Ali Edwards's Blog, page 23

Project Life® 2024 | Week 25

Next up in my 2024 Project Life album is Week 25. 

A couple specific ideas to note in this spread: 

Cut up your pattern papers to create pattern cards that can added to your pockets. If those 12x12 and/or 6x8 pattern papers aren't working for you in this season cut some up and add them to pockets! This spread features journal cards from the Enjoy Story Kit and stickers from the March Stories By The Month kit ("today" banner stickers). 

Here's my process: 

Here are additional images of my spread: 

As I've been working on a bunch of these spreads at once it's been so fun to pick a couple products and keep it simple by just using those. Give yourself permission to have some that are crafty + have lots of pieces from various places and other times when you constrain your choices to just a couple things. 

I cut up an oval chipboard into a more organic oval to fit on top of the "o" because I'd made a stamping mistake. Ran it through my sewing machine to add some texture and a pop of yellow. 

I also used a fun small number stamp set to add numbers to one of the journal cards. 

Filling in the pockets makes me so happy!

SUPPLIES 
9x12 Album 9x12 Page Protectors Enjoy Story Kit March 2024 Stories By The Month (sticker sheet) Number Stamp Set (released with December Daily® 2021) Kuretake Brush Pen Staedtler Lumocolor Pen StazOn Ink  Rolling Date Stamp  Scrapbook.com Rolling Adhesive  Epson PictureMate PM400 Printer  Other basic supplies can be found via my Amazon Storefront (printers, etc)

Project Life® 2024 | Week 24

Welcome to another spread in my 2024 Project Life album! 

Completely enjoying the process of filling in these pockets! For this week I was looking to keep things pretty simple and had a wonderful little a-ha moment when I realized that these kraft journaling pockets from my stash could fit right next to each other into a 4x6 pocket. I added a big tag from the April Stories By The Month kit to join the two together. You might have those in your stash too!  

Let's dive right in: 

Here's a look at my spread via images: 

I started this spread back when I was putting the Stash Class together and showed in one of my videos grabbing the -ing word strips from the 2024 Week In The Life™ kit and adding them onto a 4x6 pattern card. I love having that in-the-moment-real-time journaling paired with what I ended up writing when I completed the spread today. 

Both are great!

Loving having easy access to my stash (cards organized by category) to pull out a sentiment card and a pattern card. 

I think those Kraft pockets were originally offered either in the Grow Story Kit (a few years ago) or as an Add On. Loved adding the chipboard "details" accents along the top of the journal cards. 

I used a couple pieces of scotch tape to tape the pockets together on the back. I added the "details" oval tag using rolling adhesive. 

SUPPLIES

9x12 Album
9x12 Page Protectors
April 2024 Stories By The Month KitFoodie Story Play CollectionWeek In The Life™ 2024 Main Kit (-ing word strips)
Kuretake Brush Pen
Staedtler Lumocolor Pen
StazOn Ink 
Rolling Date Stamp 
Scrapbook.com Rolling Adhesive 
Epson PictureMate PM400 Printer 
Other basic supplies can be found via my Amazon Storefront (printers, etc)

Project Life® 2024 | Week 23

I'm back again with another Project Life spread to share for my 2024 album! 

In this spread I'm going all in using red line tape right along the top edge of a vellum 4 inch x 6 inch on the outside of the page protector. It's a super fun way to get to add in a little more crafty play without adding it on the photos in the pockets. I'm also cutting up a 12x12 pattern paper from the Frames Scrapbook Kit for my 3x4 cards. 

PS: If you are looking for my May 2024 spreads, I shared those in my Stash Class. 

Let's dive in! 

Here's a look at the finished spread: 

I seriously LOVE how this one turned out. I don't have any plans to do this every week, but as a piece of the whole story of the year it's a really fun way to mix things up. 

I used 4x6 vellum cards from the June Stories By The Month kit (plus one sheet from another collection). On top of each piece of vellum I added a half circle (cut from the Grow Scrapbook Kit) + a stamp from the Around Here Story Kit + a piece of chipboard from the June SBTM kit. To add the stamps on the half circles I cut a template from one of the extra half circles and laid it on top before stamping (check out the video for details). 

I adhered the vellum cards to the outside of the page protectors using red line tape right along the top + then folded them up to create a crease. Along the bottom edge of each one I used a 1 inch circle punch to create a little peek through hole. 

