought it would be a fun thing to do again this year. Here they are in no particular order.

 

 I just noticed the first few are very pink! Who knew?

 

One of my favorite project life weeks from back in March.

white on white.

 My October Mini.  Love the whole book really but finally using my long hoarded owl sticker felt good. 

And, finally my December Daily of course. Working on this project was such a thrill. I am linking up this post with Stephanie Howell, Shimelle and the lovely Ashli.

Overall, we had a really blessed year, with lots of ups and downs but mostly ups. Can't wait to see what next year brings.

My big news!

I am so excited to share with you that I was selected to be part of the new Jenni Bowlin Studios digital design team for 2013!! 

I was in shock when I read the email from them. Actually my husband saw the the message first and tried to slyly tell me I ought to check my email, ha! 

I have loved Jenni Bowlin's stuff forever and am so honored to be part of the team.  I am doing hybrid designs so I will be use both digital and traditional products in my projects. I want to say thank you to all of my blog readers for encouraging me so much over the years, I truly treasure all the support and look forward to more awesome things to come! 

DecDaily - 24 & 25

Ali talked about her hope that this album helps make you savor the season. Yes. I have loved this project so much so far.

I am still not done.  I have more pictures I want to add, as inserts maybe.  We have more adventures planned before the end of the year and I want all those memories together.

We had a really lovely Christmas at home.  We only left the house to go sledding in the morning.

I finally made a confetti pocket.  I filled it up with Jenni Bowlin quilt stars, painted, glittered and wrapped in twine. I added a large vertical photo on each side and  a strip of a Hambly overlay.

And my delicious new KP stamps made their way onto each photo.  I embossed the edge of Magic in gold, added wooden letters and red numbers.

Repetition of the red.  I label I printed at home (font antrokas), gold glitter glitters and journaling on to the photo.

 Made this page for Christmas eve.  Going to make an insert with journaling and more pictures of the Christmas eve petting zoo.  That little "Have yourself a Merry little Christmas" tag is a free printable I made for my readers.  Go here to pick it up :)

I have so many pictures from Christmas (and Christmas eve which is when we opened most of the gifts) that I just decided to make a collage and print it out.  I added a strip of patterned paper, glitter ribbon and glitter paper strips and the 25.  I cut out the paper around the 25 and slipped the number underneath.  I didn't use pop dots so the effect isn't super dramatic.  I was going to stitch but settled on white pen outlines instead.  I added a few stamps here and there (from SC and KP). 

All is calm, all is bright.

The ground is covered in snow, the presents are wrapped and under the tree (and many have already been unwrapped), about half of the cards made it to the mail, and the pioneer woman cinnamon rolls are waiting in the fridge for tomorrow morning.

Our family would like to wish everyone a warm, safe, and joyous holiday this Christmas!

So grateful for all of my lovely readers. Thank you for all of the encouragement and support, I treasure each one of you.  :))

ps. I made a free printable page of gift tags. (download here or by clicking below.)  Would love to see how you use it!  Please tag me (@nirupama01 on twitter or instagram) or put a pin it! 

DecDaily - swirly twirly gum drops

 More December Daily pages today.  Happy mail, travel, candy, gingerbread houses and getting holiday gifts and cards together.

 First off I had to use this fabulous KP december stamp.  It is just so awesome and I don't even know why.  I used red patterned paper, silver glitter tape and black ink. Love the mixed media look of just using one sheet of paper with holes in it.  I should try this in PL more often, but I rarely do inserts.

This page flips open to a full photo of Avinash decorating the gingerbread house.  I added the title with thick chipboard letters and white foam thickers.  Lots of red labels for journaling.

I embossed a wooden tree with gold glitter (over the stove because I'm at home and didn't feel like carrying my heat gun).  The little ones are just dipped in gold ink. 

 I put a Starbucks bag to work on the back.  The squirrels seemed topical.  Avinash helped me put together a lot of our holiday gifts for his teachers and people that work in our apartment and even helped me distribute them.  Textured red MS label, gold ornament chipboard and gold glitter numbers.  Love the gold on gold look.

Another insert about our hectic weekdays, packing, traveling and a last minute piece of happy mail that arrived minutes before we left for the airport.  The background is a Hambly transparency (map of Paris).
I snipped part of the package, love the saying on it!  I stamped across a shipping tag on the bottom (with the Ali E holiday stamp), and added a silver snowflake. 
The airmail sticker is from a cute set I picked up at Anthropolgie.  I love so much of the stationery there I can't resist picking some up every once in a while (interested in some of my pieces? I have a sampler set of my stationery collection for sale in my shop.)

