Maria has been a long-time autoship member and Sous Chef with Apron Strings. She has a great way with the monthly kits - her layouts always seem easy, clutter-free and fresh. Plus, she's a multi-photo scrapper, even when she's doing just a one-pager. Plus, she's a Michigander and gets to be near my favorite beaches!
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| Bigger than a Breadbox June '12 kit - KaiserCraft Rock Pool |
About me: I am married (John), 10 years as of November (I always
tell my husband it's the best 10 years of his life!) We have
beautiful daughters, Alexa (8) and Ava (5) who are the subject of 95% of
my scrapbooking pages right now. We actually live in a rural area,
just outside of Detroit, on a little over 3 acres. It's not unusual to
see deer or wild turkeys in our backyard, especially in the
winter. For the last 11 years I have been working for our local
health department as a public health educator. I spend my days
guest speaking in schools and am a Certified Child Passenger Safety Instructor
- basically I educate and help parents install car seats correctly
(80% of them are used incorrectly!) In my former life (pre-marriage and
children) I actually played college softball. Now I play once a
week, for fun and a few hours of adult conversation, unrelated to
work!
Why I scrapbook: I have close to 20,000 photos on my hard
drive. While pictures say a 1000 words, there was no way as the
years passed that I could actually remember what happened at those
events. Scrapbooking has become a great way for me to tell our
story. The big stories, like Disney World for the first time with the
girls, and little stories, like the funny sayings or phrases our girls have
come up with. I didn't want to flip through photo albums and think
"what was this about again?" And, in a small way,
scrapbooking taps into my creative side. It's fun to play with paper and
glue and "make" something.
What's your scrapbook style: I would say my
style is very clean, and probably rather linear or balanced. I love
patterned paper, journaling cards or labels and border punches. I love
looking at artsy, collage style layouts with a bunch of layering and
techniques. But, when I try that? It looks like I dumped my stash
on the page. Apparently, my brain just can't make that work.
Describe your scrap space: I actually have a pretty good sized
area in our basement to call my scrapbooking area. It's definitely
not the prettiest scrap area (I'll never be in a Creating Keepsakes magazine
showcasing it!) our basement isn't finished, but it's
functional. Over the years we have repurposed items - my
husband found an old drafting table top at a garage sale for my
scrapping desk. It sits on a big handmade table (came
with the house). I have our old bathroom cabinets for
storage and additional desk area (my sewing machine sits there). There is
an armoire for storage as well. One of my favorite things is actually
from Harbor Freight - a 47 bin storage rack. It holds so much stuff -
inks, small embellishments, punches, chipboard, washi...the bins are removable
and I can just turn around and get what I need as I'm working on a layout.
Favorite technique/something constantly in use: Right now, my favorite
technique is probably misting every thing I can get my hands on. Or
almost everything. (Lori can attest to that!) I love how a light
spray of mist on cardstock can give it a different look, or a few masks can
give it a pattern, or create a border with some scraps of paper. I also
use mists as my go to way to color chipboard or wood embellishments. My
"constant" technique is to print photos with a border. I think
a white border just gives photos a quick "pop" with out having to mat
every single one. I started scrapbooking back when double and triple
matting photos was the norm. I'm pretty sure that scarred me for life. ;)
Thanks for all the great inspiration, Maria!
Happy Wednesday.
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