Christmas cards ordered!

Color Me Merry Christmas Card

Get custom photo Christmas cards online at Shutterfly.com.

View the entire collection of cards.

Going Digital - Holiday Cards 2010

As mentioned earlier, this year I'll be doing a combo of custom-designed printed Christmas cards along with a few hand-stamped cards. After researching a lot of sites, I finally settled on Shutterfly for a few key reasons.  The card designs are awesome! They've added tons of new card designs and they are all great! I'm also really familiar with the interface as I use Shutterfly for all my photo printing needs and have always been happy with the quality.  I also used Shutterfly for my daughter's graduation photo book and it was AWESOME (picture on left). The quality of the cover, printing and paper was great and everyone at the party raved about the book. It sold me on the idea of doing more digital scrapbooking for sure!

And if you notice, the folded greeting cards are printed on 110 lb cardstock, the same weight as Papertrey.

And you can't beat the price - includes envelopes too!

They also have options for digital scrapbookers including full-bleed photo cards and folded cards.

The one downside for me is that they do not offer a double-sided photo card option, but I hope they will consider this in the future.

Here are some links to check out:
Christmas photo cards to http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-photo-cards 
photo holiday cards to http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery  
calendars to http://www.shutterfly.com/calendars
Christmas invitations to http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-invitations
address labels to http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/address-labels
Christmas gift tags to http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-gift-tags
Choose your favorite product from the Cards & Stationery page

I will be receiving an incentive from Shutterfly from posting this review, however I stand by every word. I have been using them for a while, and use them exclusively for my photo printing. I'm also absolutely addicted to the photobooks! I do hope you check it out. :)

Christmas Cards 2010

I've been debating whether or not to do a traditional hand-stamped Christmas card, or go the route I did last year and print multiple copies of a digitally designed card. I finally took a look at the calendar and decided it was time to make a decision. In order to take the pressure off and because they were such a big hit with family and friends, I'll be doing a digital card. I'll just have to try to ignore how much I just spent on Christmas stamps from Waltzingmouse and Papertrey and try not to feel so guilty. But if I can my digital cards printed soon, then I'll feel good about taking my time making some genuine handmade cards for a few folks who I know like the handmade stuff.

However, instead of printing at home I'm planning to use an online printing service. I'm thinking about using Shutterfly, and putting my own design on one of their full-bleed postcards. Any other suggestions out there?

Summer Is Over

Hello world! I've really been missing my blog lately. Our life has been in transition this summer, in a good way - I finally have a small craft room and I'm so ready to get back to making cards and scrapbooks. I haven't made anything in weeks!  Yikes!

Since it's back to school tomorrow, I wanted to share with you a nice little surprise. Last year I learned about this wonderful, eco-friendly lunch box from a company called Goodbyn.  It's eco-friendly because it completely eliminates the need for little plastic bags and juice boxes. And so kid friendly because it's cute, comes in great colors and includes a ton of durable stickers for decorating exterior. Anyway, the reason we're so excited because Goodbyn used a picture of my daughter Olivia with her Goodbyn on their homepage. Yay! (P.S. We're not affiliated with this company, nor were we compensated for the photograph. I paid for the Goodbyn with my own cold-hard cash).

All for tonight. Time to get the kiddo ready for her first day of 2nd grade. Check out this post from last year - guess what, I never did get caught up! But I've got something on the way that I really hope will fix that problem. :)

Double Slider Mini Album - Teacher Appreciation Week

This week has been crazy busy making and delivering Teacher Appreciation gifts for my daughter's first grade class. Don't get me wrong, I really do appreciate the teacher, but what was I thinking? I'm not very good at being realistic, and I was too ambitious and ended up being really stressed out about this week for a long time. I'm glad it's over! I made several gifts, but the highlight was the double-slider mini album made using Andrea Walford's pattern and video available here. It's not terribly complicated as long as you read the directions real well and watch the video a few times before you get started. It was a fun project and I love how it came together. The sliders work perfectly and it's just a really great gift that holds a lot of pictures.

Happy National Scrapbooking Day

What a big day - today is Senior Prom and my daughter's boyfriend is in the running to be prom king. It's also Kentucky Derby Day, and we always celebrate Derby Day with hot browns, spoonbread & maybe a mint julep or two.

I'm not doing any scrapbooking today, I've had to put aside my Week in the Life Project while I prepare for graduation, prom and Teacher Appreciation Week next week. I'm homeroom mom and am making a gift for every day. Yikes!

Anyway - there are some cool giveaways today, make sure you check them out:

• http://svgcuts.com/blog/2010/04/30/national-scrapbooking-day-sure-cuts-a-lot-giveaway/
• http://www.mypinkstamper.com/ (not quite up yet)

Week In The Life - In Progress

Hello there! I'm on day 4 of my A Week In The Life project and it's going well.I feel like I've been collecting some decent pictures and memorabilia, but I have this feeling that I won't know if I've been successful or not until I sit down and collectively put the whole thing together. Right now it just feels like a list of really boring activities, pictures of really boring places and lots of fast food wrappers (well, not that many but it seems like all I have for some days).

I find myself taking a lot of pictures in the morning but not so many through the day. Technically I'm not supposed to be snapping photos in my office, and the people I work with act like I'm Voldemort when I pull out the camera. As if taking a picture is going to make them explode or something. What's up with that? Then after 5PM I just totally blank. I'll have to work on that tonight, taking more pics of the evening routine!

Anyway, all for now as I'm at work and can't upload any pics from here.

Happy New Year?

Oh boy, I know it's been a while. But I didn't realize I haven't posted this year at all, sheesh!

Anyway, just wanted to let you know that tomorrow I'll be participating in Ali Edward's A Week in the Life documentation project.  This will be a great week to document as we are back to a regular schedule now that Spring Break is over, and we have a birthday and school play to include. I'm going to follow her 4-page a day format, although I'm worried this will be too much. All I can do is try and see how it works out. I've got a yellow envelope ready for each day's ephmera, and I've made a rough schedule of how our week is going to look so I can make sure to get photos of everything in between. 

Even though I'm planning to be as spontaneous as a I can about this project, I've made a list of things I want to try to include so I can make sure to squeeze in those extra pics and moments I might need on the "off-days."

OUR WEEK

Monday - Work, Bell Choir, Circle Meeting

Tuesday - School visit, doctor appt, parent-teacher conference

Wednesday - Work, Olivia's birthday, Church

Thursday - Work, School Play

Friday - Work, School Play

Saturday -

Sunday - Church, Birthday Party

This list will also help me organize myself after the week is over so I can remember what happened when. I also made a list of things I want to make sure to document.

• My outfit everyday
• Where I work
• Who I work with
• My office
• Picking up Olivia from school
• Lizzy at the bus stop
• Church activities (I have almost no pictures of this!)
• How much does gas, bread, milk, etc cost?
• Where we grocery shop
• What we ate
• What I read
• Newsworthy events
• Etc?

All for now! Looking forward to getting started tomorrow. :)