For all the 3x4 journal cards in this spread I cut up a 12x12 pattern paper from the Frames Scrapbook Kit. 

On each journal card I used a Kuretake Brush Pen to create the title and then a Lumocolor Pen for my journaling. 

SUPPLIES

9x12 Album
9x12 Page Protectors
June 2024 Stories By The Month Kit
Around Here Story Stamp
Frames Scrapbook Kit
Grow Scrapbook Kit (scallop pattern paper)
Kuretake Brush Pen
Staedtler Lumocolor Pen
Red Line Tape
StazOn Ink 
Rolling Date Stamp 
Scrapbook.com Rolling Adhesive 
Epson PictureMate PM400 Printer 
Other basic supplies can be found via my Amazon Storefront (printers, etc)

In Case You Missed It | July 26

Happy Friday, friends! Welcome to the latest
In Case You Missed It. Just a reminder that this is a quick post that will happen every Friday afternoon with all the updates and links that have happened throughout the week. So, let's get to it:

COUNTDOWN TO DECEMBER DAILY®

Let the sneaks begin! 😍 The countdown to our 2024 December Daily® season has officially begun. We’re currently finalizing our release date, promotion schedule, class calendar, and more. As always, we have lots of inspiration and fun content planned around this year's release. As soon as we have those dates, we will share them with you! Not signed up for our newsletter? Head to www.aliedwards.com and sign-up in the footer of our site. Be sure to follow us over at @decemberdaily, our official account for all things December Daily®. We also invite you to join us in the December Daily® Facebook group for more merriment. Find additional resources and inspiration, including Ali's completed albums, on the blog via the December Daily hashtag. Learn more about the project here. 

CHRISTMAS IN JULY SALE 

Did someone say Christmas in July? We're half way through the year and that means we are only a couple of month's away from Christmas! Shop our Christmas in July sale with 20% off December Daily physical products + classes and 99 cent digitals. Stock up now and get a head start on documenting your holiday memories. Sale runs through July 28th at 11:59pm ET. Shop the sale here. 

STORY PLAY FOODIE WEEK

Al this week we have been sharing stories being told through the lens of what we eat. Be sure to visit the blog for tons of inspiration! Find those posts here. 

NEW TRAVEL CLASS | START TO FINISH 04

Let us help you bring your travel stories to life! Join contributors Shannon Flatley, Yin Goh, Kendra Wietstock, Kelly Watson, Jeanne Williams, and Diane Dziuban as they each create a travel album using products from the 2024 Travel Collection. In this class you will find a variety of styles and approaches that includes more recent travels as well as travel stories collected from over the years. From planning and organization to creative ways of using products, this class is all about providing you with inspiration and ideas to help you create your own travel album. Learn more and 
register here. 

2024 TRAVEL COLLECTION 

Our brand new 2024 Travel Collection is here! The products are in the warehouse and ready to ship to you! We’re excited to offer free shipping ($20 international flat rate) with a $75 purchase in the travel collection category. Use code TRAVEL24 during checkout. We’ve also got a brand new Start To Finish Travel Workshop coming this summer using products from this collection! Lessons will go live each Friday starting July 5th until August 9th.  

NEW CLASS FROM ALI | STASH CLASS

Join Ali for a fun, motivating adventure into some ways to deal with all the scrapbooking stuff you’ve collected over the years and still have. Sometimes we need to press pause on our storytelling adventures for just a bit in order to get a handle on the fun things we’ve added to our physical product toolbox. Let’s come together as a community + spend some time prioritizing starting with our stash to get more of our stories told. In this four week workshop you’ll spend the first two weeks sorting + organizing supplies (or getting ideas about what might work for you) and the second two weeks creating projects using what you already own. Learn more here.

JULY REVEAL

Earlier this month we revealed a new Story Kit™ theme: COLLECT! To collect can mean to bring or gather together, to solicit and receive, or to regain control of oneself. As memory keepers we are often collectors of photos and words and supplies and we bring those things together to document our lives. What do you collect in your life? What did you collect when you were a kid? This month we are coming together to tell stories of collecting whether they are things or memories or friends or books or thoughts or something else entirely. Head to the blog for Ali’s post with all the details about this month’s release.

JULY DIGITALS 

The first Friday of every month we have a new digital release available in the shop. Play with scale, recolor objects, add journaling, print multiples…the sky is the limit when playing with digitals. Shop digitals here.

