Journaling for baby #3 with a twist

As much as I’d like to think, believe or even wish, I know that no matter my intention, with baby #3 I will have absolutely no time to reflect on how grateful we are that she is here. 

When Madalyn was born, I wrote in a journal on the date of her birth every month for more than 2 years.  I love looking back at the journal and seeing what was going on in our lives and what amazing feats she was doing.  Then Lexi came along and I was able to get most of the 15th’s during the first year and hit a few during the second, but the quality and quantity of writing was just not there.

So now, here we go with #3 and I know going into it that life is not going to afford me the pleasure of writing sweet nothings to my baby. If I’m lucky, I may remember to write things down like the date of her sleeping through the night, her first tooth and other milestones.  In order to help me record some of my thoughts and feelings, I have created a little journal of the months for the first year.  I have included places for pictures and the pages are small with only a couple for each month.  Already I don’t feel so overwhelmed as I don’t have this empty journal with 200 pages to fill!

Here is what I created today.

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And here are a few pictures of the back side of the month tabs.

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I am guessing I don’t have to say how ready I am to get to use this journal!

Supplies are Basic Grey Papers, Creative Cafe book, CTMH stamps and inks and a variety of suppliers of embellishments.

Technique Tuesday: Life’s A Jungle Book

Don’t you just love little gifty items?  I sure do!  It seems like I usually create little albums for others, but this one is for me :)

I got the pattern from a book called Making Books by Gwen Diehn.  It’s a fun book that has all sorts of patterns and ideas.

The dimensions of the book are 6” tall by 40” long.  You fold it into ten sections accordion style and have a fun little album.

To begin, I followed the pattern to get a 10” tall by 40” wide piece of paper.  Then, I random stamped Colonial White CTMH paper to match my new Animal Cookie papers by CTMH.  Once my base paper was finished, I folded it into the book and started my inside pieces.

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Each inside card is 3”x5” and I just had fun with this.  I carried my animal theme onto each card and ended up with a project that I really like and know that I will create this again for gifts!

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Technique Tuesday: Miniature Envelope Album

Here is a sweet little (4.25"x 4.25")
album made of envelopes and scrap paper.
Using just 5 standard size evelopes, you can make two albums.
Total cost for each album is less than $2!!

After making lots of heavily embellished and expensive projects, I wanted to take a couple of hours and make something with supplies on hand and NO 3-D embellishments. By sticking to ink and stamps, the little album is light and easy to make. It is also a very inexpensive gift that looks nice! So dig out those stamps and get to work!

The following is a simple tutorial.

1. Get 5 standard letter-sized envelopes and alternating directions, use the flaps to adhere the envelopes to one another. This makes a tall accordian style album.
   







2. Cut the album in half. You now have 2 albums that are open at the top. You will adhere some of the sides together and leave some open for flaps. This is done by personal preference.
   
   
   
   



3. Now cut 6 4"x4" squares out of a solid cardstock and adhere these to the album making sure to have a solid on the front and back.


4. On the flap pages, you can choose to cut off the top of flap or just fold it down and use the white base. I have both options shown.







5. Next decorate the pages as you wish. I chose to keep my colors simple. Paper is done in solid and patterened paper from Close To My Heart in Clover Meadow. The inks and stamps used are CTMH as well.