Challenge #274 week of 8th January 2018

Happy new year and welcome to 2018!

It's been a while. Times were busy and other priorities took over. Let's see what the new year brings for us all.

Shall we jump right in and see if we can get a bit of inspiration going?

2017 was not the best year. I mean, I've had worse. But it wasn't one I'll look back on with a lot of joy. But in an effort to try and keep moving forward, I'd like us to look ahead.

I'd like you to be inspired by "when one door closes, another one opens". That seems to sum up the changing of the years, seasons and even each small problem that is overcome.

So where will you take this prompt? You could go literal in thinking about changing situations. Opportunities taken. Successfully overcoming difficulties. Unexpected turns in life. Adjusting life's course to take in new situations. Or how about thinking about doors - I seem to take a lot of photos of funky doors when I'm out exploring! This could be a time to capture some thoughts about the changing of one year into the next. Or goals for 2018. Or think about a quote or a slogan that keeps you going?

You can add your photos to our Facebook group here - we love it when you share so please don't be shy! Or tell us in the comments where to find you... :-)

Challenge #268 - week of 31st July 2017

A little late but the reason is linked to our inspiration this week!

I'm trying to do a serious reorganisation and purge of my scrap room. It's a multi-purpose room and not only houses my scrap supplies but also my work books and files, and serves as our guest room, too. And the things in the flat that don't have a home elsewhere? Well, they seem to find their way in here too! Now, I'm not complaining, I'm so lucky because it's a great room with lots of natural light and is a real haven for me. But it needed some serious sorting. I've been working on moving some stuff around, decluttering a lot of stuff out of my space and generally generating some "space'. That feels good.

But in all that moving around, I discovered some dirty secrets! I've always prided myself that I don't have scrap UFOs (unfinished objects)! I make pages one after the other and generally don't move on to the next until the previous one is done. Well, more or less! But... I discovered that this isn't strictly true. I came across not one but four unfinished projects that rather shocked me.

Two mini-books, one technical scrap page and a set of pocket pages for a December Daily from 2014. ALL unfinished. Or even hardly started!

So this week, I'd like you to be inspired by unfinished projects.

There's a summer mini-book, a Learn Something New Every Day 6x8 album,
a December Daily set of project pages and a Christmas page which
may or may not make the cut of being finished!

I want to take this prompt to get at least one of these items listed above finished but you could create a page about some sort of unfinished project in your life in general. A home renovation perhaps, or work in the garden or even something more intangible such as becoming a more organised person. We are all unfinished projects after all. There's many interpretations for this so let's get finishing off!

Share over at our Whimsical Musings Flickr gallery here with the tag WM#268 or at our Whimsical Musings Facebook group  also using the tag WM#268.

#29 Inspired by Dr Seuss

Those of you who have been reading the Flickr thread Pam started off over in our group know that I found this one hard! In fact, the prompt isn't hard at all. I just made it hard for myself and took myself round in circles concentrating on all the wrong things.

This isn't what scrapbooking is supposed to be like ladies! It's a hobby. It's fun. It's an escape. If you experience what I did, then you need to step away from the scissors and go and have some chocolate (or a gin and tonic - whatever does it for you!) and calm down.

I realised I was getting all whiny on the message board because I was caught up with the idea of scrapping my own personal experience of Dr Seuss but couldn't really come up with an example of something specific. I never owned any of the books though I read them with a passion while I was at the library and just loved them to bits. But even my mum couldn't come up with a specific memory of me and the books. I drove myself crazy trying to pin down a memory - ANY memory.

And then I stopped, had some said chocolate and relaxed. I imagined Pam sitting next to me, laughing at me getting all het up over nothing and smiled at myself. I could do this. What was I getting worried about!

First off, I decided to spend some time on the site that Pam had directed us to for inspiration and went through some of the titles, the book covers, the characters etc and decided to pick up the colour scheme for The Cat In The Hat - red, white and blue/aqua. And also to pick up on the quirkiness of the characters and his books. And I was off.

Except, scrapping at night under electric light can distort colours and my "blue" was way too green! I only saw this when I scanned it.

So I took off the green and searched around for something a bit more blue. And added that.

Next day, I took some photos and realised that it was still off, but better. The quirkiness was still there though with my splats, the slant to everything, the silly title, the odd selection of items and the original 1970's (scanned) photobooth photos.

In the end, I LOVE this layout! I think it's such fun. I rarely use red and I love the wow factor it brings to this white base.

The blue paint splats were actually the perfect colour - who knew!

And this is the original I made with all that gorgeous green! Still lovely but WRONG!

While I had been browsing the site, I came across the most perfect quote that got me thinking about the photos of us at the Northwest Territories border. The photos have been used before (what a surprise!) but this as another angle to the story.

The quote is, "I'm a North-Going Zax and I always go north. Get out of my way, now, and let me go forth." If that isn't perfect for the fact that we have been working our way further and further north through the holidays we've taken over the last years, I don't know what is!

I've made this using my CKC March kit, Soothe and while not a total favourite, I still like it. The photos are fun and I can remember standing there as if it were yesterday, when in fact it was August 2007!

So the moral of this story is - never forget to have fun, don't worry if you make a mistake - it's only paper! - and beware of taking it all too seriously!

I still have several other ideas from my brainstorming Dr Seuss session and only one directly relates to the books themselves :-)

Thanks Pam for really stretching me this week and for sitting here beside me when I got a little out of control!