2024 PROJECTS + PRODUCTS SCHEDULE

As we continuing easing into 2024 we put together an overview of our schedule of projects + product releases for the upcoming year. We are sharing this as a way for you to plan, think about what you might want to participate in this year, and simply share some of the things we have coming up to help support + inspire storytelling. For the last few years we've followed a fairly similar cadence for our releases and our major projects will follow that release schedule again this year. Please note that, as you might imagine, this schedule is subject to change throughout the year based on a variety of variables. Find the post here.

As always, we’re so grateful to have you all as members of this community! Thanks for joining me today and have a great weekend!

Story Play Foodie | Ali's Spread (Project Life 2024 WK29)

The Foodie Story Play kit was a really fun jumping off point for a weekly focus in my 2024 Project Life album. 

Make sure to check out the previous posts from this week with community ideas for using the Foodie Story Play kit! 

Let's dive right in to the process video: 

Here's the spread via photos: 

This was so fun to put together! I've been having the best time over here this year loosening up my weekly approach to Project Life. For Week 29 I decided to focus on food (the food I'm growing + the food I'm eating) from this particular season. 

Repeated design elements in this spread include adding the white letter stickers to my 4x6 photos, adding number stamps with red ink to most of my journal cards (loved the already repeating titles on those journal cards), and cutting up the pink script pattern paper from the kit to use behind my title card and on top of the transparency to create a home for journaling. 

This post is a nice reminder that Project Life can be whatever you want it to be. It can be highlights from your week and it can be more focused on one particular topic (such as food). I personally love mixing in theme-focused spreads like this with the other stuff of our everyday lives. Also, you might not be into doing Project Life at all but you can still do a spread like this and include it in your regular scrapbooking album! 

I started off by using "the menu" card to document what we had for dinner during this particular week. From there I cut up the pattern paper and added the rolling stamp date behind my weekly transparent card. 

I went out into my garden and took a few photos of the things that are growing out there to supplement the couple food photos I already had for the week. 

On top of each photo I added a descriptive word. 

For the other four journal cards I used this number stamp to give me a little more direction in my journaling. I knew I didn't have a ton I wanted to say about food but I liked the idea of capturing what's real around here right now. Using the number stamps helped me to narrow the space that was available for me to add journaling. For my actual journaling I decided to just respond to the prompts on the journal cards with a Kuretake Brush pen. Nice + big + graphic. 

For the last 4x6 pocket I cut up the transparency from the kit and cut up the rest of the pattern paper. I wanted to be able to see through to the next spread and by setting it up like this I can simply repeat the same shape on the other side for the next week (in order to maintain the transparency). I ran it through my sewing machine to create a border and then stamped "currently" on the top (that's in the same number stamp set). I added my journaling and called it good! 

SUPPLIES

Foodie Story Play Kit 
Story Play Mini Kit Bundle
Number Stamp Set
Redwoods Ink 
Kuretake Brush Pen 
Micron Pen 
9x12 Album
9x12 Page Protectors 
Basic Supplies (printers, trimmer, etc) Via Amazon Storefront 

Story Play Foodie | Special Guest Jen Wong

Hi friends! When I first saw the Story Play Foodie kit, my head started thinking about all of the stories I could tell with it. I grew up in a family of food lovers and we are people who definitely love to eat. As a young adult though, I transitioned to a more plant-based diet, and I wanted to tell a bit about the story of missing certain childhood favorites, but eventually discovering I could replicate them.

I am one of those people who also loves to take photos of my food. I wanted to highlight that and started with a full-page photo of a noodle dish I had made. This photo is sized to 7" x 8.25"  (outside of a page protector).

For my story, I used the "eating" 3" x 4" card. I typed up my journaling in Photoshop, printed it out on clear sticker paper, and adhered it on top.

I loved the transparency sheet that came with the kit and thought it would be perfect for adding my story to it. I created a pocket to hold the journaling card, cutting down a leftover page protector. On the front of the pocket, I adhered one of the chipboard tags and attached some baker's twine to the top for an additional texture. The entire pocket was attached to the middle of the transparency using double-sided adhesive tape.

I didn't want the pocket to show on the other side, so on the back of the transparency, where the pocket card shows through, I added an additional 3" x 4" photo of my food.

I love how these pages turned out! This is a reminder that it doesn't have to be complicated! I'm happy I was able to get another story in the books and I can't wait to see what kind of stories you tell with this kit.

Looking for more inspiration from Jen? Find her on Instagram here. 