And, finally a page I made with OSD printables from Roadside Designs.  Love these great journaling cards.  A few more Crate chipboards. The tinsel ribbon is a great find from the Target Dollar Spot. 

DecDaily- Santa's coming? I know him!

I so loved that the kids got to see Santa this year.

I don't think I've seen such a good Santa since my best friend Rachel and I went to see Santa at the 34th Macy's.  That was like a hundred years ago of course.

This year we just lucked out at the Children's museum in a total right place & right time situation.  We didn't even have to wait long.

I was so busy snapping pictures I barely got to hear what Avinash told Santa.  But their conversation was very long, serious and one sided.  Aside from Hub commercial toys, he asked for a lot of pennies.  When pressed, he said it was to fill up his piggy bank with.  Obviously.

I printed another photo enlargement for this page.  I used a little patterned paper and that awesome gold printed vellum again.   It needed a little extra color so I stuck a wide red ribbon under the vellum.  Love how it softened the red just enough.  Also,  wood letters and a Santa badge.

I used one of those letters at Macy's to write down Avi's list (for that day at least).  I added some red JBS number stickers.  The stamps are from the KP holiday set. 

Today I was totally relieved to see all of that Target/Neiman Marcus stuff on 50% off sale.  Not bad at all, I had to haul my stuff back to return and buy again because the store refused to honor their 'Holiday Price Match' guarantee.   Just glad I got the discount.  Almost 100% sure that I am done with Christmas shopping now.  How about you, any more gifts to buy this weekend?

Project Life in Seafoam - Awkward Family Photo?

I decided to finish up the past few weeks of December in one spread.  It is kind of an extension of my DecDaily album.  There is some overlap, but mostly extra pictures that I didn't have room for.

 Also, I was just really excited to play with my new Project Life kit in SEAFOAM (!!).  I printed out a bunch of cards and just dove in.  The colors are not necessarily holiday, so I added a lot of red to my pages.  Plus, I love teal and red together.  I also used some of her really pretty neutral cards in tan, and black and white.
I got the OA 'make a countdown' paper and decided to use a lot of it this week for my dates.  No point saving it, right? I also used some In a Creative Bubble tags, and a few KP stamps (per usual). The foam star of David is Target (on clearance), we used them on Avi's teacher cards as well.

Just love when I find a dark photo I can stamp on in white chalk ink. I think it works best with the rubber stamps too. 
I cut the 'zoo lights' ornament out from our tickets.  Perfect fit.  The quotes card is another Seafoam item.

The bright pink tape? Target Dollar Spot, baby!  Also got it in red chevron and some cute tinsel ribbon in blue and silver. Score. 
The tiny gift tag and star are free printables.  I had a free heart too, but Avinash made me cover it in glitter and glue it to his shirt.

I cut up a black&white Seafoam card to mat this photo of Nandini, taken on the 3rd apparently.  She was laughing so hard b/c her brother was playing peekaboo with her.  A few minutes later some lady actually came up to me to say that her laugh was so loud it was ruining her lunch.  I choose not to include that part of the memory on here. Some people are insane.  I tell myself she is the no carb diet lady from TV.

Ryan dressed himself and Avinash in these funky Target sweaters and made me take an 'Awkward Family Photo'.  His words, not mine!  


Avinash didn't actually say that, but pretty close. Ok, I said it.  Many times while we waited in line for Santa. Title added with Basic Grey blue micro stickers.  Saving the actual Santa picture for the next spread.

Let me know if you have any questions. Linked up with Ali Edwards for my December Daily and The Mom Creative for Project Life Tuesday.
Also, don't forget there are a ton of new lines in a two peas today (free shipping code 9GYBVH).  I grabbed the map paper hearts of the new Crate line but they also just got in the new Freckled Fawn wood chips.  Definitely want those next time.

Links to free printables I used are below (follow me on pinterest for lots more):

Source: oanabefort.com

Project Life - snow day

I am pushing forward with Project Life.  Still a few weeks behind but I plan to get caught up soon.  This week was all about snow!  It is almost nonexistent in Texas, so getting to see it is such a big deal for us. 