Story Play Foodie | Special Guest Jill Drangsholt

Hi friends! Jill here to share a few Foodie kit ideas with you. I don't know about you, but the minute I got this kit in my hands I knew I wanted to use it in my travel projects. Who doesn't indulge in fun food on vacation? Those stories deserve a spot in your travel albums! Today I am sharing 3 ways I used the kit in both my Disneyland album that I've been working on since 2023 and the album for my recent Alaska cruise.

PROJECT 1: DISNEYLAND FOOD STORIES

My Disneyland album has been sitting ready for journaling and embellishments for quite some time now so I was thrilled to pop some food stories in there! The snacking, drinking, and food memory journaling cards were perfect to go along with my food photos from the trip. 

As I was thinking about something to do with the cards to make them a bit more fun, I pulled out my extra park maps and decided to try backing the journaling cards with those maps by trimming a bit off the sides and the bottom. I love the extra bit of whimsy it adds!

PROJECT 2: CRUISE FOOD STORIES

When I saw the yellow food stories paper, I knew it could be a great home for some of my cruise stories by covering up the journaling prompts already on there with plain white cardstock. While looking at my stash for a way to add a bit more color to the page, I realized that the 2x2 "you, me, us" cards from the Week in the Life collection fit perfectly in the spaces on this paper! I had already saved those cards to use in my cruise album so I was happy to find a home for 3 of them. All I had to do to use them in this format was to trim off the part of the cards with the design and adhere them to the white cardstock I had already cut out. This was a super easy page to put together that holds 3 random food stories from my cruise and will sit alongside photos from that day. If you also have some of these 2x2 cards leftover, I recommend trying them with this paper. 

PROJECT 3: MORE PLEASE FOOD STORIES

The last project I made was inspired by the card with spots for different meals of the day. When I took my 14 year old son on a cruise, I thought he might actually try some new foods or at least take advantage of all of the fun desserts he doesn't normally get to have. But in reality he had the same handful of things for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and pretty much only ate ice cream cones for snacks and dessert. But he loved it and really enjoyed the freedom he had to eat whatever and whenever he wanted. 

I had purchased the 10x8 Week in the Life album to use for my Alaska cruise so I decided to make this story into a 10x8 page. This would allow me to create more room to tell this story. First I printed a photo I had of my son's plate at 6x8 size and then I typed my journaling on a 10x8 canvas with little lines above each section where I planned to adhere each meal prompt after I cut them out from the original 3x4 card. 

This could have been my finished project but I decided I wanted more journaling for some extra context, so I dug in my stash for the clear vellum pocket and a piece of vellum from the One Little Word collection that I could layer on top. To cover the writing on the pocket, I adhered the "more please" chipboard tag and also created a tag out of one of the cards in the kit to adhere to the backside. To finish it off, I created some washi tape ribbons for my tags. My process video below shows how to do that if you are interested. 

For more info about how I created these projects as well as to see some of the last project get put together, check out my process video below.

Thanks for joining me in telling some food stories! If you want to see more of my projects, you can find me on Instagram at @jill.drangsholt

Meet Jill

Hi! My name is Jill and I live in Idaho with my teen son and my longhaired dachshund. In addition to memory keeping, I also love Bible journaling and working on my perfectionism through art journaling. I am also so thankful to have a job that serves as a creative outlet, although that is probably why I prefer working with physical products rather than digital in my off time! When I’m not being creative, you will find me reading on my patio or looking for wildflowers along the Boise River. Find more inspiration from Jill on Instagram here. 

Story Play Foodie | Special Guest Nolana Lynch

Hello Everyone! 

How are you doing today? I am happy to be here to share with you a layout I created with the Foodie Story Play kit. 

I LOVE the “Food Stories” prompt paper from this kit which focuses on what I loved to eat as a child, teen, and presently. Since I’ve been making a lot of my favourite Trinidadian childhood foods over the past few months, I decided this was the perfect story to tell. 

I kicked things off by searching for photos of the food I cooked lately in my Google Photos, and was pleased to see that I did photograph quite a few of these dishes. Some of the things I love are a nice “Buss-up Shot Roti” with Curried Potato and Beef, Pholourie which is a perfectly spiced flavour burst snack that I was obsessed with growing up (and still am), Pineapple Chow - a spiced pineapple snack with chadon beni (cilantro), garlic, pepper, and more. 

Recently, I’ve also been trying new dishes inspired by some of the things I also enjoyed eating growing up. I’ve always loved eggplant dishes, particularly a stuffed eggplant, so I tried an Eggplant stuffed with Spiced Lamb, Spinach Pancakes - which we call Dinosaur Pancakes - a favourite with my son, 

I placed my photos in a banner frame in Canva, then printed and cut them to size. They were approximately 4 inches wide, I punched a hole in the top centre of each banner, added twine and I placed them into a 4x4-inch flip-up pocket, which I adhered to the food transparency from the kit. This I layered over the prompt page.

All in all this was a really fun way to pay homage to some of my favourite foods! Can’t wait to see what food stories you tell!

Find more inspiration from Nolana on Instagram here. 

Pieces Of Us Now Available

Ready for the next chapter in the Pieces Of Life project? 

Ali will be documenting her Pieces Of Us using a new notebook + seven categories/story sparks 
during the week of October 21. As always you are invited to join this documenting adventure or participate during a time that makes the most sense for your own like.

Also, the felt folios have been restocked! Ali stores two chapters in one felt folio. 

Here's a video overview of the new notebook + a quick look at some of the past chapters!

Here's a list of the past chapters still available in the shop: 

Pieces Of Joy NotebookPieces Of Joy StampFelt FolioDigital versions of past notebooks + stamps

Story Play Foodie | Special Guest Denine Zielinski

Hi friends! It’s Denine, and I am thrilled to be here today to share a project using the Story Play|Foodie Kit. When the release of this year’s Story Play Collection was previewed, I knew that any project I would make with the Foodie Kit was going to have something to do with my son. Ever since he went out on his own, he has taken up cooking as a hobby, and he’s pretty good at it, too. I receive at least one photo from him each week of a meal that he made, and I knew I would have plenty of photos to tell a great story. That story will eventually get told, but I chose to pivot just a bit for my first project to tell the story of a recent visit with him and the amazing restaurant that he chose to take us to.

Since I am having a hard time tearing myself away from working in a traveler’s notebook, I decided that this would be a great story to tell in that format.

In the video below, you can see how this spread came together for me.

Here’s a look at some additional photos of my project:

As you saw in my process video, this is a double flip open spread in my traveler’s notebook. The front of the left page contains the left side of a full-page photo. On top of that, I added a title with the tiny white letter stickers from the kit + a chipboard half circle + a chipboard skinny striped rectangle from my stash.

The front of the right page contains a modified version of the restaurant’s logo. The original logo was much smaller with the name + the location right on top of each other. I played with it in PSE to separate the name + location, and add blank black space in between the two to get it to be 7 inches tall. On top of that is a chipboard tag from the Foodie Kit and more tiny white letters. Each letter represents the names of those of us who were together for this event. I separated the initials with tiny enamel dots from my stash.

When you flip open the right page, the rest of my full-page photo base is revealed. I used the Foodie Love paper for the background on the back side of the flap. On top of that is a 3x3 photo and a 3x3 sized version of the People Who Eat 3x4 Journal Card. I added a chipboard piece from my stash below both of those.

When you flip open the left page, I added a photo collage of some of our meals on top of the left side of the full-page photo base. On top of that is another chipboard tag from the Foodie Kit. On the backside of the left flap, I created pockets for three journaling cards by mounting the transparency to white cardstock after cutting three slits in it to slide my cards in. I added tab stickers with stamped words to each of the cards.

The above photo shows how the spread looks with both flaps opened up.

The Food Memory 3x4 card contains the  general story of this visit with my son. 

The Eating 3x4 card starts with a little introduction and then lists the dishes that we each ordered off the menu.

The Drinking 3x4 card also begins with a short introduction and then lists the cocktails that we each ordered off the menu. 

As a side note, another fun thing to add to a spread like this would be a copy of the menu from the restaurant you visited. I tried to find a printable version of their menu online with no success, but I always look for one just in case. I love adding memorabilia to my pages as often as I can.

These Story Play Kits are just the perfect size for me to create a spread or two and then move the small amount of leftover pieces to my stash. This was definitely a super fun theme to work with, and I am looking forward to my next project with it.

Thank you so much for joining me today. I hope that I have given you some inspiration to dig into your Story Play|Foodie Kit. If you have any questions, please feel free to comment below. I love hearing from you guys! You can also find me on Instagram @denine2 and YouTube @Denine2. 

Happy storytelling, my friends!