My pages are so simple this week.  A ton of photos and a little journaling.  So easy to fill up Design G pages.  I added a little chipboard snowman, waving a BG flag, ha!  I also used a vellum tag on Avi's photo, with a little red label.

The best way I know to add a little depth, put on a title in thickers.  I had to use this wooden snowflake too.

 Back to Design A for the right side.  This is actually a new AC page protector.  I love it so much more than the regular PL stuff.  The pockets are just slightly roomier so I don't have to trim anything down from 3x4.  Thus, the seems never rip and I just get everything in the pockets that much quicker.  And, the last thing I want is to wrestle with pockets. 
A lot of these journaling cards are printables from my SC decdaily kit.  I used some pictures which already appear in my December Daily as well.  I love this picture, so why  not?  Plus, glitter letters on a picture of glitter is always a good idea. 

I stamped 'hello december' and heat embossed it in white.  The words were still hard to read against the patterned paper, so I went over it with my trusty white poster paint pen (best. white. pen. EVER.)

 Still working on my Dec Daily too.  I got some divided page protectors (meant for SC Handbook) to add in pictures quickly.  They fit in my 8x8 album beautifully. 

Let me know if you have any questions. Linked up with Ali Edwards for my December Daily and The Mom Creative for Project Life Tuesday. The PL kit I am using is the Clementine kit, with multi-pack page protectors, and grid journaling cards. Thank you so much to everyone in this wonderful community. I love all the feedback and looking at everything people do each week. It definitely keeps me motivated. Also, please include a link to your projects below so we can check them out too!

I saw that the Seafoam edition is available digitally.  Seriously thinking about getting it because I can't wait for the real stuff!  Also, there are a ton of new lines in a two peas today (free shipping code 9GYBVH).  I could not resist the map paper hearts of the new Crate line.  Hope you have a lovely week, Christmas is almost here!

Why are men so hard to shop for?

I am weird.  I never liked Modern Family. I think it is a poor copy of Arrested Development and the jokes fall flat for me.  I did see a few episodes early on but the only one I really remember is the anniversary gift exchange.  Phil buys his wife a million gifts and she can't think of anything to buy him.  Cut to him listing all the ludicrous things he would like to get (I recall yoghurt maker being on the list?).  But, I think that is true. Men are impossible to shop for.

When my husband and I first met I didn't seem to have such trouble.  I was very happy to revamp his whole wardrobe (to my liking) and turn that into gifts.  Somewhere along the way, probably after he got a real job, his taste level began to exceed my own.  Now, I am at a total loss to pick out shirts that have just the right number of buttons.

I wonder why Daddy is always out of shaving cream?

Plus, I want his gifts to feel like a luxury.  Not just something he would buy himself.  I was stoked when I saw this deal from Art of Shaving.  We used to browse the store when we lived in New York and he loves getting a fancy shave.  (Luckily, we already exchanged gifts last night! Patience and secret keeping has never been our strong suit.)

I love this set, because I could customize the scent (Sandalwood is my favorite), brush and razor.

The also have three other great deals right now.

• Free Ground Shipping and 10% off ProGlide Power Save Set, through 12/30/12 Promo code: 10PowerShave
•  Free Ground shipping and $15 off your purchase of any The Art of Shaving Full Size Kit, until 12/30/12 with Promo Code: 15offFSK at checkout
•  Complimentary Weekender Bag, promo code “HolidayBag” with any purchase of $125 (expires December 31, 2012)
• Free shipping on your first purchase of 50 or more if you become a member

These sets also make great gifts for fathers and brothers too.  Just, don't tell them I said that.

{This post is sponsored by BlogHer and P&G.}

DecDaily - twinkle toes.

Peace on earth.  That is all.

I finally put 12.12.12 in my album.  So grateful for my family.  So many happy memories and grateful for this space to record them.

Just a lot of pictures, a divided page protector and some sequins.

I love the look of confetti sewn in a page protector but have yet to try it.  I tried to get a similar look by sprinkling sequins across the page.  Just something to dress up the basic grid of photos.  I hand stitched the ribbon on gold thread because I still don't know how to unjam my machine.

I added this page protector (from the SC Handbook) insert because I wanted to write more about Avinash's first dance class.  I used cards from the SC kit.  My favorite part is the mix of number stickers here: red chipboard, metal paperclips and woodgrain stickers.

So happy that he loved his dance class.  He has been asking all the time about going back soon.